AN: We pick up right after the wedding, the day before Wickham and Denny meet their well deserved end. I do not have as much time to write as I would like so I apologise in advance if my postings are not regular. I will post as I finish each chapter. Will.

Chapter 1

Elizabeth was sad to not be able to see Longbourn any longer as the comfortable Darcy conveyance got further and further up the drive of her childhood home. Here she was sitting in a carriage with her husband, a virtual stranger. How strange that sounded, husband, she was married to a man that she certainly did not love, did not like yet, but at least did not dislike intensely as she did before the revelations about the now late George Wickham were made.

Sitting on the forward facing bench Elizabeth looked out of the window but did not really see anything. She had some questions for the man she had married but was not sure how to broach them. She had no idea what kind of husband he would be and more importantly whether he would keep his word about not demanding his marital rights.

"Come Mr. Darcy, William, we must have some conversation, a very little will do," Elizabeth teased to try and suppress her feeling uncomfortable.

"We may discuss whatever you wish Elizabeth, I would not suspend any pleasure of yours," he returned.

"I do have a question for you," Elizabeth told him tentatively. Seeing his questioning look that seemed softer than his normal haughty and forbidding visage Elizabeth decided that it was now or never. "You told me that you would not claim your marital rights until I am ready. Do you intend to hold to that and is there a time limit on how long you will wait?" Elizabeth blushed profusely as she asked her husband about the subject.

"Do you think that I have so little honour that I would renege on my words as soon as we said, 'I do.' No there is no specific date. I would hope at some point you will come to the decision on your own. You do realise that I will need an heir?" Darcy replied. Elizabeth could see that she wounded him by her questioning his honour.

"What about my family, will I be allowed to see them occasionally?" She pointedly ignored his reference to an heir.

"You will not be expected to cut ties with your family. In fact we will be at Longbourn for Christmas."

What her husband just told her caught Elizabeth off guard. "It pleases me that we will spend Christmas with my family, but did you not consider that it may have been a good idea to talk to me first?" Elizabeth asked more acerbically than was warranted.

"If you wanted to surprise someone with something that you believed that would make them happy, would you talk to them ahead of time?" Darcy asked directly. 'Is this how it is to be? Will she always look for the worst in me? I suppose I have earned her disdain; I did force her into marriage,' he debated with himself.

Elizabeth felt like she had been foisted on her own petard. There she was looking for something that was not there and all he was trying to do was give her pleasure. If she were honest with herself, she knew that there were many places that he would have preferred to be for Christmas. Yet, he had done what she would want! Could she truly accuse him of having selfish disdain for the feelings of others when she was presented with clear and convincing evidence to the contrary.

"I apologise William," she said softly. "I suppose that it will take a while to get used to one another."

"You have the right of it. We said that we would start again, how are we to do that if you look for the worst motives in anything that I do?" he pointed out.

"It may take me some time, but I will try to change the way I see things," Elizabeth conceded. "May I ask you an honest question?" Darcy nodded his acquiescence. "It may be a hard question for you to hear," she warned.

"Go ahead, I am not afraid to hear it," Darcy replied.

"You and Georgiana, both told me how Wickham would take what he wanted regardless of the feelings of the other party, correct?" Darcy nodded in agreement. "Then how is your forcing my hand and compromising me not the same as what he does?"

His first reaction was anger at hearing the blackguards name and her comparing him to Wickham! He was nothing like the soon to be executed rapist! Then he listened to her words again, she was not saying he was the same, she was asking a legitimate question.

Elizabeth watched the emotions play over her husband's face. When she saw the thunderous anger, she was afraid that she had pushed too hard. She relaxed when she saw him relax somewhat. She had noticed before that William did not ever give a flip answer, he would consider his answer carefully as he seemed to be doing now. She waited patiently knowing that it was best not to talk until he was ready to answer her.

It took Darcy a little longer than five minutes to formulate his answer. "The only thing in common with that man is that you were forced. I have apologised for stealing your choice from you, and I will keep doing so until you accept that I am sincere."

"William I…" Elizabeth was stayed by her husband's hand on her arm as he leaned forward.

"Elizabeth my request to you is that you allow me to speak, when I have said what I feel I need to, you may comment and ask as many questions as you feel that you need to. Is that agreeable to you?" Darcy asked. Elizabeth nodded. "Wickham always planned his seductions, used manipulation, and lies and his aim was one of two things, or both in Georgiana's case.

"He aim was the virtue of young ladies and wealth that he did not have to earn. His modus operandi was to promise marriage to get what he wanted, but without a fortune like our sister's, he would run away as soon as he got that which he desired. He had no care for the broken hearts and enceinte girls that he left behind. He would move on looking for his next victim.

"Now let us look at my case. It was not planned; I did not abandon you to fend for yourself with your reputation in tatters. There was no financial incentive for me." Darcy saw the look that Elizabeth gave him. "You may not want to hear that but we both know it is the truth."

"It is, please continue William," Elizabeth allowed.

"Not only did I not abandon you, rather, I proposed marriage and followed through. Unlike Wickham and his promises of marriage, I returned to you. Before you say it, yes, it would have been better had I walked away at Lucas Lodge and not kissed you. However as we are both intelligent people, we know there is nothing that either of us can do to change the past," William said in summation.

It was Elizabeth's turn to think long and hard. If she were honest, then her husband was correct, the only similarity, and it was a tenuous one at best, was the compromise. He never attempted to seduce her, was always a consummate gentleman, besides the insult at the assembly, for which she had forgiven him.

When she looked at what he said objectively and not through the filter of finding fault with William, she had to own that what he said rang true. Could it be that she could have asked the same question without inferring that he was being compared to the man that she know knew was a seducer, profligate, and worse, a rapist? The truthful answer was of course yes, she could have.

Why was it that she still tried to wound him at every turn even though she had agreed to start again? It seemed that her husband was not the only one capable of implacable resentment. When she looked at herself in that light Elizabeth was ashamed of the hypocrisy that she exhibited. Was she not the one who espoused to only look at the past as the remembrance gave you pleasure? It seemed to her that she needed to start to follow some of her own advice. Feeling like she was a hypocrite was not a feeling that Elizabeth enjoyed.

"I thank you for your well-reasoned explanation William and I agree that there is no comparison between the two of you and I will never infer that is the case again, you have my word," Elizabeth said in contrition.

"As much as I hate to hear myself and that individual mentioned in the same breath, I do understand the genesis of your question. I did after all, steal you right to choose your mate in life, and now we are bound together, for better or worse, for our lifetimes. I pledge to you here and now that I will honour our vows, I will never be with another for the rest of my life, regardless of how long it takes you to decide to consummate our marriage," Darcy said with absolute sincerity.

He answered a question that Elizabeth wanted to ask but did not know how to phrase it delicately before he pre-empted her need to ask. "You saved me the mortification of asking you about that subject William, so I thank you. There is but one part of the vows that I am not able to perform and that is the one regarding love. As to the rest, like you I will adhere to them completely," Elizabeth responded.

"I will not delude myself that you will wake up on the morrow and be in love with me. My fervent hope is that as you become to know the real me, not the man that I have always presented in public to keep the huntresses away as much as I could, you will at the very least come to like me and if nothing else, we will become friends," Darcy stated openly.

'Yes, mayhap we will become friends, I am starting to see that there is a lot more to my husband that I assumed in the past. It is incumbent on me to try and look for the positive and not always assume the worst in him,' Elizabeth told herself.

From that point on, they newlyweds did not talk. The silence became a companionable one.

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Thomas Bennet summoned his family, that included William Collins, to the drawing room after he and Lydia returned from Colonel Forster's office. Once they were all seated, he stood and paced for a few seconds as he decided how to break the news that Colonel Fitzwilliam had shared with him before his departure back to his unit.

"There is no easy way to tell you this, both Wickham and Denny will be executed at dawn on the morrow for rape and other crimes," Bennet informed his family. For a few blissful seconds there was silence before the gasps and exclamations commenced.

"In the end everything that Lizzy, Mr. Darcy, and Colonel Forster said about Wickham was true was it not Papa?" Lydia asked almost calmly which was not her wont.

"Yes, Lydia it was all true. He confessed to his interrogators that he wanted to ruin you as a way to get back at us for banning him from Longbourn and exposing his predilection for young girls and leaving debts behind wherever he went. Your new brother owns a few thousands in the late blackguard's vowels and has helped a number of families that were left with ruined daughters with child," Bennet related to more gasps from his womenfolk.

"Papa, why did our new brother do that?" Mary asked. She was confused, she used to believe that the world was all black or white, but lately she had become to understand that there was more grey than anything else.

"My new son is a complicated man, Mary. He is however a most honourable one, I accept that his compromise of Lizzy was not planned, that it was a moment that he let his vaunted control slip. He cleaned up after Wickham not because of any sense of camaraderie for the wastrel, William has no such feelings for that man. He felt that it was his duty because of his father's feelings for Wickham, regardless of how misplaced they were, and it was his father that gifted the man a wasted gentleman's education. William believes that his father's actions led to some of the unrealistic explanations that Wickham had," Bennet explained.

"It seems that I have to start to learn to start looking at things from many different angles," Mary said introspectively.

"If you ever need to talk Cousin Mary, I am a good listener," Collins volunteered.

Mary blushed lightly. No one normally noticed her. Mr. Collins was going beyond that and offering to talk to her if she felt the need. Mary felt a stirring in her stomach that she could not identify. "Thank you for your generous offer Mr. Collins, I will remember that." As she spoke, she remembered that when her cousin was regaling them with stories of how his patroness used to be that he had not dismissed her opinions. The remembrance caused the unknown feeling to intensify.

Bennet had expected much caterwauling when he made his announcement, so he was beyond surprised at the restrained reaction from his youngest. He knew that she had been shocked when they had gone to meet with the Colonel, but he expected that she would put that out of her mind as an inconvenient fact. He looked at his wife and she nodded knowing what he was about to announce next.

"Lydia, your mother and I have decided that you are to go to school. We made the mistake of allowing you and your sisters into society before you were prepared and now, we must correct our errors. Our lack of proper care of you and your sisters could have led to your ruin and that of your sisters. As you now know, both you and Kitty are back in until you are at least eight and ten. You will be going to the Wrightfield School for Young Ladies in Wiltshire." Bennet was sure that this news would cause a tantrum. He was not prepared for the almost stoic response.

"When do I leave Papa?" Lydia asked eerily calm.

"After Twelfth Night Lydia. I will accompany you to your school. If you do well in your first year, we will seek a school closer to Hertfordshire. Kitty," Bennet turned to his second youngest daughter, "you will go the same school as your new sister Georgiana that concentrates on the arts like music and your talent, drawing and painting. Mary, you may either go to the same school to study music or we are willing to hire a music master for you."

"From the little time that I have spent with our new sister, I am happy that she will be at the same school," Kitty smiled. Not only would she be on her own out from under Lydia's shadow, but she would study the subject that was close to her heart.

"Papa, if it all the same to you, I would prefer a music master here, I am almost ten and nine and I am sure that I will be older than all of the other girls at the school," Mary reasoned.

"Then it will be so Mary," Bennet allowed.

"No school for me Papa?" Jane asked in jest.

"You my daughter are being courted, we are not sending you anywhere," Mrs. Bennet, not catching the jest, stated.

"No Jane, we are not sending you away to school," Bennet replied. In the past he would have made sport of his wife but no longer did he behave in such a way towards his Fanny.

"I am feeling fatigued, Jane dearest will you assist me up to my chambers?" Mrs. Bennet requested. Jane stood and offered he mother her arm as they departed the drawing room.

'I am concerned for Fanny; she had not been fatigued like this…since she was with CHILD! Could it be? This started a month or so after we started sharing a bed again. We will have to ask Mr. Jones to examine Fanny,' Bennet reasoned to himself. He was struck dumb at the possibility that he would be a father one more time. 'I suppose six daughters are better that five!' he told himself not allowing himself to think of the possibility of a son after so many disappointments in that area.

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Miss Caroline Bingley was fuming. She had arrived at her Aunt Hildebrand's house an hour previously and already she wanted to kill the women. There would be no society, no fashion, and worst of all no allowance! Her money would go to the old biddy and not to her.

If she were to escape from this nightmare of a place in the wilds of Yorkshire then she would need to relieve her aunt of some funds, it would not be stealing when she was just taking back her own money after all. She had found a way to take money from Charles, she would find a way to do so here as well.

Unfortunately for Miss Bingley, Miss Hildebrand Bingley, her late father's spinster sister, was not approaching her dotage and was a spry and very much aware woman of three and fifty. She had loved one man many years ago, he had chosen connections and wealth over love. Hildebrand had decided that she would not marry. It gave her no solace that the man had a short and miserable marriage. He drank himself to death before ten years with his wife was up.

"Caroline, a letter just arrived for you from your brother," Aunt Hildebrand informed her niece.

Miss Bingley lit up, she was sure that the missive was one apologising to her and begging her to return to his house. She broke the seal with gusto.

14 October 1811

Netherfield, Hertfordshire

You failed Caroline. Lady Catherine and all of Darcy's family, yes, the Earl and Countess included, approve of Miss Elizabeth, Mrs. Darcy by the time this reaches you.

Your letter did nothing except bring Lady Catherine and her daughter, Miss de Bourgh, to witness the wedding for themselves.

I am disgusted by your machinations, vitriol, lying, and spite. Consider this as my final letter to you.

CB

"No! This cannot be!" Miss Bingley yelled as she ripped the offending missive into as many pieces as she was able to and cast it on the ground.

"Pick that up!" Aunt Hildebrand ordered. She was almost amused at the pinched look on her niece's mien. "If you make a mess wilfully as you just did, you and not one of my servants will clean it." As Miss Bingley turned to storm out of the room, he aunt halted her. "The paper will remain here until you remove it and you will be locked in your chamber with no food until you do!"

The following morning the fuming woman, swearing revenge on everyone, was hungry enough to clean up her own mess.