“I… I’mwhat?” she stammered.
“Marrying Richard de Lohr, Beckett’s father,” her mother repeated patiently. “Your father has sent word ahead. He and Richard are traveling to Cicadia as we speak, and they should arrive shortly. This is a much better match for you, Deedee. Sir Richard is a son of the Earl of Hereford and Worcester. No longer will you have to marryonlya grandson. You will be marrying the second son of the earl, a man who has position and prestige. He is an advisor to the king, in fact. You will be an important woman. Are you not pleased?”
Ananda seemed very happy about the whole thing, but Diara could only feel shock. As Ananda began rattling on about what to wear when she was introduced to her betrothed, Diara labored up from the bed and wandered over to the window seats overlooking the bailey. She was trying very hard to accept what she’d been told, though it was difficult. She’d only just had somehope that she could actually have a husband she wanted, and now this. Now, she was to marry the father of her dead intended.
I am to marry an old man.
The realization was sickening. She’d gone from a young pup to an elderly man in the blink of an eye. From one future to quite another. She tried to remember Beckett’s father, a man she had only briefly met when she was introduced to Beckett.
He was big.
That much, she remembered. He was a very big man, broad-shouldered, and she remembered he had a big neck, something some of the knights tended to have because they wore heavy helms and heavy protection around their necks and shoulders. Men without muscular necks and shoulders would collapse under such weight, so Beckett’s father had muscles all over his upper body. She remembered the size of his hands because he’d reached out to greet Robin, and she’d caught sight of hands that were the size of a trencher.
Big.
That was all she could recall about him.
Leaning against the window as the breeze lifted her hair, she thought hard on the man’s face. He had hair that was auburn, with a hint of blond around his face that might have actually been gray. She couldn’t really remember. He had to be more than twice her age. However, the more she thought about it, the more she remembered that he was nice looking and that Beckett had looked a good deal like him. Beckett, in fact, had been quite handsome, something he surely got from his father.
So, he was big and handsome. And old.
But she couldn’t remember anything else.
For the rest of the afternoon, she had to listen to her mother discussing wardrobe issues. The marriage to Beckett had been coming in the summer, which was about three months away, so although her trousseau had been planned and the fabricpurchased, the seamstress hadn’t yet begun the garments. She listened to her mother talk about sending word to the seamstress to hurry up with the dresses that had been ordered so that all of it could be packed away and taken with her once she had married.
Her mother seemed to think the marriage was to take place immediately.
Truth be told, that was a little intimidating. Diara had been given two years to become accustomed to the idea that she would be marrying Beckett, and she had taken all of that time to prepare herself for what was to come. Now, in just the space of a few days, her world had been upended, and not only had she lost one fiancé, she had evidently gained another.
Everything was happening in a blur.
As Diara stood at the window and looked out over the bailey, she could hear her mother issuing orders to the servants. They were to bring in trunks and capcases and, already, the packing for the new marriage had begun. Ananda wasn’t wasting any time. Of course, every woman wanted her daughter to be married and to marry well, but in this case, Ananda had lost hope over the past few days due to Beckett’s demise, so the missive from her husband that another husband for their daughter was on the horizon had the woman worked up into a frenzy.
Diara simply let her mother run with it.
In truth, she was still too stunned to get involved with her own future. She didn’t feel like packing or talking about wedding plans. She’d always assumed that she would live with her husband once they were married, which meant they would be returning to Selbourne Castle, a place she’d never been. She had prepared herself for that. But now, she had no idea where she would be living, only that she would no longer be living at Cicadia. When she had been introduced to Beckett, it had beenat his father’s castle near Gloucester, so she had to assume that was where she was going to be living from now on. A chatelaine of her own castle. Not just any castle, but a de Lohr marcher castle. That was a massive responsibility.
She wasn’t entirely sure she was mentally prepared for it.
Certainly, Diara had been trained to run a household just like every other noble daughter in England. That was simply part of their education. She knew how to manage a kitchen, purchase supplies, manage money, manage the servants, and every other task that was normally performed in a noble household. Chatelaines had to know the jobs of every person they supervised, and she knew how to do just about everything. Her training at Carisbrooke had been, if nothing else, complete and thorough. Lady de Redvers was a taskmaster when it came to training her young charges, so in spite of whatever gossip there happened to be flying around, all of that was pushed aside when training was in session.
Now, all of that education was about to be put to the test.
Diara turned to watch her mother as the woman had her trunks neatly lined up so that the packing could begin. Ananda did not seem to have any concerns at all about her daughter becoming the chatelaine for a major castle on the Welsh marches. Either she was so happy to get rid of her daughter that the thought hadn’t crossed her mind, or she simply had faith that Diara could effectively accomplish the task. All of that fine training in a fine household was about to pay off.
Her daughter was marrying a de Lohr son.
Still trying to reconcile herself to her impending future, Diara returned her attention to the bailey. She was rather young to be married to a seasoned knight, at least one as old as Beckett’s father, because a man like that needed an equally seasoned wife. A man like that had royal connections, and he had seen much in life, so she could only imagine what he must have been thinkingabout marrying a woman so young, hardly out of fostering herself.
She suspected how it all came about.
Diara knew her father had gone to Lioncross Abbey to demand a new husband to replace the one that had passed away, but she never imagined he would demand the father of her former betrothed. The more she thought about it, the more she realized that Robin must have gone straight to the Earl of Hereford and pitched such a fit that the man had no choice but to give him what he wanted. She could just hear her father demanding one of the earl’s own sons to fulfill the contract. She supposed it made the most sense that Beckett’s father, whom she knew was widowed, should be the chosen one.
She could only imagine what a nuisance her father must have made of himself.
Diara was certain that did not bode well for her. Already, her soon-to-be husband was probably greatly aggravated by her cantankerous father, so she could only pray that annoyance didn’t cross over to her. The poor man had just lost his son, and now he’d been forced into a marriage that she was quite certain he did not want. She didn’t know who she felt sorrier for—her or him.
The afternoon passed as Diara continued to sit near the window and pondered her future. Her mother continued to busy herself by packing her daughter’s trunks, grateful for the fact that Diara wasn’t participating because she preferred to do everything herself. That suited Diara just fine, and she remained in the window, watching the bailey, rather pleased that Iris hadn’t joined her in her vigil. Her cousin was down in the kitchens today, helping supervise the baking. Ananda insisted that the young women under her charge, including her husband’s niece, actively participate in the management of Cicadia, which was rather interesting considering the womanwas one of those people who always liked to be in control of everything.
