“So I try not to pry in to m’lord’s affairs too deeply, of course,” the driver said; his voice broke in to Lawrence’s sense of broken self-defeat, interrupting another dangerous reverie. “And of course, the lord is free not to answer, should he find it pushes too deep into his own personal situation, but... could I inquire as to who the... pretty young lady in the nightgown was, back at that manor we left?”

Lawrence had known the driver, Colby, for most of his life; the man was only a year or thereabouts younger than he, and had grown up as a daughter of one of the older maidservants, playing amid the fields of the Amhurst estate. When he came of age he worked in the Amhurst stables, and moved then on to learning the art of maneuvering carriages through the moors, carriages which had once carried the previous Lord Strauss through the paths and fields on late nights. Colby had never pried so much into Lawrence’s life; he had been a loyal servant, though, and Lawrence saw in him someone who had come up much the same as he himself had. Lawrence considered not answering the question - certainly such an inquiry from a servant or driver would provoke the fabulous rebuke of any other noble of good standing, but Lawrence had never been quite like other nobles of good standing, had he?

“She is... a lovely young woman, Colby,” Lawrence said, deftly avoiding a confrontation with the heart of the matter. He knew full well what the driver’s question had intended, but he had no desire to give the answer the chauffeur had truly wanted. 

“Indeed, from the look of her she seemed to be quite a lovely woman, and one I can only guess has quite the station among the nobles, yes?” Colby asked, pushing forward as the carriage trotted along a dark and lonely road. A lantern, hung at the side of the vehicle, burned a soft orange light to guide the path along the cobblestones. It was not much to go by, but it helped abate some of the oppressive darkness; even on the night of a full moon, the hills and trees obscured much of its silvery glow, and one could scarcely see beyond the length of one’s own feet.

“She is indeed a lovely woman, and the woman due to inherit the title and lands and wealth of the viscount of Roxborough, her father, we he passes, if that gives an answer to your question,” the duke responded weakly. He looked out the window and a gossamer figure in the distance; his eye twitched as he narrowed his gaze, and he could see the figure vanish. He closed his eyes, and her face appeared; this time, not a face stricken in tears and pain, but a face gripped with passion; with want, the same face he had seen her give to him when she saw his body for the first time. A face he had never expected to see; a face full and bright, just for him.

Had he been hallucinating?

“And I’m certain that none of that matters much to you at all, does it, m’lord?” Colby asked with a wry smile, looking back over his shoulder through the window connecting the carriage to the chill of the outdoors. “I know you’ve never been a man for title or wealth or station. Not power-hungry, nor a silly social climber wearing a suit of paper.”

“You know me well, Colby, perhaps more so than I had thought,” the duke responded.

“It’s the only reason I can manage in thinking on why you’ve reached an age as old as you have without taking a wife, as would be expected of you,” Colby continued.

“Is it? Most simply assume I have unconventional tastes, instead,” the duke laughed. “That’s what they tell me the circles of gossip whisper, anyway.”

“I certainly know that you’ve known affection, or at least as close as could ever be said to be that sort of romantic affection, in the way you’ve cared for women you’ve been with in the past, but...” Colby opined. “I think you simply had not truly seen in them what you long for.”

“Perhaps,” the duke said dismissively.

“But you saw it in that girl, didn’t you, m’lord?” Colby dared, as the carriage came to a tall forest, the road cutting away from clustered trees.

“That’s quite a statement for you to make,” the duke retorted. He couldn’t stop seeing her. He couldn’t stop thinking about her - once more he saw the image of a woman on a black steed, dress white as snow, laughing and calling out across the hills, before the lantern light flickered and she was gone.

“I think it’s an accurate one, though, don’t you?” Colby asked. “She said she loved you, after all. And I know that’s far from the only sign of truth to be seen, m’lord, but the manner in which she said it shook me down to my core. And I’m sure it did the same to you.”

“She’s a lovely woman, but...” the duke stammered.

“But?” Colby questioned. “I think there are few buts to be had when it comes to matters of love, m’lord.”

“You knew my father, Colby,” the duke announced with a sigh. “You knew the... manner, in which he acted. I’m certain you’re not privy to every detail, but the stories are there, and I’m certain you heard a few in your youth from the serving-girls and the butlers, and the like.”

“I knew him to be a flawed man, yes,” Colby admitted. “I do not yet see how those flaws have changed you, m’lord, or influenced your relationship with this girl who seems just right for you.”

“Don’t you see, Colby? What would happen if I took that girl’s hand? Do you think I could make her happy, with the things my father did? Do you think she’d leave my manor with anything save tears staining her eyes, the same way my mother did?” the duke responded.

“M’lord, you are not destined to be your father,” Colby stated simply. “No one is destined to be anything, except what they wish to be.”

“That’s unfortunately not how life works for us,” the duke lamented.

“And why not? You’ve rejected every other cage so many have tried to place on you - expectations of who to marry, and when, and it seems that that young lady has done the same,” Colby reasoned. “Why do you think yourself bound by the legacy of your father?”

The words resounded, and the duke did not have an answer. He had never thought on things from quite that perspective. The duke looked upon the moors again, and he saw her face. Everywhere, he saw her face. He saw her face and heard her voice crying out in love for him and he knew that Colby was right. No man is doomed to make those same mistakes.

“But how could I truly trust myself not to become the man my father did?” he asked Colby.

“I trust that you will not, as I’ve known you for a great many years, and have never seen such a beastly part of you, m’lord. And, clearly,” Colby mused as he tugged on the carriage’s reins, “that pretty young woman felt the same way. She trusted you - with her heart,” he exclaimed. “Why don’t you trust yourself?”

“I...” the duke tried to gather the words, but he did not truly have an answer. He struggled to find one, but nowhere could he devise an excuse for so salient a point. He looked out on the moors and damned himself silently as he saw her again, riding along the bend of the road just behind them. He heard the clop of Midnight’s hooves... and he focused, looking closely onto the far ridge. Stricken with shock, he exhaled, as he realized that this was not an illusion, nor some deceptive and damning ministration of his mind.

“M’lord?” Colby asked, peering over his shoulder.

“Is that... someone... coming up behind us?” the duke asked, his heart beating hard. It looked like her, and she could scarcely make out a carriage, studded with lights, following behind - the earl’s carriage, flashing as it tumbled along the roadway.

“It seems like a carriage, m’lord, and a woman... on a horse?” Colby reasoned. As he peered closer through the dark the duke noticed some movement on the horse, and heard a scream.

“Spin around! Block the roadway,” the duke exclaimed, pain settling into his stomach. “Some manner of... bandit, or some such, is...” he swallowed hard.

“Indeed, m’lord,” Colby responded, a canny and broad smile brimming as he yipped at the horses, pulling their reins around. The carriage swung hard and the duke nearly fell from his seat, but he hung on tight as the vehicle came into place, wheels in the mud and horses sniffling and whinnying as they marched impatiently, blocking passage along the road.

“It’s that bastard the earl, I’d bet,” the duke exclaimed as he stepped with haste out onto the roadway. His heart beat harder as he heard the screams and saw the procession advancing along the dips in the path, the cobblestones rumbling underfoot as they drew closer. Midnight whinnied loud, clearly trying to throw the earl from its back, and then he saw her - fighting atop the steed, with the earl grasping at her arms and trying to take control of the horse. Her face, so pained and desperate, brimmed suddenly with manic joy as she caught sight of the duke standing tall, blocking the path ahead.

“Lawrence!” he heard her shrill cry echo along the path as the wicked earl tried to silence her. He, too, looked up from his grappling of the slight woman, the devil in his eyes as they approached. The earl’s carriage creaked and swayed under the speed and the weight of the chase, but it came to a slow stop as the driver caught sight of the duke’s barricade. Midnight whinnied and rumbled and stopped all at once when it came close to the duke; the horse lifted its back legs, and the surprise earl found himself thrown completely from the horse’s back, landing on his side in the mud along the roadway with a grunt and a thud.

“Agh! Stupid animal!” the earl exclaimed, teetering as he struggled to his feet.

“Lawrence! You came back for me?!” Anne’s voice erupted like a cheerfully singing dove, and she leapt from Midnight’s back and ran to embrace him. He swept her into his arm and held her tight, never wanting to let go; certainly after seeing what had happened. The earl limped along the road, grunting, his face blazing with rage; blood ran down his nostrils, his face swollen and his eyes utterly infected with hate.

“You!” the earl shouted, staggering up the roadway as his carriage driver looked on pensively. “What are you doing here? She doesn’t want you! She doesn’t have a choice,” the earl called hoarsely. “I’ve already decided that she’s mine. And when I want something—”

“You look like you’ve had quite a bad evening tonight, Martin,” the duke coolly retorted, holding shivering Anne close to his side. “That nose of yours might need looked at.”

“This witch!” he hissed. “She did it. And don’t you worry, Duke of Amhurst, she’ll pay for it in time,” Martin snarled. “Now, let go of her, let her be on her way here.”

“I don’t think I’m going to do that, Martin,” Lawrence stated simply. 

“What do you mean you aren’t going to do it, you idiot?” Martin sneered. “Let go of her! You don’t even like women,” he raged.

“You know what? You’re right, I don’t like women,” Lawrence said, letting Anne go; she pleaded for him to stay, but with a gentle caress he assuaged her fears. “I love women. Or, woman, more particularly. One particular woman. Anne Hatley of Roxborough.”

“Hah! You’re too late,” Martin sneered. “I’m the Earl of Carteret! I get whatever I want, and there’s little you can do to protest, you fop. You, of all people? Lawrence, of Amhurst? The most lily-touched fool in all England? Think you can take any woman you like?” he continued to rage. “You know nothing! I bed women with a simple smile! I control half of the estates in this country, and I’ll control another half when I’m finished with this harlot! Do you think you can do anything to stop me?” he asked Lawrence with a guffaw. “You can’t even help yourself! What, twenty-nine and you can’t find a wife? What a fool! And you think you deserve the viscount’s estate? What will you do with it, cry upon all of its lands? You idiot! You know nothing! You kn—” the earl’s final narcissistic exclamation found itself cut short by the sudden and quite final meeting of Lawrence’s coiled-up fist against the side of his already-bruised face. The single punch came with such ferocity that the earl spun on his feet, letting out a dumbfounded little groan of shocked pain, as he teetered back-forth on his feet. He turned around, woozy, and seemed ready to make a statement of protest at the complete lack of civility from the Duke of Amhurst... but instead all he managed to do was fall flat onto his ass, staring wide-eyed at the stars twinkling above.

“Hey!” the driver called out in protest from the earl’s carriage. “How dare you? Do you know who that man is?”

“To me, he looks like a silly infant, squirming around in the mud like a pig,” Lawrence proclaimed with a laugh. He felt Anne run to his side, and he laid his arm across her shoulders, feeling... almost transformed. He heard the Colby yip at the horses, and as they began to trot through the mud and back onto the road, he looked down to Anne. Tears on her face - but he knew they were tears of panic, and tears of confusion; and most of all, tears of joy.

“I love you, Lawrence,” she admitted, pressing her face into his chest. “I didn’t think you’d come back for me.”

“I suppose it’s fortunate that I did,” he joked.

“Should I kick him once? Just for the sake of it?” Anne asked with an impish smile, watching the daze earl try to stand on rubbery legs.

“You certainly should,” Lawrence added. And with aplomb he watched as his love left his side, and with her face all tightened up pure anger, she delivered a swift, singular strike of her toes against the earl’s ribs, sending him back to his side, writhing.

“My! That was quite unladylike of you,” Lawrence exclaimed facetiously, sighing as he came round to hold her once again. Her eyes gleamed, and it seemed at that perfect moment that the night had come in just the right way, to set up just the right moment, of her tranced in him, and him tranced in her. Their lips met again, with all the primal and molten fury that had in those moments of passion they spent together in the cabin; the feeling erupted within the both of them, and he held her tightly as she gripped at his back, pulling him closer, as close as the two of them could ever be. Lawrence closed his eyes and for the first time in as long as he could possibly remember the nightmares washed away, taken and thrown like scattered ashes tossed to the cool night breeze, deposited in dark places where they would never again be remembered.

“I love you, Lawrence, and I knew I would, from that moment we spoke at that table, in this awful malcontent’s parlor,” Anne admitted with a sheepish smile. “I saw you staring at that leek soup, and I needed to know you.”

“That soup was dreadful. I certainly hope that’s not the memory of me you will carry into your old days,” Lawrence winced with playful disdain.

“We can’t control these sorts of things!” she declared in jest.

“No, but we can certainly control our future together, Anne. And I’ve made quite a decision for that future, love.”

“And what is that?” she retorted haughtily.

“Colby?” he called to the driver, who smiled as he checked on each of his horses in turn.

“Yes m’lord?” the cheery man pipped up.

“How far do you think the nearest church is from here? And do you think we might manage to rouse the priest from his slumber at this hour?” Lawrence said, as Anne’s eyes lit up in glee.

“It’s quite a ways, m’lord, and I doubt we’ll be rousing any priests,” Colby remarked. “But I doubt that’d stop you, would it?”

“You’re absolutely correct on that,” Lawrence answered, lost in Anne’s eyes, and she in his.

Epilogue

“Do you miss your father sometimes, love?”

Lord Strauss, now Viscount of Roxborough in addition to his title as duke of Amhurst, relaxed lazily upon a plush sofa in the manor he and his wife, the lovely Anne Hatley-Strauss, Viscountess of Roxborough, inherited from her dear father after he passed. He saw only a few seasons more, after Anne’s late-night wedding to the man she had so completely fallen in love with; but, Anne knew that her ailing father had lived those seasons in bliss, seeing his daughter so full of life - and most importantly, seeing her truly free.

“What has you thinking about him, darling?” the viscountess queried with a tilted head and a warm smile as she lounged against him; the study, where Anne had spent so many nights of her childhood sneaking about and reading father’s library of books, bathed in a calm and cozy, flickering fire, dancing in the fireplace. “Have you got the estate’s affairs on the mind again, as you so often do?”

“No, love, it’s not that,” Lord Strauss responded, eyes idly tracing the flames as their glow flickered across the mantle. 

“Is something troubling you, love?” Anne asked, concern streaking creases along her face.

“I... I suppose, perhaps,” he declared, lifting her gently from him as he stood, paced towards the fireplace. “For a long time, I struggled to find myself, love. I suffered to see my own place among the vultures and the womanizers. I thought I would never find a soul that resonated with mine so well. And I was certain that when I did, I would do to her what my father did to the woman he had loved - I would destroy her, and destroy myself with her, just as my father did,” the duke mused.

“I trusted you. My heart did, and it has led me to the right place, I’m sure of it,” Anne chimed warmly. “You need not carry those doubts with you anymore.”

“I’ve no doubt in me about my fate, anymore,” the duke dispelled any such thoughts. “You trust in me - and your judgment is clearly far better than my own, what with your talent for managing... well, this entire bloody estate,” Lawrence laughed. “But your father... I was given something dear to him. Not just wealth, or estates, or names and titles - he spoke to me intimately that he wanted to give me something far dearer to him, something that he knew was not his to give, but which he hoped he could see happen. He gave me you,” Lawrence said, dithering as he stared at the fire.

“My father did not give me to you - I found you all on my own,” Anne wryly returned. “Though I know he took a liking to you... and he was right to. No other noble would love me the way you have.”

“I’ve never been a husband... we never train to be husbands. I know women take endless, drab courses on the proper way to be a ‘wife’, but men... we never know if we’re good husbands. And I don’t know if I’ll live up to what your father expected. If I’ll be everything he wanted me to be, for you,” Lawrence mused.

“My love...” Anne’s voice trailed as she sighed pleasantly. She rose from the couch, stepping slowly to the fireside. The flames licked and kicked along the stones and wrought-iron of the fireplace, illuminating the Lady Roxborough - the orange glow cascaded over her form, illuminating the seven-months-pregnant waist of the excitedly expecting young woman. She looked into his eyes, and he into hers, and somehow, she knew that no matter what words they exchanged, or didn’t exchange, they’d always find the answers together.

“My sister would be proud of you. I wish you could have met her. Perhaps one day, you - and our child - will,” he sighed, full of mirth.

“I’m sure she would be proud of you. And so would my father,” Anne responded happily. They embraced, their lips meeting, and it felt as good as it had the very first time they kissed; in fact, it got better every day.

“As long as we have love,” Anne sighed. “We’ll be the best husband, and the best wife, and viscount and viscountess, in all of England.”