Lord Sebastian's Secret (The Duke's Sons #3)(50)

Sebastian gazed up at him with no idea in the world what to say.

“I might have known! Dragging my daughter off into the wilderness.”

“He did not drag me, Papa. I have told you and told you…”

“I had my suspicions, and now we see… Well, your engagement is at an end. I forbid it! We can’t have a barbarian in the family. Out of the question.”

“What?” Georgina jumped up to face him. “Don’t be ridiculous, Papa.”

“I forbid it, I say!” The marquess’s face was red with anger.

“But…but if my story was wrong, why not Sebastian’s as well?” Georgina replied.

“Because it fits, doesn’t it?” He glowered at Sebastian.

Sebastian struggled to formulate arguments against this ridiculous accusation.

“No,” said Georgina. “It does not. Sebastian is a fine—”

“Deceiver,” her father interrupted.

“Papa!” Georgina looked as if she’d like to box his ears. Sebastian watched her struggle for control. “You said I was inexperienced,” she went on finally. “Well, so is Sebastian. Even more. I’ve been listening to you talk about reincarnation for weeks. This was simply…a sort of dream, as you suggested.”

“If I could—” began Mr. Mitra.

Georgina’s father spoke right over him. “How would he know that the ancient tribesmen tattooed themselves or wore checkered clothing, eh? Answer me that. He’s not exactly a scholar.”

This familiar criticism stung, not least because it was so true. Sebastian couldn’t think what to say to change his host’s mind. If he could grab him and shake him, perhaps…but he couldn’t. And it would probably just make things worse. No, certainly it would. Demonstrate his barbarian tendencies or some such nonsense.

“Listen to me!” Mitra exclaimed. His vehemence was so uncharacteristic that they all turned to stare. “You cannot directly associate these…possibilities we unearthed in the meditation with what is happening today.” Mr. Mitra glanced at Joanna Byngham and then away. “There is no absolute succession.”

Georgina’s father glared at him. “You’ve also said that the lives a person experiences are determined by character and deeds.”

“Yes, but…”

“Ha! And none of the rest of us turned up as uncivilized Welshmen, did we?”

“Papa,” cried Georgina.

The marquess paid no attention. “Pack your things and be on your way,” he said to Sebastian. “Today. You and your brother. He didn’t even dare tell us what he saw, did he? Eh? What’s he hiding?”

“Papa,” said Georgina again.

Sebastian rose. He had the sense that he stood alone against a crowd. Georgina started toward him, but her father held her back. “Go on,” he said. “Get out.”

The man was his host, and the father of the woman Sebastian still firmly intended to marry. He couldn’t fight him. And he couldn’t think how to change his mind. If Georgina couldn’t sway him, how could Sebastian hope to? He would only make things worse. Angry, bewildered, he walked out.

He strode through the castle corridors, his brain trying to make sense of what had just happened. It couldn’t be that his future happiness was to be destroyed because of…an attack of imagination. That just wasn’t possible. It was cruelly unfair. He didn’t even have much of an imagination. But Georgina’s father had seemed perfectly serious. Sebastian couldn’t summon a shred of hope that he’d been joking. What were they going to do?

Sebastian stopped in the middle of a hallway, parade-ground rigid. One thing he wouldn’t do. He wasn’t leaving. If the marquess threw him out of Stane, he’d park himself nearby until he got Georgina back. He’d pitch a tent below the walls, if necessary.

As a last straw, Sebastian found Randolph lying in wait for him in his bedchamber. His brother sprang up as soon as Sebastian opened the door. “I hope I didn’t offend our host,” he said, moving from foot to foot as if anxious.

“Not nearly as much as I did,” replied Sebastian dryly.

It didn’t appear that Randolph heard him. “That was simply an…overwhelming experience. I could think of nothing but writing it all down. Astonishing. And then when I finished, I suddenly began to wonder what the council of bishops would say.” He walked over to the window and back, looking at the floor rather than Sebastian. “They do not always find me…entirely congenial, you know.”

“I don’t think they’re likely to hear of it,” replied Sebastian. “Considering what happened after you were gone.”

Deep in his own thoughts, Randolph didn’t even ask what his brother meant. “Do you think they would consider it some sort of…spell?” he said.

Under any other circumstances, Sebastian might have speculated and probably teased his brother a bit. Now, his own problems weighed too heavily. “How would I know what a bunch of bishops would think?” he replied. “I like Mitra. But I wish to God he hadn’t done…whatever that was.”

Randolph looked regretful. “I suppose I shouldn’t participate in any more…”

“You won’t have the opportunity,” Sebastian interrupted. “We’ve been ordered out of Stane Castle.”