Realanger.
He drove Fitz backward into the nearest bedpost hard enough to rattle his teeth.
Several boys shouted. Someone laughed nervously.
Georgie grabbed Fitz by the front of his coat and hissed low enough only he could hear, “You do not strikeme, Darcy. Not when your father wishes I were his son instead of you.”
Fitz shoved him back instinctively.
Georgie hit him again, and this time the blow landed properly. Pain burst across Fitz’s cheekbone as he stumbled sideways into the washstand, sending water crashing across the floor.
The noise finally brought a master running. “What is the meaning of this?!”
The boys scattered instantly. Georgie stepped back at once, breathing heavily but already composed.
Fitz tasted blood.
The master’s gaze swept across the room, taking in overturned furniture, spilled water, and Fitz’s bruising face. “Darcy? Wickham?”
Neither spoke.
The master’s expression darkened. “Fighting.”
An hour later, Fitz stood rigid beneath cold torchlight while the headmaster pronounced punishment. Georgie accepted his verbal rebuke with bowed head and convincing remorse.
Fitz remained silent as the headmaster turned his eyes toward him. “Gentlemen do not brawl like common street boys. It might be expected from those of lower birth,” here the headmaster sneered at Georgie, whose face darkened at the slight, “but you are the grandson of an earl, and better is expected of you.”
The lashing came afterward. It was not brutal; not by Eton standards, at least. But enough to leave fire burning across Fitz’s back beneath his shirt while humiliation hollowed him out from the inside.
Later that night, he lay awake in darkness staring at the canopy above his bed while pain pulsed steadily with every breath. Across the room, Georgie laughed quietly with another boy as though nothing had happened.
Not one apology.
Not one word.
And suddenly Fitz understood something dreadful.
Wickhamenjoyedit.
Not merely the laughter, but thepower. The ability to wound while convincing everyone it was harmless sport.
Slowly, carefully, Fitz rolled onto his side despite the pain, and he began to build the wall higher still.
Chapter 2
June 1796—Pemberley, Derbyshire
The two boys arrived home from Eton beneath heavy June skies after a miserable journey through rain-soaked roads. Fitz had spent most of the final day eager with anticipation. His mother’s last letter before term ended had spoken cautiously of her confinement approaching.
At last, a sibling. He scarcely cared whether it proved brother or sister, so long as it was healthy.
The carriage rolled beneath Pemberley’s great stone archway near dusk. Servants emerged quietly into the courtyard as the horses slowed.
Tooquietly.
Fitz noticed it immediately.
No one smiled.
