The Silver Rose Read Online Free PDF

considered to be a harmless if time-wasting amusement of their sister’s, then not only would she never be free of Ravenspeare Castle, but she’d find herself working to fund her brothers’ expensive lifestyles.
    And marriage? No, that was not a possibility and never would be. Men were all the same when it came to their women. She would be as firmly dominated by a husband as she was by her brothers. This prospective marriage to a Hawkesmoor was a joke, an evil joke of Ranulf’s. She would just close her eyes, play her part, and wait until their lethal game was played out. What did she care about a Hawkesmoor? One fewer in the world could only be a good thing.
    She settled down on the straw to wait for the mare to deliver the foal. Leaning back against the wooden partition, she listened to the snorting and whiffling behind it of the stallion who had sired the foal about to be born. Edgar didn’t disturb her, merely leaned against the stable door, sucking on a straw. He was almost as fiercely devoted to the Arabians as he was to the Lady Ariel, and he could tell that something was troubling her.
    What kind of man was this soon-to-be-dead Hawkesmoor? Ariel gave up trying to pretend that if she ignored the whole extraordinary business, it would wash over her without leaving a trace. Presumably he was a sobersided Puritan who considered laughter to be the devil’s tool and enjoyment of any kind to be the embodiment of evil. A greedy man, obviously, if he was prepared to marry into thefamily whose very name was anathema to his own, just to acquire a disputed piece of land. But Puritans were greedy. They amassed wealth but considered spending it to be a sin. He would be a dour, ill-disposed, glowering man, who would demand absolute obedience from his wife in a somber household where they attended church twice on Sundays and listened to four-hour sermons.
    Except that she would not really be his wife. She would not leave Ravenspeare Castle; therefore, she would never come under her husband’s dominion. Because her husband would not survive the wedding party.
    Ariel stared unseeing at a knot in the wooden partition opposite. She couldn’t grasp it properly. It was outlandish. It was impossible. And yet it was neither of those things for those who knew the Ravenspeare brothers.
    The mare suddenly whinnied and snorted, and a gush of water poured from her, followed almost immediately by the transparent caul-covered body of a foal. It slipped out easily and fell to the floor. The mare bent and licked it clean.
    Ariel and Edgar watched in breathless wonder. It was always miraculous, however many births they witnessed. The foal staggered to its feet, its incredibly thin long legs shaking as they took its weight.
    “Looks like you got your wish, m’lady,” Edgar observed, as the colt found his mother’s teat.
    “Yes. Another stallion.” Ariel stroked the mare, who was gazing with her head down at her suckling foal. “And Serenissima didn’t need any help.” Easy births were unusual, but horses generally needed less help than humans. There were few birthings that took place in the hamlets around Ravenspeare Castle at which she was not present with her bag of shiny instruments and her pouches of herbs.
    “I had better get back.” She picked up her coat from the straw, slung it around her shoulders, and went out with the dogs into the now full dark of the October evening.
    When was this deadly charade to begin? She could see no way to avoid playing her part, not as long as she remainedunder Ranulf’s roof. And where else was she to go? She had no money of her own as yet. Oliver wouldn’t help her; he was in her brother’s camp. He was her lover with Ranulf’s approval and encouragement; in fact she sometimes suspected that what she had originally thought had been an overwhelming mutual attraction had actually been engineered by her eldest brother. For what reason, she couldn’t guess. Maybe it was a reward for friendship,