For a moment, he simply stared. His eyes took in the whole picture. The faded gray habit, the heavy sensible horse, the determined set of her jaw. A flicker of disbelief crossed his face. Then something else.
Pure unadulterated amusement. It wasn't a loud laugh. It was a short, sharp bark of sound, quickly suppressed. He turned to the man beside him, murmured something, and the man chuckled. The Duke did not look at her again.
He had seen, judged, and dismissed her in the space of a single breath. The sound of his laugh, small as it was, echoed in the sudden silence of Eleanor's mind. It was worse than Julian's open mockery. It was the casual cruelty of a man so far above her that her presence was nothing more than a brief comical diversion. A stone in his shoe, a fly in his wine.
The shame was a hot prickling wave. She felt her cheeks burn. For one terrible second, she wanted to turn Perseus around and flee, to retreat to the crumbling safety of Oakhaven. But then, the huntsman raised a brass horn to his lips. The call, clear and wild, cut through the crisp air.
The hounds, held in check by the handlers, began to bay, a chorus of frantic excitement. The horses shifted, their energy electric. The moment of choice was over. The hunt was on. Alister St.
Clair, Duke of Blackwood, felt the familiar surge of adrenaline as his stallion, Ares, gathered himself for the first gallop. The thunder of hooves, the cry of the hounds, the mad exhilarating rush across open country. It was one of the few things that could silence the constant grinding machinery of his thoughts. The responsibilities of the dukedom, the endless correspondence, the political maneuvering in London, all of it fell away, replaced by the simple primal chase. He barely gave the woman on the draft horse a second thought.
The sight had been so incongruous, so utterly out of place, that the laugh had escaped him before he could check it. It was poor form, he knew. Unbecoming of a host. But really, what was the woman thinking? This was the Blackwood hunt, not a country fete.
It was a serious and dangerous business. He dismissed her as some eccentric local, a spinster with more pride than sense. She would be left behind before they even reached the first copse. The pack streamed across the frosted meadows, a river of white and tan, their noses to the ground. The field of riders followed, a chaotic cavalcade of color and sound.
Alister held Ares's back slightly, letting the most reckless of his guests surge ahead. He knew this land. Every rise and fall, every treacherous patch of bog, every shortcut. The hunt was not a sprint. It was a test of stamina and intelligence for both horse and rider.
They cleared the first set of low stone walls, a ripple of riders flying over them. He glanced back out of habit, assessing his field. And he saw her. She was not attempting the jump. Instead, she was trotting the big gray horse along the wall to a spot where it had crumbled, creating a gap.