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“He was not ill-treated in my father’s stables, surely?”

Golda shook her head. “Put that out of your head,” she said, gathering up the leftover curtains. “Nothing ails him, and he will be right enough, given time.”

Relieved on that score, Aimee turned toward the window where the sun was hanging low in the sky. “You will need to take some bed clothes along to Miss Magnatrude and Freda also,” she said conscientiously. “They will need their beds made up before long and water also to wash.”

“Oh, you don’t need to worry about them.” Golda pulled a face. “His lordship brought their servants along not half an hour ago. They’ve been seeing to their comfort alright. They’ve had the first lot of the hot water already.”

“Did he?” Aimee asked in astonishment. “Oh, I had no notion.” She remembered the unbolted door and realized that must have been his errand. “Should I go and check they are settled in, I wonder?”

Golda pursed her lips. “You’re the bride, Miss Aimee, and this is your wedding day. All you need worry about is taking your comfort now.” She walked to the door. “I’ll send Unwin up with a glass of wine for you and some hot water presently.”

“Thank you,” Aimee responded, but her capable servant had already closed the door after her.

Aimee sighed and, climbing the steps to the platformed bed, sat on the feather mattress, reaching up to the remove the jeweled pins that secured her veil to her head. She made a small pile of them on top of the bed coverings and then carefully folded the intricately decorated veil and set it down next to them.

Next, she removed the simple gold chain from about her throat and placed it on top of the veil along with the engraved silver ring that had been her mother’s. Now she was a baroness she could wear more extravagant jewelry, she reflected, and remembered the gifts she had bought for her new kinswomen. Her spirits brightened. She would set about winning their good opinion on the morrow.

A knock on the door had her starting up from the bed, but it was merely Unwin, carrying a small table into the room. Golda followed on his heels with a basin of water. She set it down on the table and removed a cloth from her shoulder to put next to it. “Come and wash, milady,” she said. “Unwin will light your fire as I fetch your supper.”

As Aimee vigorously washed her face and neck, Unwin set about laying the fire in her hearth. She was just drying her neck when Golda re-entered with wine and a tray of foods.

“Shall I take down your hair, Miss Aimee?” Golda asked. “I mean, milady,” she corrected herself painstakingly.

Aimee touched the elaborate arrangement of her hair. She felt oddly reluctant to lose the last vestiges of her bridal appearance. “Not just yet, Golda,” she prevaricated. “It is not so very late after all.”

Golda lifted an eyebrow at her but held her tongue. “It’s a shame we can’t manage your trunk up them stairs,” she said after a moment’s silence. “But it’s more’n the boy and I can manage between us.”

“You are not to even try,” Aimee responded at once. “I can manage well enough without it this eve.”

“Is there anything I can fetch from it that you might want?” Golda asked. “A comb? A clean shift?”

Aimee thought of how lovingly she had packed her bridal trunks and felt a pang at the thought of Golda rifling through it for her essentials. “No, thank you, Golda. I can unpack my trunks soon enough. Please do not fret on my account.”

The maid pressed her lips together and said no more. She and Unwin moved the table to position it nearer to the fire. As Golda set out the food, Unwin carried Aimee’s goblet of wine to her, and she took it from him with a smile. “Thank you, Unwin.” He bobbed his head and retreated.

“Will there be anything else, milady?” Golda asked, crossing to the window and glancing briefly out before she emptied the basin of water out of the window.

“No, that will be all, thank you both.”

When they had departed, Aimee moved to the window and drank her wine as she watched the sun go down on her wedding day. She wondered what Ursula was doing right now. Was she taking supper with her husband? Aimee glanced over her shoulder at the table which had been set with enough for two. And where oh where was her own errant bridegroom?

8

It was not until some two hours later when she had quite given up on him that Aimee heard the heavy rap on her door. Hearing it now, she marveled that she could have ever mistaken Golda or Unwin’s knock for her husband’s. She sat up as the door opened and watched him enter in silence before closing it behind him.

He stood a moment in silence, surveying her so grimly that Aimee felt a tingle of alarm spread through her body. Then she decided the coldness of his glare must surely be a trick of the shifting shadows from the firelight.

“Shall I light more candles?” she heard herself say in a quavering voice. “Only it has turned rather dark in here.” When he said nothing, she asked, “Have you yet eaten?”

He gave a brusque nod and turned his back to her as he drew his tunic up over his head, and the words she had been about to utter withered and died on her lips. She sat as though paralyzed, watching the muscles in his back ripple. Flinging his tunic on the floor, he turned next to unlacing his crotch, and Aimee turned her head sharply to face forward, her breath coming fast.

She had long since shed her best gown and was clad now only in her shift. There was nothing more she could do to prepare, so she simply lay back down and tried not to panic. Old Janet, her father’s oldest servant, had told her how babies were made when she had turned thirteen. Merchant’s daughters were not generally sheltered against the facts of life.

Aimee reminded herself she was eager for the next part. She had anticipated Lord Kentigern’s embrace for months now, so it was no good shrinking from him now like some terrified virgin, even if that was what she was. Hearing her husband’s heavy footfalls against the floorboards as he approached the bed, Aimee braced herself and did not flinch when he reached for her.

When he rolled off her panting ten minutes later, she was reeling. The consummation had been jarring in its physicality, and for the first time, Aimee had not found Lord Kentigern’s size to be a source of wonder and awe. Underneath her husband, she had realized the act was one of shocking intimacy.

The rapport she had established – or failed to establish with her husband – made her feel very alone as he had rolled off her. He had not been rough with her; far from it. Instead, he had handled her with a sort of calculated and studied care that had chilled her somehow quite to the bone. He had known what he was doing, and he had done it with the cool and detached patience of an impartial stranger.