her head from all the false smiling. Greeting and curtsying to Lady Anne, Lord Gray’s kin, a woman with the same color hair and eyes as her cousin and nearly the same height, had been the most horrible experience of her life, because now Marianne felt like a liar to William’s kin.
Though Anne’s face was plain the mischievous smile she donned when a morsel of gossip presented itself hinted at a fun disposition.
Marianne would have certainly enjoyed Anne’s company had her situation not been so wretched.
Anne’s husband, the Earl of Seacliffe, had darker hair and stood barely taller than his wife, though their similar smiles of acceptance towards Marianne made her feel only more guilty, and that was before the hugging and greeting of several other well-bred ladies, their husbands, and other distant relatives and friends of William’s.
All she heard was praise in her ear.
“How lucky you are to have snatched him.”
“Such a beauty ye are, ‘tis no wonder he fell for ye.”
“What a lovely gown ye wear. I imagine Lord Gray must spoil ye quite a bit already.”
Marianne’s eye twitched under her crumbling patience, but she endured it and no one seemed to believe her sputtering language was anything other than a weak, womanly shyness brought on by so many people.
She looked through the crowds, wishing the fog of laughing and dancing people would all decide that the room was too hot for their tastes and scatter, hopefully home to their own beds. But they stayed and remained oblivious of the helplessness of their hostess.
Marianne saw William studying her from a group of men with an entertained smirk on his face.
She fought to keep from scowling at him in front of so many noble people. Instead, she brightened her smile, poured every happy memory into her head and let him have it.
The shocked expression on his face made it worth the effort, but her cheeks and skull felt as though they were on fire.
Her face relaxed when she felt a prickle behind her neck. She turned and Sir Ferdinand appeared through the haze of people. Fear jolted inside of her and consumed her body like wildfire. Her eyes met his through the haze of dancing people as he stood off the wall and openly stared. His crooked nose scrunched and drooping eyes sent her hideous messages of his displeasure.
Marianne shivered, then froze, forgetting the conversation Lady Anne was trying to have with her when Ferdinand approached and formally bowed.
She stood straight and stiff and allowed him to clasp her hand with his gnarled fingers and bestow it with a kiss. Even through the fabric of her gloves, she felt his wet lips and suppressed another shiver of disgust.
“Congratulations to you, my lady.” His voice was deceptively sincere. Marianne tried to pull her hand back, calmly so Lady Anne and none of the watching guests would see, but he held firm, his other hand caressing the glove he had just kissed.
Though she was slightly taller, perspiration formed on her forehead with her sudden stress and quickening of her heart.
This man frightened her beyond anything she ever experienced, and sent chills under her skin.
Like the first time when she had been introduced to him, the faint scent of urine wafted from his clothes and circled her, tightening around her body through her clothes, trapping her to him.
He was bald on the top of his head, but on either side of his skull grey hair stuck out in all different directions. Unlike his hair, his eyes were focused solely on her.
“‘Tis a shame I missed my opportunity to have you. I should have acted more swiftly.”
Anne pretended to sneeze so that she might clasp her nose against the smell. The small action gave Marianne enough courage to smile, because in this castle, Ferdinand could not frighten her with his perverse innuendos.
“‘Tis fortunate for both of us that I am swifter.” She said, and Ferdinand’s grasp on her hand tightened with a strength that should have been impossible for his age.
***
Her hair was as red as he remembered and she smelled of the fresh air he had eagerly inhaled in the damp church. With her face so flushed from the humiliation she no doubt felt, pleasant color invaded her cheeks, leaving a beautiful maiden for his pleasure. More beautiful than he remembered.
When well-wishers approached, her face lost its blushing color and twisted in an awkward smile.
Her face soon dropped, as though stunned and fearful of whom she was seeing, but a group of