The baron simply shook his head. Most of his fellow huntsmen had stumbled off into the bracken to throw up, though a few-the older, sober ones, mostly-stood their ground.
The Reverend Mr. c.u.mmings came rolling up in his little dogcart just as Lord Lumpley spun on his heel and streaked for the trees to join his retching friends. The vicar hopped from his carriage-then found his knees not entirely up to the task at hand. As he started toward the lake, his legs were wobbling so badly it looked like he"d slipped a pair of snakes down his trousers.
"B-but surely that"s not Miss W-w-w-w-ard? G-G-G.o.d save us!"
"I wouldn"t count on it," Mr. Bennet mumbled under his breath.
One of the more frenzied hounds made a running lunge for the dreadful, sinking its fangs deep into the thing"s throat. The zombie screamed, though more in rage than pain, it seemed to Elizabeth, and then knocked the dog aside into the shallows.
The dreadful"s shrieking suddenly stopped-because the hound had torn out all the flesh between the collarbone and jaw. There was no windpipe left to scream with.
And still Emily Ward struggled to reach land, the stone behind her moving but a fraction of an inch with each lurching step. Her mouth remained open wide, her arms out straight before her, as if she were beseeching, pleading for help.
"Well," Mr. Bennet said, "I don"t suppose we"ll have a better opportunity for practice than this. It"s not often you find an unmentionable staked down for you."
Elizabeth moved a hand toward her sword. Not that she was so anxious to draw it. Gripping the hilt, she found, helped keep her hand from shaking.
"You... you want me to...?"
"No." Her father"s eyes slowly slid from hers, locking onto the silent figure standing at her side. "It is Jane"s turn."
"Sir!" the vicar said. "Why do you insi-si-sist on subjecting your own d-daughters to all this-"
"Last rites again, if you please!" Mr. Bennet snapped without taking his gaze from Jane.
The vicar started to reply, but whatever he meant to say died, strangled by stutters, on his spluttering tongue. He stumbled away from the Bennets and faced the lake.
"Depart, O Christian soul, out of this world," he mumbled. "In the name of G.o.d the Father Almighty who c-c-created you..."
"I can"t do it," Jane whispered.
"You must."
Tears streaked Jane"s face, and she shook her head. "I won"t."
Her father took an angry step toward her, scowling so fiercely he looked like another man entirely-a man Elizabeth might have fled from not so very long ago, before her training began. A man she still might flee from.
"You must!"
Jane"s tears flowed faster, then turned to sobs.
"Crying will not save us!" her father raged. "Mercy will not save us! Only the sword will save us! Draw yours and use it, girl! Do it now!"
Yet Jane just buried her head in her hands and sobbed all the harder.
Mr. Bennet stepped up so close he was practically shouting in her ear. "Prove you are not weak! Prove you are not worthless! Prove... oh, hang it all."
And he wrapped his arms around his daughter and whispered "There, there." When he peeped Elizabeth"s way a moment later, she saw her father once more, only more sad-eyed now. Defeated.
If they were to survive the coming days, this fragile, beautiful thing he cherished-her sister"s compa.s.sion and gentleness, her spirit, her very soul-had to be destroyed. Or so he"d believed. Yet still, he couldn"t bring himself to do it.
He"d failed. His daughters would never be warriors. Elizabeth looked around at the men watching them from beside the lake and peeping out from behind trees and bushes. Many of their faces were slack with dismay; just as many were curdled with disgust.
Her life would be in their hands, now-the hands of those who either lacked the fort.i.tude to fight or judged her improper, mad, unworthy for daring to think a young lady might possess it. All she and Jane could do was slink home with their father, their reputations ruined, and pack away their weapons, and wait for the dreadfuls to come.
Or not.
Elizabeth heard the shing of a blade leaving its scabbard, saw a glint of sharp-edged steel, and realized only when she took her first step toward the water that it was she who"d drawn her sword. She went striding through the dogs, out into the lake, and aimed a swing of her katana at what was left of the dreadful"s neck.
She missed, instead slicing off a raised arm that promptly plopped into the water and sank. As Elizabeth brought back the sword to try again, the zombie reached out and grabbed it-actually s.n.a.t.c.hed the blade out of the air with its remaining hand and held tight to it, all the while straining against the rope around its waist, pushing its black, protruding tongue toward Elizabeth"s face.
AS ELIZABETH BROUGHT BACK THE SWORD TO TRY AGAIN, THE ZOMBIE REACHED OUT AND GRABBED IT.
The stench hit Elizabeth, then, the odor of rotting flesh so close, so overpowering, her vision blurred. The katana was ripped from her grip. Her knees began to buckle.
And then another blade flashed out, and Emily Ward"s head toppled off its severed neck bone. As the rest of the body splashed backward after it, Elizabeth turned to find Jane at her side, still weeping. The sisters started to fall into each other"s arms.
"Not bad!" an unfamiliar voice boomed out. "But not good! Now dry those tears! Your father is correct-warriors weep not!"
Elizabeth and Jane looked up, past their shocked father, past the pale, trembling Mr. c.u.mmings, past the a.s.sorted huntsmen cowering in the woods, and beheld a large, raven-haired man standing, legs spread and arms akimbo, near the vicar"s dogcart.
Lord Lumpley leaned out from behind a vine-choked oak. "Who are you?"
The man ignored him so utterly that one somehow understood he would"ve done the same even if he"d known he was a n.o.bleman.
"You are Oscar Bennet?" he asked Elizabeth"s father.
"I am."
The man started toward him through the brush with quick, confident steps. As he drew closer, Elizabeth noticed that he was extraordinarily young for one with such commanding ways. He was about Jane"s age, she would have guessed-eighteen years old.
He was also extraordinarily handsome, though Elizabeth was still too stunned and distraught to register that fact fully.
The sword at his side, though-that she couldn"t miss.
It was a katana.
"The Order sent you?" Mr. Bennet asked.
The young man gave his head a sharp, downward jerk. "Your message was received. I am the response." He looked at the girls with such stony coldness he seemed more statue than man. "I am to be your daughters" new master... and yours, as well, Oscar Bennet."
CHAPTER 10.
THE STRANGER"S AIR of chilly calm seemed to help everyone recover their nerve-at least enough to stop throwing up or hiding in the shrubbery. Even the dogs settled down, though this was more because the dreadful had been dispensed with and an attempt to catch another scent (with Emily Ward"s fresh-severed arm) had come to naught.
There were no more unmentionables near Netherfield Park-at least not any that smelled like Mr. Ford or Miss Ward.
"Oakham Mount might be a good spot to try for the scent again," Mr. Bennet suggested. "Perhaps it would be wise to carry on the search from there... this time with a little less pomp and a little more firepower."
Lord Lumpley kept sneaking nervous peeks both at the body lying in the shallows of the lake and at Jane on the sh.o.r.e, splattered with its blood. Elizabeth supposed he was trying to decide which sight he found more monstrous.
"Yes... yes, I see your point," he said. "We should proceed more in the manner of... a grouse hunt. I shall return to the house and see that the gun room is opened... for those who wish to continue."
He shuffled away listlessly, and before long he and his dogs (both of the hound and lap variety) were gone, with the Reverend Mr. c.u.mmings trailing after them in the interests of "ministering to the sorry stricken." Mr. Bennet and the stranger had volunteered to attend to Emily Ward "in the necessary way," and no one seemed anxious to stay and see just what that meant.
After cutting the dead girl free from her drowning stone, the men carried her body a short distance into the woods. As they settled it down in a small, rocky clearing, Elizabeth steeled herself, walked back to the water, and collected Emily"s head. She grasped it by the hair as she brought it to her father, holding it far out before her, like Diogenes with his lantern.
Jane turned her back as she went by.
"So...," Elizabeth said once head and body were reunited. She had to lick her lips and swallow hard before she could go on. "What happens next?"
The stranger narrowed his dark eyes, squinting at her as if she were a pane of frosted gla.s.s he was trying to peer through.
Her father spoke up before the other man could.
"If you will permit it, sir, I would like to spare my daughter this one, last thing."
It disturbed Elizabeth to hear her father deferring to such a far younger man, yet it bothered her even more that she might be dismissed-as indeed she was.
"You have spared your daughters too much already, Oscar Bennet," the stranger said. "A final indulgence would be but a pebble atop Mount Fuji." He looked at Elizabeth and gave a brusque wave toward the lake. "Go. Wait."
Elizabeth held his gaze a moment, not moving, before choosing to do as he said.
"What will become of Emily"s body?" Jane asked as her sister rejoined her by the water.
"I don"t know. Something Papa did not want me to see."
Together, they watched their father and the stranger. But the men were shrouded in the shadows of the forest, and all they could discern was a flurry of movement, a ray of stray sunlight flashing off a raised blade, and then, a moment later, flames and smoke that rose high like a pyre before dying out with surprising speed.
When Mr. Bennet came to collect the girls, he looked as grim as Elizabeth had ever seen him.
"Come," he said. "We return to Longbourn."
"All of us?" Elizabeth asked.
The stranger was striding in the opposite direction, toward a large, black horse-practically a Clydesdale, it was so big. It stamped a huge hoof with impatience as it waited for its master, its reins wrapped around a low-hanging branch.
"Yes," Mr. Bennet said. "All of us."
During the ride back, Elizabeth had her best chance yet to make a thorough study of the mysterious young man from "the Order" (whatever that was). She and Jane were riding behind him and their father, yet she didn"t need to look the stranger in the face to read his character. The stiffness of his bearing, the long straight line of his broad shoulders, the stern snap of his tone when speaking to Mr. Bennet, even the peculiar way he wore his long, thick, shiny-black hair, pulled up in a queue that sprouted from just below his crown-all spoke of discipline and strength of will. And haughtiness and pride, as well.
Elizabeth knew she should resent his arrogance, especially his condescension to her father, yet she found she couldn"t. It was because he represented hope, she told herself. If, as Mr. Bennet insisted, she and her sisters needed to be molded into warriors, here might be the man to do it. After all, one doesn"t forge a sword on a blancmange. It takes an anvil of iron. And this young man certainly seemed hard and cold enough to pa.s.s for one.
Upon reaching Longbourn, they found the rest of the girls engaged in proper-ish ladylike pursuits under the unenthused tutelage of Mrs. Hill the housekeeper, who"d been temporarily drafted into service as a reluctant replacement for Miss Chiselwood. Mary was hunched over a book (her history of The Troubles, Elizabeth was pleased to see); Kitty was working on her poise by toying with nunchucks while the etiquette guide she was supposed to be reading sat balanced atop her head. Lydia, meanwhile, was honing her embroidery skills with a needlepoint portrait of Mary, complete with halo, pimples, fangs, and the words OUR L ITTLEA NGEL-M AY G OD T AKE H ER B ACK S OON floating over her wispy hair. All were shocked into silence when the stranger marched in, boomed "To the dojo- now!" and immediately marched back out.
"Come along, girls, come along," Mr. Bennet said, waving them toward the door.
"Who was that?" Lydia asked.
"Our new master of the deadly arts, apparently," Elizabeth said.
"Our new-?" Kitty began. She looked over at Lydia, broke into giggles, and then both girls raced for the dojo with idiotic grins on their faces.
Even Mrs. Bennet was charmed by the stranger despite his best efforts to the contrary, asking "Who is that rude, handsome man?" after he brushed past her in the foyer.
He lost some of his comeliness, if not his rudeness, once he was in the dojo, for the state of the place puckered his perfect features into a prodigious grimace.
"Are those daffodils?"
Mr. Bennet peeped over at Elizabeth and jerked his head at the flower pots crammed into the corner.
"I wasn"t expecting anyone from the Order quite so soon," he said as his daughter hustled the flowers out and tossed them over the nearest hedge.
The stranger let his scowl reply for him. When Elizabeth was back inside, he nodded at the floor and said, "Sit."
Mr. Bennet and the girls seated themselves in the warrior way-legs crossed, spines straight-and though the stranger didn"t compliment them on it, he did allow his glower to fade.
"My name," he said, "is Geoffrey Hawksworth. You will call me "Master Hawksworth" or simply "Master." I have been sent by a party whose name your ears are, as yet, unfit to hear. Suffice it to say, I represent a fellowship to which your father, Oscar Bennet, once belonged-a secret league of warriors sworn to eternal vigilance and readiness. As part of his oath of fealty to the Order, he swore to raise all his progeny in the warrior way. But he broke that vow. He chose to live as a gentleman and bring you up to be ladies... and now you find yourselves helpless at the very hour The Enemy returns."
The young man pointed a redoubled frown at Mr. Bennet.
It pained Elizabeth to see her father bow his head, looking cowed.
"I have been tasked with setting right your father"s failing," Master Hawksworth went on. "You will become warriors. I will make you so through exacting instruction, unremitting discipline, and a complete and utter absence of mercy. Do not mistake any of this for cruelty. It is a mercy to you, one for which you should be thankful, for it might save your lives. You will show your grat.i.tude-and your devotion to your training-through absolute obedience. Anything I say, you must do without question. This is the first step on the path to preparedness, and you must take it with me now."
The young man paused then, and when he spoke again his voice was so soft it sounded almost tender.
"Do you understand?"
"Yes," the girls said.
"Yes, what?" Hawksworth prompted them gently.
"Yes, Master," Elizabeth said.
The Master nodded and almost-almost-smiled.
"Good," he said. And then suddenly he was spinning on his heel and stabbing at Kitty with an outstretched arm and a pointing finger, and everything mild or kindly or human about him was lost behind a mask of raw contempt. " YOU! Jump through the ceiling and catch me a swallow!"
Kitty blinked at him. "Ummm... Papa hasn"t taught us how to do that yet... Master."
"I did not ask what Papa has taught you," Master Hawksworth snapped back. "I told you to jump-and you did not." He pointed at the floor now. "Fifty dand-baithaks."