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Elizabeth was in the sitting room, a book in her hands that she was not really reading, an art she had perfected to avoid being drawn into conversation with her mother, though such means to avoid her mother's attentions were unnecessary at the present moment, engrossed as she was in her tarot. The words on the page in front of her neglected, Elizabeth looked out of the window, smiling at the signs of unseasonal fresh growth out in the garden of Longbourn and the meadows beyond, Jane's happiness reflected in the corner of the world over which she had influence.
The contrast with the scene a few short weeks ago, when the last of the bright autumn sunshine had seemed somehow not to touch the changing leaves, was the confirmation, to Elizabeth, of all she had ever said to her elder sister about it being her power, not their mother's, that had long been the basis of the prosperity of their modest estate. Naturally, Jane had always demurred at the expression of such ideas, insisting, as was right and proper, that their mother was solely responsible for their prosperity, and when pressed by Elizabeth to admit that she knew better in her heart, allowing that perhaps all five of the Bennet sisters together could take some share of the credit. But now, when Jane was transformed by such perfect happiness as her engagement with Bingley permitted her, the truth was undeniable.
Of course, that same happiness meant that Jane's influence over Longbourn would soon be at an end. Elizabeth doubted that her own powers were sufficient to maintain the fertility of Longbourn, even as she found herself once more involuntarily recollecting the way she had felt when she had visited Pemberley with her uncle and aunt. They had not felt any of the strangeness of the way the paths around the estate never followed the ley lines, or the chill she had experienced as they walked deeper into the woods. It was almost as though the estate had been calling to her to be its mistress, desperate to be set free from the constraints that had been placed on it by hands in the veins of which the witchblood did not flow. That, of course, could never be the case; not after she had rejected its master's proposal so stridently. And yet she still could not quite give up the idea that Darcy's regard for her continued, the strongest proof her optimism advanced his involvement in the arrangement of Lydia's marriage to Wickham, rescuing the family's reputation and entangling himself once again with the man who he had every right to abominate for the way he had treated his beloved sister.
The recollection of the letter in which Darcy had unfolded the truth still caused Elizabeth pain. She could well understand, given such circumstance, how he could come to form a view that it was possible to be bewitched into loving another. It was the same accusation levelled at herself -- that she had practised some sort of sorcery to ensnare him -- that had been the most provoking statement he had made in his first proposal. When she examined her feelings, she knew that she would still have turned him down. But would she have done it differently, less fiercely? It was impossible to know.
Mrs Bennet exhaled sharply. Elizabeth knew that she would not long be permitted to ignore such an omen. "What is it, mama?" she asked, still without turning around.
"The thirteenth card!" Mrs Bennet said, rising from her table and pointing at the cards laid out on it in alarm. "Oh, Lizzy, I could feel it-- Go to the library, my dear, check that your father still lives! For if he does not, the curse of Longbourn shall fall upon us all! Oh, what is to become of us when Charlotte Lucas is mistress of this house?"
The curse on the estate, enacted by Mr Bennet's late great-uncle at the height of his madness, the last in that line of the family to have displayed the powers of the witchblood, was one of Mrs Bennet's most enduring preoccupations. It ensured equally that the estate needed more than most others those touched by the witchblood to maintain the rhythms of nature, but also that none such could themselves inherit. Many a night would Mrs Bennet have her daughters form a circle and attempt to counter it with whatever latest spell she had invented herself -- or, more recently, that Mary had found in one grimoire or another in the process of making her extracts. Many of these involved sacrifices; most could at least be repurposed as the foundation of a family meal, though Elizabeth always had to suppress a sense of annoyance when one of the chickens was employed; the opportunity to use it for her own haruspicy was regrettable. But though there had sometimes been signs and portents -- unnatural creakings and moanings in the structure of the house, strange winds blowing out their candles, even on a few occasions the cold touch of the beyond on one or another of their shoulders -- the curse had remained stubbornly in effect. Elizabeth knew that the fact that she and all four of her sisters had inherited the witchblood left her mother with little choice than to attempt such workings, but it seemed utterly fruitless. By all accounts, the wildness had taken over their great-uncle completely; such power could not be countered by those who themselves remained sane.
Elizabeth rose. "Do not you often remind me that we should not interpret the cards too literally?" she said, as mildly as she could. She remembered well another similar incident, a year or so earlier, just before Mrs Long had come calling with the news that Netherfield Park had been let. Her mother -- who had spent the half hour or so before the visit in a similar frenzy of speculation as to which of their relatives, friends or acquaintances might have passed on -- had quickly informed all and sundry that she had foreseen a great change in their fortunes in her divination, for the thirteenth card could just as easily mark the figurative death of one state of events and the beginning of another, for surely the new tenant would be destined for one of her daughters. In that, at least, she had this last week finally been proven correct.
"Indeed, my dear, but what else can it mean?" She clutched Elizabeth's arm. "Oh, but what if it is Mr Bingley? Or, what a cruel reversal of our fortunes that would be!" She crossed herself hurriedly, shocked at herself for having even expressed such a thought out loud.
"Mama! Mama!" Kitty came running into the room. "You will not believe it, Mama, a great coach is pulling up into the drive. La, it is the finest I ever saw. I was upstairs and I saw it; I do not recognise the livery at all--"
"You see?" Elizabeth said. "This new arrival must be what the cards foretold."
"Perhaps you are right. Oh! Or perhaps it is a messenger with grave news. I suppose I shall have to prepare my nerves to bear one further shock at least." Her mother led the way out of the room.
In the hallway, though, it was Elizabeth's nerves that suffered a fright. "What is it, Lizzy?" Kitty asked, at her audible reaction to seeing the livery on the coach.
"I believe we are to be favoured by a visit from Lady Catherine de Bourgh of Rosings Park," Lizzy said quietly.
"Oh, perhaps it is Mr Collins who has died!" Mrs Bennet said, sounding a little too pleased at the prospect. "That would be a turn of events, would it not? Though I know not who the next in line to the estate might be."
"That would be a great misfortune," Elizabeth said. "Let us of course pray that it is not the case. And perhaps we should consider how to best greet her ladyship."
"Indeed, indeed, Lizzy. And we must entertain her. Kitty, go and fetch Jane and Mary; make sure they are properly dressed." She shouted for Hill and they began a rapid conference about what refreshment might be offered to such a distinguished visitor.
Elizabeth stood in the hallway amongst all the hustle and bustle, quite at a loss to understand any possible reason Lady Catherine could have for visiting Longbourn. As far as she knew, Hertfordshire was quite out of the way of any journey she might usually undertake. She must have come on purpose to visit the Bennets. And since the only Bennet to whom she had ever been introduced was Elizabeth herself, the object of the journey must be some sort of tête-à-tête with herself. But what could such a great lady have to discuss with someone who knew herself to be a provincial girl of a very minor family beset by the ill fortune of a cursed estate? Could it possibly be related to the hope that she dared not even name to herself in this moment? If so, Lady Catherine would be very angry.
If this was the case, she did not betray it immediately. She spoke to Elizabeth with at least a bare minimum of civility, and even suffered to be spoken to by Mrs Bennet without an introduction. Then she had risen stiffly and remarked to Elizabeth that she should like to take a turn with her in the "kind of little wilderness" outside.
It was there, out of earshot of the other members of the household, though not perhaps the more curious inhabitants of the village, that Lady Catherine had confirmed Elizabeth's suspicions, and given fresh hope to her fondest wishes. After a brief peroration on the unusual nature of the engagement between Darcy and her daughter, she had asked her first to confirm that was not engaged to marry her nephew, to which Elizabeth could only reply with the truth, but when she pressed her on the point of whether she intended to become so, Elizabeth refused to make any commitment. This caused Lady Catherine to unleash a tirade about the unsuitably of her and her family and connections far superior to that of the gentleman in question when he had visited her at Hunsford Parsonage.
Looking behind Lady Catherine at the plants in the border, and the ivy creeping up the wall behind them, Elizabeth could see that she was doing a poor job indeed of mastering her emotions. They were growing before her very eyes, vines from the ivy spreading out across the floor. She kept herself in check sufficiently that they did not in fact envelop Lady Catherine, but she could feel their desire to be let loose, the temptation to surrender utterly to the wildness, become one with it as her great-uncle had, stronger than she had ever experienced before.
"I did not wish to have to do this, Miss Bennet," Lady Catherine said quietly. "Most sincerely, I did not. But you leave me with no choice."
And then, astonishingly, they were not alone in the garden at all. Lady Catherine was flanked -- had always been flanked, Elizabeth realised -- by two attendants who emerged from smoke and shadow into solid reality, tall and unnaturally thin. When Elizabeth tried to look at them, her eyes slid away from their features; everything about them was a blur of blue and black, the colours of the moonless night.
But even as she realised what she faced and why Lady Catherine had wanted to talk here particularly, even as the figures advanced, wings unfurling behind them, a greater understanding dawned in Elizabeth's mind. "Oh, I see it all now!" she said. "Indeed I do." The strange layout of the grounds of Pemberley was not the result of some lack of witchblood in the estate's stewards; old Mr Wickham -- as she imagined it must be, given his son's own prodigious, if unchannelled, talent -- had known precisely what he was doing, protecting the house and nearer grounds from the creatures in its woods. And the sickly, almost ethereal nature of Lady Catherine's daughter was all too readily explained with this new knowledge. "Miss de Bourgh is to be presented at court one day, after all. But not St James. No, not St James at all. The Unseelie."
The creatures screeched, and stood still, writhing in agony as they clawed at thin air in front of them.
Elizabeth could not know how long they would remain trapped, but she would not be denied a moment of triumph. "Oh, yes, I name you!" she shouted. "And I name your creature for what she is: a changeling!" Elizabeth ignored their agonised howls, addressing herself to the furious human figure behind them. "What happened, Lady Catherine? Did Rosings Park sicken and fail with such a mistress as yourself? Perhaps you told yourself you had no witchblood, but I rather fancy that you do. I rather fancy that your poisoned mind poisoned your land, that that is why you had to make a bargain with these oh-so-fair folk. And given them their due, they have been fair: they have seen to the prosperity of Rosings, and what was the price? That you ensured that their brethren in Derbyshire gained access to Pemberley. All it took was the sacrifice of your own daughter so that Darcy could be tricked into marrying one of theirs."
Her indignation at Lady Catherine's monstrous crime gave her power; she felt it coursing through her, and out into the ground around her, felt the blades of grass and the thorns on the roses and the bulbs lying dormant under the soil. All of it wanted to erupt, to lash out on her behalf, but, though restrained, her opponents were not without powerful magic of their own, and kept it at bay.
A stalemate. Would Lady Catherine retreat? Or did she think that she still had some chance to prevail? Perhaps she was not even in control; perhaps she had not been for many years.
An endless moment passed, and then, suddenly, the tide began to turn. Elizabeth felt the wildness swarming, enveloping the two figures and Lady Catherine in vines and rapidly growing shoots. Even the chickens had somehow escaped from their run and were running over the lawn, pecking away. Insects began to swarm around.
If Elizabeth had achieved such a feat herself, she would have been in danger of losing herself in the wild. But she realised that she was no longer alone. Behind her stood Jane, Kitty, even Mary, muttering from one of her books, and their mother, who seemed bewildered but had been dragged outside by her daughters in defence of their sister.
Overwhelmed, the writhing figures evaporated back into the air to escape the confinement of the greenery. Defeated, gone, but not destroyed. It was enough for now. The wildness subsided, the vines entrapping Lady Catherine slithering away.
"Sister," Jane said mildly as she stepped forward. "We came to enquire if Lady Catherine might enjoy some refreshment."
"I do not know you," Lady Catherine said haughtily, and stalked away to her carriage without another word.
The next few minutes were mostly employed in trying to provide some sort of explanation to the others of what had just occurred, and herding the chickens away from damaging the ornamental borders. It was perhaps for the best that Elizabeth had plenty to employ both mind and body, for the tumult in her most delicate feelings was considerable. Lady Catherine's attacks -- both verbal and magical -- confirmed what she had dared not hope, that Darcy intended to propose to her once again. She knew that if he were to do so, she would accept. And that it would be something indeed to be mistress of Pemberley; not so much an opportunity as a responsibility, ridding the shades of Pemberley of the pollution they suffered under. There would be much to learn about how to go about such a task, much she did not yet know. She knew, however, that there were ways to find out.
She picked up the last of the chickens still running around the lawn and took it inside with her.