Chapter 27
Previously: The Rose of Whitby – Chapter 26
As well as Gregory took those declarations, as badly Darcy does the next morning when her papa updates her as well. She feels like a failure of a woman, it’s her duty to give her husband an heir, especially as a baroness!
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Dr Seward does what he can to console her and promises to look more into the science, maybe there is something he can do- although he doubts it.
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Knowing about her short-comings as a woman makes Darcy’s jealousy flare up worse than before. Now she’s even more on edge when Gregory is alone with Dame Jennifer, or out in town before the last pub closes.
After another day of that it comes to a head when Gregory is just sulking around her, pawing around on her bed as Pretty. Upon her asking, he tells her he really wants to discuss this as Gregory, so he jumps on the windowsill and after throwing another layer on, Darcy gives her door a long look, then sighs. She’s noticed earlier that she was literally going up the wall with jealousy- walking right up along it, and so now she walks down the outside of the building from her window to Pretty’s large eyes. Not wanting to distract from what clearly weighs heavy on him, she just shakes her head, it must be a dhampir power, and leads him to their favourite bench in the gardens.
His expression makes her take his hands and give him some time. He confesses that her distrust really hurts, he didn’t do anything wrong and really, she wasn’t jealous when he went drinking with the other knight, and that would have been much more interesting to him than Dame Jennifer. Darcy blinks, she was ready to apologize for the jealousy, she herself thinks it feels strange, she doesn’t like how hard it is to think through the haze of possessiveness, but the last part confuses her. The other knight? But that was a man. What would Gregory do with a man? Isn’t jealousy about, well, not wanting your lover to be intimate with somebody else? Gregory gives her a bit longer to wrap her mind around the concept with some hints as to what he means that are less subtle than he probably thinks, and with her face going between red and white, thrown from scandal, shock, and embarrassment, Darcy finally looks down at the floor and, in a whisper, asks: “Did I make a mistake with Eluned?”
“No, you don’t have to demure to my wishes!” is his answer when he understands that she asks him if she shouldn’t have let Eluned help her, if she should have become a man for him. She feels like a woman, so she’s a woman, is his opinion, she doesn’t need to change for him, he just wants her trust and his freedom. With a nod, she promises to be a more obedient wife, she knows she’s too jealous. That wasn’t what he meant, he isn’t marrying her for obedience or the title, he hasn’t even checked if he’ll be baron, he just wants leeway. Apologizing again to the point where he gets annoyed and shuts her up with a kiss, Darcy still has to say more.
He was the one who brought it up after all, and she’s worried what he’ll think, because no, he won’t be baron and she can’t even take his name. Prepared for his disappointment or outright protest, she is surprised when he shrugs instead and tells her he doesn’t care. Maybe if that is always what he says, she can ask one more thing? He did get injured again on another excursion after all, and again when he went ahead alone, she doesn’t like to always let him go alone when that means he’ll get hurt before she can be there to help.
Gregory tries to dissuade her because she already is doing so much, he argues, she doesn’t have to! When she insists that, no, she wants to be better for him!, he’s clearly surprised. But she read with Papa that dhampirs can be more than wolves maybe, so she wants to try. If she’s to come along with him for scouting and such, maybe a rat would help? Having no trouble to find one of her night friends, she scoops the rat up and tries to find out how that would go, the same way she did with the bat. It’s much easier than that time, but Gregory laughs at seeing her turn into a rat the size of a small pony. That wasn’t what she was thinking about but… it’s fun to be a rat! She chitters a giggle and bounces around, quickly joined by Gregory riding on her back as the cat until she scuttles up a tree. Yes, she can still cling to vertical surfaces in this form, too, but… she’s making a ruckus. With a sigh she turns back, even as a rat, albeit a huge one, she’s noisy, really, this whole sneaking thing is beyond her.
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Wanting to cheer her up, Gregory encourages her to see if her clinging to surfaces maybe can be useful, so she walks up a tree then stretches her hands for him, finds that yes, she can easily lift him up even like this. When he starts kissing her she shifts her grip only to squeak as holding him closer ends up with something poking against her. Reprimanding him slightly and setting him down again she still feels bad for not being able to actually keep him safe and… she didn’t miss that he said ‘for his wishes’, not that he prefers her being a woman. She wants to be good for him, maybe she can just indulge him a little bit, so she offers for him to sleep in her room again, she doesn’t want him to have to be alone.
He admits he better be Pretty for that because he doesn’t trust himself to not get reprimanded worse. When she takes her robe back off and feels him undress her further with his gaze, she blushes but doesn’t say anything, doesn’t shy back for a bit when he steps in and starts kissing her, not even when his hands begin to wander, but then pushes slightly against his chest as she shakes her head, reminds him that she, well, she’s not sure she will even be able to perform on their wedding night, let alone now already, he must have felt the harness.
Whispering in her ear, he tells her that he could still make her feel really good. She blushes harder, and regrets having allowed him to stay. Brushing his hair aside, she hopes this will make him stop trying to get more than she really wants to give before they are married, and sinks her fangs into his neck again, tries to really make him feel good and when his body tenses against hers, she lifts him up, carries him to bed and slips both of them under the blanket. He mumbles, blissed out, that he doesn’t always only want to get that, he wants to give it to her, too, can they finally be married?
Luckily he falls asleep quickly and Darcy hesitantly cuddles against him, heart racing with confusion, again that sense of possessive need, but also a bit of elation at having her lover here.
Despite that, she really, really hopes he teleported far the next morning, because he shouldn’t be seen at all being close to her room, she’s still worried about Dame Jennifer reporting anything.
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So it goes for another few days as both Darcy and Arthur are walking on eggshells for the time they’re housing the Dame, both know that their etiquette isn’t up to standard, both know that they might be found out as impostors, that Darcy, really, only is heir with some very fudged fey help. Eluned might be sure that her magic will hold up to scrutiny if anybody checks on the records about Darcy’s legitimacy, but that doesn’t make those two willing to chance it, to have anybody question Darcy, or worse, drag her in front of a court.
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That knowledge slowly sours Darcy’s enthusiasm about the ball as she realises that she actually has to mingle with all those real nobles and all of Gregory’s carefree optimism doesn’t sway her from preparing frantically with Arthur. When the day finally comes, her and Arthur barricade themselves into the carriage with a veritable rolling library for last second preparations. In all her panic about the social occasion Darcy forgot to pack any of the earth she’ll need to be able to sleep, dhampir weaknesses still being so new to her, but the house spirit has added an extra piece of luggage to what she has packed.
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Arthur tries his best to not gape too much when they finally drive past the gates and up to the duchess’ estate- but he knows his eyes are wide. The ‘country house’ is probably larger than Rossmore castle. It has less towers and turrets and such, and instead is a big, wide block of extremely fancy manor, with rows and rows of windows and wide, green lawns sprawling around it. The driveway has to be half a mile of pale gravel, lined with topiary and flower beds. Everything is clean and sharp and pristine. Not like their castle grounds with their flowers blooming out of season, and this sense that everything is just pretending to be civilised, a wildness lurking underneath. He never noticed that, consciously, but now he feels the contrast to how neat and open the grounds here are. Even the stately trees dotting the lawn further back, before they turn into a forest, feel much more like a park than the vanguards of encroaching woodland.
He supposes this is what real nobility lives like. And, well, the duchess is a really important lady, after all. Nervousness squirms in his stomach again while he mentally rehearses the correct forms of address for the various noble ranks- especially the duchess. If they annoy a personal friend of the queen, that would be very, very bad. Normally, his reading says, the title of Duke of York is even created for direct relatives of the crown- like younger sons. The current duchess only has the title because of some political thing with the Stuart line dying out, and the region needing more protection because of some underwater kingdom called Lemuria. So the current duchess’ father, who was a close friend to the royal family and a big shot in the military was made duke, and when he died, his daughter inherited because he didn’t have any other relatives.
And all of that is clearly a really big deal, and Arthur feels thoroughly out of his depth with all these concerns of the nobility of titles and inheritance and protocol.
He’s just glad he doesn’t have to pretend to be an actual noble- just not make a complete idiot of himself and accidentally insult someone.
Which he might.
He takes a deep breath, and tries to steady his nerves as they pass a big fountain and arrive at the front door, where Dame Jennifer hands them over to the servants to take to their guest rooms while she goes report to the duchess.
At least they’re not important enough for the duchess herself to welcome them.
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The servants lead Arthur and Gregory down halls and up stairs to two rooms next to each other in the wing for the male, unmarried guests. The servant is about their age, but very proper and deferential and polite, and Arthur has no idea how to act towards him. He tells them that they’ll have about an hour to freshen up, and then they’re invited for afternoon tea in the garden to be introduced and meet the other guests, and if they need anything, to just call.
Arthur is busy wondering whether that includes needing directions to that garden, when Gregory grins and winks and tells the young man he needs directions to the ladies’ wing.
Arthur does his very best not to stare at Gregory for that, darts a look at the servant- who looks, he thinks, blanker than before, like he doesn’t want anyone to read what he’s thinking.
Then Gregory assures him it’s only to help his lady unpack, nothing inappropriate, and Arthur doesn’t know whether that makes it better or worse. But the servant tells Gregory how to get there after another moment of hesitation, and Gregory says “Thanks!”, brightly, and flips the servant a coin he almost doesn’t catch, and then takes off.
Leaving Arthur alone in this huge, strange house.
Well, alone with the servant who gives the coin a look Arthur can’t read, then slowly puts it into his pocket, and asks him if there’s anything else.
Arthur manages to assure him there isn’t- he doesn’t feel like asking for directions to that garden right now. He’ll just… unpack and wait for Gregory to get back. Yes. So he steps into the opulent room and does that.
Probably the fact that there isn’t a servant doing that for him is a sign of him not being considered terribly high status, but he’s happy enough for the privacy.
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Darcy very much could have done without Gregory’s first idea at the duchess’ estate being to bribe his way over into the woman’s wing. Supposedly just so he can help her unpack, but she sends him away with no uncertain words, as an invisible cat, so that nobody can see him sneak out of her room. God beware she’ll have to deal with the rumours that would start, she knows full well she’ll hear enough about her lacking virtue with the early wedding, she doesn’t need any more ammunition for any political enemies.