Co-Authored by: This work is co-authored with kag523
Spoilers: This is obviously an AU story, but spoilers and references include the entire BSG series and much of Jane Austen's Pride & Prejudice. Certain nods to the BBC TV series and the movie have been made as well.
Authors' notes: The title of this piece is an homage to Jane Austen's original title for Pride & Prejudice. We would both like to thank our tireless beta, sci_fi_shipper for her patience, encouragement and her amazing insights, as well as for putting up with two hyper authors :-) We couldn't do this without her.
'It is a truth universally acknowledged, that a single man in possession of a good fortune, must be in want of a wife...'
This was the well-known, yet frustrating, phrase niggling at the thoughts of Mr. Leland Joseph De Bourgh, as he rode through the Hertfordshire countryside, heading toward the newly-let manor at Netherfield. He'd agreed to meet his friends there for a few weeks of rest, and was looking forward to the time away from London and the Ton. He was exhausted from the prying eyes and manipulations of this Spring's social Season. With the death of his father, John De Bourgh, the winter prior, Lee had fully come into his inheritance, and since then, he'd learned the truth about being a young man of independent fortune.
Everyone wanted a piece of it.
Thus the plan for some time away in the country with his good friend, Mr. Karl Agathon Bingley, and his sister, Miss Deborah "Dee" Bingley. It was mid-July, but this early in the morning, there was still a bite in the air which wicked away any moisture from his neck and face, leaving Lee as refreshed as when he'd set off from the George Inn just before dawn. Slowing his horse from a canter to a slow trot, Lee pulled at the reigns gently, using his knees to nudge the gelding toward the dense shadows that cloaked the underside of the trees at the top of the nearest hill. The morning light flowing across the fields held shades of amber, wrapping the hillocks beyond him in golden light chased with purple shadow; the beauty of the alternating verdant hills and woodland at odds with Lee's unsettled temper. He needed to make some decisions about what to do when he returned to London.
His aunt and uncle, Lady Ellen and Lord Saul De Bourgh, were pressuring him to invest a goodly portion of his newly-inherited fortune into a business venture. He needed time to consider it without their input. There was also the issue of a possible family alliance in the near future. Lee's pragmatic side tended to think of marriage as yet another business deal he needed to make. He sighed, a line of annoyance between his brows. With his father now gone and the closest male heirs his uncle Saul, and his cousin Samuel De Bourgh, Lee knew he needed to settle, but the last Season had turned his stomach against the thought. Unlike the rest of the unmarried men of the Beau Monde, he'd rather not pick some insipid young girl straight out of a finishing school on the Continent based on her dowry alone. Dee Bingley, with her dark good looks and sparkling green eyes was certainly an option, though Lee found himself indifferent to her company. But the question of a wife still needed to be dealt with.
Lee's arrival here – as Mr. Bingley's arrival days before, surely had – would leave the neighbourhood a hothouse of speculation. As an intensely private person, that was something Lee wasn't looking forward to. Thinking of this, he pulled at the reins and brought the horse to a stop. He knew what his unmarried status would mean for the small-town gossips and hopeful mothers of Hertfordshire. Shrugging off his woolen overcoat and laying it across his lap, Lee paused at the top of the hill, hidden in a copse of ancient oaks, and looked out over the valley to where the large stone manse of Netherfield stood. It was an altogether enchanting place, and restful. Karl had done well to let it. Lee sighed, running a hand roughly through his short brown hair, as the pressures he'd felt earlier slowly dissipated.
In the distance, he heard the sounds of a horse and rider, galloping hard and approaching from the East, the hoofbeats echoing loudly across the hard-packed trail where Lee had just come. Glancing behind him, Lee was surprised to see a young man on a black horse, his body tucked down low to the animal's neck, the two of them moving at an insane speed through the trees. For a moment, Lee's eyes widened, and his own horse began to sidle nervously off to the side. Pulling at the reins, Lee moved himself out of the way, and sat watching in admiration as the figure approached at breakneck speed. The young man controlled the animal with a skill he'd rarely had seen before.
The enormous stallion was a thoroughbred, with hints of Arabian in its lines and musculature. Atop it sat a figure – a young man of perhaps fourteen or fifteen guessing by his height and breadth – dressed in a loose-fitting riding coat, buckskin riding pants and tall scuffed boots, with a hat pulled low over a bright snatch of blonde hair. Lee grinned as he heard the youth whooping and calling to the giant horse, urging it forward, ever-faster, the boy's body moving in time with the great beast beneath him. Atop his own mount, a much milder-tempered gelding, Lee had a sudden, poignant envy of this young rural gentleman, growing up in the country, able to do and say what he liked, without the constraints and socially-confining expectations of elevated social status. Lee's own horse shifted once more, pulling back further from the trail, putting the two of them into a small patch of leaf-dappled sunlight a few steps from the path.
The rider topped the hill a few seconds later, the movement of the horse's passage swirling up a dust-devil of leaves and dirt. Crossing the path, the youth turning his head slightly to glance to where Lee stood, surprised momentarily. Atop his own, motionless horse, reins pulled tight, Lee watched, entranced, with a happy grin on his face, as the stallion and rider rushed past him and then moved in a flash across the valley and out beyond Netherfield to the West.
As the hoofbeats grew distant, he could hear the young man's high-pitched voice echoing loudly with braying laughter.
-[section break]-
Mrs. Laura Adama sat in the high-backed chair of the morning room, a crocheted antimacassar under each elbow as she leaned forward, her long, bejewelled fingers pointing at her husband in determination as she spoke.
"My dear, have you heard the news?" she asked, a high-arching eyebrow rising like a punctuation mark at her words.
"Hmmph," her husband grumbled, his grey-speckled head nodding slightly, though he didn't look up from the newspaper. The headline "Alchemy of Heirs!" catching his eye for a moment. He lacked an heir himself, and the story – as far-fetched as it seemed – had drawn his attention.
William's eyes scanned down the page, noting the claims of an informant who had once worked at Prometheus Laboratories, situated in Somerset. The young man – who had requested to remain anonymous for fear of his life – claimed that the alchemists working in the laboratory there had succeeded in reproducing human tissues many years ago. Entire humans – at any age – could be created in tanks of liquid. Adama snorted in disbelief and turned the page. People would believe just about anything nowadays.
"Mrs. Lucas tells me that Netherfield is newly let," his wife said, her voice rising slightly.
Laura and William Adama's union had been one of the rarities of their age. They had married for love, rather than for money or connections, but that fact had not been enough to ensure them happiness or male offspring. Their family abounded with girls. Their eldest child, Kara, had been born only a few weeks past their first anniversary. Her delivery had been celebrated despite her gender. A second pregnancy had soon followed, but Laura had lost that child before it had even quickened in her womb.
Longbourn, the Adama estate, could only be inherited by a male heir, but William and Laura continued to believe that given Kara's healthy birth, they'd surely have a son at some point. William doted on his only daughter, treating her much as the longed-for son he awaited, carrying her atop his shoulders as he visited his lands and letting her join him on walks into town, teaching her to ride and shoot and allowing her to have her pick of the books in his impressive library. In their fourth year of marriage, Laura again was again with child, and under the advice of her doctor, had travelled to the city of Bath to be observed by a physician specializing in female ailments, for the remainder of her pregnancy and confinement. A second daughter, Sharon, was born there, happy and healthy, and Mrs. Adama returned to Longbourn with her hopes for more children renewed.
The specialists at the hospice in Bath, had new treatments for childlessness, and Laura was determined to provide William with his much-desired, much-needed heir. When the Admiral's schedule allowed, the two of them travelled to Bath to take the waters, and to be treated by the physicians there. Three more pregnancies resulted.
All of them were girls.
By the time the Adamas began to despair of ever having a boy, it was far too late to make the legislative and monetary efforts to purchase the entailment to Longbourn. Given the rule of primogeniture, when Mr. Adama eventually died, his nephew, Mr. Leoben Collins, would be the one to inherit, not William's own children. The girls – Kara, Sharon, Mary, Kitty and Caprica – with their meagre dowries, and (based on their parents' love-match) no real familial connections, would be left to their own devices. Relegated to the roles of companions or governesses with spinsterhood a likely result.
"ADMIRAL!" Laura snapped, suddenly bringing his attention back to the sitting room and his wife, who was now looking at him in annoyance over the top of his paper. After twenty-five years of marriage, and many more years as an Admiral in his Majesty, King George's Royal Navy, William Adama knew when to hold back and wait. This discussion was going somewhere. He would bet on it.
"Yes, dear. I am very sorry," he said conciliatorily. "There was just an odd bit of news here in the paper."
Laura smiled patiently, her coiffed russet curls bouncing slightly as she spoke. She'd been a beauty in her day and advancing age had lent a soft, muted quality to her features.
"What I said, my dear, is that Netherfield is let. And what do you say to that?"
"Well, that it is news indeed ..." When determined, Laura Adama was a force to be reckoned with, and her husband knew the moment that the linen-covered hoop with the faint dotting of embroidery dropped forgotten into her lap, that he wasn't going to avoid this conversation.
"I should hope you are going to do something about it."
"Mmm...?" The Admiral said, without commitment, turning the page, and settling lower in his own leather-backed chair. He was going to be given a direct order shortly, he could feel it.
Laura huffed in exasperation, and suddenly stood from the chair, the forgotten hoop dropping onto the floor next to her foot. William raised his eyes from the paper and smirked at his wife where she stood, arms akimbo, her lips pressed into a line of irritation.
"William Adama! How can you be so obtuse? You must know that this is indeed the best news for us and the girls!" Laura said, coming to stand at her husband's side, her gentle face worried. Though she'd take on the world without a second look, William knew his wife well enough to realize that with each passing year, her daughter's fortunes pressed harder into her conscience. Reaching up, he placed a gentle hand on her arm, squeezing lightly.
"Hmm? How so? Why should Netherfield's being let be of any concern to us?"
"Oh, laugh at me if you will William, but you know as well as I do that the arrival of a single unattached, wealthy prospect to the neighborhood provides the girls with the opportunity of securing a good match. If the Adama's are to continue, we must have more babies which means our daughters have to marry and marry well."
"Ah. Now that is a sound argument my dear," he answered dryly. "And how, pray tell, are we to accomplish convincing this fine gentleman to marry one of our daughters?"
Laura smiled down at him, her eyes twinkling, though her jaw was set with a fortitude that would deter lesser men.
"Well, Admiral. You know that I am nothing if not resourceful. Fortune has smiled upon us with an abundance of choices for any young man. Why, he might set his eyes on Sharon who is indeed the beauty of Hertfordshire. Or if his tastes are more inclined towards lively conversation, I am sure that Caprica might strike his fancy." She paused, tipping her head to the side, a frown marring her brow. "Kitty, I admit, is much too young and Mary ... well, she is rather serious but if the gentleman prefers a steady companion, he must needs look no further!"
Mrs. Adama wandered to the window in contemplation, her slender body silhouette against the light, looking out to the lawns and gardens she'd tended for so many years.
"And what of Kara?" her husband said, folding the newspaper and dropping it down beside him. "Might not she be tempting to him?"
There was a slight pause before his wife turned on him, her frustration causing splotches of pink to rise in her cheeks.
"Oh, do not speak to me of that wild child! I am at my wits end with her," she said, her voice rising. "Why just this morning, I caught her coming in from the stables wearing breeches and men's riding boots, covered six inches deep in mud. You know this is all your doing William. You have always favored and encouraged her unruly behavior."
She chidingly waved her finger at her husband as she approached.
"No." Laura continued. "No, Mr. Bingley will most certainly not be interested in Kara, even if she manages to keep a civil tongue in his presence." She shook her head as if reliving an endless number of disappointments, sighing and taking the last two steps to her husband's side.
"Very well, my dear," the Admiral said patiently. "As always, it shall be as you say. And what would you bid me do to facilitate the joyous occasion of marrying off one of our jewels?"
Laura grinned, her words tumbling out in excitement.
"Why you must pay him a visit of course! And invite him to shoot with you. Then you may bring him by for refreshments and he will have the opportunity to meet the girls. We shall let nature take its course."
Adama's low, growling laughter rumbled through the room. It was the tone of a man who both loved and respected his wife.
"Nature, or one very determined Laura Adama?" He raised his eyebrow at her scheming, but she stood her ground, undeterred. There was a long pause.
"Very well," the Admiral said finally. "I shall not tease you further. Would it please you to know that I have actually visited Mr. Bingley already, have invited him to shoot with us tomorrow and assured him of our presence at the upcoming ball at the Forster's where he is most anxious to make your acquaintance?"
"Oh William! You are a wicked man teasing me so," she said, laughing cheerfully.
In a moment she had thrown herself bodily into his arms, letting him catch her and snuggling herself deep into his lap, as if the two of them were but five and twenty again, not three decades hence. The Admiral nodded, listening as his wife shared the plans, William knew quite certainly, she'd had since the first moment when she'd asked him if he'd 'heard the news'.
"What a great scheme," Laura said, nodding to herself. "The Forster's ball will certainly show the girls at their best and Mr. Bingley will surely choose one after a turn or two. Now, no more than two mind you. We do not want to discourage any other young men from having their turn. Yes. Two with each daughter. That would do nicely. Very nicely indeed..." She turned to her husband, a serious look clouding her green eyes, the ones he adored; the same shade that Kara, but none of his other daughters, had inherited. His wife looked anxious and... for lack of a better word... haunted, now.
"William, you do realize how advantageous a match this will be, do you not?"
"Yes, Mrs. Adama, I do realize that," William said sadly, thinking of the correspondence in his breast pocket. It was from Leoben, the man who would eventually inherit the Adama estate and all of the monies that went with it, displacing their five daughters and leaving them untethered and at the whim of an uncertain future.
Mr. Leoben Collins was coming to visit Longbourn the following week.