“You would not find Deverell there,” she said. It came out almost as a question.
“No,” he said, not questioning how she knew of his plans. “I would not.”
“And you do not wish to,” she said.
He took a breath, held it, let it out. “No.”
Henry’s shoulders eased, a smile ghosting across his mouth as if some tension he had been carrying silently had slackened. Isla swallowed. A warmth uncurled in her chest, slow and incredulous.
“It is almost as if,” she said carefully, “you have decided you do not need whatever answer he would give.”
“Almost,” he agreed.
Henry cleared his throat. “For what it is worth,” he said, “I heartily support any plan that avoids cities. Libby has had her fill of crowds for the year, and I have had my fill of bad wine.”
Elizabeth gave a soft agreeing noise that could have meant anything. Isla steadied the trap.
“Well,” she managed. “If Your Grace would prefer country air, I am not opposed. I have slept in worse places than a country inn.”
Edward’s mouth quirked. “So have I.”
He wheeled his horse toward the road that circled the city. Morrow, sensible beast that she was, followed his lead without waiting for Isla’s formal cue. York’s walls drifted slowly away to their left. Isla kept her eyes on the bend of the new road, but she was aware of every small, almost imperceptible release inside her, the loosening of a knot she had not known was so tight.
The test had been coming nearer with every mile. Now it receded, not gone from the world but no longer set like a trap in their shared path. He had chosen to trust what he had seen. He had chosen her. She kept her face as composed as she could manage. Edward’s horse drew level with the trap again. He did not speak immediately. When he did, it was not of Deverell or York.
“Do you think the mutton pie will be as you remember?” she asked lightly, because someone had to say something that was not weighted with everything.
“God, I hope not,” he said. “If it is, we may find ourselves testing Henry’s capacity for wagon-driving sooner than anticipated.”
Henry made a wounded noise. “I will have you know I am an excellent nurse. I have kept more than one colonel alive through fever.”
“Let us hope you are not called upon to practice on me,” Edward said.
The small exchange broke the tension further. They rode on, leaving York behind.
***
The inn Edward had remembered proved to be exactly as promised: modest, clean, and occupied principally by men whose hands bore the callouses of honest work rather than cards. A fiddler sat on a stool near the hearth, coaxing melodies from his instrument that made Isla’s foot tap without conscious thought.
The landlord, massive and genial, seemed delighted to have quality under his roof without the attendant fuss that sometimes accompanied it. They took a corner table, ate stew thick with barley and carrots, and drank ale that tasted of hops rather than desperation.
For a time Isla simply sat and let herself be content. Henry and Elizabeth could not stop smiling at one another. Every time she looked up, their faces were turned toward each other, some private remark passing between them. It should have been cloying.
It was not. It was restful. Proof that such things could exist, even if imperfectly. Edward, across from her, relaxed by degrees. The lines at the corners of his eyes smoothed and the set of his shoulders eased.
When someone cleared a space in the middle of the floor and the fiddler shifted into a livelier tune, people began to dance. Not with the careful, arranged precision of a London ball, but with the easy, rough joy of villagers who had known one another since childhood. A tall farmer spun his wife with more enthusiasm than grace; two children attempted to copy them and nearly fell over their own feet, giggling. Isla’s heart squeezed.
She had danced like that as a girl. In barns and cleared parlors and once in a field under the stars, the music a fiddle and a thin whistle, and twenty voices raised in song. She found her fingers tapping the table again.
Edward followed her gaze. “I apologize,” he said dryly. “The entertainment is not up to Ravenscroft standards.”
“Ravenscroft standards,” she said, “could use the improvement. No one has fainted once this evening.”
The fiddler launched into a reel Isla knew as well as the sound of her own name.
Without allowing herself to think, she pushed back from the table and stood.
Edward’s brows rose. “You are going to dance.”
