3

Oh, how he must have cackled as he'd watched her uncle drag her out of the library and into the family carriage at the culmination of his self-serving scheme!

Margaret's vision turned a dark and bloody red. "I'm going to use the damned Rose to turn him into a worm ! And then I'll tear up all of his years' worth of notes and burn his diploma and?—"

"If I may?" Her husband rose to meet her, his broad chest filling her view and the cinnamon-and-cloves scent of his shaving cream filling her senses. "Naturally, I am pleased to hear you plotting another man's doom, for once. In fact, I find it startlingly enjoyable. However, do you think you might allow me the satisfaction of knowing whom, exactly, you are planning on murdering on behalf of both of us?"

"His name is Gerald Morningford ," Margaret spat, "and I know exactly where to find him."

Left to her own devices, she would have leapt into a carriage immediately and set off with no accoutrements except a thick commonplace book and a non-leaking fountain pen with which to scribble and revise drafts of the most scathing possible remarks to properly wither her enemy upon arrival.

However, as a married woman, travel had apparently become absurdly overcomplicated.

"Many people," her husband insisted, his tone infuriatingly patient as he blocked the doorway, "would indeed consider the packing of fresh clothes necessary before a journey likely to last for days."

"Who gives a damn what I wear when I confront him?" Margaret rose onto her tiptoes to peer longingly over Lord Riven's shoulder. "Aren't you the one who told me not to waste time chasing after temporary fashions? That worm has the Rose in his actual grip. "

"And you'll have a far easier time intimidating him out of it if you aren't grimy and travelworn when we arrive. Moreover, you may recall how confused exhaustion made you by the end of your last journey, when you weren't allowed to stop and rest along the way. Don't you think you ought to take the time to sleep at a few inns, dress in clean attire, and have your wits about you?"

His eyebrows rose into a maddeningly supercilious expression. "Or do you wish to arrive looking desperate and bedraggled and struggling to think when you finally confront your nemesis?"

" Ugh ." Growling, Margaret gnawed at her lower lip and fell back a step. "I can't bear it. He'll be pawing at the Rose right now and feeling so smug and superior. Morningford always told me it was his area of study by right, as the direct descendant of our college founder."

"Ha." Red sheened across Lord Riven's pale gaze. "As it happens, guarding the Rose was my responsibility as the descendant of the man who swore to keep it safely hidden...and I can tell you now, madam, that if you wish me to keep my own control and not shed blood on your precious college grounds, you will allow me the time to pack and rest along the way. Otherwise, I may not be able to recall, when we arrive, that I am still a gentleman."

"Oh, very well." There would be an enormous amount of fuss, Margaret supposed, if her—albeit temporary—husband bit out Gerald Morningford's treacherous throat on college grounds. In a worst-case scenario, it might even lead to her being barred from the college library for months. And yet...

"You do know you needn't come along with me," she told him. "I've made a commitment, and I shall honor it. I won't forget our partnership and leave you to lose your estate the moment the Rose is in my hands."

"I do trust that you won't mean to," said her husband dryly, "but I am beginning to have some small understanding of the power of an academic fixation over and above all other concerns. Moreover, as much as I admire your keen mind, I fear that any brute who would go to such dishonorable lengths to gain the Rose in the first place might not be easily talked into giving it up afterwards, no matter how persuasive your arguments. You might find it surprisingly helpful to have a partner by your side for this particular battle."

"Hmmph." She'd made it through every challenge in her academic career without receiving or requiring any support from any of her fellows...but Margaret did have to admit that it might be helpful to have her husband at hand to arrange all the particulars of the journey home afterwards, leaving her free to study the Rose unhindered by any practical distractions.

So, in the end, she endured the tooth-grinding delay of all the preparations. Their carriage, laden with frivolous baggage of all descriptions, did not set off until nearly one in the morning. Ordinarily, she would have been asleep by that point; tonight, fueled by furious energy, she was kept busy with her scribbled imprecations, questions, and furious notes to herself until the conveyance finally drew to a halt some hours later.

When she looked up, blinking, Lord Riven gave her a wry shrug. "Dawn approaches, I'm afraid. Even with the best possible wooden shutters, it's better not to take any chances."

She might have argued—but a sudden, jaw-splitting yawn took her off guard, and she fumbled her pencil as she lifted her hand to her mouth in reaction.

Lord Riven caught the pencil with his usual grace and held out one strong arm to her as the carriage door was opened. "May I help you to the ground?"

Margaret looked into his expectant gaze...and sighed, swallowing down a second yawn. "Oh, very well," she grumbled. "I suppose rest would make sense for both of us."

Her head whirling with exhaustion, she gave in to necessity and placed one hand on his proffered arm as she walked down the carriage steps. It was an astonishingly steady support; she felt strong muscles flexing underneath the fabric of his coat to hold her weight and keep her safe from any falls.

Needless to say, she snatched her hand back the moment her first foot landed on firm ground. She couldn't allow herself to grow accustomed to that sort of thing.

However, as the long days of travel passed, Margaret found it impossible not to relax her guard, at least by fractional degrees, and equally impossible not to notice when her husband required support from her as well.

Lord Riven never shrank from conversations at the inns where they stopped each morning, but she could read the tension in his large frame as he first took in each new sight and unfamiliar person. After who-knew-how-many decades spent moldering by himself among bitter old memories in his family home, she could almost feel the sensory impact of the outside world slamming into him, each new technological development and turn of phrase striking him like a metaphorical explosion.

She might even have felt pity if she hadn't seen each startling new discovery punch more holes into the fog of despair that had shrouded him when they'd first met. Watching him wake up to the world again felt dangerously revelatory. He'd had a startlingly modern haircut at the first inn where they stopped, but while his mane might have finally been tamed, his mind was once more ravenously hungry and on the prowl for information and sustenance.

For practicality's sake, Margaret adopted his nocturnal schedule for the duration of their journey. However, she wasn't prepared for how much she would enjoy the conversations they fell into in the long hours of the nights. He'd never again asked, even in jest, to take her blood—but everything else seemed to hold endless fascination.

"What drew you to a study of the Rose in the first place?" he inquired, midway through their second night of travel. His boots were propped against the footboard just beside her, his arms crossed loosely across his chest. As he leaned back against his cushioned leather seat, his keen gaze was illuminated by the warm glow of the carriage lamp. "I wouldn't have taken you for a woman prone to chasing fairytales or legends."

"Not even the most stubborn industrial modernists can pretend that items like the Rose are mere legends," Margaret said. "We still see their effects every day—and over half our nobility was created by them. My parents' explorations took us all around the world in search of even more rare and legendary wonders, but they always told me the Rose was one item sure to be found within England's own borders."

She gave a casual shrug, trying not to notice the light brush of her husband's boots against her skirts as the carriage turned a corner. "Of course, once I lost my parents as a child, my own travels had to end...and even now, respectable ladies aren't meant to travel abroad on their own." She grimaced. "Fortunately, thanks to our late queen, we can at least attend university and make names for ourselves in that way, even if it does enrage men like Morningford."

"Ah." Her husband's upper lip curled. "I've known fools like that in other centuries too, who only find their own strength in pushing others down." There was a drifting silence for a few moments before he continued in an oddly wistful tone. "How far did you travel with your parents?"

"Oh, mostly across the continent—they were particularly interested in the myths and history of some of the smaller kingdoms in the Eastern European mountains. But beyond all of those...wait." She tilted her head. "You were planning a tour of the continent as well, all those centuries ago, weren't you?"

"As it happened, I got no further than the very top of northern Italy, and even that was further than I should have allowed myself to go." His lips gave a wry twist. "Not quite the epic adventure I had planned."

Her gaze lingered, against her will, on those well-shaped lips, but her spoken response was pragmatic. "If you did wish to travel more, you ought to do it soon. There's too much political tension simmering on the continent to put off adventure for much longer."

"Ha! No, I gave up on that particular dream long ago." He shook his head, as if for added reinforcement. "Keeping the Rose safe from any more thefts from now on will be adventure enough."

"Hmm," said Margaret, studying his expression.

She wasn't truly his wife, regardless of temporary legalities, so she kept her own thoughts on the matter to herself.

Still, she found herself sharing a surprising number of her thoughts on other, more vulnerable matters as the hours and nights passed in the quiet rocking of the carriage and the darkness outside drew them closer and closer into a startlingly pleasurable sense of intimacy. Ever since she had first been trapped in the cage of her uncle's house as a child, Margaret had learned through necessity to divide everyone she met into either a challenge to surmount along her way or a rival to defeat. The notion of a companion who could be a partner to be trusted —even if only for the limited time of this shared quest—was so outlandish, so viscerally terrifying, and so dangerously exhilarating that she could scarcely bear to allow her thoughts to brush against it...much less admit to any of the even more dangerous and previously unheard-of yearnings that had begun to simmer far below at a safely unexamined level.

So, it was both a relief and, irrationally, a disappointment to finally arrive at the quiet, willow-lined campus of Morningford College on their fourth night of travel. As their carriage rolled past the first of the familiar, ivy-draped stone buildings, Margaret instinctively relaxed in her seat, comforted by familiarity, but Lord Riven tensed with anticipation.

He sat forward in his seat, frowning out the window at the darkened buildings. "Will the library be open at this hour?"

"Oh, Morningford won't use the library for his gloating." Margaret grimaced at the mere thought of her rival. "Before he lets anyone else catch a glimpse the Rose, he'll have to prove himself the master of it. He'd never admit any uncertainty in such a public place. He'll be studying it for days in the privacy of his own quarters before he astonishes the world with the announcement of his miraculous ‘discovery.'"

"You mean, his theft?"

Her nostrils flared with distaste. "Trust me, he couldn't care less for the morality involved. The man is obsessed with winning."

"Correct me if I'm wrong, my dear, but..." Her husband cocked one tawny eyebrow. "I'm fairly certain you enjoy winning too. You're certainly one of the most determined people I've met in centuries."

"It is not at all the same!" Margaret gaped at him. "Yes, of course I love winning, but I work for it . I have never once resorted to dirty tricks to get ahead!" From the first day of her long-postponed arrival at university, she'd had to fight every single hour to prove herself the best, so that no one else could ever again have an excuse to deny her entrance. "And unlike him , I haven't had any family support or connections along the way. He started ten steps ahead of everyone else and still thinks himself hard-done-by!"

"Naturally. That kind of villain always loves playing the victim." Lord Riven shrugged, his easy acceptance slightly dampening her outrage. "So, where shall we find this worm, then? In one of the halls of residence? Or?—"

"Where else?" Margaret sighed. "The original Morningford Cottage, his by right, as decreed by his founding ancestors. Their descendants are the only students not required to stay in the halls of residence."

She herself had never so much as stepped inside Morningford Cottage for any of the raucous parties that had become famous—or infamous—as regular campus bacchanalias full of both rowdy drunkenness and invaluable professional connections. No doubt, if she ever had attended any of those events, she would have met her husband's own former man-of-business there, Shaw's proud college education leading to his acquaintanceship with Morningford in the first place. However, even if Margaret had had any time to spare from her all-important studies, its current occupant had pointedly excluded her from the invitations he issued to every one of their male colleagues and older college alumni.

Even so, she knew the elegant, round-roofed stone building all too well. She'd had to walk past it every day for years, and she'd seethed over the perfection of it every time. The elegant, twice-pillared, and round-roofed stone house sat conveniently located between the college library and the tall classroom building where most professors kept their offices...and, unlike either of those two edifices now, its windows glowed brightly through the darkness as she and Lord Riven alighted from his traveling carriage. As directed by Margaret, they'd drawn up behind a tall hedge, safely out of sight.

It was impossible for her not to feel the contrast.

After all the years she'd spent gritting her teeth, enduring his taunts, and refusing to give in to his loud-mouthed bullying, Gerald Morningford now sat, smug in victory, with the Rose of Normandy in his hands at the very heart of the ancient college and traditions that he'd always taken as his due. As ever, all the money he'd inherited was freely at his disposal for all sorts of criminal bribery and mischief. Meanwhile, where was Margaret? Robbed of even the limited access she'd once had to her own funds and pathetically lurking —there was no other phrase for it—behind a shadowy hedge like a thief in the night, with no right to be here at all .

A branch of the hedge snapped off in her clenched hand and made her startle. She dropped it swiftly to the grass as mud squished even higher up the tall and solid heels of her traveling boots.

"Careful." Lord Riven set one big hand lightly against her back.

A week ago, that movement would have made her startle once again; now, she drew strength from its steadying reminder and the pleasantly prickling sensation of his closeness, which shortened her breath in a terribly addictive way.

She was not alone or lost here, after all. For the first time in her life, she had a true partner by her side, and once they reclaimed what had been stolen from them, she would be able to resume her rightful place here with her head held high.

Some odd discomfort niggled at the back of her mind at that reassurance, but this was no time to give in to doubts. Chin up, she strode across the damp grass to Morningford Cottage, ignoring the longer official pathway, and took confident hold of the front doorhandle.

Naturally, it refused to turn. Growling, Margaret turned to her much larger husband. "Are you strong enough to break this door down?"

He shrugged. "Perhaps, but I wouldn't be able to enter the house afterwards. If you recall, I am held under a code."

"Ugh." Of course . As per the Bosworth Accords, vampires were not allowed to enter any mortal residence without an invitation. " I could invite you once I was inside," Margaret pointed out.

Lord Riven looked pained. "That might suffice—with an extraordinarily lenient judge—but have you considered trying a tediously obvious strategy first?" As she gazed back at him in confusion, his lips quirked. "Here." Stepping up to her side, he rapped on the door, producing two loud, authoritative knocks.

Footsteps sounded from within a moment later, and Lord Riven smiled down at her with disconcerting tenderness. "You see? I do have some uses after all."

Before she had the chance to recover from that smile—much less summon the retort that he deserved—the door of the cottage was yanked wide open.

Gerald Morningford stood revealed in the doorway, glaring out at her with bloodshot eyes. His brown hair looked shockingly greasy and disheveled in the low light of the entryway, his face was covered by unexpected stubble, and the combined stinks of alcohol and sweat rose from his rumpled clothing to make her nose wrinkle. " You !" he spat. "I should have known. Have you come to lord it over me?"

"I...beg your pardon?" Margaret glanced back at her husband for assistance—was she missing something obvious again?—but received in return a look of equal confusion.

"Oh, just come in. You may as well, at this point!" Turning his back on them both and leaving the front door open, Morningford stomped sulkily down the short and narrow entryway, then took a lurching turn to the right.

Margaret hurried after him, and Lord Riven—having been formally invited—followed after, closing the door firmly behind them.

Much to her own chagrin, Margaret had found herself wondering, more than once in the past, exactly what the inside of Morningford Cottage might look like. Would it be full of priceless antiques gathered by the college founder? Private notebooks full of fascinating research never shared with the official college library? Or would the loutish current resident have filled it to the brim with lewd paintings and sculptures?

As it transpired, the gaslamp-lit parlor he led them to was filled largely with trays of half-eaten, abandoned food and scattered paperwork, ranging from pages of freshly-scribbled notes to what looked appallingly like recently-wine-stained ancient documents. Margaret was so horrified by Morningford's inappropriate treatment of research materials that it took her a long moment before she finally noticed, hidden in the midst of all that chaos, the fist-sized, dark red garnet that sat nearly camouflaged atop the patterns of the carpet.

Her breath stopped as everything else fell away from her field of vision.

The Rose of Normandy .

It was, of course, no polished and glittering piece of modern jewelry but a roughly-cut, ancient gemstone. Some of its facets looked deceptively plain in a dull, near-brownish red, while others, smoother and brighter in their color, gave off an eerie but unmistakable glow. More than one of the facets, in their various fractures and gradations, gave the illusory impression of hidden depths, as if other worlds lurked deep within it.

Of course, in their own fashion, they did—and the power of all those waiting possibilities drew Margaret in a lunging step forward across the littered floor, heedless of the detritus that crunched beneath her sturdy boot heels. A buzzing sensation reverberated through the air and vibrated against her skin like a warning of imminent lightning or thunder, rumbling too deep for any mere human to hear.

"Take care, my dear," her husband said softly behind her...

Just as Morningford let out a contemptuous snort. "You see? It's utterly useless."

At that, even in the grip of breathless passion, Margaret stopped and turned to gape in disbelief. "I beg your pardon?" she demanded.

Morningford scooped up an open bottle from a side table and took a long, sloppy swig, while Lord Riven looked on with open distaste. "Oh, yes. All those centuries of wild stories... All my ancestors' promises of what could happen when we finally tracked it back down for our own use... All those wasted bloody years I spent watching you take everything that should have been mine... And what for?"

He gave a bitter laugh as he gestured with the hand that held the bottle, heedless of the drops that flew across the room to spatter across priceless documents and make Margaret cringe. "They were all wrong! And so were you, for all your smugness. This rock may have worked miracles in the past, but it's long since lost all of its powers. It won't do a thing for anyone anymore!"

"It has not lost any of its danger," Lord Riven said through his teeth.

As Margaret said, "That is patently absurd. I can feel its power from here!" She pointed impatiently at the Rose and felt its vibrations ripple through the air, drawing her an involuntary half-step closer. "Why in the world would you come to the conclusion that it had lost anything?"

"Because I've spent the last three days throwing everything I have at it without a single effect!" Morningford snarled. "I've thrown every invocation at it that I can think of. I've even rubbed its damned sides like a lamp from a story! In the end, I even got so desperate, I broke down and used that stupid poem you suggested in your thesis."

He grunted with bitter humor as he took another swig. "That's some satisfaction, anyway. At least you were wrong too. I always knew you must be faking all that certainty, no matter how many people you fooled. Your work was shoddy all along."

" What ?" Everything fell away but his sneering face as his words rocked through her. "My work is not shoddy !"

"My dear..." her husband began, nearby.

She ignored him, her glare fixed on her nemesis. "Exactly how did you attempt the Norman ritual that I suggested in my thesis?"

Morningford blew out his wine-smeared lips in a whuffling sound of contempt. "How do you think? You're always so damned fussy , getting lost in all the details. I was man enough to scoop the damn rock up, read the stupid little one-line poem exactly as you wrote it in your thesis, and..."

"The translated version?" Margaret's eyebrows shot up in disbelief. "The original poem is in the appendix. Did you not even bother to read that part?"

"My dear... !" her husband repeated, more urgently.

"One moment!" She flapped one hand in impatient reassurance. "I just need to sort out this point and show him how very wrong he is, again ."

"But—"

Morningford spoke over Lord Riven, looking both affronted and uneasy as he scooped up a familiar thesis from a pile on the floor and began to flip through its pages. "Why would you bury the original in the appendix if it actually mattered?"

"Because it wasn't meant as an instruction manual!" she snapped. "I was following best academic practice, as you'd know if you ever paid attention to the rules."

"Individual words shouldn't matter anyway," Morningford muttered, his shoulders hunching as he read.

"It's a ritual ," Margaret said sternly, "a holy one. Did you even bother to start it with a prayer?"

"A prayer ?" Morningford snorted. "Like what? The Lord's Prayer? Or?—"

" Margaret ," said her husband, moving forward with intent.

But with her academic reputation on the line, Margaret had no time for even the most appealing of distractions. "Anything!" she told Morningford. "Any prayer from the heart would have sufficed. It was not my work at fault in your failure!"

"Oh, holy God, let this work for me!" Morningford groaned—and then, as Margaret blinked in surprise, he launched into the very words she had worked for so many years to uncover. " Ouvre-moi ton c?ur, pierre précieuse, et accorde-moi une merveille !"

"No!" Lord Riven bellowed.

An explosion of pressure burst through the air, knocking Margaret back as it billowed out from the stone that still lay on the floor, shooting out glorious red rays of light across the room. Its powers had unlocked exactly as Margaret had always known they would with that ritual.

It was so utterly glorious, she could hardly breathe with wonder.

It was so academically satisfying, she could have floated up into the air with glee...

And then she heard Morningford's next words, hoarse with triumph: "Make me new monsters!"

"What?" Margaret spun around, horror like a splash of icy water to douse her victory. "No. Stop ! What are you thinking?"

"I've finally won!" Morningford's bloodshot eyes were alight as he grinned manically past her at the radiant Rose of Normandy. " I'll be the one in the history books now! After all those years watching you take everything that should have been mine, I'll be the one remembered."

"But...that was what you took from all of your own years of study?" Margaret stared at him in disbelief. "Don't you recall what happened the last time someone tried this? The horrors that resulted? All the deaths ?"

"People are still talking about it hundreds of years later." His grin peeled his stained lips so wide, he looked feral with hunger. " I'll be the most famous Morningford from now on. People will think this college was named after me!"

"There are principles more important than fame," Margaret gritted. "There are even..." Oh, God! She grimaced, her chest compressing with agony as realization slotted into place. "Issues so much more important than winning or being right. Damnation !" As the air thickened around them with the condensing power of the Rose, she looked past her victorious rival and saw the bleak expression on her husband's face...her husband, who had tried so hard to stop her from committing her own fatal mistake.

"I swear, I'll step down from academia if you want," she promised Morningford in a desperate rush as her husband doubled over, no doubt in despair at her folly. "I'll never challenge any of your theories again, no matter how misguided or foolish they might be. I'll even tell everyone you were right about everything. Just stop this madness, now!"

Morningford snorted down at her. "Who's going to make me? You? You couldn't knock over a fly."

"Luckily, Lady Riven has a husband now, to deal with the heavy work." Apparently, Lord Riven had actually been leaning over, not to despair but to scoop up a heavy book. He slammed it into the back of Morningford's head with a painful-sounding thump that sent Margaret's rival crashing safely to the ground.

She spun immediately back to the Rose of Normandy...whose deep red glow did not diminish. Instead, it began to pulse with unmistakably gathering momentum.

"Do you know how to stop it?" her husband asked urgently.

"Only its caster can stop it," she whispered numbly. "But as he utterly refused...oh, God, I'm sorry. I'm so sorry. I did this!"

" No ." Lord Riven's warm, steadying hand landed on her back as eerie white light began to mingle with the pulsing red glow before them. "This was not your fault. The fact that that pathetic weakling chose fame over honor was his failure, not yours. Whatever comes next, you were not to blame ."

"How can you say that?" Margaret turned in his embrace, taking in his dear, familiar features as if for the first time. "You tried to stop me just now. If I'd only listened, if I hadn't been so determined to prove myself..."

"You have nothing to prove to me," he said quietly. "Not ever . You're by far the most brilliant person I've ever known—and more. You saved me from my self-imposed prison after centuries of pain. Without you, I would never have worked out the trick played upon me to steal the Rose, much less been given any chance to regain my honor. You woke me up from my stupor and brought me back to life after I had given up all hope. I will never be anything but grateful to have become your husband, no matter what horrors may befall us."

As white and red translucent, heat-less flames lit the air around them, Margaret gazed up into her husband's red-rimmed gaze, alight with sincere respect, trust, and affection...

And she realized that he wasn't the only one who had been changed by their time together. There was one person in the world, now, more important to her than anything else, even the most fascinating of scholarly pursuits...and one piece of information that she still knew about all garnets, even those with ancient, magical powers.

They were among the most fragile of gemstones.

Margaret lunged forward to yank the burning Rose from the floor. As unbearable pain scalded her hands, she lifted the near-mythic object of all her years of study as high above her head as she could—and then she smashed the priceless gem to the ground, grabbed a poker from the fireplace to hammer at its first, telltale lines of fracture, and finally stomped on top of it herself, digging in hard with the tall, thick heel of her right boot to grind it into dust.

The final shards of the gem exploded under her foot with a sonic boom that sent her flying through new flames that were no longer metaphysical but scorchingly real...

And blackness overcame her.

When she awoke, she was surrounded by a warm glow. The world rocked around her as she lay, her cheek pressed against a warm, firm surface that rose and fell with long, steady breaths. A deep ache emanated from the palms of her hands, which were wrapped in soft, thick coverings, but two strong arms cradled her body and held her wonderfully close. As the now-familiar scent of cloves and cinnamon filled her senses, she gave a sigh of deep relief and instinctively nestled even closer to that source of warmth and comfort.

Her husband's chin lifted from her head, and he tipped her chin up to meet his gaze. "You're awake! Thank all the saints."

"I am," she said wonderingly, "and we're both alive."

"We-ell..." A wry smile twisted his lips. "Close enough, in my case. Undead, at least."

"Thank God," she said fervently. "And you haven't been changed? I haven't, either?" Suddenly conscious of their shockingly intimate position, Margaret wriggled hastily backwards, disentangling her skirts and landing hard on the leather seat beside him. "I don't feel any different..."

"Nor do I. You smashed the stone before its power could take effect. Even that cad Morningford survived, although he won't enjoy waking up to discover his family's house burned down, the Rose destroyed, and his family's selfish ambitions failed forever." Lifting her bandaged left hand, he stroked the line of her thumb gently, his expression troubled. "How bad is the pain?"

"Nowhere near as bad as the pain I suffered when I realized what I'd been tricked into doing." Margaret groaned. "If I'd only kept my mouth shut..."

"He would still have worked it out on his own in the end," said Lord Riven. "Not everyone can be as clever as my wife, but even a fool like him will eventually stumble onto the clear truth in the end."

"My wife..." The words felt like a caress—but they brought new horror lancing through her.

"Oh, no !" Margaret lurched upright. "I was going to use the Rose to take away your curse. I'd promised you! I didn't even think before I destroyed it."

"Believe me, I prefer the choice you made," he said dryly. "The last thing I wanted was for both of us to be changed into slavering horrors...if, that is, we'd survived the Rose's latest effects at all. At any rate..." He slid her a sidelong glance. "It did occur to me, at some point in the last few days, that my current state might not be quite the curse I'd thought it...at least, under certain circumstances."

"Oh?" She tilted her head, leaning fractionally closer. Her hands still ached, but oh, he was so warm, and it felt so good to be so close to him after all the fear and horror of the night...

"For instance," he said carefully, "remaining immortal might actually be rather useful if one wished to remain married to a younger wife...and perhaps grant her the same length of life as well, one day, if she decided that she wished to spend even longer with me."

Margaret's eyes widened. "You...wish to remain married?" She blinked. "Oh, of course, the law. You have to be married to stay in your house. But?—"

" No ," he said, firmly, "I don't—need to stay in my house, that is. You've freed me from the leash that bound me for over two hundred years of misery. I swore, then, to keep the Rose from ever being used for harm again. Now, because of you, it never can be." He took a deep, shuddering breath as he gazed at her with open yearning in his red-rimmed eyes. "However, I promised you your freedom, and I will keep that vow. We shall visit your uncle and aunt next and reclaim your inheritance together—quickly, too, unless they wish to have the news of their criminal manipulation spread across highest society and see all their hopes for social-climbing utterly ruined.

"Even if they do choose to hold out on that front, we have more than enough information to hold over Shaw now, to ensure that he finds his own slithering way to get back your inheritance without the delay and annoyance of a court case. Regardless, you will have both it and your independence returned to you, I swear. From what you've said, that inheritance should be enough to support you at your college for the rest of your life if you so choose."

"Enough...?" Margaret's eyes narrowed. She'd never bothered to tell him, had she, just how large her inheritance actually was? If she had, he would know that, once unlocked from her uncle's control, it would be far more than enough to pay for multiple lifetimes of study and still make up for any possible loss of his own income or estate, either now or in the future.

"However, if you wished to make a second bargain between the two of us..." A fascinating muscle in her husband's hard jaw flexed as he swallowed. "I do recall you saying that you couldn't imagine a time when either of us might wish to remain wed forevermore, but it occurred to me: you've lost your official purpose too, now that you've so neatly disposed of the Rose. So..."

The breath he took sounded ragged, but he held her gaze with all the steadiness and strength that she'd come to know so well across the past week, his brown eyes steady in the dark. "When you told me how you first came to study it, you implied it had been a compromise of sorts. As a single lady, you couldn't explore the world as your parents had together. You had to find an object of wonder within our own country's bounds."

Something light and bright was unfurling within Margaret's chest, pushing back all the darkness of the night. "That is true." She gloried in the steadiness of her tone. "But of course, a married couple could shock no one by traveling together...and you never had the chance to enjoy your planned Grand Tour."

"Indeed not," he agreed. "Someone I deeply respect told me recently that if I ever hoped to travel, I should be certain to do it soon. But it has been centuries, as you know, since I last left my home. I would prefer to do it now with a companion I both admire and enjoy." His words were carefully chosen, but his deep voice scraped like sandpaper, and the red in his eyes glowed with heartfelt intensity. "Do you think you might consider joining me for my journey and making me the happiest of men?"

Margaret had sworn upon the day she'd first arrived in her uncle's cold and unloving household that she would one day win her freedom for all time. However, as she contemplated the vampire at her side, who had held firm to his first promise across centuries and had now promised to stand for her , it occurred to her that freedom could take many different forms.

Some of them could even be delectable .

"That depends." In a sudden, determined move, she shifted across the seat and back onto his lap, adjusting her long skirts around them both.

His breath shortened as she settled into place astride his legs, and the glow in his eyes increased, but he kept his arms firmly to his sides, leaving her free to escape at any moment.

"On what exactly, madam wife?"

"We-e-ell..." She flattened her hands against his broad shoulders and found them even more solid and pleasing to the touch than she had grown to suspect over the days of their first journey.

"I hope you know that I have certain expectations for any real marriage."

He gave a pant of pained laughter as she leaned even closer, and his hot breath ruffled teasingly against her lips.

"I promise, my dear, on my honor as a Riven and a gentleman. You will never have to do without good tea leaves again, no matter where in the world we may travel."

"I should hope not." Shifting on his lap, she tilted her head to one side. His shuddering breath tingled against the nape of her bare neck, and she bit back an instinctive gasp of pleasure.

"But what about you?" she asked lightly. "You might not care for the supplies of blood available everywhere we travel."

His muffled groan was music to her ears, but his strained voice said exactly what she had most hoped to hear.

"I swear, I will never again ask for anything that you're not ready and desirous to give."

"In that case..." With her last hesitation gone, Margaret gave him a triumphant smirk. Oh, how she did love to win! And with this man at her side, she foresaw a very long future of mutual victories ahead of them.

"Husband, I have a request to make. You see, in all my studies of the Rose and its effects, I came across a number of rumors. Scandalous rumors!"

"Is that so?" His voice was hoarse.

"It is," she said sternly. "As a single lady, of course I couldn't possibly pursue them with the academic rigor they deserved.

But as a married woman, I did wonder if my husband might be willing to help me explore...

for reasons of scholarly curiosity, of course...exactly what a vampiric bite might feel like, when enjoyed by mutual consent between lovers."

As Lord Riven's strong arms closed tightly around her, she felt more free and unburdened than she had in years.

"Madam," he said gravely, "I would never stand between you and any of your scholarly pursuits."

And indeed he did not...on that night or any other in their long adventure of a life together.

Those scandalous rumors, as Margaret was able to confirm to the academic world in a published article that became Lady Riven's first widely-read and multiply-republished work, were in fact quite deliciously true...and she took enormous pleasure in every new and wondrous revelation they uncovered as a couple forever after.

As it turned out, marriage could be astonishingly convenient after all.

The End