Chapter 27 #2
“Here,” she said, bending Charity’s arm so that they could see the bottom edge of her wrist clearly. Along the outermost edge, against the bone, was a small reddened cut. “Your mother wore a poisoner’s ring. If one squeezes hard enough, they fail to feel the cut.”
She let Charity’s arm fall limply back to the bed. “And you can see that the mark is easy to overlook. But this poison would be useless against the Tsar. It is known to us.”
Known? Peregrine’s heart was beating painfully inside his ribs, and he couldn’t catch enough air. “My mother tried to extort me for the cure—I assumed it was a lie.”
“No, Lord Fitzroy, it is no falsehood,” she replied. “But it has been more than a day since she was poisoned. I must caution, the longer it is in her blood, the smaller her chance of recovering her senses.”
Any chance was better than none at all. “Please,” he whispered. “Whatever you can do.”
“If I lend you my aid, you must give me your word that you will assist us in discovering the other traitor to my brother. There will be no retiring to a country seat out of reach while Her Grace lies recovering.”
“Your Imperial Highness,” Perry said, trying to suppress wild yearning. “If Charity wakes, that will be the easiest bargain I will ever make.”
Catherine Palovna smiled grimly, her eyes falling on the discarded apothecary box near the floor. She rooted through the bottles it contained, setting a few aside. “There are a few other samples I need for the compound.”
Peregrine laughed bitterly. “Perhaps you would like to look at the gardens.”
The Grand Duchess found all she needed and helped Perry prepare the formula before leaving with Sidmouth. “If she does not regain consciousness by morning, Lord Fitzroy,” she told him, setting her hand upon his arm, “then know I will be sorry for your loss. I liked Her Grace a great deal.”
He swallowed the lump forming in his throat again. “Thank you for what you have done, nonetheless.”
The others offered to spell him, but Perry sent the maid and the others away again. He could sit this last vigil alone.
Peregrine toed off his boots and stripped off his jacket and waistcoat slowly, setting them on the back of the chair.
He was desperately trying to keep his thoughts cordoned on the narrow path that rode between unwarranted optimism and heartsickness.
He could not afford to have confidence in the treatment.
He did not want to be uplifted, only to have his heart shattered by disappointment again.
No matter what the outcome with Charity, God or Fate had brought him here—to this moment—for a purpose. This was a task that was greater than he. To help end his mother’s reign of terror upon London and the others.
Fishing Charity’s sachet out of his waistcoat pocket, he set it next to her on the pillow, letting the scent linger in the air.
And then he lay beside her on the bed, atop the covers.
He threaded the fingers of his right hand through her left, spinning her wedding ring on her finger with his knuckles.
“I didn’t have the chance to tell you the story about your ring, Sparkles,” he told her.
“It was my grandmother’s. She was one of the kindest people I ever knew.
It was because of her I learned anything at all about compassion.
I suppose… I wanted to show you that not every member of the Fitzroy lineage was a terrible person. ”
He talked to her about everything and nothing for hours until his voice grew hoarse sometime well after midnight. And then he curled his arm around her hips, weariness sinking into his very bones as the hours went on and his hope flagged again.
His fitful dreams were cruel. He dreamt of her fingers running through his hair. Her breath on his face. A whisper of her voice, so faint he couldn’t make out the words.
And then something tugged his scalp sharply, ripping him so abruptly from sleep that he sat up in the weak morning light, disoriented.
Blinking sleep from his eyes, he looked down to see Charity’s eyes were open, and her expression was… well, it was quite petulant. “I’m thirsty,” she informed him with a scowl, her throat rasping to prove the words. But then her lips twitched, badly suppressing a smile.
Perry’s heart leapt into his throat. Could this possibly be real?
Or had stress broken his mind? He reached out with shaking fingers, almost too afraid to touch her for fear that he would find he was only dreaming.
But his palm found her skin. It was warm to the touch, soft, like her lip against the pad of his thumb.
Still in disbelief, only his hand moved, curving along her jaw, brushing across the flutter of her pulse in her throat.
And she turned her head, leaning into his touch.
His vision blurred with tears, but then he laughed. “There you are,” he gasped, the words nearly lodging in his throat. He let both hands frame her face then, cupping her cheeks while he brought his nose to hers. “Oh, darling. There you are, my love.”
Her mouth was bone dry, and her head still ached. But mostly, Charity did not know what to make of Perry's haunted eyes. She lifted a hand to his cheek to comfort him. “Where else should I be?”
That was when she saw her wrist, and the dark bruises fading to a greenish yellow. A vague memory swam to the surface, of his mother’s enraged face with malice-filled eyes, and pain blossoming at her wrists.
“Your mother—” Her voice caught, her throat too tight and too dry to finish the rest. Perry straightened and then hurried to help her sit up.
After stacking a mountain of pillows behind her back, he fetched a glass of water.
Only after she had taken several sips did he settle back down in the chair beside the bed.
“She poisoned you,” Perry said, his eyes flashing with anger before shifting into pools of sadness. “I thought I'd lost you, Sparkles.”
The realisation of how close she had come to dying, how easily her life might have been snuffed out, made her head pound and stomach roil. She had only to take a glance at her husband to grasp how her death would have destroyed him.
Charity pulled him closer, letting him lay his head upon her chest. “How long?” she asked after a long moment.
His breath hitched. “Two days and two nights, the longest of my life. If we hadn't got the antidote—”
How desperate would he have been by then? She combed her fingers through his hair, forcing herself to ask the next question, bracing for the answer. “The antidote. How did you get it?”
“In the end… the Grand Duchess.” He sat up again, looking away. “But the day she poisoned you, my mother offered to trade it for my denunciation of Ravenscroft and Antoine.”
Horror replaced the uncertainty.
“I refused.” He dragged in a ragged breath. “I refused to trade their lives for yours. And all I could think was that I had condemned you to die. But I knew you also would not want me to make the other choice.”
She stopped him there and begged him to take her into his arms. He was so careful as he pulled her into an embrace. But when her hands slid up his back, urging him closer, his hold tightened.
There was a catharsis in this, she realised—in trusting a partner to hold you safe during a moment so raw.
Peregrine’s tears made warm patterns on her shoulder as he wept, and hers gathered along the collarbone of his shirt.
But there was healing for both of them in it.
Against the odds, they were still here. Together.
Able to find another chance at happiness.
“You were right. That was what I would have chosen. I would not have blamed you, love,” she assured him eventually, stroking her hand along his neck. “But… how did the Grand Duchess come to be involved?”
And so he told her in whispers about how the others had persevered when he had lost hope. That the others had cared for them both caused her heart to swell with gratitude.
“But,” he paused briefly, “you will never believe what they discovered after Selina lost her temper with Lark.”
Perry was right; it was truly unbelievable. Charity listened, open-mouthed, while he explained Lark had married Nicholas, that the Tsar was going to be murdered, and the Grand Duchess had been summoned to find a way for them to solve this disaster as privately as they could.
That, by whatever grace of God or Fate or random chance, the Grand Duchess had been able to provide Perry with the cure that his mother had tried to force Perry to trade for.
Charity desperately needed to see all their friends just then. She grabbed Perry’s hand and urged him to stand.
“Everyone must be so worried. Ring the bell, Perry. You must send word that I am better. More importantly, I want to thank them for all they’ve done.”
He gave her a wry smile. “Easy enough to do. The Magpie and Selina refused to leave the estate last night. They are all here, staying in the guest wing.”
“Then call them here,” she demanded, excitement filling her with newfound energy.
“Here and now?” he asked, arching an eyebrow. He gestured around. “In your bed chamber?”
Charity was not to be stopped. “Propriety and the early hour be damned. No one who is here will judge me for this decision.”
Perry shook his head as he laughed, but did not raise any further arguments against her request. His eyes never left her; he did not even turn his back as he pulled the cord for the servants.
Charity’s maid Miller rushed in, her face pale, and stopped in her tracks when she saw Charity’s smiling face.
Within a scant few minutes, they were all there, laughing at each other with their hair mussed and in various states of dishabille.
Selina wore a borrowed wrapper, its too-long belt trailing down her side.
Ravenscroft’s shirt was half-tucked. Only Thorne was in any semblance of order.
His years on the battlefield had apparently trained him in how to dress at a moment’s notice.
Ravenscroft hurried across the rug and bumped Perry aside, taking up her hands to kiss her knuckles. “Mon Dieu, it is a miracle,” he declared. “Say something, anything, so that I know this isn’t a dream.”
Selina pinched his arm. “There, now you know you are awake. Move over so I can see for myself that Charity is improved.”
Laughter bubbled out of Charity at the sight of her friends acting, well, like themselves. Or perhaps it was more appropriate to say that Ravenscroft and Selina were like siblings tussling over a favourite toy. She could not find it in herself to begrudge them their enthusiasm.
Thorne stayed well behind them, either unwilling to wade in, or uncomfortable with the unusual setting. When Charity met his gaze over their heads, he inclined his head in a bow. He had come; they had all come running once again at her call.
Yet, someone was still missing. Lark.
She was the last to arrive. She kept her distance, unsure of her welcome, until Charity invited her to come near.
“I am so sorry,” Lark whispered in a hoarse voice. “If you hadn’t rescued me, Mama might not have—”
“I would do it again in a heartbeat,” Charity vowed, silencing the woman’s apology. “We are sisters now, are we not?”
Lark sniffed back tears and held tight to her tremulous smile. “Sisters, and friends.”
The sun was well up when Quinn came in and announced that breakfast was being served in the dining room.
He offered to bring Charity a tray, but she would hear nothing of it.
She sent everyone off so she could get dressed, telling Perry he was allowed to come back and carry her to the table.
Anything, so long as it meant she wouldn’t have to stay abed while the others talked.
At the last moment, she asked Lark to remain.
The Tsar will annul Lark’s marriage, Perry had told her. Had anyone asked Lark how she felt about this news?
“I am sorry for what will come of your marriage, that the Tsar will not let it go ahead.” Charity said when they were alone. “Are you in love with him?”
“I care for him,” Lark said, answering vaguely.
“I cared for Lord Roland,” Charity confessed. “He is a fine man, and he has made Grace a most excellent husband.”
Lark tilted her head to the side and studied Charity’s face. “I… I do not understand.”
“Lord Roland, even the Duke of Atholl, God rest his soul, were both decent, good men. I could have been content with them, just as you might have been with Prince Nicholas. But I will tell you what I have learned in these past days.”
Lark leaned forward, curiosity keeping her silent.
“I deserve more than that. You deserve more than mere contentment. The annulment might pain you now, but you must think of it as a gift. You have a choice now, and a chance to find love. Love and respect, and a deep, abiding bond that will carry you through the darkest and lightest of days.”
“Like you have with Perry?”
“Exactly. And we will be here, by your side, until you find it.”