Her heart constricted at the thought of everything else she was about to lose. Her ancient tester bed, where she’d spent most every night of her almost-seventeen years. The harpsichord her mother used to play when they had company. The little rose garden her father had planted for her…
“I’m taking my roses,” she said suddenly, surprising even herself.
Matthew’s dark brows knitted together. “What?”
“I’m taking my roses. I need them for essential oils to make perfume, and I haven’t any idea whether there will be roses in Wales at all, let alone my roses.”
Arabel shook her head. “They’re planted, Chrystabel. You cannot take roses.”
“What did Cromwell say?” Chrystabel marched over to snatch the letter from Matthew’s hand and quote from it. “‘You shall have liberty to take one day to gather and carry off your goods, and such other necessaries as you have.’” She looked up. “I’m a perfumer. I consider my roses necessary.”
“You cannot take them,” Arabel repeated. “There’s no point. They’ll die.”
“It’s winter. They’re dormant.” Chrystabel hoped that meant they wouldn’t die.
“You cannot take them,” Arabel insisted.
“You think not?” The look Chrystabel sent her sister was a challenge. “Watch me.”
Tremayne Castle
JOSEPH ASHCROFT, the Viscount Tremayne, was puttering around in his—well, he liked to call it his conservatory, even though it really wasn’t one—when he heard the old wooden door rattling, making quite a racket.
A shout forced its way through the cracks. “Please, let me in!”
“You cannot go in there, Mistress,” one of Tremayne’s groundsmen hollered as the door rattled some more—to no avail, since it was barred from the inside. “This wing is unfinished and uninhabited. You must go around the castle and through the gatehouse.”
“I cannot—it’s urgent!”
“That door won’t open from out here. You really must go around, Mistress…?”
“Creath Moore—my name is Creath Moore.” The groundsman must have looked confused, because she added, “Creath—it rhymes with breath. And I must get inside now!”
Joseph was already unbolting the door. When he lifted the bar and pulled it open, Creath fell into his arms.
And immediately began sobbing on his shoulder.
“I’ve got her, thanks,” Joseph told the groundsman, who was standing there looking astonished to find anyone in the roofless building.
A new hire. Otherwise he would have known that Joseph used this half-built wing of the castle for his winter gardening—and the man would also have known Creath. She lived on the nearest estate, and she and Joseph had been friends for nearly ten years, ever since his family had moved here to Tremayne to wait out the Civil War in relative safety. He and Creath had grown up together. All of the old retainers knew her.
In ten years, Joseph couldn’t remember Creath ever sobbing this hard. Not even when her parents and little brother all died of smallpox last year. She wasn’t a short girl, but he was tall, and she felt slight and fragile shuddering against him. He couldn’t imagine what was so wrong, but his heart went out to her.
“Close the door,” she managed through her sobs. “And bar it. Please.”
Joseph disentangled himself from her to do that, shutting the door in the groundsman’s surprised face.
“Will you be all right?” he asked Creath once they were free from prying eyes.
“Yes. No. I don’t know.” Choking back more tears, she staggered over to his potting bench and dropped to one of the stools he kept nearby. Her gaze darted around the huge open space to all the glassless windows, which Joseph had covered in oiled parchment that let in light but blocked any view. “Will you look outside and see if anyone is approaching?”
Joseph blinked. “You just asked me to bar the door. Now you want me to unbar it? No one is there other than the groundsman—who else would be out in this freeze? With that icy wind gusting off the Severn, I fear we’re in for a storm—”
“I need to know if Sir Leonard followed me—just look!”
At twenty, Joseph already knew that he’d never understand women. But he could tell that this one was on the edge of hysteria. “Very well.” Hands held up in surrender, he backed away until he hit the door, then turned, opened it, and quickly shut and barred it again. “There’s no one. It’s so beastly cold—” He broke off as he turned back to peer at her. “And yet, you wear no cloak. Did you walk here from Moore Manor with no cloak? Over a mile in the freezing cold?”
“There was no time to fetch a cloak. And I didn’t walk here, I ran, which warmed me some. I feel cold now, though.” Despite all four fireplaces blazing beneath the oiled canvas stretched overhead—holding in the heat that kept his plants alive—she shivered. “I cannot go through with it, Joseph. I cannot marry Sir Leonard. I just cannot.”
Sir Leonard Moore, the rather distant cousin who had recently inherited her father’s baronetcy, expected to wed her on the second of January, the day before she turned sixteen. He coveted her holdings—acres of valuable land that weren’t included in the baronetcy’s entail, as they’d come from her mother’s family and now belonged to Creath. Unfortunately for her, Cromwell had seen fit to appoint Sir Leonard her guardian, which meant she couldn’t refuse to marry him. As long as she was underage, her marriage rights were his to bestow.
But up until now, she hadn’t objected to the match. When Joseph had questioned her, Creath had claimed she didn’t mind wedding a man more than twice her age. She’d always been destined to be a lady of the manor, and her mother had trained her well. Though she wished Moore Manor weren’t Sir Leonard’s manor, at least it was home. She’d told Joseph she would be content loving her children and caring for her
