I opened my small satchel and handed him my dance card. In broad strokes, he filled the entire list with his name before he handed it back to me.
"Just so that there aren't any misunderstandings," he winked, and my heart somersaulted.
I would have probably read so much more into this small exchange, but right then the carriage door opened, and I received my first glimpse of Carlton House. Gaslights and torches lit the front courtyard andhouse. It didn't look like a house at all, though. It looked like an ancient Roman palace. All the windows were alight from the inside, making it look even more spectacular.
But that was nothing compared to the inside, where I simply couldn't stop myself from staring. Green Roman pillars reached from the floor to the high-up vaulted ceiling, and a spiraling, two-sided stairway led up and up from there. I craned my neck when we started ascending the set to the right for no reason other than the left seemed more crowded. More stories lay above us, all accessible through a winding stairwell that threatened to make me dizzy.
"Is everything alright, Roweena?" Thomas' voice brought me back and reminded me that I was acting like a country bumpkin, and suddenly I felt like one too.
I might be wearing the most beautiful, expensive dress I had ever possessed, but so were all the other ladies around me, who I now noticed were looking at me like I did at the beggars in the street. I swallowed and regained my composure.
"I'm sorry," I apologized. "It won't happen again."
"It had better not," he hissed quietly, and I bit my lip.
His voice rose in greeting, "Ah, the Duchess of Southerland, how are you faring tonight? You look ravishing."
The Duchess of Southerland appeared to be around my age, twenty-two. Her smile didn't hide the slight sneer in the curve of her lips. Assessing me from head to toe as if she already knew who I was and that I had no business being here.
"The Earl of Dunmere," she held out her hand. "It's so nice to see you again, and this must be your new fiancée." She nodded at me, while Thomas bent and kissed her hand.
Just like Prudence taught me, I made a curtsey and learned that making a curtsey in front of Prudence differed greatly from making one to a Duchess. "Your grace, how do you do?" I was proud that my voice didn't waver.
"My fiancée, Mistress Roweena of Wellington." Thomas introduced. "Roweena, this is Harriet, the Duchess of Southerland.
I had never been happier that my mother's status had allowed my father to addofto our name. Still, the sneer around the Duchess' lips deepened.
"Very nice to meet you. You caught yourself quite the fish, Mistress." Harriet's voice was icy.
"I'm not sure I like to be called a fish," Thomas protested, offering a wide smile that didn't quite reach his eyes to deflect from Harriet's dismissive tone toward me.
"Ah, don't be sensitive." Harriet slapped her folding fan against Thomas' arm. "I hope you will have a lovely evening." She nodded at us before rushing off to the right, calling, "Wellesley! Wait up."
Thomas sent me a smile as he pulled me forward, probably meant to be encouraging, but to me it only said,I told you so.You don't belong.
We entered a lavishly decorated and lit ballroom. Everything inside the palace screamed Roman Empire, from the green polished pillars with gold accents to the lavishly red mosaic on the floor.
Chairs stood around round tables to the side of one wall, another was made up of open balcony doors, and a third was occupied by a long table filled with refreshments. A smallorchestra occupied a podium in the corner, quietly playing soothing tunes.
The entire area was filled with talking, laughing people. So many people. The cream de la cream of English nobility. Extravagantly dressed in all colors of the rainbow, with expensive jewelry glittering under a myriad of lit candles.
My heart turned into a butterfly as its chambers beat out of sync, making me dizzy for a moment. My father had completely overstepped himself this time. I didn't belong here. There was no way I ever would. High breeding, manners, and poise screamed from every person. I had more in common with the man holding up a tray filled with champagne glasses than the woman he was offering it to, who didn't even acknowledge him when she took a glass.
Sweat beads ran down my back despite the slight chill in the large room from the open doors. Every instinct inside me told me to flee. To run and never to look back. Tears prickled at the corners of my eyes, and I might have even allowed them to fall, had not a deep voice made Thomas turn, taking me with him since I was still holding on to his elbow.
"Thomas, you scoundrel, where have you been, and who is that beauty by your side?" asked a middle-aged man with a jovial grin as he approached us.
"Don't let him confuse you. If anybody is a scoundrel, it's him," Thomas said with a wide, open grin. "Henry."
"How have you been," Henry asked him, pounding Thomas on the back. "I heard you got engaged." His eyes roamed me up and down, lingered too long on my deep-cut neckline, and made me blush. "I sincerely hope this isn't her, because I might have to call you out on a duel for her hand," Henry's hand moved up and mine automatically forward, so he could kiss it. My stomach fluttered, and my self-confidence returned at his obvious flattery.
"Henry, may I introduce Mistress Roweena of Wellington, my fiancée. Roweena, this loud jackanapes is my dear friend, and if he doesn't make me kill him in a duel, best man, Henry Paget, the Marquess of Anglesey."
"Enchante mademoiselle," Henry kept lingering over my hand until Thomas cleared his throat.
"I'm afraid Henry spent too much time in France," he explained to me.
"It's very nice to meet you, your... Grace?" I faltered, unable to remember the title for a marquess.
