No marriage is happy ever after - On VERY temporary hold!

The Journey

Louisa stopped in front of her carriage and, after hurriedly hiding the paper from the butler in her bosom, turned to take a look at the building that had up until now been her home. Midgrove Manor was a beautiful house in three stories and a cellar, laid with yellow bricks and a grey roof, darkened by the passing time. The house was lined all the way round by thick bushes which were then lined by flowerbeds. The massive amount of windows in the house gave it an open feel and when the morning sun hit the front of the house, it looked like a golden ornate strewn with jewels.

Her eyes went further to take in the nearby gardens. She had taken many a walk around them these last days, edging into her memory the sloping of every hill and valley, the spicy scents of the adjoining woods and the sound of the gravel from the roads and paths underneath her feet. She would not be here from now on. She might be able to call on her parents every now and then but at the moment she felt very little inclined to do so. Perhaps she would call upon her brothers. She would miss them dearly.

All this she knew and now it was to be hers no more. Once again she felt tears rising behind her eyes. She shook her head furiously and stepped into the carriage, Mary at her side, Emily in front of Louisa and Lydia next to Emily. She forced herself to put on a smile as she looked at her bridesmaids who smiled eagerly at her. Emily, however, did not smile as much as the two other girls. Her smile was one of understanding or at least she believed she understood.

"Leaving home is never easy, Louisa."

Louisa nodded slowly, still keeping her smile in place. Emily would believe that Louisa would just miss her family and old home in general. She knew nothing of the revolting emotions inside Louisa, fighting hard to break her carefully constructed self control.

Louisa had loved her home, yes. Whenever she could have been spared from her duties as a lady to be, she would run out the door and explore the grounds around. Already as a child she had been showing great skills on a horseback and she would go with her two brothers on endless rides and almost as often come home, looking as if she had brought the entire forest home in her massive hair.

As the outings became fewer and fewer the more her mother had been shaping Louisa into a lady, the more dear they had also become. Being the daughter of the house she had had some freedom that she had no idea if she would ever get as the wife of an earl.

The carriage took off with a jolt, shaking the girls inside around. Mary and Lydia squealed like two newborn piglets. The former jabbed her elbow into the side of the carriage. "Really, does that coachman not know how to drive? Are you okay, Louisa?"

The bride gave a slow nod while covering her smile. It had been a lovely interruption to her thoughts to hear those girls scream. "I am just fine, Mary. The carriage may have been hitting a stone when taking off."

"Or the horses may be some new, inexperienced asses that should never have been put before a bridal carriage!" Lydia huffed.

"Girls, girls," Emily chided in front of Louisa. "We had a bit of a start and nothing worse than that. Lydia, you do not have a hair out of place, so stop your sulking." Though Emily's face was stern, Louisa noted the pressing of the lips that held back the same laughter that she herself had managed to suppress.

Louisa leaned slightly out of the window to take in the sights of her old estate. Midgrove Manor was a happily situated building on one of the small hills with a lake below at the back and a rather great forest behind the stables even further back. In front of the house stretched a gorgeous lawn strewn with elegantly placed shrubberies or fountains and cut through by gravel paths leading around to different places like an imitate cobweb. The main road leading from the house was by far the broadest and as such the only one laid with dark gravel.