Wizards Daughter

Willicombe still wasn't happy and so he gave them only a small bow, this time not bestowing upon them the full glory of his bald head.

As soon as the drawing room doors closed, Rosalind grabbed Nicholas's hand and pulled him toward the bow windows. "Nicholas, you are late."

"Not more than a minute or two. What is this? What is wrong, Rosalind?"

She dropped his hand and began to wring hers, and looked down at her feet.

He stared at those wringing hands, an eyebrow winging upward. "What is this? You are obviously upset. Tell me what is wrong, Rosalind."

"My name. It is my name that is wrong."

"Your name? Yes, well, La Fontaine is on the unusual side. But as you told me, your namesake was a name to be respected. Rosalind de La Fontaine. I like your name, Rosalind, it suits you. What of it?"

"You don't know who I am, Nicholas, you really don't. You don't know why Ryder Sherbrooke is my guardian. You don't know anything about me."

"Well, no, it hadn't really occurred to me. We've been rather occupied since we met. But you will feel free to tell me when it pleases you."

"You look very handsome today, Nicholas. I like the buckskins and your riding jacket. Very smart."

"Thank you. I'm listening."

"Well, the thing is-" She stopped dead, then shook her head and paced to the far end of the drawing room, then back to him. "All right, I'll just spit it out. I hear ghosts," she said, coming to a stop right in front of him. "I know ghosts, I've lived with them for ten years. I've never seen them but I've heard them murmuring from shadowed corners or, most often, in my dreams."

"All right, for ten years you've heard ghosts. Tell me about this."

"I will spit it out, I will. I have heard ghosts since-well, since Uncle Ryder found me nearly beaten to death in an alley near the docks in Eastbourne."

He grew very still. How could this be? "I don't understand," he said slowly. "You were nearly beaten to death? You were only a young child. What is this, Rosalind?"

"They believed I was around eight years old. They even let me select a month and a day for my birthday and of course I picked the very next day after they told me. Uncle Ryder took me to Brandon House-it's where he brings children who have been abandoned or beaten or sold, children in awful situations-he raises them and loves them and educates them, and gives them hope. He told me the physicians weren't sure I would live, but I did. But, you see, when I finally regained my wits, I had no idea who I was. I still don't. My memory never came back. Just the ghosts lurking in the back of my mind, and they've never come forward, never told me who I am."

He studied her pale face. "You still don't know who you are?"

"No. The ghosts came and I've asked them over and over who I am, but I can never understand what they say, if indeed they themselves know."

"But your name-La Fontaine."

"I selected the name myself when I was ten years old because I liked Jean de La Fontaine's fables, as simple as that. I'm more of a fiction than his fables are-at least his fables have a moral. I don't have anything. I don't know who I am. At first Uncle Ryder and Uncle Douglas tried to find out about me, but they could discover nothing. Then they decided that whoever had tried to kill me could still be out there, and still want me dead. If someone hated me enough to try to kill me, then I must be worth very little. Or worth nothing at all."

Nicholas had never considered anything like this, never. It didn't matter. He hated that her eyes were sheened with tears, hated her pallor. He pulled her against him and kissed her, gently, as if she'd only just been beaten and he didn't want to hurt her more. "I'm so very sorry, Rosalind."

She pushed away from him. "No, no, you don't yet understand, Nicholas."

"I understand someone tried to murder a child but you survived thanks to Ryder Sherbrooke. I will be grateful to him for the remainder of my life."

"Yes, yes, of course, but that isn't it, Nicholas. Don't you see?" She drew in a deep breath. "You are the seventh Earl of Mountjoy-an earl, Nicholas, a peer of the realm. You have an impressive lineage, whereas, well, to say it plainly, I am nobody. I am very sorry I did not tell you immediately when you asked me to marry you, but the truth is, I simply didn't think about it. I wanted to kiss you too much and it all happened so very quickly and we've been tossed into the Rules of the Pale, trying to figure out what it all means, and I simply didn't think about it until I was lying in bed last night and it hit me in the nose. I ca

Nicholas turned from her and walked to the bow windows. He pulled back the drapery and looked out onto the spring-ripening gardens across the street. There were daffodils swaying in a light breeze, their yellow vivid against the well-scythed green grass. He turned slowly to face her. 'This is unacceptable, Rosalind."

She felt clouted to her soul. She wanted to burst into tears, but she didn't. When she'd realized at the advanced age of eight that her brain was perfectly blank, she'd wept until she was ill, and learned tears were good for exactly nothing. "I'm sorry," she said. "I'm very sorry I didn't tell you immediately. I allowed you to gain lust and fondness for me."

"Lust and fondness," he repeated, a dark brow arched. "You put that nicely. You misunderstand me. I find it unacceptable that someone tried to murder you-a child."

"That is because you are noble. But I survived. Listen, Nicholas, I could be a butcher's daughter, a pickpocket, a match girl. I could be a perfect nobody."

"No, you're not a nobody. Otherwise why would someone try to kill you, an eight-year-old child?"

"My Uncle Ryder and Uncle Douglas agree with you. They believe I must be the daughter of someone important, someone who made powerful enemies. It's true I was wearing very nice clothes when Uncle Ryder found me. Ripped and torn nearly off me, of course. And this." Rosalind unfastened a gold chain from around her neck. Hanging from the chain was a small heart locket. She handed it to him.

Nicholas held it in his palm. It was warm and smooth. He felt the small latch and opened the locket. Both sides were empty. He checked the thickness of the gold. No, there wasn't hidden space.

"It was empty when Ryder found you?"

She nodded. "Perhaps there were two pictures, one of my mother or father, and one of me. Perhaps, but I don't know. Were the pictures removed because someone might recognize them?" She shrugged. "But it doesn't matter, Nicholas. No one has any idea at all of who I am or who my parents are-or were-or if they're English or Italian. Uncle Ryder believes I'm possibly hath, since when I began speaking, I spoke both Italian and English. Uncle Ryder also believes my parents must be dead" or they would have searched the earth for me. Of course that is what he would do if Grayson disappeared. It's a damnable thing, Nicholas, but I am a blank page."

"No, you're not at all blank. You have an ability that none of us have-you can easily read the Rules of the Pale. This is a gift, so perhaps you come from parents with a similar gift. You've accepted this gift of yours without question. I would say this gift is only one of many."

One of many? Hmm. "So much has happened so quickly. I haven't even wondered why I can read that blasted book." She gave him a pathetic attempt at a smile. "I will ask the ghosts when I next hear them. They come to me less often now. It's odd, but I miss them. It's like they're my only link to my lost past. And now they're giving up on me."

"Ghosts," he repeated. "Ghosts around you."

"You don't think me mad, do you?"

He looked distracted. He drummed his fingertips on the mantelpiece. "Mad? Oh, no. My grandfather, I believe he was intimately acquainted with ghosts, and he wasn't mad, believe me." He shrugged. "To be honest, I suppose I assumed you were of my class. Say we discover you aren't, Rosalind. What does that mean in the long course of events? Not much of anything. My own father was a weak man, manipulated by my stepmother, but vicious as only a weak man can be. Whoever you are doesn't matter to me. You 'reRosalind de La Fontaine. You will shortly be mine, Rosalind Vail, the Countess of Mountjoy."