Author's Note: Anyone who has read The Scarlet Pimpernel will find the conversation between Percy and Marguerite very, very familiar--I've taken it pretty much directly from the book. I've done that for the benefit of those who haven't read TSP yet. After all, we who've read it know what happens; the other don't. And I did say that no knowledge of the book would be required.
Chapter Two
In Which Marguerite Confronts Percy and Caroline Confronts Charles.
Morning of July 14, 1799
Richmond Estate. England.
There he stood, a beautiful figure in the moonlight of early morning. Marguerite felt a vague pang as she observed him, feeling yet again the divide that stood between them. She had never, at any point in her life, intended for the St. Cyr family to die--if he had loved her so deeply, as he had sworn he had, how could he have lost all affection for her so quickly?
Even as she stared at him, it seemed he did not notice her; he turned and moved directly towards the terrace. Though she had no memory of giving her mouth consent to utter a sound, Marguerite found herself calling out, "Sir Percy!"
He had nearly began mounting the steps, but halted and, after a pause, turned to look into the shadows which had called to him. Half fearing that he would continue on, she stepped forward quickly; as soon as he caught sight of his pursuer, Percy immediately bowed to her with the typical gallantry he always regarded her with. Even so, however, his foot remained on the first step, and he displayed every indication of wishing to go.
"At your service, Madame!"
It was a painful thing, she decided, to be treated so indifferently by one's own husband. Only barely managing to smother the desperation she felt welling within her, she said, "The air is deliciously cool, the moonlight peaceful and poetic, and the garden inviting. Will you not stay in it awhile; the hour is not yet late, or is my company so distasteful to you that you are in a hurry to rid yourself of it?"
"Nay, Madame, but 'tis the other foot the shoe happens to be, and I'll warrant you'll find the midnight air more poetic without my company: no doubt the sooner I remove the obstruction the better you ladyship will like it."
Marguerite felt rather as if she had received a physical blow as he turned to leave, but pressed on. "I protest you mistake me, Sir Percy," she said quickly, stepping towards him quite unconsciously. "The estrangement, which, alas, has arisen between us was none of my making, remember."
If ever Sir Percy was a difficult man to read, Marguerite quickly decided that that was the moment, he cold response was: "Begad, you must pardon me there, Madame! My memory was always of the shortest."
Yes, he was a very difficult man to decipher in that moment. He regarded her with the lazy nonchalance which had become second nature to him, nevertheless there was something further in his look. She met his gaze for a moment before her eyes softened and she slowly walked towards him, to the foot of the terrace steps.
"Of the shortest, Sir Percy!" she breathed. "Faith, how it must have been altered! Was it three years ago or four that you saw me for one hour in Paris, on your way to the East? When you came back two years later you had not forgotten me."
He stood perfectly still for a moment, cold and rigid. It did not, however, escape his notice that she looked divinely pretty in the moonlight, the fur cloak sliding from her delicate shoulder as the gold embroidery of her dress shimmered about her, her childlike blue eyes shining up at him, and his hand clenched against the stone balustrade of the terrace.
"You desired my presence, Madame," eh said coldly. "I take it that it was not with a view to indulging in tender reminiscences."
She knew that she ought to have played by the unspoken rules of the game of marital rupture, returning coldness for coldness, and sweep past him with naught but a haughty look of scorn and disdain. However, the keen instinct which makes a beautiful woman conscious of her powers long to bring to his knees the one man who pays her no homage prevailed, and she remained, reaching out her hand to him.
"Nay, Sir Percy, why not?" she enquired. "The present is not so glorious but that I should not wish to dwell a little in the past."
With ceremony and decorum he kissed the hand she had extended, and Marguerite felt a small stab of disappointment at his maintenance of his calm nonchalance. "I' faith, Madame," was his reply, "then you will pardon me if my dull wits cannot accompany you there."
He made to go once again, but his wife was not yet prepared to lay the matter to rest. Her voice, sweet, childlike, and very near to tender, called him back once more: "Sir Percy."
"Your servant, Madame."
Such informalities! How had she fallen so far in his graces? Desperation gave way to sudden, unreasoning vehemence as she said, "Is it possible that love can die? Methought that the passion which you once felt for me would outlast the span of human life. Is there nothing left of that love, Percy…" she faltered, but forged on, "which might help you… to bridge over that sad estrangement?"
She had not previously believed it possible, but amazingly she witnessed his form stiffen still further as his mouth hardened and a look of unrelenting inflexibility appeared into habitually lethargic blue eyes.
"With what object, I pray you, Madame?" was he cold demand.
Once more Marguerite felt her inner courage flounder, but she determinedly kept it from appearing on her features. She had been an actress before her marriage, and she would be an actress still if need be! "I do not understand you," she replied.
His retort, which came nearly instantaneously, was instilled with a sudden bitterness which sprang to life and seemed to course in the words he uttered, even as he made visible efforts to restrain it. "Yet 'tis simple enough. I humbly put the question to you, for my slow wits are unable to grasp the cause of this, your ladyship's sudden new mood. Is it that you have the taste to renew the devilish sport which you place to successfully last year? Do you wish to see me once more a love-sick suppliant at your feet, so that you might again have the pleasure of kicking me aside, like a troublesome lapdog?"
'Devilish sport?' Even as her stomach jerked uncomfortably, she looked directly at him, as it was thus she remembered him as a year previous. And yet, despite her newfound hope (if it could be deemed worthy of such a name, as the mood was quite lacking in the optimism), she found herself whispering very nearly brokenly. "Percy! I entreat you! Can we not bury the past?"
"Pardon me, Madame, but I understood you to say that your desire was to dwell in it."
Idiot man! "Nay! I spoke not of that past, Percy!" she cried as her voice began to display a tone of tenderness. "Rather did I speak of the time when you loved me still, and I… Oh, I was a vain and frivolous youth; your wealth and position allured me; I married you, hoping in my heart that your great love for me would beget in me a love for you… but, alas…"
"Twenty-four hours after out marriage, Madame," he said coldly, "the Marquise de St. Cyr and all his family perished on the guillotine, and the popular rumor reached me that it was the wife of Sir Percy Blakeney who helped to send them there."
"Nay!" she cried. "I myself told you the truth of that odious tale."
"Not till after it had been recounted to me by strangers, with all its horrible details."
Even through her hurt and despair, Marguerite felt the stirrings of anger. "And you believed them then and there," she accused passionately, "without proof or questions--you believed that I, whom you vowed you loved more than life, whom you professed you worshipped, that I could do such a thing so base as these strangers chose to recount. You thought I meant to deceived you about it all--that I ought to have spoken before I married you: yet, had you listened, I would have told you that up to the very morning on which St. Cyr went to the guillotine, I was straining every nerve, using every influence I possessed, to save him and his family. But my pride sealed my lips when your loved seemed to perish, as if under the knife of that same guillotine. Yet I would have told you how I was duped! Aye! I, whom that same popular rumor had endowed with the sharpest wits in France! I was tricked into doing this thing, by men who knew how to play upon my love for an only brother, and my desire for revenge. Was it unnatural?"
She stopped, pulling a deep breath as her voice choked with tears, avoiding his gaze for a moment before looking appealingly at him. It was as if he himself were her judge. He had let her speak, refusing to offer comment or sympathy: and now, while she regained herself, attempting to subdue the tears that rushed to her eyes, he waited, still impassive and immobile. The moon had long since set and now the dim, gray light of the early dawn seemed to endow his form with the appearance of being yet taller and more rigid. Gone was the lazy, good-natured look, though Marguerite was so beside herself that she failed to see that his eyes were no longer languid, mouth no longer good-humored or inane. A strange look of intense passion seemed to glow from beneath his drooping lids, his mouth pressed as though will alone kept the passion in check.
Marguerite was aware, however, of one very important thing. She knew in but a moment that she, for the past few months, had been entirely mistaken: this man who stood before her, cold as a statue, loved her as he had loved her a year ago. She realized that, while his passion might have been dormant, it was there, as strong, as intense, as overwhelming, as when her lips first met his in one long, maddening kiss.
Pride, she now knew, had kept him from her and, as any woman of her likeness would, she meant to win back that which had been hers before. Very suddenly, and with more strength than she cared to acknowledge, it seemed to her that the only happiness that life could possibly afford her again would be in feeling that man's kiss once more upon her lips.
This impetus spurred her onward, and her voice was low, sweet, and infinitely tender when she next spoke. "Listen to the tale, Sir Percy," she urged. "Armand was all in all to me! We had no parents, and brought one another up. He was my little father, and I, his tiny mother; we loved one another so. Then one day--do you mind me, Sir Percy? The Marquis de St. Cyr had my brother Armand thrashed--thrashed by his lackeys--that brother whom I loved better than all the world! And his offence? That he, a plebeian, had dared to love the daughter of the aristocrat; for that he was waylaid and thrashed… thrashed like a dog within an inch of his life! Oh, how I suffered! His humiliation had eating into my very soul! When the opportunity occurred, and I was able to take my revenge, I took it. But I only thought to bring that proud marquise to trouble and humiliation. He plotted with Austria against his own country. Chance game me knowledge of this, I spoke of it, but I did not know--how could I guess?--they trapped and duped me. When I realized what I had done, it was too late."
The silence that fell between them was difficult to define, and thus Marguerite endeavored not to attempt. Then he spoke, "It is perhaps a little difficult, Madame, to go back over the past. I have confessed to you that my memory is short, but the thought certainly lingered in my mind that, at the time of the Marquise' death, I entreated you for an explanation of those same noisome popular rumors. If that same memory does not, even now, play me a trick, I fancy that you refused me all explanation then, and demanded of my love a humiliating allegiance it was not prepared to give."
Marguerite's heart sank. "I wished to test your love for me, and it did not bear the test. You used to tell me that you drew the very breath of life but for me, and for love of me."
"And to probe that love, you demanded that I should forfeit mine honor," he said, but even as the words accused, his impassiveness and rigidity seemed to both fade. "That I should accept without murmur or question, as a dumb and submissive slave, every action of my mistress. My heart overflowing with love and passion, I asked for no explanation--I waited for one, not doubting--only hoping. Had you spoken but one word, from you I would have accepted any explanation and believed it. But you left me without a word, beyond a bald confession of the actual horrible facts; proudly you returned to your brother's house and left me alone… for weeks… not knowing, now, in whom to believe, since the shrine, which contained my one illusion, lay shattered to the earth at my feet."
To soothe her floundering heart, she now noted that, quite the opposite of his coldness and impassiveness, his voice now shook with an intensity of passion, which he seemed to make superhuman efforts in keeping in check.
Sadly, she said, "Aye! The madness of my pride! Hardly had I gone, already I had repented. But when I returned, I found you, oh, so altered, Wearing already that mask of somnolent indifference which you have never laid aside until… until now."
"Nay, Madame, it is no mask," he retorted coldly. "I swore to you… once, that my life was yours. For months now it has been your plaything… it has served its purpose."
However, most unfortunately for Sir Percy, his wife had already deduced the fact that even his current coldness was nothing but the very mask he denied. All of the pains and fears she had suffered throughout the opera, when Chauvelin had first held her brother's life over her head, and Lord Grenville's ball, where she had, out of desperation to save her brother, possibly revealed the identity of the Scarlet Pimpernel to Chauvelin, who was quite possibly the man's greatest enemy, they all came back to her then. However, there was no bitterness now; now there was the hope that this man who loved her would help her to bear the burden.
"Sir Percy," she said impulsively, "heaven knows you have been at pains to make the task which I had set to myself terribly difficult to accomplish. You spoke of my mood just now; well, we will call it that, it you will. I wished to speak to you… because… because I was in trouble… and had need… of your sympathy."
It amazed her that, while she was near to tears yet again, he was able to stand there so seemingly unmoved. "It is yours to command, Madame."
"How cold you are!" she said with a sigh of growing despair. "Faith! I can scarce believe that but a few months ago one tear in my eye had set you to well-nigh crazy. Now I come to you… with a half-broken heart… and… and…"
"I pray you, Madame," he said, and now his voice shook nearly as hers did, "in what way can I serve you?"
"Percy!--Armand is in deadly danger. A letter of his… rash, impetuous, as were all his actions, and written to Sir Andrew Ffoulkes, has fallen into the hands of a fanatic. Armand is hopelessly compromised… tomorrow, perhaps, he will be arrested… after that, the guillotine… unless… unless… oh! It is horrible!" she cried with a wail of anguish. In her mind she heard, over and over, that terrible 'either--or--?' that Chauvelin had given her, demanding that she betray the most heroic personage she had ever heard of in exchange for a brother who had been her entire world of most of her life. "Horrible!… And you do not understand… you cannot… and I have no one to whom I can turn… for help… or even for sympathy…"
Her tears, which she had endeavored to restrain to doggedly, could be held back no longer. In her mind's eye she saw her brother, her dear, beloved Armand, being lead to Madame Guillotine in Paris. The uncertainty of Armand's fate swamped her, and she teetered before falling against the stone balustrade, where she buried her face in her hands and sobbed bitterly.
As for her husband, he stood staring at her with what could possibly have been tears glistening in his own eyes. When Armand St. Just, and the peril in which he stood, had first arisen, Percy's face had paled a shade, and the look of determination and obstinacy was more apparent than ever. However, as he watched his wife's delicate frame shake with wrenching sobs, his eyes had softened. He did not, however, lose all pride.
"And so," he said with bitter sarcasm, "the murderous dog of the revolution is turning upon the very hands that fed it?" For Marguerite's part, such words only caused her to sob harder, until she was nearly doubled over with the weight of her fears and guilt over the fate of the St. Cyrs. "Begad, Madame," he added gently when her crying only increased, "will you dry your tears?… I never could bear to see a pretty woman cry, and I…"
Instinctively at the sight of her all-consuming helplessness and grief, and with a sudden overmastering passion, he stretched out his arms and would have seized her and held her to him. The urge to protect her from every evil with his very life, his very heart's blood, was strong, but pride had the better of it in his inner struggle once more. Percy restrained himself with a tremendous effort of will and said coolly, but still very gently, "Will you not turn to me, Madam, and tell me in what way I may have the honor to serve you?"
Marguerite sucked in a deep breath and pressed her hands violently to the balustrade, the stone scraping the soft palms over her hands as she made a fierce effort to control herself. She turned to him once more, the glistening tracks from the tears still on her cheeks, and held out her hand, which he kissed with the same automatic, punctilious gallantry. Her fingers, however, lingered in his for perhaps a second or two longer than what was necessary. His hand, she had perceived, was trembling slightly and was more than a little warm, whereas his lips had all the warmth of marble.
"Can you do aught for Armand?" she whispered, almost brokenly. "You have so much influence at court… so many friends…"
"Nay, Madame, should you not rather seek the influence of your French friend, M. Chauvelin? His extends, if I mistake not, even as far at the Republican Government of France."
She looked away, feeling the threat of tears once more. "I cannot ask him, Percy… Oh! I wish I dared to tell you… but… but… he has put a price on my brother's head, which…"
Oh, what she would have done for the courage to tell him all! What she had done--possibly betraying that great hero, the Scarlet Pimpernel--how she had suffered, how her hand had been forced. A great fear, however, kept her in check. She had been given hope that he still loved her, and her greatest wish was to win him back. She dared not put that tentative love in jeopardy by making another confession, one that could possibly render her more contemptible in his eyes. It was entirely possible that he would not understand, and would not sympathize with her struggles and temptations. His dormant love might perish entirely, and the thought was more than she could bear.
Percy's entire stance was one of intense longing--a veritable prayer for the confidence she fearfully withheld. When she remained silent he sighed tersely and said with marked coldness, "Faith, Madame, since it distresses you, we will not speak of it." A slight pause, and then: "As for Armand, I pray you have no fear. I pledge you my word that he shall be safe. No, have I your permission to go? The hour is getting late, and…"
"You will at least accept my gratitude?" she said with great tenderness, stepping yet even closer.
Percy quickly stifled the almost involuntary move he would have made to take her into his arms. Her eyes were still over bright with unshed tears, which he longed to kiss away. However, he was a man who learned from his mistakes: she had lured him once, just like this, then cast him off, rather like one would cast an ill-fitting glove. In his mind, this was naught but a mere mood, and he was too proud to fall prey to it once again.
"It is too soon, Madame!" was his quiet response. "I have done nothing as yet. The hour is late, and you must be fatigued. Your women will be waiting for you upstairs."
He stepped aside, allowing her to pass, and Marguerite sighed a sigh of disappointment. His pride and her beauty (such as it was when she was hysterical with grief) had been once more in direct conflict, and yet again his pride and come the victor. Perhaps she had been mistaken--perhaps what she had seen as love was naught but the passion of pride, perish the thought, hatred rather than love. She stared at him for a moment, as if the truth would somehow reveal itself. He, however, was as rigid, as impassive, as ever, and she came to the damning conclusion that she had, indeed, been wrong. He had no care for her.
He bowed to her ceremoniously, but she simply gave him a broken look before mounting the terrace steps, as if by continuing on her way she could some how cast away this man as he had so evidently cast away her. She focused on the soft sh-sh-sh sound her gown made as the train swept across the stone, because that sound was more real than anything else in that moment. She reached the top and laid a hand on the handle to the tall glass doors that led into the house, but stopped, looking back and hoping against hope to find him with open arms and calling her back. Her hopes, however, were instantly dashed: he had remained fixed in his place, the very picture of stubborn pride and ardent inflexibility.
She felt tears stinging her eyes once more, but refused to let him see, and so quickly turned and entered, running as fast as she could up to her own rooms.
Marguerite refused to stop running until she had reached her rooms, at which point she flung the door closed and sagged against it, struggling so severely to restrain her violent sobs that the exertion created a severe ache in her chest. Of course, she would have liked to say that it was caused merely from her struggle to withhold her tears, but she knew better: her heart was aching as fiercely as her lungs. He had loved her once, and only moments before she had been given hope that he might love her still. And yet… his parting words…
"Your ladyship must be very tired," the exhausted maid said, well nigh swaying on her feet.
"I am quite sure I will be presently," Marguerite said. "But go on. I will go to bed on my own."
"Are-"
"Go, Louise. I can see you are tired."
The woman left with a curtsy and a yawn, and Marguerite was left to her own company, for which she was grateful. With haste that was rather untoward of a lady, she shed herself of her gown and corset with little difficulty--she had, after all, done her own dressing during her years on the stage--and redressed in the most comfortable nightgown she owned. There was no point in holding her appearance to a high standard when there was no one to behold the fruit of her efforts.
She sat at her vanity then and began dissembling her hair from its elegant arrangement, watching her reflection. One by one, the pins fell with small clatters to the desk, though somehow the sound never once reached her ears. Marguerite knew, beyond any conceivable doubt, that she loved her husband. It had recently occurred to her that she always had, even when she thought her affections mere gratitude and appreciation for his unswerving devotion.
Now, however, she knew better. He was so very dear to her that it was painful to think of him, for she knew that no amount of love for her could change the contempt he looked at her with. She had sent the St. Cyrs to their deaths--no attempt to undo the damage would avail. And for that unintentional condemning, her husband would despise her forever. She reached up to remove one of the last pins from her hair, only to find that she had removed them all.
She sighed, feeling restless when she should have felt exhausted. Had Chauvelin discovered the identity of the Scarlet Pimpernel? What would befall Armand? Suddenly Marguerite smacked her hands atop her vanity and leaped to her feet, staring hard at the window. Chauvelin had been a friend! How could he do this to her? To Armand?
Again she sighed as she moved to look out the window. The sun was slowly rising, and though she had not gotten a wink of sleep, she was a far cry from being fatigued. Her worry for Armand, her upset that she may have betrayed that heroic figure, the Scarlet Pimpernel, and her stress over the capture and execution of either man was enough to create a great deal of nervous anxiety. After all, Armand had already departed for France days ago… What exactly was he doing there?
She attempted to calm herself. Percy had given his word that Armand would be safe, and the Scarlet Pimpernel had performed great feats upon more than one occasion. Surely everything would be all right. Yes, Chauvelin was very clever--he had once been her friend for a reason, after all--but the Pimpernel had to be equally clever, at least, to have evaded the French authorities for so long.
Marguerite stood very still for several long moments, toiling through her internal struggle. Then, very suddenly, she pursed her lips and jerked the curtains closed over the window. The situation was beyond her control, and it was time for her to go to bed.
Bingley House. London, England.
Caroline Bingley was not a woman known for concern for her fellow man, and therefore anyone who did not know her intimately would have been dreadfully perplexed by the look of extreme anxiety on her face. However dismissive she was in public, it was quite the opposite of her true personality. No one would ever suspect such a cold and apathetic woman of being one of the most active aids to the League of the Scarlet Pimpernel. Indeed, her engagement to Lord Anthony Dewhurst had created quite the stir in society, given that outwardly the two of them had little-to-nothing in common.
At that moment, however, Caroline hardly looked her part of the cold, distant, proud mistress of Netherfield Hall. She was unusually pale, and her face was taut and drawn with blatant worry. "Charles," she said, gripping her hands tightly, "I won't pretend to be unconcerned. If that note is still accurate, no one knows if these Bennét girls are even alive. The Committee had the men burn the house to the ground, and the younger three girls and the father were all arrested."
"And the mother was killed in the arrest, very true, but would Chauvelin have his lap dog searching for those two girls if they were dead?" her brother asked, and Caroline shook her head impatiently.
"Everyone knows that Marcellus Jerrard is obsessed with one of the Bennét twins," she informed him tersely. "Their relationship, and his shifting loyalties, were the scandal of the Continent when the revolution broke out thanks to her father's prestige, you know that."
"Which leads me to believe that those girls are still alive," Charles persisted, smiling easily at his sister. Caroline, however, was not so easily assuaged.
"It is difficult enough, with Lord Anthony constantly in that pit of death," she said shrilly. "If you go to France and are caught-"
"Don't worry, Caroline!" he laughed, going over to her and picking up her hands. "Tony knows what he's doing, we all do. You know that."
"Yes, but that Chauvelin is said to be the newest favorite with the Committee leaders, and he is not called a fox for nothing," she snapped, drawing her hands away. "And Marcellus Jerrard is following directly in his footsteps."
"Darcy and Blakeney would not send any of us on a suicide mission, Caroline. You know that they have a tendency to takes those themselves."
"Risking their own lives and running the chance of leaving Lady Blakeney or Georgiana on their own!" she cried, jumping to her feet. "None of you seem to realize the danger of what you do!"
"A few things for you to keep in mind, dearest sister," Charles said reasonably, placing his hands on her arms and giving them a reassuring squeeze. "One, we both know that neither Georgiana nor Lady Blakeney would be left uncared for if anything were to happen to their respective supporters, God forbid. Two, we all of us know perfectly well the danger of what we do, but we also know that we have good reason to do it. Would you let those innocent families be led to the guillotine?"
Caroline did not reply, which was answer enough for her brother; he grinned and said, "I thought as much. Given the opportunity, you would be right there beside us, and we both of us know it."
"That does not mean," she said archly, "that I am comfortable with my brother and my fiancée throwing themselves into such situations on a regular basis."
"Don't worry, Caroline," he said once again, taking her hand and squeezing it. "St. Just has already gone to find the imprisoned Bennéts, and tonight I'm off to find the twin girls. I shall return within two weeks, to be sure."
Caroline, again, did not reply, but this time it was not easy for her brother to read her. In truth, she didn't have the heart to tell him that she was very much afraid that he would be gone longer than two weeks. According to the note her brother still held, the Bennét family had been separated somewhere outside Marseille, which was a port city on the southern edge of France--quite a distance from Netherfield Hall. Not only this, but no one knew where the Bennét twins had disappeared to, not even Marcellus Jerrard, who was spearheading the French search for the twins.
No, Charles would be gone for a good deal longer than two weeks. That is, he would return later if he survived to return at all. The Bennéts were a high-profile family, thanks to their rank; France would not give them up easily.
Naturally, she did not say any of this. Instead she turned and faced her brother, adopting a smiling, calm expression that in no way betrayed her inner turmoil. "Of course, Charles," she said. "Now come with me; we are to have tea with Lady Newhurst, dreadful woman, and I refuse to endure it alone."
Charles' expression was horrified. "Why did you not tell me?" he cried. "That Newhurst woman has been trying to link my name to her daughter's for the past two years!"
Caroline laughed and took her brother's arm. "Perhaps you ought to just accept the inevitable and marry the girl. She would not prove to be terribly annoying, I'm sure."
"Not to you," Charles muttered. "You wouldn't be living with her!"
Very special thanks to: Jena: Lol, unfortunately for us all, it'll bea while before everyone meets, but as we go along they'll all end up closer and closer together.
percyismine: I'm so glad that the action bit was up to par! I'm always been particularly self-conscious of those, lol.
ArwenEvenstar83: Sorry this update took so long. Blame my school teachers and directors for that, lol. I hope it was worth the wait!
darksidetwin2: Oh, I'm so glad you like Josephine!I was afraid that most people would hate her, since she's an OC and will be taking up what could be a lot of Lizzy/Darcy time. Because she will. But not too much, so don't worry.
austen freak: I'm so glad you're enjoying this, and I hope I can keep it up to par! If I start slipping, let me know ASAP, lol!
Melly: I'm so glad you're enjoying this. Lol, I'm writing it for folks like you and me--obsessed with both but unable to find a way to link the two. I hope I'm not disappointing!
embracing: Lol, it'll be pretty crazy, confusing, and muddled up for a while. There are so many story lines to follow! We have Elizabeth and Jane, which split up at one point; Darcy, who mostly follows Elizabeth's; Charles, whose storyline mostly follows Jane's; Josephine; Richard; Georgiana and Caroline, along with Sir Andrew and Lord Tony; Percy; Marguerite; the younger Bennéts; Marcellus; Chauvelin;Armand... I'm sure there are more, too. Hopefully I'll be able to keep things fairly clear, lol.
