Author's Notes

Believe me, no one is as surprised as I am right now.

Practice Makes Perfect

"Fitzwilliam?" Darcy heard Elizabeth call, voice softened with the lateness of the hour and the partially closed door between them. "I need you."

Drying his face with a linen and replacing it beside the washbasin, he crossed their bedroom and admitted himself into Elizabeth's adjoining dressing room. He found her sitting before her vanity table. She'd exchanged her evening dress for a nightgown; her hair, however, was still pinned up in the intricate coiffure she had worn for the Masons' dinner.

Elizabeth met his gaze through the looking glass, her chin in her hand and one corner of her lips curling into a self-deprecating smile. "I have met my match in Lily's latest triumph."

He raised an eyebrow, not entirely sure he understood. "Have you?"

"Oh yes," she replied as she watched his reflection draw closer. "I sent her off to bed, she was feeling not quite the thing—"

"I'll have Mrs Reynolds send for the apothecary if she's still unwell come morning," said Darcy, garnering a tender look from Elizabeth even as she continued.

"—and I have exposed my pride to ridicule in doing so." She pulled on a curl framing her face and let it slip from between her fingers to spring back into place.

"Surely it can withstand a little?" Darcy teased.

She gave a delighted laugh. "A very little, I suppose. In the meantime," she straightened up on the ottoman, "I need your help to free myself."

"Mine?"

Darcy would admit to himself later that his tone held a touch more alarm than the situation warranted. Her eyes danced, and he wanted nothing so much as to kiss her even though—or perhaps because—she was laughing at his expense.

"Elizabeth," he reasoned, "in all things, you know I should be very happy to help, but this calls for a more practiced hand than mine. Let me ring for one of the maids. I'm sure any one of them would be willing to assist you."

"And wake half the staff at this hour? No, no, the pair of us in concert, at least, must be equal to a few fanciful curls and some finery. Anything less is shameful and I forbid it."

He rested his hands on her shoulders, already knowing he had lost but trying one last time. "I am not used to such delicate work."

She turned to kiss his fingertips pertly. "I forgive you in advance for any undue tugging or tangles."

With all the patience of a governess, she talked him through finding by touch alone some cleverly hidden pins here and unfurling an end of the ribbon there. It was not very many minutes until her mass of curls was tumbling down her back.

Darcy caught himself grinning.

"You see?" Elizabeth said brightly. "And I daresay you might be the gentlest lady's maid I've ever had. But I release you from your duties, I can manage from here."

He hesitated a moment. Then he reached for the gilded brush on her vanity table and met her eye in the glass once more. The expression on her face was something new, and he liked it very much indeed.

"I would hate to leave my work only half done. What next?"

.*.

Elena's hand crept up to touch her hair for the third time in as many minutes.

"Almost done," Darcy admonished gently, a laugh rumbling low and warm in his throat. "Almost done . . . and . . . there. Go on, have a look."

No sooner had the words left his mouth than Elena was scrambling to her feet and over to the brook. He watched her drink in the sight of her own reflection before turning back to him with eyes that shined like stars.

"It's just like a real fairy's hair!" she cried, bouncing on her toes and breathless with excitement. Elena did look like a little wood nymph—barefooted, rosy cheeked, and wildflowers weaved into her dark tresses.

"What do you think, Adrianna?" he asked of his handiwork.

From her place in his lap, his younger daughter clapped. "Fairy hair!" While her auburn hair was yet too baby fine for plaiting, Elena had fashioned her sister a wreath of flora with Darcy's help. Adrianna bore her crown as regally as any queen.

"What have we here?"

Elizabeth stood at the top of the hillock, looking upon them all with such keen affection that it made Darcy's heart ache.

A chorus of mama, mama rang out as the girls ran through the tall grass to meet her, Elena latching onto one of her hands while Adrianna gripped fistfuls of her mother's skirts. Darcy watched Elizabeth look from one to the other in mock astonishment.

"But who are these little creatures? Fitzwilliam, did you trade our children away to Queen Mab?"

"No, Mama, that's silly. It's us!"

With a furrowed brow, Elizabeth knelt. She reached out and cupped each girl's face in her hands, making a show of studying them carefully while turning them this way and that. At last, her face cleared.

"It is you. Oh, thank goodness!"

Elena giggled as a kiss was pressed to the tip of her nose. "I told you."

"Look it, Mama!" said Adrianna, tipping her head down so her mother might admire her flower crown.

"I see it, my love." Elizabeth lightly fingered the delicate petal of a harebell tucked behind her ear. "You both look beautiful. Whoever helped you with your hair?"

"Papa did! He's the best at braids, even if he is a boy."

"The best, the best!" Adrianna echoed.

"Yes," murmured Elizabeth in honeyed tones as she met his gaze, "he is."

End Author's Notes

RED

(exit stage left)