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The dance, a quadrille, was ending as the man entered the ballroom. Katrine Castlereagh saw him at once from her vantage point on the dais. She drew a sudden, sharp breath, then stood perfectly still.

The new arrival paused in the doorway, glancing around him with quiet assurance. The butler had left his post as the evening advanced; there was no one to announce this late-coming guest, no one to take his high evening hat of black silk or the rain-spotted cloak that hung in heavy folds reaching from his broad shoulders to his heels.

The dance floor cleared, leaving an open stretch of gleaming parquet between the door and the dais. The man turned his head, gazing down the aislelike stretch of space.

His gaze narrowed as it fastened upon Katrine. He allowed himself a slow and complete inspection of her person from her shining curls to the hem of her ball gown. His expression was hard, stringently assessing, before it smoothed into polite, social blandness. Removing his hat, he tucked it under his arm and began to walk toward her.

He moved with long-limbed grace and a total lack of self-consciousness. His stride was neither too fast nor too slow, but held enough controlled power to cause his cloak to expose its red silk lining as it dipped and swirled around him.

His evening clothes were perfectly tailored to his tall, solid-muscled frame and correctly somber, yet the rich cream-on-white paisley of his waistcoat hinted at exuberance. The dark waves of his hair were close-cropped; the soft rain of a Louisiana autumn falling beyond the ballroom's long windows had spangled them with droplets that caught the light from the wax tapers in thechandeliers overhead. Smile lines were set around his mouth and eyes, burned there by the same hot winds and strong suns that had weathered his skin to the golden brown of the polished oak floor. The green of his eyes was the muted, reflective shade of a woodland pool, a dark color that hinted at deep and private thoughts.

Katrine's husband, Giles Castlereagh, standing at her left hand, turned from his nephew to whom he had been talking as he noticed the approach of the new guest. An odd excitement came and went across his puffy features. He shifted with ponderous deliberation and descended a single step from the dais, putting out his hand to grasp that of the other man.

"Rowan de Blanc, I believe?" Giles said in smooth satisfaction. "Welcome to Arcadia. Permit me to present you to my wife, sir. Katrine, my dear, you will have heard a great deal in the past about M'sieur de Blanc."

Katrine turned from signaling for the butler to come forward and take their guest's hat and cloak. Her greeting was given automatically, as a matter of training, though she was not sure what she said as she surveyed the man at close quarters.

Rowan de Blanc inclined his dark head in a bow. The movement, she saw, was just as it should be, low enough to show respect, not so low as to suggest undue humility. His voice as he made his salutation was deep and even in timbre and his choice of phrase gallant without being flirtatious. If he noticed the tremor in her hand as she gave it to him, he was considerate enough to give no sign of it. His grasp was firm yet gentle and the brush of his lips on the gloved back impersonal in spite of its heat.

His brow was broad, his nose straight; his lashes a thick ambush from which to view the world. There was generosity in the molded shape of his mouth and his chin was aggressive in its firmness. He would have been devastating if there had been any warmth in his expression, Katrine thought. As it was, he was too handsome, too well-bred, too strong, too discerning, too experienced. Rowan de Blanc was much too near perfect for comfort. And because of it, he terrified her.

"You will forgive my tardy arrival, I hope," the newcomer said, nodding his thanks at the same time to the butler who relieved him of his outer wear. "The St. Louis Belle was late in landing at St. Francisville this evening. Though I received your invitation to the tournament while in New Orleans, I only learned of the ball to open the festivities after I reached my rooms here."

"Think nothing of it," Giles answered with an expansive gesture. "The gathering was an impulse arranged because several of the gentlemen arrived ahead of time. In any case, Katrine and I had only just begun to think of deserting our post."

"You're very generous," the other man said, his gaze resting on Katrine's face once more as she stood in regal stiffness before him.

The lady was not, Rowan had to admit, precisely what he had expected. There was no hardness in the warm coffee brown of her eyes, no evasion in her gaze. The delicate flush that overlaid her cream-satin skin gave her finely drawn features a look of freshness, while the moist and sweetly curving lines of her parted lips drew his gaze like a magnet. There was fascination in her hair that fell in thick, shining coils from a diamond pin at the crown of her head. The color was elusive, now russet and gold with shadings of rich brown, now warm brown with a red-gold sheen. Her gown of sea-green brocade draped the gently rounded curves of her breasts, hugged the narrow span of her rigidly corseted waist, then billowed into the enormous, shimmering bell of her skirt.

There was a certain medieval appearance to the long, flowing cuffed sleeves of her gown. It was appropriate for the occasion, and also the setting. The gilded paper of the ballroom's walls was half-hidden by age-darkened tapestries and the banners of kings long dead; the musicians playing pianoforte, violins, French horn, and harp were dressed like court fools, while through the open doorway of the supper room could be seen a long trestle table. There was no torchlight or rushes on the floor, however. Giles Castlereagh had been wise enough not to become too carried away by the present vogue for the literary excesses of Sir Walter Scott.

Quietly on the air came the first strains of the old English air "Greensleeves" played to a gentle waltz tempo. Rowan took instant advantage of the music. "If you have indeed finished receiving your guests, Madam Castlereagh, may I have the honor of this dance?"

Dismay congealed upon Katrine's features. "No. Oh, no, really--that is, I believe I am already engaged for it."

Her husband turned his head to stare at her with a lifted brow. "Are you, my dear? To whom?"

"To you, naturally," Katrine said with color rising to her cheeks, "as it will be the first of the evening."

"Nonsense. We won't stand on ceremony, not when my gout is near crippling me."

"I will sit the dance out with you then." Her words were decided. Giles was a man of many ailments, most of them highly convenient, for him. They were also useful to her on occasion.

"No, no. Go along with M'sieur de Blanc. I will not have you deprived, and you know I like watching you enjoy yourself. Besides, I think I hear the siren call of the card room."

"Really, Giles--" she began in protest.

"To please me?"

The request was mild, but the look in his eyes was adamant. She could press the matter no further without giving offense to Rowan de Blanc.

"As you wish." Lowering her lashes, Katrine placed her hand upon the stiffly held arm of the dark-haired man, permitting him to lead her onto the floor.

They circled gently, with the correct distance separating them and the correct formal restraint in their movements together. In spite of that, there was an uncomfortable intensity in the gaze he bent upon her. The freshness of the damp night clung to him, mingling with the warm male scent of well-ironed linen and bay rum. His grasp at her waist, firmly guiding her into the turns, seemed to burn the imprint of his fingers into her skin. The movements of his thighs with their well-defined horseman's muscles were disturbing as his legs pressed against the silken fullness of her hooped skirts.

Katrine drew a deep but discreet breath to steady her nerves. There was no point in sulking; it was not going to help. She gave Rowan a swift upward glance as she said, "I would not have expected someone of your repute to be amused by our annual games."

"I wasn't aware I had a reputation, Madam Castlereagh," he returned.

"Your brother spoke of you at length. He was proud of your exploits, you know."

"I know." The words were abrupt.

Her gaze flickered away, then back again. "I only meant that our archery competitions and jousting at brass rings must seem tame. They can hardly be compared to hunting with the Indians of the Amazon forests, riding with Arabs with blue faces, or trekking into the heart of Africa."

"You think I require an element of risk to ensure my amusement? Your tournament can supply that, surely."

The lethal softness of his voice sent a tremor down the length of Katrine's spine, but she refused to acknowledge it. "I doubt the small dangers of competition can equal those in your travels."

He smiled down at her, a superficial movement of his lips. "Such ventures can be expensive, and you forget the prize for the winner."

"A purse of gold? What do you care for that? Your father's estate was more than adequate, so I understand, to permit you to follow whatever whim may move you."

His smile faded. The words abrupt, with a slicing rapier's edge, he said, "Terence told you a great deal."

Katrine looked away from his direct gaze. "We spent much time talking."

"Did you?" He paused, then went on deliberately, "And did my brother tell you how much he loved you before he died? Did he, perhaps, die of love for you?"

Her gasp was so ragged that it tore at her throat. She missed a step, and he caught her close for an instant to aid her recovery. His arms were taut with muscle under the smooth broadcloth of his coat sleeves; the hard closeness of their hold was like a prison. Something stirred, fluttering in panic, at the center of her being.

She pushed away from him as she answered in sibilant tones. "No, he did not! There was never any hint of such a thing."

"Are you quite certain? Did he, perhaps, offend with his calflike adoration, so that he was forced to appear on the field of honor?"

"It wasn't like that at all. No one knows why he shot himself. He was only found beside the lake with the pistol in his hand."

"Then why," he said deliberately, "did my brother call you la belle dame sans merci, the beautiful lady without mercy?"

For a dreadful instant, Katrine saw the candlelight dim, heard a rushing in her ears. There was a constriction in her chest that could have been from remembered pain, from the press of her corset, or from the iron firmness of his grasp. She drew a difficult breath against it. She would not swoon, she would not.

"Terence, your brother--" she began.

"My half brother."

"Yes, I know," she said in distress. "He--those words were a jest of his, just a title he gave me."

"Was it indeed? Is that why he said you were most merciless of all with yourself?" His voice was low, almost intimate.

"I have no idea. I never knew he thought it--never knew he spoke of me."

"He wrote that and much more in his only letter home to his mother, our mother. He thought of you often, apparently. You intrigued him, the beautiful young woman married to a sickly and doting older man, smiling yet forlorn as you held your Court of Love--I do have that last right, do I not?"

"Yes, yes," she said almost at random. "It was a game we invented for the week of the tournament, Musetta, my sister-in-law, and I. Terence--played it well."

"He had imagination, if that's what you mean. He saw you as some bartered bride, traded by your father for an ideal, showered with riches by your husband while being kept imprisoned here at Arcadia like some medieval princess in a tower. It appealed to his sense of the romantic to think of rescuing you, though he knew you were well guarded."

"Don't be ridiculous," she said in a sudden surge of annoyance. "That isn't the way it is at all!"

"No?"

"Furthermore, I don't believe that your brother saw me as an object of pity."

"Not pity, but knight-errantry, perhaps. My mother, who is much like him, wondered if he tried to rescue you and was killed for his pains."

Katrine could hear the undertone of scorn in his voice. "But you think it unlikely? You are right. I can't imagine what he can have said to give her such an idea; it's far too fanciful."

"Terence had more sympathetic feeling than was good for him, but he was not known for being fanciful."

"Just what are you suggesting, then?" she demanded as the reviving effects of anger swept along her veins, "A sordid liaison? The revenge of a wronged husband?"

"It seems a possibility."

She lifted her chin with the lightning of wrath flashing in her dark brown eyes. "If you think so, then you know nothing of your brother."

"You know more?" There was a twist to his lips.

"Why not, when you have scarcely been near Louisiana in years. Even if that were not true, I fail to see how a man who spends his time adventuring in the wilds of Arabia can speak of another man's romantic impulses."

"My reasons for preferring other climes have nothing to do with romanticism." The words were stiff.

"No, your nose was totally out of joint because your mother remarried after your father died, because she left you with her father in England and traveled to this country to raise a second family, including another son to supplant you." It gave Katrine immense satisfaction to see his look of surprise and dislike at her knowledge of his background.

"It's true I was a misfit in my mother's new family and new life," he said evenly. "The reason had more to do with being of French and English blood and born in Europe than it did with jealousy of a younger brother."

"Half brother," she said in biting imitation of his earlier correction.

"He was no less to me for having a Louisiana Frenchman for a father. We were both my mother's sons. As for what I knew of him, I saw him every year or two in England, when he and my mother visited her father's family. And I understood him well enough to know that he would not have willingly left this earth and its joys."

Pain struck deep inside her, turning her gaze black as she stared up at him. Memories swept across her mind, memories she could never share with anyone, least of all this man who held her as they swayed and circled in time to the music. The song was winding down toward its end. She moistened her lips. Finally she said, "You did not come for the tournament."

"Did you think it for even a moment? No. I came to see you, madam, to discover what you can tell me about my brother's death."

"Nothing. I can tell you nothing." Her voice was a raveled thread of sound.

"I don't believe you," he returned without hesitation as the music died away and he was forced to release her. "I suppose that means I will have to stay for these games. What is the award for the first contest? The honor of escorting you in to dinner tomorrow night and sitting at your right hand? You will at least not be able to escape my questions then."

"You first have to win," she rejoined as she turned with her hand resting as lightly as possible on his arm, moving toward where her husband, Giles, stood talking to a neighbor.

"Oh, I believe that may be arranged," he answered.

The confidence in his voice was like the scraping of a fingernail on glass. "What arrogance," she said, "when you have not seen the other contestants."

"The event is fencing, I believe?" He lifted a brow as he spoke.

"Yes." Her voice was chill in its remoteness.

"There is no arrogance involved when you are able to do as you say."

They were too near Giles for her to form an answer, and he gave her no opportunity in any case. Expressing his gratitude for the dance with punctilious manners, he inclined his head in a curt bow, then left her.

Katrine stared after him, at his straight back, his wide shoulders emphasized by his dark coat, and the easy swing of his long legs. She thought she should have been relieved that Rowan de Blanc was using the tournament only as an excuse to visit Arcadia. Somehow, she was not. He had entered the lists, after all. That still made him dangerous.

Suddenly she hated this annual event, the round of fencing and archery and jousting at rings that always ended with a race staged with horses from Giles's beloved breeding stables. She despised the pageantry based on Scott's novels that Giles insisted upon, abhorred the false medieval pomp and pretense. It was her husband's show, all of it; it had nothing to do with her. She had wanted to cancel it this year, but he would not hear of it. If her wishes had been followed, then Rowan de Blanc would have had no excuse for coming here.

"What did the man do to make you so furious?"

Her husband's nephew asked the question with sly insinuation as he paused beside her. The son of an older brother, Lewis Castlereagh was a young man near her own age. Katrine barely glanced at his slender form as she answered. "Nothing whatever. What makes you think so?"

"You are frowning at him as if you would like to put a knife in his back."

She lifted a hand to touch the pucker between her eyes. "I must be getting a headache."

"My dear Katrine, don't be coy. I saw you having words with the man." A smile remarkably like a sneer curled Lewis's thin lips. He watched her intently, his pale blue eyes as silvery as mirrors reflecting an empty room.

"Did you?"

"Terence's older brother, is he not? I wonder why he came."

"For the obvious reason, I would suppose," she said shortly.

"Oh, do you think so? You should know if anyone does. He appears a formidable competitor and very sure of himself."

"He is certainly that," Katrine answered with a trace of quiet bitterness.

"Ah, well, perhaps we can hope for a defeat for him tomorrow. A nice little sword cut perhaps, right between the eyes."

Katrine was loath to agree with Lewis about anything. He was not her favorite person, a feeling that was mutual. Vain, grasping, with a gift for active malice, he had, from the day he arrived from England six years ago, just before she was wed to his uncle, set himself to annoy her. He resented the marriage and lived in constant anxiety that she would conceive a child who might inherit all of Giles's considerable estate. He need not have worried, though Katrine had no intention of explaining the matter to him.

Lewis smoothed a hand over his fine, silver-blond hair, pushing back the straight, metallic strands on his forehead in a quick gesture of irritation. "You know," he said acidly, "you really should warn Giles if de Blanc means to make trouble."

"I expect Giles is able to judge that for himself. He did invite the man."

"So he did. One is forced to wonder why, given the circumstances."

Katrine gave him a stabbing glance. "What do you mean by that?"

"Why, the untimely end of young Terence last fall, what else?" He opened his eyes wide while he waited, scarcely breathing, for her reply.

She should have known he was angling for information. He dearly loved secrets, especially those of other people. She was saved from having to reply, however, by the arrival of another man. She turned, thankfully, to give Alan Delaney a welcoming smile.

"Did I hear you mention Terence?" Alan said. "I've been thinking of him often of late--natural, I suppose, with the tournament at hand. I miss him. He was one of the few who understood when I talked of books."

Giles's nephew gave the other man a cynical smile. "We were speaking also of his older brother. Rowan de Blanc has been annoying our Katrine. We can't have that now, can we?"

Alan was of average height and solidly built. Dressed with neatness and circumspection, he had the ruddy complexion of an outdoorsman in spite of his serious manner and bookish turn. He was also no one's fool; he knew well enough when he was being baited. He frowned at Lewis with color rising under his skin before he turned to Katrine. "Is this true, madam?"

"Not in the way Lewis suggests," she said shortly.

"Did I mention in what way?" Lewis protested.

Alan ignored the other man as he insisted, "But de Blanc was giving you trouble?"

"I was irritated with him, that's all," Katrine answered. "He seems to think I was in some way to blame for Terence's death."

"Ridiculous," Alan said with a shake of his head. "He should know you are the most blameless of women; he has only to look at you to tell. Shall I speak to him?"

"I beg you won't do anything of the kind!"

"No, no," Lewis thrust in, "I doubt he would listen anyway. But you have some skill at fencing, as I recall, and the Delaneys never lack for courage. It would be a fine thing if you could give him a scratch or two to remind him of his manners."

Alan met Lewis's calculating gaze with a steady regard. "The sabers will be blunted, you know."

"The points only, not the edges."

"True, but there are still rules a man cannot break and be called honorable."

Lewis shrugged. "Well, then, let him know he has been in a fight. If you can."

"What of you?"

"I? Cunning is my forte. I leave real swordsmanship to stalwarts like yourself."

"I will try my best, as always." Alan's words were dry.

"That," Lewis said with matching irony, "should do the trick." Dividing a sour smile between Alan and Katrine, he nodded and walked away.

"Coxcomb," Alan muttered under his breath.

Katrine was inclined to agree, though she pretended not to hear.

It was later, as supper was ending, that Musetta drifted to Katrine's side in a swirl of golden yellow gauze. Giles's half sister, born of his mother's second marriage and some twenty years younger than he, was holding a plate of ivory china trimmed in gold and eating the last crumbs of a buttery-yellow coconut macaroon. With her soft, golden blond curls cascading around piquant features and over her ivory-tinted shoulders, she made an exquisite picture. It was the kind of artless artistry that was typical of Musetta.

"Tell me quickly, Katrine," she said in soft, suggestive tones, "is he worthy of our court?"

"You mean Rowan de Blanc?" Katrine gave her sister-in-law an innocent look.

"You know I do; the rest we have taken apart and put back together a dozen times over."

"Have we?"

"You especially. Don't be mean. I have done everything except dangle my dance card in front of his nose, but he has asked no one to stand up with him except you. Answer me."

"Very well," Katrine said, her voice abrupt. "I don't think he will do."

Musetta drew back a little, her cerulean-blue eyes widening. "But he seems such a valuable candidate. Think of the European polish he can bring, think of the knowledge of women and love he must have gained during his travels. You can't tell me you don't want to hear what he has to say?"

"I don't think he will be interested in word games. And I don't think you would care for his answers to your questions."

Musetta tilted her head, her eyes narrowing. "You intrigue me, yes, you do. Is that what you intended?"

"Not at all," Katrine said with a shake of her head that brought a shining auburn curl rolling over her shoulder. "I just think it would be a mistake to treat this man lightly. He is here about Terence."

"What of it? If he asks questions, there will be no answers, for we have none. His name is entered for the tournament; he will compete with the others. While he rests with the others, perhaps he will play, like the others."

A moist wind lifted the lace curtains at the window near where they stood. Its cool breath brushed Katrine's shoulders. She folded her arms at the waist, rubbing at the gooseflesh that roughened her skin. Frowning a little, Katrine told her sister-in-law of Rowan de Blanc's threat to win the next day's contest in order to question her at his leisure.

"You are taking it all too seriously, as usual," Musetta said with a shrug.

"I still wish Giles had settled for a simple house party," Katrine replied in moody tones.

"And spoil our fun? Don't be silly. I swear, if I didn't know better, I'd think you wanted to keep Rowan de Blanc to yourself. I saw the way you hung on to him when you stumbled."

"I didn't." Delicate color rose in Katrine's cheeks in spite of the denial.

Musetta gave her a wicked smile. "I wouldn't mind clutching a handful or two of him myself. I can't wait to see him stripped for the fencing. Dear me, the way his pantaloons will stretch across the backs of his legs. It makes me feel quite warm to think of it."

Watching Musetta unfurl her fan and ply it hard enough to make her curls fly around her face, Katrine asked, "What would Brantley say if he could hear you?"

The other woman shrugged. "He would pull his beard, frown his disapproval, and go back to counting cotton bales. If he won't dance with me himself, or amuse me with a little conversation, then he can hardly complain if I look elsewhere."

Musetta's marriage had been arranged by her brother after her arrival from England trailing the scent of scandal from an aborted elopement to Gretna Green, apparently not her first such escapade. That the match was a mistake was accepted by everyone except Giles.

Katrine said, "And Perry?" The music was beginning again as the musicians answered a signal from Giles, who had appeared at the far end of the room. She had to raise her voice to be heard over the strains of a Strauss waltz.

"Dear Peregrine," Musetta said with warmth rising in her eyes for the young man who had been entertaining her of late. "I might consider his thoughts, if he asked me."

There was the sound of a step behind them, then a quiet voice made rough with emotion asked, "My thoughts on what?"

Musetta turned in a yellow swirl of skirts. "Perry, my love, there you are. I've been waiting for you. You must tell me what you think of our new arrival as we dance. Will he best all of you as easily as he boasts?"

A moment later they were gone. Katrine stood watching as the two blended with the other dancers, the laughing blond woman and the slim dark-haired young man with the serious face, dark, fiery eyes, and moist red lips. Perry, it appeared, was denying with vehement emphasis that he would be bested by anyone. His flamboyant gestures were in keeping with the flowing polka-dotted cravat and overly long hair of the romantic style he favored.

Katrine sighed a little and tightened her arms around herself. Musetta was so capricious. She could be honey sweet one moment and a witch the next. She lived from moment to moment, swayed by the least emotion that touched her, with little care for the consequences of the things she said and did under its influence. In the two days since young Peregrine Blackstone had arrived, he had hardly left her side. Flattered by his obvious passion for her, she had little discretion.

But perhaps her husband wouldn't notice. Giles's brother-in-law was a busy man; the responsibility for the prosperity of Arcadia rested on his sturdy shoulders. Acting as Giles's man of business, he kept a careful accounting of every acre of cotton put into production, every mule, breeding mare, piece of furniture and knickknack bought, every item used from the storehouse, and every bite of food consumed at every table. He attended to the sale of the cotton and watched over Giles's fortune in gold that increased with every growing season.

Heavyset, several years older than his wife, bearded in the style recently made popular by Napoléon III, he could be officious at times. It was Brantley Hennen who parceled out Katrine's monthly household allowance and her personal pin money. It was only natural that she should resent him for the careful way he counted it out coin by coin each time, as if it came from his own pocket. That did not, however, keep her from feeling just a little sorry for him.

On the far side of the room, beyond the shifting kaleidoscope of dancers, Rowan de Blanc was standing with his broad shoulders propped against the wall. He was watching her, his dark brows drawn into a single line over his eyes.

Katrine had known he was there. She had felt his gaze upon her from the moment he settled into position. There was something about the intensity of it that made her feel vulnerable, stripped bare of defenses. She didn't like it.

She had armored herself with hard-won resolution and dignity as the chatelaine of Arcadia and wife of its owner. She could not bear that anything should disturb her precarious balance in that role. She would not permit it. Not from Rowan de Blanc. No, and not even from Giles himself.

Turning her back on the man against the far wall, she lowered her hands, letting her left rest lightly on the bell of her skirt. She lifted the heavy satin brocade of her hem in the front with the other, then raised her chin to a proud tilt and walked slowly from the room.

Rowan de Blanc frowned as he watched that majestic departure. The provocative swing of Katrine Castlereagh's full skirts caused an ache in his groin that was as unexpected as it was uncomfortable. The way the candlelight gleamed on her shoulders, the shimmering silk of her hair made his fingers tingle with the need to touch, to hold. The urge to peel away the layers of heavy clothing she wore, to discover and explore the feminine mystery underneath, was so strong that he clenched his hands into fists in his effort to subdue it.

He was beginning to see why Terence had been bewitched.

Terence, so young and idealistic, had been no match for this woman, a married lady of wealth and position as well as unusual beauty. But he was. This he knew without conceit.

He would counter her every evasion, strip away her pretenses one by one. He would discover how his brother had come to die for her sake. He would know the truth, no matter how long it took, or what he had to do to force an answer.

He would not be denied. Nor would he be bewitched.