Trapped at the Altar (4 page)

Ari's face was white, her own gray eyes suddenly huge against the pallor. But her voice when she spoke was strong. “I . . . I do not wish for this betrothal, sir.”

“And since when, my child, did you imagine your wishes were of the least importance to this family?” His voice was low, with all the hidden menace of a serpent's hiss. “You will do your duty, a duty that has been prepared for you from the moment of your birth. Ivor has understood that, why have you not?”

She stood straight, her small frame seeming somehow to dominate the dim chamber. “I have chosen not to think of the unthinkable, sir. I cannot marry Ivor.”

Her grandfather looked at her almost with pity, but his voice was icy. “You will marry Ivor Chalfont, Ariadne. That is all there is to be said. And as of this moment, your betrothal contract is ratified.” He pushed a parchment across the table to Ivor. “Sign.”

Ivor looked at Ariadne, who steadfastly stared at the wall ahead, and then he took up the quill and signed. He held it out to Ari, who ignored it, still staring at the wall.

“Sign,”
her grandfather rasped.

And to Ivor's relieved astonishment, she took the quill and carefully wrote her name in the assigned place.

“Good. That is done.” Lord Daunt took the parchment, wrote his own name below theirs, sanded the sheet, and folded it carefully, sealing it with candle wax and imprinting his own seal from his signet ring in the wax. He reached into his pocket and took out a silver box, which he slid across the table to Ivor. “Put this on her finger.”

Ivor opened the box. The ring was one single emerald, large and square, in a diamond setting. It seemed far too large for Ari's small, delicate hand, but when he held out his hand for hers, half expecting her to refuse him, she put her hand in his without a tremor. Her face was expressionless, but there was something in her eyes that filled him with deep unease. He knew from experience that Ariadne picked the time of her fights and had on many occasions caught him off guard. He slipped the ring on her finger. It had been sized to fit, but the stone was far too large and extravagant a decoration for her delicacy.

“It doesn't suit you,” Lord Daunt declared, “but it is the family betrothal ring, and therefore it is yours to wear.”

“Just as it doesn't suit me to marry Ivor, but he is the family choice, therefore he is mine to wed,” she stated almost distantly.

Her grandfather's eyes were lit with a momentary flash of anger, and then he said quite mildly, “I am glad you see the situation as it is, Ariadne. Your life will soon move outside this valley, yours and Ivor's. It is time for our families to resume their rightful places at court. The times are changing. King Charles maintains that he follows the Protestant
religion, but it is said in secret that he practices Catholicism. Be that as it may, he is old and failing, a life of debauchery finally taking its toll.” Contempt laced the old man's words, and he moved a hand in a dismissive gesture of disgust, as if consigning his King to oblivion.

He continued briskly, “His brother, the Duke of York, who will inherit the crown, makes no secret of his Catholic faith. His wife is openly of our faith, and the time is now right for us to return to the world. You, Ivor, have been trained as a courtier. I have done what I can to educate you in the ways of the court. You will stand accused of no crime, no treason. You have led an unblemished life. This I have ensured. After your marriage, you will go to London with all pomp and ceremony, a wealthy young couple of noble estate, and you will take your place at court.”

He passed a hand across his eyes with sudden weariness. A gesture Ivor had never seen before, and he thought the old man looked worn out as his face was illuminated by a ray of sun through the open window. His skin seemed paper-thin, and the shadows beneath his eyes were black, the lines around his mouth deeply etched. Was he dying? Had he had a premonition? The thought for an instant terrified Ivor. It was impossible to imagine the valley without the old man.

And then Lord Daunt waved a hand towards the door. “That is all I have to say to you both. Prepare for your wedding, Ariadne. The women know what to do, and I'm sure by now your bridal gown and trousseau are already well on their way to completion.”

Ariadne said nothing. She curtsied stiffly and walked out of the house, ignoring Ivor hurrying behind her. Outside in
the bright morning sunlight, she said only, “Go away, Ivor. I cannot bear to see you at the moment.” And she walked away to her own house, where she lived with her own female attendant.

And the next morning, the old man had been found dead in his bed, eyes wide open, staring at the ceiling as if something had startled him.

Ivor became aware of ten pairs of eyes looking at him with puzzled curiosity, and he pushed the memories of that day aside. Someone had been speaking to him, and he had failed to respond. He coughed. “I beg your pardon, gentlemen. My mind was elsewhere.”

“Obviously,” Rolf Daunt said drily. “And since the matter at hand concerns you most nearly, I would be grateful if we could have your undivided attention. I will ask again, is there any reason that you know of for Ariadne to be refusing this marriage?”

Ivor came fully to his senses, his mind snapping into focus. He shook his head. As far as he knew, only he, Ari, and her poet were aware of their attachment, so he could safely deny all knowledge of it. Since her grandfather's death, Ariadne had kept to herself, saying little to anyone, and he assumed her withdrawal had been considered a natural manifestation of her grief. No one had remarked upon it, at least . . . not until her bombshell that morning, when she had announced to her uncle that she refused to marry Ivor.

“Grief for her grandfather might account for it,” Ivor
suggested. “It's possible she finds something distasteful about the idea of dancing at her wedding when her grandfather's body is barely in the grave.” He looked around the table, feeling for the first time that he was taking his place in Council, that his opinion would now carry weight.

“That's nonsense . . . it was Lord Daunt's wish that in the event of his death, the wedding would take place seven days later. He made that clear in his final will. Honoring his wishes will be honoring him.”

“Maybe so, sir, but I think Ariadne is so grief-stricken that she cannot accept that.” Ivor wondered if he could use this newfound power to push for a postponement of the wedding and, if so, whether a delay would benefit Ari or himself. Would it give her time to accept the inevitable, or would it simply give her more time to agonize, to try to find a way out of it?

Short of turning her dagger upon herself, and that was not Ari's way, she would not succeed in avoiding this marriage, so better to get on with it, he decided. He continued with a confidence he was far from feeling, “However, I am sure, sir, that when the time comes, Ariadne will honor her grandfather's wishes.”

“She will have no choice in the matter,” Rolf declared. “And it is not right that she should be roaming the countryside at will and alone. You should have prevented her, Chalfont.” He gestured to a young man standing guard at the door. “You, Wilfred, take three men and go above, find Lady Ariadne, and bring her back immediately.”

Ivor said swiftly as the door closed behind Wilfred, “I will go myself, sir. There's no need for a search party.”

“They will find her soon enough,” Rolf stated with a dismissive gesture. “And we have not finished our discussion. Once the wedding is over, we will begin preparations for your journey to London. There, as my predecessor intended, you will advance the family's fortunes. With the right contacts, the right dispensations, we will leave this valley, and with the Daunt lands returned to us as the rightful owners, we will resume our place in the world.”

It was spoken with firm confidence, but Ivor couldn't help wondering how easy it would be to get the world to forgive and forget the twenty-year reign of pillage and terror across the countryside. The Daunt lands had been broken up when the family had been driven into exile, and it was to be assumed their present owners would be reluctant to yield them up without a fight. But he merely murmured an assent, anxious to get out of the Council chamber and go in search of Ariadne. He could only pray that she was not with her poet if Wilfred and his friends found her before he did.

At last, Rolf signaled that the meeting was over, and Ivor hurried out into the afternoon. The steep cliff of the gorge threw the valley into shadow as the sun sank lower, and he cursed Ariadne. She should have known better than to have stayed away this long. He glanced up the cliff, just making out the narrow trail snaking to the top. There was no sign of the small figure picking her way down to the valley. Wilfred and his friends would
have left on horseback by the main pass out of the gorge. They would have reached the cliff top five or ten minutes ago. It didn't bear thinking of what would happen if they found her with Fawcett.

Did Ariadne really love her poet? It was a novel idea and arrested Ivor mid-step. For a moment, he stood still, hands thrust deep into his britches' pockets. Somehow he had assumed Ari was merely in the grip of a fleeting romantic fantasy. Most girls her age had them, or so he believed, and having lived all her life in the shelter of the valley, there would be something almost exotic about a man from the outside world. She would come to her senses soon enough. Or so he had believed.

But Ariadne was not like any of the valley women. She had been treated differently, of course; she was special, and everyone knew it. No young man from the valley would have dared approach her for a dalliance or even something more serious. Ivor was accustomed to thinking of Ari as belonging to him. She was his friend, his companion, destined to be his wife, and until this moment, he realized, he had never once wondered if she could be considered attractive or desirable in the ordinary sense of the words. It had seemed an irrelevant consideration.

But clearly, her poet found her so. Abruptly, he felt a wash of intense jealousy, so surprising it almost took his breath away. The thought that they were up there on the cliff top somewhere, playing at lovers, or whatever it was they did together, was suddenly intolerable. She
belonged
to him. How
dared
she renege on such a binding pact? It was her destiny, and she knew it. It was one thing to dally
with a romantic fantasy before that destiny had been presented to her as immutable, quite another now that it was fixed in stone. Now this romantic dalliance became a personal slight.

He started for the stables to fetch his horse. It was his business and his alone to find her and bring her home.

Lord Daunt remained at the table in the Council house, drumming his fingers on the tabletop.

Three of his brothers had also stayed behind, and the youngest of them inquired rather tentatively, “Is something the matter, Rolf?”

“I don't trust Ariadne,” Rolf declared after a moment. “She's always been impetuous and not inclined to obedience. Our father indulged her shamefully, and she thinks she can do what she likes. It's time she realized things have changed, and she'll do as I want, when I want.”

He took a deep draught of the ale in his tankard. “My informants tell me that if the Duke of Monmouth lands along this coast, the West Country will almost certainly rise in his support. If his rebellion succeeds and he takes the throne, then the Protestant faction in this part of the world will become all-powerful, and our position in this valley will be even more precarious. Up to now, we haven't been troubled by London interference. My father believed it was because the King has Catholic leanings, whatever front he puts on for public show. But Monmouth is a fanatic, as bad as Cromwell in his heyday, and if he chooses to send the might of an army after us, we cannot with-
stand such a force, however protected we seem to be in this stronghold. But if the Daunt name is reinstated in court favor, through this marriage of Ariadne and Ivor Chalfont, our Protestant connections will ensure we don't invite persecution.”