A duke found his bride-to-be’s servant bound to a chair in a cottage with a theft charge. But the girl slipped a folded note into his pocket — and it named the poison meant to be poured into his wedding goblet, purchased through the very household he was about to marry into.
PART 7
The shortcut had bought them distance, but not an easy road. One wheel struck a hidden root not long after, with a crack loud enough to make both horses shy. The carriage tilted sharply before settling at an angle that made further travel impossible.
Sebastian climbed down at once to inspect the damage, running a hand along the splintered wheel rim, while the driver held the horses steady.
“It will not turn another mile,” Sebastian said, straightening. “Not without proper repair — and no wheelwright within reach tonight.”
The light had already begun to fail around them, the forest canopy thick enough to hasten the coming dark. Norah climbed down after him with her satchel clutched close.
“There is shelter not far from here,” the driver offered, nodding toward a break in the trees where the ground rose gently. “An old huntsman’s lodge, built for your grandfather’s hunting parties, my lord. I doubt it has seen use in a decade or more. Stone walls at least, and a hearth, if the chimney has not fallen in.”
Sebastian glanced at Norah, who nodded despite her weariness, and the three of them made their way on foot along a narrow deer track, leading the horses behind them, until the lodge came into view through the thinning trees — squat and gray against the darkening sky, its small windows shuttered, but its door still hanging true on rusted hinges.
Inside, the air smelled of dust and old smoke, but the hearth proved sound. The driver set about coaxing a fire from dry kindling stacked in a corner, while Sebastian secured the horses beneath a lean-to attached to the lodge’s rear wall. Norah found a stub of candle in a drawer near the single table, and by the time the fire had caught properly, the small room had taken on a rough sort of warmth.
“Hollis will keep watch through the first hours,” Sebastian said, settling onto a bench across from Norah once the older man had taken a position near the shuttered window, a hunting rifle from the lodge’s stores resting across his knees. “We should use what time we have to make certain the evidence survives whatever comes next.”
Norah drew the receipt and the original note from her satchel, laying them carefully on the table between them. For a moment neither spoke, watching the firelight flicker across the damning words.
“If Vivien’s people search the carriage before we return, or seize it entirely to hide the wheel’s damage from prying eyes, we lose everything we have gathered.”
“Then we do not risk everything on a single copy.”
Sebastian reached for the paper and ink Norah had carried in her satchel — the same tools meant to disguise her as his scribe, now serving their true purpose.
“We transcribe it again tonight, in a hand that cannot be traced to either of us. You will carry one copy hidden on your person, while I carry the other. If one is found, the second still survives.”
They worked together by candlelight, Norah reading the note aloud in a whisper while Sebastian copied its words in a plain, unremarkable hand — then reversing the task for the shopkeeper’s receipt, checking each line twice against the original before either would be satisfied.
The careful work steadied something in Norah’s chest, gave her hands a task to focus on beyond the fear that had chased her since the forest road. Gradually the tightness in her shoulders eased as the second set of copies took shape.
“We cannot simply present these to the household and expect justice,” Sebastian said once the copies lay finished, the ink drying slowly in the firelight. “Vivien’s father holds influence enough to challenge any accusation brought quietly. And if we move too soon, she will simply claim the evidence is forged — a plot by a spurned servant and a foolish duke too trusting of her word.”
“Then it must happen where she cannot deny it,” Norah said slowly, an idea forming even as she spoke it aloud.
The wedding itself — still days away — offered exactly the kind of setting they needed. A gathering too large and too witnessed for Vivien to simply sweep aside with practiced tears, provided the proof could be presented at precisely the right moment, before any harm could be done, and while enough guests remained present to prevent quiet dismissal.
“It cannot happen carelessly,” Sebastian said. “If we accuse her too early, she has time to arrange her defense, perhaps even to silence you before the wedding day arrives at all. We must return to the estate as though nothing has changed. Continue the preparations. Let her believe her plan proceeds unhindered until the moment itself.”
Norah nodded, though the thought of returning to that tower, of playing the role of a captured servant once more while carrying knowledge dangerous enough to unmake a noble house, settled heavy in her stomach.
“We still do not know how they mean to deliver it into the wine itself,” she said. “The note names the goblet and the effect. It does not name the hand.”
“Then that is the piece we are still missing,” Sebastian said, “and the one most likely to give itself away, if her father’s house grows frightened enough by what we already know.”
Outside, the wind picked up through the trees, rattling the lodge’s old shutters. Norah folded the fresh copies carefully — tucking one set deep into the lining of her borrowed dress, while Sebastian secured the other within his coat.
For the first time since the cottage, a fragile sense of purpose settled between them. Sharper now than fear. Steady enough to carry them through whatever remained before the wedding day arrived.