by Lisa Cach
“I think you are right to worry, and right as well to keep yourself hidden from his friends. The baron is no stranger to the sin of pride, and his friends’ casual ridicule of your relationship might cause him to view it with the same jaundiced eye.”
“That is what I fear. Do you think he cares so little for me that he can be so easily influenced?”
“You know him better than I. I would like to think not, but you have not had so very much time together.”
“I do not want to let him go,” Valerian said, her voice cracking. “Oh, God, listen to me. What is happening to me?” she asked, swallowing down the incipient sobs and getting ahold of herself. “He has friends visit, and I fall apart.”
Theresa gave her a knowing look, but did not answer her query. “His friends will not stay forever. See the baron only away from them, and do not press him for declarations of his feelings or of his commitment to you. Demand nothing of him, and when they have gone, he will come back to you.”
“You mean I will be the only cow left in the field.”
“If you want to look at it that way. It is at least realistic. Men can afford to lose themselves in romantic illusions. Women cannot. These friends will demand his attention, and if you whine to him of your own needs, he may see you as a source of distress rather than pleasure.”
Valerian made a face. “I do not understand how you could ever have said that this being a mistress is either an easy or a pleasant way of life.”
“Ah, well, it is all a little different when you are stuck in the country with only one available protector, and he is both handsome and of a comparable age. He takes on more significance than perhaps he is worth. And perhaps, dearest, you have let your heart become entangled in what was to be a physical pleasure.”
“I sometimes think he has become my world,” Valerian said sadly.
“And when was that ever good for a person?”
Valerian went to bed with Theresa’s final words repeating in her mind. Of course it was not good to make a person the whole of your existence. But if she lost both her aunt and her lover, who would be left?
Chapter Eighteen
Nathaniel stood in the rain, looking across the meadow to the cottage, and felt he deserved every bit of misery the weather could deal out. In the past two weeks he had only been to see her once, when the shock of his friends’ arrival had still been new, before he had been drawn into their games and way of life. He had complained to her about them, about their intrusion, their noise, their concern with a lifestyle that had suddenly felt alien to him, and he had known that she was cheered to hear that he did not prefer their company over hers.
He forced himself to come out from under the trees, to walk through the tall grass of the meadow. He had not ridden Darby, half from a desire for time to think, and half from the compulsion to punish himself with a slog through the mud. He had said he would not abandon her, but for the past week and a half she must have thought he had done just that.
It was early morning yet, his friends all sound asleep, but there was already smoke trailing from the chimney of the cottage, and he knew that Valerian and Theresa had most likely been awake for some time. He reached the door and knocked.
“Eee-diot!” he heard from inside, muffled by the wood of the door.
It was a long minute before Valerian appeared at the door, wearing her forest green cloak, pulling its hood over her head as she stepped outside. “I would invite you in, but Aunt Theresa is not yet dressed.”
She looked pale, tired in a way that he had not seen before. His gut twisted, wondering if she had been staying awake late at night in hopes that he would come to her.
“Do you mind walking a bit more?” she asked. “The cave is the only private place I can think of that is dry and warm.”
“I do not mind at all. Your aunt is an admirable woman, but I confess that I would much rather see you alone.” He brushed his fingers along her cheek, the skin so white and fragile in the grey morning light. She pressed his palm to her lips and kissed him, then took his hand and led him out into the rain.
They did not talk as they walked, the track in the mud requiring attention to avoid a slip, eye contact impossible. Her hood fell back in a gust of wind, and she let it lie on her shoulders, apparently not deeming the rain heavy enough to be a bother. He tried to imagine Kate or Beth, or any of the other women presently at his house, climbing with such little concern through rain and mud and wind.
His Valerian was a creature of the wilds, more at home in a cave than a ball room. Just as he could not picture Kate out here now, he could not see Valerian with her hair dressed close to her head and covered by a lace cap, her waist and ribs squeezed tight by stays, her feet bound by delicate silk shoes with soles meant only for walking indoors. Her differentness felt unbearably precious in that moment.
They did not speak more than a few words until they were deep inside the cave. Valerian tossed her cloak onto a boulder outside the hot-spring cavern, where it would not become even more wet from the steam, then slipped off her shoes and sat at the edge of the pool, pulling her skirts above her knees and dangling her feet in the heated water.
He hesitated only a moment before following suit, his cold skin burning at the touch of the water.
“I am glad you came,” she said simply and smiled at him.
He felt the guilt return. “I am sorry, Valerian. I did not mean to stay away so long—and after I swore to you that they would not change anything between us. I should have come sooner.”
She took his hand, and met his eyes without recrimination. “There is no need to apologize, Nathaniel. You are allowed to enjoy your friends. You have been alone amongst strangers, and it is understandable that you should wish to spend time with your friends when they come to see you.”
“But to have kept you waiting—”
She put her fingers over his lips. “Hush. You have not kept me waiting. Do you imagine that I mooned by the window from dawn ’til midnight, with nothing to do but wonder where you were?”
Well, yes, he thought to himself, but was wise enough not to say it. Even he could see the arrogance in such a thought.
“I am not an idle woman. I have had my hands full with rashes and earaches and illnesses of indeterminate origin. There has been the garden to work upon, and plants to be harvested and preserved, not to mention laundry to wash, food to cook, pots to scrub—”
“All right, all right,” he interrupted, and forced a laugh. “I understand. You did not perish for loss of my company.”
“But that is not to say I am not happy to see you.” She raised the back of his hand to her lips and gave it a kiss, her eyes sparkling at him with amusement.
Whatever guilt remained faded away under a wave of private shame. He had been a peacock indeed to think that her world revolved around him, and he had been a fool not to have remembered that her heart was larger than his, more forgiving and more generous.
“And I am happy to see you,” he said at last, feeling within himself the sting of his own failings. When he was with her, he wished to be a better person. “I do wish I had come sooner, if only so that I had not gone so long without the pleasure of your company.”
“Your friends have brought out the flatterer in you.”
“Are you so averse to a compliment, then?” he tried to tease.
“Only if it is on such meaningless things as my stunning intellect or saint-like character. Why do you not compliment me on my elegant coiffure, or the stylish cut of my clothes?”
He smiled, relaxing, beginning at last to feel at ease with her. “Surely Mademoiselle knows she is forever at the height of fashion.”
“Naturally. ’Twould shame the family name to be anything less. Now tell me, kind sir, with what low amusements do your guests entertain themselves? I take a scientific interest in the behaviors of the common rabble.”
“Mademoiselle wishes to know such trifles?”
“Mademoiselle has a shameful curiosity.
”
He dropped out of the game. “Do you truly wish to hear about them, Valerian? They are nothing compared to you.”
“They are your friends. To learn of them is to learn something of you.”
“I am not entirely certain that would be in my favor.”
“Come, Nathaniel. They cannot be that bad.”
“Ahhhh, if you only knew,” he joked, waggling his brows. Sitting here in the dark cave with Valerian, their feet dangling in the water of an ancient Roman hot spring, he felt again the gulf between her world and that of his friends, where all was artifice and true feeling something to be ridiculed. At that moment, he wished he could stay where he was forever.
“Their day starts with breakfast, of course,” he said, “which is served at the early hour of eleven.”
“A trying hour at which to be awake,” Valerian said, and brought one leg up to where she could cross her arms across her knee, resting her chin there and smiling at him with interest.
“And the day only grows more strenuous as it progresses.” He described it all for her, the card games, the riding, the walks in the garden, the drinking, and the flirtation, describing it all as if it were the odd behavior of a native people of some far-off land. He did not mean to mock his friends, and yet it was impossible not to. He no longer belonged entirely to their world, and he felt as if his eyes had been opened to the true shallowness of their pursuits.
But he did not belong to Valerian’s world, either. His voice trailed off as that realization came to him.
He felt her touch upon his arm. “What is it, Nathaniel?”
He leaned over and kissed her. “Nothing but self-indulgent fancies.” For the present, he would rather drift between worlds than give up hers entirely. Some half-conscious part of himself knew that she was someone he needed.
He came home to a drawing-room full of bored aristocrats. He had hardly noticed the rain on his walk back, his mind wandering in confused contemplation. It was a bit of a shock to see his friends trapped inside by that same rain that had done him no harm.
“Nathaniel! Where have you been, dear man?” Kate cried, throwing down her hand of cards. “We have been most frightfully bored without you.”
There were murmurs of assent throughout the room. “I never claimed Cumbria to be filled with amusements, myself included,” he said. At this moment, he rather wished the lot of them would pack up and leave. He had tired of entertaining them.
Kate noticed his damp hair. “You have been out, in this foul weather? You are becoming quite the country man!”
Paul spoke from the chair where he sat swirling brandy in a glass. “Ah, but where has he been? What could draw him out into the weather on such a day?”
Nathaniel narrowed his eyes at his friend, but Kate jumped in before he could say anything. “Indeed, there is only one thing I know of that draws a man through foul downpours and cold alike.”
“A fine piece of horseflesh?” Christopher asked, to the amusement of the group.
“Hounds for sale?” another of the men asked.
Kate arched her eyebrow at the lot of them. “A woman.”
“Now where would he find a woman in this godforsaken corner of the world?” Christopher asked.
“Our dear baron could find a woman anywhere,” Paul said.
Nathaniel recognized the mood Paul was in, one of boredom and mischief combined. He felt himself the baited bear, but declined to amuse them. He went to the window and looked out, turning his back on his friends. He knew from experience that this sort of conversation was best left to its own course. Anything he said would only make it worse.
“We have been here a fortnight already,” Beth said. “Why is this the first we have heard of her?”
There was a chorus of speculation.
“Perhaps her parents do not know.”
“She may be entirely unsuitable.”
“She is a hag.”
“He fears I shall steal her from him.”
“He intends to marry her and wants to surprise us with the announcement.” A round of laughter followed that suggestion.
“You do know that our dear baron has not yet properly introduced himself to his neighbors in the district,” Paul said. “Some have stopped by to pay their respects, but he has yet to be at home to a single one of them. He has made himself quite the hermit.”
“For shame!” Kate said. “We must remedy the situation, if he is incapable of doing so himself. I think a party is in order. A ball, perhaps, at which his dear neighbors can at last make the acquaintance of the brooding baron of Raven Hall.” She cast her eyes at Nathaniel, the question hanging there. Even Kate would not be so bold as to plan a party at his house without his assent.
He did not want to meet his neighbors, the term being loosely applied. No doubt he would have to search over many miles of countryside to find sufficient guests of a quality suitable for a ball. And yet, it was true he had been remiss in his neglect of those neighbors. He had been brought up well enough to be aware that he had offered a degree of insult to his neighbors by not so much as saying “Good day” to any who had stopped by to meet him and offer condolences on Uncle George.
He turned from his contemplation of the rain and nodded to Kate. At least it would keep the lot of them entertained, planning the party. Perhaps when it was over, they would at last feel satisfied with their visit and leave.
“We shall have to make it a masquerade,” Beth said.
“What a confoundingly stupid idea,” Christopher said.
“How is he to meet his neighbors if he cannot see their faces?”
“I think it a splendid idea,” Kate said. “He will be the more likely to invite his lady love if she is in disguise, do you not think? And what fun, to guess who she might be!”
Nathaniel was not fooled by Kate’s enthusiasm. Since long before he left London, he had been aware that her interest in him was a bit more than friendly. He did not doubt that her interest in his “lady love” was a competitive one.
And yet, even knowing that, he knew suddenly that he would ask Valerian to come to the ball. She did not speak like a country girl, and in proper disguise no one but Paul would guess who she was. For one night, he could bring her fully into his world.
For one night, he could pretend that their worlds were one.
Chapter Nineteen
There was no help for it: She was going to have to go to Raven Hall. Valerian gave herself a headache thinking about it, but she could not come up with an acceptable alternative. Daniel was a capable enough gardener, and had most likely remembered to water their plants in the greenhouse, but the various exotic plants had been too long without expert care.
And of course she could not trust Daniel to know how to harvest the resin from the opium poppies. There were plenty of poppies growing here in the meadow, but they were not yet in season. She was running low on laudanum pills and needed to make more for Aunt Theresa.
With Nathaniel’s accounting of the daily schedule at the hall, she could at least reduce the risk of meeting any of his friends if she went early in the morning. Unfortunately, after scoring the seed pods, it would be several hours before she could scrape off the resin that would bead along the scratch, which meant she would still be hiding amongst the pots and withered orange trees when the household awoke.
Ah well. There was nothing for it. She would just have to hope that Paul did not see her, and that anyone else, chancing upon her in the greenhouse, would take her for a servant and ignore her.
She made it to the relative safety of the greenhouses with only a brief encounter with Daniel, pruning back a wisteria that grew wild over an arcaded walkway.
“Coming to see the baron, are you?” he asked, and she imagined there was a touch of disappointment in his tone.
“I have come to tend the plants.”
“Ah. That is all right, then. Where be your aunt? I have not seen her about.”
“She, er . . .” She could not come up with
a lie that would suit. She should have thought of this. Daniel would not be the only one wondering why Theresa had disappeared of late.
“It is the death of old George, I imagine,” Daniel filled in. “We all knew—well, we did not expect she would want to come back here much after that. It was surprised I was, that one day she did come.”
“She was fond of the old baron.”
“And he of her. Or so I hear, and that is just gossip.” He gave her a long look, one that said as plain as spoken words that he knew she had taken over with Nathaniel the role they all thought Theresa had held with old George.
Valerian excused herself and escaped to the greenhouse, her cheeks flaming. It was obvious that Daniel did not approve of her behavior, and it surprised her. She had thought no one here cared a whit for her virtue or lack thereof, as long as she stayed away from their own sons and husbands. Daniel looked as if he cared about her behavior for her own sake.
She set to work with petty resentments churning in her gut. It is not his or anyone else’s affair what I do, she grouched silently, carefully scoring a seed pod. They could have found me a husband, if it mattered so much with whom I slept. Behind that thought, though, was the memory of her mother, who had chosen to marry and had intended that her daughter do the same. But her mother had intended her to grow up with both her parents, as well, and that had not happened.
For a moment she wanted to blame Aunt Theresa for her easy fall from virtue, and just as quickly banished the thought. Her aunt and her mother had been cut from different cloth, but both had loved her without reservation, and done their best for her. She was old enough to take responsibility for her own decisions, and to deal with the consequences.
Milky resin was already beginning to bead along the scores on the poppy pods, and Valerian moved on to tend to other flora. The sun slipped from behind a cloud, heating the room, creating a steamy warmth rich with the scent of earth and greenery. Valerian hummed softly under her breath as she worked, loving the feel of dirt in her hands, and imagined herself on some far away isle in the Indies, tending tropical flowers in her plantation garden.
