| By: Gabriel and Miriam Cole |
It was still, quiet, and dark when she awoke. At first she was quite out of sorts; everything hurt;
the deep ache in her lower back seemed to throb into a source of bright misery as soon as she
opened her eyes. The rhythmic kicking at the inside of her abdomen did little to relieve this; each
time her unborn son pummeled at the confines of her womb, her spine seemed to cry out and beg
for succor. None was forthcoming.
“Melina?” she asked softly, reaching out in front of her and finding the warm, soft form of her
handmaiden’s shoulder beneath the blankets. The only times in her life that she had not been able
to do so had been the nights she had spent with her husband or other lovers. Melina, of course,
awoke at once and rolled over.
“Lady Celeste?” she asked, reaching out to touch Celeste’s face. “Is it the baby? Do I need
to send for the midwife?”
“Oh, it’s the baby alright,” Celeste answered her. “But it’s not the midwife I need.”
“Hot compress for your back?” Melina asked. Her concerned eyes were just visible, like
pearls in the darkness.
“How did you know?”
Melina laughed sleepily and yawned. “My Lady, it’s my job to know your every need before
you do.”
“Bless you, but you are a sweet girl,” Celeste told her. “A pillow for my knees, too.”
“Of course,” Melina replied. She peeled the covers back and drew open the bed curtain. She
was wearing a long cotton nightdress which was the only bit of her Celeste could see until she
padded over to the fireplace and stoked the embers back to roaring life. The chill edge seemed to
ebb as the glow became brighter; Celeste looked at the gilt-faced clock on the mantle above where
Melina was working.
“Half past the fourth candle,” she murmured. “Blair’s not even up yet.”
“No, ma’am,” Melina replied. “Lord Blair doesn’t rise until the fifth candle, or a bit after to
have his morning run before work. The only person up this early will be the cook. Excuse me,”
and she vanished through the door into Celeste’s bath chamber.
With a wince, Celeste shifted over to the spot Melina had vacated. It was warmer; closer to
the fire and still toasty with the other woman’s heat. She did her best to draw the blankets up
around her chin, but they were heavy and she was in an awkward state.
In all truth, she was in more than one awkward state.
It had been a year since the madness had gripped her husband. A year since those four
terrible nights in Dursk that took the brilliant man she had married and turned him into the eccentric
he was now. I’Lupo Inverno, the Durskans had always called him. It was a fitting name for Blair
Cassius Eustatius Octavius Quintas du’Winter. Lord du’Winter had always befitted his name; he
was as cold and hard as ice, as slippery and as beautiful.
To Celeste Moulinnay’s great despair, it had turned out that he was as brittle as ice, too.
Melina suddenly returned through the bath chamber door with a long, shallow bowl and an iron
kettle. The pot made a deep sloshing sound as she hung it over the flames, but the maid hardly
paid it any mind as a few drops of water fell into the coals with a pop and hiss. She scooped a
pillow from the seat of one of the plush, gilt and velvet armchairs and gently placed it between
Celeste’s knees.
“I thought you didn’t like this side of the bed, m’Lady?” Melina asked playfully.
“I’m stealing your heat,” Celeste smiled up at her. “And I wanted to watch the fire for a bit.”
“Ah,” the maid answered. She crawled gingerly over Celeste’s legs and stretched out behind
her. Unbidden, she began rubbing her Lady’s lower back with long, strong fingers. “What troubles
your mind, m’Lady?”
“Blair,” she replied at once, closing her eyes as the ache in her back eased.
“It has not been the easiest dozen years for you, Celeste,” Melina observed knowingly. They
had been together since Celeste was fifteen years old; her handmaiden had been ever present at
her side in that thirteen years. They, like many Durskan ladies and their handmaidens, possessed
a strong, strange sort of sisterhood—and Celeste would not trade that bond for all the gold in her
husband’s extensive treasuries. “In fact,” Melina continued, “I would say that it has been rather
rough.”
This was so very true that she nearly wanted to weep for frustration. The worst of it was that
she loved Blair with every fiber of her being; but Blair was a uniquely difficult man to love. His
boyhood had been a wreckage of his birth-mother’s diabolical lunacy; a woman he had been
driven to murder in the weeks before their wedding.
Now, though; now she knew that Blair was far more capable of that violent action than she had
ever imagined he could be.
With an effort, she tore her mind away from those memories and forced herself to focus on
Melina’s back as the other woman again scrambled out of the bed and padded barefoot to the
fireplace. Celeste watched her movements as she laid a towel in the bowl, added a handful of
crushed herbs, and poured the hot water over all. The maid spent a few ‘marks kneading the cloth,
and the room began to fill with the heady scent of Midicant and Moonflower. Melina wrung the
towel between her hands and bore it back to the bed.
Celeste tugged her own nightshirt up past her hips and gasped when the heat of the cloth was
laid against her spine.
“Too hot, m’lady?” Melina asked concernedly.
“Nay,” Celeste answered quickly, “Nay, not at all. It feels marvelous.”
In fact, it felt so very marvelous that she drifted into a doze. Her mind wandered happily
through the good memories; the first time she had seen her husband, the births, two years apart,
of first her son Alistair and then her daughter Grace. She remembered the long, slow journey to
Khathia in the first days of their marriage—one of the happiest times of her life.
The cloth was gone and Melina with it. Celeste stirred petulantly, but the incessant drumming
at the inside of her belly precluded any further thought of sleep. Blearily, she opened her eyes and
looked toward the mantle again. To her surprise, the fire was low, and the dim blue-gray light of
early dawn was making the frost-crusted windows glow the color of roofing slate. Melina had risen
and cleared away the tools she had used to make the compress. Celeste could hear her soft
humming in the dressing room and she smiled. It was still far, far earlier than she usually rose, but
her maid preternaturally seemed to know that she would be starting her day now rather than later.
“Melina?” she called, and was rewarded immediately by the woman’s light steps from just
beyond the dressing room door.
“Coming, ma’am,” the maid said an instant before appearing in the room. “Are you ready to
rise?”
“Aye,” Celeste moaned. “But I need help up.”
“Of course, m’Lady.” Melina threw back the covers and took Celeste gently by the arms. “Up
you go!”
Once on her feet, Celeste did her best to stretch the kinks out of her once again aching back.
It would not be long before her second son was born; perhaps not more than a week.
“And good riddance to you, boy,” she told her belly. “Not that I don’t love you; but you’ve got too
big to be in there. Time to come out.” She poked herself and Melina giggled girlishly.
“Oh, ma’am,” the maid chuckled. “You’re such a silly!”
“Melina, dear,” Celeste clucked fondly. “Silly me into a dress, would you? In spite of the
pummeling my guts are taking, I’m frankly famished.” And to her own surprise it was true; the early
candle notwithstanding, she found that her stomach was growling as fiercely as her back.
“As it happens, ma’am, I have your dress laid out already,” Melina said quickly. “And, as it’s
a bit chilly in the dining room at this time of morn, a warm shawl, too.”
“Bless you,” Celeste said, allowing herself to be led into the dressing room. Melina had her
clothed in a trice; the dress was blue with a low-cut bodice and a very-flattering flair, considering
her current mostly-round state.
“Quite fashionable,” she remarked to her reflection as Melina took the time to tease the
tangles from her thick, wavy, black locks. “Is this one of Blair’s designs?”
“It is,” Melina answered. “He had it brought up yesterday evening while you were in the parlor
with Grace and the piano teacher. I think it’s very flattering.”
“It is,” Celeste admitted, admiring it one last time before heading for the door. “And it’s in the
style I like.”
“Very Durskan,” Melina agreed. “Very you.”
Celeste smiled, but made no other reply. She led the way down the long upstairs corridor with
its brightly polished oak floors to the marble staircase that led down to the parlor. She descended
carefully; she’d been having trouble with her balance lately; and found herself surprised to see her
husband throwing his cloak about his shoulders in the entryway. In spite of the years they had
spent together, she still felt a peculiar fluttery thrill somewhere behind her navel whenever she saw
him.
Blair du’Winter was, simply put, intoxicating.
His shoulder-length black hair—which his manservant spent a goodly time each morning
straightening—was braided neatly today, and tied back with a smart silver bow. His pale face was
a study in lines, planes, and angles so severe and precise that the best of artists would have
struggled to match it. And his eyes—Celeste felt the blush climb her neck as they turned on her—
icy blue, half-lidded, and mysterious beyond measure. She watched him note her presence, note
the dress she was wearing, and offer the very slightest, almost imperceptible twitch of the right
corner of his mouth, indicating his pleasure.
“Pierre,” he beckoned quietly, and a shadow broke from the darkness of the entryway,
became a man, and opened the door. And just that abruptly the pair of them were striding out into
the swirling snow, and the wide door clicked closed behind them. Another black-haired form came
from just out of sight to give the heavy double-sided wooden portal a healthy push to make certain
it had closed against the unforgiving Khathian winter chill. Jamison Vencello turned a boyishly
bright face up toward his Mistress paused upon the stair and bowed with the liquid finesse of long
practice.
“A very good morning, madam,” he greeted, his deep voice carefully soft. “Early for you to
be rising, isn’t it?”
“It is,” Celeste told the butler. “Kindly let the cook know that I’ll be taking breakfast now.”
“Of course,” he returned, offering her a second half-bow before vanishing in the direction of
the kitchens. With Melina’s help, Celeste finished her descent, stopping at the bottom of the
marble stairs to note her husband’s wet buckskin running shoes neatly placed on their ridged mat
to the left of the oak and walnut front doors. The plain, dusky leather jerkin that he reserved for his
morning jog hung above them, though it was more damp with sweat than with snow.
“I cannot believe he went running in this weather,” she marveled aloud. Her slippered feet
shushed across the flag-stone entryway as she made toward the dining room.
“He runs most everyday, m’Lady,” Melina put in. “The only days he doesn’t run are blizzards.”
“Aye, but Blair so hates the cold, it really doesn’t agree with him.” Celeste answered over her
shoulder as she and her maid passed down the dark, ornate corridor which led to the expansive
dining room beyond. “Really, I often wonder why he moved us here to Khathia in the first place.
The summers are pleasant enough, though never as warm as it was in Dursk, but these winters are
harsh beyond measure.”
“I know why we came here,” Melina returned merrily, slipping around her mistress so that she
could ready Celeste’s place at the table. Their eyes met and both women answered, in equally
poor imitations of Lord Du’Winter’s thick, almost unintelligible Durskan accent, “Business!” It came
out as beesnees and both women burst into girlish giggles.
“Ah, that’s my Blair,” Celeste murmured, running her hands through her supple onyx curls as
Melina pulled the overstuffed armchair out from its place at the table. The chair was one borrowed
from the formal front parlor; though Celeste loved the tall, straight, dining chairs, with their
intricately hand-carved scenes of Durskans dancing at the high balls they so loved, the weight of
her unborn son made even the briefest spells sitting in them agony. So she settled herself into the
soft cushions and watched as the kitchen girls hastened in to set her place at the table. Celeste
could tell they were flustered; she never came to break her fast so early; her marito’s dishes were
still scattered at his place, uncleared.
“So sorry, m’Lady,” one of the younger ones apologized, as if reading her mind. “We weren’t
prepared for you. It won’t happen again, on my word it won’t.”
“No fears, girl,” Celeste told her around a wide yawn. “I certainly didn’t intend to rise so
early. My young son here thought I should be about though,” she poked her own well swollen belly
lightly, “And has rather forcefully made his position known.”
The girl smiled sympathetically, but obviously without any understanding, as she gathered Blair’
s dirtied bowls and vanished again into the open mouth of the swinging door that led to the kitchen
corridor.
“Which one was that?” she asked Melina absently after the girl had gone.
“Ah, Filia,” Melina answered. “Why?”
“Merely curious,” Celeste replied. “Did you happen to see what Blair was wearing today? I
mean beneath that greatcloak?” She hastened to add the last bit before Melina could begin
speaking.
“I did,” the maid chuckled, smiling broadly as she tucked a soft, fleecy blanket around her
Lady’s nearly absent lap. “It was one of his own designs; a green and silver doublet with lace over
a green silk shirt and those black wool pants he favors with the laces. Seems he was able to make
a good choice this morning, no?”
Celeste sighed and frowned toward the window, her sapphire blue eyes full of a long known
worry. She could see nothing but white light through it; the frost and snow were so thickly caked on
the outside. “He’s altogether himself, then,” she mumbled to no one in particular, “At least this
morning.”
“What’s that, ma’am?” Melina asked softly, stepping up to rub Celeste’s shoulders, her own
cornflower colored eyes fixed concernedly on her Mistress’ hands as they worried at her silk-lined
napkin.. “Something about the morning?”
“It’s lovely,” Celeste told her with a wistful shake. “A beautiful snowy day!”
“It’s seventh Yule,” Melina commented, straightening firmly and nodding with an air of decided
cheerfulness. “Alistair and Grace should be bounding in a bit for their spice-cakes and maple-
drizzle.”
“Well, I’d rather hoped to be done with my own breakfast by the time they woke,” Celeste told
her, frowning at the swinging portal through which Filia had vanished. Almost as though
summoned, the girl reappeared, bearing her Lady’s breakfast on a broad platter of highly polished
silver.
“Apologies, m’Lady,” the girl squeaked breathlessly. “The cook sends her blessings and
politely asks Melina to come ahead next time so that you don’t have to wait.” She set a fine china
plate laden with a hot, fresh roll, two small links of sausage, an egg, poached and covered in small
dice of tomato and pickled beans. A tall glass of fresh milk was also set before her, followed by a
bright, lovely orange—already sectioned—in its own separate but matching dish.
“A lovely breakfast,” Celeste assured warmly, “My compliments to the cook and tell her not to
fret; waiting a nonce for food is better than taking a spill down the stairs because you’ve sent your
handmaiden away.” Her stomach growled loudly, startling the serving girl, but Filia recovered
quickly, laughing and remarking, “The young Lord is a fierce one then!”
“Indeed,” Celeste answered with an embarrassed chuckle of her own. “I’d like hot tea, as well,
please.”
“I’ll have it out in a trice,” Filia dipped a curtsy and retreated again into the crowded kitchen
corridor.
Ravenous, Celeste tucked in to her food with relish and though she was careful to maintain her
elegant poise, she had cleaned the plate completely before Filia returned with the tea.
“Would you like some more, m’Lady?” the girl asked with the slightest hint of surprise as she
swapped out the dishes. Celeste bit her lower lip lightly and made a scrunched, helpless face at
Melina. “Actually, I think I’ll have one of the cook’s honey sweet rolls—with the lemon glaze, not
the crème—to eat with my tea.”
“Of course, ma’am. Anything else?”
Melina giggled and Celeste shot her a mock-glare. “Aye, bring one for Melina too. And a
second cup and saucer so she can take some tea as well.”
“As you wish,” Filia piped dutifully, her skirts rustling softly as she curtsied once more and
withdrew.
“A sweet roll?” Melina mewled, hands going to her shapely hips. “I don’t want a sweet roll!”
“Yes you do,” Celeste insisted matter-of-factly to her maidservant’s amusement. “Besides, if
I have to get fat, so do you!”
“Oh, so that’s your game!” Melina giggled again and hugged Celeste’s shoulders.
“It is and you have no choice but to play,” Celeste told her with a smile. “Now be a dear and
fetch my footrest from the parlor.”
Melina was gone almost before Celeste had realized she was leaving.
With the room momentarily silent, her thoughts turned, as they did so often of late, to Blair.
He had not been himself since Felix—
Celeste cleared her throat and looked wildly around the room, fixing her eyes on the white light
of the window and forcing herself not to think on that. It was still too fresh, too painful; she felt the
constriction in her throat worsen and the sting of hot tears seared at the back of her bright blue
eyes. Closing them, she felt a pair of glittering drops fall past her lashes and onto her hands. She
drew in a deep breath, and then another, and another. When she felt she had herself under control
she opened her eyes and looked down at the cup and saucer in her hands. It was the good blue
and white porcelain she had bought a decade earlier, and she forced a smile. She had bought it
because the blue of the glaze was the same as the pale, frosty blue of her Blair’s eyes. Celeste
could still hear the aggrieved, drawn out, “Mio Dio!” he had ejaculated when she had told him of
her reasoning for its commission.
This was a much better line of thought for a Yule morning.
Remembering the china made her remember another of her fondest memories. She smiled
quietly to herself and wiped her leaking eyelids as she recalled the first time she had seen Blair du’
Winter. It had been a pleasant early-summer afternoon in Dursk and she was returning to her
home at Rebblik Hall Manor with three of her closest friends. They had been riding in an open
coach, enjoying the air and sunshine when they had come upon a group of young noblemen,
cheering and hooting as two of their number engaged in a spirited wrestling match. Blair had been
one of the brawlers; she felt her cheeks grow warm even now as she remembered the way he had
looked; shirtless, bronzed, and firmly entrapped in a headlock at the hands of a taller, heavier
friend. Come to think of it, Blair was not tall by any standards; barefoot he was a scant two inches
taller than her own modest five and a half feet. But he was lean and cut with lines of muscle and
sinew; his silky, raven-black hair had been straightened even back then, setting him immediately
apart from his friends with their own hair done in a variety of the very popular and natural styles of
curls. Shortly said, he was the most attractive man she had seen in her admittedly short sixteen
years. Looking back, he was still the most attractive man she had ever had the pleasure to meet.
But then as the pair of them flailed about he had shifted and glanced directly at her. Even in
memory, Celeste basked in the rosy glow she had felt as that icy blue-grey gaze had met her own
cobalt watchfulness through a thin curtain of his inky dark tresses. He had made no indication of
either surprise or pleasure, but every hair on her body had stood up even as her stomach dropped
somewhere down between her toes. The connection had been powerful but brief. In the very next
instant, Blair; shorter and outweighed, slipped out of his friend’s hold, lifted him bodily from the
ground and flipped him through the air to land in a thudding jumble of limbs at the side of the road.
Celeste and her friends had clapped gleefully as their driver urged the horses past the group of
young nobles; she and her bosom friend Ciepri blew kisses at the young victor, while her cousin
Jianna and friend Kami made, “Ooo’s,” of sympathy at the young lord now flat on his back and
staring amazedly up at them as the coach rattled past.
“Your footrest, m’Lady,” Melina’s voice burst the memory and Celeste started in spite of
herself.
“Ah—what?” Celeste asked a bit more sharply than she had intended. “Oh, thank you, Melina.”
Her handmaiden frowned concernedly at her and slipped the footrest beneath her outstretched
legs.
“I’m alright,” she assured Melina, quietly. “Just reminiscing.”
“Memories are important,” Melina intoned in mildly neutral tones as she took up the empty
teacup which had appeared alongside a plate bearing two lemon glazed sweet rolls. Celeste
frowned at them; she had not even noticed Filia’s entrance and exit.
“Aye,” Celeste agreed noncommittally. Suddenly ravenous again, she took the left-most
pastry from the plate and gave it a heroic bite. The maid giggled as Celeste winked at her, but her
thoughts were already returning to that day twelve years earlier. That initial connection had
stunned her; burned indelibly into her soul so that she could call it up even now and blush at the
feelings it brought to her heart. And though she had not realized it at the instant which it happened,
Blair had felt the spark as well, but for him there had been even more to it.
Blair du’Winter was not a man of words by any stretch of the imagination—he rarely shared
his thoughts with her, or anyone else for that matter, and to know his emotions from his own lips—
well, she’d likely get further speaking to his coat rack. But in the years since their wedding, she had
gleaned notable insights from his friends, though most of the more profound revelations had come
from her husband’s manservant and bodyguard, Pierre.
She had fallen in love with Blair that fine summer day, and with typical youthful feminine
aplomb she had set out to learn all she could of the mysterious young Lord whom she had seen
wrestling. Her friends knew his name and his title; and they gossiped mercilessly about his family
and his lunatic mother:
“The youngest son of Atticus du’Winter, Duke of Morestei.”
“He inherited the estate because his eldest brother ran away to live in Arinon, and the middle
brother is even crazier than their mother.”
“His other two mothers live in Khathia because Atticus’ youngest wife threatened to butcher
them and all their daughters if they stayed in Dursk. Her name was Hellyssa Ricci and she was
Blair’s birthmother!”
Celeste paid them only half a mind, but the gossip was sinfully enjoyable. She had arrived
home in time to bathe and dress for the informal ball her middle mother had planned for that
evening.
It had been quite a shock to come down the stairs with her sisters, cousins, and friends and
spy young Lord Blair du’Winter warmly clasping hands with her father and exchanging pleasant
greetings with a smile charming enough to move kingdoms and a look in his eyes like a hungry wolf
in winter.
the deep ache in her lower back seemed to throb into a source of bright misery as soon as she
opened her eyes. The rhythmic kicking at the inside of her abdomen did little to relieve this; each
time her unborn son pummeled at the confines of her womb, her spine seemed to cry out and beg
for succor. None was forthcoming.
“Melina?” she asked softly, reaching out in front of her and finding the warm, soft form of her
handmaiden’s shoulder beneath the blankets. The only times in her life that she had not been able
to do so had been the nights she had spent with her husband or other lovers. Melina, of course,
awoke at once and rolled over.
“Lady Celeste?” she asked, reaching out to touch Celeste’s face. “Is it the baby? Do I need
to send for the midwife?”
“Oh, it’s the baby alright,” Celeste answered her. “But it’s not the midwife I need.”
“Hot compress for your back?” Melina asked. Her concerned eyes were just visible, like
pearls in the darkness.
“How did you know?”
Melina laughed sleepily and yawned. “My Lady, it’s my job to know your every need before
you do.”
“Bless you, but you are a sweet girl,” Celeste told her. “A pillow for my knees, too.”
“Of course,” Melina replied. She peeled the covers back and drew open the bed curtain. She
was wearing a long cotton nightdress which was the only bit of her Celeste could see until she
padded over to the fireplace and stoked the embers back to roaring life. The chill edge seemed to
ebb as the glow became brighter; Celeste looked at the gilt-faced clock on the mantle above where
Melina was working.
“Half past the fourth candle,” she murmured. “Blair’s not even up yet.”
“No, ma’am,” Melina replied. “Lord Blair doesn’t rise until the fifth candle, or a bit after to
have his morning run before work. The only person up this early will be the cook. Excuse me,”
and she vanished through the door into Celeste’s bath chamber.
With a wince, Celeste shifted over to the spot Melina had vacated. It was warmer; closer to
the fire and still toasty with the other woman’s heat. She did her best to draw the blankets up
around her chin, but they were heavy and she was in an awkward state.
In all truth, she was in more than one awkward state.
It had been a year since the madness had gripped her husband. A year since those four
terrible nights in Dursk that took the brilliant man she had married and turned him into the eccentric
he was now. I’Lupo Inverno, the Durskans had always called him. It was a fitting name for Blair
Cassius Eustatius Octavius Quintas du’Winter. Lord du’Winter had always befitted his name; he
was as cold and hard as ice, as slippery and as beautiful.
To Celeste Moulinnay’s great despair, it had turned out that he was as brittle as ice, too.
Melina suddenly returned through the bath chamber door with a long, shallow bowl and an iron
kettle. The pot made a deep sloshing sound as she hung it over the flames, but the maid hardly
paid it any mind as a few drops of water fell into the coals with a pop and hiss. She scooped a
pillow from the seat of one of the plush, gilt and velvet armchairs and gently placed it between
Celeste’s knees.
“I thought you didn’t like this side of the bed, m’Lady?” Melina asked playfully.
“I’m stealing your heat,” Celeste smiled up at her. “And I wanted to watch the fire for a bit.”
“Ah,” the maid answered. She crawled gingerly over Celeste’s legs and stretched out behind
her. Unbidden, she began rubbing her Lady’s lower back with long, strong fingers. “What troubles
your mind, m’Lady?”
“Blair,” she replied at once, closing her eyes as the ache in her back eased.
“It has not been the easiest dozen years for you, Celeste,” Melina observed knowingly. They
had been together since Celeste was fifteen years old; her handmaiden had been ever present at
her side in that thirteen years. They, like many Durskan ladies and their handmaidens, possessed
a strong, strange sort of sisterhood—and Celeste would not trade that bond for all the gold in her
husband’s extensive treasuries. “In fact,” Melina continued, “I would say that it has been rather
rough.”
This was so very true that she nearly wanted to weep for frustration. The worst of it was that
she loved Blair with every fiber of her being; but Blair was a uniquely difficult man to love. His
boyhood had been a wreckage of his birth-mother’s diabolical lunacy; a woman he had been
driven to murder in the weeks before their wedding.
Now, though; now she knew that Blair was far more capable of that violent action than she had
ever imagined he could be.
With an effort, she tore her mind away from those memories and forced herself to focus on
Melina’s back as the other woman again scrambled out of the bed and padded barefoot to the
fireplace. Celeste watched her movements as she laid a towel in the bowl, added a handful of
crushed herbs, and poured the hot water over all. The maid spent a few ‘marks kneading the cloth,
and the room began to fill with the heady scent of Midicant and Moonflower. Melina wrung the
towel between her hands and bore it back to the bed.
Celeste tugged her own nightshirt up past her hips and gasped when the heat of the cloth was
laid against her spine.
“Too hot, m’lady?” Melina asked concernedly.
“Nay,” Celeste answered quickly, “Nay, not at all. It feels marvelous.”
In fact, it felt so very marvelous that she drifted into a doze. Her mind wandered happily
through the good memories; the first time she had seen her husband, the births, two years apart,
of first her son Alistair and then her daughter Grace. She remembered the long, slow journey to
Khathia in the first days of their marriage—one of the happiest times of her life.
The cloth was gone and Melina with it. Celeste stirred petulantly, but the incessant drumming
at the inside of her belly precluded any further thought of sleep. Blearily, she opened her eyes and
looked toward the mantle again. To her surprise, the fire was low, and the dim blue-gray light of
early dawn was making the frost-crusted windows glow the color of roofing slate. Melina had risen
and cleared away the tools she had used to make the compress. Celeste could hear her soft
humming in the dressing room and she smiled. It was still far, far earlier than she usually rose, but
her maid preternaturally seemed to know that she would be starting her day now rather than later.
“Melina?” she called, and was rewarded immediately by the woman’s light steps from just
beyond the dressing room door.
“Coming, ma’am,” the maid said an instant before appearing in the room. “Are you ready to
rise?”
“Aye,” Celeste moaned. “But I need help up.”
“Of course, m’Lady.” Melina threw back the covers and took Celeste gently by the arms. “Up
you go!”
Once on her feet, Celeste did her best to stretch the kinks out of her once again aching back.
It would not be long before her second son was born; perhaps not more than a week.
“And good riddance to you, boy,” she told her belly. “Not that I don’t love you; but you’ve got too
big to be in there. Time to come out.” She poked herself and Melina giggled girlishly.
“Oh, ma’am,” the maid chuckled. “You’re such a silly!”
“Melina, dear,” Celeste clucked fondly. “Silly me into a dress, would you? In spite of the
pummeling my guts are taking, I’m frankly famished.” And to her own surprise it was true; the early
candle notwithstanding, she found that her stomach was growling as fiercely as her back.
“As it happens, ma’am, I have your dress laid out already,” Melina said quickly. “And, as it’s
a bit chilly in the dining room at this time of morn, a warm shawl, too.”
“Bless you,” Celeste said, allowing herself to be led into the dressing room. Melina had her
clothed in a trice; the dress was blue with a low-cut bodice and a very-flattering flair, considering
her current mostly-round state.
“Quite fashionable,” she remarked to her reflection as Melina took the time to tease the
tangles from her thick, wavy, black locks. “Is this one of Blair’s designs?”
“It is,” Melina answered. “He had it brought up yesterday evening while you were in the parlor
with Grace and the piano teacher. I think it’s very flattering.”
“It is,” Celeste admitted, admiring it one last time before heading for the door. “And it’s in the
style I like.”
“Very Durskan,” Melina agreed. “Very you.”
Celeste smiled, but made no other reply. She led the way down the long upstairs corridor with
its brightly polished oak floors to the marble staircase that led down to the parlor. She descended
carefully; she’d been having trouble with her balance lately; and found herself surprised to see her
husband throwing his cloak about his shoulders in the entryway. In spite of the years they had
spent together, she still felt a peculiar fluttery thrill somewhere behind her navel whenever she saw
him.
Blair du’Winter was, simply put, intoxicating.
His shoulder-length black hair—which his manservant spent a goodly time each morning
straightening—was braided neatly today, and tied back with a smart silver bow. His pale face was
a study in lines, planes, and angles so severe and precise that the best of artists would have
struggled to match it. And his eyes—Celeste felt the blush climb her neck as they turned on her—
icy blue, half-lidded, and mysterious beyond measure. She watched him note her presence, note
the dress she was wearing, and offer the very slightest, almost imperceptible twitch of the right
corner of his mouth, indicating his pleasure.
“Pierre,” he beckoned quietly, and a shadow broke from the darkness of the entryway,
became a man, and opened the door. And just that abruptly the pair of them were striding out into
the swirling snow, and the wide door clicked closed behind them. Another black-haired form came
from just out of sight to give the heavy double-sided wooden portal a healthy push to make certain
it had closed against the unforgiving Khathian winter chill. Jamison Vencello turned a boyishly
bright face up toward his Mistress paused upon the stair and bowed with the liquid finesse of long
practice.
“A very good morning, madam,” he greeted, his deep voice carefully soft. “Early for you to
be rising, isn’t it?”
“It is,” Celeste told the butler. “Kindly let the cook know that I’ll be taking breakfast now.”
“Of course,” he returned, offering her a second half-bow before vanishing in the direction of
the kitchens. With Melina’s help, Celeste finished her descent, stopping at the bottom of the
marble stairs to note her husband’s wet buckskin running shoes neatly placed on their ridged mat
to the left of the oak and walnut front doors. The plain, dusky leather jerkin that he reserved for his
morning jog hung above them, though it was more damp with sweat than with snow.
“I cannot believe he went running in this weather,” she marveled aloud. Her slippered feet
shushed across the flag-stone entryway as she made toward the dining room.
“He runs most everyday, m’Lady,” Melina put in. “The only days he doesn’t run are blizzards.”
“Aye, but Blair so hates the cold, it really doesn’t agree with him.” Celeste answered over her
shoulder as she and her maid passed down the dark, ornate corridor which led to the expansive
dining room beyond. “Really, I often wonder why he moved us here to Khathia in the first place.
The summers are pleasant enough, though never as warm as it was in Dursk, but these winters are
harsh beyond measure.”
“I know why we came here,” Melina returned merrily, slipping around her mistress so that she
could ready Celeste’s place at the table. Their eyes met and both women answered, in equally
poor imitations of Lord Du’Winter’s thick, almost unintelligible Durskan accent, “Business!” It came
out as beesnees and both women burst into girlish giggles.
“Ah, that’s my Blair,” Celeste murmured, running her hands through her supple onyx curls as
Melina pulled the overstuffed armchair out from its place at the table. The chair was one borrowed
from the formal front parlor; though Celeste loved the tall, straight, dining chairs, with their
intricately hand-carved scenes of Durskans dancing at the high balls they so loved, the weight of
her unborn son made even the briefest spells sitting in them agony. So she settled herself into the
soft cushions and watched as the kitchen girls hastened in to set her place at the table. Celeste
could tell they were flustered; she never came to break her fast so early; her marito’s dishes were
still scattered at his place, uncleared.
“So sorry, m’Lady,” one of the younger ones apologized, as if reading her mind. “We weren’t
prepared for you. It won’t happen again, on my word it won’t.”
“No fears, girl,” Celeste told her around a wide yawn. “I certainly didn’t intend to rise so
early. My young son here thought I should be about though,” she poked her own well swollen belly
lightly, “And has rather forcefully made his position known.”
The girl smiled sympathetically, but obviously without any understanding, as she gathered Blair’
s dirtied bowls and vanished again into the open mouth of the swinging door that led to the kitchen
corridor.
“Which one was that?” she asked Melina absently after the girl had gone.
“Ah, Filia,” Melina answered. “Why?”
“Merely curious,” Celeste replied. “Did you happen to see what Blair was wearing today? I
mean beneath that greatcloak?” She hastened to add the last bit before Melina could begin
speaking.
“I did,” the maid chuckled, smiling broadly as she tucked a soft, fleecy blanket around her
Lady’s nearly absent lap. “It was one of his own designs; a green and silver doublet with lace over
a green silk shirt and those black wool pants he favors with the laces. Seems he was able to make
a good choice this morning, no?”
Celeste sighed and frowned toward the window, her sapphire blue eyes full of a long known
worry. She could see nothing but white light through it; the frost and snow were so thickly caked on
the outside. “He’s altogether himself, then,” she mumbled to no one in particular, “At least this
morning.”
“What’s that, ma’am?” Melina asked softly, stepping up to rub Celeste’s shoulders, her own
cornflower colored eyes fixed concernedly on her Mistress’ hands as they worried at her silk-lined
napkin.. “Something about the morning?”
“It’s lovely,” Celeste told her with a wistful shake. “A beautiful snowy day!”
“It’s seventh Yule,” Melina commented, straightening firmly and nodding with an air of decided
cheerfulness. “Alistair and Grace should be bounding in a bit for their spice-cakes and maple-
drizzle.”
“Well, I’d rather hoped to be done with my own breakfast by the time they woke,” Celeste told
her, frowning at the swinging portal through which Filia had vanished. Almost as though
summoned, the girl reappeared, bearing her Lady’s breakfast on a broad platter of highly polished
silver.
“Apologies, m’Lady,” the girl squeaked breathlessly. “The cook sends her blessings and
politely asks Melina to come ahead next time so that you don’t have to wait.” She set a fine china
plate laden with a hot, fresh roll, two small links of sausage, an egg, poached and covered in small
dice of tomato and pickled beans. A tall glass of fresh milk was also set before her, followed by a
bright, lovely orange—already sectioned—in its own separate but matching dish.
“A lovely breakfast,” Celeste assured warmly, “My compliments to the cook and tell her not to
fret; waiting a nonce for food is better than taking a spill down the stairs because you’ve sent your
handmaiden away.” Her stomach growled loudly, startling the serving girl, but Filia recovered
quickly, laughing and remarking, “The young Lord is a fierce one then!”
“Indeed,” Celeste answered with an embarrassed chuckle of her own. “I’d like hot tea, as well,
please.”
“I’ll have it out in a trice,” Filia dipped a curtsy and retreated again into the crowded kitchen
corridor.
Ravenous, Celeste tucked in to her food with relish and though she was careful to maintain her
elegant poise, she had cleaned the plate completely before Filia returned with the tea.
“Would you like some more, m’Lady?” the girl asked with the slightest hint of surprise as she
swapped out the dishes. Celeste bit her lower lip lightly and made a scrunched, helpless face at
Melina. “Actually, I think I’ll have one of the cook’s honey sweet rolls—with the lemon glaze, not
the crème—to eat with my tea.”
“Of course, ma’am. Anything else?”
Melina giggled and Celeste shot her a mock-glare. “Aye, bring one for Melina too. And a
second cup and saucer so she can take some tea as well.”
“As you wish,” Filia piped dutifully, her skirts rustling softly as she curtsied once more and
withdrew.
“A sweet roll?” Melina mewled, hands going to her shapely hips. “I don’t want a sweet roll!”
“Yes you do,” Celeste insisted matter-of-factly to her maidservant’s amusement. “Besides, if
I have to get fat, so do you!”
“Oh, so that’s your game!” Melina giggled again and hugged Celeste’s shoulders.
“It is and you have no choice but to play,” Celeste told her with a smile. “Now be a dear and
fetch my footrest from the parlor.”
Melina was gone almost before Celeste had realized she was leaving.
With the room momentarily silent, her thoughts turned, as they did so often of late, to Blair.
He had not been himself since Felix—
Celeste cleared her throat and looked wildly around the room, fixing her eyes on the white light
of the window and forcing herself not to think on that. It was still too fresh, too painful; she felt the
constriction in her throat worsen and the sting of hot tears seared at the back of her bright blue
eyes. Closing them, she felt a pair of glittering drops fall past her lashes and onto her hands. She
drew in a deep breath, and then another, and another. When she felt she had herself under control
she opened her eyes and looked down at the cup and saucer in her hands. It was the good blue
and white porcelain she had bought a decade earlier, and she forced a smile. She had bought it
because the blue of the glaze was the same as the pale, frosty blue of her Blair’s eyes. Celeste
could still hear the aggrieved, drawn out, “Mio Dio!” he had ejaculated when she had told him of
her reasoning for its commission.
This was a much better line of thought for a Yule morning.
Remembering the china made her remember another of her fondest memories. She smiled
quietly to herself and wiped her leaking eyelids as she recalled the first time she had seen Blair du’
Winter. It had been a pleasant early-summer afternoon in Dursk and she was returning to her
home at Rebblik Hall Manor with three of her closest friends. They had been riding in an open
coach, enjoying the air and sunshine when they had come upon a group of young noblemen,
cheering and hooting as two of their number engaged in a spirited wrestling match. Blair had been
one of the brawlers; she felt her cheeks grow warm even now as she remembered the way he had
looked; shirtless, bronzed, and firmly entrapped in a headlock at the hands of a taller, heavier
friend. Come to think of it, Blair was not tall by any standards; barefoot he was a scant two inches
taller than her own modest five and a half feet. But he was lean and cut with lines of muscle and
sinew; his silky, raven-black hair had been straightened even back then, setting him immediately
apart from his friends with their own hair done in a variety of the very popular and natural styles of
curls. Shortly said, he was the most attractive man she had seen in her admittedly short sixteen
years. Looking back, he was still the most attractive man she had ever had the pleasure to meet.
But then as the pair of them flailed about he had shifted and glanced directly at her. Even in
memory, Celeste basked in the rosy glow she had felt as that icy blue-grey gaze had met her own
cobalt watchfulness through a thin curtain of his inky dark tresses. He had made no indication of
either surprise or pleasure, but every hair on her body had stood up even as her stomach dropped
somewhere down between her toes. The connection had been powerful but brief. In the very next
instant, Blair; shorter and outweighed, slipped out of his friend’s hold, lifted him bodily from the
ground and flipped him through the air to land in a thudding jumble of limbs at the side of the road.
Celeste and her friends had clapped gleefully as their driver urged the horses past the group of
young nobles; she and her bosom friend Ciepri blew kisses at the young victor, while her cousin
Jianna and friend Kami made, “Ooo’s,” of sympathy at the young lord now flat on his back and
staring amazedly up at them as the coach rattled past.
“Your footrest, m’Lady,” Melina’s voice burst the memory and Celeste started in spite of
herself.
“Ah—what?” Celeste asked a bit more sharply than she had intended. “Oh, thank you, Melina.”
Her handmaiden frowned concernedly at her and slipped the footrest beneath her outstretched
legs.
“I’m alright,” she assured Melina, quietly. “Just reminiscing.”
“Memories are important,” Melina intoned in mildly neutral tones as she took up the empty
teacup which had appeared alongside a plate bearing two lemon glazed sweet rolls. Celeste
frowned at them; she had not even noticed Filia’s entrance and exit.
“Aye,” Celeste agreed noncommittally. Suddenly ravenous again, she took the left-most
pastry from the plate and gave it a heroic bite. The maid giggled as Celeste winked at her, but her
thoughts were already returning to that day twelve years earlier. That initial connection had
stunned her; burned indelibly into her soul so that she could call it up even now and blush at the
feelings it brought to her heart. And though she had not realized it at the instant which it happened,
Blair had felt the spark as well, but for him there had been even more to it.
Blair du’Winter was not a man of words by any stretch of the imagination—he rarely shared
his thoughts with her, or anyone else for that matter, and to know his emotions from his own lips—
well, she’d likely get further speaking to his coat rack. But in the years since their wedding, she had
gleaned notable insights from his friends, though most of the more profound revelations had come
from her husband’s manservant and bodyguard, Pierre.
She had fallen in love with Blair that fine summer day, and with typical youthful feminine
aplomb she had set out to learn all she could of the mysterious young Lord whom she had seen
wrestling. Her friends knew his name and his title; and they gossiped mercilessly about his family
and his lunatic mother:
“The youngest son of Atticus du’Winter, Duke of Morestei.”
“He inherited the estate because his eldest brother ran away to live in Arinon, and the middle
brother is even crazier than their mother.”
“His other two mothers live in Khathia because Atticus’ youngest wife threatened to butcher
them and all their daughters if they stayed in Dursk. Her name was Hellyssa Ricci and she was
Blair’s birthmother!”
Celeste paid them only half a mind, but the gossip was sinfully enjoyable. She had arrived
home in time to bathe and dress for the informal ball her middle mother had planned for that
evening.
It had been quite a shock to come down the stairs with her sisters, cousins, and friends and
spy young Lord Blair du’Winter warmly clasping hands with her father and exchanging pleasant
greetings with a smile charming enough to move kingdoms and a look in his eyes like a hungry wolf
in winter.
| I'Lupo Inverno |
| February 2010 |
| Serial Fiction |
| Copyright 2010 by Gabriel and Miriam Cole |
| Click this button to go to the Orion's Child Serials Page! |
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| Prologo: Un’alba d’Inverno |
| Your Gracious Majesty, Lords and Ladies, Dearest Friends; You are most cordially invited to Rebblik Hall Manor this coming Julellen 20 to celebrate with us the nuptials of our lovely daughter Celeste Angelica Verrinea Dredarria Leanna Moulinnay when she happily weds Duke Lord Blair Cassius Eustatius Octavius Quintas du’Winter. The customary feast and revelry will follow on the grounds, entertainment to be provided by the Order of Gravatan. Please reply promptly if you wish to weather under our roof. Most Humbly Yours, Baron Lord Roger O.E.F.M. Moulinnay --The Wedding Invitation of Blair du’Winter and Celeste Moulinnay |
| Second Eraon of Men, Year 2258 Seventh Yule The Present |
Editor's Note: By now you have noticed that this is not part of Leather and Blood. I'Lupo Inverno is the story of
Blair du'Winter and his wife Celeste Moulinnay. This is a labor of love and a great stretch from our usual bent. We
hope you enjoy reading this as much as we did writing it; it will alternate in the coming issues with episodes of
Leather and Blood. Further; the language of the Durskans is Italian--or rather we are so enamored of the Italian
language that it became, with very little change, the language of the Durskans. If you encounter a phrase or word
you are unfamiliar with (or could not derive its meaning from context) entering it as it appears in an online translator
should produce the appropriate English result.
GMC
Blair du'Winter and his wife Celeste Moulinnay. This is a labor of love and a great stretch from our usual bent. We
hope you enjoy reading this as much as we did writing it; it will alternate in the coming issues with episodes of
Leather and Blood. Further; the language of the Durskans is Italian--or rather we are so enamored of the Italian
language that it became, with very little change, the language of the Durskans. If you encounter a phrase or word
you are unfamiliar with (or could not derive its meaning from context) entering it as it appears in an online translator
should produce the appropriate English result.
GMC