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Chapter 1
Brunlow, Oxfordshire 1810
“Be quiet, Rupert, or we will be discovered,” Violette whispered to the Jack Russell at her side and urged him to follow her. The dog immediately abided by her order, quieting down, and hurrying after her as they ran across the garden.
The Snowspring estate had a garden that Violette loved to escape to. With the yew bushes growing high, forming wiggly walls of dark green leaves and berries in the winter, it was the perfect place to hide from the house.
Now in the height of summer, between the bushes there were tall sunflowers, with bright yellow petals sitting like crowns around each flower head. Violette ran between these flowers, heading further into the garden.
“Violette? You must come back at once! What will your father think?” Violette’s mother’s voice echoed round the garden. Hearing it was much closer than she had first anticipated, she bobbed down, crouching behind one of the yew bushes and tucking Rupert under her arm, urging him to be still on the ground beside her. “You must come greet our visitors, Violette.”
“What will father think?” Violette muttered so quietly under her breath that her mother wouldn’t hear her on the other side of the yew bushes. “I could not care less.”
Rupert made a tiny little bark as though in agreement with her.
“Shh!” Violette said to him quickly. Atop his white body, the pale brown tail wagged happily, not understanding he’d done a thing wrong. Fearing her mother had heard the bark, Violette stood straight and ran the other way past the yew bushes, heading further into the centre of the garden, with Rupert happily following at her heels, presuming it was another of their usual games.
Once they were free of the yew bushes, she made her way into the centre of the walled garden section. In the middle was a pond, where she and Victor used to make paper boats and float them on the surface. These days, the pond was full of lily pads and fish swimming back and forth. Just as Rupert moved to the edge of the pond, peering at the smooth surface in curiosity, Violette did too at his side.
Staring back at her was her reflection, with the eyes that were a mixture of hazel and green on the pond surface, bold in her face. Her copper-brown hair was messy, falling out of its updo with curls hanging almost everywhere.
She had given up long ago trying to tame it, not that she minded its unruly nature too much. From a young age, she had seen how as soon as she stepped outside into the garden in the morning, it would fall out of its restraints, wild and flowing in the breeze.
“Violette?” her mother’s voice was getting nearer. She turned away from looking in the pond to stare at the gate in the walled garden. There was a chance that she might just be able to hide out here a little longer, until their guests left, so that she wouldn’t be forced into their company.
“Shh, Rupert,” Violette urged again to the Jack Russel as she sat on the low wall around the pond. The dog moved to her feet, snuffling around her shoes in its keenness to be stroked by her.
“How do you expect to conduct yourself after your debut if you are constantly hiding in the garden?” The words were much closer than she had expected them to be. Violette turned a little on the wall, looking to the opposite side of the walled garden, surprised to see her mother had come in through a different gate entirely.
Her mother was standing there with her hands on her hips and those same hazel-green eyes staring back at Violette, though the face and hair were aging.
“I still hope to delay my debut,” Violette said truthfully as she hung her head a little.
“Do not be silly, child.” Lady Rowena Brunlow dismissed her objection with a wave of her hand as she walked forward.
“See? You call me a child. Am I not too young to make my debut so soon?”
“It is customary for one so young to have their debut. I had mine when I was a year younger than you, not a day over eighteen,” she said as she walked around the pond toward Violette. “Now, your father has requested your presence, so you must come.”
“Must I?” Violette asked. She released her hold on Rupert and reached out to a lily pad leaf, pulling it free of the pond in order to play with it and fold it into a new shape.
“Your father insists on it.”
“Does that mean we must all follow his orders?”
“Violette,” her mother’s stern voice made Violette’s shoulders slump as she bent over the lily pad. “You know we must.”
“I do not see why we must,” Violette muttered, uncertain if her mother had really heard her at all. It was always the way, for as long as Violette could remember. Whatever her father asked her mother would meekly agree to. She half wondered sometimes if Rowena were capable of having a mind and an opinion of her own.
“I am not having this discussion with you again,” Rowena said, reaching down and pulling at Rupert’s collar. “Come along, in you both come.” Rupert barked so loudly that Rowena stood straight and released his collar, placing a hand to her chest in surprise.
“Mother, he does not like that,” Violette explained as she patted Rupert’s head in comfort.
“He should follow an order.”
“Like the rest of us?” Violette scoffed, earning a narrowed glare accentuated by her mother’s dark eyebrows.
“Leave Rupert then and come inside alone,” Rowena said softly. “Why you prefer to spend your time with dogs and horses over people anyway baffles me.”
