Seeking Persephone

by Sarah M. Eden

  “Ah, but you’d miss me.” Harry laughed, following Adam.

  “I never miss anyone.” Adam did not pause nor look back nor seem to care if Harry followed.

  He certainly wasn’t missing her, Persephone thought as she watched the distance between them grow. George Sanford, one of her two best friends all the years she was growing up, had always remembered to offer his arm. He’d never once left Persephone behind to walk alone.

  Persephone let out a whoosh of air. It condensed in front of her face. She rubbed at her cold, probably pink nose and turned back toward the paddock. Buttercup continued acting up. John Handly seemed rather content to let the troublesome horse get out her frustration.

  Lucky filly. She, at least, could snort and pound her hooves in frustration. Persephone could do little more than stand out in the cold and wonder if she’d given up everything the day she’d accepted Adam’s suit.

  “An unhappy filly, wouldn’t you say?”

  Persephone looked up to see a vaguely familiar face smiling a lopsided, gap-toothed smile as he watched Buttercup kicking and snorting.

  “It would certainly seem so.” Why did the man, dressed as an undergardener, look so familiar to her? She watched Buttercup snap her vicious-looking teeth at John. “Perhaps her disposition is bad.”

  The man turned down his heavily lined mouth and shook his white-haired head. “Came here a few months back. Badly treated, she was. She don’t trust people. Figures they was bad to her once, they’ll be bad to her again.”

  “But John would never hurt her.” Persephone watched Buttercup continue to storm about.

  “Don’t matter.” The old man sucked a breath through his sparse teeth. “She won’t give him a chance to. She’ll fight him ’til holy perdition.”

  Persephone colored a little at the unaccustomed sound of such a coarse phrase. “It seems a lost cause. Why does John keep at it, I wonder?” Buttercup attempted to kick John, who managed to skirt the flailing hooves.

  “There ain’t no lost causes, Yer Grace,” the man said, looking at her full on. His face was lined, but his eyes were bright. “Every creature has someone who could save ’em if only they would try.”

  Why did Persephone get the feeling she was missing something vital in this extremely odd conversation? “So is Buttercup more afraid or more angry?”

  “Afeared.” The man nodded with emphasis. “Been afeared fer years.”

  “I thought you said she’d only been here a few months.”

  “Used to be different.” The man turned to face the paddock once more. “Didn’t go after every person that came near. Friendly like.”

  “What happened?” How did he know so much about Buttercup? Had he accompanied the horse from her previous owners’?

  “Got torn apart. Left behind.” The man leaned against the fence and watched the ongoing power struggle out in the paddock. “Decided to bite before anyone bit first.”

  “That is tragic.”

  John stood closer to the troubled creature than he had a few minutes before, approaching slowly and cautiously the way he had for weeks.

  “Aye.”

  The conversation ended there. The two of them stood silently beside each other, both watching John and Buttercup size each other up. An odd pair, to be sure. Both the two in the paddock and the two watching.

  Every creature has someone who could save ’em if only they would try. Persephone glanced back at her companion. It seemed an absurdly philosophical observation for a man who, at first glance, gave the impression of poverty and the ignorance that, sadly, inevitably accompanied it.

  “John is doing well with Buttercup.”

  Persephone spun around so quickly at the sound of Adam’s voice that she felt herself topple. He reached out and righted her.

  “The snow makes the ground slick,” Adam said quietly, uncomfortably. His hands lingered the slightest moment on her waist.

  Persephone could only nod. He wore a look she knew well but had never seen on him. She remembered it haunting her in the mirror the morning after her mother died. The midwife had handed her the baby, Artemis, and she knew in that moment that she had lost something profound. More than just a mother, she had lost her childhood.

  She had pulled up her hair that day, something most girls wouldn’t have done for several more years. As she had stared at her reflection, Persephone remembered being startled by the starkness in her expression, the hurt, the fear, the uncertainty.

  “Are you well?” Adam whispered to her, obviously entirely confused.

  Persephone could only stare back at him. She knew that look in his eyes. Had it always been there? How could she have missed something so familiar?

  What happened to you? she silently asked.

  “Perhaps the cold’s too much for ’er,” the man Persephone had all but forgotten suggested. “’Tis bitter out today.”

  “You may be right, Jeb.” Adam nodded. He seemed to smile a little, almost encouragingly, at her. “I had come back with the intention of walking Her Grace to the castle.”

  “Did you really?” Persephone asked quietly, still studying those eyes she wasn’t sure she’d ever truly looked into before.

  “My mother taught me a few manners before she disappeared.” Adam shrugged, holding out his arm to her.

  A momentary intensity in his eyes spoke volumes. Persephone slipped her arm through his, her thoughts spinning dizzyingly. Disappeared? Persephone had seen Adam’s mother at the wedding. She certainly hadn’t disappeared. What had he meant by that?

  “A nice hot cuppa tea’ll warm ’er up,” Jeb said.

  Adam nodded to him.

  “Good day to ye, Falstone,” Jeb gave as a parting and turned back to watch John and Buttercup.

  Adam led Persephone away from the paddock, toward the inner wall and the path that led back to the castle.

  “Falstone?” Persephone asked, confused.

  “Before my father died, I was Lord Falstone.” The unease in his voice increased. “A courtesy title.”

  “Jeb knew you then?”

  Adam answered with an infinitesimal nod. “He has been at Falstone nearly all his life. He was head gardener for many years.”

  “And now?”

  “Rheumatism,” Adam answered. “He still oversees the hedge garden. And helps his son in the stables now and then.”

  “John,” Persephone said, understanding suddenly dawning: the familiarity of his face, his knowledge of John and the horses. Jeb was John’s father.

  “Have any of the other servants been at Falstone as long?” Her mind remained on Adam even as she spoke. What had happened with his mother? What was it that caused the bleakness in his eyes? It was still there, hidden behind the look of indifference she was only just beginning to see past.

  “Mrs. Smithson began as a chambermaid.” Adam walked stiffly, speaking in a tone of disinterest that the ton would have applauded. “That would have been some time ago. Barton has been here at least as long as I have.”

  Adam may have been disinterested—Persephone no longer trusted herself to interpret his demeanor or tone—but she certainly was not. Barton, the butler, had known Adam all his life. So had Jeb. And probably Mrs. Smithson.

  If anyone understood this enigma she had married, they might. But how did someone approach her own staff with such a question?

  “Pardon me, but could you please explain my husband to me?” That would never do.

  Persephone looked up at Adam. His eyes were focused ahead. She walked on his left side, something she suspected he planned. She was always on his left side. His scars, she felt certain, were clues to his character, as was that inexplicable comment about his mother.

  What she needed was someone who could help her interpret those clues. She would decipher them, she knew that much. In her heart of hearts she knew that doing so was essential.

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  Mother had a way with words. According to his esteemed parent, Adam’s name was on the lip
s of every member of the ton. This time, the Upper Ten Thousand chose to entertain itself by speculating on his recent marriage.

  Some are saying that Persephone has left you already.

  “Thank you, Mother,” Adam muttered, tossing her letter onto his desk. Apparently, Mother thought Adam missed the spiteful gossip of society. Unlike herself, Adam preferred being as far from London as he could possibly get for as long as he could possibly manage. Only Parliament brought him to Town.

  Father had devoured the first few letters Mother had sent back to Falstone after she had moved to London. Adam had watched him read, holding his breath, hoping Father would tell him that Mother was coming back. After six months Adam had quit hoping, and Father had begun simply burning the letters unopened.

  “We are fine without her,” Father had told him. “We do not need her here.”

  They hadn’t needed anyone. Adam had spent his days dogging his father’s heels, learning the Falstone lands inch by inch. He had learned where the forests were being replanted, where the pack would be found in each season, where the tenant cottages were and who lived in each. He had learned the servants by name, which families had served at Falstone for generations. Father had taught him to be a duke, to do his duty.

  Neither he nor his father had needed a single soul beyond each other. Then Father died.

  At seven, Adam was the Duke of Kielder. Mother came to Falstone for the funeral and had seemed genuinely grieved. She’d stayed long enough to help Nurse Robbie pack Adam’s personal effects and wave her handkerchief as the Falstone traveling coach took Adam to Harrow.

  Adam rubbed his eyes, leaning back in the armchair he always occupied when alone in his book room. He couldn’t seem to stop the memories he had no desire to relive.

  Harrow had been nothing short of torture those first few weeks. Father had been dead only a month. Adam wore a black armband around the sleeve of his blue Harrow jacket and, overwhelmed by his grief, had kept himself from crying by biting the insides of his cheeks until he bled. He’d grown accustomed to the metallic taste of his blood in those early months.

  What he hadn’t come to accept, what he hadn’t anticipated, was the staring and the whispers. He’d known his face was scarred, knew what the surgeons had done to him. But no one at Falstone had stared. No one at Falstone had cared, beyond Mother and her unceasing “my poor boy.”

  “Do not pity him, Harriet,” Father would insist every time Mother had called Adam by her favorite moniker. “Adam will be Kielder someday. He has to learn to fight battles.”

  Jeb Handly and Father had taken up his education early on, teaching him to fight in the back courtyard of Falstone. Harrow had provided ample opportunity to use those skills. Between his indisputable tone and air of authority—another weapon he’d learned from his father—and his ability to back up his threats, the other boys had quickly learned to take the Duke of Kielder at his word.

  The boys left him alone and, in his solitude, Adam had thought of Falstone and Father and had done his best not to think of Mother. His isolation had lasted all of two terms, ending abruptly the day a group of older boys had decided to rough up a scrawny boy far younger than they were.

  Adam had seen their victim before—he’d always seemed too small, too defenseless. Despite being outnumbered and puny, the kid had been defending himself with a determination Adam couldn’t help admiring. So Adam had stepped into the fray. He’d only been seven himself, but the dynamics of that brawl had changed the moment he’d joined. All of Harrow knew he didn’t find it necessary to fight politely: no holds were barred, no part of the anatomy was off limits. He was unrelenting and, at times, vicious.

  By the end of his first year at Harrow, Adam had no longer needed to fight. He had become legend. And he had a shadow.

  The scrawny boy hadn’t left him alone since the day Adam broke the noses of two of his assailants and very nearly broke the arm of the third. In fact, Harry, who was no longer scrawny, was in Adam’s library at that very moment. He was the only person Adam had ever known who had stayed with him.

  Some are saying that Persephone has left you already. Adam glanced uneasily at Mother’s letter where it lay discarded on his desk. His plan had been to marry a lady who could leave, as she inevitably would, and her absence wouldn’t have bothered him in the least—a woman he would be better off without, whom he wouldn’t need. But the thought of Persephone leaving had a far from neutral effect. Adam rose abruptly to his feet, pacing to the fireplace.

  Mother had stayed for years before moving to Town. Before that final departure, she had been gone often. Every time a new surgeon had arrived, Mother had left. She would tell him to be brave, say how very sorry she was, and then she would leave. Newcastle had been one of her favorite destinations. About the time his new wounds had healed enough for the pain to be bearable, she would return. “My poor boy,” had always been her words of greeting.

  What difference would it make to him if Persephone decided to spend weeks, months, away from Falstone? Or when she eventually left altogether?

  Adam pushed away from the mantel and crossed to the French doors overlooking her garden. He’d begun thinking of the hedge garden as somehow belonging to Persephone. She spent a great deal of time there, reading, sitting, walking. Twice he’d watched her as she’d sat on the stone bench in the back corner and wept.

  What difference would it make if she left? More than he would ever have guessed when he’d first written his offer. For one thing, he knew he wouldn’t be able to sleep. And he’d found, the day before, that he liked walking with her. They’d only gone from the stables to the castle, but he liked having her there, her arm linked in his.

  She’d made him laugh. He still chuckled when he thought back on their late-night conversation. In his mind he could picture the two of them clanking about in full armor attempting to take the neighborhood by force and claim it for Kielder. Who would he laugh with if she were gone?

  Adam shook his head. There was no point denying the obvious. If Persephone left, Adam would miss her. He, who never missed anyone, would miss her.

  He glanced across the room at the painting hung over the mantel. It was the last portrait ever painted of his father, less than three months before he’d died. It was to have been a family sitting, but Mother hadn’t returned for it. Adam knew that she and Father had exchanged heated letters over the issue. Mother insisted that the artist paint Adam without his scars. Father had insisted otherwise.

  There he stood, Adam at nearly seven, scars apparent to the world, beside his father, completely oblivious to the cruel hand fate would soon deal him. His father’s image drew Adam’s gaze. Had he missed Mother? Looking back with an adult’s perspective, Adam realized Father had.

  “Adam?”

  His eyes snapped to the door. Persephone stood just inside the doorway, a letter clutched in her hands. “Do you have a minute?”

  Adam nodded but felt ridiculously uncomfortable. When one is thinking rather confusing thoughts about a person, it is remarkably disconcerting for that person to suddenly appear.

  Persephone stepped inside, and Adam felt his pulse quicken. She’d been doing that to him lately, and he was at a loss to explain why. It was almost as if she made him nervous. No one made him nervous.

  “This is a very nice room,” Persephone said, looking around. “Mrs. Smithson skipped this room when she gave me my tour. I don’t think I have ever been in here.”

  “No one ever comes in here.” Adam felt inexplicably put out and decided her intrusion into his private space had unnerved him.

  “Oh.” She stepped back. Adam wondered if it was an involuntary instinct, for she hardly seemed aware of her retreat. “I am intruding, then?”

  It was the perfect opportunity to send her away, to reclaim his last sanctuary. She’d already invaded his bedchamber. He found, however, that he didn’t want her to go. He hadn’t seen Persephone all day, and it was well past noon.

  John had told him Atlas still
wasn’t rideable. What had Persephone done with her morning, having her usual ride canceled? He wondered how she spent her time, what she thought about. It was an odd feeling for him, thinking about another person as much as he did.

  “Not at all,” he heard himself answer her. He even motioned her inside the room.

  Persephone moved to the chairs nearest the fireplace, her eyes still wandering around the room. Why was his book room so intriguing to her?

  Adam studied her as intently as she studied the room. He’d selected every piece of furniture in it. He had chosen where each painting hung. Did she approve? Approval had never mattered to him before.

  A sudden flash of memory took him back twenty years.

  “Very good, son. Very good.” Father had said that, eying the picture Adam had drawn of Falstone. He’d worked for days on it, desperate to get each detail correct. The “very good” was exactly what he’d wanted to hear, desperately wanted to hear. Father, Adam remembered, had always been the one person he could count on to say just that.

  Adam shook off the memory only to realize Persephone was staring at the portrait above the mantel. He felt uneasy, nervous. Perhaps the artist should have painted over the scars. Persephone’s childhood portraits were probably the rosy-cheeked cherubic paintings most children inspired.

  “Who is this you are standing beside, Adam?” Persephone asked, tilting her head to one side as if studying the painting more closely.

  “My father.” He resisted the urge to move to her side.

  “I thought he must be. You look very much like him.”

  “Do I?” No one had ever told him that before.

  “Very much,” she confirmed. “You have the same eyes. And there is something very similar about your mouth and the shape of your face. And, of course, you both have black hair.”

  “I suppose there is a resemblance.” Adam moved closer, looking for the likeness.

  “Your nose is your mother’s.” Persephone shifted her gaze from the portrait to Adam himself. “I noticed that when I first saw the two of you together.”