For Darkness Shows the Stars

one had any idea that ‘Ben’ was Benedict North. Only Andromeda had ever seen him.”
    So that’s why she’d been crying at the race. Elliot could imagine the shock the Post must have had to realize how close she’d been to her old tormentor. To realize that he was the heir to the North estate.
    Baroness Channel and the admiral came out onto the porch, followed by Kai. His face was drawn, and there was murder in his dark eyes.
    “My dear,” the baroness said to Elliot, her veil shaking in indignation, “I just heard from Nicodemus what your father did. Are you all right?”
    “I will be,” said Elliot, “as soon as I can be assured that the people on the North estate are in good hands.” It was even more important than before. Whatever faults her father had, he was not exploiting his workers. Once Benedict took over, there was no telling what he’d do.
    Felicia called the baroness to deliver Tatiana’s note, and Elliot looked at Kai. He stood apart from the others, leaning against the wall of the house and staring unabashedly at Elliot. His hands were clenched at his sides. Elliot caught her breath as she realized his anger was not on Andromeda’s behalf. It was on hers.
    “Where is Ro?” he asked her softly, as if they were the only two people on the porch.
    “There.” Elliot strangled the sob that rose in her throat. “My father made her watch me leave.”
    “I’ll go get her.”
    “No,” Elliot said. “He’s promised to shoot any of the North workers who cross the border between our estates.”
    “I’ll go fast.”
    “It’s too dangerous.”
    “ Very fast,” Kai insisted.
    “No, you won’t,” said Felicia, cutting in on their tête-à-tête. “Luddites have guns, don’t you remember? We aren’t going to risk either of you getting shot just to make a point. Even if you are successful, it will only incite the baron to be more unreasonable.”
    Kai shoved away from the wall. “He’s always at a maximum level of unreasonable.”
    Felicia went on. “Ro isn’t in any danger tonight.”
    “Oh really?” Andromeda drawled. “Even with Ben there?”
    “Ann!” said Felicia sharply. “Stop it. You’re just trying to scare Elliot now.”
    But Elliot wasn’t scared. Not of Benedict and Ro. For he still wanted to marry Elliot and get his hands on the shipyard, a situation he was smart enough to realize would never happen if he did anything to hurt her Reduced friend. Still, she had no desire to leave Ro alone on the North estate in the long term.
    “Fine, Felicia,” she said. “What will we risk? We can’t take my friends off the North estate by force, and even if we could, the rest of the estate would suffer.”
    “One crisis at a time, Miss Elliot,” came the baroness’s voice from across the porch. “And unfortunately for your little Reduced friend, this one takes precedence.” She held out Tatiana’s note.
    Dear Baroness Channel,
    Due to unforeseen circumstances, the funeral for Chancellor Elliot Boatwright will not be able to proceed as planned. We are unable to gain access to the beach where the Boatwright’s pyre is, and must therefore lay him in the North family tomb inside our star-cavern sanctuary. We hope to see you at the ceremony at sunset.
    Sincerely,
    Tatiana North

Forty
     
    ELLIOT WAS TOLD THAT the Boatwright’s funeral was very sparsely attended, most of the Luddites having vacated the North estate as soon as the story of Elliot’s banishment and the baron’s change of funeral locale got around. Idly, Elliot wondered which more offended their neighbors: the fact that the baron had disowned his by-all-accounts capable and hardworking daughter for daring to accept the bequest of her grandfather, or the way he dishonored his father-in-law’s funeral rights. No one could remember a Boatwright whose body had not been sent out to sea.
    He’d done it to spite her—of that Elliot was sure. If her grandfather was not put on the pyre and sent off to sea from the Boatwright estate, then Elliot would not be able to witness it. She’d kept Tatiana’s note to the baroness, reading it over and over for some hint of her sister’s state of mind when she wrote it. But it had been carefully crafted to contain nothing but a simple conveyance of information and common courtesy.
    That’s what made it so curious. Elliot had rarely seen Tatiana without an opinion or a sarcastic remark. She’d lived with her sister’s cruelty and self-importance all her life.