Chapter Seven
The carriage wheels crunched softly over the gravel, stopping just short of the grand portico of Hawthorne House. Lydia pushed the curtain aside and took in the imposing stone facade, tall, stately, shadowed in late morning light.
The windows, all shuttered and immaculate, offered no welcome or warmth.
She smoothed the skirt of her traveling gown and stepped down without assistance.
No footman moved.
Only the butler appeared. Tall, narrow, and stiff as the doorframe behind him.
“Your Grace,” he said with a short, stiff bow.
He said all the right words, did the right actions, and yet, it was obvious from the stiffness of his shoulders and the coolness in his eyes that he was bristling with disapproval.
Lydia offered him a cool, gracious smile. “Good morning, Mr…?”
“Cobb, Your Grace. I serve as the butler.”
“Mr. Cobb,” she echoed, pleasantly. “I hope you are quite alright?”
Cobb hesitated. Just a breath. “Your Grace?”
“It’s only that you stand so rigid, sir, I half expect someone to lean a walking stick against you.”
Mr. Cobb opened his mouth, stammering, as she swept past him without looking back.
Inside, Hawthorne House was beautiful in a grand and silent type of way.
A red runner stretched across polished marble floors, leading through the entryway and into the main hall.
Chandeliers gleamed above her, delicate branches of crystal catching what little light filtered in through the tall, mullioned windows.
The scent of lavender polish and old stone filled the air.
It should have felt like stepping into power.
Instead, it felt like stepping into someone else’s memory.
The house smelled unused. As if it had been closed off too long, too many empty seasons, too many quiet winters. She had noticed it on her previous visits, as well.
She heard the creak of shoes against the wood as a housekeeper stepped forward from the shadows.
A stout woman in her fifties, with greying hair and a mouth so tight it could have been sewn shut.
“Your Grace,” the woman said, then added quickly, “I’m Mrs. Hartwell. Housekeeper.”
Her smile didn’t quite reach her eyes.
Lydia nodded. “It’s a pleasure, Mrs. Hartwell.”
“I’ve had the second duchess’s suite prepared, as per His Grace’s instructions. If you’ll follow me…”
Lydia did.
They climbed one sweeping staircase and turned into a west-facing corridor lined with portraits. Aristocratic faces followed her. Pale, powdered women and stern-looking men in oil and gilt.
She paused briefly beneath one. A former duchess, no doubt. Expression disapproving, hand resting on the shoulder of a boy with solemn eyes.
Did she marry for love? Lydia wondered. Or strategy?
Her footsteps echoed over the polished floor as she reached her new rooms.
Mrs. Hartwell opened the double doors.
The chambers were large, airy, and bathed in soft grey light. A canopied bed sat at the centre, draped in pale blue damask. A dressing table with a silver-backed mirror waited in the corner, untouched. The fireplace had been laid but not lit.
The flowers in the vases were already fading.
White roses, once elegant, now drooped at the stems, their petals browned at the edges. Their scent had turned bitter.
Lydia stepped inside. There was no note. No welcome. Her single trunk sat by the wardrobe, carefully placed. Too carefully.
The room smelled faintly of lavender soap, old linen, and dust.
Behind her, Mrs. Hartwell hovered.
“If there’s anything you require, Your Grace, I’m sure the staff will do their utmost to… assist.”
Eventually, the silence implied.
“Thank you,” Lydia said with cool precision.
Mrs. Hartwell hesitated, then nodded and left, shutting the door behind her with a soft click.
Lydia stood alone in the centre of the room.
Her reflection stared back at her from the mirror across from her. It was composed, carefully dressed, still wearing gloves.
She pulled one off slowly and pressed her hand to the cold marble of the mantelpiece.
The chill bit into her skin.
So, this is it, she thought
Power wrapped in frost and laced with dead roses.
She had crossed the threshold, claimed the name, worn the ring. And now the house, and its people, watched her like she was an interloper in silk.
“You chose this,” she reminded herself out loud. “You knew what it would be.”
And still, for just one breath, she let the ache surface. She missed her father and missed warmth. Familiarity. A world where her name didn’t come with judgment or curiosity.
But then she exhaled, slowly.
Straightened her back and turned to unpack her things herself.
***
The next morning, the breakfast room was quiet when Lydia entered.
Sunlight filtered through tall, sheer-draped windows, gilding the silverware and porcelain in soft, golden light. The scent of warm bread and tea lingered faintly in the air, but the room felt more like a set piece than a welcoming space.
Only one chair was occupied.
Charlotte looked up quickly when Lydia stepped in, her napkin still folded neatly in her lap, her teacup untouched.
“Good morning,” Lydia said softly.
Charlotte rose politely, her smile genuine, if hesitant. “Good morning, Your Grace.”
The title sounded strange coming from her lips, and Lydia gave her a knowing look.
“You can still call me Lydia.”
Charlotte exhaled, relieved. “Good. I didn’t know if—well, the staff have been… formal.”
Lydia glanced toward the butler, who was standing silently at the edge of the room, eyes lowered, posture stiff. The maid pouring tea didn’t meet her gaze.
“Yes,” Lydia said coolly. “I’ve noticed.”
Charlotte bit her lip and gestured to the seat beside her. “Please, sit. The cook makes fresh scones every morning. With jam.”
“Jam,” Lydia echoed, managing a smile as she took her seat. “How decadent.”
Charlotte laughed softly, but her eyes drifted toward the staff again. It was the kind of glance a woman made when she was used to discomfort but not quite sure how to fix it.
They ate mostly in silence. Lydia sipped her tea slowly, methodically, aware of every scrape of silverware, every cautious glance in her direction. Her place setting had been laid perfectly, but it still felt like a performance.
Nicholas was nowhere to be seen, and she didn’t ask where he was.
Charlotte didn’t mention him.
When breakfast was done, Lydia thanked the staff. Politely and formally. No one replied. Mr. Cobb, the butler, bowed, shallow and stiff.
She left the house an hour later with a shawl wrapped around her shoulders and the morning sun bright in her eyes. The gardens of Hawthorne House were expansive. Clipped hedges and old fountains, gravel paths that curled between stone urns and arched rose trellises.
It was quiet out here. Calmer, but not untouched.
She walked slowly along one of the narrower paths near the east wing, trailing her gloved fingers along the rough stone of a low wall. From somewhere ahead, around a bend in the hedge, came the low murmur of voices.
Lydia stopped.
The wind caught part of their conversation and carried it back to her.
“—never thought I’d see the day. A shopkeeper’s daughter married to the Hawthorne title.”
“He must be desperate. Or mad. Or both.”
“Did you see the dress, though? No lace. Looked like she stitched it herself.”
A quick laugh.
“Imagine the duchess with a needle.”
Lydia didn’t move. Didn’t make a sound.
She waited until the voices faded. Until the maids or whoever scurried on, unaware they’d been overheard.
Then she stepped forward again, shoes crunching softly against the gravel.
She kept her head high.
Let them talk and whisper.
Let them forget that her father’s hands had built fortunes they could never imagine, that his name had once been spoken with respect by men who wore coronets.
Shopkeeper’s blood, they’d said.
Yes, she thought. And it is a shopkeeper’s daughter who now pays your wages.
She kept walking. Past the empty garden bench, past the silent statues, past the last clinging rose that hadn’t yet withered in the morning light.
***
Later that same day, the clock on the mantel read twenty minutes past four. She had asked for tea at four o’clock.
The drawing room was grand, with tall ceilings, heavy drapes, and oil portraits in gilded frames. The kind of room meant for receiving guests, for playing cards, for afternoon civility.
It was not meant to feel like a test.
Lydia sat straight-backed in one of the armchairs by the hearth, hands folded neatly in her lap, her skirts perfectly arranged. The fire had been laid but never lit. A cold draft moved between the windowpanes, just enough to raise gooseflesh beneath her sleeves.
Finally, the tea tray arrived.
Too fast. The butler set it down with just enough force to rattle the china, and too little care to conceal the fact that everything on it was stone cold, from the over-steeped tea to the dry, curling edges of the cucumber sandwiches.
“Your Grace,” he said coolly.
“Thank you, Mr. Cobb,” Lydia replied with a smile that didn’t touch her eyes.
He bowed and withdrew.
She poured the tea anyway, but didn’t drink it.
After a moment, Lydia stood, smoothing her skirts. She had no intention of brooding in parlours like a forgotten ornament.
So she began to explore.
Hawthorne House was larger than it first appeared. A warren of corridors, antechambers, staircases that led to half-rooms and overlooked gardens, or nowhere at all. She passed portraits she hadn’t seen before, some cracked beneath the varnish, some impossibly grand.
One wing smelled faintly of beeswax and coal dust. Another still held the echo of perfume and laughter, a music room, long closed.
The air grew cooler as she wandered, her slippered feet silent against the Turkish runners and polished wood. Light slanted in from high windows, catching motes of dust suspended like secrets.
She found a door slightly ajar, a morning room, perhaps, or a small library, with bookshelves bowed under the weight of volumes no one had opened in years.
She stepped inside and looked around, and as she did, time slipped.
When she glanced up again, the light had shifted, deepened.