Georgiana shyly wiped her lips with the hankerchief offered by her brother, and settled back into the carriage as it took off along the pitch black path. Feeling pleasantly sated, the rocking of the wheels over rock and forest debris soothed rather than jangled her nerves (as it had on the way here; tense, faint, and distraught as she had been) and she felt herself drifting into a daydream.
"Are you improved, dearest?" her brother enquired gently.
"Oh, yes." Georgiana smiled gratefully at him. Her good, kind brother. Where others might have spoiled their broken-hearted sisters with trinkets or sweets, scolded them for their foolishness, or simply turned a cold shoulder to such unseemly womanish behaviour, Fitzwilliam had known exactly how to act. He had taken her far from gossip and prying eyes, deep into the forests of Norfolk where she would have the privacy to grieve and the finest, sweetest venison blood to satisfy her appetites.
It might not have tasted as her beloved Wickham (still beloved, though she was sure the pain of being cast aside so swiftly in the face of trouble would soon cure that sentiment) surely would, but it was the kindest of offerings all the same. Her eyes itched with the ghost sensation of brimming tears and she closed them swiftly, sinking under a blanket, wishing Fitzwilliam to leave her in peace for the remainder of the trip.
Darcy patted her hand lightly and turned to the window. Grateful that her grief was somewhat relieved, he was more grateful that her gifts did not allow her entry into his thoughts. Better for her to think that his interference had been out of concern for her honour and virtue - a foolish notion for their kind, for what self respecting creature such as they would claim purity after so long? - than to suspect the truth.
Which was that the notion of spending eternity with a character as intolerable as Wickham's was simply too much for one vampyre to bear.
Georgiana shyly wiped her lips with the hankerchief offered by her brother, and settled back into the carriage as it took off along the pitch black path. Feeling pleasantly sated, the rocking of the wheels over rock and forest debris soothed rather than jangled her nerves (as it had on the way here; tense, faint, and distraught as she had been) and she felt herself drifting into a daydream.
"Are you improved, dearest?" her brother enquired gently.
"Oh, yes." Georgiana smiled gratefully at him. Her good, kind brother. Where others might have spoiled their broken-hearted sisters with trinkets or sweets, scolded them for their foolishness, or simply turned a cold shoulder to such unseemly womanish behaviour, Fitzwilliam had known exactly how to act. He had taken her far from gossip and prying eyes, deep into the forests of Norfolk where she would have the privacy to grieve and the finest, sweetest venison blood to satisfy her appetites.
It might not have tasted as her beloved Wickham (still beloved, though she was sure the pain of being cast aside so swiftly in the face of trouble would soon cure that sentiment) surely would, but it was the kindest of offerings all the same. Her eyes itched with the ghost sensation of brimming tears and she closed them swiftly, sinking under a blanket, wishing Fitzwilliam to leave her in peace for the remainder of the trip.
Darcy patted her hand lightly and turned to the window. Grateful that her grief was somewhat relieved, he was more grateful that her gifts did not allow her entry into his thoughts. Better for her to think that his interference had been out of concern for her honour and virtue - a foolish notion for their kind, for what self respecting creature such as they would claim purity after so long? - than to suspect the truth.
Which was that the notion of spending eternity with a character as intolerable as Wickham's was simply too much for one vampyre to bear.
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"Which was that the notion of spending eternity with a character
as intolerable as Wickham's was simply too much for one vampyre to bear."
...made me laugh my spleen off. I love that Darcy's cure for a broken heart is a spot of venison and a hankerchief to wipe up the gore.
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