Chapter 2
Out the window of the carriage, the fields of the Scottish Highlands stretched as far as Lady Cassandra Pembury could see, uninterrupted vistas of red and purple heather, of green fields, dotted by sheep grazing and the occasional small, stone hut, from which smoke rose lazily, filling the air with the charred scent of peat.
It was, by far, the most beautiful landscape Cassandra had ever seen. And she had thought she would be hard to impress, after twenty-two years in the Cornish countryside. Cornwall was breathtaking, with its sheer cliffs, its verdant fields, and the wild ocean raging below.
But this landscape—the mountains, the colors, the way one side of a mountain was almost black from its shadow, only for the shadow to shift and a blaze of red heather to appear—took her breath away.
Maybe this is reason enough to marry a man I hardly know and trust even less, she thought, a twinge of unease shooting through her stomach. To get to live here.
“Stop staring out of the window, Cassandra,” her mother, Lady Pembury, said from the seat across from her, and Cassandra sat back, blinking.
Her mother frowned at her. “You will catch a tan if you stick your head out into the sun like that all day. You are already too tall as it is and have all those horrible freckles from gardening all day long.”
“Lord Christopher knows what I look like,” Cassandra said, folding her arms, her sharp blue eyes flashing with annoyance. “I do not think he will call off the whole wedding just because I am a little tan.”
Lady Pembury pursed her lips. “I do not expect him to call off the wedding,” she said.
“With the generosity of your dowry, he would be a fool to do so. He is a second son, after all.” The feeling of unease squirmed again in Cassandra’s stomach at her mother’s unapologetic, mercenary way of speaking about her marriage.
“But it is still important to make a good first impression.”
Cassandra frowned. “But Lord Christopher and I have met. Many times. It is not a first impression.”
“Not on Lord Christopher,” her mother said waspishly. “I am speaking of his brother, of course. The duke. It is important that you make a good impression on him.”
“Why?” Cassandra asked, her frown deepening. “It is not him I will be marrying. Anyway, he has already given his blessing to the match.”
Her mother sighed. “Oh, Cassandra. For such a smart girl, sometimes you can be rather slow.” Her mother leaned forward, as if she were about to impart a great secret.
“This marriage, while advantageous, is still only to a second son. Your settlement is generous, and you will be comfortable, but it is the duke who holds the strings to your future husband’s purse.
It is him to whom you will have to turn if you are ever in need of a loan, or a gift…
anything! Which is why it is essential that you charm him.
Make him feel that his brother has found a woman of the rarest quality.
Someone whom he wants to help as much as his own family. ”
Cassandra swallowed. A woman of the rarest quality. She thought well of herself, but how was anyone supposed to live up to so much pressure?
“You were the one who insisted upon wanting to travel up to Calder Castle early,” her mother continued.
“Your father and I were happy to wait until the wedding to deliver you up to Scotland. But you were the one who said you wanted to spend more time with your fiance. Well, now is your chance not only to ingratiate yourself to Lord Christopher further, but to charm his brother.”
Cassandra said nothing. She had not insisted on traveling up to Calder Castle early to ingratiate herself to Lord Christopher. She had wanted to come early in order to get to know him better.
It was, perhaps, silly. They would have the rest of their lives to get to know one another. And it wasn’t as if she had any plans to call off the wedding, no matter what she found in Scotland. She had agreed to the match, and she would do her duty.
But still, she had felt uneasy about the idea of marrying someone she had really only met half a dozen times. And while Lord Christopher had been charming and kind during their whirlwind courtship in London, she had also heard whispers of other types of behavior—behavior that made her very uneasy.
Lady Charlotte Huxtable had let slip at the Darrington Ball that Lord Christopher was often to be seen at gaming halls.
At Almack’s, Lady Marmalouse had drunkenly whispered to her that she was lucky to be marrying a man with so much experience.
And Miss Rowena Flynn, who was very sweet and had been on the shelf for many seasons, had even taken Cassandra aside at Vauxhall Gardens a week previously to ask her, in hushed tones, if she was certain she wanted to marry a man with a reputation for changing his mind.
When Cassandra had pressed her for details, Miss Flynn had said that while she didn’t know any details, she had heard stories, over the years, of Lord Christopher courting ladies only to jilt them after making them fall madly in love with him.
It had left Cassandra rattled, to say the least—although she was somewhat encouraged by the fact that Miss Flynn could not name any names.
These women might just be jealous that I am marrying the brother of a duke, she had told herself at the time, although Miss Flynn did not strike her as the vengeful kind.
Or perhaps he is the victim of unkind rumors simply because he is charming, and many a young lady has fancied herself in love with him.
Still, she needed to know more.
Hence, the trip up to Scotland. She was not going to call off the wedding, she would not betray her duty like that, but she also would not be blindsided.
“You are right, Mama,” she said, fixing a smile on her face. “I will use this opportunity to charm the duke. Having him as an ally will certainly improve our family’s standing in society.”
Lady Pembury smiled back at her, but there was a slight quiver in her eyes that told Cassandra her mother was thinking about Lord Pembury. He had stayed behind in London, ostensibly for business reasons, but Cassandra couldn’t help but suspect there were other reasons he had not come with them.
There had been whispers, the last year, of financial difficulties in her father’s business. And her hasty engagement to the brother of the Duke of Calder made her think that there was a reason, other than the advantageous connection, that she was being rushed down the aisle.
An hour later, they arrived at Calder Castle, just as the sun was beginning to lower in the sky, casting an orange and red glow over the building.
As the carriage pulled up the drive, Cassandra could not help but ignore her mother’s advice and lean out of the carriage window to get a good look, her mouth half-open in awe.
Calder Castle was enormous. It was four stories high, with even higher round towers in every cardinal direction, built of a rosy sandstone that was crawling with ivy.
The ramparts of the castle ran along the edges between each of the towers, which looked down on a moat with a drawbridge over it, which had been left down for them to enter.
The Castle grounds were wild and untamed.
Where all the great houses in the South sported grounds with manicured hedgerows and stately gardens, the grounds around Calder Castle were lined with tall aspens that blazed yellow, while gorse and heather grew in the underbrush seemingly without plan or design.
The sight made something like hope bloom inside of her.
This place invites wildness and free-spiritedness.
At least, that was what she hoped, as the carriage came to a halt in front of the large oak doors.
When they reached the front doors, however, they opened to reveal not Lord Christopher, or even the duke, but an elderly woman in a dark blue dress, a mop cap on her head.
“Good evening,” she said, curtsying to Cassandra and Pembury. “And welcome to Calder Castle. My name is Mrs. Drummond, and I am the housekeeper here.”
“The housekeeper!” Lady Pembury did not bother to hide her surprise or displeasure. “But where is His Grace, the Duke of Calder? My daughter and I have traveled all the way from London, and we were expecting to be greeted by my future son-in-law and his brother.”
“Indeed, of course you were, my lady,” Mrs. Drummond said, curtsying again, but Cassandra couldn’t help but notice that her hands were wringing, as if she were nervous, and that her voice quavered slightly.
“The duke sends his apologies. His Grace was called away on urgent business with the neighboring laird.”
Lady Pembury’s frown deepened. “And where is Lord Christopher?”
“I am sure that Lord Christopher will return soon,” Mrs. Drummond said, not quite meeting Lady Pembury’s eyes.
“The duke was exceedingly apologetic, and told me to give you both his deepest regrets. In the meantime, the staff will be working hard to ensure your comfort and happiness at Calder Castle.”
Lady Pembury’s mouth twisted. Cassandra could tell that she was about to launch into a tirade about propriety and rudeness, so she quickly put out a hand to touch her mother’s sleeve.
“It is no bother for us,” she said softly, giving her mother a meaningful look.
“We understand that such things happen to two men as busy and illustrious as the duke and Lord Christopher. We look forward to their speedy return, and in the meantime, we would be very much grateful if you would show us to our rooms. As my mother said, we have been traveling for quite some time and are weary from the journey.”
Mrs. Dashwood looked relieved as she beckoned for them to follow her.
Inside, the castle was even more stunning than Cassandra could have imagined. It seemed almost medieval, with the flagstone floors, the suits of armor, and the tall, domed ceiling decorated with a mural of the heavens.
But it was also light and airy, with large windows that allowed the evening sun to spill over the stone staircase, which curved as it made its way upstairs to the second floor.
As she stepped off the staircase onto the second-floor corridor, Cassandra heard a small voice behind her.
“Papa?”
The voice was quiet and female—a girl’s voice, Cassandra guessed—and she turned at once.
“Hello?” she said, as her mother halted behind her.
Out of the shadows in the corridor to the right stepped a little girl.
She looked to be about five or six years old, in a white silk dress with a raised hem embroidered with blue flowers. She had dark hair, which fell in ringlets around her oval face, out of which blinked the most stunningly green eyes Cassandra had ever seen.
“Mistress Annabelle!” Mrs. Drummond said, hurrying forward. “What are you doing here? You ought to be readying for your supper!”
“I heard a carriage approaching,” the girl said, her eyes sweeping over Cassandra with undisguised curiosity. “I thought Papa might have returned.”
“He has not,” Mrs. Drummond said. “Now, I must ask you to return to the nursery at once. Where is Miss Ashworth? She is supposed to be watching you!”
“It is not Miss Ashworth’s fault,” the girl said, dropping her eyes to the ground. “I slipped away.”
“Well, I shall escort you back.” Mrs. Drummond glanced at Lady Pembury. “Please wait here. I will return shortly.”
And she took the little girl’s hand and led her away down the corridor, until they turned the corner and were out of sight.
“Who was that?” Cassandra asked, turning at once her mother.
“That must be the duke’s daughter,” Lady Pembury said, frowning. “Poor dear. Her mother died during childbirth. It was all very tragic.”
“That is very sad,” Cassandra murmured. “It must be hard for her to be without a mother.”
“Yes,” Lady Pembury sniffed. “But the duke is uninterested in marriage. Believe me, if he had been available, we would have angled to have you marry the duke, not his brother.”
Cassandra’s throat went dry. She turned away to hide her irritation. Her mother’s shameless social-climbing greatly disturbed her, even as she did her best to live up to the expectations that had been put on her since birth.
“Something feels very off about all this,” Lady Pembury said from behind her, unaware of Cassandra’s discomfort. “Where is the duke? And why does his own daughter seem so concerned about his return?”
Cassandra couldn’t say, but later, once she was settled into the guestroom where she would be staying until the wedding, she decided to try and find out.
Mrs. Drummond had assigned a maid to help her prepare for dinner, and as the woman pinned Cassandra’s auburn hair up into an elaborate coiffure, she asked, in the most casual tone possible, “I suppose that His Grace will not be joining us tonight?”
The maid, a young girl with a pug nose and kind gray eyes, frowned. “I suppose not, milady. He rode off yesterday evening in quite a state. Frightened the stable boys, so he did, shoutin’ for his horse like the barn was burnin’ down.”
Cassandra’s curiosity welled inside of her, but she tried to remain calm as she said, “Oh? That sounds as if it was very urgent. The business with the neighboring laird must be serious.”
“I know nothin’ ‘bout that, milady,” the maid said. “But he did seem very vexed, I am told. They both were.”
“Both?” Cassandra repeated. “The duke and Lord Christopher?”
“Lord Christopher?” the maid shook her head. “No, milady, His Grace and Mr. Greybourne. The estate manager.”
Cassandra felt her hands curl into fists, her fingernails pressing into her palms to keep the rest of her from shaking.
“So Lord Christopher did not go with His Grace?” she asked.
“No, milady. Lord Christopher has not been here in more than a month.”
It took all of Cassandra’s self-control not to gape.
A month? She had been told that Lord Christopher would be at Calder Castle, waiting for her, in the week leading up to their wedding.
And while Mrs. Drummond had explained what had detained the duke, she conspicuously omitted the details of Lord Christopher’s whereabouts. .
Which begged the question: If Lord Christopher was not at Calder Castle or with his brother, then where, exactly, was he?