The Prince's Bride

Chapter Twenty-Two

Gabriel surprised them all by asking to hold the wedding at his camp in Savernake Forest. Sister Marie located a priest who was willing to marry them, but the man was disinclined to preside over the already unorthodox wedding in an Anglican chapel. If they must have the wedding outside, Gabriel said they might as well enjoy something different than their everyday experience in the well-trod garden of Mayapple. And if they convened in his camp, his grooms might stand witness.

With Mr. Soames expected at the beginning of the week and the priest only available for a day, their timing was limited. The chosen day happened to fall on the very same as the dinner party Elise planned for Bartholomew’s school friend and his family. Elise offered to cancel the party but Ryan begged her to carry on. There was time enough for a morning ceremony in the forest and the evening dinner. The family would be away for the wedding and Mayapple staff could prepare for the party. The forest venue allowed for two events to occupy the same day.

It also allowed Gabriel to reveal his camp to Elise and her husband without an official unveiling. If the wedding took center stage, Gabriel could share Savernake Forest without having to explain his life there in quite so many words.

Ryan would not make more assumptions about the logistics of the wedding than that. It was a gesture meant to heal a family, not a sign that their marriage was anything more than—

Well, anything more than what it was. Which was a means to an end that protected her. She could also acknowledge that his camp was comfortable and familiar to him. He was being forced to marry her after all; why not do this unwanted thing in the place he wanted most of all?

If Ryan also found favor with the forest... if she looked forward to returning to his cave-cottage, well... they’d both gotten what they wanted. Or, half of what they wanted. Ryan wanted the wedding—though it was “in name only.” She didn’t want a marriage of convenience, but that was her destiny. At least she would do the thing in a beautiful ancient wood, in the cool September air, with the leaves just beginning to turn, and Gabriel’s cabin as a backdrop.

“But were you really blindfolded the first time my brother brought you to his camp, Ryan?” asked Elise, nudging her horse closer. They rode through Savernake Forest in a long, winding procession. Gabriel led the way with little Marie in his lap. Killian Crewes rode with Sofie next. After that, Sister Marie and the priest. Bartholomew, God love him, drove a small wagon containing the maid Agnes, wide-eyed and clutching the sides, and a trunk with Ryan’s wedding dress. Elise and Ryan were last in line. Only Baby Noelle had been left behind with Nanny. The woman had suffered a severely burned tongue from hot chocolate but was convinced to mind the baby for the morning.

“No, not blindfolded,” Ryan told her, “but he did ask me to close my eyes. It’s a very great honor, I assure you, being invited to this camp. You should count yourself lucky.”

“Well, the journey from not knowing him at all, to his sporadic letters, to being a wedding guest has been a long one, indeed. But the real champion today is you, Lady Ryan. It’s no small thing to forsake all others and marry my brother, especially because he promises you so very little.”

Ryan chuckled sadly. “I’ve had my own journey with him, haven’t I? When I first met him, he told me Prince Gabriel d’Orleans was dead. He wouldn’t even tell me his name. And now he’s marrying me. So. He does things in his own time.”

“That is a very gracious view for someone who is—I hope you don’t mind me saying—obviously very fond of him. It has been clear to all of us that you share some affection.”

Ryan smiled. “It’s an open secret that we are not enemies, I suppose. Matters were not helped by these last weeks together at Mayapple. You are terrible chaperones, which I suspect was by design. It was sweet, your subtle encouragement.”

“Not enemies, indeed,” said Elise. “But he refuses to claim you as his actual wife in every way. This could be seen as short-sighted at best. At worst? Selfish. If I’m being honest.”

“Our faux union is not a rejection of me, it is a safeguard of his own freedom.”

“Yes but will that freedom keep him warm at night?” asked Elise.

Ryan cleared her throat but made no reply. The caravan of horses had turned eastward, bearing into the steadily rising sun. Dappled sunbeams illuminated the canopy overhead. All around them, autumn leaves twirled from the treetops. They dropped to the forest floor and created a patchwork of orange, and yellow, and brown. It was so beautiful, it made Ryan’s heart ache. Or perhaps Ryan’s heart ached because Elise was right. Gabriel had chosen his freedom over her. She did not begrudge him this, but there was sadness to sacrifice.

“Lady Ryan?” Elise asked, “if my brother asked you, would you leave your family and live in the forest with him and raise a family?”

Ryan closed her eyes, shutting out the beauty of the forest. This was a painful question. The answer—yes—floated into her mind like a falling leaf. But living in Savernake with Gabriel—which, it should be remembered, he’d not asked her to do—would steal her purpose as caregiver and steward to her own family. The real answer was more like, maybe. Someday. After her father’s health improved or he passed on. After Diana and Charlotte were married and the estate was self-sufficient. When everyone could get on without her. If, after the great many years it might take to achieve these, he still wanted her—of course she would come. If he hadn’t met someone more convenient or beautiful or bold. She hadn’t lied when she’d said he was starved for a woman’s touch. Another truth: Any woman would want him. He was beautiful, and passionate, and capable, and—even if he fought it—regal in his own, rustic way. Reuniting with his sister was only one of many returns to civilization that he would make. Next, Pewsey. After that, Marlborough. The women would come.

But Elise had asked her a question. After a long moment, Ryan said, “Maybe.” The truth. Maybe if fifty things could be accomplished and the stars aligned and if he still wanted her. But she’d learned long ago not to pin her hopes and dreams on some man. She was invisible to most men and a sacrifice that Gabriel could not make. She had been remarkably unchosen for as long as she could remember. She could allow the reality of this to make her bitter and resentful or she could choose herself.

“I’ll take your maybe,” said Elise, “and I’ll not let anyone in Wiltshire forget it. You have my word.”

Ryan smiled. “You have been so very kind to me. Everyone in your family has been lovely. I will miss you terribly when I go.”

“Well, let’s not think of that yet. We have the wedding, we have the dinner party tonight, next comes Mr. Soames. I did not mean to dampen the festive mood of the wedding by pressing you on these serious topics. Forgive me.”

“No forgiveness is necessary. Oh, but look, we’re almost to the camp. I remember this bit. Here the trail will disappear and we’ll weave through this copse of trees. Gabriel takes a different route every time to conceal the way. When we emerge on the other side, we’ll round a hillside and then you’ll see it. I was so very impressed the first time. I know we tried to describe it, but he lives in a sort of modified cave beneath a hill. He has an underground waterfall next to his bedroom.”

Elise cleared her throat. “Does he?”

Ryan felt herself blush. “And the stables and horses are incredible. He’s a kitchen garden, a cellar for grain and winter storage, a smokehouse, chickens, of course; and—oh, look...”

They cleared the grove of trees and rounded the hill and Gabriel’s camp came into view—rough-hewn but tidy, just as she remembered it. Beside the cottage, in front of the kitchen garden, an arbor had been erected, the arch adorned with leaves of every shade of burgundy, and crimson, and aubergine, and pink. Coral-colored ribbon had been twined between the branches and streamed out, flapping in the breeze. Before the arch, a collection of chairs, mismatched except for their unsanded knobbiness, had been arranged in short rows. Stoneware vases containing bouquets of wildflowers—harebell, rockrose, wild parsnip, and others Ryan didn’t know—had been positioned beside the innermost chairs, creating an aisle. It was like a beautiful little outdoor cathedral, with the grassy hill on one side, the garden behind, and the forest in gleaming autumn color all around.

Ryan blinked back tears, taking in the simple beauty and natural splendor of the scene.

“Someone’s been busy,” said Elise, kneeing her horse forward. “Can I assume the outdoor vignette is not a permanent installment.”

Ryan, unable to speak, shook her head.

“Well, I knew he’d been gone from Mayapple for two days. What an effort he’s made. Good for him. I dare say, this is rustic,” she added, looking around. “I cannot believe my brother lives in a cave.”

“Please don’t remark upon it,” Ryan said, recovering quickly. Elise looked at her, cocking an eyebrow.

“That is,” Ryan added, “he believes that outsiders will not see it as he does. He is anxious for you, in particular, to accept it, I believe.”

“Oh, I accept it,” said Elise, reining around. “I’ll accept anything to be a part of his life, even saying goodbye to you, which is the most difficult part of accepting him. But you did say you might consider returning. Perhaps what I mean is: How could you possibly live in a cave? If you did come back? Life in the forest is no small request.”

“Yes, well, no one has made this request, have they?” said Ryan.

“No,” mused Elise softly, “I don’t suppose they have.”

Two hours later, Gabriel stood beneath the arbor he’d built, sweating in the only waistcoat he owned, waiting for Ryan Daventry to emerge from his front door and be escorted to him by his nieces.

His sister Elise and her husband smiled at him from the chairs he’d arranged in rows. His two grooms, Smith and Tucker, sat behind them, looking uncomfortable in their only waistcoats—and also a little confused. The nun Marie hovered on the periphery, checking the trees for anyone who might have followed them. Killian’s nephew Bartholomew stood to the side, tuning up a mandolin. Gabriel had not asked for music, but Bart had insisted and Gabriel had thought, why not?

From the moment he lit upon the idea of marrying Ryan in his garden, his plan for the ceremony had mushroomed from an exchange of vows to a proper wedding. Instead of thinking about the meaning of getting married, he’d occupied himself with guessing how a proper wedding might look and what Ryan might enjoy. Gabriel had not attended a wedding since he was a child; and even then, he hadn’t been a guest. He’d been a page boy who trailed behind his cousin when she walked the aisle at Notre Dame. After that, he’d been swept away by nannies so he did not fidget during the hours-long Mass. But he’d read about weddings in books and newspapers, and he knew the beauty of his own garden, and he knew that if he could extract Ryan from her existing life and install her in his own, he would seal the union just like this. They would marry in the beauty of the forest, with only his family and grooms, secluded from the world.

He could not extract Ryan from her life—he knew this—and she’d refused to commit to any preference for the wedding whatsoever, so he’d simply done what he wanted. One thing led to another and, in hindsight, maybe the little stage was a test for all of them. Would a rudimentary, outdoor ceremony be enough for Ryan when it came to something so important as a wedding? She’d been very comfortable at Mayapple and her own home was very grand indeed. If, in another life, at another time, she was able to leave Guernsey and consider life with him, would Christmases and May Days celebrated at outdoor parties be sufficient?

And what of Elise and Killian? His sister had never not been a princess. She’d exiled in St. James’s Palace and now lived on a lavish estate. Her husband literally referred to her as “Highness.” After the ceremony, she would leave this forest glen and host a dinner party for esteemed guests. Likewise, her husband’s stables boasted every modernization. Killian managed Mayapple, his nephew’s estate near Hampton, and various other properties throughout Britain. Compared to these, Gabriel’s camp was so very modest. He didn’t mean to test their acceptance so much as show them the reality of his life. They’d been asking to be let in for years. They’d opened their home to him, and now he would open his home to them. Could Elise reconcile her memories of him, also her future hopes for him, with the man he’d become?

So far, they’d been lovely. Killian had marveled at his horses and stables. Elise and the girls had seemed charmed by his cottage and waterfall. And Ryan had been—

Well, Ryan had not regarded him beyond quick glances and questions about where she might change clothes. It had been this way since they’d kissed beneath the wagon. She’d become single-mindedly focused on the logistics of returning home. Her only interest in the wedding had been the time and place and the procurement of the priest. Her only interest in their faux courtship had been how they would present themselves to the solicitor, and for how long, and how soon she could depart when it was over. Her attitude was, in every way, what they needed and also nothing like he wanted.

It was unfair and painful to confuse things. She would return to Winscombe—she was already there in her mind—and he would return to the anonymous life he wanted as Gabriel Rein. They’d said everything there was to say—each conversation ended in a small fight and a riot of nearly making love. They’d come so very close beneath the wagon. He would not dishonor her by taking her virginity and then sending her into the wide world alone.

Going forward, he would have a sister and nieces, but he would not have a wife. Ironically, that didn’t mean he could not have a wedding. He would give this to her, if nothing else—a proper wedding that hopefully she could remember with fondness.

“Ah, here she is,” said the priest, inching his pointed hat back on his head.

Gabriel looked at the man, confused, and realized he meant the bride had emerged. He would promise himself to her; he would rescue her and then desert her. In his gut, the pinch of a sharp thorn began to throb. Gabriel looked at the priest and looked at the sky. From somewhere to the side, Bartholomew began to strum the mandolin.

What am I doing?he thought.

Little girl laughter and snatches of conversation could be heard from the direction of the cottage.

“Come, come, Lady Ryan...”

“Bartholomew has begun the music...”

“No, Agnes, she wants her hair loose...”

Gabriel turned to the sound of the voices. Coming around the corner of the house, each hand pulled by one of his nieces, Ryan Daventry floated toward him. She wore a dress of deep magenta, the color of a stalk of foxglove. Her hair was long and flowing, with a crown of ivy and wildflowers ringing her head and streaming down her back. She looked to the girls, smiling and laughing, and Gabriel thought he’d never seen anything so beautiful in all his life. The pinch in his gut dug deeper.

She looked up and around, raising her eyebrows at Bartholomew and his instrument; she nodded to the grooms who’d staggered to stand, staring at her wide-eyed, clutching their hats to their chests. She smiled to Killian and Elise.

When, finally, she looked to him, she stumbled a little, pulled off balance by the girls—but locked onto him with a gaze so intense. It was her first time to look at him, to really look at him, since he’d held her beneath the wagon.

I’m sorry, he wanted to say.

I want you.

I did this for you.

I want you.

Stay.

These were the vows he wanted to make. This was what he wanted to tell her. When she reached his side and the little girls fluttered and spun to their parents, the priest began. Gabriel repeated the words after the priest, only changing one thing. His name.

“I, Gabriel Phillipe d’Orleans...” he said. Not Gabriel Rein.

It seemed less like a lie that way, and he did not want it to be a lie. He wanted it to be a wish. How long, he wondered, listening to her repeat her vows to him, had it been since he’d made some sort of wish? He’d stopped being afraid when he moved to the forest; started living on his own terms. But he’d also stopped hoping and dreaming and wishing. He existed.

Was this a foolish, unnecessary notion, he wondered. To wish?