“You’ve barely eaten all week. You need to keep your strength up.”
“What’s the point?” Eliza looked up at her, hazel eyes red-rimmed. “I’m to be married to a murderer in three days. I might as well get it over with and starve.”
Margaret was quiet for a moment. Then she knelt beside Eliza, her expression serious.
“I believe you,” she said softly.
Eliza blinked. “What?”
“About Lord Whitfield. I believe you, my lady.” Margaret’s voice dropped to barely a whisper. “I’ve known Lady Whitfield for as long as you’ve been friends, before she married. She was kind. Happy. And after the wedding, when she came to visit you… she wasn’t the same person. I saw the fear in her eyes. How she made sure her sleeves were always long. She was hiding something.”
Tears spilled down Eliza’s cheeks.
“Then you understand. I can’t marry him. I can’t.”
“No,” Margaret agreed quietly. “You can’t.”
They sat in silence for a long moment. Then Eliza’s mind began to work, turning over possibilities, however desperate.
“I could run away,” she said slowly.
The words felt foreign, impossible, but also necessary.
Margaret didn’t look shocked. “Where would you go?”
“I don’t know. Somewhere far from London at least. Somewhere they won’t find me.” Eliza’s heart was beating faster now, a spark of hope igniting in her chest. “I could find work. Change my name. Anything is better than this.”
“My cousin runs an inn,” Margaret said quietly. “In Sussex. It’s small, out of the way. She’s always looking for help. You could stay there for a while, until you find somewhere safe.”
Eliza stared at her. “You would help me?”
“Of course I would.” Margaret’s smile was sad but genuine. “No one should be forced into a marriage like this. Especially not to a man like him.”
“I do not want you to risk your own safety to help me. What if my parents find out?”
“It is a risk I am willing to take. You have been nothing but kind to me, my lady. I… consider you… my friend.”
Eliza took her hand and squeezed it tightly. “I do as well. Thank you, Margaret.”
And so, they began to plan.
“I’ll leave your door unlocked tomorrow night,” Margaret said quietly. “And I’ll make sure the other servants are occupied.”
Eliza nodded, her mind already racing ahead. “I’ll need money. Father keeps some in his study. I know where.”
“And clothes,” Margaret added. “Plain ones. Nothing that will draw attention.”
“I will be glad to not wear clothes my mother has purchased for me.”
Margaret’s expression turned worried, her voice dropping even lower. “Are you certain about this? Once you leave, there’s no coming back, my lady. Your parents will not be pleased with how it will reflect their reputation.”
Eliza thought of Abigail. Of her friend’s laughter, silenced forever. Of the terror in her eyes those last few months. Of her body, broken and still on the garden stones. Now Eliza was to suffer the same fate, only a tool for her parents to secure connections, to marry her off without a second thought to a monster.
“I’m certain,” she said.
The house was silent. Eliza waited until she heard the clock in the hall chime twice, then slipped from her bed.
She had changed into the plainest dress she could find, a simple brown day dress that Margaret had left for her, along with a dark cloak and bonnet.
