Page 28 of Dropping the Ball

“Just the once,” Bernadette said, trying to smile and failing. “More than ten years ago. Tensions in Scandinavia, as I’m sure you know, have been high ever since then. Then came the Norwegian war for independence in eighteen-fourteen. Hethersett could not be recalled to Britannia, and when I wroteto him, suggesting I travel to Christiana to be with him, he wrote back saying I should not. Quite vehemently, to be honest.” Bernadette sagged, feeling the weight of being so hurtfully rejected by her own husband those years ago. And yet, he’d continued to write long and illustrative letters.

“This is preposterous,” Alden snapped, bringing Bernadette back to the present. “Your father cannot hold you to a marriage you do not want to a man you do not know and have not seen for a decade. It is barbaric.”

“It is the way of East Anglia,” she said with a helpless shrug. “I do not feel married, and I am certainly not in love with Hethersett. We do enjoy writing to each other. He writes with such eloquence, almost the way my friends in the Oxford Society do. I dare say I know as much about the courts of Sweden and Norway as I do those of East Anglia, Mercia, and Wessex.”

“Are you certain you are actually married?” Alden asked, one eyebrow raised.

“Unfortunately, yes,” Bernadette sighed. “I most definitely signed the contract, and Father reminds me of my duties every time I visit home. Which is why I spend as little time in Norwich as possible.”

“This is unfathomable,” Alden said, resting back against the headboard with her and shoving a hand through his disheveled hair. “It cannot be.”

“And yet, it is,” Bernadette said. “I cannot marry you, despite my deep and ardent feelings for you. And you must marry in order to avoid your family’s curse.”

Alden went very still and tight for a moment, as if he were holding his breath. Then he hissed, “Damn. Thisisthe curse. It has to be. The moment I find a beautiful, intelligent, wonderful woman, one who as no fear of my passions, in any sense of the word, I discover that we can never be together.”

“I am sorry,” Bernadette said quietly.

Alden sent her a sad smile, then reached for her hand on the covers between them. “As am I,” he said. “I would marry you tomorrow, if you were free.”

“And I you,” Bernadette sighed, tears threatening to spill once more.

For a long time, they were silent. Then Bernadette asked, “What do we do now?”

Alden let out a long breath, seeming to gather his thoughts, then nodded. “I suppose there’s nothing for it but to continue on with the ball.”

Bernadette felt as though her insides shattered with those words. “I will do my utmost best to find you a suitable woman to marry,” she whispered.

Alden turned to look at her as if his whole world had fallen apart. “Something will transpire between now and then that will resolve everything, I am certain.”

Bernadette forced herself to smile. “Yes,” she said. “I am certain it will.”

She was anything but certain. Her fate had been sealed long ago, when she had been too young and weak to stop disaster. She could not erase those bonds now, and Alden could not ignore a curse that had already come between them.

But really, there had to be something she could do. At the very least, she could write and confess all to Hethersett. Perhaps he would be so enraged that she had given her heart to another that he would divorce her. The shame of that would ruin her standing in theton, and her father would likely be so angry he might disown her. Her entire family would be disgraced. But she would have Alden.

There was simply no way to know which set of disasters might befall them, whether she appealed to Hethersett or not. In any case, the ball had to move forward. Come what may, they could build memories that would carry her through the dark days tocome, when the ball was over and both of them would be forced to move on without each other.

Chapter Ten

Dear Uncle Gerald,

I am writing to beg of you that I be released from any obligation to marry simply for the sake of not inheriting the castle. I know this request goes against everything that you wish for your sons and nephews, but events have unfolded that would make marrying whatever eligible lady would have me a crushing blow to any chance of happiness I might have in this world.

For you see, I have fallen in love. Deeply and recklessly. And whilst I can hear you advise me to marry the woman I am in love with, alas, she is not free to wed. She was bartered away by her father over a decade ago, and she cannot undo the binds that constrict her.

She loves me, though, dear uncle, and I must confess, I love her more than any maiden that has ever entered this shamble of a life I lead. She is not in the least afraid of the creatures that occupy my house, nor of my unusual mannersand ways of conducting myself. Indeed, she has made friends with the lizards, particularly Egbert, and is his new favorite, and she does not flinch in the least when I forget to don a coat or a neck cloth whilst going about my daily business.

In addition, the servants have come to love her most fervently. I receive smiles and praise from them when I am seen to treat her well, and scowls of disapproval every time they believe I have slighted her by continuing with plans for the ball. I desperately fear that if I do not marry the lady in question, even though there are circumstances extant that may make marriage between us difficult indeed, my carefully selected staff will mutiny and leave me in disgust.

So please, dearest, most generous uncle, I beg you to release me from the chains you have bound me with. It may not be good or moral to offer my heart, my soul, and my life to a woman married to another man, but I cannot imagine my life without her. If you would but free me from the obligations of the curse, I might be able to find a way to help my beloved obtain a divorce, or simply live wickedly with her for the rest of our days.

I await your answer and pray that it will come in enough time for these ball plans to be halted.

Your dearest nephew, who views you as his own father,

Alden

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