SURPRISING NEWS
Amabel lay face down on her bed, the cool linen covers creased under her. She was crying. Still dressed in her nightgown, hair loose about her shoulders, she had woken to the same horror she had felt the previous evening.
It's really true. Not a bad dream. She lay where she was and wept. At that moment, she heard a knock at the door.
“Amabel?”
Amabel groaned: she did not want to see anyone. Chrissie, all innocence and playfulness, was absolutely the last person she felt like seeing. Her uncle had, hours ago, ago given her the most upsetting news she had received since being told Mother was dead.
He wants me to marry that man.
She sobbed. How could he ask her to do this? An uncouth oaf, someone who was barely cultured. Someone who humiliated her! How could he? She sobbed and bunched the cushion under her head, giving it a fierce thump. She wished it was Uncle Brien. It was the least of what she would like to do to him to make him feel the depths of her pain.
“Amabel? Are you there?”
She's not gone yet. She held her breath. Go away. Leave me alone.
“Amabel?” Her cousin's voice rang out through the dusky silence. Amabel heard footsteps walk slowly down the flagstone hallway. She sighed and rolled over, looking at the ceiling.
She thought she would never cry again, never speak. When her uncle had told her of his decision, after the dinner, she had not reacted at all. She had simply stared at him. Then bowed her head in assent.
What else could I do?
“You look miserable, lass,” her uncle had said, surprised.
She had given a bitter laugh. Had her uncle expected her to be pleased about the match? She hated the idea.
The man is little better than a peasant! She had wanted to scream. He had acted thoughtlessly. He had assumed some right to her, as if he owned her, and he had laid his hands on her. Her wrist still bore the marks of his fingers, his grip holding her tight. She looked at them now, a line of little bruises. He could barely talk and seemed out-of-place at even such a basic gathering.
That man, rash and rude, was to be her husband?
She had found her voice, then, and turned to her uncle.
“May I know the date of this ceremony? I find I need to make finishing touches to the gown and pack for the journey.”
“That is difficult to determine, Lady Amabel,” he had said.
“How so?”
He had smiled then. “Because Lord Broderick has to prepare. To ready his troops and himself for a raid on the Bradleys.”
What? Her great-uncle had sent him on a raid? Against their enemies? Already?
She had not known what to say, so she had said nothing.
Uncle Brien had chuckled. Taken her shock for concern, which was the last thing she had meant.
“Dinnae worry yerself, lassie,” he had said condescendingly, “he'll come back whole and well.”
She had never wanted to slap her uncle more than she had wanted to at that moment. Her hand clenched, and she walked out lest she do something she would live to regret.
Her uncle's mocking chuckle had followed her.
As soon as she was in the hallway out of sight, she had fled to her bedchamber.
The anger had not died. All she could think about was how much she hated her uncle. And Broderick MacConnaway. Both of them.
“My lady?”
Amabel closed her eyes. Her maid, Blaine. Why would she disturb me now, without my calling for her? And why will no one leave me? Alina, at least, knew her well enough to give her peace.
“Yes?” she sighed.
The maid knocked again. “May I come in?”
“Of course.” Amabel's voice was brittle. She turned to face the younger woman as she came hesitantly in through the door.
“Begging yer pardon, milady. But yer uncle. He was wantin' yer presence below.”
Amabel stared at her.
“Whatever for?”
The maid looked frightened. “I dinnae know, milady. I only know he said for ye to wear somethin' bonny. The green dress, I think?”
Amabel closed her eyes. She wanted to control her anger but she was not sure if she could. She struggled for calm. It was not the maidservant's fault. She would not unleash her anger on her.
“He said I should go to the hall?”
“No, milady. The solar. I dinnae ken why, as I say. Only that he said to be there by nine of the clock. And now it be half an hour to nine.”
Amabel bit her lip.
“Well, you have half an hour to make me look bonny, as you say.” She forced herself to sound light and indifferent but, from the look on the maid's face, she succeeded only in sounding frighteningly brittle.
“As you say, milady,” the smaller woman replied. She retrieved the dress and a matching kirtle and ribands from the cupboard.
Amabel stood and let her dress her.
She felt empty. I no longer care what happens. Let my uncle do his worst. He cannot reach me behind this ice.
She glanced in the mirror when Blaine finished. A slender, graceful face stared back at her, high cheekbones carved into the pale face, mouth set hard. A face that looked almost exactly like her mother’s.
Amabel's memory of her mother was hazy: gray eyes, long, solemn face. Her freshest memories were all from a painting in a locket her father wore beneath his tunic, painted with precious colors from Italy. He had showed it to her one night on one of his rare visits, when she was too scared to sleep. The face that looked back at her from the mirror's silvery surface now was identical to that in the locket. But for the fact, where her mother's eyes were soft and tender, hers were chips of ice.
I cannot blame myself for that, she thought bitterly. Blame my great-uncle.
She wore her long green velvet dress, bound at her slender waist with a kirtle of cloth-of-silver. She looked cool, distant and regal.
Not too bad, she thought appraisingly. A fitting bride for the altar of uncle's arrogance.
He could make her marry, could humiliate her. But he could not command her to love this man.
Only she could do that.
And her heart was set against it.