Free Uncertain Magic by Laura Kinsale Page A

when we're alone."
    He stared out at the water. "Don't I? How practical you are, Miss Delamore."
    "You may call me Roderica," she said generously.
    "I would far rather call you Roddy, as Geoff does. May I have that honor, or is it reserved for—" He paused, and then said with an odd quirk to his mouth, "—old friends?"
    "I'll never be properly dignified if everyone calls me
Roddy, "
she protested. "It sounds like a stableboy."
    "Ah, but I have a special fondness for stableboys. I'll call you Roderica until we're married, if you like. After that, I shall consider it my prerogative to choose what suits you best."
    They walked in silence for a while as he led her aimlessly among the tussocks of dried and windblown weeds. Finally she said, "You wanted to discuss something, my lord?"
    "Yes." He reached down and pulled a late-blooming wildflower, a ragged thing with tiny, colorless petals, and gave it to her absently. "We both know the advantages to me in this match." He lifted his head to gaze at the horizon. "I'd much like to know what advantages you see for yourself."
    Roddy looked down at the brittle stalk in her hands. "That's difficult to explain. Is it so important to you?"
    "It is," he said.
    "I want a family, my lord. Children."
    He tilted his head, probed her with a glance that was as hard and quick as blue metal. "Forgive me if I seem vulgar, but I can assure you that there are any number of men who could give you children. My… talents… in that area are hardly unique."
    "Nevertheless," Roddy maintained bravely, "I feel that we shall suit."
    He gave a humorless laugh. "What illusions are you laboring under, child?" He stopped and turned to face her. As he met her eyes, his brows drew downward. He reached out and gripped her shoulders in a savage shake. "Has no one told you about me?" he demanded. "God's mercy, will your friends let you do this blindly?"
    Roddy held his fierce gaze on the strength of willpower alone. "If there's aught to tell, my lord, I would rather hear it from you. As a man of honor."
    His hands fell away from her as if she had singed him. "
Honor
. There's a piece of drollery. Half the world would tell you I can't even spell it."
    Roddy said nothing.
I will not let him frighten me
, she promised herself, watching gamely as he tore another autumn weed from the earth and ripped the plant into tattered shreds. There was violence there, in the restless fingers that made quick work of destroying a wildflower. He dropped the crushed pieces as if they were nothing. "Shall I tell you, then?" His voice was harsh. He looked at her and then away. "Ahh... those eyes of yours. You scare me, little girl. Old…young…" He laughed, a distorted sound. "A man might fear Athena in all her wisdom never saw as much as you."
    Roddy pressed her hands together behind her back and swallowed. She kept her gaze resolutely from his face.
    "Where shall we start?" he said, with a lightness that was chilling. He took her arm and turned her toward the sea. "With my most recent sins, I think. I remember them more clearly. You'll forgive me if I give you a summary rather than an accounting—thirty-five years of corruption might be too much to stomach at one sitting."
    "My lord—"
    "Just lately," he went on, as if she had not spoken, "I have seduced the third daughter of George Compton of Asherby—her name is Jane, I believe, but I can never keep all these Marys and Janes and Elizabeths straight in my mind. She is to bear my child—so you see, Roderica, you have indeed selected a man with fertile seed. That should put to rest any fears you might have entertained on that score. This Jane…" He paused, as if searching his memory. "Ah, yes. I've blackmailed her father into paying her keep for me at the remote hunting lodge where I will continue to visit her until my carnal desire for her is glutted. When that time comes, I plan to cast her off entirely, but of course I shall continue to insist that her father pay me well to