Pendragon

"I will ask him, but you know, I would rather do something like you did, Mrs. Miggs. You took action, and that was well done of you. You taught Mr. Miggs what was what right then and there. You didn't give him the time to roll over and snore."

"I doubt he could have slept, it was powerful cold in that open field."

"That doesn't matter, it's a mere detail. Here's to you, Mrs. Miggs," Meggie said, and both women drank deeply. "What should I do to my new husband? I must show him that what he did was reprehensible, after I've gotten all his manly reasoning from him." Meggie rested her chin on her hands, thinking hard. She said after a moment, "I mean, perhaps it wouldn't be wise to hit him over the head with the champagne bottle. I might kill him. I really don't want to hang. Also, my father is a vicar and that wouldn't look good to his bishop or to his congregation. Ah, Bishop Arlington even conducted my wedding ceremony. He would be profoundly distressed."

"A bishop, you say? My, that's something. No, don't take a chance of killing him, dearie. I don't want you dumping cold water on him either, it would ruin my good bed."

Meggie agreed and drank until her glass was empty.

She looked at Mrs. Miggs. "Nothing feels bad now," she said and burped and smiled at the same time. "As a matter of fact, I rather think I would like to dance."

"Drink yourself one more glass, then go back upstairs to that husband of yours."

"But what can I do besides ask him questions?"

"Hmmm. Let me think about this, Meggie. Are you leaving in the morning?"

"I think so. He won't tell me anything, curse his eyes. He has really quite lovely eyes, you know, all dark and brooding, but then he'll laugh and his eyes change and dance and lighten up and flash. I don't think he wets his finger and dampens his eyelashes to make them look longer and thicker. Many girls do that, you know. No, his are naturally thick and long. Did you remark upon his beautiful eyes when we arrived? No, well, you can remark upon them in the morning. Ah, perhaps I could take a mail coach and just go back home. I wonder if he would run after me, tugging on his trousers." Meggie frowned. "Somehow I ca

"No, Meggie, forget about mail coaches. They aren't for you."

Meggie was forced to agree. But she really didn't feel at all bad now, didn't feel like Thomas would be better off dead. "I can play the fiddle a bit, Mrs. Miggs. If you have one I will play for you and we could both dance."

"I'm sorry, no fiddle, Meggie. Do you play well?"

"No, but it is at least music. I thought I loved my dratted almost cousin Jeremy just last year. Actually, I would have sworn I would love him to my deathbed just three months ago, but then he opened his mouth and out came such obnoxious condescension. I saw the real him and it wasn't a pretty sight."

"Cousins can get under your skin, that's true."

"Then he spoke to me right after the ceremony. I didn't want him to, but he insisted. He told me it was all a ruse, a performance he'd given just for me, and he apologized and said he didn't want me to feel badly about him anymore, that he really wasn't a pig. He was noble, Mrs. Miggs, and for a time this afternoon, I just couldn't bear it. I'd loved him so very much, then despised him while loving him, and then he has to tell me he was noble all along. It gave me a headache. And now Thomas is upstairs, snoring, and I'm not particularly pleased about anything right now."

"I know, but things will change. You will learn how to manage him, Meggie. A taste of the whip, a lick of honey, and you can have a man at your knees, his tongue out, ready to evict your mother-in-law. Now, here's a last glass for you, dearie. Then you need to get yourself to bed. You're slurring your words, which is a sure sign that you will wake up wanting to die yourself. You just send your new husband downstairs first thing and I'll give him something that will set you to rights again."

Meggie said to the now-empty champagne bottle, "He makes me bleed, leaves me, then finishes the business, and now that I'm feeling really quite fine, she tells me I'm going to feel awful again."

"It's the wages of drink, my dear."

Chapter 16

MRS. MIGGS WAS wrong. Meggie awoke alert, full of energy-no pounding head, no queasy stomach, not a single fuzzy residual thought in her brain. She felt strong and fit except for the ache between her legs and just a slight feeling of silliness. Actually, she believed she could still dance a bit. Had she really said she could play the fiddle for her and Mrs. Miggs?

Oh, dear.

Blessed hell. She'd forgotten-she was married. She had a husband, a husband who had behaved very peculiarly last night.

Meggie turned slowly, fully expecting to see Thomas lying beside her, on his back, still snoring, but Thomas was gone, none of him anywhere to be seen. And he'd been gone for a while. His pillow wasn't even warm.

She looked at the small clock on the mantel. It was only seven o'clock in the morning. He'd left her very early indeed.

When she'd eased into bed long after midnight, her husband of one day-and one half of one night-had been sprawled on his belly, arms flung wide, taking up much more than half the bed. A single cover was to his waist, leaving him bare the rest of the way up. There was a lot of the rest of the way up to see. She'd seen the front of him and now she was seeing the back. Without considering what she was doing, Meggie raised her candle higher. He was a big man, long and smooth, not hairy on the back like he was on the front, very nicely made-she'd give him that-but nothing else. For a moment, no, just for the quickest of an instant, she wanted to pull the cover down, but she got her brain back, and backed away. She finally doused the candle, made herself into a ball, and hugged the side of the bed until her fuzzy brain became so vague, so empty of anything save visions of swimming in the sea, only she wasn't really wet or even swimming, just there somehow in the water and it was cradling her, making her feel just fine. When she fell asleep, she slept deeply, not a single disagreeable dream to wake her in the night.

She sat up when she saw the door slowly opening, and there he was, her husband, just standing there, one booted foot inside the room, looking toward the bed, looking at her. A man had just opened the door to her chamber, hadn't even bothered to knock and now he was in the same bedchamber as she was and he was looking at her. It was astounding, this husband business. The power it gave men over women and the most private parts of their lives. Actually, she'd had some power as well when he'd taken off his clothes for her to see him the previous night. Now that she thought about that, her skin turned warm, particularly the skin on her face.

"Meggie," he said, not moving from the doorway.

He was smart, she thought, not to come any closer. "Shall I pack your dressing gown in my valise?"

"What?"

"Shall I pack-

"Yes, I see that you're wearing it. Shall I ask you why?"

"I couldn't very well go downstairs to get more champagne wearing my nightgown, one, I might add, that didn't make it past the bed and to safety and is thus spotted with my blood and with you as well."

He appeared flummoxed for a moment at this stark talk, then said, "I see. You know, a girl shouldn't speak so openly about intimate matters, particularly her virginal blood and her husband's seed."

He would swear he saw her lips form a word, and he knew that word was moron.

"Why did you go downstairs for more champagne?"

"You haven't seen Mrs. Miggs this morning?"

He shook his head.

"I finished the champagne you ordered up for my fantasy di