Chapter One
I cannot continue. I am exhausted and so is my horse. If I do not find shelter, we will both die of exposure.
Selina Voss rode astride her bay mare, Wind, unusual enough for a woman. She achieved this by the simple expedient of wearing breeches like a man. Those breeches had been stolen from a young footman the night before. Selina regretted the crime, but her need had been great. Riding side-saddle would have forced her to a pace that would have been easily overtaken had her father decided to pursue her.
I do not know that he hasn’t. Our last exchange was…fractious.
Her cheek still smarted from their last exchange. It had been that blow that had sent Selina running from the house in which she had grown up. Struck by a man twice her age, whom her father had introduced her to as the man she would marry. Selina had resisted that notion, laughed in the face of the gray-haired old man who thought he could buy himself a young wife. His face had turned purple, and he had slapped her hard enough to knock her to her knees.
Maximilien Voss, the Earl of Sawthorne and father to Selina had been in the room. He had stood by and done precisely…nothing. Struck because she refused a marriage to a man twice her age. A politically and financially convenient marriage for the Voss family, but one devoid of her say, just like her mother before her. Struck and not defended by the one man that ought to have protected her. Her father.
Tears stung her eyes and she angrily scrubbed at them with her gloved hand, pulling Wind to a halt as her vision deteriorated. There was no moon or stars to speak of. The storm obscured both and lashed her with rain besides. Her fingers were becoming numb, as were her toes. The landscape around her was a mass of impenetrable darkness. She was riding into the pit of a void.
Somewhere out there is Valebridge. Somewhere out there is my only hope. Arthur. My once beloved Arthur. If anyone can help me now, it is him. But where are you?
Her stomach was an empty hollow. She turned her head to the sky and opened her mouth allowing rain to spatter across her tongue to quench her thirst. In a saddle bag, there were dried apples and oats for Wind, but she had been in too much of a hurry to pack much food for herself. And had not thought of water. After all, this was Kent, not Arabia. But she had not drunk anything since a cup of tea at midday when her father had announced his plans for her.
She did not know what the time was now, but it felt as though it must have been at least midnight. Reaching into the saddlebag, she took out a handful of oats and reached to Wind’s muzzle to let her eat. Selina’s head was swimming with fatigue, her cheeks stinging from the impact of the freezing rain against the sore spot where she was struck.
What choice did I have but to run? I am not property to be bought and sold. Mother warned me of this, but I did not believe I would ever face the same fate.
Tears flowed freely down her cheeks, mingling with the rain, as she shivered relentlessly. Her predicament seemed utterly hopeless. She was lost, not even aware of what direction she had been riding since the storm had descended. For all she knew, she was heading back toward Sawthorne Manor instead of the South Downs where Valebridge could be found. Somewhere.
As she wept, a small golden light appeared in front of her. It seemed to be bobbing in the air, like a will-o-the-wisp. She frowned, screwing up her eyes against the bitter rain. A sudden flash of lightning cast a brief illumination over the scene. It was followed by an appalling crack of thunder that set Wind to rearing. Selina lost her grip on the reins, flailing for them but grasping only empty air.
She slid from the saddle and over the horse’s rump. The ground rushed towards her, knocking the wind from her, and she felt a flash of pain at the back of her head. Wind’s hooves thudded back to the ground, until the mare was still. Trembling and with ears twitching, but still. The light bobbed closer, and Selina saw that it was a lantern held on a wooden pole by a man. Her head throbbed and the light began to dim.
A grizzled face looked down at her, mouth open in a round, amazed shape, mirrored by his eyes. Then he was swallowed by darkness and so was Selina.
***
Marcus Roy strode through the vaulted halls of Valebridge Castle. The sound of the persistent hammering on the tall, wooden entrance doors reverberated through the house. He was barefoot, wearing only shirt and breeches. His coal-black hair fell in tousled curls about his angular face. The flagstones of the corridor were icy cold beneath his feet, but he preferred the cold, clean touch of stone to dusty carpets.
With only a skeleton staff at Valebridge, carpets would have taken too much time to maintain, so he had got rid of them. In one hand he held a slim, leather-bound volume, one finger marking his place.
What the devil is someone doing abroad on a night like this? Let alone hammering on my door!
The hallways of the castle were a maze, added to and remodeled many times over the centuries and rarely with any continuity. The haphazard nature of the building’s rambling wings meant that sound rode strange currents. A knock at the door reverberated far into the shambolic pile of stone. Whereas, sitting in the gloomy drawing room barely fifty yards from the front door, one could hear not a whisper.
Fortunately for whoever was demanding his attention, Marcus had been reading in his private study some three stories directly above the door. The clang of the wrought iron knocker against wood that had been seasoned into a new form of steel, had reached him, jerking him from his study. He descended a flight of stairs and strode across the cavernous Great Hall, discarding the book onto a side table set into an alcove in the wall.
Shadowed portraits glowered down at him. His ancestors were an unpleasant bunch, judging by looks. Cruel men with a frightening morality when it came to concepts such as ways and means. Marcus hated them. He especially despised the blank space among a group of paintings depicting the Dukes of Valebridge. A blank space that had been occupied with the image of Jeffrey Roy, Duke of Valebridge and father to Marcus and Arthur.
Now, deceased father to Marcus alone. Though most who knew anything at all of the Roy family story believed something different. He reached the door and turned the huge, black key in the lock. Then he turned the iron ring set into the door’s center and heard an ominous scraping click. The door swung open under the force of his broad shoulder, creaking on its ancient hinges.
“Dai?” he said, raising a hand against the sudden glare of lamplight.
The old man standing on his threshold held a horse by its bridle and there was a young woman slung over its saddle like a sack of potatoes. Dai lowered the lantern, drawing a metal shutter across it and flooding his face with shadow.
“Aye, it’s me. And I’ve got something for you, so I have. Found her on the Downs riding alone and without provisions or the proper clothes for this weather. Thought I should bring her here before she dies of exposure, like.”
His Welsh burr was strong. He was Marcus’ height, though with a stoop to his back. His shoulders were broad but bowed. His face was lined and grizzled, with a shock of white hair masking some of his features. The old man had suffered more than his fair share of turns on the wheel of life. It had not been kind to him. Marcus squinted past him to the woman. Dai was already lifting her down and, staggering slightly, carrying her to the threshold.
“Bring her inside,” Marcus commanded.
“No, won’t be doing that. Not this house. You take her.”
Since stumbling across the man on the Downs, Marcus had never known him to use an honorific. It had been one of the qualities that endeared the peculiar old man to him.
“This confounded curse again, eh?” Marcus said, as he carefully lifted the woman from Dai’s arms.
“Aye, that’s it. Curse. Don’t want anything to do with it, see.” After those words, his face suddenly grew solemn. “You just look after her, mind.”
Marcus gave him an earnest nod.
Then the old man was hurrying away into the storm-tossed night, drawing the horse away after him.
“I’ll put the horse in the stables for you. Shouldn’t be out on a night like this,” he called over his shoulder.
A peal of thunder followed hot on the heels of a stuttering surge of lightning. Marcus ducked, despite himself, and retreated from the main doors. As they slammed closed behind him, the woman stirred. She was beautiful, with a pale heart-shaped face and a pretty snub nose. Her skin was soft, and her hair dark with water. Her lips were pouted and seemed lush and inviting.
For a moment, Marcus just stood, his back to the doors, and stared at her. She was light in his arms, her body deliciously feminine. As he looked, her eyelids fluttered open for a moment.
“Arthur… Thank God. I found you,” she murmured.
Then exhaustion overcame her once more and her head lolled back, eyes closing.
Chapter Two
For a long moment, Marcus had just stood with the woman held in his arms. He barely noticed the burden. Looking at her peaceful heart-shaped face, he found himself captivated.
What has brought you to my door, I wonder? And on a night like this.
It was only when she murmured in the depths of her unconsciousness that he was recalled to himself. He jerked his head up, looking around, though there were no servants abroad at this time of the night. That was a standing order. Marcus found sleep difficult and had a tendency to wander the castle late into the evening. He abhorred the thought of servants seeing him and speculating on his behavior. If it were possible to own a great house such as Valebridge and have no servants, he would do so.
Marcus strode down the long, high-ceilinged Great Hall, past portraits of Valebridge Dukes dating back to the reign of the first King Edward. He climbed the broad stairs at the end of the Great Hall, to the first landing and the long defunct guest wing. There, he kicked open the first door and walked through a sitting room and small dressing room, before finally entering a bedchamber. As gently as he could, he placed the young woman on the plump but bare mattress.
The bed had not been made – he did not receive visitors often, not at all in fact. Standing straighter, he looked around, feeling that he could not leave the young woman lying uncovered in her damp clothes. Seeing no bedclothes and not knowing where the servants kept such things, he instead went to the window and seized one of the thick, velvet curtains. A single, strong pull tore it from its rings and the heavy material thumped to the floor.
Marcus gathered it and carried it to the bed, carefully draping it over the young woman.
She called me Arthur. She thought I was my brother.
But after all, that is what he wanted everyone to believe when he had returned from Cumbria at the behest of his father, only to find him deceased that very day. Left behind were two letters. One, incomplete and clutched in his father’s cold dead hand had told him of Arthur’s fall into degradation but ended there. The other, in an unfamiliar hand and signed only ‘A’, told him that none in the house knew the face of Arthur Roy, that none would know if Marcus took on the name and the title. Told him that Jeffrey Roy had allowed the world to believe that he had only one son, Arthur.
So, Marcus Roy became Arthur Roy. The title passed to him, the family solicitor not questioning his identity, seeing only the characteristic black hair, dimpled chin, and sharp cheekbones of the Roy line. Now, someone had come who seemed to know Arthur, and the deception had worked. Marcus wondered if it would continue once the woman awoke. Perhaps she had been an old friend of Arthur’s.
Or a lover? That would put my illusion to the test. Perhaps I should absent myself, allow the servants to take care of her.
But Marcus was intrigued by this golden-haired angel. For that is how she seemed to him as she lay in peaceful repose. Pale-skinned and with hair the color of sunlight. He had briefly glimpsed pale eyes in the dim lamp light by the front door. Blue or gray perhaps. Her features were delicate, fine-boned but with sensuous lips and a firm chin that seemed to speak of strength. She was slim, he could tell because her sodden dress clung to her bosom and hips. Her femininity was decently covered now but he had been very aware of it as he had carried her up the room.
He ran a hand through his tight, black curls and stroked his chin.
A doctor should be summoned, and I cannot leave her to wake alone in a strange room. It could cause her more distress and I do not know her state of mind to begin with. If she was riding alone on a night like this, I cannot imagine it was well-balanced and, in any way, typical. She must have been running from something. Or, running to something. Or someone.
Observing the woman’s steady, deep breaths of sleep, he decided to break his cardinal rule and summon Thomas Beveridge, Valebridge’s butler. He could have one of the grooms awakened and sent out to fetch Doctor Fuller from the nearby village of Folkington. In the meantime, one of the chambermaids could be awakened to watch over the young woman. Marcus felt an urge to take on that task himself, wanting to remain by her side.
It might frighten her to awaken and see a strange man in the room. Except she does not see me as a stranger, but as Arthur.
He left the chamber and briskly strode to the servant’s quarters to wake Tom, resolving to return to her as soon as he could.
***
Selina awoke from turbulent dreams, half-remembered but more as vague impressions than specific recollections. Her mouth was dry, and she felt hot. A thick and immensely heavy blanket lay across her and she pushed at it. Opening her eyes, she saw by the dim glow of candlelight, a large room with a high ceiling. A window to her left had one half of a set of curtains and a young woman in the black and white of a maid sat dozing in a chair next to the bed.
Selina pushed at the remarkably heavy blanket before realizing that it was, in fact, the other half of the curtains. For a moment she had no memory of where she was or how she had come to be here. In fact, she wondered if this were simply another dream brought on by the fear and exhaustion of her flight.
That’s right! I fled from my father’s house on Wind, and I came to…I came to…
“Where am I?” she croaked.
The maid started from her slumber, head lifting from where it had been resting on her chest. Selina swallowed, licked her lips, and spoke again, sounding more human this time.
“Excuse me? Where am I?” Selina asked, trying to lift herself into a sitting position. But she was too weak. Her head felt like lead and her limbs like water.
“Begging your pardon, my lady, but you are in Valebridge Castle. If you will excuse me, His Grace asked to be informed the moment you awoke.”
She promptly left the room. Selina let her head fall back, the room had begun to spin about her, and she lacked the strength to hold it up. Minutes later, the door opened again, and a man walked in. Selina turned her head and smiled. He looked just like she remembered, if older. The same dimple in the chin. The same tight dark curls. The same high cheekbones and infinitely dark eyes. He stopped just beyond the threshold, staring at her.
Once more, Selina tried to push herself upright, but her arms were not up to the task. After raising her body a few inches, she fell back. The man moved quickly to her side.
“Arthur,” Selina gasped, “I was almost afraid that I had been dreaming. But it really is you…”
She reached up with a trembling hand to stroke his face. There was a fine white line along the left side of his jaw. She ran her fingers along it. The touch sent a thrill through her and brought back memories of intimate moments together in the dark, lonely woods that filled the myriad of dells and valleys of the Downs, when they were merely children. He smiled, such a familiar sight, and yet…
He has aged. There is an aspect to his face that I do not recognize. It is the effect of passing years. Doubtless, he feels the same.
“I am here,” he whispered.
His voice was accented strangely. She could not place it, but it was not the sound of Sussex that she had expected. But it hardly mattered. He tentatively put his hand to hers and smiled. His touch was strong, yet tender. She immediately felt safe and protected.
“What on earth were you doing, riding alone in this weather?” he asked softly.
“I had to get away,” Selina replied, still gazing into those familiar and yet strange, dark eyes.
“From what?” he asked.
But Selina’s head was swimming, her eyelids felt heavy, though she did not want to close them. She wanted to gaze upon the long-missed face of her childhood sweetheart. The boy whom she had befriended on many summer visits to her grandmother in Wilmington. The tall, gangly boy who had become a lean youth with coal-black hair and eyes that smoldered when they rested on her. They still did.
She pulled her hand from his and ran her fingers across his lips. He pursed them, kissing her fingertips and Selina smiled, closing her eyes.
“Will you help me, Arthur?” she whispered.
“Of—of course. Just tell me how,” he replied earnestly.
But fatigue and fever had swept consciousness away from Selina. Her last memory before blackness rolled over her was the feel of Arthur’s lips against her fingertips, as he held her hand to his mouth.
Chapter Three
Marcus held the mysterious young woman’s hand to his lips. It was wildly inappropriate, but he could not help himself. When she had touched his lips, it had taken all he could do not to kiss her. Instead, he held her soft fingers to his mouth, breathing her in, tasting her.
She must have been a sweetheart of Arthur’s. She could probably tell me a lot about him that I do not know, but that would involve revealing that I am not who she thinks I am.
That thought was anathema to him. He did not want to lose the feeling of a racing heart and shortness of breath that he found himself experiencing in her company. Did not want to lose her company. No woman that he could recall had been able to affect him so, particularly after such little time. He frowned, trying to puzzle out what it was about her that enthralled him so. A tap at the door disturbed his reverie.
He placed her hand by her side and returned the curtain to its position over her body, standing and hurrying from the room. Opening the door of the chamber’s sitting room, he saw, not the aged physician that he had expected, but Luke Livingston.
“Luke? What the devil are you doing here?” Marcus said in hushed tones.
“I am responding to a distress call, old man. I am assisting Doctor Fuller with a view to taking over his practice in a year or two. When your boy arrived, I persuaded him to let me attend instead of him. Will I do?”
Luke was a little shorter than Marcus but of an age with him, both in their mid twenties. Luke had a shock of unruly, fiery red hair and a broad face, spattered with freckles with bright green eyes. The accent of Cumbria was thick on his voice.
“You didn’t tell me you were going into practice in this neck of the woods,” Marcus said.
“Wanted to surprise you, Arthur, old boy,” Luke replied, “…and looks like I arrived just in the nick of time. What seems to be the trouble.”
Marcus ushered him into the room, checked the hallway outside, and then closed the door.
“Yes, well. It’s perhaps fortunate that it was you. Because the patient I have for you seems to have known Arthur…” he dropped his voice to a whisper, “…the real Arthur, that is.”
Luke’s eyes widened, face turning solemn. He was wearing a tweed suit and stout brogues, and his grip tightened on his leather bag.
“Valebridge. You know me. And your secret has been safe with me for five years since you inherited. And it will remain so, safe as houses. But do you think you can keep it from your…patient? I mean, the servants here didn’t know Arthur, or your father for that matter. That’s why we got you a new household staff. But someone who truly knew him?”
His face was creased in concern and Marcus slapped him on the shoulder, giving him a grin.
“Let’s see, shall we? It is a young woman who arrived at my door in a state of exhaustion last night, right in the middle of the storm. She might be suffering from exposure for all I know. She is hot to the touch and unconscious now.”
Luke nodded briskly and went through into the bedchamber. Marcus closed the door behind him and waited until Luke had made his examination and returned.
“You’re right. A fever as a result of exposure to the elements. Throw in exhaustion as well, I would say. She needs rest to break the fever. Warmth when she shivers and cold when she is hot. I can give her some quinine, which should help.”
Marcus summoned Tom and explained the patient’s requirements, then led Luke to the billiards room.
“You have time for a game, don’t you? Heaven forbid I interrupt your study,” Marcus said wryly, still irked with the secret Luke had been keeping from him of his employment.
“I don’t really, but I am damn well intrigued by this whole saga. You really have no idea who this girl is?”
Marcus set about setting up the table and choosing a cue. In truth, he had no appetite for sport but wanted his old friend there to talk over a few things. Besides, it would distract him from thinking about his unexpected guest.
“No clue, old chap. How could I? I haven’t seen Arthur since we were the six-year-old twins. And father had made sure we hated each other. All those damn competitions he insisted on, each trying to prove ourselves worthy of inheriting the dukedom.”
He took his first shot, and the balls flew across the table in all directions. None found the pocket. Luke shrugged as he took his place.
“I can’t imagine what that was like. He couldn’t have been all bad though, to attract a beauty like that.”
“She is, isn’t she,” Marcus agreed, staring into space.
“I should say so. And should be well enough to attend the ball on Thursday. Unless there is more wrong with her than I could see. The fever isn’t as severe as all that. How do preparations go?”
Marcus grimaced. Luke had potted three balls in a row and had only just had his first miss. It wasn’t the game state that Marcus was disgruntled about, however.
“Preparations proceed apace. We are on track to host the ball on the twenty-sixth, two days’ time. Worse luck.”
Luke chortled. “I stand by my opinion. If you want to rebuild the legacy of the Roy family, you need to get the ton on your side. Your father and grandfather burned the family name to the ground with their behavior. They were a pair of blackguards.”
Marcus missed a shot and stood back, glowering. “Preaching to the choir, old boy. I know how important it is, but that doesn’t make it any more palatable. I abhorred the county set in Cumbria, and I abhor the Sussex set even more. Let alone the London ton. I should just like to be left alone to rebuild this house and the estate.”
“But need their approval if Roy isn’t to remain the name of a reclusive and scandalous house,” Luke said bluntly. He chortled as he downed another of his balls, looking around the table for his next shot.
Marcus watched but stared straight through the table. His mind kept worrying about the identity of the woman and her relationship with Arthur.
“How unfortunate that you arrived barely a day after your father’s death. Had the old rogue been alive, he might have been able to answer a lot of questions,” Luke said.
“Aye, like why the old man chose to dispossess me and make Arthur his heir. And why Arthur helped me to take on his identity, when all those years he stood by doing nothing.”
“If the letter truly was from him – out of remorse, I would say. He knew it should have been you and wanted to make sure you got your birthright,” Luke said in a tone that suggested this conversation had been had many times before.
“Who else could ‘A’ be?” Marcus mused, before reverting to a more serious tone. “Knowing him, it was part of some scheme. Something to trip me up. I just cannot think how.”
“Perhaps your visitor is part of that?” Luke said, moving around the table and rapidly clearing up.
“A trap orchestrated five years ago by my now-dead brother? Seems far fetched.”
Luke shrugged. “Stranger things have been known. And you are a testament to that, good sir.”
Look out for the upcoming release of the full novel on Amazon on the 19th of August!
