A Kingdom of Dreams (Westmoreland Saga 1)

"What an impatient nature you have!" she replied sternly, completely undaunted by his tone.

Her words were accompanied by such a wellbred, reproving look that Royce chuckled in spite of himself. "You're right," he admitted, grinning at the outrageous child-woman who dared to lecture him on his shortcomings. "Now, tell me why old Balder withdrew."

"Very well, but it's most unchivalrous of you to badger me so about matters which are of a most private nature—not to mention excruciatingly embarrassing."

"Embarrassing for whom?" Royce asked, ignoring her jibe. "For you, or for Balder?"

"I was embarrassed. Lord Balder was indignant. You see," she clarified with smiling candor, "I'd never seen him until the night he came to Merrick to sign the betrothal contract. 'Twas an awful experience," she said, her expression as amused as it was horrified.

"What happened?" he prodded.

"If I tell you, you must promise to remember that I was much like any other girl of fourteen—filled with dreams of the wondrous young knight whose wife I would become. I knew in my mind just how he would look," she added, smiling ruefully as she thought back on it. "He would be fair-haired, and young, of course, his face wonderful to look upon. His eyes would be blue, and his bearing would be princely. He would be strong, too, strong enough to protect our holdings for the children we would someday have." She glanced at Royce, her expression wry. "Such was my secret hope, and in my own behalf, it must be said that neither my father nor my half-brothers said aught to make me think Lord Balder would be otherwise."

Royce frowned, a picture of the foppish, elderly Balder flashing across his mind.

"And so there I was, strolling into the great hall at Merrick after spending hours practicing my walking in my bedchamber."

"You'd practiced walking?" Royce uttered, his tone filled with a mixture of amusement and disbelief.

"But of course," Jennifer said gaily. "You see, I desired to present a perfect picture of myself for my future lord's benefit. And so, it would not do that I bolt into the hall and seem too eager, nor that I walk too slowly and thus give the impression that I was reluctant. It was an enormous dilemma—deciding just how to walk, not to mention what to wear. I was so desperate that I "actually consulted my two stepbrothers, Alexander and Malcolm, to get their male opinion. William, who is a darling, was away from home for the day with my stepmother."

"Surely they must have forewarned you about Balder." The look in her eyes told him otherwise, but even so he was not prepared for the sharp stab of pity he felt as she shook her head.

"Quite the opposite. Alexander said he feared the gown my stepmother had chosen was not nearly fine enough. He urged me to wear the green one instead and dress it up with my mother's pearls. Which I did. Malcolm suggested I wear a jeweled dagger at my side so I'd not be overshadowed by my future husband's illustrious presence. Alex said my hair looked too common and carroty and must needs be caught up under a golden veil and laced with a rope of sapphires. Then, after I was attired to their satisfaction, they helped me practice walking…" As if loyalty prevented her from painting an unflattering image of her stepbrothers, she smiled brightly and said in a determinedly reassuring voice, "They were funning me, of course, as brothers will fun their sisters, but I was too filled with dreams to notice."

Royce saw beyond her words to the truth and recognized the heartless malice in their trick. He felt a sudden, overpowering desire to smash his fist into her brothers' faces—just for "fun."

"I was so concerned about every detail being just right," she was saying, her face perfectly cheerful now as if she were laughing at herself, "that I was quite late coming down to the hall to meet my betrothed. When I finally arrived I paraded across the hall at just the right speed, on legs that trembled not only with nervousness but with the weight of the pearls, rubies, sapphires, and gold chains at my throat and wrists and waist. You should have seen the look on my poor stepmother's face when she saw the way I was attired. It was quite a garish display, I can tell you," Jenny laughed, blithely unaware of the pent-up anger building in Royce as she continued.

"My stepmother later said I looked like a coffer of jewels with legs," she chuckled. "She did not say it unkindly." Jennifer hastily added when she saw the black scowl on her captor's face. "She was quite sympathetic, actually."

When she fell silent, Royce prodded. "And your sister, Brenna? What had she to say?"

Jennifer's eyes lit with fondness. "Brenna will always find something good to say about me, no matter how shocking my mistakes or outrageous my conduct. She said I 'sparkled like the sun and moon and stars.' " A bubble of laughter escaped Jenny and she regarded Royce with eyes aglow with merriment. "Which of course I did—sparkle, I mean."

His voice harsh with feelings he could neither understand nor contain, Royce looked at her and said tightly, "Some women need no jewels to make them sparkle. You are one of them."

Jennifer's mouth dropped open in shock and she gaped at him. "Was that a compliment?"

Thoroughly annoyed that she'd actually reduced him to uttering gallantries, Royce shrugged curtly and said, "I'm a soldier, not a poet, Jennifer. It was merely a statement of fact. Go on with your story."

Abashed and confused, Jennifer hesitated and then dismissed his unaccountable mood change with a mental shrug. Helping herself to another bite of apple, she said cheerfully, "In any case, Lord Balder does not share your disinterest in jewels. In truth," she said, laughing, "his eyes nearly popped right out of his head—so entranced was he with my glitter. In fact, he was so bedazzled by my vulgar display that he passed only a cursory glance over my face before turning to my father and saying, 'I'll have her.' "

"And, just like that, you were betrothed?" Royce asked, frowning.

"No, 'just like that' I nearly fell into a dead swoon —so shocked was I by my first glimpse of my 'beloved's' countenance. William caught me before I fell to the floor and helped me onto the bench at the table, but even once I was seated and beginning to regain my senses, I could not tear my gaze from Lord Balder's features! Besides being older than my father, he was thin as a stick, and he was wearing—er—" Her voice trailed off and she hesitated uncertainly. "I ought not to tell you the rest."

"Tell me all of it," Royce commanded.

"All?" Jennifer echoed uncomfortably.

"Everything."

"Very well," she sighed, "but 'tis not a pretty story."

"What was Balder wearing?" Royce prodded, beginning to grin.

"Well, he was wearing…"—her shoulders rocked with mirth as she gasped—"he was wearing someone else's hair!"

Laughter, rich and deep echoed from Royce's chest, joining the lilting music of Jennifer's.

"I'd scarce recovered my senses from that when I next noted that he was eating the most peculiar-looking food I'd ever seen. Earlier, while my brothers had been helping me decide what to wear, I'd heard them joking between themselves about Lord Balder's desire to have artichokes at every meal. I realized at a glance that the peculiar-looking fried objects heaped upon Lord Balder's platter must be the food called the artichoke, and that was what led to my being banished from the hall and Balder crying off."

Royce, who already guessed why Balder had been eating the food which was purported to increase male potency, fought to keep his expression grave. "What happened?"

"Well, I was very nervous—stricken actually—at the prospect of wedding such a dreadful man. In truth he was a maiden's nightmare, not a maiden's dream, and as I studied him at table, I felt a most unladylike urge to shove my fists into my eyes and howl like a babe."

"But you didn't, of course," Royce guessed, smiling as he recalled her indomitable spirit.

"No, but 'twould have been better if I had," she admitted with a smile accompanied by a sigh. "What I did was much worse. I couldn't bear to look at him, so I concentrated upon the artichokes which I'd never seen before. I was watching him gobble the things up, wondering what they were and why he ate them. Malcolm noticed

what I was looking at and so he told me why Lord Balder was eating them. And that was what made me begin to giggle…"

Her wide blue eyes swimming with mirth and her shoulders shaking helplessly, she said, "At first I managed to hide it, and then I snatched a handkerchief and pressed it to my lips, but I was so overwrought the giggles became a laugh. I laughed and I laughed and 'twas so contagious even poor Brenna began to laugh. We laughed ourselves into fits, until my father sent Brenna and me from the hall."