Page 32 of Lord of the Darkness

“We have to find her, to tell her… Where could she have gone? There is nothing and no-one in the village I can imagine her going to. Perhaps Hazelworth Hall? Her mother would surely be someone she might seek out for comfort?”

At that moment, a footman came to tell them that the carriage awaited them at the door, and they hurried out. Benedict instructed the coachman to take them to Hazelworth Hall, and anxiously stared out of the window as they went, hoping to see sign of Ariana.

Beside him, James peered out of the other window, and remained silent – they would, Benedict resolved, be having serious words later, about the deception which James had perpetrated upon him.

***

“You’re saying he tried to poison you?” asked Lord Jasper. “Has the marriage curdled so quickly?”

“Not poison me, exactly. He’s been slipping a love potion into my tea at night. I — suppose he thought that it would mend the troubles between us. I overheard him talking about it with the man who gave him the potion.”

She was seated by a small fire, slowly drying, in the parlour of Lord Jasper’s home – a large cottage on his father’s estate, which he had chosen to live in, rather than the main house. The hail which had battered her so as she walked here continued to drum against the windows, as if carrying some urgent warning.

Lord Jasper had been trying to paint the view from his window, down towards the river with the rain and the looming clouds, when she had knocked at the door - the tall canvas stood on his easel by the window. He had placed it at an odd angle so that it took up most of the space in the room. Between this and the clutter of overstuffed chairs and side tables, there was barely enough room for the two of them to sit comfortably.

She had been shocked when he opened the door himself, as she had expected a footman or a maid. But it seemed that they were completely alone in the house. That thought made her shiver with apprehension.

“Are you sure it wasn’t a joke? Perhaps you misheard him.”

Lord Jasper had been standing with his back to her, close against the table which was set by one wall. He had settled her here by the fire, and left the room for a few minutes after her arrival, then returned with a tray bearing two cups of tea, into one of which he now stirred honey with a long spoon. He turned, lifted the tray and came to her, then placed the tray on the tiny side table between them.

Ariana felt that she ought to accept the tea out of politeness, but after what she had just learned about Benedict putting potions in her tea, she had no desire for it.

“I overheard the whole conversation,” she said, eyeing the cups warily. “Benedict wasn’t jesting. He said that he had stopped giving me the potion because he felt bad about doing so.”

“That was unusually magnanimous of him,” said Lord Jasper. He studied her face in silence. “When you were under the spell of the potion, did he—”

“Did he what?”

“You know.”

Ariana did know, and she was mortified that Lord Jasper would think to ask such a question. Her cheeks heated, and she looked away, staring into the fire.

“No, he was oddly courteous through it all,” she said, though her stomach was beginning to twist into painful knots. “He never gave me so much as a goodnight kiss.”

Reaching for his own cup, Lord Jasper rose and strode to the easel.

“Strange for a man to have you in his possession and not take advantage of the fact.”

“Would you have done things differently in his position?”

“I’m not saying that I would have. I just know what most men would do. There’s generally only one reason to give a woman a love potion, and it doesn’t involve a happier marriage. He’s a better man than your average husband.”

There might have been some truth to this, though Ariana didn’t think she was ready to hear it. As she had trudged through the sleet on her way here, Benedict had grown in her mind to grotesque proportions, until he seemed all-powerful and inescapable. She was about to comment on Lord Jasper’s observation when her eyes fell on a bright object half-buried under a pile of papers on another side table. Her blood froze.

It was a lapis blue pendant necklace.

“Jasper,” she asked slowly, “where did you get that?”

She pointed with shaking fingers towards the necklace. Jasper leaned over and brushed the papers aside for a better look at where she pointed, then his face curled into an ominous smile.

“Come with me to the river,” he said finally, reaching for his greatcoat. “There are some things we need to talk about.”

“But it’s freezing!”

The sound of the rain gave emphasis to her words. She didn’t want to go anywhere with him, not until he explained himself.

“It wasn’t a suggestion,” said Lord Jasper coldly, in the same level tone. “Come with me.”