Chapter Three #2
“Entirely too fond, it would seem,” the duke said. “Are the rest of your siblings similarly afflicted?”
“In what way afflicted?” Persephone refused to acknowledge his further disparagement of her dear papa.
“What absurd names did your parents assign the other members of your family?” His tone clearly indicated he was not impressed with her mental prowess.
“Athena is just younger than I. Evander is fourteen. Linus, thirteen. Daphne will be twelve toward the end of the year. The youngest is Artemis.”
“Fates save us from short-sided scholars,” the duke muttered.
Artemis would surely have deemed the duke “grumpy,” one of her favorite descriptors. Persephone had never met anyone who fit the word so well.
She watched him as they passed into dense forest, the road the only visible break in the trees.
“Do you have a middle name?” the duke asked, as if it were highly unlikely.
Persephone fought down an ironic smile. “I do.”
“I suppose it would be too much to hope that it is something common.” He still did not look at her.
“Iphigenia,” Persephone said.
The duke’s head turned instantly in her direction. His expression registered shocked disbelief, just as she knew it would.
He was looking at her full-on for the first time, and Persephone barely managed not to stare. For the right side of his face, from hairline to nearly the corner of his eye, was a spider’s web of scarring—not hideous or frightening, but absolutely impossible not to notice.
“Persephone Iphigenia?” the duke said in something like amazement, and not the flattering kind of amazement, either. He had already returned his gaze to the landscape. “Did no one ever call you anything else?”
“Only ‘Miss Lancaster.’”
“Well, I cannot call you that,” the duke answered with an obvious grasp of the irony. “I suppose I will have to consign myself to ‘Persephone.’”
“It would seem so.” Persephone was baffled.
She’d never met anyone quite like the Duke of Kielder. He was gruff and not at all personable, and yet there was enough intelligence and wit in his conversation to make him intriguing. Then there were those scars, which made a person wonder how he’d acquired them, want to know more of his history.
“You, of course, will call me Kielder.”
“I will not call you Kielder,” Persephone answered almost immediately.
“Everyone calls me Kielder.” The tension in his jaw was obvious even in profile.
“Kielder?” Persephone shook her head. “It sounds as though I am accusing you of a crime.” Killed her. That was exactly how the title sounded.
The duke’s lips seemed to twitch for a fraction of a second before his indifferent demeanor was set firmly in place once more. “You would, no doubt, prefer Agamemnon or Apollo or something along that vein.”
“My papa certainly would.” A smile gently tugged at her mouth. He had a sense of humor, it seemed. She’d seen him nearly smile. Perhaps the duke wasn’t as irascible as he seemed, his less-than-ideal mood stemming merely from the same nerves Persephone had been dealing with all morning.
“What do you propose to call me, then?” the duke asked impatiently.
She remembered hearing his Christian name during the ceremony. “Adam?” Persephone suggested.
“No one calls me Adam.”
“No one?” She hardly believed that. Certainly his family and closest friends would.
“Harry does,” the duke admitted, though obviously begrudgingly.
“Harry?”
“A friend,” he answered in clipped tones. “One who allows himself far too much freedom.”
The journey continued in silence. The duke seemed intent on watching the passing scenery, so Persephone opted to do the same.
Despite being late morning, the forest was dim, very little light filtering down through the thick canopy of trees.
It was like leaving behind the sunshine and passing into a beautiful tunnel, evergreens mingled with shrubbery, every shade of green represented in the mixture of plant life.
How deep does the forest run? she wondered.
What sort of animals roam inside? Persephone could picture a crystal-clear lake tucked away somewhere, or a roaring river, perhaps.
There was so much she wanted to know and didn’t feel comfortable asking. Until she understood the duke better, Persephone couldn’t be sure that her inquiries would be welcomed, let alone answered.
The carriage made the turn that Persephone remembered well from her arrival that morning.
The woods suddenly gave way to a clearing.
In the midst of the clearing was a thick, embattled stone wall, at least ten feet high with an enormous iron gate.
Behind the fortified wall lay a castle, the kind children saw in fairy-tale picture books: towers with heraldic flags ruffling in the cool breeze, turrets and arrow-slits now filled in with stained-glass windows.
Once inside the outer wall, they continued past the stables and kitchen gardens. They pulled further in under the arching gateway of the inner wall and past the formal gardens.
And I am now mistress of all this, Persephone thought in astonishment. Her amazement gave way quickly to apprehension as the open landau came to a stop directly in front of the home that was now her own.
“Fourteenth or fifteenth century,” Papa had said that morning as Persephone and her sisters had stared, openmouthed, at the towering walls. Persephone hadn’t really heard Papa’s explanation of how he’d determined the castle’s age. She had simply stared, as she was doing just then.
The castle’s four outer towers loomed large over her, connected to each other and the keep—the central wing—of the castle by narrow passageways elevated several stories above the ground, supported by stone arches. It was intimidating, daunting, and far more than she’d bargained for.
A footman in red and gold livery, the same colors seen in the flags, met the carriage and let down the step. The duke stepped down first, turning slightly back toward her. He kept the scarred half of his face turned the other way, Persephone noticed.
The duke extended his hand to her. With a nervous glance at the row of pristinely turned-out servants and another at the overwhelming residence spread out before her, Persephone swallowed back her apprehension and placed her hand, noticing it shook a little, in the duke’s.
He helped her down, never looking at her but keeping his face turned away.
This is never going to work, Persephone said to herself. She’d never been mistress of anything but her family home, and it wouldn’t have even remotely filled a single story of any of the castle towers. She was not cut out for the life she’d just thrust upon herself.
The duke slipped her arm through his and walked, all dignity and aristocratic assurance, toward the castle. Persephone looked up at him, hoping for some tiny show of reassurance. She saw his eyes flick toward her briefly before settling straight ahead.
“‘Adam’ will be fine,” the Duke said, still looking ahead. Then, almost as an afterthought, he added, “Persephone.”
Not exactly a fairy-tale beginning, but it was all she had.