Chapter 5

CHAPTER 5

H anna staggered down the dimly lit hallway. Her head was spinning, and she could scarcely breathe. Each step felt heavier than the last, as though the weight of her father’s words anchored her to the ground. Trembling uncontrollably, she finally reached the drawing room, where she collapsed onto the nearest chaise, struggling to contain the storm of emotions that raged within her.

“Hanna!” Emma’s voice cut through the haze, and she was at her side in an instant. She grasped Hanna’s icy hands in her own, her eyes widening with concern. “What is it? What has happened?”

For a moment, Hanna could not speak, her throat constricted by the weight of the truth.

“He…” she began, her voice little more than a broken whisper. “He wants me to marry the Duke.” Her voice trembled, quivered, and shattered like fragile glass. “I cannot believe it, Emma. That man… that horrid man, Father wishes me to marry him.”

Emma drew back as though struck. “The Duke of Ashford? But that is impossible! Father spoke of him with nothing but contempt. Even at the ball, he warned us to keep our distance from him, said he was the most dangerous sort, and now—now he wishes you to wed him? I cannot make sense of it. How can this be?”

Hanna buried her face in her hands, her shoulders shaking with sobs that she struggled to stifle. “It is true, all of it. Father said… he said that the Duke’s brother ruined them both. That their business dealings have crumbled to dust and left us in ruin. He claims that marrying the Duke is the only way to save us now, the only way to secure our family’s future—oh, Emma, I am to be sacrificed like a lamb to the slaughter.”

Emma’s eyes darkened, her expression hardening as she listened. “No,” she said firmly, shaking her head. “It cannot be true. Father has always been prone to exaggeration, to wild tales that grow more fantastical with each telling. He must be mistaken. Our situation cannot be so desperate that you must be forced to marry a man you fear.”

Hanna looked up, her eyes shimmering with unshed tears. “I wish you were right, but he seemed so earnest, so unyielding. He spoke of the arrangement as though it was already set in stone.”

Emma’s face paled, her lips pressing together into a thin line. “We must write to Harry and Alexander,” she declared with renewed urgency. “Surely they will intervene. They will not allow this madness to continue.”

“There isn’t time,” Hanna whispered, shaking her head. “The Duke is going to apply for a special license—a privilege only the highest of the nobility possess. He intends to bypass the banns entirely. The wedding could be upon us in mere days. There will not be enough time for a letter to reach Ireland, not even if we send it with the swiftest rider. And even if it did, what could they possibly do from so far away?”

“They could come,” Emma insisted, refusing to yield. “They could ride day and night if they had to.”

“But even then, they might not make it in time. It will take at least a week for a letter to get there, and at least a fortnight for them to come back,” Hanna said, despair filling her voice. “And what power do they have over the Duke or Father’s will? You know how stubborn he is when he’s made up his mind.” Her voice broke, and she fell silent, the enormity of it all crashing down upon her.

The room seemed to grow colder, darker, as the silence stretched on, broken only by the soft crackling of the fire.

Emma’s grip on her sister’s hands tightened, her nails digging into the skin as though to anchor Hanna to reality. “Then… there must be another way,” she said finally, her voice fierce. “We could run away. Yes! Run away tonight, before they have time to make the arrangements for the wedding. We could flee to Ireland—seek refuge with Alexander. He would shelter us, I am certain.”

Hanna blinked, taken aback by the boldness of her sister’s suggestion. “Run away?” she repeated, as though the words were foreign to her. “You mean that we should simply leave? But where would we go? How would we?—”

“We would ride by night, avoid the main roads, and take the back lanes,” Emma interrupted, her eyes alight with a fervor Hanna had never seen before. “We could take some of Mother’s old jewels—sell them if we must. We would cut our hair and disguise ourselves as boys if it came to that. Anything to escape this fate.”

The image flashed before Hanna’s eyes, vivid and wild: she and Emma, dressed in their brother’s old clothes, riding through the darkness with the wind in their hair, their hearts free and unburdened.

For a fleeting moment, it felt possible, even exhilarating. And then, just as quickly, it crumbled to dust.

“No,” she murmured, shaking her head. “It is a fantasy, Emma. A dream, nothing more. You know as well as I do that the reality would be far harsher. We would be hunted, caught, and dragged back to Father in chains if need be. And even if we managed to reach Ireland, what then? Alexander would have to hide us, to lie , and he would be ruined . His reputation would be destroyed, his standing in Society lost forever. I cannot do that to him, not when he just became a marquess and is likely to rise in rank when he returns to England.”

Emma opened her mouth to protest, but Hanna held up a trembling hand. “And you… you would suffer, too. Father would never forgive you for aiding me. He would take out his anger on you, make you pay for my defiance. I could never forgive myself if I brought such pain upon you.”

Tears filled Emma’s eyes, and she shook her head furiously. “I will endure it, gladly,” she insisted, her voice thick with emotion. “If it means you are safe, if it means you are free, I will endure anything.”

“But you shouldn’t have to,” Hanna whispered, pulling her sister into a tight embrace. “You shouldn’t have to suffer for my sake. No, I must face this on my own. I must… I must find a way to survive it.”

The words felt hollow, and Hanna could not help the tremor that ran through her as she spoke them. How could she possibly survive this? How could she marry a man who terrified her, who might as well have murdered his own brother for power?

“Perhaps…” Emma began hesitantly, drawing back to look at her sister. “Perhaps he is not as terrible as he seems.”

Hanna blinked at her in disbelief. “How can you say that? You have heard the stories, the whispers. Everyone knows what he’s done, what he’s capable of.”

“And yet,” Emma persisted, “you said yourself that he was kind to you that night in the garden. He helped you, did he not?”

Hanna hesitated, the memory of that night washing over her like a distant dream. “Yes,” she admitted. “He was gentle with me. He showed me how to breathe, how to slow my heartbeat. But what if it was all a facade, a mask to hide his true nature?”

“Or what if,” Emma countered, her voice softening, “that moment was the truth, and the rest are lies? What if there is more to him than the rumors suggest?”

Hanna stared at her sister, her heart aching with the weight of uncertainty. Could it be true? Could the man she feared so deeply be capable of kindness, of gentleness? Or was she simply grasping at straws, desperate for some glimmer of hope in the darkness?

“You cannot know until you try,” Emma whispered, her eyes shining with unshed tears. “And perhaps, just perhaps, this marriage will not be the end of you, but the beginning.”

The thought was a tiny spark in the vast sea of despair, but it was a spark nonetheless. And as Hanna sat there, holding her sister’s hand, she felt a flicker of resolve, fragile but real, begin to take shape within her.

She would face this. She would face him . And somehow, some way, she would survive.