Regardless, in the wake of that unholy devastation, both sides had agreed—with a stern Papal bull lending added weight to their final treaty—that the gem was far too dangerous to ever again be used in warfare.
It was in the wake of that same catastrophe that groundbreaking laws had finally been passed and agreed by even the highest of nobles regarding their own Rose-gifted powers, and British society had shifted—with a mere two dozen or so executions along the way—to its current code of carefully civil supernatural and human coexistence.
Over the years, of course, numerous rumors had circulated, telling conflicting stories of the gem’s travels since its final use at Bosworth. Some swore it had been buried far beneath the Tower of London to be held under the ravens’ watchful guard forevermore; others that it had been stolen by one of Henry Tudor’s French supporters as they’d fled, and then gifted by their king to the Pope, to be held secret and safe within the Vatican itself.
If nothing else, the fact that the gem hadn’t been wielded in even the most vicious heights of the bloody religious wars that swept the nation two hundred years later had always made it clear, at least to Margaret, that Britain’s royal family no longer held the gem.Noruler as rash and arrogant as Richard VI could have possibly restrained himself from that temptation, had it been to hand—and the satisfaction of having her longtime thesis vindicated by these records now within her grasp felt even more satisfying than winning the last department honors over her rival had, two months earlier.
If she were ever to see Gerald Morningford again, Margaret would take great enjoyment in pointing out her victory against him inthisintellectual arena, too, after all of the absurd and bombastic theories that he’d shouted over her various public lectures across the years. It would be interesting to see whether he would be able to summon any more articulate a response than the voiceless, sputtering rage and gestured threats he’d made after that most recent department meeting—or his usual bitter rants about the injustice of female students even beingallowedinto the college founded by his ancestors.
However, the thought of Britain’scurrentplayboy ruler ever holding the gem in his own decidedly loose grip, with so many tensions mounting in the continent beyond, was enough to subsume Margaret’s brimming satisfaction with cold dread...and add even more determination to her cause.
By the time her husband finally deigned to appear in the library that evening, she had read every crumbling record, made ten pages of closely-scribbled notes to begin with, and was nearly bursting with the need for action.
“You rang for me, madam?” Lord Riven’s tone was wry, but he strolled forward with careless animal grace, holding a wineglass full of swirling red liquid and avoiding her carefully sorted piles of paper on the couch to sink into the generous wingchair on the other side of the empty fireplace. For the first time since they’d met, he’d had a proper shave, revealing a strong and surprisingly well-shaped jaw, but she didn’t have time for any more than a passing note of that new shift in his appearance.
“It all comes down to thetiming,” she told him fiercely. “You said that unlike me in my own situation, you’d asked questions and found evidence to prove that the new law around undead property is real. But I have a far more urgent question. If it took full effect yesterday, it must have been decided months ago—and debated well before that. What was your man of business about, waiting so long to inform you?”
“Do you imagine I didn’t ask him that as well?” Lord Riven cocked one imperious eyebrow. “Shaw assumed all along what anyone would—that even if that shameful act did pass, the king would veto it, as any other ruler in our long history would have done. It was a nasty shock to him, as well, and a mistake in judgement. Still, Shaw’s a good man in his own way.”
Riven sighed, swirling the bloody vintage in his wineglass as his brows lowered and his brooding gaze turned inwards. “Sadly, it’s my own fault that he waited so long. Apparently, he’d been searching for months for any means by which I might evade that law, even in the remote chance that itdidtake effect...but he didn’t dare wake me from Sleep without having that clever solution already to hand. I’d strictly forbidden him from waking me early, you see, unless the house was literally burning down around me. Apparently, I was a bit too firm in that injunction. I certainly didn’t intend to frighten him out of all his wits.”
He winced. “Obviously, I hadn’t expected Parliament to act so rashly within my planned two years of rest, nor for King Whatsisname to actually allow it.”
“Thomas the Second,” Margaret told him as she put together the new points of data. “It’s been King Thomas II for the last five years now.”
“Who can keep track? I stopped bothering half a century ago.” Her husband shook his leonine mane, visibly steeled himself, and then took a fast, deep swig from his glass, his face tightening with unmistakable distaste.
Intellectual curiosity pricked at Margaret’s focus. “Is that cow’s blood or pig?” According to Mrs. Haworth, the local butcher supplied both on a daily basis.
“The taste is much the same in either case.” He gave her a tight smile, his voice taking on a wry note. “Trust me, if you’d care to offer a better option for tonight...” His gaze slid pointedly to her exposed throat, beneath her upswept hair.
She rolled her eyes. “Hardly.” They might be rubbing along better now than they had been in the beginning, but they werenotsharing the sort of relationship required for that scandalous type of intimacy...no matter how pleasurable it was indeed widely rumored to be. “However, I can offer you some comfort. Shelve any guilt that you’ve been feeling! You didn’t frighten that man at all. In fact, I’d say you frightened him nowhere nearenough. He’s taken shameless advantage of you.”
“I beg your pardon?”
“I wasn’t the first to have read through these private records in the past year,” Margaret told him.
For a moment, her husband was perfectly still. Then he said, his voice a low and ominous rumble, “How could you possibly know that?”
“Whoever was rifling through them was careless with his packing-up afterwards—and he certainly hadn’t been trained in preservation. He accidentally included a recent gentleman’s magazine among the documents.”
His words gritted out through clenched teeth even as his skin visibly paled. “And how do you know I didn’t do that myself last night, after you retired to bed?”
She gave him an indulgent look. “Did I not include enough detail about the magazine I found? It’s of the type read by would-be gentlemen of fashion all around the country, full of the latest society gossip, reviews of London theatricals, and the most elegant new styles in suits and top hats.”
Lord Riven’s brown eyes narrowed. “Are you attempting to make a witticism about my taste in clothing?”
“Oh, I’m not thinking only of your attire.” Margaret gestured at the two silver candelabras that did their best, along with a low fire, to illuminate the large, shadowy room. “You haven’t even boughtgaslampsfor your home yet—you, of all people, who are in most desperate need of modern means to light the evenings!”
His elongated canines were made visible by the flare of his upper lip. “Very well,” he muttered at last, “but only a simpering fool would race after fashion for century after century.”
“Oh, certainly.” Margaret had never cared much for frills or changing sleeve lengths. “Before our wedding ceremony, though, had you even left this house within the last century? Or spoken to more than a handful of people here?” How longhadthis sprawling manor house been shrouded in dustcovers?
“Enough!” He let out a long sigh, tipping his head back against the faded velvet upholstery of his chair. With his abundant, tawny hair and nearly unlined skin, Lord Riven would look no more than thirty forever—but something about the haunted expression on his face and the weary slump of his strong shoulders made the weight of his true age suddenly tangible.
“I surrender, madam. You are, of course, correct. I wasnotthe one who searched through those records, and I can imagine only one reason for anyone to do so: they were hunting for undeniable proof of the Rose of Normandy’s existence, in my keeping. I’d assumed that your family must have been the ones to ferret out the secret in order to make their demand, but it makes far more sense for Shaw to have done so himself, emboldened by my Sleep and his keys to my house. He couldn’t have accessed the Rose itself without my aid, butno onewould have questioned his right to be here, looking through my papers in my service.”
“Of course,” Margaret agreed. “I told you: my aunt and uncle are less interested in supernatural or historical records than anyone else I’ve met. All that matters to either ofthemis status and money.” Neither of which they’d ever managed to squeeze out of their orphaned niece...until now.
