by Lynda Hurst
1
The Republic of Mont-Tremblant, Fourteen Years Later
As Comte Loire, Valerian de Baptiste should have been able to refuse a summon, even an urgent one, from his own parents. Despite the fact that the Marquis Etienne d’Savoy was not his real father, but his stepfather, he still respected and loved the older man as though he had been sired by him. The man had raised him as a boy, and he owed the man everything. His mother, the former Comtesse Loire, now more recently known as the Marchioness Félicité d’Savoy, had married the marquis when Valerian was just a boy, having lost his real father to a fatal illness when he was still in the nursery.
It was unfortunate to have been pulled from his favorite position: between two buxom wenches in his favorite tavern just outside the city gates. Valerian would have been perfectly happy where he was, if it were not for his own royal cousin, Bastien, the King of this tiny European microstate, come to fetch him at his mother’s request. Mont-Tremblant adored their king just as much as he did, and only his love for Bastien was enough to pry him from the adoring arms of two tavern wenches.
With one girl on his lap and his arm around the other, Valerian hadn’t noticed Bastien standing a few feet away, patiently waiting for the occupied man to notice his royal presence. Bastien loudly cleared his throat, which effectively wrenched Valerian’s attention away from the distracting wenches. Amused at how quickly his blond cousin extricated himself from the pouting women, Bastien stepped back when Valerian caught sight of Bastien alone, without his usual guard. Valerian abruptly stood to his full height of six feet and four inches, and indignantly cried, “Where are your men? Why are you here alone? Have you no fear for your safety?”
Bastien chuckled, and answered, “Stand down, cousin. My men are outside, waiting for me. I asked them to remain there while I came alone to fetch you. Their presence would only make the customers here nervous.” Since Bastien also enjoyed the liquid offerings this particular tavern provided and would accompany Valerian when his kingly duties allowed him some time away, he kept the presence of his royal guard down to a minimum to assure the tavern owner that there would be no trouble.
“Does Anastasia know you’re here? If she caught even an inkling that you’re here with me, she would happily wring both our necks,” Valerian said, wryly.
“My queen knows I would never give her cause for worry, which is why I have my royal guard with me,” Bastien replied, his tiger-gold eyes twinkling at teasing his cousin.
Relaxing, but ice-blue eyes still blazing, Valerian asked, “Then why are you here, if not for our customary drink together?”
“It is interesting that you should ask. Your mother personally asked me to find you and personally bring you to her doorstep.”
“Bah, her past summons have all been futile attempts to see me married off. Each time I have appeared at her doorstep, she has thrown all manner of females she deems suitable at my head. I have grown tired of her efforts especially since I am comfortable as I am.”
Raising a brow, Bastien replied, “And you’re comfortable as a confirmed bachelor, wenching your way through the kingdom? You owe it to your title and family name to ensure the line continues.”
“I have plenty of time for that, just not now.”
Shrugging, Bastien knew no amount of convincing on his part would sway Valerian from his current path. Seating himself at the same table where Valerian left his two wenches, Bastien lazily gestured to the tavern owner who had been watching him closely for some time. “A tankard for me and my cousin, if you please,” he called to the man behind the counter.
Valerian growled, and said, “We are not staying. Your loving wife would have my head if she knew I corrupted you by allowing you to stay here.”
Bastien’s broad smile quickly told Valerian that he had been manipulated into leaving with him, and Valerian sighed, “If I am to be escorted to my mother’s home, then may I assume you’ll be staying to say hello?”
Shaking his head, “As much as I would love to, Aunt Félicité did pull me out of an important meeting with the minister of finance. I’m afraid you will be meeting her without me. Tell her hello for me and that Anastasia would love to have her for tea soon.”
Rolling his eyes at Bastien’s evasion tactics, Valerian sighed once again, “All right, lead the way, cousin.”
***
Cutting a swath through his old childhood home, Valerian bellowed, “Mother, this had better be urgent enough to have pulled Bastien out of an important meeting!”
Meeting her stormy-eyed son at the entrance to her sitting room, Félicité haughtily answered, “If you had replied to my summons in the first place, I wouldn’t have had to resort to such desperate measures. Come kiss your mother before I explain why.”
Exasperated, but having always doted on his mother, Valerian obediently kissed his mother on her cheek, still free of lines. Satisfied, Félicité ushered him further into her sitting room and took her own seat in her favorite cushioned chair. Valerian found his stepfather also present, sitting in the wing-backed easy chair across from his mother, and he took his own seat on the sofa between them.
Keeping his temper in check, Valerian began calmly, “What was so important you had to use poor Bastien to get me to comply?”
Etienne handed him a scrap of paper and only said, “This. The letter explains it all.”
Accepting it, Valerian read through its entirety and abruptly lost his hold on his temper by the end of it. Thrusting the paper back to Etienne, he exploded, “This is preposterous! Me? Betrothed to a complete stranger? How could this have happened?”
His mother explained, “Like the letter states, before you were born, your father had arranged for you to marry the only daughter of his old friend. They were friends as boys attending Eton together.”
“How did this only come up now? As a man, how could I have not known of such an obligation to our family name?”
Etienne offered, “The girl’s father had sent us the letter only recently, asking for the late Comte to remember their promise. It seems the girl has reached her time to marry, especially now that her father, the Earl of Ellesmere had fallen ill. Since their bond of friendship was quite strong, the earl is calling upon your late father’s honor to see this betrothal through.”
Seething, Valerian glared at the paper as if he were staring down the very man who penned it. Family honor was important to him to a degree, but since reaching manhood, Valerian enjoyed living his life the way he saw fit. For him, it was enough to do his duty to his King as one of his closest advisors, but away from the court, he strove to live his life to the fullest point that debauchery and carousing would allow. There was the odd occasion when his mother and Etienne have had to call him out on his behavior, but a simple apology and making amends were sufficient in smoothing any ruffled feathers.
It wasn’t in him to settle down yet, not when there were still women to seduce and good wine to drink. Not being any wiser about a handpicked bride in his future only that morning, Valerian couldn’t help feeling suffocated by the prospect now that it was presented to him. As a man in charge of his own life and future, he was determined to look for the best possible choice that would suit him. And a wife had no place in his bachelor lifestyle.
Félicité worried at the smile slowly forming on her son’s face. Knowing her son as well as she did, she didn’t have to wonder very hard at what ideas were churning in his head. If there was anyone who could figure out his way out of a betrothal pact, it would be her son, judging by the smug look on his face. She supposed she should discover if she was right.
“Dearest, you are suddenly looking quite sure of yourself. Something tells me that you’ve thought your way out of this. But before you say a word, let me remind you, that your father had chosen your bride specifically with your best interests in mind,” she said.
Snapping his head up and out of his imaginings, he asked, “But did you know, before this letter arrived, what Father had planned? I can’t im
agine Father not sharing this information with you.”
“I am just as bewildered as you are that your Father made no mention of it. What are you getting at?”
Intrigued, Etienne added, “I think I understand. Unless there was a proper contract written, there is no real betrothal.”
Smiling in agreement, Valerian concurred, “Yes, unless I see the actual piece of paper with Father’s signature on it, I am not yet obligated to the girl by any definition.”
Since Valerian had taken this long to avoid settling down with a woman for as long as his mother had been after him to marry, he duly expected his mother to react as she did. A fierce look of indignation mixed with horror occupied her features, and what came next was also expected.
“You cannot in good conscience leave the poor girl in the lurch, not when she must be expecting the marriage,” she cried in outrage.
“Yes, I can, Mother,” Valerian replied flippantly. “My conscience has nothing to do with it, and you are only assuming that she is expecting the marriage to happen. For all I know, she might be just as against it as I am, and if she is also only discovering the fact of our betrothal, then it’s possible that she will want to cry off.”
Exasperated with her son’s heedless way of thinking, Félicité sighed, “Ever since you were a boy, your father allowed you your own way in most things, and I’m afraid I allowed that to continue. I see that it will be useless to persuade you to at least consider the betrothal.”
Grinning wider at his mother’s admission, Valerian cheerfully added, “You are right in that I won’t be easily persuaded. However, I decided that in deference to your feelings on this, Mother, I will personally make the trip to dreary old England to take up the breaking off of this betrothal in person. Any breach of contract can be easily solved with a bit of coin in the right purse.”
Frowning at her son’s over-confidence in his ability to dissolve the betrothal, Félicité shook her head at him, and said, “Well, I am not happy with your callous treatment of the whole thing. Her parents will not be happy with the ruination of their daughter’s reputation in the aftermath, and her prospects for a marriage in the future will plummet because of your rejection of her. And let us not forget that there is our family honor to uphold.”
Mirroring her frown, Valerian saw his mother’s point, but found that he cared more about preserving his life as it was than thinking forward to the future. “Mother, I like my life as it is, and there is still plenty of time to consider a wife when I am ready. Your concerns for my future will one day be my concern, but until then, trust me to not besmirch father’s good name. As a member of Bastien’s royal court, don’t you think by now, I would have learned to be diplomatic?”
Sighing, Félicité could not fault her son for wanting to live his life as he deemed fit. Since the nursery, her son had been groomed to carry the de Baptiste name into the future with a steadfast reputation, one that his successors would be proud to endorse. As his mother, she wished her words had more sway with him as they did when he was still a boy, but she knew that all grown men must find their own way in the world, despite their mothers’ desire to keep them close and biddable. She answered, “My son, I doubt anything else I say will make you change your mind about the betrothal. But consider this: although you may have everything in hand for yourself in this situation, what about the girl? How will you manage the damage that will directly ensue because of your decision?”
Almost too readily, Valerian burst out, “If I can find her a suitable replacement in my stead, I’m sure that will easily smooth ruffled feathers.”
Félicité harrumphed and shot her son another deeper frown. “Your arrogance knows no bounds, and I should have not encouraged you to learn to speak when you were small.”
If Valerian was still the age his mother referred to and judging by the look on her face, he knew that she would have been ready to give him a healthy smack on the bottom. Rather than rile her further, Valerian replied after he got up to kiss his mother dutifully on the cheek, “Because you are my mother and can no longer discipline me as you used to, I will fully embrace your comment about my arrogance. Right now, there is no sudden rush needed for me to marry. The thought of the betrothal alone gets my back up when I would much rather marry a woman of my own choosing. But I doubt that there is a woman out there who can tame me into giving up my bachelorhood.” With one corner of his mouth uplifted, he added, “If such a woman even exists, I will accede my days of freedom as a bachelor would be over. Does that allay your fears for my future, Mother?”
Shrugging a shoulder daintily, his mother replied, “I would say that that’s a start. Your father would have wanted you to honor his wishes, but I can see that you will have your way, as is your habit.”
“I’m glad you see it my way, Mother.”
2
Donnesbury, England, At the Same Time
With a heavy heart, Mary glanced at her father, Lord Anthony, Earl of Ellesmere, as he lay on his great bed, dying of an unknown disease that had wasted away his once-strong body. None of the doctor’s recommendations or treatments had worked to absolve him of the disease, and there was nothing in the local apothecary’s repertoire of medicines that were effective. It hurt to watch her mother, Lady Diana, stand helplessly by her husband’s side as he steadily grew weaker by the day. Her own twin, married only moments before while saying his vows at their father’s bedside, stood with his new wife, Lady Margaret, on the side of the bed opposite to their mother.
Neither Jackson nor Margaret expected their nuptials to have been carried out this soon, but Father’s health warranted it sooner rather than later. The young doctor, who hovered outside the bedchamber door as the little wedding ceremony commenced, had quietly set them aside a few days ago to let the family know that Lord Anthony’s affairs should be put to order. The dreaded news was a blow in its timing, but it hadn’t come unexpected to the rest of the family.
There wasn’t much that could be done, other than make Lord Anthony as comfortable and as happy as he possibly could be, lying there in his great bed. If one were to look past his pallid color and gaunt face, Lord Anthony quietly radiated happiness to be witnessing his only son’s marriage.
Instead of watching Jackson and Margaret exchange vows, Mary watched her parents as they observed the time-old traditions of an English wedding. She had to blink away the tears as she noted their clasped hands and the apparent love shining on their beloved, but age-worn faces. It was evident from when she was a little girl that her parents had a love-filled marriage, and it pained her to know that death would soon separate them.
Mary couldn’t bear it, especially when she knew she could have done something to help her father improve his chances of surviving the illness. But she had promised Kit all those years ago. As of the past year alone, now that Kit was no longer as spry a she once was, Mary had taken to making visits to those in the parish who could not venture the distance to Kit’s cottage. Under the guise of doing charitable work, Mary was able to help with minor dressings and common tonics for various mild illnesses. Having thoroughly studied Kit’s herbal text and under Kit’s close tutelage, Mary was just as capable a healer as Kit.
But with the advent of doctors with their disdain of folk healing mixed in with the good Christian folk of Donnesbury’s disposition to cry “witch” at anything smacking of witchcraft, Mary had enough of a healthy fear to preserve her secret. An earl’s daughter practicing something so plebeian as healing the sick would have caused a major scandal among the ton’s circles in which her family ran. At risk of her reputation and that of her family’s, Mary endeavored to keep her parents in the dark about her activities.
A gentle knock sounded at the bedchamber door, and when Lady Diana answered, the young doctor, Doctor Cardinal, stepped over the threshold to inspect his patient’s condition. Mary kept silent as her father was carefully examined by the doctor’s trained eye. As she watched, she had noticed her father’s face pinched with a new pain, and h
e suddenly was overcome with wracking coughs. Coughs that produced bright red blood. Exhausted, Lord Anthony sagged against the pillows once the coughing fit was over.
Everyone in the room shot looks of panicked alarm to each other at the sight, including the young doctor. Reaching for his case, which was within reach of Lord Anthony’s bed, Doctor Cardinal exclaimed, “We must bleed him! I need my leeches!”
Having watched her father’s color turn a sickly gray during the little ceremony, Mary knew that bloodletting was the last thing her weakened father needed. He could not afford to lose what little strength he had left, not if she had anything to say about it. Anger now boiled in her veins as she recalled the countless times the leeches had been employed on her father, only to see him weaker than before the procedure.
