Magic in the Stars (23 page)

Theo grabbed her and kissed her so thoroughly that she forgot
what she was protesting. How could he do this to her so easily?

When he finally dragged her over to open the door, she was
afraid to face the people on the other side. She wasn’t the same person she’d
been a few minutes ago. Could they tell?

“Theo,” he whispered as he turned the key. “I am Theo to my
family. And you are my family now.” He opened the door wide.

With four large intimidating Ives men scowling down at her,
Aster was not entirely certain she wished to be family. Even the marquess, in
stocking feet and with his coat askew, managed to glare sightlessly at the squeak
of the opening door.

“My betrothed, gentlemen,” Theo announced with hauteur.
“Stand back and let us pass.”

Wordlessly, Cousin Emilia swatted the men out of her way,
grabbed Aster by her arm, and swearing under her breath, dragged her barefoot through
the upper corridor.

“Have you lost your mind?” Emilia asked after Aster directed
her to the proper room and they’d closed the door. “Those men will eat you
alive!”

“I am not a fluffy meringue,” Aster protested, hunting
through her meager wardrobe for an unburnt gown. “I don’t have time to argue
this under the circumstances. Are any of the guests left?”

“Bree and Dee can see them off. Your Ives savages most
certainly won’t. Instead of looking after children and guests, they were
fighting over who got to break down the door!” Emilia rummaged through drawers,
looking for stockings. “You cannot mean to marry that brute who carried you off
and compromised you as if you were naught but a maid!”

“He told me there’s another planet I know nothing about.” She
was too agitated to even begin to understand what that would mean to her
legions of charts.

Presented with the ugly stocking she had to draw on, Aster
sighed in confusion. A lifetime of a man massaging her toes . . .
might almost be worth living with savages.

But she had vowed never to endanger anyone again by ignoring
what the planets told her.

“And you
believe
him? Men will say anything to get what they want!” Emilia handed her a pair of
ankle-high walking shoes. “I think we need to take you directly home.”

Aster looked up in alarm as reality sank in. “Oh, the party
is over! I do need to go home. But the marquess has just come out of his room,
and there’s so much more to be done—”

But Emilia was right. She couldn’t stay here. It was only a
betrothal, after all.

As much as she longed to be with Theo, to manage his unruly
household, to hug all the twins . . . She didn’t belong here.
She might never belong anywhere except alone.

***

Once the entertainment was over, their guests scattered
back to the food, the fire, or their carriages to spread the gossip. Theo
dragged his hand through his hair and watched forlornly as Aster escaped with
her cousin.

“Now that little contretemps is over, I need to talk with
you, old chap.” Pascoe broke up the remaining crowd by pounding the marquess on
his back and steering him down the corridor with a friendly arm around his
shoulder. Both men were similar in height and looked to be good friends out for
the evening—even though Dunc was only half-dressed and Pascoe was keeping him
from bumping into statues.

Still shaken by the enormity of what he’d just done, Theo simply
watched them depart. Having just turned his entire life on its head, he wasn’t
certain what he should do next. If he couldn’t kidnap Aster and carry her off
to an altar, he needed distraction while he fretted over what Aster’s family
was telling her right now. Not having to deal with Duncan left him
empty-handed.

He turned back to Jacques and Erran. “Who’s minding the
brats now that their fathers are squirreling themselves away in a cave?”

Instead of answering, his brothers regarded him with
something akin to awe. “You talked the lady into marriage? After we nearly set
her on fire?” Jacques asked.

“With goats involved?” Erran added, shocked into speaking.

“Are there any more where you found her?” Jacques demanded with
interest.

“Downstairs.” Theo started in that direction—until he winced
and glanced down at his crisped shoes. “And the wealthiest one just escaped
with my betrothed. Keep your eyes open, idiots. Which ladies fled and which
ones didn’t?”

“Wealthy?” Jacques glanced after the ladies, who were
already out of sight. “She was about to pry the hinges off with a fire poker.
She’s a
lady
?”

“Viscount McDowell’s eldest. Maternal grandfather left her a
fortune, if she marries.” Theo tottered toward his room, holding the more
damaged part of his feet off the ground.

He thanked the heavens that Aster had not noticed his burns,
or she’d blame herself for bringing more
danger
to his doorstep. Kissing her into mindlessness had been well done on his part,
he thought in satisfaction. And if he thought too long about her kisses, he’d
forget his brothers and hunt her down for more.

Learning to deal with a wife could almost be as intriguing
as studying the stars, if his damned family would leave him alone.

“Two more of them downstairs,” Jacques said helpfully. “A
bit young, but pretty.”

“One of them is already betrothed,” Theo warned, assuming
Azenor—Aster’s—companions were brave enough to linger. “But someone ought to be
down there seeing off our guests and rounding up the nursery set.”

Erran threw a longing look down the corridor and muttered, “Termagant.”

Theo ignored that idiocy and returned to his chamber to the
horrified cry of Jones, Duncan’s valet. He thought the man would have hysterics
before he got him out of the damned tight trousers and into something more
comfortable and less charred.

Theo was debating how he would pull boots over his damaged
feet when a light knock rapped at his door. The valet answered it, wearing his
best disdainful air. Theo began to consider hiring one of Aster’s footmen in Jones’s
place. He didn’t like feeling he was sartorially challenged and less
aristocratic in comparison to his own damned servant.

He debated rising at the murmur of a feminine voice on the
other side of the door, but Jones closed the panel before Theo could summon the
energy.

“The lady sent an unguent for your burns,” Jones said, nose
high in the air. “Shall I dispose of it?”

“Bring it here.” Theo sniffed the concoction and decided it
stank bad enough to be useful. He rubbed some on the worst sores and wished he
had Aster here to do it for him. He might never forget the bliss on her face
when he’d rubbed her feet.

How fast could he obtain a marriage license and have her to
himself?

First, he’d have to convince her to actually marry him.

And then he’d have to convince himself that sharing a
lifetime with a doomsayer and believer in magic was worth the creature comfort
she might provide. He was desperate enough to believe anything—but her demand
to be presented to the Astronomical Society would destroy his credibility with
the men to whom he wished to sell his telescopes.

Aster spread her chart and Theo’s on the floor of her
bedchamber while Bree and Dee looked on. Nessie had retired to her room after
all the excitement. Emilia had gone back to town with the last of the guests,
unable to persuade Aster to leave with her.

She had not fulfilled her duty and found Theo a
suitable
wife. She simply could not
abandon him until she’d had a chance to consider his insane proposal.

Although her wicked heart screaming
yes, yes, yes
! wasn’t helping rational thought.

“Uranus complicates everything!” she wailed once she’d
examined her calculations, even knowing her sister and cousin had no idea what
she meant.

She shook the pamphlet Theo had given her explaining the
mathematics of the new planet’s position. “There are only twelve months in our
solar year. We cannot add a
thirteenth
house to the Zodiac just because we’ve discovered a new planet. Mercury rules both
Gemini and Virgo because it goes around the sun so rapidly. I cannot substitute
a slow-moving planet like Uranus.
Why did
no one tell me about Uranus
?”

“Because you were using old journals from the last
astrologer in the family and none of us are scientists?” Bree suggested. “It’s
not as if any of our family is likely to obtain scientific tracts on
astronomical discoveries much less
read
them.”

“Theo says there may even be more planets than we have seen,
ones even slower to orbit the sun than Uranus,” Aster said gloomily, glaring at
her no-longer relevant charts. “Nothing computes anymore.”

“How about marriage?” Dee asked helpfully. “You seem to have
calculated nicely into that. Why not roll up your charts and think about
weddings? Will his lordship have banns called or go to town for a license?”

“But I must be certain marriage is safe!” Aster stabbed her
finger at all the danger signs in her chart. “How does Uranus affect these?”

“The same way it affects everyone else in the world who
can’t read charts,” Bree said impatiently. “You are betrothed. You must write
our parents and make plans. You must have a
life
for a change, instead of worrying about what
might
happen!”

Aster didn’t know how to have a life anymore, not one that
included people she cared about—
more
than cared about. The power her scientific lordship exerted over her was beyond
frightening . . . and well into thrilling. But marriage to him meant that she’d have
to give up everything familiar—her snug nest, her friends in the city—and move
even further from her family, for a dangerous household bordering on madness.

Marriage meant babies.

Which was why she was wildly attempting to find reassurance
in her charts. The change he asked of her was so immense . . .

Change
. Uranus could
explain the inexplicable gap in her chart
here
 . . . .
If Uranus affected her sun at . . .

As her instincts kicked in, she scrambled to make the
calculations, forgetting Bree and Dee and the world beyond the scrolls on the
floor.

She was still at in the wee hours of the morning, well after
everyone had yawned and wandered off to their beds after an exhausting day.

She needed to tell Theo about these new points, here and
here and here. They showed up on all the charts of Theo and his brothers! What
an extraordinary conjunction of sun transits and Saturn. All pointed toward
accomplishment, allegiance . . .
love of brethren
!

If she took that into conjunction with Uranus as an
influence . . .

But Theo still had Catastrophe conjuncting with
Commerce—would that be his glass manufactory?

She almost had all the new lines drawn when she heard a
horse thundering from the stable.
From
the stable? She glanced out to see a large man in an old caped redingote ride a
mighty steed down the drive.

It couldn’t be the marquess. Theo’s uncle then? And he’d
left the children here?

Realizing she ached all over from sitting stiffly on the
floor all evening, she debated leaving her final calculations until morning. The
instinct
Theo had said was more
important than her charts said she was on the right track, and her heart was
immeasurably lighter with hope.

If her mathematics were correct, Uranus was an
enormous
factor in her life. No wonder
her chart and her life were in such conflict! Her new chart opened up endless
possibilities—not necessarily of the good kind.

She must have all the information the Astronomical Society
possessed before she agreed to any dangerous commitments. What if she was still
misreading the charts and there were more planets of doom affecting her or Theo
or their families? She needed to know
everything
.

But Theo had promised to help her, which relieved a huge
part of her burden. Just having knowledge within her grasp, she felt bolder.
Instead of crawling between the covers, she wanted to head for the bathing room
in the middle of the night. That wasn’t all she wanted, but until she was
married . . .

Her pulse accelerated at just the thought.
Married
. If she had drawn the lines
correctly . . . she might marry. And maybe have children. She
was too afraid to consider all the potential interferences just yet.

One change at a time—did she wish to live here in this
foreign territory with madmen? Well, not madmen. Stability simply wasn’t in
their charts. Their stars were littered with bravery and valor, individuality,
and discord—elements that disrupted stability, if nothing else. She’d need the
courage of a pride of lions to survive.

Deciding to follow her brave new instincts and take
advantage of what might be her new home, she gathered up her robe and candles
with a vow to make use of the beautiful tub. She deserved a good long soak in
warm water.

She almost retreated the moment she stepped into the
corridor.

Barefoot and in shirtsleeves again, Theo leaned against the
wall across from her room. He looked fatigued and worried, but he smiled with
such delight at her appearance that she didn’t have the heart to scold. She
halted, clutching her clothes to her chest, waiting for explanation.

“Pascoe just left,” he said, as if that explained
everything. When she waited, he sorted for the clarification that didn’t always
come easily to him. “He and Duncan have heaped more work on my incredibly
limited abilities. I watched the light in your window the whole time we talked
and wondered if you were packing and planning on abandoning me come dawn.”

“I was recalculating our charts,” she whispered, not wanting
anyone to overhear. “Your glass manufactory may be in danger in this next week.
But studying all of you together has been enlightening. If I am correct, you
can defeat all these terrifying knives hanging over you by working together.
Your aspects are in perfect alignment for allegiance to lead to
accomplishment.”