CHAPTER 5
The following evening, twilight enveloped the stable yard, and lanterns illuminated the swept straw amidst the mud. Lydia’s damp half-boots, scrubbed as well as the inn’s limited staff could manage, left small prints behind her as she crossed the yard, following Maximilian’s shadow. They had spent the day at the inn out of necessity.
Dinner had required restraint.
The Dowager Marchweather declared the mutton “morally unfit for gentlemen,” drank two syllabubs, and fell asleep in her chair, scandalizing three farmers’ wives.
Maximilian had cut his food with precision, chewing and swallowing in silence, his jaw set hardas they awaited news of the carriage being in proper repair.
Now, as he led Lydia through the yard, his stride was clipped, each step a private calculation. Lydia matched his pace, her crimson shawl a bold contrast against the gloom.
The stable door creaked, not from disrepair but from age, and the warmth inside hit her immediately—stale hay, horse, and a hint of linseed. A single lantern swung from a hook just inside, casting a warm glow across the packed dirt. In the far stall, a stable hand worked a curry comb over the ribs of a dappled mare, carefully avoiding their gaze.
Maximilian went directly for the carriage, crouching to run his palm along the spokes, his eyes narrowed. Lydia followed, keeping a measured distance, but the tension in him was palpable.
“I do not see the point in fussing over the repairs,” she said, trying to keep it light. “If the carriage wishes to kill us, it will—regardless of your pampering of the axle.”
His response was a brief, unamused glance. “I do not intend to be killed by carelessness, Miss Montague.”
She folded her arms, letting the edge of her shawl catch the lantern light. “How tedious it must be to beforever on guard. We survived the night, did we not?”
He straightened, wiped his hand on a clean square of linen, and fixed her with a stare. “Survival was not a matter of chance.”
Lydia bristled—not at the content, but at the tone: cool, assured, and certain of its necessity.
“And yet here we are,” she said. “You inspecting every wheel and bolt as if you could outwit fate. Meanwhile, I wish you would stop fussing long enough to listen.”
He circled the carriage, testing the lashings. “You may speak. I am listening.”
She drew a breath. “No, you are cataloguing. Every word is another entry in your inventory."
Is it so terrible to want a moment’s respite from all this—” She gestured to the carriage, the yard, the sky. “—constant tension?”
He paused, hands braced on the rail, the strain in his arms visible even in the dim light. “I do not prepare for calamity, Miss Montague. I anticipate it so I might prevent it.”
“All that vigilance has not spared you from disasters,” she shot back.
A muscle in his jaw tightened. “I am alive. You are alive. That will suffice.”
She stared at him, annoyed at how his logic made her feel irrational. “You sound as if every pleasure is a risk you cannot bear. Is that the life you prefer?”
The stable hand, sensing the shift in atmosphere, muttered a quick “Evening, Your Grace,” and slipped into the dusk, leaving them alone with the sounds of shifting horses and the rhythmic creak of wood settling after the day’s exertion.
Lydia moved closer, her boots scuffing through the straw. “I do not want to be another item on your checklist, Your Grace.”
He looked up, sharp. “You are not an item. You are...” He stopped, realizing how close she had come.
For the first time, she saw something raw on his face. Less certainty, more hunger. “I am what?” she pressed, her voice low.
He held her gaze. “You are reckless. You terrify me, Miss Montague.”
She almost laughed. “You? Frightened? What an honor.”
He exhaled, his composure fraying. “You think I enjoy it? Watching you court danger, inviting chaos?”
“I do not do it for your amusement,” she said, stepping even closer until the lantern’s light caught the highlights in her hair and the challenge in hereyes. “I do it because life is too short to spend it in retreat. Some of us were not born to bar the doors and outlast a siege. Some of us wish to win.”
He braced himself, as if expecting a blow. “You have no idea what it means to be responsible for another’s safety.”
