Chapter 4
Aperfunctory knock made Elizabeth look up from Jenny’s cradle to see Darcy's head poking through the doorway. Was that a streak of soot on his cheek? And what was wrong with his hair? It looked as if he had dunked his head in mud puddle.
But she was still happy to see him, a surge of warmth filling her chest. “Pray do come in!”
He stepped inside, revealing clothes that were in no better condition. Not dripping wet, but definitely soggy and muddy. Yet the skies outside were clear; she could see that much from her window. “Good heavens, what happened to you?” she asked, amused.
He glanced at Chandrika, her maid. “No time for that now. Someone has broken through the wards, presumably a High Fae.”
A chill rushed over her. The wards were supposed to be impermeable. Could the French assassins get in now, too? Then the door, which he had left open, suddenly closed behind him. A shiver of fear ran through her. She pointed at it, her finger trembling. “Behind you! Could that be it?”
Darcy glanced back. “No. Pray show yourself to Mrs. Darcy, if you please.”
One of Georgiana's lesser fae popped into view. It was one Elizabeth had met before, a spindly brownie no more than three feet high, dressed in a tattered leather vest and a black skirt. “Just me,” she said in a creaky voice. “'To tell ye if that evil one appears.” Her pointed ears twitched.
Darcy nodded. “Georgiana has asked her to stay with you. The High Fae cannot cloak itself from the lesser fae, so she can warn us if he is here. Quickthorn thinks he may be injured.”
The little dragon curled up beside the cradle rose to his full height, which meant just above Darcy's knee. “I will defend them,” Agate warbled stoutly. “I cast a protection over us as soon as the wards broke.” Then he glanced down into the cradle. “Or at least I tried. I am not certain it worked.”
The hatchling dragon had known something was wrong? “That was very brave of you,” Elizabeth praised. “Next time, though, pray tell me what is happening.” She turned back to her husband. “What can we do to stop the invader?”
“The dragons are trying to sniff out his location. Roderick and Frederica are working on a plan to capture him, while I organize defenses. Though Georgiana is no doubt the Fae's target, Mrs. Reynolds is gathering iron to surround Jenny's cradle.”
Elizabeth shivered. The fae had stolen Darcy's true-born sister at birth and left the girl they knew as Georgiana behind.
What was to stop them from taking Jenny, too?
Her body reacted to the horror even before her mind, and she was already beside the cradle, scooping up her newborn infant into her arms. “No one is taking Jenny,” she said fiercely.
“I will not let them.” Not if she had to stay awake for days on end. The fae would have to kill her first.
Chandrika chimed in. “There will be at least one more set of eyes on her. I will make certain of it.”
Darcy gave them a sharp nod. “Good. I will try to return once I have seen to everything else.” And then he left.
Elizabeth had to stop herself from calling after him. What was wrong with her? Where had her vaunted independence gone? Perhaps it was another victim of giving birth, along with all the changes in her body.
No. She would not accept it, not when she had to defend Jenny. Not when Pemberley was under attack, and no one had even told her until now.
She was not alone. The lesser fae was perched in the window, keeping watch both inside and out.
Chandrika quietly moving her chair to beside the door, ready to stop any intruder, and Agate, now pacing back and forth like an overgrown puppy.
But none of them knew any more than she did of what was happening.
Elizabeth hated being left in ignorance.
She tried sending to Cerridwen, but received only the briefest impression of impatience in response, a draconic equivalent of Not now. No doubt her dragon was much better employed in hunting down the intruder, but Elizabeth desperately wanted to know what was happening outside this room.
“Agate, are you able to send to the other dragons?”
“Of course,” the hatchling said, surprised. “What use would I be otherwise, if I could not call for help?”
She had to be careful how she worded this. “Were you to hear any news from them, even if it seems unimportant, I would be relieved to hear it.”
The little dragon seemed to swell in size. “I will see what I can discover,” he pronounced.
It was something, but not enough. She could not remain here in her bedroom like a swooning lady in an old romance while Pemberley was under attack.
Yes, she was still tired from Jenny’s birth, and her spirits seemed to shift with each breath like a lovesick maid's, but she was also the Mistress of Pemberley and dragon companion to Cerridwen the Seer.
She had made her way alone through enemy France while heavy with child, when everyone had told her to stay at home and rest.
She could do it again. Her nether regions might be sore and her physical strength somewhat sapped, but there was nothing wrong with her mind or her Talent. If she were a tenant farmer, she would already be out working in the fields again, with her baby strapped to her back.
It was time to step up and take her place again.
Darcy strode away from Elizabeth's room purposefully, as if he actually had some idea what important matters he was supposed to be seeing to. His breath hissed out between his teeth. What use was he in a battle against an invisible High Fae whose magic would far outstrip his meager Talent?
He had always been Georgiana's protector, but now his sister was organizing her own defense. Her lesser fae knew far more about what could help, and he would only be in the way. All Darcy could do was to put himself at the service of the dragons and hope they could find a use for him.
Still, it gnawed at him, that someone had broken into Pemberley, endangering his family, and there was nothing he could do about it.
At least he could wield iron, unlike the lesser fae who would be burned by the touch of it.
He left the house and turned across the park to the stables, to the small armory that served as an occasional fencing studio.
It would be strange to carry a sword around his house, but it might give him a moment's advantage.
Under his feet, the land felt restless. Pemberley did not like invaders, either. Nor did his lynx. Darcy caught a glimpse of him, pacing at the edge of the line of trees, guarding him. Even his familiar felt the danger.
He had expected the old room where he had received his fencing lessons to be full of dust, as befitted an unused area.
Instead the ground was clear, almost polished with use.
The weapons hung on the wall shone with care, all except the pile of rusty ancient ones heaped in the center.
Good God, was that a pike? What was that doing here?
Then the ladder in the corner shook as his cousin Jasper Fitzwilliam descended it from the loft, his free arm laden with several ancient swords. He dumped them on the heap with an ear-splitting clang.
“Darcy! Just the man I wanted to see,” he said cheerfully. “Did you know the loft is full of these things?”
“Yes, those were the ones no one wanted anymore, but were too good to discard. I doubt any of them can hold an edge now. The valuable ones are in the attics of the main house.”
“These still have iron in them. I thought we could hang some across windows to keep the fae out. And a few knives that servants could carry - not to fight with, but to repel any fae who gets too close to them.”
That was a startlingly practical solution from Jasper, who usually could think of nothing beyond his next fencing bout. Even if it involved edged weapons, the great love of his life. “An excellent idea. I came here to find a weapon to carry, too.”
Jasper waved his hand expansively at the rack of foils on the wall. “Help yourself. Not the one on the end, though; that is Georgiana's favorite. It would be too short for you, anyway.”
“Georgiana’s favorite?” What did his sister have to do with swords?
“Did Freddie not tell you? That is why I am here, to train Georgiana to defend herself against a High Fae. Though none of us thought she would need the skills so soon.” He shook his head.
Darcy wanted to object. He ached to argue that Georgiana was a young lady and should have nothing to do with fighting skills.
Except how could he deny her any way to protect herself, when he himself was helpless to fight back against an invisible, inhuman enemy?
Somehow he managed a strangled, “I see.”
As expected, Jasper did not even notice his discomfort. “I will ask old Mrs. Reynolds to distribute these. She will know best - should have been a general, that one!” With a feral grin, he added, “And then I will go hunting. I have been practicing for this.”
“For what?”
“Fighting an opponent I cannot see. I have been sparring with Georgiana's lesser fae, the ones who were teaching her knife skills before I came. It adds an extra challenge, fencing with someone who can see me when I am at a disadvantage. At first they drubbed me every time, but now I can manage some hits.”
Only Jasper would enjoy such an uneven match! There had been no one in England who could seriously challenge him in years, so it must be a novelty to him. “If you can stop this High Fae, I will be forever in your debt.”
Carrying a sword was strange enough, even if it was just a sharpened fencing foil.
Slinging an old sword belt over his elegant tailcoat felt more extraordinary.
He had never used one before; Jasper had found it for him in the loft, along with a pair of daggers.
Had it been his father's, or perhaps his old fencing master's?
It did not matter how odd he looked. It was his responsibility to defend his family, including his changeling sister.
Something blotted out the sun. He looked up at a dragon gliding overhead.
Quickthorn, by the blue-green scales that glinted in the light.
And there, not far off, Rowan's currant-red form made a sweep across the sky.
It seemed impossible that a creature so massive could stay aloft - and that dragons could be taking their true form over Pemberley.
Until now, they had been careful to stay in their bird forms where anyone might see them.
Now they must need the full defenses of their draconic forms as they searched for the intruder.
There must be something he could do to help, something beyond carrying a sword he was unlikely to be able to use.
His eyes narrowed. The land. Perhaps Pemberley itself knew something.
He had used his Talent before to find lost children and animals, but he had known what those looked like and touched things that bore their scent.
He did not even know whether this High Fae was male or female, much less anything about them.
But Roderick had said once that Darcy underestimated what he could do with his land Talent. Perhaps it was time to test that.
He veered from the path and strode out across the park toward the lake. The water there ran through the estate, and Elizabeth claimed it could carry knowledge. Once he and Mrs. Sanford had joined forces to heal Elizabeth there.
When he reached the water's edge, he stripped off his gloves.
Kneeling down, he spread his hands through the neatly scythed grass, pushing his fingertips down into the cold soil.
The power of Pemberley rose to meet him, flowing into his fingers and up his arms with a rush of tingling warmth.
Had it been this powerful before he went to France?
His land bond had always been unusually strong, but now the magic wove through him, rather than being something he sought out.
For a moment he let himself luxuriate in the sensation of strength uncoiling through his limbs.
His senses plunged into the land, exploring the roots and rhizomes preparing for winter, the tiny creatures of the soil, and into the water, where his presence drew the attention of a small lamprey making its way past a brown trout.
Life was everywhere, making its way through the land and the lake.
He needed to focus. He mentally formulated the concept of an invader, someone who did not belong at Pemberley. A fae who was neither human nor animal, who had come to hurt the family bonded to this earth. Then he queried the land. Could it help him find this unknown High Fae?
Pemberley made no answer, but that was not surprising.
The land moved on a different time scale than impatient humans.
It could not make a quick decision. Darcy kept up the pressure, sending his consciousness out far into the earth like rapid-growing roots of his own, out past the lake, into the woods and then the pastures and field.
Behind him towards the gardens and the hills - and then the land reacted.
There was something in the house, and the land did not like it. At all.
Darcy's mouth went dry. That monster was in the house with Elizabeth, Jenny, and Georgiana. He had to stop it.
He disentangled his mind from the land, but not before giving it his gratitude. Then he headed for Pemberley House at a run.