Tempest

I. Grey Skies
the clouds that never clear

-~o~-

I can do this, Elizabeth Bennet reassured herself, smoothing the waterlogged folds of her black crepe gown. Failure, after all, was not an option.

The rain splattered against her ruined coiffure, thick strands of chestnut hair spilling out of their careful arrangement as she hurried down the pebbled path towards the manse looming in the distance. Wind slammed into her with each step; the biting cold spread through her drenched garments as her teeth chattered. Once, she thought bitterly, she would have had a parasol, or even a hired carriage. If things were different, she could have grieved for her father, mourned him as he deserved, instead of being forced into this act of desperation.

Had it only been her, she would have taken her chances at finding employment as a governess or even a servant, eking out a meager but respectable living. But she could not condemn her sisters and mother to weeks of living on the streets while they searched for work. Especially when she, and only she, was at fault for their dismal circumstances.

Gritting her teeth, Elizabeth reached up to the ornate brass rings that guarded the entrance to the imposing stone residence and knocked.

The harsh drumming of rain surrounded her as she stood, spine iron-straight despite the chill deep in her bones, each second both fleeting and interminable. She did not want the heavy oaken doors to creak open – and the wretched conversation that must follow – yet nor could she stomach the idea that she would be left outside waiting in the cold, the rest of her family scrambling for a place to stay, a way to survive. She closed her eyes against the cool liquid trailing down her pale skin and waited.

At last, a glimmer of light appeared.

"Is there something you need, Miss?" The liveried manservant's inquiry was brusque, his disapproval clear as he examined her soaked clothing. She realized she must look a fright: skin pale and tinged-blue with cold, unruly curls escaping their pins, dress hem dirty and ragged as a result of trekking through the mud. A choked half-laugh, half-sob rose to her throat at the ridiculousness of it all – once again, she came to his place of residence with skirts filthy and torn, but how different the circumstances from when she had visited Jane at Netherfield three years prior!

"Miss?" the servant repeated.

For a moment, she was tempted to tell him it was a mistake, to walk away and never return. But the images rose to her mind unbidden.

Beautiful, darling Jane, coughing her lungs out as she was forced to bear the weather in spite of her weak constitution. Mary, wearing those deepening furrows in her brow, never to touch the ivory keys of the pianoforte again. Kitty, without any new gowns; Mother, wilting away under the twin pressures of poverty and ignominy. And silly, flighty Lydia, unable to afford even the smallest of comforts in her plight, Lydia –

She truly had no choice. She would swallow her pride and throw herself at his mercy.

"An audience," she croaked, the words grating in her throat like sandpaper. She coughed and continued with as much dignity as a drenched, penniless young woman trespassing on a grand estate at a strange hour could have: "With Mr. Darcy, please."

He eyed her dubiously from the warmth and dryness of the interior of the building. "A moment."

Water trickled down her forehead. She blinked gratefully; any tears would at least be disguised by the downpour.

When he returned, it was to grimace at her unapologetically. "Mr. Darcy is indisposed – he is not receiving visitors."

"Isn't he?" she muttered, unsurprised that the haughty, taciturn man she remembered would ignore a lone woman at his doorstep in the rain, at night. "Perhaps his disposition would improve if you told him Miss Elizabeth Bennet is calling."

The doorman hesitated, visibly reluctant.

"Please," she added quietly.

He nodded, and the crack of light vanished again. She fought another shiver as a new gust of wind blasted through the dark.

Suddenly, the door burst open; she was momentarily disoriented by the glow of candlelight. As her eyes adjusted, she realized that the figure at the door was taller and leaner than the manservant who had greeted her, hard, aristocratic features cast into sharp relief by the flickering wall-torches. Her mouth went dry.

"Miss Elizabeth," came the low baritone she had not heard in three years, carrying no small amount of shock. She wished she could make out his face more clearly, to read the expression there. "I did not believe it was truly you – you are shivering."

On the account of the rain, no doubt – it does affect us lesser mortals. She bit her tongue to prevent the sharp retort from emerging as she followed him inside.

"Blankets, Ann," he ordered the maid standing by the fireplace. "Quickly." The girl hastily went to do as asked. Turning, he grasped Elizabeth by the hand and led her to the sofa. She did not complain; the heat at the hearth, in tandem with the warmth of strong grip on her icy skin, did much to alleviate the chill that had spread through her body.

The maid returned with a stack of quilts that Elizabeth hastily wrapped herself in with numb fingers. There was silence but for the crackling of the fire.

She dared not look at him, yet she could not help but sneak small glances from the corner of her eye. He appeared thinner than she remembered, or perhaps it was his state of undress; she had to fight a blush as she realized that he was only in a shirt and trousers. There were dark shadows under his eyes, either from the dim lighting or from too little sleep.

That strong profile turned. She dropped her eyes, embarrassed that he had caught her staring. He had no such compunction, taking in her bedraggled state with an utterly unreadable expression.

"I admit I had not expected to see you again," he said slowly, gaze returning to the fire.

Elizabeth gave a little start. "I had not thought that we would meet again, either," she managed, heart pounding so hard against her ribcage that she feared she might burst. "But circumstances prove otherwise."

"And what might those circumstances be?"

She cast a quick look around her, taking in the Persian carpet, the ornate papered walls, the gilded furniture – yes, Pemberley was so removed from Longbourn that it was a different world. What had he called her – "a disadvantageous match, with little fortune and the lowest of connections?" Now she no longer even had those. What could she possibly mean to him now? A humiliating reminder of the past? The girl who had spurned him? And that was assuming he still cared; what was to say that his "ardent love" hadn't been fleeting, a passing fancy, now faded to indifference?

…But Jane…

And he was not entirely free of culpability in this matter either as the man who had separated Jane from her Bingley. A spark of the old anger rose within Elizabeth. The worst he could do was to throw her out on the streets – and that was where she would end up anyway, if she did not succeed!

"I merely came to ask," Elizabeth said with the brazenness of a woman with nothing left to lose, "if your offer from three years past was still available for the taking."

Darcy froze. She could see the sudden tension in his knuckles, white against the armchair, in the corded muscle of his arms, in the sloping angle of his square jaw. The room felt unbearably quiet and entirely too small. She did not dare to breathe.

When those steel-grey eyes finally met hers, she nearly gasped: they were hard as diamond, not just proud but glittering with an intensity that made her clutch the blankets closer.

"If you come to taunt me, madam, I assure you that my sense of hospitality does not prevent me from seeing you to the door, godforsaken weather outside or no."

She did not know how, but her voice remained miraculously steady in spite of the trembling of her hands. "I speak in earnest."

"Please, elaborate." The harshness of his deep, usually velvet voice belied the politeness of his words. For the first time, Elizabeth was aware of his physical presence; he was so much larger, stronger than she was, his hands alone probably capable of circling her neck and squeezing until it snapped. She hid her fear behind a hollow smile.

An arrogant man, prone to emotion, but at least not an indifferent one, which suited her purposes. But an arrogant man would not settle for a woman who endangered his pride. And marry she must, for a man like Mr. Darcy, a man who deemed her mother and sisters classless and little better than trash would not help her to support them otherwise. Her father would be rolling in his grave right now, but she – well, she was giving up propriety, love, and her freedom regardless – why not add her integrity to the mix?

"I reconsidered," she stated simply.

He did not move. "Why?"

"Can a lady not change her mind?"

"Unusual, considering that you made your opinion of my character so very clear."

"Then consider my opinion of your character now far higher." The words left a sour taste in her mouth. To her surprise, he gave a low, caustic laugh – if such a bleak sound could even be characterized as such – clasping his hands together as he faced her at last.

She stared.

There were lines around his eyes that definitely had not previously existed, and the dark circles surrounding them were not at all mere products of the lighting. The sculpted features appeared haggard, almost, little creases around his mouth and between his brow that spoke of too many frowns and not enough laughter. His cheekbones, always aristocratic, appeared more pronounced than ever, a testament to the thinning of his face.

The last three years may not have been good to her, Elizabeth realized, antipathy momentarily forgotten, but neither had they been good to him.

"I am afraid that is not enough, Miss Elizabeth. I am not the same man I was three years ago – I was married, you understand."

Brown eyes widened as they settled on the previously-unnoticed plain gold band on his left hand.

"Anne passed away not eleven months ago," he said in response to her silent query. A sardonic smile she did not quite understand touched his lips. "I suppose you will offer your condolences now?"

A genuine twinge of compassion tugged at her. She, too, had lost someone recently – and this man, no matter how disagreeable, had obviously felt the loss keenly.

"I do not believe you want them, and I will not pretend to know the lady in question, but – " she hesitated, searching for the right words – "I am truly sorry for your loss."

A glimmer of something flared in those unfathomable eyes. They softened slightly. "Thank you. But I hope you understand I am no longer interested in a wife."

No longer interested in a wife.

Something collapsed at last inside, with the strain of knowing her father, with his dry wit and silent support, was gone forever, with the memory of their humiliating eviction by the Collinses, with the irrefutable evidence that she had failed.

The numbness suited her well.

"It is too late for a carriage," she heard him saying as if from a great distance away. "I will have a room arranged for you to stay the night."

"That is very considerate of you," said a voice she recognized after a moment as her own. "I hope it isn't any trouble."

"Not at all."

She swallowed. Determined to maintain her composure any way she could, she reached for the cup of tea at the same time he gripped the glass of port. Their arms collided, and the teacup slipped from her grasp, shattering on the hardwood floor with a loud crash.

Her cheeks flamed. "I'm so sorry – "

The sentence was interrupted by the unmistakable wail of a child in the distance. Elizabeth jerked toward the source of the sound, staring uncomprehendingly down the dark corridor.

Mr. Darcy stood abruptly. "My son," he said tightly, as if it was more information than he wanted to give, then strode down the hall. Rising to her feet, Elizabeth hurried after him. It was her fault, after all; she had awakened the child – he had a son –

He burst into the nursery, Elizabeth on his heels. In a fluid, practiced movement, he swept up the crying bundle, a mop of dark hair and pudgy, flailing hands in the darkness that refused to be calmed. The gentleness with which he did so made Lizzy very aware of her status as an interloper.

She watched Mr. Darcy's jaw clench in frustration as the child wouldn't quiet after the first few minutes, continuing to cry out until she could bear it no longer –

"Let me," she said quietly.

His throat worked as if he was going to refuse, the tightness around his eyes signaling repudiation. She had overstepped, she knew, broken the rules of respectability first by arriving alone to a gentleman's residence at this hour, then by invading the sanctuary of his son's nursery.

To her shock, he reluctantly placed the boy in her waiting arms.

She had handled infants before, but never had she felt quite like this. It was the loneliness, she knew; the child wanted comfort, but so did she. Still, the weight was warm, delightful, fitting just right as if meant to be there.

"Shhh," she murmured, rocking back and forth. A pair of bright blue eyes blinked at her. "Shhh. You're safe. Your papa's here to take care of you, darling. Everything will be alright." The soothing words continued to spill out, even as she became aware of Mr. Darcy's piercing eyes on her as she cradled his son, until at last the child hushed and she set him down with a silly smile on her face that she didn't even know she could wear.

Then, in the black of the nursery, hearing only the measured breaths of Mr. Darcy and her own hectic inhalations, did she finally realize the enormity of her presumption.

She had barged into this man's home, demanded marriage, pried about his dead wife, broken his glass of port, and grabbed his son. She closed her eyes, cheeks aflame. No wonder he was not interested – had she been less graceless, might her family have avoided a fate on the streets when their friends' charity inevitably wore out?

"Mr. Darcy, I apologize – "

"You put him back to sleep," he said flatly, speaking over her. "No one can quite manage to do that, and you do it in minutes the first time he sees you."

How to respond to that?

"That proposal that you spoke of – it is renewed. I will procure a special license tomorrow."

He could not mean – her hands balled into fists at her side, heart racing. She dared not hope.

"We should be married in two days' time," he continued. "A grand ceremony is unnecessary." He turned to exit.

Married.

"Wait," she called after him, recovering from her paralysis. "What changed your mind?"

A pause.

"I may not need a wife, but George needs a mother."

And with that, he left her quite alone in the darkness.