His only claim to familiarity with Elizabeth had been his relationship to Charlotte, for the simple reason that she had always found him exceedingly dull. There was no quality worth admiring, no folly worth teasing. He was simply there; an object of polite discourse, a warm body that occasionally led her about a set at the Assembly. To marry such a man! Elizabeth’s entire soul shuddered at the blasphemy of surrendering her hand and future when she could not also give her mind, her heart, nor even her sincere respect.
Elizabeth pulled the blankets to her chin and stared upward. No, she would marry no man she could not love as she had loved Darcy, and as such a man did not exist—none could ever hope to compare—she would remain alone. A deep sigh filled her lungs, and her eyes drifted closed… and as always, he was waiting for her.
A tendril of her own hair drifted across her cheek, a whisper of breeze tickled her brow, and then that comforting warmth caressed her eyelids, brushing lightly over each. “Elizabeth!”
She lifted her chin, tipping her face into the soft touch. Her lips curved faintly as she mouthed back, “William.”
“Oh, my dearest Elizabeth! What grieves you, my love?” The words in the dream curled round her ears, piercing and echoing until she heard them spoken in truth—low and trembling.
She attempted to smile, raising hesitant fingers to brush his roughened cheeks. “William,” she whispered, “you are so thin, you look to have endured hell itself! Why do you ask what grieves me? Do you not know what I would give to hold you and to be your comfort?”
“You already are, my love. No darkness could prevent your face illuminating my way. But oh, my Elizabeth, if I did not have to leave you the moment I awake!”
She breathed in his scent—strong and masculine—and threaded her arms about his neck. “Then never wake! Let us remain always so. I can be content here.”
She felt his breath catch, sensed the weight of his arm tightening round her back as he pulled her close, but then he was pushing her away.
She lifted her face from his chest. “William?”
He was shaking his head, sliding his arms from her to capture her hands. “’Tis not fair, Elizabeth.”
She shuddered in reply. “Fate has been too cruel to us! Could I only have known that I would lose you—”
“No!” He touched a finger to her lips, his dark eyes hooded with grief. “No, that is not what I meant. It is not fair to you, Elizabeth.”
She sniffed and rested a hand upon his chest. “You must not speak so, William. It is not I who was taken. I remain here, as I have always been. It is you who have been wronged.”
“Yet it is you who remain shackled to a phantom in the night. You have another life, Elizabeth—people who love you, a future to live.”
A chill shivered through her scalp and she opened her mouth in denial, but he brushed his thumb over it to silence her. “Please, my dearest, I cannot allow your days to be taken as mine were.”
Her eyes began to burn and a sob caught in her throat. “My days are already a torment, William! Every waking moment leads me farther from you. Gladly would I sacrifice my reality for these moments in your arms.”
He pulled her close once more, his chest shaking in restrained anguish. “But there is more for you. You must permit life to have its way in you, else you will die. I could not bear it, my precious Elizabeth!”
“What would you have me do, William? I did not summon these dreams of you as an act of will, nor do I understand why you are so real to me, but I cannot deny the truth. You are mine and I love you, William!”
Something like a cry burst from him and his arms tightened still more. His cheek, wet with agonised joy, he rested atop her head as he trembled for breath. “My Elizabeth! You have made my existence worthwhile. Would that I could do the same for you! But it is too selfish of me to keep you for my own. I can bring you nothing more but grief, my love.”
“Do you expect me to simply forget you, to cease seeing you whenever I close my eyes? Even if I could, there must be some reason for you to always be in my heart!” she protested.
“My darling, I do not deserve to have you making yourself miserable on my account. You must allow some other to fill your thoughts, so that I may fade.”
She pressed her tear-streaked face to his shoulder, clinging to his shirt. “There could never be any other, William. How could I love again?”
“A moderate degree of affection may grow from friendship, may it not? Even a comfortable sort of accord, with a home and family of your own, would be preferable to the waking nightmare that has been yours because of me.”
“And I am to settle for comfortable accord, after I have known what it is to have my heart shattered, seared, and set aflame? You believe I could be content with only a ‘moderate degree of affection’?”
“Not content, no, but no longer tormented, Elizabeth. I beg you would live again, and know that with you, you carry those hopes I was never able to realise. Love for me, my darling.”
She buried her face more deeply into his chest, pushing against him until he reclined back and held her cradled in his embrace. She fought to breathe, and for a fleeting instant dreamt of suffocating herself in his arms. At least then, she would nevermore be parted from him. This horror he had asked of her—could he really expect her to do it? She sobbed, a piteous gasp, and bit her frozen lips. “How?” she whispered into his neck.
“Laugh, Elizabeth. Laugh as you did on the night I first set eyes upon you. You captured my heart in that moment, for no other has ever shone so brightly in her joy as you did. You have lost that—I have robbed you of it—and I cannot bear to see you so broken! I would rather see you at peace in another’s arms than devastated in my own.”
She swallowed, not lifting her head. “I do not think I have it in me.”
“You do, if anyone does. There is none so strong and clever as my Elizabeth. Please, my darling, will you try?”
