Uncertain Magic by Laura Kinsale

as they turned to face the altar, made him seem human to her at all.
    His voice, that rich and seductive voice that she had almost forgotten in the three weeks since she had seen him, repeated the vows with steady certainty. Her own words quavered pitifully, as fleeting as her frosted breath. It was suddenly becoming real, this ceremony. She stood there and thought:
What am I doing
? Every warning, from her father and mother and Earnest—from Faelan himself—all came back and tumbled around in her head until she thought she would crumple to the floor where she stood.
    Faelan touched her arm, and suddenly it was already over, already too late to change her mind. He took her hand and worked her glove free. The ring slid onto her trembling finger, as smooth and cold as the closing of a trap.
    Without the support of his offered arm, she doubted she could have made the walk back down the aisle. She looked toward her family as she passed, and saw not a flicker of the discomposed emotion beneath those unmoved faces. Even her mother did not cry, too frozen in unhappiness for tears.
    It was Roddy who wept as the door closed on the carriage. In the cold light of dawn that morning, she'd visited the stables before she left home, fed her old pony an apple in small pieces, so his worn-out teeth could manage it. She'd gone to all the rooms in the house and the secret places in the garden where she had played as child, gathering precious memories amid the bare, silvered branches.
    She pulled her woolly cloak about her and pressed her gloved hand to her mouth to conceal its quivering, staring very hard out the frosted window until the sight and sound of the guests was far behind. It was done, irrevocably, and she felt as if she had leaped from Earnest's imaginary cliff and now fell through the air, a long, slow fall, with time in plenty to remember every fear and regret.
    Faelan was watching her, she knew. Just watching, from his place by the other door, which made her want to cry harder. Because she was afraid. Because he was a stranger still and maybe did not understand what it was to leave the home and family that had been her shelter for nineteen years. Maybe he had never loved anyone, and never could.
    The future unrolled before her, empty of affection and laughter: no brothers, no parents, no familiar network of minds and hearts to envelop her in comfort and security. She marveled that her lips had moved to say the words that bound her to him. The folly of it, the utter folly… she would never find happiness by leaving behind all she had ever known and loved. Her need for freedom now seemed a crazy dream, with no connection to this reality of a ring and a promise and the unknown man beside her.
    Her head drooped, nodding listlessly with the motion of the coach as the long ride dragged on. Faelan was silent, and Roddy found she had no voice to speak. Even the rattle of the wheels was muffled by the new snow that covered the frozen road. The interior grew dim with late afternoon, and her clasped fingers seemed very white in the gloom.
    An unexpected movement caught her eye in the twilight. His hand touched hers, covering the pale shape with another, larger one, entwining their fingers in a gesture that was no less intimate for being muffled by two layers of kidskin. He remained silent. He did not even look at her. Though he pressed his palm to hers steadily, she sat still, afraid to misinterpret. It was so strange, to have that touch and not be certain of the thought behind it. She wanted comfort, but she was not sure, not brave enough to turn to him and lay herself open and find that she had been wrong.
    "Regrets?" he said, his voice soft amid the darkness and the creak of the wheels on fresh snow.
    Roddy looked up at him. She nodded.
    He smiled a little. "Honest child. You'll shame me into respectability."
    She moved her hand uncertainly, and his hold tightened, just enough to still her.
    "Roddy," he said, with a note in his voice