Chapter 20
The box arrived just before Christmas.
Elf was in the middle of last-minute preparations for the grand Christmas masquerade they always held at Rothgar Abbey in mid-December.
Servants and family had spent the day outside gathering traditional greenery.
Now they were transforming the great house with it all, creating an indoor forest—a forest twined with scarlet-and-gold ribbons, and hung with mistletoe kissing boughs.
Spontaneously, the servants were singing traditional Christmas songs and she saw some of the younger ones sneaking nuts and oranges. That was allowed on a day like today.
Elf put the box aside for a moment to give instructions to the maids hanging the gilded nuts among the boughs on the staircase.
A squawk alerted her, and she turned to see Portia, her five-month-old son on her hip.
Red-haired Portia was slim and petite, and her son was growing so healthily he seemed almost too much for her to carry.
Despite the fact that Elf knew Portia was much stronger than she looked, she reached to take the child.
She received a bright smile from both mother and little Francis.
She carried the wide-eyed child around the hall, showing him the gilded ornaments and the scarlet ribbons.
“Elf,” said Portia, “this package is from Fort.”
Elf turned back slowly. She’d learned to put him out of her mind, she’d thought.
Now, immediately, her heart raced.
Not long after their last meeting, he’d removed to Walgrave Towers in Dorset.
At the same time, Cyn and Chastity had finally left for Portsmouth and shortly thereafter, sailed.
They’d been in Nova Scotia now for months.
Their first letter had been enthusiastic, even if Cyn had been annoyed to find out halfway through the voyage that his wife was with child and had concealed it from him.
Elf’s revived pain at saying farewell to Cyn had been soothed by time spent at Candleford and the birth of Portia and Bryght’s son.
At some point, however, it had dawned on her that she missed Fort more than she missed Cyn.
That was an ominous sign when Fort had made no attempt to contact her.
With Chastity gone, Elf heard little about the Earl of Walgrave. He’d already left the country for Italy when she learned about it.
It shouldn’t have mattered whether he were one hundred miles away or five, but it did. Elf had been hard-pressed to keep up her cheerful manner, but since she wanted to assure her family that she was completely happy, she did.
And she was happy, more or less.
Her days were filled with business she enjoyed, including a certain amount of mingling with friends and relatives. She was a wondering and devoted aunt. The first of the Spitalfields silk weavers had settled in Norwich, and the business there was prospering.
Just last week she had journeyed to London to celebrate an early Christmas in Prince George’s Almshouse, down near Harrison’s Wharf. Dibby Cutlow ruled the seven other elderly inhabitants, considering the place virtually her own establishment.
The king had graciously permitted them to name the charity after his newborn son.
These days, he beamed on all things Malloren.
He had been delighted when informed that Portia and Bryght’s son had been born on the same day as his own.
He was already talking of the two being companions in a few years—a suggestion that did not appeal to Portia and Bryght at all.
Bryght had even been heard to mutter that Rothgar must have had a hand in it.
Rothgar had merely remarked that if they didn’t like the situation, they should have planned with greater foresight.
Whether by accident or foresight, Bute and Grenville were openly contesting for power and the king’s favor.
This had made George even more devoted to the undemanding Marquess of Rothgar.
In fact, the king was here at Rothgar Abbey, complete with wife, child, and entourage, looking forward to the masquerade.
There was still much to be done, but Elf walked over to return Francis to his mother and look at the box.
She felt a strange reluctance to open it. She’d found a kind of equilibrium, and wasn’t sure if she could handle any disturbance to it. But she commanded a pair of scissors from a maid and snipped the string. Pulling off the lid, she revealed scarlet and gold.
“Oh, it’s a costume,” Portia said. “Gaudy, to say the least.”
“And inappropriate. You know that tonight we have to be in character.”
“You could go as a Covent Garden whore.”
Elf flushed, and covered the thing, wondering how she could have ever thought it appealing. More important, why had he sent it? She’d assumed it had been thrown out.
“I suppose this must mean Fort’s back,” Portia said, setting Elf’s heart racing once again. She hadn’t thought of that. “Did you send him an invitation?”
“I’m sure we must have, as a matter of form . . .” Now Elf’s heart rate teetered on the edge of panic. Surely he wouldn’t come.
Why not?
He might want to come.
Oh no. She pushed that aside. Foolish hopes and dreams were just too painful.
“If he comes, he comes,” she said briskly, knowing that if a dark-clad monk appeared tonight, she’d quite likely faint.
Elf carried the box up to her rooms and summoned Chantal. When the maid came, Elf gave her the package and rather enjoyed the shriek of horror when it was opened. “Milady . . . no. Please!”
“Definitely not. But don’t throw it away, Chantal. It holds memories.”
Then Elf turned to look at her costume for the night. Layers of filmy silk swirled in brown and yellow, making up a loose gown to be daringly worn without hoops or corset. A kind of harness over her shoulders was included, however, to support the diaphanous wings.
Her mask was also yellow and brown, and included delicate gold antennae.
She was going to the masquerade as a wasp.
They held no formal dinner on the night of the masquerade, but Elf and the other Mallorens in residence—Portia, Bryght, Brand, and Rothgar—were invited to dine with the king and queen and their senior attendants.
This inconvenient honor necessitated a grande toilette of its own.
Elf attended in massive hoops that supported deep blue silk and a lot of silver embroidery and lace.
It was as well that tonight she didn’t need to chatter over awkward moments, for her mind was almost numb with panic.
The king and queen, however, neither of them normally garrulous, wanted to talk about babies.
Portia and Bryght were happy to support that conversation.
They even managed to do so without implying that their child was even prettier and cleverer than Prince George.
Elf, seated between Lord Hardwicke and Lady Charlotte Finch, was relatively comfortable, though she could hardly stomach a mouthful of food.
Would he come?
What would he wear?
Had that costume been a message? Should she wear it?
No. No matter what his intent, she would not wear it. That belonged in another life.
But was Lisette the only aspect of Elf Malloren that really interested him?
As soon as the event finished, she hurried to put on her wasp costume. Part of her urgency was practical, for she should be available to deal with any last-minute problems. Mostly, however, she felt that the sooner she was dressed, the sooner it would begin, and the sooner she would learn her fate.
Gown, corset, hoops, and headdress were quickly disposed of. Elf looked in the mirror at her undisguised shape covered only by her white silk shift and experienced a sudden blinding vision of another mirror.
When Chantal, in a dark gown, appeared behind her, she almost shrieked with shock.
“Milady! What is it?”
Elf put a hand to her unsteady chest. “Just nerves, Chantal. Don’t ask why, but I am all on edge. Come, let’s make me ready to sting.”
She discarded her white shift and put on one of flesh-colored silk.
The wing harness went on next, fixed securely around her shoulders.
Then the fine silk slipped on top. It had been dyed to her order, not precisely in rings of yellow and brown, but in a swirling pattern.
The skirt floated in a ragged end around her bare calves, and for shoes, she wore simple sandals of a Grecian design.
She’d tried on the gown before without any unease but now, Fort in mind, she felt overbold. No lady exposed her figure in public so close to its natural state. Even the most brazen whore wore corset and hoops.
She ran her hands dubiously past waist and over hips. Her breasts were so shamelessly round. The shape of the nipples could be seen. “What do you think, Chantal?”
The maid’s eyes opened in surprise. “But, milady, it is magical! Everyone will be entranced.”
“You don’t think it . . . bold?”
The maid firmly turned her from the mirror. “Not at all. There will be others there in classical style or dressed as fairies. Come sit, and I will put on the wings and headdress.”
Remembering the lady at Vauxhall—the one who’d dressed as Titania and had trouble with her wings—Elf had consulted people at the Drury Lane theater about the design of hers.
She wished to be comfortable. Chantal carefully attached the sparkling shapes of wired gossamer to the harness.
Elf felt no additional weight and when she stood, she was hardly aware of them.
Even some dancing steps did not make them wobble or come loose.
“Excellent!” she declared, and risked another look in the mirror. They really were delightful wings—noticeable, pretty, but not so large as to be inconvenient. She refused to study other things again.
“Sit, milady!” commanded Chantal. “We must do the head.”