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“Pick up a sword and fight me, damn you!”
“I will not hurt you,” Derith insists.
“You’ve already hurt me! More than you can ever understand!” I feel the tears streaming down my cheeks as I chase after him, slashing the blade wildly as if I’ve never held one before, his speed keeping him ahead of me.
“Listen!” Derith insists.
“Nothing you can say…!”
“I need you to know that I don’t blame you!” Derith shouts at me, holding up the chair again when I get too close. “When this is over. Don’t blame yourself for my death either. None of this is your fault. It’s all Balor. You did what you felt you had to do. He’s used your grief for your family against you—that’s how he was able to breach your mind. I need you to know that I don’t blame you for what’s about to happen, and I don’t want you to blame yourself.”
And then he stops backing up and turns to face me. He drops the chair to the floor and kicks it away from him.
“Master?” Kellen says in horror from where he stands at the mouth of the room.
That sudden change of tactic makes me pause in my tracks, but it’s only for an instant. Right now the need to end this, to kill him, beats like a drum in my head. The voices of my family seem to scream at me from beyond, echoing in my skull. I have to finish this now for my own sanity. It’s the only way they can be at peace.
I launch myself at Derith, my sword up, my eyes trained on him, on his amber eyes…
The world slows to a crawl, and I feel a sensation I’ve only felt once before; when Suisse came to me.
***
I was not the woman I was yesterday.
Yesterday, I was Suisse Cherval, today I am the Lady Suisse D’Orsay. Which does have a nice ring to it.
A week before that I was riding in the back of a carriage, on my way to meet the man I was going to marry, hoping he would turn out to be kind (and perhaps handsome too because I can be as shallow as the next woman).
Ours isn’t a love match—for families like ours, marriages based on love are a thing of the past as we struggle to hang onto the glories of past nobility. Cherval women married for money. Or, more accurately, we are married for money. My father picked out suitable husbands for each of my older sisters and they paid well enough to keep the wolf from the door. In their letters, they don’t seem too miserable.
Part of me wishes we could live a simpler life, in a small house with honest work. Although work doesn’t look especially wonderful. When I was little, I used to feel sorry for the girls who lived in the rows of pitiable houses past which we would drive on our way to visit wealthy relations and plead for money. They seemed to have it so hard; children younger than me toiling in the fields or milking the cattle. But when we drove back, late in the evening, having been politely but firmly rebuffed by some goggle-eyed dowager held together by face paint and corsets, those same houses glowed from within and shook to the sound of music and happy laughter.
Our house was huge. My dolls probably had nicer rooms than the girls who lived in those hovels. But there had never been laughter like that.
So; there were up sides and down sides to money.
Soon I would find out if marrying Lord Balor D’Orsay was up or down.
The castle was impressive, when I first arrived, if a little imposing.
It wasn’t what one would term ‘friendly’, but it was impressive. The horses’ hooves clattered on freshly swept cobblestones as we entered the courtyard. Servants in bright livery rushed out to welcome us, opening the door for me and placing a footstool so I could step down.
“Miss Cherval?”
That was the first time I heard the voice of the man who would shortly become my husband, and there were butterflies in my stomach as I turned to get my first look at him.
“It is a pleasure to meet you.” Balor bowed. “You are even more lovely than your father described.”
The reasons men wish to marry Cherval women are equal parts loveliness and reputation. My mother had been a great beauty and, while I hesitate to blow my own trumpet, my sisters and I had inherited those looks. Equally important, however, was the fact that the Chervals had been at the court of the old Royal family. While that dynasty is now gone, young nobles love to ally themselves with old blood, and it doesn’t get any older than Cherval blood.
“I am honored to meet you, my Lord.” I curtsied deeply.
“Please, please.” Gentle hands reached out to stop me and draw me back up again. “We are to be husband and wife. You do not need to curtsey to me. And my name is Balor.”
For the first time I looked him right in the face, I couldn’t suppress a flutter of excitement. He was far younger than the men to whom my sistershad been shackled and far more handsome than any man I’d ever seen. His dark handsomeness had an almost magical quality enhanced by his amber eyes.
I’d never seen eyes that color before, but I would see them again shortly.
