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Madam looked out the window. Arthur shook his head so the lock fell again, and she slowly but surely plastered herself against the back of the bench. She cleared her throat. “And who are your Beta and Gamma?”
“I have neither.” Arthur sat back. “I have no clan.”
“Whyever not?” She turned back to him, genuine interest on her face. “You speak with passion regarding the hierarchy and the responsibilities of the Alpha and do not preside over a clan?”
Arthur took it in turn to sit back. “Did Georgie put you up to this?”
“Up to what?”
“To this, this insistence I take my responsibilities?”
“He did not. Nor have I done any such thing. Is this not a conversation?”
“It is an interrogation.” His bear muttered and scolded him. “I will speak no more on this topic.”
“As you please.” Madam turned her face from him, her profile so impassive as to have been carved like one of Gunter’s ice sculptures set as a centerpiece on a buffet at a levee. She tilted her head in a gesture very like her sardonic curtsying to princes. “Shall we discuss our favorite meals? Or colors?” He huffed. “No? Another time, perhaps.”
The rest of the drive was undertaken in silence. They stopped twice for refreshment; the sun began its descent in midafternoon, as it did at the time of year, and though the journey would end in a matter of moments, it would yet stretch before them for decades.Versipelleslived far longer than the average human; Madam would be released from this unwanted alliance well before Arthur shuffled off his mortal coil—ah, Hamlet—and then he…
Would be free. To return to his hibernation and his exile.
In less time than it took him to sink into a dolorous mood, the carriage turned between two ivy-covered pillars lacking a gate, and in an uncharacteristic fit of expression, Madam gasped.
Five
Beatrice grabbed a hanging strap for purchase. The vehicle rocked side to side as it negotiated the uneven surface of the drive, which needed not so much a raking as it did utter reconstruction. The coachman slowed to a crawl in deference to the horses as he guided them around one gaping hole after the next. What might once have been a grand avenue of oaks was uncared for, overgrown and untamed, with years of fallen leaves gone to mulch at their roots. The way to the manor was circuitous, like something out of a myth, the final obstacle the hero must traverse to achieve his triumph.
There was no triumph to be claimed. As the house came into view, she saw that the shrubbery flanking the terrace betrayed a lack of care, as did the stones of the terrace itself, as did the crumbling masonry of the building, as did the shattered windows on the first and second floors… It was three stories of desolation, topped by attics that surely suffered from the woeful state of the slates on the deteriorating roof. The hedgerows had lost shape, the lawn was a disgrace, and there were no tidy rows of servants lined up to greet them upon their arrival.
Beatrice took it in, as the coachman sang the horses down to a halt, as an outrider opened the door, lowered the steps, and handed her down, as she shook out her skirts and waited for the vast breadth of duke to join her.
She took it in, every brittle brick, every weed and bramble, every shattered pane, the general pall of disrepair and disregard, and contrary to reason, jubilation flooded her being.
***
Madam was seething, Arthur could tell. She stiffened as she looked the place over, taking in its decrepitude and disuse, spine rigid, bosom swelling, hand clenching the silly purse she carried. Her face was impassive, and yet he was certain she was infuriated.
He’d love to see her lose her composure, see that icy mien dissolve in fierce rage. He imagined her behind closed doors succumbing to true feeling, the rime of her public persona melting. Would she be as fiery in private as she was frosty in public? Why in the world were his thoughts trotting down this road? It must be the fault of his bear.
He got a grumble for his pains, the beast continuing his sulk.
Arthur gestured to the porch, and Madam processed up the shallow steps, happily finding the safest places to set her feet. Her tiny feet; they must be miniature if the rest of her was anything to go on, as delicate as her fingers were, and her button nose.
Arthur raised a hand to knock and saw the flinch, so minute and yet there. By the Gods, could he resurrect that poxed wolf he would, and see Castleton sent straight back to Helheim. Or whatever constituted the lupine infernal place. He opened his palm to bash against the door.
Moments passed as they waited for a response. The weather, which had become more threatening the farther they journeyed from Town, looked to be turning nasty as gray clouds rolled in from the west. Arthur banged on the door again and then tried the doorknob. His heightened hearing discerned a slow shuffle as he was about to put his shoulder to the bloody thing and render it into kindling.
A key turned in the lock, a laborious undertaking of scraping and tugging. The knob turned slowly, ominously, like the work of a specter in one of Mrs. Anchoretta Asquith’s Gothic novels. A huff and groan put paid to that theory as the door creaked open to reveal a small man dressed in butler’s livery dating from the seventeenth century. Worn velvet pantaloons were tucked haphazardly into felt knee boots; the man’s waistcoat looked to have only ten of its required thirty buttons, and his ornate frock coat was threadbare. He was of a height with the duchess thanks to his profound stoop; a well-furrowed face beamed from beneath a decrepit wig.
“Master Artie!” The butler’s face collapsed into even more wrinkles. “As I live and breathe!”
“It is a miracle you do so, Conlon,” Arthur said. “You were ancient when Odin was a lad.” He looked down at the duchess, astounded, as she had poked him inelegantly in the side.
“And is this…” Conlon’s voice wobbled with emotion. “Oh my days, is this our new duchess? Your Grace,” he intoned and started to bow, an undertaking that would likely take an hour or more.
“Please, Mr. Conlon, do not.” Madam stepped forward, a warm look in her eye if not a smile on her face. Arthur consulted the heavens to see if a drove of pigs soared overhead. “I suspect you suffer from your joints, and I desire you not to exert yourself.”
“It is the lumbago, ma’am,” Conlon admitted.
