DD-Michaels-END.rtf (6 page)

The sight had her breath catching in her throat. The snowy horse, its mane and tail caught by the breeze, its hooves throwing up green-and-b
l
ack clumps of earth. The rider, the full sleeves of his white shirt billowing in that same breeze. Both outlined so clearly, first against the lush green of the grass, then against the dark, cold gray stone of the castle.

And she'd been wondering why she'd so blithely followed this man? How could she be, when the answers were so obvious?

Morgan hadn't even noticed that Saul had brought the traveling coach up beside her until she heard Jacob say, "It's
l
ike the drawings in the books in Mr. Ainsley's library, isn't it, Morgie. A fairy castle. Not even real. Morgie? You hear me?"

Morgan swallowed with some difficulty, men nodded
,
not trusting her voice. Lightly tapping her heel against Berengaria's flank
,
she moved forward. She followed the path set by the earl, allowing Berengaria her head, just a little, so that they approached the castle at a maidenly, if eager trot. Her mount's shod hooves made sharp, echoing contact with the thick planks of the lowered drawbridge that spanned the
now wi
l
d
fl
ower-and-grass-clogged moat
,
and Morgan delighted in the sound.

Once she was inside the castle walls, a young boy wearing scarlet livery and a powdered wig approached, and reached for the mare's bridle. "Afternoon, miss. His lordship says you're to be taken straightaways to the drawing room, if that's all right, miss."

"Yes, thank you." Morgan raised her leg slightly, lifting it out of the sidesaddle, then leaped gracefully to the cobblestones of the large courtyard, not even considering that she should wait for assistance, let alone that anyone would think she needed it.

As Berengaria was led away, Morgan turned in a slow circle, attempting to drink in her surroundings. She wasn't an expert on medieval architecture, and had never wished to be, but this castle seemed awfully...
young.

Castles, Morgan felt sure, should look ancient, and weathered. With
moss perhaps, and definitely with ivy. And there should be more castle, too. Things like keeps and bailiwicks, whatever they were. And an array of stone outbuildings. Thi
s
was just a huge stone box topped with fanciful turrets on all four corners, and with a sort of half house, half castle stuck inside.

New, if stones could look new.

A very large toy. A plaything. A child's fantasy. As Jacob had said, a fairy castle...

"This way, miss," the footman prompted her.

Morgan looked behind her, to be sure Jacob and Saul and the coach were on their way across the drawbridge, then followed the servant beyond the flagstone courtyard and up a few wide steps, into the castle.

The stone hallway was huge, and seemed to go up and up forever, until it disappeared into darkness. Morgan had a moment of silliness, wondering if there was an echo in the hall, and what the footman would doif she cupped her hands around her mo
u
th and yelled
"
Ba
ll
y-hoo!"

"This way now, miss."

Biting her lips to hold back a giggle, she had only a few moments to take in the huge wooden tables and straight-back chairs that lined the hall, barely enough ti
m
e to gawk at the dozen or so suits of armor, and no ti
m
e at all to wonder if a retreat wouldn't be prudent, before following the servant.

And it only got worse..
.
or better, if she had set out on a hunt for the ridiculous. The drawing room had stone walls, and window embrasures that had to be
f
our feet deep. The walls were hung with huge tapest
ri
es, and when she sat down, the furnishings, completely wooden, proved as uncomfortable as they were ugly.

Morgan shivered, the riding habit that had been just perfect for the day suddenly feeling thin and inadequate, because the castle interior seemed to have its own weather, a very different temperature from the outside. With no sun to warm
her, she looked longingly at the huge stone fireplace that was, alas, without a fire.

The man lived like this? He forced his mother to live like this?

"I've blundered into a madhouse," Morgan whispered to herself. "And no one in my family will be the least surprised."

She then picked up her gloves and riding crop, deciding a hasty escape would be the only way to
m
aintain her own sanity. She was halfway to her feet when the earl entered the room, stopping not six feet inside the doorway.

Ethan lifted a finger to his lips for a moment, warning Morgan to silence, then smartly turned to face the doorway.

This was the moment. Morgan Becket would either delight in his mother, or run screaming from her. You could tell a lot about a woman from the way she reacted to a man's mother. Especially
his
mother.

Another liveried servant, this one older, thinner and terribly bent, entered the huge chamber, loudly tapped the floor with the long staff he carried, and announced in a rusty voice, "Hear ye, hear ye, presenting her ladyship, Druscilla, Dowager Countess of Aylesford!"

Ethan executed a rather elegant bow, and held it, then turned his head toward Morgan. He gifted her with a smile and a wink before turning his attention back to the doorway, which she then did as well
......
just in time to see the dowager countess make her appearance.

"God's teeth," Morgan whispered under her breath as she blinked, blinked again, and then hurriedly dropped into a curtsy.

She hadn't run, screaming, from the room. Ethan grinned. So far, so good.

The woman who'd swept into the large room had once been very beautiful, and still was, in a faintly faded sort of way. Her son very much resembled her, as far as it went, and it didn't go far, because the dowager countess seemed to have come from another time, one long since passed.

She was dressed in a sort of costume, her crimson brocade gown finished with huge, puffed velvet sleeves slashed through with ivory silk. A matching brocade beret covered most of her pale blond hair, and there was a huge emera
l
d-and-dia
m
ond pin in the shape of a dragon attached to the very front of the thing. Her neckline was clogged with what could be a dozen different necklaces, and she had a heavy gold chain around her waist, from which hung a two-foot-long painted stick that ended in a clutch of red-tipped ostrich feathers.

She looked wonderful. She looked ridiculous. And when she winked at Morgan, just as her son had done, she seemed very aware of how bizarre she must appear.

"Welcome to Tanner's Roost, my dear," the dowager countess trilled. "How wonderful to have a fresh victim!"

Morgan looked to Ethan, who merely shook his head and scolded his mother.
"Maman,
don't scare the girl off now that I've just found her."

"Oh, stuff and nonsense, Ethan. Look at that chin, that proud carriage. This one doesn't frighten easil
y
—do you, dear? Now go away and clean up your dirt, if you really plan to desert your poor mother and ride to
London
, and Miss Becket and I will have a little natter. Won't we, Morga
n
—
I
will call you Morgan, because it's such a lovely name. Except perhaps for Morgan Le Fay, or whatever that harridan's name was. Ethan? You're still standing there. Shoo!"

"He looks like any guilty son, doesn't he?" Morgan commented as Ethan quit the room, enjoying herself again. She should have agreed to leave Becket Hall sooner, and would have, if she'd known being out and about in the world could be so very amusing. Then, waiting until the dowager countess had seated herself before sitting down beside her, she added, "Now, what
i
s this about a new victim, my lady?"

"Druscilla, my dear. Just call me Druscilla. Everybody does. I do hope you'll have time to meet some of my friends, although I doubt that, as Ethan warned me that you are pressed for time if you are to beat dusk to
London
. We're practicing for tomorrow night's performanc
e
—
m
y guests and myself, that is. Not that you'll be missing a marvelous treat by not lingering here to watch us. Poor Algernon makes for a very timid Henry, I'm afraid. Shall I tell you a secret? If Algernon had really been the king, he would have sent Anne Boleyn off to her chambers with no more than a mild scold and cold porridge for her dinner."

The earl's mother lifted the painted stick
,
pushed on a small button near the base, and the lush feathers opened into a fan, which she then began waving under her chin.

"Warm in here, isn't it? I don't know how the ladies of old Henry's court stood it, I really don't. All this heavy velvet? And you'd positively
weep
if you saw the ridiculous underpinnings those poor creatures were forced to endure, although I was thoroughly shocked when I realized what they
didn't
wear. Perhaps a welcome breeze up under their skirts cooled them somewhat. In any case, it must have come as at least a little something of a relief when Henry chopped off their head
s
—
t
ook a bit of the weight off their shoulders, as it were."

Morgan wasn't used to being at a loss for words, but found she had nothing to say to her ladyship's statements. So she merely smiled, fairly convinced that
this strange woman was the sort who could hold conversations all by herself, if the other person just smiled or nodded in the right places.

And she was right, for Druscilla was off once more, barely taking a breath before saying, "You're probably wondering if I'm a wee bit batty. Or prodigiously batty,
a
nd I suppose some would say I am. But I'm happy, and Ethan indulges me just as his dear father did before him. Neither of them cared a scrap about the scandal, which is just as well, because what is done is done, and can't be undone. Oh, the marriage, yes, that could have been undone. God knows George's family tried, insisting their poor boy had lost the reins on his brains. But not Ethan. Difficult to undo Ethan, don't you think? And he makes a splendid earl, even if society still pretends to be all aghast about his dreadfully inappropriate mother."

This time Morgan nodded, schooling her expression to one of mingled sympathy and disgust. Or at least she hoped so. Mostly, she wanted the woman to keep talking.

"It was a love match, you understand. George and me. We took one look at each other and that was that
,
and me only fifteen to his eight and thirty. We cared not a snap what the world would think. Well, George didn't. I had no idea the fuss it would make, as George had somehow neglected to tell me he was, at the time, a viscount. And his title wasn't really important, then or now, because we loved each other dreadfully. So we built our castle, and put up our walls, and never bothered about anyone. It's been five years that he's gone, and I still miss him so."

The bright light in Drusilla's eyes faded as she shrugged, sighed. "Well, enough of that. My only regret
i
s that Ethan seems always to pay the price for his parents' happiness. It can't be comfortable being the son of a soft-headed fool and a common strumpet. But, still, the ton accepts him, if only on sufferance. Ethan says that's because of the title and all the money, but I think it's because he's so pretty. What do you think?"

"I...uh..." Morgan hadn't counted on being asked a question, so she quickly, and none too tactfully, responded by asking one of her own. "You weren't really a strumpet, were you?"

Druscilla patted Morgan's hand. "No, dear, but I certainly wasn't acceptable, either." She leaned closer. "You see, I was
a
performer."

"An actress?" Morgan asked, rather excited to hear such a romantic story, certainly a happier story than that of her own parentage. Although, if
London
society looked at Ethan askance, what on earth would they do if anyone ever learned about her beginnings?

"Not then, no," Druscilla said. "I had aspirations, yes, but I was still young, and was forced into company with a band of jugglers and magicians and miracle-sellers and their ilk. Would you like me to read your palm? I can, you know. Not correctly, but definitely convincingly. I would have done much better if I'd looked like you. I'm much too pale, too watery. You've the look, the fire, of a real gypsy. I had to wear a huge black wig, and it itched horribly, almost as badly as this horrid gown. Next year, and so I told my friends, we'll perform a more
modern
play."

"
Ma
m
an?
Have you quite talked Miss Becket's ear off in my absence?"

Morgan watched as the earl reentered the room, looking every inch the
London
gentleman, and refused to acknowledge the small skip her heart gave at the sight of him. She could still see the raw power in him, but that power had been somehow leashed with the addition of finely cut clothing. It was the sure knowledge that the leash could be easily snapped that intrigued her. Almost challenged her, as if he had somehow flung a glove at her feet, daring her to try.