Georgiana stomped down the bright gallery as heavy-footed as her pumps would allow, the shimmering glass display cases rattled as the floorboards underfoot shuddered under her fury.

"GEORGIANA!"

Her brother was shouting at her from the drawing room, marching along the corridor behind her, she could hear the clomp of his riding boots.

"I will not go, Fitzwilliam, you cannot make me!"

"Georgiana, please stop and listen!"

She stopped suddenly underneath the portrait of Margaret of Woodbury, the long dead ancestor whose oil-painted perfection was displayed underneath the stairs, and turned to see the anguished red face of her brother. He had decided that she should spend the season in the company of their aunts, switching between Waddingham, Rosings and Belgravia, rather than spending the entire summer with him at Pemberley.

"Alright, brother. I will listen to you, but do not expect me to acquiesce," she folded her arms in protest against him, "for I shall not."

Darcy could feel his heart pounding away in his chest, "please."

"You stand there and shout at me, and now you say 'please'? Forshame, Fitzwilliam, sending me away to stay with Aunt Catherine and Aunt Mary, and a whole host of people I barely know so that you can disappear off to town with Mr Bingley, dancing and drinking and doing who knows what."

"That is not why -"

"Of course, it is. You're packing me off like an unwanted burden so that you can have fun, and I am left in the countryside to rot! Papa would never have let this happen."

"Papa would have wanted you to spend time with family, to meet your cousins."

"Do not say that, Fitzwilliam. Papa would let me do what I wanted!"

There was no doubt that Georgiana Darcy had been their father's favourite, looking as she did so much like their mother. He had adored her and spoiled her but had also insisted that she receive the education of a gentleman. Fitzwilliam wondered what kind of man would ever be good enough for his clever, sharp, sister, even as she stood before him shaking with anger and grief. She was slight girl of thirteen years, with the same dark grey eyes as his own and a cascade of the same brown curls pinned up and laced with ribbons. He took her by the hand and led her to the settee tucked under the staircase.

"This isn't my decision alone."

"Maybe not, brother," she sniffed, "but I feel that perhaps you did not fight hard enough."

"I did, my sweet love," he sat next to her, tucked her under his arm, "I promise you."

"But then we can stay here for the summer, there is no rule to say that we cannot."

Darcy wished it were the case, but he was not the only guardian assigned to the welfare of his sister. He had travelled to the home of his Aunt and Uncle Fitzwilliam, the grand and imposing estate of Waddingham, family seat of the Earls of Matlock, and been ambushed by a collection of relatives who demanded to know his intentions for his sister. Aunt Catherine, of course, had the loudest and most damning voice and was of the firm belief that Georgiana should be sent away until she was of marriageable age, whilst Uncle Fitzwilliam, his mother's brother, wanted the child brought to Wakefield to reside with his own family and increase his menagerie of daughters, and his own coffers as Georgiana's substantial allowance would transfer to him for safekeeping. It was only his cousin Richard, with whom Darcy shared the guardianship, who believed that the youngest Darcy would benefit from remaining in the care of her brother. Fitzwilliam had looked over at his cousin, happy to have an ally in an enemy camp and, after hefty discussions and disagreements, it had been decided that Georgiana would remain with Fitzwilliam, but spend the season with her Aunts.

"There is no rule, but we have to show willing. Aunt Catherine is eager for you to perform for her ever since I advised her of your skill at the pianoforte," he was trying to persuade her. "Besides which I will be just as miserable as you, I would much rather spend my time at Pemberley than at plays and recitals meeting dull women and their odious mothers."

Georgiana looked up at him, "are you planning to wed, Fitz? You always told me that a single man in possession of a large fortune had no need of a wife and that you would never marry, that the idea of marriage made you feel nauseous."

"And it still does," he grinned at her, "but unfortunately a house like this needs a mistress."

"I can be the mistress of Pemberley, I think I will be perfectly wonderful at choosing a dinner menu, or making irrational demands of the servants."

"Is that how you think a mistress should behave, being rude to the servants?"

"Of course not, but that's how Miss Bingley behaved when she last visited. It was perfectly odious."

"So, you do not wish me to marry Miss Bingley?"

Georgiana scrunched her face up and shook her head, "most decidedly not! Neither of the Bingley girls are good enough for you, and if you must marry then I will help you decide, for the future mistress of Pemberley will be my sister, and I must be able to tolerate her to some degree."

"I must say, sister, that I never realised that you felt so strongly about Caroline Bingley. You are all delights and smiles when she visits."

"I am very good at pretending, brother. But when you meet a young lady who is deserving of you, then I will all true delight and wonderment, for I wish nothing more than for you to be happy."

"You know that going to Kent and Yorkshire for the summer would make me happy."

"I understand the obligations of my position, Fitz. I am not a fool."

Darcy felt now that his sister would be happy to consent, despite her early protestations. For all of her outrage and anger, Georgiana Darcy knew the role she was expected to play and she played it most agreeably for the most part, which was lucky as for all of his shouts and demands, Fitzwilliam Darcy knew that he would be completely unable to force his sister to do anything she did not want to.

"Only sometimes," he said with a smile, pulling her to her feet, "now how about a race around the park before tea? I shall call to Peter to get the phaeton ready."

"Oh," she said, excitedly, "I love the phaeton! Will you teach me to drive it myself?"

"Only if you promise not to seize Aunt Catherine's barouche and escape back to Derbyshire as soon as you are in Kent."

Georgiana grinned, "papa always told me not make promises that I could not keep!"

She ran off towards her rooms, calling out to her maid for a bonnet and gloves as she did so.

Fitzwilliam smiled. The house was a hive of activity today, and he was looking forward to getting out into the park, loosening his cravat and feeling the Derbyshire air in his lungs. This had been one of the worst years of his life so far. He was now the master of the vast Darcy estates, but there was a great and unsurmountable cost. The night they put his father into the marble mausoleum he had found himself howling with grief, but it was not only for George Darcy, who was a veritable paragon of virtue and duty. No, it was for himself, because the older he had got, the more the Darcy inheritance had felt like a noose around his neck, looming over him like an impending death sentence, because now all of his own personal hopes, dream and wishes had vanished into the ether.

The Darcy fortune was built through years of mutually beneficial marriages with distant relatives, land grabbing betrothals to the less than willing daughters of land-owners, strategic dalliances with heiresses and the continual push to produce healthy sons to inherit it all. It was his duty now to find a suitable girl, marry her and have a boy so that the cycle could continue.

"Come on, Fitzwilliam!" He heard the shout of Georgiana from the entrance hall, her voice edged with impatience.

He stood and looked around at the home he had lived in all of his life. It felt different now, somehow more like a responsibility than a burden. He would be alright, he thought. They would both be alright, because they had Pemberley and each other.

"FITZWILLIAM!"

Smiling, he took his hat and gloves from Staughton, ran down the steps, and took his sister by the hand as they both disappeared into the courtyard.