Visions (The Daevas #2)

10 | Pique

But George and Edmund would be gone by then.

I widen my eyes and pull back the tears that are ready to sting my eyes and spring out. I will not see George after this, till our wedding comes. Oh, I hope my fiancé will do the best he can to quicken our marriage. I cannot bear not seeing him for five terrible months. I have the urge to listen to them, but I cannot do it. If I were Anne, I would -- but I am not my sister. I am docile as Anne is not.

I take an inward breath, feeling like a weakling.

"Mother," I hear Anne say from behind me, "how did you and Father bear not seeing each other for five months when you were both engaged to be married?"

Mother's beautiful smile creeps up her lips, making her whole feature glow. She stops sewing, placing it aside. I listen, but do not stop working on my embroidery. "Five months is much shorter than our traditional engagement gap, Anne. We had a year before getting married."

I gasp. Anne is silent. "But Mother, that is so long to wait for!"

She laughs, feeling like a girl in love again. She still looks eighteen, despite her age. The human thinks she is such a natural beauty -- which is true; but some of them think that she uses special potions to keep her young and utterly beautiful -- which is false. "I know that, darling. How we both knew that."

"Yes," Anne says, exasperated, "but how did you both bear it?"

"Your father had a talk with your grandparents, my parents, about speeding up the wedding date."

Anne laughs delightedly, while I gape at my mother. "And what happened, Mother?" I ask, shocked.

She gives the lightest of shrugs, her eyes scintillating. "Instead of a year, they made our wedding move to a month, eleven months removed. It was quite a story, but it made me extremely happy that we got to be hitched in such an early time. We were married here in England, and personally in Rome, where the king and queen saw us married by the Pope. His Holiness was Daevas, you know." Mother grins. "Then your father took me to places for our honeymoon, and then the two of you came along after we came back to Spain at the royal palace with the whole family and our people."

"Father was anxious for the both of you to be married!" Anne and I say, having that twin instinct.

"I cannot believe Father did that." Anne is enthralled.

Mother gives a little laugh. "A man of duty, yes. But he's not always what people think him to be. He is boyish in a way that he is manly, too."

"Maybe that's why Edmund and George are here -- to talk to Father about our wedding!" Anne exclaims in mirth.

Mother pulls back a little, her eyes bright. "My goodness, you might be right."

"Of course I --"

There is a knock on the door. I hear men's voices, and I instantly know who the voices belong to. I straighten my back out of habit, and my eyes do not leave my work. Mother stands up from her seat, her maroon gown catching the light as she turns toward the door. Anne leans back on the wall, her arms crossed. It is a very unladylike manner, but Anne is Anne, and she does what she pleased. The servants open the heavy door, and my father is standing at the center -- with George and Edmund.

The three of them are looking extremely handsome today and I have to hold my breath as I see George grinning directly to me. My heart gives a little skip, and I feel like I have fallen.

"Edmund!" Anne exclaims. She rushes to his side, while Edmund smiles at her. My sister's hands are on his shoulders, and the duke's hands are holding her elbows. They look like a couple in one of those fairytale novels that Mother used to read to us when we were just little 'uns, Anne and I.