Chapter One

March 1786

Falstone Castle had been extremely quiet for the past few months. The late Duke of Kielder had died four months earlier. His son, Adam, a mere seven years old at the time, had been sent to live near Harrow School. The widowed duchess, as always, was away, traveling and spending time elsewhere. Robbie MacGregor had found the silence intolerable. She was not one who preferred chaos and noise, but the quiet was disconcerting because it served as a reminder that her time as nursemaid to the young duke was coming to a close.

Adam, now only just turned eight, was too young to be at Harrow and was living in a nearby boardinghouse specifically for wee boys whose families had sent them away before their schooltime was meant to begin. They lived there on the same schedule as the older boys who were attending Harrow, and their days were filled with lessons and schooling, like those of their older counterparts. It was both a school and a substitute home for boys who were far too young for either one. Adam would not be at Falstone Castle often anymore. And when he was, he was at the age when a governess was a far more fitting choice than a nursemaid.

Robbie was accustomed to the need to find new employment when the wee bairns she looked after outgrew their need for her. Indeed, before his passing, the late duke had indicated she ought to begin that search again. He and his wife had been estranged nearly all of Adam’s life, and it had been unlikely that there’d be more children in the castle to look after. Now that Adam was fatherless, it was a guarantee.

She cared about all the little ones she’d looked after over the years, but Adam held a special place in her heart. His life had been difficult, torn between two parents who were forever at odds with each other, desperate to please them both but not having the first idea how. He was quiet and shy but also deeply curious and had a heart that, while guarded, was tender and compassionate. She’d been concerned about him before his father’s passing; she was full worried for him now.

But a ray of hope had arrived a week before Adam’s return from his first school term break: a letter from Brier Hill, a small estate about a day’s drive from Falstone Castle. Lord and Lady Jonquil were inviting Adam to spend his school holiday with them. The young couple had met him during the last ball held at Falstone Castle before the old duke’s passing. They were kind and had taken a particular interest in him. They’d sent him letters, asking how he was, expressing their sorrow at his grief. Adam was wary of strangers, but Robbie suspected this visit would do him a heap of good.

She stepped inside the master’s bedchamber. The duchess had insisted Adam take up residence there after his father’s death, pulling him from the nursery that had once been his domain. Robbie’d been in no position to deny the order, but how she wished Adam’s mother could see how unhappy he was in this space. It, no doubt, reminded him painfully of his father. And the room was far too large for an eight-year-old boy. The servants had had to find a box for him to stand on simply to get into the bed. The dressing table, the washbasin, even the windows, were set too high for him. The room stood as a stark reminder of what Adam had lost and the burden his tiny shoulders now carried.

He sat in an armchair near the fireplace, dressed in the black of mourning, bent over a book. She wished it were a lighthearted book, the sort most wee’uns read at his age. He’d taken far too much to heart his role as the Duke of Kielder and the master of this castle. He’d become ever more quiet and withdrawn, and he never seemed happy. That change, in particular, fair broke her heart.

She had, under strict orders from the duchess, sent a scared, innocent little boy off to a cold and uncaring boardinghouse to undertake schooling instead of remaining at the castle, surrounded by people who cared about him. He had returned harder and more unhappy and, in many ways, unreachable.

“Well then, my wee Adam, it’s time we were off.”

He closed his book on his lap. His posture remained quite rigid, quite formal. That had become his way while he was gone. He’d never been the easy, relaxed child others were, but this degree of feigned maturity was new for him.

“I’m not certain I want to go.” His imperious tone would likely fool many people into thinking he was stubborn and autocratic. Robbie knew him too well to believe such a thing. Her wee Adam was scared.

“Lady Jonquil said in her invitation that she very much wishes to see you. Disappointing a lady is nae a gentlemanly thing to do.” Robbie had discovered in the single day Adam had been home that he responded more to appeals to his ideas about the correct way for a duke to act than he did to anything else.

His little mouth twisted, pulling at the spiderweb of scars that marred the right side of his face. The sweet boy had been born with a stump of an ear and had endured far too many procedures undertaken by different surgeons. That they had butchered him would be obvious for the rest of his life.

“Would my father have gone to Brier Hill if Lord and Lady Jonquil had invited him?” Adam asked.

Robbie nodded. “He would have, aye, especially if they’d written to him as often as Lord and Lady Jonquil have written to you.”

“But what if they don’t really want me to visit? What if they are only asking because they think they’re supposed to?” There was a wee inkling of the uncertain and tenderhearted little Adam she had loved so much these past eight years.

“I do nae think they’d have invited you if they weren’t anxious to see you.”

“But that would be ridiculous.”

Robbie had to bite back a smile at the all-too-familiar word. Adam had adopted “ ridiculous ” as his favorite descriptor several months earlier. “Why, wee boy, would that be ridiculous?”

“I only met them once. I’m not their friend. I’m not their son. Mothers and fathers want their children to visit at term break.” His countenance fell a little. “Most do, leastwise.”

The poor bairn. He was well aware his mother hadn’t sent for him to spend his term break with her.

Robbie sat on the ottoman placed in front of the chair that engulfed this tiny boy and his enormous burdens. “I think they should very much like to have you visit. They would not have written to you if they did not like you and want to have you come to Brier Hill.”

He sat for a moment, thinking. “People do like to have dukes visit.”

“Dukes are sought-after guests, aye.” Oh, how she wished he understood he was more than a duke. But if leaning on that meant he would undertake this visit, she was willing to go along. He needed to be away from this castle, away from the reminder of his father’s death and his mother’s defection. He needed a term break filled with something happy and uplifting before returning to the boardinghouse, where she suspected he’d been terribly unhappy.

Adam gave a firm, regal nod of his head. He slid off the chair. How tiny he looked in this enormous room.

“We had best go,” he said, his little eight-year-old voice sounding far too old.

Robbie held out her hand to him. He didn’t take it but walked with a ramrod posture from the room. He had once clung to her hand like any little one would. That too had changed while he was away.

She ought to be encouraging the separation, knowing it was only a matter of time before the duchess chose to let Robbie go and hire a governess. But this wee lad, with his high rank and his low spirits, needed her. He was hurting and alone. If she were gone, he would slip further and further away.

***

Dukes weren’t supposed to be scared. Adamknew a great deal about what dukes were and weren’t supposed to be, what they were and weren’t supposed to do. His father had taught him. And Adam was a good learner.

But as the traveling carriage approached Brier Hill, he was scared. He’d never visited anyone before. He had experience welcoming people to Falstone Castle. Father used to hold balls there so Mother would come home. Adam would stand with them as they greeted their guests. He knew how to do that.

But this was the first time he had been a guest somewhere else. Before this, the only time he had ever left home was when he was sent to the boardinghouse next to Harrow. And that had been a miserable thing. Would this be as well? Adam was so tired of being miserable.

Were dukes supposed to be miserable? Father had never told him that, but Father hadn’t always been happy. Maybe that was one of the rules: a duke worked hard, looked after people, was very responsible, and didn’t get to be happy.

There were so many reasons Adam didn’t want to be a duke. The biggest one, of course, was that he wouldn’t be one if his father were still alive. He missed his father. He refused to miss his mother.

The coachman opened the door of the carriage, and Adam held his breath.

“We’d best step down, wee Adam.” Nurse Robbie had made the journey with him. Dukes probably weren’t supposed to need nursemaids, but having her with him helped him be brave. And dukes were meant to be brave.

He accepted the coachman’s hand as he climbed onto the step, but only because he was too short to do it on his own. Someday he’d be bigger.

Nurse Robbie followed close behind as he walked toward the front door of Brier Hill. He wished she could walk beside him, hold his hand like she used to. But he needed to act like a duke and not like a baby.

He’d not quite reached the front door when a tall gentleman with wavy golden hair bounded from the house. Though Adam had met him only once, he recognized Lord Jonquil. He’d bounced about the entryway of Falstone Castle all those months ago, looking like someone who wanted very much to run down a corridor but had been told that corridors were not the place for playing. Adam didn’t know any grown people quite like him.

Adam set one arm at his stomach and pointed his foot out, but he couldn’t remember where his other arm was meant to go when he bowed. At his side? Behind his back? He was making a poor showing for himself. He guessed at the position of his arm and hoped he was at least close to correct. “Lord Jonquil, thank you for your invitation.” He had heard some of his father’s exalted guests say that when they’d arrived at the castle. It seemed the right thing to say now.

Lord Jonquil returned the bow with a perfectly executed one. Adam studied it, wanting to know how to do better. The arm he’d not known what to do with was supposed to stick out at the side. He told himself to remember that. He also watched how low Lord Jonquil bowed since that was supposed to be important. Dukes didn’t bow as low to other people as those people bowed to dukes.

“We are very pleased you chose to accept,” Lord Jonquil said. “But I feel I must issue a warning.”

Worry immediately seized Adam’s heart. Was he going to be sent away? Were there other guests here? Was he not actually wanted?

In a voice that sounded like he had a great secret to share, Lord Jonquil said, “My wife is giddy at the idea of having you here. She will be here to greet you any moment and may not be able to prevent herself from squealing with delight, perhaps even hugging you.”

Adam swallowed against the lump of uncertainty forming in his throat. “She will hug me?”

Lord Jonquil shrugged and grinned. “She might. Your visit is all she has talked about for weeks.”

Adam could feel his face scrunch between his eyes. Why would she be so happy to have him visit? Adam’s father had liked to spend time with him, but his mother certainly didn’t. Nurse Robbie never forgot about him, which meant she probably liked being with him. Jeb, who worked in the stables at Falstone Castle, never seemed grumpy because Adam was there. But only those three people. Lady Jonquil was probably happy about having a duke at her house. Mother often talked about the important people she spent time with. Being a duke made a person important.

He straightened his posture and made his face as fierce as his father’s was when greeting people at the castle. Dukes were not meant to be frivolous, Father had often told him. Being serious was necessary.

“Lord Jonquil,” Adam said, motioning to Nurse Robbie, “this is Nurse Robbie. She came here with me.”

Lord Jonquil offered her a bow as well. Adam wasn’t certain servants were usually bowed to. There was so much he didn’t understand. With Father gone and Mother always away, there was no one to explain any of it to him.

A moment later, a lady stepped out the door. He knew her. He had never before met someone with hair the color of hers. It was brown and red at the same time. He found it very fascinating. He’d asked Lady Jonquil about it when he’d met her at Falstone Castle. She hadn’t laughed at him for not knowing about red hair. And she didn’t put the white powder in her hair like many ladies did. He didn’t know why.

The very first letter he’d received after Father died had come from her. And she had written to him many times since. He was glad Lady Jonquil was happy to have him visit, even if it was just because he was a duke. He knew she would be kind to him; not many people were anymore.

“Oh! You’ve arrived at last!”

He watched her, uncertain. “Are you going to hug me?”

She smiled. “Not if you would rather I didn’t.”

He shook his head. Nurse Robbie sometimes hugged him. His father had now and then. He wasn’t certain he wanted anyone else to.

Lady Jonquil didn’t look angry. “And what would you like us to call you while you’re here?”

“At school, they call me Your Grace or the duke.”

She bent so they were looking right at each other instead of her looking down at him. “But is that what you want us to call you?”

He was confused. “I can choose?”

She nodded. “While you are here, we will do everything we can to make this a happy place for you. If that means not hugging you, we won’t. If that means calling you Your Grace or Adam or whatever you wish, we will do so.”

Dukes were supposed to be called Your Grace. That was one of the rules. And yet the idea of choosing something else caused a little bubble of something to push on his heart. Adam looked down at his feet for just a moment. “My father used to call me Adam.”

Lord Jonquil said, “My father calls me Lucas, even though I have a title. Sometimes it’s nice to have someone remember who you are and not merely what you are.”

Adam looked up and directly into the eyes of Lady Jonquil. He didn’t know why, but something about the way she looked at him made him want to cry. But dukes didn’t cry.

“You can call me Adam,” he said but made sure to sound very duke-like when he said it.

Lady Jonquil smiled, and it made his heart bounce around. “Welcome to Brier Hill, Adam.”