Wizards Daughter

Slowly he nodded.

"Do you believe I'm a witch, Nicholas? Do you believe that someone tried to kill me because they recognized me for what I was, recognized I was from this long line of wizards, and was afraid I could harm them in some way? And so this someone tried to destroy the witch, or tried to destroy the spawn of this long-ago wizard?"

"I don't know."

He walked to where she now stood, and placed his hands on her shoulders. "I simply don't know, Rosalind, but I do know that everything is becoming clearer."

"Nothing is clear at all, Nicholas, save that like the Wyverly heiress, you married me because you felt you had to."

"Marrying you was the most important thing I have ever done in my life."

"It didn't matter to you what I wanted."

"You wanted me. That's what you told me. This marriage has been a two-way road, Rosalind. I didn't force you to do anything you didn't want to do."

"But our reasons for marrying each other were quite different."

When he said nothing, she continued. "That's beside the point in any case. It didn't matter to you who I was, where I'd come from, what I believed."

"Don't be an idiot. Of course it mattered."

"How were you so certain I was that little girl when you saw me at the ball that night, Nicholas? Surely I bear only the slightest resemblance to the little girl?"

He shrugged but didn't release his hold on her. Was he afraid she'd bolt? Probably. "I knew. I simply knew, there's nothing more I can tell you."

"All right, so you'd found the little girl you'd dreamed about, you were led right to her, is that correct?"

He nodded.

"She was now a woman and that added layers of problems. And your solution was to marry her-me."

"Yes. But there is so much more, Rosalind. From the begi

"Well, naturally I'm important to you. If I hadn't wanted you desperately, why then, you would be cursed to dream that dreadful dream for the rest of your days."

"Yes," he said, "that is the truth."

"What if I am indeed a witch, Nicholas? Remember Re

He drew in a deep breath and his hands tightened on her shoulders. 'Then you are a witch and my wife, and we will deal with it."

"When I come into my own-my own-what will you do, Nicholas?"

"Do you mean you will smite the land and bring famine to the world?"

She didn't laugh. "What will you do, Nicholas?"

"I don't know. How can I know something before it happens? If it happens? Or what the result will be?"

She looked up at him, studied the face that had become so beloved to her in such a short time. She felt deadening pain. It was difficult to force the words out of her tight throat. "The most important fact of all of this is you don't love me, Nicholas."

"Rosalind-"

She held out her hand. "You're an honorable man, Nicholas. Give me the key."

"But we need to study Captain Jared's journals, see if he's hidden some information to help us, to-" "Give me the key, Nicholas." He released her and gave her the key. She walked quickly away from him, turned, and said, "I know you want me, Nicholas, I know well you enjoy making love to me. However, from what I've heard, it seems a man is content with any woman who wanders into his vicinity. She simply has to be available."

"No. Well, yes, perhaps there's some truth to that. But you, Rosalind, you are very special to me, you-"

She raised her hand. "You don't love me, Nicholas. That's the truth of it. How could a man love a debt?" And she unlocked the library door and left. Nicholas stood frozen in the middle of the room. He heard a deep sigh from behind him.

"Go to the Devil," he said and went out into the gardens.

39

Two hours later, he went looking for her. He finally found her in the long portrait gallery in the east wing, staring up at Captain Jared Vail, the first Earl of Mountjoy. She was looking up at a man in his prime, a big man, his legs in the tight leggings of the Elizabethan times. Broad shoulders, a chin possibly more stubborn than Nicholas's. She started when she studied his eyes. His eyes-they looked familiar. She'd seen those eyes, hadn't she? No, that didn't seem possible. His eyes were a glorious blue, bright, filled with wickedness and endless dreams and wonders, and mayhem.

She knew the moment Nicholas entered the gallery. He walked with lazy grace, but she saw the tension in him. They stood only three feet apart," but in truth, there was a chasm between them.

"He was quite a man, was Captain Jared," he said, looking up at the portrait.

She eyed him a moment, then said, "You said you simply knew who I was, simply knew I was the child you'd lived with nearly all your life in your dream. Come, Nicholas, how did you recognize me? I was a woman, not the child you dreamed about."

"I told you the truth. I simply knew. I realize it must sound impossible to you, but I knew you would be at that ball, knew it all the way to the deepest part of me, and I knew you the moment I saw you. Does that mean nothing to you, Rosalind? Can't you see? We were meant to know each other, meant to be together."

She crossed her arms over her chest, tapped her toes. "Listen to me, Nicholas. Despite all that's happening here, despite all the questions, the mystery, it is still my life. Mine. And you married me under false pretenses."

Yes, true enough, damn me for an idiot. He reached out his hand to her, dropped it when she didn't respond. "Rosalind, I did what I had to do. Whatever this debt is, I know to my bones that both of us, together, must figure it out. We must figure it out because I know I am meant to save you."

"Ah, so now you believe the debt is to save my life? Uncle Ryder saved me first and now it is your turn?"

"No, I'm not certain that is the debt, but it seems certain to be a part of it."

She said nothing for a very long time, merely stared at him, through him really, and he had no idea what she was seeing, thinking. She said at last, "That first night I sneaked a look over my shoulder at you even while Grayson was leading me to the dance floor. I will be honest here, Nicholas. You fascinated me from the first moment I saw you. You looked so mysterious, so dangerous." She stared back up at Captain Jared. "You made me feel things I didn't know existed. You made my insides want to shout with joy. I felt drawn to you. In some deep part of me, I knew you were meant for me. I was very glad when Uncle Ryder told me you were coming to visit that next morning. And you came and I knew I wanted you, desperately." She paused a moment, thoughtful. "And now you will say that I too recognized you, recognized you as what-my knight? My husband? What?"

He said, without looking at his wife, "I've been wondering why you can't read the final pages of the Rules of the Pale."

"All right, so you are not ready to deal with my questions. Aunt Sophie says that a man, if he is smart, can distract with great skill, he can avoid facing something that makes him uncomfortable. Perhaps you would like to deal with this question: If Grayson hadn't been led to the Rules of the Pale, by whomever or whatever, if we didn't know about Sarimund and his damnable rules at all, there would have been nothing to focus on, nothing to draw us into this mystery. What would you have done? Would you simply have hung around me, hoping something evil would try to do away with me and you would slay it?"

"I don't know. I didn't think of it, truth be told. Everything has happened so very quickly. I only knew that finally, in this span of almost three hundred years, it was I, Nicholas Vail, not Captain Jared or any of the other following firstborn Vail sons, who was finally in the right place at the right time. And there you were, in the middle of it. Waiting for me."