Chapter 66: A Visitor
"A child?"
Both Elias and Vincent stared at her, dumbfounded.
"You’re... with child?" Vincent breathed, the color draining from his face as his gaze drifted to Elias, who looked back at him with equal bewilderment.
"The ledger does not balance, Your Ladyship," Elias muttered, his brow furrowing as he frantically calculated the weeks of their marriage in his head, entirely unable to make sense of the timeline.
Penelope let out a soft, delighted chuckle at their collective panic before shaking her head. "I am not actually going to conceive, gentlemen. But at least we possess the benefit of that knowledge. The assassin, on the other hand, does not know the truth."
Vincent closed his eyes for a brief steadying second. "Explain it to me, simply and directly."
Penelope crossed her arms, a clever glint in her eyes. "The lad was entirely obstinate about withholding the ingredients to the antidote. He seemed perfectly content, as long as he dragged you down with him. So I had to give him a reason to stay alive. But it had to be a reason to return to his conspirators. I planted a seed of doubt in his mind. I made him suspect I was carrying your child."
She leaned back slightly, her expression calculating. "As long as he believes I carry your heir, their grand design to eradicate the Devereux bloodline remains unfinished. He will run straight back to his masters to report this new complication, and hopefully, our hounds will be right on his heels."
She rose to her feet, smoothing the lines of her comfortable robe. "If there is anyone who can disrupt the grand designs of his masters, it is that boy. Surely, the sudden arrival of an unborn heir forces them to alter the entire trajectory of their coup. He must stay alive to report it. He simply cannot afford to die while carrying such vital intelligence, can he?"
Elias and Vincent remained perfectly still, staring at Penelope with a newfound blend of awe and absolute terror.
"That is actually..." Vincent began, a slow, appreciative smile tugging at the corner of his lips, "a brilliant maneuver."
"You see?" Penelope smiled, thoroughly pleased by the validation. "That is why I am entirely certain he will scurry back to the shadows where his masters hide. We need only exercise a modicum of patience until they are lured out into the light."
Vincent sat straighter against his pillows, his expression sharp and resolute. "I am entirely on board with the ruse."
Before they could delve any deeper into the strategy, a firm knock upon the heavy oak door disrupted the moment.
"My Lady," a servant’s muffled voice called out from the corridor. "You have a visitor down in the drawing room. She claims she is a kinswoman to the late baroness."
Penelope’s eyes widened, her breath catching in her throat.
Her aunt? Here, at the estate?
Abandoning all thoughts of political intrigue, Penelope immediately hurried forward to answer the door. "Have her settled comfortably in the parlor. Inform her I shall be down in a moment."
The servant offered a brief bow before departing down the hall.
"I see you have finally located her," Vincent uttered quietly from the bed.
Penelope froze, a sudden wave of realization washing over her. She hadn’t told him. The missive containing her aunt’s whereabouts had arrived on the very day of their bitter argument, and the chaotic tempest of the poisoning had swept in immediately after. She simply hadn’t found a single moment of peace to share the news.
"Go," Vincent said softly, his gaze gentle as he sensed her sudden internal conflict. "Do not keep her waiting. Elias is here to keep me company."
"Are you certain you do not wish to meet her?" she asked, pausing by the threshold.
Vincent shook his head, a weary smile touching his lips. "No. Not at present, at least. I am hardly in a state to receive guests."
Penelope had no desire to press the matter. Truthfully, she had no inkling of what her aunt or the rest of her kin thought of the notorious Marquis. It was far wiser to gauge the waters herself before determining whether a meeting between them would be entirely safe.
With a subtle nod, she turned and slipped out of the chamber, closing the door softly behind her.
Left in the quiet of the room, Vincent turned his gaze toward Elias. "Have you had a chance to visit the barracks?"
"I managed a brief visit yestereve," Elias murmured, adjusting his stance by the bedpost. "The absolute last thing either kingdom needs is to be dragged into another bloody campaign. At this rate, it seems the entire continent is allergic to peace."
"Duke Lucian has already crossed the border back into Belgravia," Vincent said, his eyes narrowing as he stared at the ceiling. "I harbor an ill feeling about it, but His Majesty has not so much as penned a reply to our dispatches."
Elias raised an eyebrow. "Ah, so that explains his presence at the garrison the other day? The Duke came merely to offer his farewells?"
"I only wish it were so simple," Vincent muttered, clicking his tongue in irritation as he deliberately cut the thought short, entirely unwilling to dwell on the memory.
Elias didn’t question it either.
Elias was well aware of the fragile, simmering hostility that lay between Vincent and the Duke.
Forcing the two to cooperate had invariably courted disaster; they stood as polar opposites, diametrically opposed in their creeds, tactics, and philosophies.
It was a natural friction, Elias supposed, born from the divergent cultures and clashing histories of their respective kingdoms. Yet, there were moments when Elias quietly wished they could forge a common ground.
Had they ever truly aligned their wits and steel, they would have been an unstoppable force across the continent.
Even the King had recognized the tremendous leverage of such an alliance. It was the very reason His Majesty had sought to bind their bloodlines through marriage, hoping to weld the two formidable houses into a singular, unyielding bulwark for the crown.
But looking at Vincent now, Elias could only suppress a grim sigh. Instead of unity, the rift between the two lords only seemed to widen, growing deeper and more precarious with every passing day.
Sometimes, it felt like His Lordship was patiently waiting for an opportunity to drive his blade into the duke of Belgravia.
