The ring was made of emeralds and pearls; it was exquisite and it fit perfectly on Ophelia’s finger.

“My last duchess,” Hugo said. He leaned over and kissed her.

“My first and last duke,” Ophelia whispered back.

Epilogue

“I don’t care what name you give her as long as it isn’t as awful as mine,” Betsy said. She was lying on her stomach on the huge bed that graced the matrimonial bedchamber at Lindow Castle.

“Your name isn’t awful,” Ophelia said. “Boadicea was an amazing woman, who nearly conquered the Roman legions.”

“Dead men piled up at her feet like logs,” Alexander said in a bloodthirsty tone.

“My name is Betsy,” his sister said, turning another page in her book.

“There aren’t so many warriors’ names left,” Hugo said. He was lying on his back, propped up against the headboard. Leonidas was tucked next to him, looking at a book.

Under Ophelia’s reign, the castle had become an extension of the nursery. Where the older Wildes were, the younger Wildes likely were not far away.

The boys started coming home from Eton even when they hadn’t been sent down; Horatius made trips from Oxford merely to say hello. The five younger children—which now included the inseparable pair of Viola and Joan—divided their time between the stables and their parents, whether that meant sitting under the duke’s desk as he paid the accounts, or trooping after Ophelia as she conferred with the housekeeper.

Horatius looked up from the other side of the room. Although he was far too proper to join the family on the bed, he had consented to join them in the bedchamber; he and Alaric were playing chess at a game table against the wall. “We don’t have an Erik in the family,” he said. “Erik the Red was an excellent pirate.”

“Viking,” Alaric said. “Not the same thing.”

“Pirates! Let’s play pirates again,” Alexander cried.

“Erik for a boy,” Hugo said, meeting his wife’s eyes. “All right with you, darling?”

“Artemisia if she’s a girl,” Ophelia said, patting her very round belly. “She was a very fine warrior, who challenged the Greeks.”

“We’d have to call her Artie,” Betsy declared.

“You can do that,” her father replied reaching down to tickle her.

Then he edged over so he could kiss his wife.

“All right?” he asked.

Ophelia smiled at him with a steady love in her eyes. “More than all right.”

Acknowledgments