Darling Jasmine by Bertrice Small

Author:Bertrice Small
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi
Publisher: Kensington Publishing Corp.
Published: 2011-03-10T16:00:00+00:00

Adali had more than doubled the guards watching over Greenwood House and its parklike grounds. Would there ever come a time when his mistress was completely safe, he wondered? Perhaps this Scotland would offer the sanctuary that they sought. He prayed it would be so.

The children had arrived from Queen’s Malvern, and but for the absence of James Leslie, Jasmine was happy again. Her two eldest children were much like their father in features, although they both had her dark hair. India, however, had Rowan’s golden eyes, while Henry’s eyes were her own turquoise. It was her second daughter, Fortune, who seemed to be the swan in the duck’s nest. Fortune had bright red-gold hair, which Skye claimed had been the color of her own grandmother’s hair. As the child had Skye’s blue-green eyes, Jasmine had to assume her coloring came from her Celtic ancestors; and indeed she was very much like the children who had played in MacGuire’s Ford, the village on Jasmine’s Irish estates, and little like her elder siblings.

As for baby Charles Frederick Stuart, he was every bit a Stuart, with his auburn curls and amber eyes so like his grandfather’s, the king’s. Almost three, he visited the court with his brother and sisters dressed in a satin suit of orange tawny with wide collar of delicate Irish lace. He carried a miniature sword with a gold hilt decorated with tiny emeralds and topaz that had been made just for him. Sweeping off his soft-brimmed hat with its three white plumes, he bowed to the king and queen while his proud mama looked on, well pleased by her smallest child’s exquisite manners. Manners, Jasmine knew, she had not instilled in her baby. She silently thanked her grandmother.

Behind the tiny duke of Lundy, who by virtue of his seniority in rank led his siblings, came Henry Lindley, marquis of Westleigh; followed by his sisters, Lady India and Lady Fortune Lindley. The young marquis was dressed like his little brother, but his suit was turquoise blue satin, his custom-made sword studded with diamonds and aquamarines. His sisters were garbed in gowns of pink silk and lavender silk. As their elder brother bowed, they curtsied deeply, rising slowly and very gracefully to the silent approval of the queen and the court ladies, considered matrons.

“We are pleased to see ye once again, my dears,” the king said in kindly tones. Then he beckoned to his grandson. “Come here to me, Charlie-boy,” he said, and when the little boy had clambered within reach of his grandfather, James Stuart lifted him onto his lap, and reaching out drew his son, Prince Charles, into the child’s view. “This is yer uncle,” he told Jasmine’s smallest son. “Ye are named for him. He is Charles, too. One day, when I am dead, Charlie-boy, this Charles will be yer king, and ye must be loyal to him. Yer a Stuart, laddie, and we Stuarts may fight among ourselves, but we are always loyal to each other in the end.

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