Page 18 of The General's Gift
Finally, he nodded, satisfaction carved into his patrician face. “Good. I am glad we understand each other.”
Celeste beamed, every inch the dutiful ward. “Oh, entirely, my lord.”
She rose from her torture-chair, smoothed her skirts, and walked out with the grace of a girl already plotting Act two.
Celeste paused on the threshold of her new chamber. It was vast and splendid in its own forbidding way—high ceilings ribbed with oak beams, heavy curtains the color of dried blood, and an enormous bed carved with grim, martial lions. Not a single ribbon, cushion, or vase of flowers softened the space. It was less a lady’s retreat than a garrison in velvet. So this was to be her sanctuary.
Well, she’d made do. Nothing that a bit of tulle and ribbons could not remedy.
A maid stood stiffly by the hearth, looking like an accessory to the grim decoration. “I’m Prudence Templeton, and I’m to await you, as your lady’s maid.”
Celeste brightened at once. At last, a maid of her own! A friend. Perhaps even an ally in her quest.
“My name is Celeste—I mean, Lady Cecilia,” she said with an eager smile. “I’m very pleased to meet you. Do you have experience—”
The maid gasped. “Oh, my lady! I assure you I have no experience. Not a touch, not a whisper, not a sinful thought hasever tainted me!”
Celeste’s entire body went hot in mortification. “I… I beg your pardon?”
The maid clasped her hands tightly. “The flesh is weak, but I have resisted!”
“I… I see,” Celeste managed, trying desperately to steer the conversation back toward something sensible.
A knock at the door mercifully interrupted. A footman entered, balancing her luggage.
“Your trunk, my lady,” he said politely.
The maid’s gaze snapped to him, lit with a feverish urgency.
“Thomas, vouch for me!” she cried, flinging out an arm. “Tell the lady that never have your calloused hands touched my flesh!”
Celeste let out a choking sound.
Thomas turned scarlet. “I—” He cleared his throat roughly. “Where would the lady like the trunk?”
“Say it, Thomas!” the maid pleaded, voice rising. “Say that I have been unblemished by man’s wicked urges!”
Thomas looked like a cornered rabbit. “The trunk, my lady?” he repeated, more strangled than before.
“Oh, wretched soul!” she clutched at her heart as if pierced by some invisible dart. “Can you not even say it? Are you so tormented by your own yearning?”
The poor footman dropped her luggage with a thud and fled.
The maid exhaled heavily. “Oh dear. I have spoken too much again, haven’t I?”
Celeste could only nod, her hand creeping to her brow.
“It is my curse,” the maid murmured wistfully, staring at the door Thomas had escaped through. “To feel so deeply, and yet be doomed to silence.”
“I don’t think it is my right to pry into your personal business, Prudence. All I wished to know was whether you have experience with coiffure.”
“Oh, miss!” she exclaimed. “I can make even the ugliest of crones as beautiful as Venus herself.”
Celeste’s heart lifted at once. “Truly? Do you know the latest fashions from London?”
“Indeed!” Prue declared. “Every last one of them.”
Celeste clapped her hands together.
