Blaze Wyndham Read Online Free PDF

offered to dower them so they, too, may find husbands. Are these the actions of a wicked man? Your parents are content. Why can you not be?
    “ But where is the love? ” Blaze whispered to herself.
    It will come , said her conscience. It is bound to come. You will find love, but more important, you will have the satisfaction of knowing that you have, by humbling your overproud spirit and being a good Christian daughter, helped your seven sisters to their own happiness. How can you refuse the earl’s suit?
    “I cannot,” Blaze said softly, a tear of self-pity rolling down her face. “Oh, Blessed Mother of Christ, forgive me my disobedience. Help me to be more thoughtful of others,” she prayed. A hand dropped upon her shoulder. Startled, Blaze looked up to see her father. Hastily crossing herself, she arose. “Oh, Papa, I have made Mama very angry,” she confessed, flinging herself into his arms.
    Robert Morgan’s arms enfolded his eldest child against him. “I know,” he said gravely, thanking heaven that she could not see the laughter in his eyes. Blaze had never been the easiest of his children. She required a special touch. His wonderful Rosemary! The best of mothers, and so good with all the others, yet she could never quite understand that Blaze needed more than the others. “Your mother tells me that you have refused to accept our decision in this matter of a husband for you. Is this so?”
    “I will marry the earl, Papa,” Blaze said softly. “How can I scorn such a generous offer?”
    “You cannot,” answered Lord Morgan quietly. He set her back so they might look at one another. “You must trust me in this, Blaze, as you have always trusted me. Lord Wyndham is more than suitable. If the truth were spoken, my dearest, it would say that you are marrying up, for indeed you are. I had not met the man before today, but I have never heard ill spoken of him. His manner is firm and kindly. It is obvious that he loved his first wife despite her inability to give him children, and that he truly mourned her death. I believe he will love you too, Blaze. I believe that you will learn to love him. He will be a good husband. His generosity to you, not to mention to your sisters, speaks well of him. Not only will the dowries he is providing for your sisters aid them in finding husbands, but his connection to them by your marriage will aid us even more. Can you be content to have faith in my decision, my child?”
    Blaze nodded. “I did not mean to be so difficult, Papa, it is just that I never thought . . . never expected that I should be wed to so great a lord. I believed if I wed at all it would be to some younger son with no more than I, if that. Is the earl’s home very far from Ashby?”
    “RiversEdge is approximately a half-day’s ride from Ashby unless one goes directly across the fields, which the earl did today. His sister was celebrating her birthday, and he wished to be there. It is this sister whose eldest son is the earl’s current heir.”
    “They cannot be happy that the earl is remarrying,” said Blaze wisely.
    “It is not their decision,” replied Lord Morgan, and taking his daughter’s hand, he led her from the chapel. Together they walked down the corridor into the Great Hall of Ashby where Robert Morgan drew Blaze down next to him onto a settle by the fireplace. “The Langford earldom goes back to King Henry V, my child. The first earl saved that king’s life at the Battle of Agincourt, and was rewarded with a greater title than he already possessed. He was only sixteen at the time. The Wyndhams are long-lived. Lord Edmund’s grandfather lived to be seventy-five years of age, and his father was past seventy when he perished in an epidemic.”
    “The earl was his father’s only son?” Blaze inquired.
    “Surviving son, my dear, and only offspring of the second earl’s third wife. The family seems to have been racked with difficulties in the matter of producing a strong male line.