Something Old, Rebecca Connolly [ebook reader for laptop TXT] 📗

shoulder and grinning as her long, dark hair danced in the near-constant breeze Cornwall possessed. “London folk think we be taering round for ’er, but there’s no stramming ’ere. No’ when ee can see for yerself.”

It took a moment or two for Lily to take her friend’s meaning, given the local dialect had more creative words than Lily was accustomed to, but she nodded once she comprehended. “It’s breathtaking. I cannot thank you enough for showing me the area, Emblyn. You see the land in a way that I fear others I know would not, and I wish to appreciate it as your eyes see it.”

“No need to thank me, Miz Granger,” Emblyn assured her brightly. “’Tis no bother to me to go about the beauties with you. I ’ave no need o’ finery with ee, nor to pretend I’m anything other than a come-by-chance. My brother would ’ave me raised up, but I know ’tis not for me.”

“Why shouldn’t it be?” Lily asked as they walked, hurrying to her side. “If he is willing to claim you as family, take you into his household, why shouldn’t you do so?”

Emblyn gave her a look, her fierce blue eyes steady and stubborn. “I’m naw fool be’ind the door, Miz Granger. All the actin’ in the world won’t make me as fine as ‘e is. We may share blood, but I cannot be ’is family. No’ in tha’ way.”

Lily’s heart ached at the words, though she wondered at the lack of emotion behind it. “Does he know this?” she pressed, sensing there was more to the situation than simple difference in station. “That you feel this way?”

“Yes,” Emblyn sighed, shaking her head. “But ‘e’s stubborn as an arse and more impossible. ‘E refuses to ‘ear anything but that I am his sister, and he will take care of me.” She rolled her eyes, her tone having taken on the more proper way of speaking in company, as though imitating him in a way. “I have a ’oome and a ’usband.”

“What?” Lily cried. She took Emblyn’s arm and pulled her to a stop. “You’re married?”

Emblyn nodded, her eyes lowering. “My Joshua. ’E’s away at sea. My brother doesn’t know, and until Joshua is back, he won’t.”

Lily gaped openly, her mind spinning on the information. She had only known Emblyn for a matter of days, and yet she was supposed to be a young, unmarried woman in a relatively poor state and of low birth. There wouldn’t be the same arrangements made by Lord Basset in a different situation, and yet…

“How long has he been gone?” Lily inquired slowly, trying to piece together what she could. “Joshua, I mean.”

“Years now,” Emblyn murmured, raising her eyes to Lily’s. “At least three. But ’e is mine still. ’Twas a quiet wedding, and naught knew about it. But ’twas so. If I be my brother’s sister, ’e will want me married off. And I already a wife? ’Twouldn’t be fittin’, and I’ll not risk my soul.” Her jaw tightened, and she blinked hard before brightening. “‘Ave ee ever truly studied bluebells?”

Lily frowned, not enjoying the change in topic. “Did you love Joshua? I mean, do you?” She could have winced at the plaintive note in her question, as though she were some child needing a happier resolution to the story.

“Of course I do,” Emblyn said, smiling in a way that lit her entire face. “’E were the only man who ever spoke to my heart. ’E’ll come back to me when ’e’s able, and laugh at the whole world being messy-y-mazy o’er us!”

There was no mistaking the sheer joy in her face, in her entire being, as she spoke about him. She was so full of adoration, so sweet in her love for him, that Lily felt her heart long for the same. Once she might have talked about Thomas in such a way, before they’d been married. When she’d dreamed and hoped and had fancies…

She felt so much for him, so much that was not easily explained, and yet she said nothing. They danced around the subject of feelings, of their happiness, of all of it. But they never addressed it. Not really.

“Bluebells, did you say?” Lily ventured, now quite pleased to have the subject of love changed to something less discomforting.

She stooped to inspect the nearest bunch of lovely blooms, each a rich, deep violet color. They hung from stems as though they were weighed down by their size, the curve of the petals forming the telltale shape of the bell they were known for. Each was so very delicate, so perfect in form and hue.

They were exquisite, each and every one. And the cliffside was showered in them.

“’Ansum things, ain’t they?” Emblyn came to stoop beside her, smiling at the flowers fondly. “They grow on the moors, against all odds. Last only a week or two, mebbe less. An’ if ee trample ’em, they’ll not bloom again for years.”

Lily froze in the act of touching the petals, Emblyn’s words sinking like the weight of an anchor in her chest. The immediate application of them would be unclear for Emblyn, but they were bright as the sun in Lily’s mind.

These diminutive flowers, growing against all odds in rock-laden ground, were as fragile as glass. A brief window of their full bloom, and then it could be missed. Further than that, trodding them could do such irreparable damage that they would not return. Could not return. Not without patience and time and a determined root indeed.

Had she been just as trampled? Had the years of absence in her marriage with Thomas trod her down until her bloom had disappeared? Or was their marriage like the bluebells, being trampled down without thought or care, little knowing what it would take for any semblance of them to return?

Sickened at the thought, Lily resisted her initial impulse to pick a sample and instead brushed the petals nearest her with one finger in a faint caress.

It needed to remain here with