Chapter Text
Lady Chrissy Cunningham is not usually a woman prone to fits of fancy or superstition. She rolls her eyes when her friends chastise her for not sitting cross legged when they play cards, she’s broken a mirror a time or two, and she always flips her stockings right way around if she puts them on wrong. All those sensible ideals and beliefs have gone out the window, though, the closer she gets to her wedding day.
Between Eddie’s aunt and her feud with the Archbishop of Canterbury and the awful events that happened to Lord Steve and Duke Hargrove with his father, the former Duke Hargrove, she’d begun to believe they might not ever make it to the church. That was, of course, utter pessimism and she knows better. But who could blame her after so many setbacks?
It’s finally time now, this morning she woke up as Lady Chrissy Cunningham for the last time. Tonight she’d go to sleep as the Viscountess Munson. She closes her eyes and wiggles in her nightdress, the pure bliss of the day rushing through her. Their banns have been published for more than a month, the excess time dictated by Eddie’s place in his aunt’s circle, and she was very tired of having to hear about how the wedding was coming when it meant she still had to wait. Twice she’d considered proposing a weekend jaunt to Gretna Green, but that was just wishful thinking.
No more of that now, she thinks to herself as she climbs out of bed to start her day. Her maid knocks on the door, and then Chrissy is enveloped in the silks and satins of her wedding dress. Her mother has, predictably, made it just a bit too small for her. She decided to grin and bear it back when she first tried the dress on, soon there won’t be a single thing in her life Lady Cunningham can dictate. She thinks about how in a matter of hours she’ll outrank her own family, in proximity to Her Majesty at least if not in title alone.
She stands before her full length mirror and admires herself as a bride for the first time. She’s desperately hungry, fasting is not her favorite activity by any stretch of the imagination, and she can’t wait to get downstairs so they can walk to the church. They’re not in London, thank goodness, but her family’s estate in Surrey. The church where they’ll be married is the one she spent every childhood Sunday, a place as familiar to her as her own rooms.
She and Eddie had wanted to get married in London, it would be easier for his aunt to attend if she remained close to Court, but in the end they both agreed that it would be better to leave for their honeymoon from her parent’s estate rather than the townhouse. And here they could accommodate more guests. It seems like the entire ton has come out of the woodwork seeking to wish them all the joys of wedded bliss. They both know most of them are only here to say they attended the Viscount Munson’s wedding, but the thought is still nice.
She turns this way and that, seeing how the early dawn light catches all the gold and silver threads in her dress. It’s beautiful, and she thinks again how nice it would be if Eddie’s parents could have attended. They’ve been gone for over a decade now, but she remembers them as being kind and sweet, just like Eddie. She’s grateful to Lord Wayne Munson for taking in Eddie after the carriage accident, and even more grateful to Her Majesty for making sure Eddie’s titles remained preserved and waiting for his majority.
Her maid cajoles her into the chair in front of her vanity and beings pinning her hair up into an updo that will support the tiara sitting on the table in front of her. It belonged to Eddie’s mother, Her majesty’s sister, and it’s even more stunning in person that it looks in the portraits of Annabelle Munson that hang in the London townhouse. When Her Majesty told Chrissy she wished her to wear it for the ceremony she’d almost fainted. It was one thing to know the Queen approved of their match, another thing entirely to be trusted with one of the few remaining pieces of the woman’s closest family member.
It isn’t as grand as some of the pieces she’s seen at Court in the last few years. Lady Tammy Thompson’s tiara is covered in enough diamonds to replace the lighthouse at Dover, and Lady Carol Perkins regularly wears a piece that must weigh more than the tiny dog she always carries. None of that matters to Chrissy, she would marry Eddie in a fishing net veil and a headpiece made of seashells. Appearances are important in their set, though, so not only will she wear the late Viscountess Munson’s tiara with pride, she will do so in front of everyone who matters in London society.
One final pin is jabbed into her hair, and then the diamond and silver circlet is settled on her head. She looks at herself in the mirror and doesn’t recognize the woman staring back. It’s her bright blue eyes, her blonde hair is a fashionable updo, her wide toothy smile shining back at her, but she doesn’t know this person at all. This Chrissy is glowing with suffused joy and anticipation, none of the dark sadness and fear she carried around for so long before Eddie.
She remembers who she used to be, when her parents expected her to marry Lord Jason Carver and didn’t want to hear a single word against him. Try as she might, she hadn’t been able to steal her spine enough to make them understand that they might as well bury her in the family plot if she became Lady Chrissy Carver. There would be nothing for her in that marriage but heartache and pain.
And then Eddie appeared and literally plucked her from the path of disaster. He swooped in and neatly separated from her from Jason on that dance floor, and he hasn’t let go since. She realizes with a buzz of giddy excitement that she’s spent her last night sleeping alone. Tonight, when she lies down to close her eyes, Eddie will be right next to her in their own bed.
Well, not their own bed. They’re leaving from the wedding breakfast to Cherry Tree first, but Lord Steve has promised her their room is very secluded from the rest of the house and they won’t be disturbed until they’re ready. The carriage ride will be torture, undoubtably, but they’ll share it with Lord Steve and Duke Hargrove so that should help pass the time. Speaking of the torture of time, she checks the clock in the corner of the room. She has an hour before she and her parents need to leave for the parish church. More than enough time to supervise the packing of her trunk.
The majority of her furniture will remain here at the estate, she and Eddie have been discretely furnishing his townhouse for months now so they don’t have to have any of her things brought from her parent’s home after the wedding. None of it matches who she is now, anyway, it’s all for the Lady Chrissy they think they raised and not the strong person she is after so many years with Eddie’s silent support and boundless love.
She gathers some things herself to put in a separate carpet bag to go into the carriage before they leave for church. In go the letters Eddie has written her over the years, a book full of pressed flowers from their walks in Kensington Garden, and a single lock of Eddie’s hair she clipped herself last winter when he let his curls grow out for a time. These are her most cherished possessions, and she won’t leave them here with the rest of her things to surely be “forgotten” by her mother.
Finally, finally, the clock chimes the hour and it’s time to head downstairs and go to her wedding. She practically flies down the marble staircase, holding tight to the banister so she doesn’t slip and injure herself before she can see Eddie again. In the parlor she finds her parents and Steve waiting. She’s delighted to see him, she was more than a little concerned she would have to walk to the church with just her mother and father. That would mean a minimum 15 minute lecture on how disappointed they were in this match.
She doesn’t understand it, not really. Eddie is a Viscount, the Queen’s nephew, and disgustingly wealthy from both his inheritance and his own investments. The only reason they dislike him is he isn’t Lord Jason, they wanted her wedded to him and saddled with a brood large enough to ensure the Cunningham name would be forever intertwined with the Carver reputation. She wonders if Lord Jason’s wife knows about her, but she shoves that thought aside to embrace Lord Steve first and then her parents.
“Chrissy, you look lovely beyond the power of speech. I am rendered mute in your presence, my lady. Allow me to kiss your hand so I may steal some of your glow for my own.”
She can’t but burst into giggles at Lord Steve’s overwrought greeting. It’s exactly what she needs right now, silly and sweet and soothing for her jangling nerves. She’s so close to her prize, she can practically taste it on her lips. She nods, and Lord Steve bends low over her hand, kissing it lightly, before offering her his arm. She takes it, nodding to her parents as they head out of the house towards the church.
It doesn’t matter that her mother looks as though she’s got a sharp bramble in her shoe, or her father’s eyes are pinpricks of frustrated exasperation. She’s on her way to marry Eddie Munson, in another hour they won’t be able to tell her to eat a pea again. She practically skips down the lane, as light and buoyant as a cloud.