The day of Elizabeth and Darcy's wedding dawned…in a downpour. Derbyshire had never seen the likes of such rain, according to the wizened farmer with whom Lizzy consulted on her early morning ramble.

"Whatever are you doing out in this, Miss?" he asked, coming forward to the gate. Lizzy looked quite a sight. She had walked nearly five miles that morning with a copper pot held above her head to keep the rain off. Her feet were bare to the ankle, as she'd removed her boots after they'd accumulated too much mud.

"Attempting to quench my anxiety," Lizzy remarked cheerfully, stopping. "Today is my wedding day, you see, and I am understandably horrified."

"Is he very ugly, then, Miss?"

"Oh, absolutely hideous."

"Old?"

"Practically decrepit."

"Such a shame for a pretty girl like you. I'm sure he's quite wealthy, then?"

"Rich as Croesus. And he's had six wives before me, just like old Harry."

"Are you being made to marry him, Miss?"

"I suppose you could say that, although there is an element of free will involved," Lizzy remarked philosophically. "Doubtless I will regret it all my life. But, there it is...Cheerful weather for the wedding, eh?" she asked, looking up into the sky, an act for which she was rewarded by a fat raindrop in the eye.

"What's his name, Miss? He must be one of the lords around these parts?"

"He isn't a lord at all, I'm afraid. His name is Fitzwilliam Darcy, and he lives just up there." She pointed up the rise of the hill, to where Pemberley was vaguely visible through a haze of rain.

"Then you were fooling me," the farmer remarked, steadying himself against the gate. "Master Darcy is a fine young man – not old or ugly in the slightest. Why, you're a lucky girl!"

"Or he is a terribly clever magician capable of disguising himself before all honest and good-hearted farmers," Lizzy remarked. "I suppose I am lucky, in a sense. It will be nice to have such a large house. But whatever am I to do with all of it? I cannot even conceive. I'd much rather live in a cottage like this," she motioned to the farmer's house. "I'd be infinitely more comfortable, you see."

The farmer shook his head. "It's very easy for you to say that, Miss. But of course you don't mean it."

"I mean every bit of it," Lizzy remarked stoutly. "And here's a bit of poetry for you -

A cottage small be mine, with porch

Enwreathed with ivy green,

And brightsome flowers with dew-filled bells,

'Mid brown old wattles seen.

Now I know that is practical claptrap suitable only for the pigsty. Forgive me for being so flippant. My humor always sours when I'm nervous. Of course I meant no offense whatsoever, and of course I know Master Darcy is an upstanding young gentleman and of course I am highly honored that he is going to marry me, a practical nobody with a temper and a pert tongue. Nevertheless, I must march on and march out my anxiety. For anxiety it is, my good sir."

"I was nervous on my wedding day, too," the farmer remarked. "I remember it very clearly. It was the only day I had no appetite."

"Well," Lizzy said, "I fear that I always have an appetite. Even on a day such as this." She moved as if to march on, paused, and turned rapidly on her heel to ask, "Would you be so kind as to come to my wedding today? I would be very much honored, and I can assure you that if you manage to make it through the hideously tiresome ceremony, there will be some very good cake afterwards."

The farmer looked slightly bemused and scratched his chin in order to sort his thoughts. "I suppose I might come if I get the cows fed in time."

"Never mind about the cows," Lizzy said, "I'll help you feed them now."

"Lizzy!" Georgiana exclaimed, flying down the stairs to greet her prospective sister-in-law. "Wherever have you been? You must get ready, and we are supposed to be starting for the church … Your petticoat!" she exclaimed, looking down at Lizzy's dress, "Six inches deep in mud, Lizzy. Six inches!"

"I was feeding the cows," Lizzy explained, quite simply.

"Feeding cows? On your wedding day?" Georgiana made a face.

"Yes, I know it doesn't conform at all to your romantic ideals, George," Lizzy said, "but I'm a very salt of the earth, prosaic person, and I cannot flounce about in a cloud of lace all morning in anticipation…I had to get my feet wet. To whet my appetite for marriage, so to speak. Quite literally wet," she said, looking down at her boots. "I've never been married before, you see, and so I'm understandably a bit nervous."

"You've nothing to be nervous about, Liz," Georgiana chided, "It's only Darcy, after all."

"Yes, it's only Darcy," Lizzy agreed, "and what does he matter? He hardly counts as a person."

"Well, come along, then. It will take the work of five people to get you ready in time," Georgiana said, pulling Lizzy up the stairs. "But I shall see that you are suitably attired, considering all the trouble I went to in order to get you that dress from London."

"You have single-handedly orchestrated my trousseau, George," Lizzy remarked, passively allowing Georgiana to guide her up the stairs. "But what a pity there are no trousers in it. Does not the word "trousseau" suggest trousers to you? I don't mean to be truculent, George. I would never be truculent about a good pair of trousers. And I would certainly never attempt to dismantle your mantling of me in shawls and whatnot."

"Now you flying off into the clouds, Liz," Georgiana said.

"Flights of fancy. Off to Cloudcuckoo land. To roost with Aristophanes. I would have a rollicking good time with Arisophanes, George."

"Then perhaps you should marry him, Liz."

"Marry Arisophanes? Well, we should be merry as crickets, my lad. But I am afraid that Arisophanes has gone the way of all flesh. To dust, that is. And I would rather marry Darcy than dust."

"The most complimentary thing she has said of me all morning," Darcy said, sticking his head out from the library.

"Fitzwilliam!" Georgiana gasped, throwing herself in front of Lizzy as if to shield her. "You cannot see your bride on your wedding day. It's terrible luck."

"He's hardly Medusa, George. His glance will not turn me to stone so I do not understand why you are fussing so much about it." Lizzy made a face at Darcy behind Georgiana's back. He rolled his eyes and laughed.

"I thought your wedding day might soften you, Lizzy, but I can see I am much mistaken."

"Did you, like George here, expect me to prance about singing songs and heaving my bosom in heady expectation?"

"Lizzy!" Georgiana exclaimed, clearly scandalized.

Darcy laughed again. "I suppose I was imagining something in that nature. Perhaps sans heaving bosom."

"Well, I am sorry to frustrate your expectations, but I am not even remotely nervous. Nor are you obviously, since you appear to be conducting your normal course of activity – reading some hideously boring book, I imagine." She glanced into the library and strained to see the title of the volume Darcy had just put down. "I hope that you don't bore yourself to death before we say our vows, Darcy. That would be tragic. And inconvenient, for then I could not inherent a sou from you. So wait to bore yourself to death until after we are married if you please."

"Anything you ask, my dove," Darcy cooed sarcastically.

"Well, your dove is about to fly away now," Georgiana said, once more grabbing Lizzy's arm and pulling her down the hallway.

"Am I to wear dove grey?" Lizzy asked, once again allowing herself to be pulled. "Oh, Darcy, do let's coo at one another," she shouted back at him rather desperately. "Anything, if it will save me from this."

"I abandon you to your fate, Elizabeth," Darcy answered, retreating into the depths of the library. "I abandon you to your fate…"