for her with a cross saddle. The sidesaddle was ugly, with its hideous double pommel, one to put a leg over, and one to trap the other leg beneath. An extra cinch dangled under its skirts, which she knew was the balancing strap. Such nonsense. With a cross saddle none of that was necessary. She pretended not to notice the thing as she stepped up on the mounting post and threw her leg over the horse’s back.
She heard the stableman’s indrawn breath of disgust, and she didn’t know whether to laugh or to reprimand him. She decided that as he was not her employee, and as she would probably never lay eyes on him again, the better course was to ignore him, too, and focus on the elegant horse the marquess had chosen for her.
She was called Patience. She was smaller than Breeze, with a well-cut head and small ears and beautifully turned hocks. “She has the look of an Arabian,” Annis said.
The marquess, already astride Breeze, nodded. “You have a good eye, Miss Allington. There is an Arab stallion in Patience’s pedigree. She’s the only one at Seabeck. All the other horses here are from the pure Spanish bloodline.” He lifted his reins and indicated a direction with his chin. “There’s quite a nice path through the coombe. It runs up to the crest of the hill, where there’s a view of the sea. Shall we?”
“Yes, please.” She urged Patience forward, and the mare set out at a smooth walk that matched Breeze’s speed perfectly.
The last of Annis’s discomfort fell away as the two of them rode in silence out of the drive and turned into the well-trodden path. The breeze from the Channel helped to dissipate the cloud of confusion that had enveloped her all morning. The wind set the boughs of the trees dancing and made Patience’s mane ripple like silk.
It was pure pleasure to be riding, to be silent, to be free of deciding where to stand, when to sit, what to say to a marchioness or any of her stodgy guests. Annis felt comfortable for the first time since arriving at Rosefield Hall. She was grateful for the sounds of water and wind and horses’ hooves. She relished the view that opened before her as the horses made the shallow climb out of the coombe, which turned out to be a sort of valley, and up to the crest of the slope.
They reined in before an ancient beech tree. Its trunk and branches leaned inland, bent by many years of ocean breezes. Half-buried beneath a root that arched out of the ground was a rectangular slab of stone that didn’t seem to fit the landscape. Annis pointed to it. “What is that stone doing there?”
“It’s a menhir,” the marquess said. At Annis’s puzzled expression, he explained. “One of the standing stones—well, this one has fallen over, but there are several stone circles in Dorset. If there was once a circle here—a henge, it’s called—it’s gone now. The stones have probably been pressed into other uses, fences or walls. I expect this one was too large to move.”
“I don’t know what a henge is,” Annis said. Intrigued, she swung down from her saddle and bent to put her hand on the cool, rough surface of the stone. “Have you touched it? It feels alive!”
He laughed and slid down to join her beside the stone. He laid his own hand on it, right beside hers, then shook his head. “It doesn’t feel alive to me, I’m afraid. It just feels cold and rough and old. A henge is a stone circle, you know, from ancient times. A ceremonial circle, we think. No one knows exactly what it was for.”
Easy together for the moment, made comfortable by the presence of the horses and the glitter of the wide sea below the fields, they turned together, looking from east to west. The marquess pointed out the farms of his estate, the sheep grazing in their pastures, the first golden haystacks of summer beginning to blossom here and there. The crenellated roof of Rosefield Hall was just visible beyond the gentle green of the hills and the darker green of the woods.
Annis turned in a half circle, admiring the view and breathing in the sweet air. “There’s a scent, something I don’t recognize.”
“The sweet one, rather cloying?”
“Yes. I first noticed it from the carriage. Is it those white flowers, the ones with the yellow centers? They grow all through the