“Why would that be a sound reason for me to marry him?” Elizabeth said. “And it wasn’t Drystan who—”
“Elizabeth,” Drystan said.
“Weren’t we to divulge the truth? I believed we had an understanding,” she said.
“We do,” he said.
*
She narrowed hereyes at him and put as much confirmation and challenge in her next words as possible. “Nowwe do.”
“And for always.”
Those simple words did much to mitigate Drystan’s actions in her heart. Still, it hurt. She thought there was an understanding, and there was a part of her that wanted to continue being angry at him for coming in here, but something in his eyes was pleading with her. Could she give him this time? They’d talk to her father, persuade him to their decisions, and then…allow him to explain himself?
The answer was almost so easy she never needed to ask the question. Of course, she’d give him a chance to explain. They’d barely talked over the years. They were nothing but second chances and almosts. To truly talk after this would be a gift.
“Why do I feel like there’s two separate conversations going on here?” her father boomed.
“That’s because there is—” she said.
“There’s only one,” Drystan said at the same time.
“Which is it?” her father demanded.
At her father’s sudden glower, Elizabeth grasped her hands. Perhaps she was too hasty to come barging in here, but while she was being dressed, the chamber maid entered her room, announcing the steward was meeting with her father.
Running out, she couldn’t believe it was true, and yet it was. Feeling partly betrayed, mostly cross, she wanted to give a good rounding to both of them. But now she could see perhaps she should have waited, or at least, heard the conversation before she joined.
When her father got this color, he usually ordered everyone out.
Steadying her heart, she turned to her father. There was only one argument to make, that of not marrying John if that could be accomplished, then she could marry Drystan…who hadn’t even proposed. But he said he loved her, which had to count for something.
“There’s only one point,” she said. “That of my unwanted marriage to John. You can’t like him, Father.”
“No,” he said. “And if the weather hadn’t hit us this year and last, I could keep refusing his offer. But you’re of age, the crops are poor, and I lost livestock.”
First compared to a dessert, now equal to crops? Her father couldn’t know the hurt his words inflicted. That was the only truth that kept her from crying out. Still, when she looked to Drystan, his eyes gazed softly at her.
“Backing out now means concerns for the family,” her father continued. “Who knows what repercussions they’ll strike with.”
“There will be no repercussions.” Drystan cleared his throat. “With the funds, the estate will be invulnerable. She doesn’t need to marry him if we change our methods here and diversify the property.”
“More of that buying land elsewhere nonsense,” Galoncryf huffed.
When Drystan looked to her, she nodded in as much encouragement as she could.
“We can’t keep moving the livestock from higher ground to lower and back up,” Drystan said.
“It’s not sustainable. Boundaries will be made. If Galoncryf estate diversifies to wheat, not just barley, to sheep, not only cattle, and we buy in Scotland and England, the estate can survive any storm.”
There was still something unmoveable in her father. Drystan presented sound reasons, there was a chest of coin to make the estate all it could be, and yet…he wasn’t saying the right words.
If she hadn’t barged in here, her future with Drystan would have been impossible. It was good she interrupted him. Better if she didn’t let him talk anymore. What was he thinking coming in here without her?
“Is your hesitation about not trusting him because I do,” she said.
“It’s the fact he’s a steward not by training, but by default,” Galoncryf growled.
