Elizabeth again found Darcy listening to his sister play. Forcing herself to smile, she bid Georgiana to continue her practice while she consulted with her husband. Once outside the music room, she near dragged Darcy to his room, where she insisted on him holding her in bed.

Happy to be embracing his Elizabeth, Darcy was yet puzzled by how upset she seemed.

"Dear Elizabeth, whatever can be wrong?"

"Oh Fitzwilliam, it is Mary. She is so very unhappy, and I don't see any path to happiness for her."

Darcy hugged her closer and soothed her hair. "Mary is a sensible girl. It does not seem possible for her to have entered into an impossible situation."

"And yet she has," she confessed. "It is so sad, tragic, even. I have never seen her love anyone, and this love is so… so worthy. Yet utterly impossible."

"Mary is in love with someone?" Darcy asked, surprised. The plain-looking girl did not inspire him with thoughts of helpless passion.

"Yes, she is terribly in love, so terribly that she is prepared to turn about and go back to Longbourn immediately."

A terrible fear that his sister-in-law had become infatuated with him paralyzed Darcy momentarily.

"Who is the man?" he asked fearfully.

She looked at him and shook her head, tears filling her eyes.

"Did she tell you?" he asked, puzzled.

Elizabeth hedged, unable to tell him directly.

"They became friends so quickly, they had so much to admire in one another," she explained.

Darcy looked at her blankly. "I thought she had no friends but Georgiana," her admitted. She looked at him, willing him to comprehend.

Still puzzled, Darcy asked what she meant. She took a deep breath and explained.

"Mary has fallen in love with Georgiana."

He shook his head slightly. "Mary has fallen in love with Georgiana?" he repeated, still uncomprehending.

"Yes, she feels very deeply. I am concerned for her health if this continues."

Darcy tried to take this in but could not. "But, Elizabeth, they are both girls."

Elizabeth laughed helplessly. "Yes, I know. And yet, Mary is in love with Georgiana. I gather that your sister was speaking of your love for me, and Mary came to understand that her feelings were like those of a husband for his wife."

Darcy was stunned. That his rash actions had caused gossip was one thing. That they had recoiled on him in this completely unforeseen manner took him as a blow in the dark to the back of the head. Elizabeth was very glad she had bade him lie down with her, and she cradled him in her arms, murmuring encouragement.

He held onto her as the oar, and the great comfort of her love made it possible for him to comprehend someone loving Georgiana as he did his Elizabeth. He had known that Georgie might be courted. He had judged the set at the fashionable watering place as fit company for her, then dismissed the matter from his mind.

He flushed to remember that at the time, his primary concern had been that Bingley was to bring his sisters for a long visit, Caroline no doubt having pressed her brother to ask for the invitation, and he had wished Georgiana out of the way of the maneuvering Bingley sisters.

Rather than forfeit the pleasure of Bingley's company — and that of Caroline, whose flirtation had yet to become tedious — he decided that Georgiana's health, always vaguely understood between his father and himself to be poor, required good sea air and pleasant society. He had quickly chosen Ramsgate, convenient to town and well-recommended by physicians trusted by the highest in the land. He settled Georgiana there with Mrs. Younge, who had been recommended by one of Louise's acquaintance. He flushed to think of how badly that had turned out, and the thought struck him that his taking of Elizabeth had perhaps been not the sole time he had acted without concern for the happiness of others.

"I've been selfish," he blurted out to her, desperate for her understanding.

Elizabeth felt buffeted. First Mary's helpless love, now a crisis of realization. She held him close and encouraged him to speak.

Darcy reflected, then saw himself and found himself recoiling from the comfort so proffered. Drawing back, he explained, "No, I don't deserve your sympathy. I've been so vilely selfish that I cannot tolerate myself."

Having received no small measure of comfort from their embrace, herself, Elizabeth blinked back tears and tried to think of what to say.

Seeing her struggle to speak, Darcy forced himself to break the silence. He explained to his motivations in placing Georgiana at Ramsgate, then confessed to several other such thoughtless deeds of expedience over the course of the years. Left unsaid were his trespasses toward her. She had forgiven him, but he could not feel confident of that in this new light. To himself, he seemed so irretrievably vile that no person should want anything to do with him.

Elizabeth was pained to see such self-reproach on his face, his posture collapsing to one of self-immolation.

She desperately thought of how to draw him from his self-reprimand, but nothing came to her, so she merely sat by, waiting for him to come to himself once more.

Darcy broke the surface of his suffering some timeless interval later. Elizabeth was sitting, alert, looking at him with grave concern on her face. He desperately wished for her touch but felt himself unworthy.

He again forced himself to speak. "I'm sorry, I haven't been thinking of Mary in all this. You said you are concerned for her health?"

"I have never seen her so distressed," she said. "She seems to be not resting, unable to eat, scarcely able to speak. She mastered herself enough to request me to tell her immediately if you wished her to go from the house. She said she had noted an inn on the way that she could reach on foot to await my father's servant, if that was your will."

Darcy blanched at this reflection on himself.

"I am sorry that your sister sees me as such an ogre. I cannot comprehend asking her to go from our home for the sin of loving my sister."

Elizabeth swiftly rose to convey the message of amnesty. She found the door to Mary's room open. Mary was collapsed in a chair and Georgiana was standing over her, attempting to console her. Georgiana looked up at Elizabeth helplessly. She smiled and thanked the girl for checking on her sister, but said she must have a private word with her. Reluctantly, Georgiana withdrew.

Elizabeth quickly told Mary that she must not worry, Darcy would not turn her from the house, and he was not angry. Mary sagged in relief, then anxiety struck again.

"And you, Lizzy, you do not think me terrible?" she asked peering into her sister's face. Elizabeth assured her that she could never think her terrible for loving so well.

Mary burst into tears again, and Elizabeth heard a timid tap at the door. She answered it to find Georgiana, who looked to Mary and looked stricken to see her again crying.

"I didn't go far, and I thought I heard…" she said. Elizabeth looked at her, filled with sympathy.

"I think she could use your comfort," she told her, leaving them to seek Darcy.

She found him pacing up and down his room. At her entrance he started for her, then held himself back. She went to him and drew him to her. He could not resist her embrace and let her hug him then lead him to the bed to sit with her arms wrapped around him. He attempted once or twice to object, but her fingertips found his lips to still his self-condemnatory speech, and suddenly it was much more important to kiss her fingers than to warn that she should not be near him. Quickly they shed their clothes and climbed into bed.

Georgiana was consumed with concern for Mary. She would not speak, but only sat slumped in the chair, the neckline of her dress drenched in tears. The inconsolable girl stared ahead, seeming insensible to all Georgiana's attempts to comfort her.

A slight tap at the door roused Georgiana from her vigil, and a housemaid proffered a jug of cider. "With compliments from the new cider master, my lady," she said.

Georgiana thanked her and placed it on the table, returning her attention to Mary, who sat unmoving.

She knelt before her, clasping her friend's hands in hers and peering into her face, implored her confidence.

"Please, Mary, if there is aught in this world that troubles you, I would share it with you."

Sobs again started deep in her chest, and Mary felt that of all the possible torments, this must be the worst: Her beloved, begging for the confidence that must tear them apart forever. She would be soon sent from Georgiana, perhaps tomorrow. She forced the despair down and drew shuddering breaths until she was able to look Georgiana in the face again, desperate to fix in her memory the countenance of her beloved.

Relieved to see her friend in some command of herself, even if her eyes still contained desperate depths, Georgiana offered to pour some of the cider, as they had taken so little at tea. The thought of sharing this girlhood treat with Georgiana filled some aching corner of her heart with warmth, and she managed to nod. Eagerly, Georgiana brought cups and poured the drink. It sparkled on the tongue and hinted at sweetness mingled with the rich tartness of the apple. As heart weary as Mary was, the beverage cheered. It seemed akin to her friend, suffused with the sweetness of summer.

"I see why you like this," Mary said, taking another sip. The cider seemed to warm her from within, effectively opposing the freezing resolution that she had imposed on herself.

Georgiana took a sip, then a larger drink.

"This is better than I remember," she said. "It is so much better than the wine and punches I have tried."

Mary found that she had drained her cup, and Georgiana picked up the jug and poured again.

Soon, the bottoms of their cups were again peering at them, and Mary found that she was explaining to Georgiana how she was like the cider.

"When I think of you in the sun, in the orchard… this sweetness," she gestured as Georgiana poured again, "It is… you."

Georgiana giggled, the warm glow of the cider restoring their happy intimacy. She found herself attempting to demonstrate in dance the happy action of the bubbles in the drink upon one's spirits. Then she and Mary were dancing to their own joined voices, their feet seeming floating above the floor as they whirled like apple blossoms on a breeze.

Gazing into her friend's face, it occurred to Georgiana that Mary's lips would be sweet as the cider. She drew close and pressed her lips to Mary's, her hands stroking Mary's arms, the slight down on them a delight of softness.

It seemed to Mary that she had returned to her dream of Heaven, that Georgiana, bathed in golden light, was showing her paradise, and she drew close to imbibe the divine lesson from her.

Georgiana's hands slid up and down Mary's arms. The feel of her so close, both in body and in mind, filled her with such happiness that she thought she might kindle to flame.

"Oh, Mary," she cried softly. "My dear love." Drawn irresistibly, she kissed her again, her arms closing about Mary to draw her closer to her breast.

This, truly, was Heaven. A feeling of blessedness permeated Mary, and she spoke reverentially, "I love you, Georgiana." The words seemed as sacraments as she spoke, and a great peace settled in her heart.

"I love you, too, Mary," she replied, made nearly unbearably, deliriously happy by her friend's escape from sadness to joy. The contrast rendered her bliss transcendent.

Mary, everything about her from her quiet prickliness to her hot protectiveness, filled her world. She was an ever-changing mystery and a comfortable daily reality in one, and that Mary had agreed to stay with her indefinitely had changed the prospect of her life from gloomy to blessed.

Mary pressed her lips against Georgiana's, the touch awakening an incandescent glow within her. Georgiana feverishly kissed her back, her hands sliding through Mary's hair to touch her scalp and neck, drawing shivers.

Then Mary was speaking from the heart, telling Georgiana that wherever she was, that was Mary's home and she never wished to go from her. Georgiana, replying that their home should be ever together.

The fear of her beloved loathing her for her love had fallen away, leaving only the bright assurance of mutual affection.

Couldn't resist the cider. Brewed right, a quite strong cider can be very palatable.

I can't believe how close we're getting to the end of "I Will Have You." Just seven more chapters after this! If you'd like an advanced reading copy of my upcoming novel and/or short story collection (free in hopes of a review), please message me or email me at kaurifish at .

Thanks for reading!

Kaurifish