This story was originally created for Ramblings From This Chick's Historical Christmas Eve project, where a number of wonderful historical romance authors were asked to create an original scene based on a set theme. My theme was 'A royal visitor on Christmas Eve'. Here's the original post, which appeared on the Ramblings From This Chick website on December 12, 2012.
I decided to finish the whole story and post it here, for readers to enjoy over the rest of the holidays. So, if you haven't read THE CHRISTMAS KING, please start here. The rest of the story is posted in 7 parts...all following this first part of the story.
Enjoy—and may you have a very Happy New Year!
THE CHRISTMAS KING
By Lecia Cornwall
CHAPTER ONE
Collingwood Castle, Wales, nineteen days until Christmas
Eve
“Say the words!” Louisa Niven
whispered, handing her older sister a bundle of dried herbs.
Phoebe took them gingerly, and tied
a few strands of her brown hair around them, wrinkling her nose at the strong
scent of rose, lavender and elfwort. “Show me my true love, and send him to me
by Christmastide,” she murmured. She hesitated before tossing them into the
fireplace. “Are you sure this will work in an earl’s library? Shouldn’t we be
in a forest hut, or out in the woods, dancing around a bonfire naked?”
Louisa rolled her eyes. “Oh,
Phoebe, really! It’s freezing outside, and the legend just says we need to
gather the herbs of love at midsummer, then burn them on the feast day of St.
Nicholas for the spell to work. That’s today, and no one said it couldn’t be in
the library.” She tossed her own bundle onto the flames, watched the hungry
flames pounce on them. Sparks crackled and shot up the chimney.
“Do you see anyone?” Phoebe asked,
kneeling next to her sister to peer into the smoke.
Louisa frowned. “No. At least,
nothing that resembles a true love. You try.”
Phoebe pressed the herbs between
prayerful hands, looked heavenward, and giggled. “I feel silly,” she confessed.
“Just do it!” Louisa hissed. All
Phoebe did was moon for love, and a suitor who would ride over the mountains
and sweep her away, and now she
hesitated? Phoebe glared scornfully down her pert nose for a moment before she
drew a breath and cast the bundle into the flames.
They leaned forward, scanning the
sparks for a sign. “That bit of burning ash, is that a face?” Phoebe asked,
breathless, then drew back. “No. It looks like Poppy, Gran’s cat, if you ask
me. Are you sure Gwen recalls the spell correctly? No matter what people say,
she’s not really a witch, just the village midwife. She’s even older than Gran,
and Gran can’t remember our names some days.”
“Everyone knows Old Gwen has magical powers,” Louisa replied.
“She tells the same tale every year—maidens who gather the right herbs at
midsummer, dry them, tie them with a lock of hair and throw them onto the fire
on the feast of St. Nicholas will see a sign, and if they do, they can expect
their true love to come to them by Christmas Eve.”
“Has it ever worked before?” Phoebe
asked.
“Gwen swears she met all four of
her husbands exactly this way,” Louisa murmured. “I’m sure we’ve done
everything right.” She stared at the crumbling ashes. “Perhaps there wasn’t
enough yarrow, or the meadowsweet is insufficient, or the lavender...”
The door opened, and the girls
leapt to their feet. Louisa tucked the last bundle into her pocket.
Celyn Beauchamp regarded her two
young cousins. “And what are you two up to?” They looked like a pair of cats
hiding songbirds between their teeth. She crossed to the desk, set down a sheaf
of papers and sniffed the air, filled with the sweet scent of herbs. “Casting
Old Gwen’s love spell, are you?”
“Oh Celyn, Have you looked at the calendar? It’s December the
sixth—St. Nicholas’s Day!” Louisa reached into her pocket and held out a bundle
of herbs. “Look, I saved one for you. All I need is your hair, and then—”
Celyn tilted her head and smiled at
her fourteen-year-old cousin. “My hair?” It was pinned up in a sensible and
matronly bun, and she wasn’t about to take it down for such nonsense.
“Gwen says it’s essential, so the
goddess knows who’s casting the spell,” Louisa said as she took the scissors
out of her other pocket. “Please? It won’t take much hair, and it’s your last
chance. The spell only works for young
maidens, and you’re going to be twenty-one before Twelfth Night. Next year
you’ll be an old maid!”
Celyn folded her arms over her
chest, exactly the way an old maid might. She let them drop to her sides again,
and resisted the urge to loosen her hair a little and pinch some girlish color
into her cheeks. “Really, don’t you two have something better to do?”
“Like what?” Phoebe asked. “It’s
too cold to go outside, and we’ve read every book in the library. If I have to
sew one more shirt for Mrs. Jones’s new baby, I’ll cry. I’ve made at least a
dozen already!”
“It’s not so cold,” Celyn said.
Especially with the library fire roaring as it was, using a full day’s worth of
fuel all at once. She rolled up her sleeves to keep them free of ink as she
crossed to the desk. “It’s warm in the kitchen. Mrs. Jones is making fruitcake
and plum pudding. You might offer to lend a hand so she can stay off her feet.”
“Gwen says she’s sure to have the
child by Christmas. Who’ll cook the goose and make the venison pies?” Louisa
complained.
Celyn felt her smile slip a little,
and pasted it firmly back in place. She only hoped there’d be enough money for
a goose, or that Aled managed to shoot a pheasant or even a hare, never mind a
deer. Collingwood’s huntsman was getting old, and his eyesight was failing, but
he wouldn’t allow anyone to take his post. Christmas would be meager indeed,
and the hampers for the village would be light this year, and with the cold
coming so early…Celyn swallowed her fear and changed the subject to the only
other one at hand.
“How have the omens for love been
this year?” she asked, coming forward to take the bundle of herbs from Louisa,
turning the dry twigs and flowers in her hand. There was no use burdening her
cousins, or anyone else at Collingwood, with the dire position they were in.
She still had a few pounds of the money Lord Collingwood had left her when he
died. He’d meant it as a dowry, but there were bills to pay and mouths to feed while
they waited for the new earl to put in an appearance and take up his
responsibilities. She doubted she’d ever marry, anyway, and the last of her
dowry might as well pay for some semblance of Christmas, and bring cheer and
joy to everyone at Collingwood. Soon, perhaps by spring, the new earl would
arrive, and everything would be fine…but she’d been saying that for
months.
Phoebe sniffed. “What omens? I
didn’t see anything at all. I’m almost seventeen! If we were still in England,
I’d be making my debut next Season, and there would be no need to cast spells.
Suitors would flock to my side.” She smoothed a hand over her blond curls.
Celyn glanced at the stack of
unpaid bills on the desk, looked around at Collingwood’s threadbare library, at
the antlers on the wall, the faded furnishings. She couldn’t afford to send
Phoebe to London. “Perhaps next year,” she said gently. “When the new earl
comes.”
“When the new earl comes!” Phoebe
mimicked. “If he ever does. Great-Uncle Caradoc has been dead almost a year,
and his heir hasn’t answered a single letter.”
“Then I shall write to him again,
and keep doing so every week until he does reply,” Celyn said, keeping her tone
even. She was as frustrated as Phoebe, but as long as there were people to
feed, and ink and paper to write, she couldn’t give up. Everyone depended on
her in the earl’s absence. Why hadn’t he
replied? She was about to set the herbs down, but Louisa caught her wrist.
“Will you try the spell, Celyn?”
she asked.
Celyn closed her hand on the sharp
twigs, felt them prick her fingers. “I’ve really got too much to do. I’ve this
letter to finish, and I should be helping Mrs. Jones, and there’s—”
“Please?” Louisa said, closing her
hands over Celyn’s. “It won’t take long.”
Celyn sighed. “All right then, if
only to prove it doesn’t work. One has to be practical, sensible, and—” Phoebe
loosened a lock of Celyn’s dark hair, and raised the scissors. Celyn winced as
the curl fell free. Louisa tied it around the bundle, and led her to the fire.
The warmth felt good at least, hopeful, restorative—exactly the way she
imagined true love might feel.
“Say, show me my true love, and
send him to me by Christmastide,” Louisa prompted. A tart reply hovered on
Celyn’s lips. If her true love did show up at Christmastide, what on earth
would they feed him? But when she looked into her cousin’s sweet face, saw her
flame-bright eyes, Celyn saw something she hadn’t felt herself for a long
while—hope.
“Show me my true love, send him to me by Christmastide,” she
murmured.
“Now toss it,” Phoebe instructed,
and Celyn opened her hand, let the bundle fly from her fingertips into the
fire. With a rush of heat and light, it ignited, and the flames shot upward.
“I see purple!” Louisa gasped.
“And blue!” Phoebe said.
The colored flames reflected in her
cousins’ wide eyes. “Well, what does the legend say?” Celyn asked, as
astonished as they were. “Is that a good sign?” She watched the rush of embers as they climbed the dark
chimney, carrying the spell out into the frigid winter sky.
“I think it must be! That didn’t
happen when I tried,” Phoebe said.
Louisa clapped. “It’s working! Do
you see a face, Celyn?”
Celyn squinted. “I see someone who
looks just like Aled, probably because I’m hoping the hunt will go better
today. I fancy rabbit stew for supper.”
“I see a crown!” Phoebe cried.
“Look, just there—” she pointed at the shape in the glowing ash.
“A king?” Louisa gushed. “Gran has
always said the King promised her he would come and dine with her at Christmas.
She’s still waiting, even after all these years! Perhaps this is the year!”
Celyn felt a shiver creep up her
spine, and straightened her shoulders. How silly, and yet, it did look like a crown…
Phoebe pinched her sister. “As if
the King would come here! And he can’t be Celyn’s true love—he’s married to the
Queen!”
“Gran was a maid of honor at court. She knew the King well.
He wouldn’t forget such a solemn promise,” she said passionately, clasping her
hand over the injured spot. “It wouldn’t be—kingly.”
“That was years ago, before he went
mad!” Phoebe argued. “Gran barely remembers what she had for breakfast a half
hour after she’s eaten it. How can we believe her account of a conversation she
had with the King over thirty years ago?”
Louisa looked mulish. “He might
come! Besides, he’s not the only
king—there are kings in other countries, too!”
Celyn brushed the remains of the
herbs off her hands and rose to her feet. “But foreign kings aren’t very likely
to come to take Christmas with us,” she
said. “Unless Napoleon invades, of course, and finds himself very lost.”
Phoebe’s eyes widened with terror. “Not to fear,” Celyn soothed.
“Well if it’s not the King, it must mean Celyn’s true love will come,” Louisa insisted
stubbornly. “I refuse to give up hope.”
Celyn gave her cousin’s shoulder a
squeeze. There was more chance of a royal visit than true love showing up at
the door, since there wasn’t a marriageable gentleman within fifty miles of
Collingwood. She glanced at the portrait of the late earl that hung above the
fireplace. Right up until his death at the advanced age of seventy, Caradoc
Colley been regarded as the last suitable bachelor for ladies of quality in the
whole of Snowdonia. Unfortunately, all four of them—herself, Louisa, Phoebe and
their grandmother—were related to him.
She
went back to the desk. “All flames look like crowns. It means the chimney is
drawing well, or there’s a draft, perhaps.” It was chilly on this side of the room, away from the
hearth, and she glanced at the windows, but they were all firmly shut, and
laced over with frost. She sat down and took out a fresh sheet of paper.
Phoebe looked over her shoulder.
“You’re not really writing to him again,
are you?”
Celyn dipped the pen in the ink. “I
am writing to the new earl’s man of affairs with an itemized list of
expenditures.” And one more plea for money, supplies, and the essential
materials needed to repair the cottages.
“He never answers,” Phoebe said.
“Are you sure he’s even real?”
Celyn was beginning to doubt it
herself. There’d been one reply to her letters, a terse note from someone—not
the earl—informing ‘whom it may concern’ that all inquiries and accounts should
be sent directly to the earl’s man of affairs. She hadn’t received any
acknowledgement from the earl himself—no orders or instructions or even a
condolence on their loss.
“Of course he’s real,” she said
brightly. “I write so he’ll know that we are keeping Collingwood in good order,
and everything is in prefect readiness for when he does wish to come.” She
began to list the expenses of the last month, her chest tightening with every
figure she noted. The harvest had been poor this year…
“He should come and see to it for
himself,” Phoebe sniffed.
“Perhaps he’ll come in the spring,”
Celyn said yet again, but frustration fell on her like a wet blanket, and she
had to force herself to smile. “We can’t expect him sooner—no one in their
right mind would travel in this weather! Now go and see if Mrs. Jones needs
help in the kitchen.”
Phoebe flounced out with a gusty
sigh, but Louisa kissed Celyn’s cheek.
“Will you tell me if you dream of
him tonight, your true love?”
“Of course, sweeting,” Celyn said.
Along with visions of sugarplums and Christmas fairies bearing roasted goose,
baked ham and cake. She turned her attention back on the letter as Louisa
skipped out.
“True love for Christmas,” she
murmured. She glanced at the flames in the fireplace once more. They were plain
yellow now, burning sedately. She shook her head. If only wishing really could
make dreams come true.
But that, as she well knew, was
impossible.
CHAPTER TWO
London, sixteen days until Christmas Eve
“You simply must come to Kingscott Hall for Christmas, Millicent!”
Edward Kingsley, Earl of
Wintercross, made his escape the very same day—the very same moment, in fact—as
that invitation was issued. By luck, he’d arrived early in answer to his
stepmother’s summons to tea, or he wouldn’t have overheard her conversation
with Lady Millicent Grainger. He’d have been snared like a rabbit, and served
up at the family Christmas festivities as the man engaged, or even worse, married to Millicent Grainger.
But he was safe—for now. As
Millicent was joyfully accepting the invitation, Edward snatched his hat from
the butler’s hands, where he’d placed it not two minutes before, and fled.
Not just from Kingsley House—he’d
left Town entirely.
It wasn’t that Lady Millicent
wasn’t a suitable candidate for the post of someone else’s countess—her dowry
was generous, she was pretty enough, and her pedigree was excellent. Her father
boasted the Graingers could trace their lineage back to the moment William the
Conqueror first set foot on English soil. Millicent’s ancestor had probably set
her cap for the first wealthy, unmarried
knight to step ashore, just the way Millicent herself had set her sights on
Edward the moment she arrived in London last spring. He hadn’t shown her the
slightest interest, but she’d been popping up everywhere he went, with her
toothsome smile and winning charm—at the theater, at his elbow at every ball,
trailing him on horseback down Rotten Row—stridently courting him, though he’d
not given her any reason to hope for a proposal.
“You’ll
have to marry eventually, and Millie’s a good sort,” his father, the Duke of
Kingsbury, had advised him, since Millicent had successfully courted him, and the rest of Edward’s kin. “Why not get it over
with, and set up your nursery? It would please your stepmother, and a number of
other people as well. There are at least twenty bets on the book at White’s as
to when, not if, you’ll marry Millicent.” He’d winked at Edward. “I
myself have wagered on December twenty-ninth as the happy day. I stand to win a
hundred pounds if you to make Millicent your bride by then.”
But
Edward had no intention of proposing. He’d never met a woman he liked well enough to marry, and at the advanced age of
thirty-one, he doubted he ever would. He felt he should have some regard, at
least, if not a greater depth of feeling, for the woman he married. Since such
a woman didn’t seem to exist, he was more than content to enjoy the pleasures,
pastimes, and comforts of a wealthy bachelor’s existence permanently, even to
the point of allowing his half-brother to inherit his lands and titles once he
left this life. And really, what did one need a wife for? He had excellent
servants to see to his needs, and friends for conversation or dining out. The
fickle romantic escapades of his half sisters, the five silliest women in all
England, had shown Edward it was wisest to avoid romantic entanglements. He’d
seen enough gentlemen of his acquaintance lose their wits over a woman. It
wasn’t a pleasant fate.
His stepmother firmly believed that
a single man was an unhappy one, and she’d been throwing eligible young ladies
at Edward since he turned eighteen. She had high hopes that Millicent would be
the one to bag him at last, but Edward was about to disappoint her yet again.
Just days before Christmas Eve,
when he might have been at Kingscott Hall enjoying a cup of hot rum punch and
looking forward to an excellent dinner, he found himself on the road, far from
any of his luxurious homes, in the middle of—he stared at the faces around him
in the dowdy wayside inn—where the devil was he? Wales yet, or still England?
He hoped his coachman knew. It had been snowing for days, blotting out the road
and the houses and anything recognizable as a landmark.
He stared into the cup of sour ale
he’d been nursing for hours. Perhaps this was a fool’s errand. He’d had to
leave word of his plans, after all, a hasty note written to his father, to be
delivered the day after he’d left London. Once his destination was known, he
pictured Millicent following him into the wilds of Wales, riding sidesaddle on
a wild-eyed gelding, color-matched to her riding habit, with one of her
father’s dueling pistols clutched in her dainty white hand. No doubt his
half-sisters would accompany her on the manhunt, giggling all the way, a
fashionable posse in stylish bonnets and fox-fur muffs, intent on dragging him
back to hearth, home and altar. He shuddered, and hoped that his intended
destination, the recently inherited Collingwood Castle, turned out to be as
deep in the mountains of Snowdonia as his man of affairs described it.
Edward hadn’t even heard of the
place before his late mother’s great uncle Caradoc Colley, the newly deceased
Earl of Collingwood, left Edward his castle and title. Edward never expected to
actually go to Collingwood, especially
not in the dead of winter, but here he was, on his way. It would make a perfect
hiding place—he frowned, and flicked a glance over his manicured hands.
He was not hiding.
He was inspecting his property, and
planning to enjoy Christmas in blissful, Millicent-free solitude. If he ever
arrived. He’d been on the road for days longer than he’d expected, and was now
delayed at the world’s most disagreeable inn. While his coachman haggled with
the local blacksmith over a wheel repair, Edward was kicking his heels among
the locals in the taproom, who regarded him suspiciously over the rims of their
cups.
It was the overloaded baggage wagon
that had broken a wheel. In his defense, he’d been in a hurry. He’d ordered his
servants to pack everything he might conceivably need. There were at least a
dozen hampers of food, wine, ale and whisky, trunks of clothing for every type
of weather or social event, monogrammed blankets, linens, eiderdowns, and the
finest feather pillows. There were uncountable boxes of beeswax candles, and
plenty of books. More than plenty. When the wheel broke, it had taken five men
an hour to unload the cart. They behaved as if they’d never seen fine things
before.
“It’s starting to snow again,” the
innkeeper warned to the room in general. Edward wondered how the man could
tell, since the taproom had no windows.
“Is it your left knee or your
right?” someone asked.
“Left,” was the innkeeper’s morose
reply, and it was met with a general groan.
“What does that mean?” Edward
demanded.
“It means two feet of snow, maybe
even more afore it lets up,” a farmer informed him. He picked up his hat and
nodded to his companions. “I won’t delay, then. I’m for home while I can still
find it.”
Edward watched the room empty out
on the strength of a weather prediction made by an aching left knee.
“Will you be wanting to stay the
night?” the innkeeper asked. “I wouldn’t advise traveling on.”
“Oh wouldn’t you?” Edward pictured
being trapped in this dank inn until the innkeeper’s elbow predicted spring.
“My coach is well sprung, made for heavy travel, my good man. I daresay I shall
be more comfortable there than in what passes for your finest room.”
The man just rubbed his knee and
winced, and Edward had insisted on setting out within the hour, leaving his
baggage cart to follow. Surely Collingwood Castle couldn’t be much farther.
Once he arrived, he would have a good fire, a hot meal, and his first decent
night’s sleep in a fortnight in all that blissful solitude. He wondered what
merriment his sisters were up to at Kingscott, and resolutely pushed the
thought away.
It was rather a romantic notion,
spending Christmas in the snow-covered Welsh countryside. He told himself he
would not miss his family, or the endless romp of holiday parties and balls, or
the simple things, like a crisp, freshly pressed copy of the Times delivered with his breakfast. But he would miss it—he loved Christmas at Kingscott—the
excellent meals, port, cigars and good conversation in the library with the
gentlemen, watching his half-sisters carrying armloads of holly, mistletoe, and
ivy in to decorate the hall, laughing, throwing snow at each other, their eyes
sparkling, their joy infectious.
He straightened his scarf, and
brushed imaginary snow off his own coat. He would have a quiet, restful
holiday. He would tramp over the fields, perhaps do a little shooting, eat
well, sleep late, read, and not have to fear bumping into Millicent—or someone
sent to encourage him to come to the point and marry her—at every turn. He
might even stay for the entirety of the winter, if he liked the place. Looking
out the window now at the snow, he wondered if returning to London was even an
option. He may not have a choice but to remain until spring.
He shut his eyes and tried to nap.
If this trip convinced the rapacious Millicent and everyone else that he had no
intention of marrying, then a lonely Christmas was a small price to pay.
CHAPTER THREE
Five days until Christmas Eve
Celyn burrowed into her pillow,
trying to ignore the hand gripping her shoulder, shaking her awake.
“Celyn, please wake up! The barn in
the village is on fire!”
She was instantly awake. Catrin,
the maid, hovered above her, her face pale under her nightcap. A candle shook
in her hands. “Aled’s downstairs and he needs to know what to do!”
Celyn felt her chest tighten, and
last wisps of sleep fled as her bare feet connected with the icy floorboards.
“How bad is it?” she demanded, reaching for her robe.
“You
can see for yourself,” Catrin said, and opened the drapes. The night sky glowed
red above the trees beyond the park, and Celyn felt her mouth dry. She dropped
the robe and crossed to the wardrobe to find a gown.
Catrin
fastened the buttons as Celyn pulled on her stockings. “Aled was asleep in the
barn. The new baby is keeping him awake at home, and he wanted some peace and
quiet. He fell asleep with the lantern—” the maid said.
Panic
welled in Celyn’s breast. “Is he all right?”
“Yes
he’s fine, I think. He sounded the alarm, and they got the beasts out in time.
Everyone is trying to put out the fire, but you’re needed.”
Celyn
hurried downstairs, imagining the worst—people burned or killed, animals lost,
the precious harvest stores gone. Aled was pacing the hall, mud and ash from
his boots mixing on the black slate tiles.
“The barn is on fire, and the wind
is shifting—” he said, twisting his cap in his hand. There were smudges of soot
on his lined face, and tears in his clouded eyes. He looked every day of his
advanced age, his bravado gone, his shoulders stooped under a dusty horse
blanket.
“How bad?” Celyn asked again, reaching for one of Caradoc’s
old cloaks from the pegs in the hall, wrapping it around the old man’s
shoulders.
Aled shook his head, clutching at
the warm wool. “Awful. The wind’s carried the flames to some of the houses.
Mrs. Jones and the little ones are out in the snow. Me an’ Davy Price managed
to get the animals out of the barn, and everyone’s trying to put it out, but
the pond is frozen. The stores—” he swallowed, his body shaking with cold and
sorrow. “My daughter-in-law can’t keep the wee one quiet at night. He’s getting
his teeth in near as fast as I’m losing my own, and I just wanted a bit of
quiet,” he said. “Where else is there to go but the barn?”
Celyn’s heart plummeted. She pulled
on her own cloak and opened the door. “We’d best go and see.” The icy wind
slapped her face and made her gasp, and snow filled her untied boots. She bent
against the wind and pushed it back across the park with Aled behind her.
The village was in chaos. Four
cottages were already on fire, and the hungry flames were reaching out for the
rest. The barn was a birdcage of blazing timber. She looked around desperately
for any sacks of grain that might have been saved, but there weren’t any. At
least the livestock stood safely in the shadows. She felt her stomach rise, and
swallowed quickly. She had never faced a crisis like this. Caradoc had managed
things, with Aled to help, when he was younger. Children were crying and women
screaming, standing in the snow in their nightclothes as their homes burned,
staring at her, waiting for her to fix this. She clenched her fists in the
folds of her cloak, and wondered where to even start.
She began by counting the faces,
whispering a frantic prayer that everyone was safe, that no one was trapped
inside the barn or in the burning cottages. She took off her cloak and wrapped
it around Mrs. Stackpoole, who was eighty, and tucked a pair of youngsters
under it as well. Their chattering teeth rivaled the roar of the fire.
“Soak the cottages,” she ordered
the men slithering up the icy banks of the pond with buckets, knowing it was
too late to save the barn. The entire harvest was inside, feeding the flames,
starving the people.
Screams rose as the barn caved in,
the timbers defeated by the assault of the flames. A rush of sparks flew upward
into the dark sky, chased by scarlet tongues of fire. So much for spells and
wishes, she thought, seeing nothing but disaster in the flames this time.
“What will we do, Celyn?” Aled
asked, his voice plaintive in the wind.
They were all watching her, every
soul from the oldest to the youngest, expecting—she felt anger fill her like
another rush of hot sparks. Didn’t they see there was nothing she could do? But
they were counting on her—old Mrs. Stackpoole, and Mrs. Jones with her five
children, her belly big with the sixth, and Davy Price, who’d lost his wife
only weeks ago, and now was without a home, too, with four children to raise.
Celyn wanted nothing more than to
go back to sleep, and wake up to find that none of this was real. She clenched
her teeth to keep them from chattering, and swallowed the bile rising in her
throat.
“Take everyone up to the castle,
out of the cold,” she ordered Aled. “Get Catrin and the girls to make hot tea
and soup. Get blankets and—”
There were tears on the old
huntsman’s cheeks, contagious tears, and she felt them sting her own eyes. “It
will be all right,” she said firmly, trying to convince herself as much as
Aled. She grabbed a pail of water, the rough rope handle tearing into her palm,
and lugged it toward the cottages.
Despite their efforts, the village
was a smoking ruin by dawn.
“It’s starting to snow,” one of the
men said grimly, coming to stand with the rest beside Celyn. “We’ll have a foot
or more before nightfall.”
Celyn looked up at the leaden sky.
The heavy flakes of snow raised hisses of displeasure from the dying fire, but
they came too late to help. “We’d best go up to the castle,” she said. “In the
morning, we’ll see what’s to be done.”
“It is morning,” Perry Evans said grimly, looking around at
the black remains of the village. “Won’t be nothing to be done until next
spring, I’m thinking.”
“Aye,” several men agreed. “What
will we do until then, Celyn?”
“What we need is a miracle,” she murmured.
Aled forced a wavering smile. “Then
it’s a good thing it’s the right time of year for them, isn’t it, lass?
Christmas Eve is only days away.”
She didn’t argue. She could feel
only despair, battering her like the icy snowflakes hit her cheeks, her hair,
and her chest. She turned away from the burned village and led everyone back
across the park to the solid and reassuring bulk of Collingwood’s stone walls.
Once she’d bathed and changed,
she’d write to the earl again, directly this time. But he was in London, a
whole world away, and she was on her own.
CHAPTER FOUR
Four days until Christmas Eve
Edward arrived at his new estate in
a foul mood. It had taken four days to travel the last thirty miles through the
snow. It would have been faster to walk, but his boots were handmade and brand
new, and his valet was traveling with the baggage.
It was evening, but the sky was bright with snow, and there
seemed to be little difference between day and dark. The thick, joyless white
shroud of snow made it impossible to see anything of Collingwood’s park, or the
landscape surrounding it.
The castle itself sat on the brow
of a hill like a massive cockscomb, gray against the snowy sky, the chimneys
and towers poking the low clouds, prodding the snow out of them. Edward gazed
up at the forbidding towers and the crenellations as the coach forced its way
the last few yards up to the door. Every window was ablaze with light, as if
there was a party going on inside, and he wondered briefly if he was expected,
and if it was all in welcome for him, but that, of course was impossible. He’d
advised no one of his arrival. He wondered what he would find—lazy servants celebrating the season early,
emptying the wine cellar and sleeping in the master’s bed. He hoped the steward
turned out to be a good man who knew his job.
According to his man of affairs in
London, the steward was a chap named Colin Beauchamp. He sent careful and
regular reports, though every one of them asked for money. Edward had refused
to send anything, of course, until he’d had the need for funds reliably
assessed. Beauchamp wanted to build a dozen new cottages for Collingwood’s
tenants, stating the old ones were in poor repair, and he recommended improving
the livestock as well, adding a hardier breed of sheep, more ponies. The man
was almost insistent in his tone, and rather impudent for a mere steward of a
very small holding Edward had never heard of before. He was here now, and he’d
see to the truth of Beauchamp’s claims himself.
The coach entered a wide courtyard,
surrounded by high walls and creaked to a stop in the snow at Collingwood’s
front door. Edward stared out the window at it. He felt as if he’d stepped back
three hundred years into the past. The huge arched wooden door was studded with
nail heads, designed more for discouraging invaders than welcoming visitors. He
could see the black teeth of a portcullis above it—raised, fortunately, but
poised like grim fangs nonetheless. Gnarled vines crawled over the surface of
the frozen stones like veins, supporting the ancient walls perhaps, along with
a secondary portcullis of menacing icicles. Light squeezed through a narrow
slit above the door, casting orange light on the blue snow, and he wondered how
long it had been since they last poured boiling oil down from there.
“Thank you, Childs,” he said to the coachman as he got down
from the vehicle and straightened his cravat—that and an elegant coat being his
only armor. “Drive the coach round to the stables, then find the kitchens and
get yourself settled.”
He strode up to the door and rapped
sharply with the brass head of his walking stick. The thick wood ignored the
blows, having seen far worse, no doubt.
A puff of icy wind took his hat, and bowled it into a
snowdrift. He snatched it back and he held it tight, and knocked again, louder
this time. He should have had Childs wait until he was admitted. Was the wood of
the door so thick they couldn’t hear him? He hadn’t packed a battering ram,
probably the one thing lacking, and as luck would have it, the one thing that
would have proven most useful to have at hand.
Perhaps the inhabitants of
Collingwood were deaf, or drunk, or abed already. He pictured the servants
sitting around a warm fire in the kitchen, deep in some distant part of the
castle where they couldn’t hear him knocking. He set his hand on the massive
iron ring that served as a latch and pushed the door open. It groaned a
complaint, but gave under the hand of its master.
He walked into a cold white wall,
and it fell on him. At first he thought he’d fallen into a snowdrift that had
mysteriously appeared inside the castle. He wrestled it to the floor with a
curse, and stood with his walking stick at the ready, menacing a sheet, freshly
washed. Or so he assumed, since a long line of sheets hung across the entry
hall, dripping on the stone floor. There was clothing, too—shirts of every
conceivable size, petticoats, and kerchiefs all in various stages of drying. An
iron chandelier swung over the entire scene, filled with tallow candles that
flickered with a smoky, meaty stench.
He shut his eyes and opened them
again, but the laundry was still there. Surely Childs had made a wrong turn.
He’d brought him to a workhouse, or a foundling home, mistaking it for
Collingwood Castle.
There were distinct sounds on the
floors above him, singing echoing down the stone stairs, and laughter. “Hello!”
he called impatiently, parting the curtain of sheets to peer down a dark
corridor. A face appeared out of the gloom, a young girl, round eyed and
startled. She cried out at the sight of him and dropped the bundle of wet
sheets she was carrying. They landed on his boots with a soggy plop. She
flattened herself against the wall and stared at him.
“I
thought you were Davy Price, coming in with firewood, but you aren’t are you?”
she asked pointlessly, scanning him from the sheets on his boots to the crown
of his snow-covered hat. He wondered if she were daft. Perhaps this wasn’t a
workhouse after all, but an asylum for mad women.
“Is this Collingwood Castle?” he
demanded, speaking slowly and loudly.
She didn’t reply. She stood
blinking at him like a demented owl.
“Is this—” he began again, but
stopped when she broke into a glorious grin and rushed forward with a cry. He
retreated until he was backed against a wall and her nose was practically
pressed to his.
“Oh my, it’s you, isn’t it? You’ve arrived early!”
“You were expecting me?” he asked,
carefully.
“Not until Christmas Eve. Are you
the King?”
The King? He stared at the fey creature. She looked about
twelve or so. In the isolation of Collingwood, she had probably never seen a
gentleman in her life, if she thought he was the king.
He sidestepped past her, and
straightened his shoulders. “I’d like to see the steward if you please.”
Lesser mortals would have quivered
at the frosty tone of his voice. But she merely smiled, and tilted her head to
one side. “We haven’t got a steward. You’re here because of the spell.” He
jumped as she suddenly dropped into a deep curtsy, her head practically resting
on her knees. Definitely touched, he decided, blinking at the top of her blond
head. She didn’t move. Was she waiting for permission to rise? He felt his skin
flush with irritation.
“Get up at once! I’m not—”
“Who are you talking to, Louisa?”
Edward looked up to find an old woman standing on the stairs, clad in a white
nightgown, her feet bare, her long snowy white hair draped over her shoulders.
She might have been a ghost from another age. Perhaps this was a haunted mad house. He shook off the shiver that ran up his
spine as the child bounded to her feet again.
“It’s the King, Gran. He’s come
early!”
The old lady put a papery hand to
her throat and stared at him.
“Madam, is the housekeeper
available?” Edward tried again.
“Is it the King?” she asked the girl. “He’s in a frightful state of
undress. No wig, and where are his attendants?” she looked at him sharply. “Did
you bring her majesty as well?”
The King? Wig? Edward frowned. “I came alone,” he said, unsure what
else to say. “My name is Edward Kingsley. I’m Wintercross.”
“Of course, Your Majesty—we’re all
winter-cross. The weather has been dreadful.” she tilted her head and peered at
him like a magpie. “King Edward, you say? What happened to King George?” Her
face crumpled. “We’re always the last to hear news from London!”
He looked to the girl for help, but she was circling him,
taking in every detail of his person as if she’d never seen anyone so
marvelous. He felt his skin heat. “Look, I am not—”
“Arabella! Whatever are you doing
down here without your robe? And no slippers,” Another woman said as she
hurried down the stone stairs. “You’ll catch your death of cold!”
“He’s come! The King! The legend is
true!” the girl said.
The woman stopped where she was,
and stared at him in surprise. She had fine dark hair, caught in a braid that
hung over her shoulder. Loose curls frilled around her face—a very pretty face.
Her eyes were green, he thought in the dim light, or golden, perhaps,
reflecting the candlelight like stars. Her cheeks were high and flushed pink,
and her lips parted slowly in surprise. “The King?” she gasped. She was dressed
in a pale wool gown, white in the lantern light, an angel. His mouth watered,
and he swallowed.
“He’s come for Christmas!” the
elderly lady said. “Just as he promised. I told you he would.” She leaned up to
whisper in the angel’s ear. “But he’s King Edward, not King George. Whatever
happened to King George?”
Edward was tired, hungry and cold.
He was used to a houseful of obedient, well-trained servants who knew precisely
what he wanted almost before he did. “Is this some Welsh custom I am unaware
of? In England, children stay in the nursery, and women do not appear at the
front door in their night attire. And they do not keep guests—although I am
most certainly not a guest—waiting at the door!” he snapped.
He saw something flare in her eyes,
an answering anger perhaps? She took his measure with a single sweeping glance
as she retrieved a dry blanket off the line and arranged it over the old lady’s
shoulders. “We weren’t expecting guests, or callers, given the weather. Are you
lost, perhaps?”
He looked into her eyes, drowned in
them, felt the heat of her skin even a dozen feet away. Did he smell
wildflowers, hear singing? He had the oddest desire to sniff her hair, touch
her cheek to see if she was real.
“He’s not lost! He’s the answer to
the spell!” the girl said, and Edward shook off the moment and looked at her
instead, frowning.
“Now see here, this is not a
Christmas revel! I have been on the road for a fortnight. Once I’ve seen the
steward—Beauchamp, I believe he’s called—I want a hot bath, then I will take a
meal while my rooms are being prepared. Summon the housekeeper at once,” he
demanded.
The angel’s face changed, grew as
pale as the sheet beside her, and her eyes widened to flooded pools. She stood
staring at him as if she were seeing a
ghost. His eyes bored into hers when no one moved to obey his commands. “Don’t
stand there looking at me! Tell me who is in charge and fetch them at once!” he
said, advancing on her, his voice ringing off the stone.
“You’re the earl,” she said, a breathy, strangled statement,
devoid of any joy at seeing him. In fact, he’d never felt less welcome
anywhere.
“I am indeed,” he said, taking
another step toward her. “And you are—?”
“Celyn!” the girl’s cry rang out as
the beauty’s eyes rolled backward, and her body crumpled. He caught her before
she hit the stone floor.
She was most certainly real, solid
flesh, warm and feminine in his arms. She smelled of flowers, and her hair was
soft and warm against his hand. He stared down at her. She was quite lovely,
though young for a housekeeper, and rather refined to be a maidservant. There
was lace at her collar—good lace, and a small garnet pin, like a drop of blood.
“Who is—” he began, but the child was screaming for help, her cries ringing off
the walls.
“Unhand her at once, or I’ll run
you through,” a gruff male voice warned, coming through the sheets. Edward
stared.
It was not an asylum. He had
stumbled into some sort of Christmas play, a troupe of actors here for
Christmastide. A bow-legged elderly man was pointing what looked like a pike at
him, holding an ancient shield emblazoned with a Welsh dragon. Behind him stood
a burly woman twice his size, heavily pregnant and wielding a rolling pin,
glaring at Edward with malice. Edward didn’t want to unhand the woman in his
arms. She was warm and soft—the first warm soft thing he’d felt for days.
“Beauchamp?” Edward asked the man.
“That’s right,” the old man said,
his eyes narrowing. “Now set her down. I don’t know who you are, or where
you’ve come from, but you’ll not harm a hair on her head while I have breath in
my body.” He looked like a faint summer breeze could knock him flat, Edward
thought.
“No, Aled, he’s not a villain!” the
girl chimed, stepping in front of the pike and pushing it aside as if it were a
toothpick. “He’s come for Christmas. He’s what Celyn wished for, don’t you
see?”
“He’s the King!” The old lady
warbled. “King Edward.”
The old man’s scowl deepened,
folding the wrinkled brown skin of his face into dangerous creases. “We Welsh
aren’t fond of English kings named Edward,” he growled.
“I’m not the King, Beauchamp. My name is Edward Kingsley,” Edward explained, despairing of
the aged steward’s wits. “I’m the Earl of Wintercross and—”
The girl’s eyes shone. “Don’t you
see? He’s not invading, Aled, or kidnapping Celyn!
“He’s her true love!” she gushed. “He’s come to marry her!”
Edward felt his throat close in
horror. He’d escaped Millicent, and a dozen other predatory debutants and their
scheming mamas. What on earth had he walked into? He stared at the unconscious
woman in his arms.
“We haven’t any mistletoe yet, but
we will,” the girl murmured. “Would you like to kiss her anyway?”
Yes, Edward thought, staring at her
soft lips, slightly parted.
“No,” he growled, warning bells
clanging in his head. “Is there a place to, um—put her?”
“Will you carry her to her bower?”
the girl asked.
“I can’t think the Queen will
approve, Your Majesty!” the old lady said stiffly.
“This way, if you will, Your
Majesty” the pregnant woman with the rolling pin said
flatly. “There’s a settee in the library. I’ll fetch some
the smelling salts and some brandy.”
Edward hesitated. He glanced down
the long dark corridor, and then back at the heavy door that seemed to be some
kind of magic portal to a very odd world. He was tempted to set the woman down
right here, and go back through that door as quickly as his feet could carry
him, but instead, he followed the odd denizens of Collingwood Castle.
