The Penwyth Bride (The Witch's Daughter Book 1) by Ani Bolton Read Free Book Online Page B

light to meet some friends in Hayle, where a gathering of gentlemen were to course a hare.
    “Young men have their amusements,” Lady Penwyth explained apologetically as she pushed the bread-board toward me. “Damon has been away on the Continent for so long that I could not forbid him the pleasure of renewing acquaintances with his friends.”
    I covered my disappointment as well as I could as I slid into my seat. I had dressed with more care than I wanted to admit to.
    Susannah, dressed for riding, was dispatching her salted pilchards with gusto. A trace of annoyance lingered about her, and I wondered if it was because I had come downstairs earlier than she had anticipated.
    If she hoped to escape me, she was thwarted. “Susannah will show you the grounds, and it will be her very great pleasure,” Lady Penwyth continued, serenely buttering her bread.
    Susannah’s jaws stopped working. I almost laughed at her comical expression of tragedy. She swallowed painfully, and forced her lips into a curve. “If you feel up to it, Miss Eames. Your lame--I mean, you are probably still fatigued from travel, are you not?”
    “Oh, no. A walk in the garden will give me much enjoyment,” I returned.
    She sent me an evil glare.
    “The countryside is rather wild and barren,” Lady Penwyth went on, “especially when one is new-come from tamer counties, but Susannah can show you our own little bit of romance, the Penwyth Quoit. Quite haunted, the locals say.”
    “It is only a tall pointed rock, Mama.”
    “It sounds thrilling,” I said, with little interest. A turn about the groomed gardens was one thing; I could resist the calls of the domesticated plants easily while in the company of another. But the lunar landscape beyond the grounds was potent and insistent. My affinity responded to it so strongly I held a cold doubt that I could control it in front of Susannah.
    “I’ll meet you in the courtyard when you are finished eating,” Susannah muttered. “I will just change out of my habit, since my own plans mean nothing to anybody.” Scraping her chair viciously back on the painted walnut planks, she stomped out of the room.
Lady Penwyth lips tightened as she watched her daughter’s receding back. Then she sighed. “You must forgive my daughter’s manner, Miss Eames. She has been left far too long in this backwater, I fear. I’ve had less success with her than my sister has had with you.”
    I stared at her wonderingly.
    “I’ve done what I can to impart some polish to her . . . music lessons, needlework and so forth, but Susannah’s nature will not admit any feminine accomplishments. She was born for the saddle, her father says. I suppose I must resign myself to it, and pray I can make a match for her that will not be an utter disaster.”
    Lady Penwyth gave me a watery smile, and again I saw the shadow of my stepmother, a woman left to parent a creature who could not be molded as she pleased, as females of gentle breeding are supposed to allow. I did not know whom I felt sorrier for, Susannah or her mother.
    “I have hopes that your coming, Miss Eames, will show her that a path other than on the back of a horse might be had. You will set the right kind of example for her.”
    Suddenly I realized why Susannah disliked me so.
    “Now, enough of my daughter. This may be a backwater, as I have said, but we have a lively society available to us, and I promised my sister that you should have the opportunity to show yourself at them.”
    I murmured a thank you, quailing inside at the thought of trying to dance a jig among strangers, and especially under Damon Penwyth’s appraising eye.
    “I have also taken the liberty of asking Jenny to maid you while you are here. She is quite competent, and Susannah asks wretchedly little of her in the way of personal service. She should be able to attend you both.”
    The slamming of a door echoed through the dining area, bringing a pained expression to Lady Penwyth’s features.