Think. He needed to think of something to say that was not related to the neckline of her dress. “I suppose this explains how she could come to Kent with you.”
“As far as I know, she flew. The basket she was supposed to be in held a loaf of bread.”
The cat stood and arched her back in a stretch. She reached one paw up to touch Darcy below his left ear. Without warning she dug in a claw and scratched him.
“Ouch! What was that for?” Darcy demanded, as if the cat might answer him. And he had liked the creature!
Elizabeth held up her hand. “Wait. Do not move.”
Now the dratted cat put both front paws on his shoulder. Did she expect him to let her scratch him again? But Elizabeth had told him not to move.
Instead of a sharp claw, a raspy tongue rubbed over the scratched spot. How very strange! As he held still, he felt a tiny prickle of power. “She is using magic!” he said accusingly. “What is she doing?”
“The fay call it marking. It tells other fay that she trusts you. Pepper marked me when she first came to live with me.” Elizabeth turned her head and pushed aside her ringlets to reveal a tiny scar beneath her left ear.
The sight of her exposed neck made him dizzy. “It makes no sense.”
“No, but do the fay ever make sense? They seem to delight in being illogical. I do not claim to understand Pepper. I do not even know why she chooses to live with me rather than in Faerie.”
Pepper seemed satisfied with her work and curled up again on Darcy’s lap, but he no longer found it relaxing. He did not like unpredictability and things he could not understand. At least the scratch no longer hurt. Darcy reached up to touch the spot where she had clawed him. The flesh was not even tender, and he could feel no more than a tinyridge. “Could it be healed already?” he asked Elizabeth.
She peered at the spot beneath his ear, torturing him again with the sight of her chest. “It appears to be. I am sorry she hurt you. She does like you. It is rare for her to sit on anyone’s lap but my own.”
Richard strode into the room. “Here you are. That cat is going to leave fur all over you, Darcy.”
That was the least of Darcy’s worries about Pepper.
“Miss Bennet, the sun is finally out, and I wondered if you would care to go for a stroll in the gardens,” said Richard.
Darcy glared at him, but before Elizabeth could even respond, a familiar hearty voice came from the entrance hall. “Never mind. I’ll show myself in.”
ELIZABETH QUICKLY ROSEto her feet. What man would dare to march into Rosings uninvited? Neither Darcy nor the colonel appeared particularly surprised, though.
A stout older gentleman with long sideburns strode into the room, his gloves in one hand. “There you are, my boy. And Darcy, too, I see.”
Pepper jumped off Darcy’s lap and ran behind Elizabeth’s skirts.
Darcy bowed. “Welcome to Rosings, sir.”
The man tossed his dusty gloves on a side table, apparently oblivious to the fact that a servant would have to clean it as a result. “Catherine has got herself in a spot of trouble, I understand. How is she?”
“Improving slowly,” said the colonel. “She awakens briefly but speaks only nonsense. Sometimes she throws things.”
The older man guffawed. “Sounds like typical Catherine to me! I thought I had best check in on her myself. And is this the young lady who provided such signal assistance when my dear sister was taken ill?”
Pepper hissed softly.
“Yes, it is,” said Colonel Fitzwilliam. “Miss Bennet, might I have the honor of presenting my father, Lord Matlock?”
The Earl of Matlock, the Master of the Collegium of Mages. And someone had told him about her. Elizabeth caught her breath, her shoulders stiff. Somehow she managed to curtsy and murmur, “It is an honor, my lord.”
He advanced until he was standing directly in front of her. “Well, well, well. You have certainly managed to impress my son. He mentioned you in his letter. It seems we all owe you a great debt of gratitude.”
She could feel goosebumps rising on her arms. “Lady Catherine has been very gracious to me. I was happy to assist her in my own small way.”
Why was he looking at her so expectantly? Surely he did not expect her to offer him her hand. She would never take such a liberty with a peer of the realm! But he had raised his own hand, so she had no choice but to offer hers. What odd manners he had!
His hand closed around her fingers. The tingle of magic prickled her skin. The flavor of it was different from Darcy’s or the colonel’s, or even her father’s, but it was still familiar. It was like –
