Chapter 26
Chapter twenty-six
Valeraine landed Lelantos in the field for the visiting dragons.
There were metal loops to tether a dragon dotted all over, allowing them to spread out safely.
She dismounted, grabbing a rope from the saddlebags as she went.
Lelantos’ area of the field was a little muddy, pulling at her fine dancing shoes.
They would be forever stained from this mess.
The area was also conspicuously absent of signs of Lelantos bunking in it. She wondered, belatedly, where he had been for the past few hours? What mischief might he have gotten up to, what fights might he have started?
If she tethered him, the Rosings grooms would care for him, at least bringing food and water around.
It seemed prudent, this time, to tie him down, in this wild place full of her temper. If he came to her call of anger again, the situation would only grow worse.
She tied the tether from him to the sturdy stake in the ground, giving it plenty of slack.
Lelantos submitted easily, unbothered by the tether. He had probably been tied down hundreds of times before, just never by her.
There was a growing dread in her at this act, at this declaration of distrust in her dragon. But she couldn’t exactly leave him to continue wandering the Rosings estate, could she?
She was ensnared in the web of Pemberley’s power. Lelantos joined her. They must both be restrained now, to hold onto whatever small dignity they had left.
She considered flying back to Longbourn right then, abandoning the whole mess. But it was days travel back home — they had already arranged to stay at Rosings tonight, and to return tomorrow morning by flight and by coach. Lelantos deserved a rest now.
Her dress was already dirty from climbing onto a muddy dragon, the hem the worst of it from dragging on the ground, so she gave it little mind as she scratched Lelantos in his favorite spots: behind the ears, massaging his wing joints, under his chin.
The action soothed them both, their shared emotions calming and centering.
They would get through this, together. Everyone would ridicule her for racing, for daring to do something different. She would never regret claiming the sky. She had done it for the good of Longbourn. And she had found herself in the process.
Valeraine went to the room allotted to the Longbourn sisters, wanting to change out of the gown and find a servant to launder it for her. It could probably be saved, with prompt care.
“Val! Where did you go?” Selaide was there, waiting for her. “We saw you leave with that horrid fellow. Is he courting you now?”
“No! I am not courting Pemberley.”
Selaide slumped in her chair.
“Who’s ‘we?’” Valeraine asked.
Selaide gestured magnanimously to Kesley, leaning against the wall. Valeraine’s first instinct was to shoo him out of the bedroom, for propriety’s sake, but her energy was not up to the task of defending something she did not truly worry about.
“But what happened to your dress?” Kesley said. “I am beginning to think there’s merit in Selaide’s speculation.”
“This mud is from Lelantos. Pemberley is…” Valeraine looked for a way to explain it. The gargantuan mess of it all. “Well. Pemberley knows.”
This terrible news settled on the room like a funeral shawl, fluttery and dooming them all. Dooming Valeraine most of all.
“Pemberley knows?” Selaide shrieked. “Knows you’re the rider? He will tell everyone. We will all be ruined!”
“Come now Selaide,” Kesley soothed. “Let Val tell it. Will Pemberley spread the word?”
Pemberley hadn’t taken his opportunity to announce it to the ball. But that didn’t mean he hadn’t gone back in and done that very thing already.
“I’m not sure,” Valeraine said. “He hates that I raced, but he doesn’t seem one for idle gossip. The secret might stay safe until he confides in someone who chatters, like Miss Nethenabbi.”
“I will go back to the ball,” Selaide said. “If Pemberley is spreading the scandal, I must secure a man before he hears the news.” With that, Selaide scurried out of the room.
As if she could secure a husband in an hour.
“Oh, Val. Everything will be alright,” Kesley said. “Who cares what some pompous man says? Isn’t he the one who killed Mr. Allencourt in the derby last year? When I announce I am the masked rider, I’m sure people will believe me over him.”
Valeraine nodded, but didn’t agree. Kesley came from Sidton house, which was small and insignificant. She knew what people would believe: the prestige of Pemberley house.
“You’ll barely notice the difference in how people look at you, I’m sure. It’s not as if Longbourn had far to fall, anyhow.”
With that, Valeraine found tears coming to her eyes.
She had been furious, and scared, and her time with Lelantos had gathered her composure again.
Now, she found her grief. Everyone who heard this news would immediately think less of her and of Longbourn.
The successes she had gained for the house — the prestige of racing well — would all be for naught.
They didn’t have far to fall, that was true. But it made the small gains which she had earned for Longbourn even more precious.
There was being insignificant — where the house had been before she had flown — and then there was being embroiled in scandal. There was always worse that they could descend to.
She might have proven that Lelantos was a strong and admirable dragon, but she had also proven that she — and therefore Longbourn house — were wild things that couldn’t fit into society.
She would never find someone who would marry her, and her sisters’ chances would be disastrously impaired.
Except, perhaps Kesley, here with her in every step.
The house was ruined. It wasn’t Lelantos’ death that had done it; it was her own dreams, failing spectacularly.
A tear dropped from Valeraine’s cheek onto the rich flooring.
Kesley wrapped his arms around her, and she laid her head on his shoulder.
He squeezed her with all tenderness, allowing his shirt to become wet and his trousers muddy where her gown brushed them.
He hugged her until her distress and grief were all rung out, holding her together when she couldn’t do it herself anymore.
He patted her back and said, “All hope is not lost. How about this: we will procure a dozen eggs, and raise a brood of dragons together. We will form a new grand house, where you will race our dragons and where I will charm our investors, and we will never be sad again.”
Valeraine hiccupped a laugh. “Where will we get these eggs?”
“We’ll find them somewhere. Perhaps all the ladies of the kingdom will give them to you, as a token of their admiration for your riding. Then Pemberley will rue the day he set himself against us.”
It was a comforting dream. There was only one problem: “We won’t build a new house. We’ll rebuild Longbourn, and make it shine.”
“Of course.”
He released her from the hug, self consciously looking at the wet patch on his shoulder.
“I should return to the ball, before too many wonder where all of these Longbourn sisters are disappearing to, and what gentlemen are also missing. Stay firm, Val. I am sure this will all look better in the morning. If the news of you flying is breaking, I will announce myself as the masked rider.”
She nodded, and he left her alone to begin the task of laundry so this gown would not be ruined, along with everything else.
Merna arrived in the room, sent by Selaide to report. She had a spring in her step, evidently happy to have left Mamma under such a stalwart excuse as running an errand for Selaide — an excuse their mother would never dispute.
“Mr. Pemberley is not speaking to anyone,” Merna said. “He has refined his scowl utterly, and turns it on anyone who approaches him. Only the Nethenabbis have dared to talk to him. Mr. Nethenabbi has continued to dance with Alyce.”
Valeraine would have expected this to lessen the anxiety of her heart, but it had the opposite effect. What was Pemberley waiting for? Would he not spread the news, even to his closest friend?
Valeraine retired to bed with these thoughts, sharing a cramped mattress with her sisters that night.
Overnight, her anxiety transmuted to anger. How dare Pemberley presume to control her? Why was his word the final one on who could race and who could not? He talked of honor and grace, and yet he was standoffish, and proud, and rough in the derbies.
She would go to Pemberley in the morning and dare him to tell the world of her racing.
She would make sure he knew in no uncertain terms that this was not idle gossip to pass around, but the height of a private matter, which he had shoved himself in the middle of without anyone’s approval or invitation.
She would argue with him until he pleaded for release, surrendering to the force of her will.
He considered Longbourn to be beneath him, but she would be certain to show him that didn’t mean he could destroy it without guilt, like it hadn’t been worth anything in the first place.
He would still be at Rosings in the morning. Pemberley estate was easily twice as far away as Longbourn, after all. He would be one of the guests staying the night.
When dawn broke, Valeraine rose like a storm and stalked down the halls. She saw a passing servant girl, and asked her where Mr. Pemberley was.
“He and his party left earlier, Miss.” the girl said.
He had already run away. Had he run back to Netherfield, or to his home at Pemberley manor? Was he going in silence, or in great sound and fury to ruin Longbourn house?
He left without a word to her.
Is that what she was to him? Nothing? The woman whose reputation he held in his hands, and she wasn’t worth a goodbye? He could have threatened her, or blackmailed her. He could have gloated his power over her. He could have reiterated his admonition not to race again.
Apparently, she wasn’t even worth that.