Magic in the Stars by Patricia Rice Read Free Book Online Page A

for a witch and demand she remove her
wicked spell. Unfortunately, modern science rejected magic.
    “That is good to hear,” she said with what seemed like
genuine relief. “I had feared his chart predicted much worse. Lord Ashford
really should hasten to marry and produce heirs. That would free you of the
considerable burden you’ve been suffering under.”
    Her sympathy almost undid him. Theo refused to believe she’d predicted Duncan’s fall or the king’s
death using charts based on an imaginary cosmos. But he selfishly wanted to
believe she understood the burden he’d carried all these years so that she would
accept his mission now for what it was.
    She just sat there like a mysterious flower that would be
gone tomorrow—but still sliced him straight to the quick today, letting all his
guts spill out.
    “He’s blind,” Theo said bluntly. “Ashford is totally blind.
He smashed his skull. The physicians don’t know if he’ll ever recover his sight,
and I despair of him recovering his right mind.”
    She paled, revealing a sprinkle of rusty freckles across her
nose. Her cup rattled until she set it down.
    He’d been unreasonably cruel, but that was how he felt—cruel
and miserable and ready to inflict his selfish rage upon the world.
    “I see,” she murmured, although she wasn’t looking at him as
she said it. A black cat crept from behind a drapery to leap onto her lap, and
she stroked it absently, as if it were truly a witchy familiar offering comfort.
    “No, you don’t,” Theo said angrily. “He has told Margaret he
releases her from their betrothal because he is no longer the man he was. She accepted his release! They’ve neither of
them ever considered any other since they were in school!”
    Well, except for Dunc’s mistresses, but that’s what bachelors
did if they could afford them.
    “That was very wrong of her,” the lady acknowledged sadly.
“Now that your brother's chart has reached the part of severity and destruction,
and yours is on the part of family disaster, they are closely followed by the
part of marriage. She’ll regret her decision someday.”
    Destruction ? He’d
rode all this way to talk to a bedlamite?
    Theo set his lips and ordered himself to keep an open mind.
“Well, I regret it right now.”
    This wasn’t at all how he’d meant to do this. Slamming down
the delicate china he’d just picked up, Theo rose to pace the intricately woven
green-and-gold carpet. The complex design distracted him until he practically
fell over his feet. Was that a representation of the planets amid the
curlicues?
    Another feline peered from beneath a curiosity cabinet and
ducked back under at his approach. Theo rubbed his brow and tried to focus.
“Ashford has ordered me to marry,
produce heirs, and carry on in his place, putting me in charge of his
holdings.” He spat out the words as if hammering nails.
    “Oh dear. That is not good,” she said. “A man with his head
in the stars cannot be expected to grasp the nature of earthly objects. Surely
you have a steward to attend the estate, at least?”
    He was irritated at how quickly she accepted his
limitations, but she wasn’t saying anything he hadn’t already told his damned
brother. “Our steward disappeared months ago. Dunc never found a better one and
hasn’t been in a hurry to do so—until now.”
    “Disappeared? Do you generally have valuable staff vanish?”
she asked in perplexity.
    Theo waved his hand in dismissal of Iveston’s perpetual
state of abandonment. Of course Margaret had left. Women always did. She’d just
picked the wrong damned time—if there was ever a good time to walk out on
friends. “People come and go. That isn’t the point. Ashford’s responsibilities
encompass far more than just the land. As you should be aware, our family
indulges in industry. For generations we’ve invested in coal and canals, and
these days it’s steam engines and foundries and more. Our entire widespread
family