Page 1 of The General's Gift
Prologue
Near Talavera, Spain, July 1809
What if you knew this was the last day you would see color? Would you look harder? Would you drink in the blue of the sky, the red of the coats, the silver of the steel—until your vision burned?
Hours earlier, under that same cruel sun, Alexander de Warenne—Earl of Hawkhurst, commander of His Majesty’s cavalry—had ridden into Spain believing glory was immortal.
Now, several leagues into the forced march, he wiped sweat from his brow and would have traded every medal on his chest for a breath of cool shade. The sun made all the colors blaze and shimmer as if aflame.
He sat his saddle, heat radiating from his charger in waves. The sky was a hard enamel blue, the kind that begrudged rain. Olive groves clung to the slopes on either side, their leaves flashing green and then silver, as if cheering the passage of His Majesty’s cavalry—and its unyielding commander.
Ahead, the road boiled with ochre dust. Every now and again came a flicker—the metallic flash of helmets, cuirasses, andspurs. The breeze carried their music: the clatter of steel on steel, a sound that prickled the skin like the promise of a blow.
Somewhere hidden under those gnarled oaks waited the French left, a bulwark that had to be broken. Wellesley was four hours’ march behind them, waiting for their success to launch the attack on Napoleon’s center. The liberation of Spain from Bonaparte’s grasping hand hung on what Hawk and the 13th did next.
“Today is the day I die.”
Philip Stratton, Marquess of Faversham, rode a chestnut charger that looked as weary as its rider. Philip’s copper hair was plastered against his brow, and the dark blue of his uniform was dust-stained. His skin was scorched from weeks of marching under a merciless heat, but his green eyes burned.
“We will all die in disgrace if we don’t turn Victor’s right,” Hawk replied, trying for levity to dispel the grimness of his friend’s words.
“I had a vision last night. The ghost of Stratton Castle visited me in sleep. All the males in my family received him before they died.”
A shiver flickered down Hawk’s spine, and he tightened his hands on the reins. Count on Philip to bring a shadow over such a glorious day. “I didn’t know you'd become a Gothic bastard. You and I will do our duty. Like every soldier in this line. If death meets us, so be it.”
Philip didn’t avert his eyes. “I’m not afraid of meeting my maker. I’ll embrace my Angélique at last.”
The name drifted between them like smoke. Angélique. Officers had whispered about her beauty as if she were some prize from Olympus. And she had chosen Philip. A comet strike of a love match. And look what it had earned him.
After Philip had been sent to India, she could not bear to stay alone in London and had returned to Paris—only to die in the Terror. Their daughter lost. Perhaps killed.
Hawk had seen men split open by cannon fire with less ruin in their eyes than Philip carried now. A soldier could weather a frontal assault by the Imperial Guard, but such a love left no survivors.
Hawk’s jaw tightened. Better the order of battle than surrender to feelings that made widowers of men before the first volley. And yet—there it was. A twinge of envy for a devotion so absolute, even death had not broken it.
Romantic nonsense.
Hawk had what few could boast—Mary. Dependable, sensible Mary. She had given him an heir and, God willing, was giving him another child even now. She was everything a wartime wife ought to be—steady, patient, without frills or impossible demands. Nothing like Philip’s doomed dream.
“I hope Angélique will remember your ugly face.”
Philip chuckled, but it was a brittle sound. Within five seconds, the shadow slid back over him, heavy as a burial shroud. “My affairs are in order. All but my daughter.”
“You did all you could,” Hawk said. “You hired the best agents, you never ceased to inquire—”
“Not enough,” Philip ground out, teeth clenched. “What if it were your child? How would you sleep knowing she was unprotected and alone?”
“Have you considered she met the same fate as Angélique?” The words came harsher than he intended. “During those blood-soaked months, the French spared neither woman nor child.”
Philip spurred his chestnut forward half a pace and gripped Hawk’s shoulder. “I know she is alive. I need you to find her for me.”
Hawk frowned. “Help me crush the French. Then you can find her yourself.”
Philip looked away. “I named you her guardian in my will.”
“Christ, Henri. You shouldn’t have—”
The old song boomed before he could finish. Cannons. War’s melody, deep and hoarse, like the roar of some blood-daubed beast. Hawk had been hearing it since his first battle, and yet, it never failed to lift the hairs on his arms.
