Thornbound

by Stephanie Burgis

  Thank Boudicca for truly reliable men! Leaving the protection of the room to him, I strode quickly across the long, narrow floor, searching for clues on every surface. Of course I knew what had taken Annabel—I could visualize the whole event only too clearly, based on that desperate tangle of sheets and leaves on the bed, not to mention the trail of small, dark drops of blood between them and the open window.

  But why had those vines taken her, of all people? And how had they travelled so far—and broken through Miss Birch’s guard—despite all the stablegirls set to watch for them by Luton’s staff cottage?

  I could barely stand to see those tiny, bloody drops. I stepped around them to peer out through the window, gripping the chipped windowsill with both hands...and then I saw another window hanging open just below.

  Those vines hadn’t had to grow all the way from Luton’s cottage and around the bulky mass of Thornfell after all.

  I was lunging through the bedroom door before I’d even had time to think, brushing past Jonathan’s startled yelp as he jumped aside. “Downstairs,” I snapped. “Quickly!”

  We hurtled together down the staircase to the ground floor, making no attempts at silence anymore. I’d passed the point of caring for discretion the moment I’d seen that second pair of open windows below me and realized exactly which room they’d come from. That anyone would dare to use my library of magic as their setting for a forbidden fey summoning again—!

  The dining room door flew open as we passed, students and inspectors spilling out with raised voices and wide eyes, but I ignored every question shouted after us.

  Damnation! From this point onward, I was going to lock that library door whenever I wasn’t there to guard it, no matter how important those books might be for my students’ education.

  Tonight, I was too late. The windows stood wide open to the evening breeze, which fluttered the long curtains as I exploded into the room. The culprit—whoever it had been—was long gone. Only green leaves, scattered across the carpet, along with marks I recognized on the windowsill itself, remained as taunting evidence of what had happened in the room I loved most, whilst I’d been buried in useless old family gossip three stories away, oblivious to what was transpiring below me.

  Perhaps Westgate was right after all. I’d always understood magic on a bone-deep level, but when it came to looking after other people...

  “What in the world is going on?” Lady Cosgrave demanded from the doorway behind me. Her silvering dark hair was piled high atop her head tonight and pinned into place by a truly magnificent ruby. A necklace of shining silver twined in intricate elven knots around her throat, and she sailed forward in her crimson fey-silk gown like a warship surging through a shoal of fishing boats as my students cleared hastily out of her path.

  Amy stood just behind, one hand raised to her mouth as she took in the scope of the disaster. For once, my sister-in-law made no move to step forward and bring calm to the room; only too clearly, we were past any possibility of that. Her gaze shifted from the leaves and the open windows to me, her brown eyes wide and questioning.

  The time for strategic misdirection had ended. I said, my voice pitched to reach the students who hovered outside the room, “Someone in this house has been bargaining with a wild fey to attack Thornfell. Now Mrs. Renwick has been taken.”

  “Taken?” Lady Cosgrave’s eyebrows shot up as the crowd behind her dissolved into anxious gasps and whispers. “What do you mean, taken? To where, exactly?”

  “The woods, I assume.” There was nowhere else any wild fey could transport themselves so easily with an unwilling human companion. As this particular fey hadn’t been thoughtful enough to drag Annabel inch-by-inch across the grounds for us to watch along their way, they could be hiding anywhere in those woods by now. I hadn’t stepped past the tree line myself since bluebell season first began, and I’d never once stepped off the official woodland paths before the safety of Samhain any year, not even in my most rebellious youth.

  Now, apparently, for the sake of my old childhood tormentor, that most immutable Harwood law—Leave the fey to their secrets!—was about to be broken for the first time...and yet again, my whole family might pay the price for my actions, if the rest of the fey in our woods took it as a final betrayal of our long agreement.

  I clenched my jaw tight and bit out my words as Jonathan set down the piled journals and stepped up behind me in support. “We cannot rescue her without magical assistance. As soon as Mr. Westgate returns with one of his officers of magic—”

  “Wait. She’s been carried off to the woods?” Behind Lady Cosgrave, Miss Stewart blanched and clasped Miss Banks’s bare forearm for support. “But Professor Luton, in our vision—”

  “Indeed.” Lady Cosgrave turned to give her cousin a meaningful look, and Miss Fennell swiftly averted her gaze from Miss Stewart’s hand upon her secret fiancée’s arm. “We did all witness Gregory Luton in those woods today, did we not? Standing directly by the bluebells.”

  “Oh, for—!” I forced myself to pause for a deep, sustaining breath, as Amy’s warning gaze landed upon me. “Professor Luton had nothing to do with this matter, I assure you,” I continued as steadily as I could. “In point of fact, I am almost certain that the true culprit—”

  “Then what was he doing in those woods today? Especially after all of those dire warnings you issued last night?” She looked around the gathered company for support. “I wasn’t the only one who heard them, was I? ‘No one is to enter the woods on any pretext until the end of bluebell season, on threat of expulsion?’”

  “That warning,” I said, “was intended for students. Professor Luton is an established weather wizard, so—”

  “Perhaps,” said Amy, moving forward, “we should hear all of the facts before we start casting wild accusations in any direction. Cassandra?” Her tone and facial expression might appear as composed as usual in the midst of any political storm, but I knew Amy better than almost anyone, and what I glimpsed in the shadows of her gaze made the ground suddenly feel unbalanced beneath my feet. Could that be raw pain she was trying to hide? Why? What about this could have hurt her on such a personal level?

  I wanted to turn to Jonathan for help, but she spoke again before I could. “What exactly do you know of what’s been happening?” she asked me. “And how long has it been going on?”

  Ohhh. I sucked in a breath as realization hit, sickeningly. I was the one who had hurt her. Damn it! “I wasn’t keeping it a secret from you!” I said hastily. “We only discovered it late last night—”

  “We?” said Lady Cosgrave sharply. “So there are multiple people in this house who knew of grave danger and intentionally kept it hidden from us?”

  Her cousin’s strong-boned face went stiller than ever. Safely outside Lady Cosgrave’s line of sight, Miss Banks gave a tiny, frantic shake of her head.

  Reluctantly, I released the safest truth available. “Wrexham was visiting me for the evening.”

  Amy’s eyes widened. Behind me, I felt Jonathan shift position. But my focus was on Lady Cosgrave now, and I caught the exact moment that her lip curled with wry satisfaction. “What a pity,” she murmured. “We had all understood that your husband, at least, was reliable in his work. But if he’s been secretly traipsing about the nation for romantic assignations when he was meant to be fulfilling his official duties...” She shrugged. “I don’t see how even I could defend him any longer to the others in the Boudiccate.”

  “You—?” My jaw dropped open. “Who are you, Honoria Cosgrave? Who have you allowed yourself to become?” The words ripped themselves from my chest; her familiar face turned even colder and more unreachable with every new word that I uttered. “You’ve known me since I was a child,” I said desperately. “You tried to matchmake me and Wrexham last winter. I don’t care how much you disapprove of my school. How can you possibly justify trying to ruin him?”

  I shook my head in disbelief. “Whatever Annabel may be holding over you, nothing justif
ies what you’re doing now.”

  If I hadn’t known better, I would have thought she’d grown a full inch in her icy fury. “Believe it or not, Cassandra Harwood,” Lady Cosgrave snapped, “you are not the only woman in this room with a mission to protect the vulnerable. And I would take great care with your personal insinuations about me and my colleagues! There are far worse fates possible for anyone than the loss of a mere magical appointment.”

  “Cassandra!” Amy hurried toward us, one hand outstretched. “This isn’t the moment for recriminations or accusations. Perhaps if we all step outside and take a few minutes to calm ourselves before—”

  “No!” I lurched away from her soothing touch for the first time in memory. Jonathan caught hold of my shoulders before I could slam into him, but I never looked away from Lady Cosgrave’s frozen face. “I cannot let this go, not even for a moment! This isn’t a political game to be played for points amongst colleagues. This is my husband’s life and his career that you’re threatening! Wrexham hasn’t done anything wrong, and you know it. So long as he fulfills his professional duties to the Boudiccate—”

  “I beg your pardon?” Lady Cosgrave let out a startled-sounding laugh. “Did Lionel Westgate not even mention why he had been called away in that message he sent you?”

  “What?” I stared at her. “What are you talking about?”

  “The private message I received from him an hour later, of course.” She waved one hand impatiently, her ruby and topaz rings glinting in the fey-light. “I assumed he must have told you about it, too, and that was why you went and hid away from everyone for so long. My cousin went looking for you as soon as we received the message, but she couldn’t find you anywhere. I might have chosen to discuss the matter with you myself after supper, but as you didn’t bother to attend that meal, either...”

  Jonathan’s hands tightened around my shoulders, as if he feared I might lose control and strike her. Above my head, his voice sounded harsher than I had ever heard it. “I think we’d all like to know what that message said if it pertains to my brother-in-law, Lady Cosgrave.”

  Amy stepped up to close us into a tight circle of privacy, her back blocking the view of our onlookers. “Don’t be cruel, Honoria,” she murmured, too softly for anyone outside to overhear. “It’s petty and beneath you, and you know it.”

  It was the first time the two had directly spoken to each other since Lady Cosgrave’s arrival, and a flash of pain crossed Honoria’s face at Amy’s words. Then her expression hardened.

  “You think so?” she asked coldly. “Well, perhaps you should take care with your own words, Mrs. Harwood. I believe you’ve already been informed that the business of the Boudiccate is above you, nowadays.”

  Amy’s expression didn’t alter. But I flinched for her as she went still, and Jonathan sucked in a breath, his strong fingers flexing around my shoulders. I didn’t struggle against that momentary discomfort; I knew only too well what he was feeling.

  Lady Cosgrave’s mouth puckered as Amy held her gaze in silence.

  There wasn’t time for any of this!

  “There is nothing and no one in this nation above Amy Harwood, and you know it!” I snapped. “But I don’t give a damn about the private business of the Boudiccate. Keep it as confidential as you like! All I care about right now is whatever you’ve learned about my husband. If you don’t tell me where he is right now—”

  “But Cassandra...” Lady Cosgrave sighed. “Aren’t you the one who ought to be able to answer that question, as he apparently abandoned his duties to enjoy your company last night?”

  I blinked at her, too baffled to even argue that last point. “He left Thornfell at dawn. He would have been back to his duties long before anyone even noticed—”

  “He may have left you,” said Lady Cosgrave, “but he didn’t return to his post. No one has seen him since last night.”

  “What?” I stared at her, the world beginning to spin gently around me. “But that’s not possible. He swore—”

  “Didn’t you even wonder what magical crisis had summoned Mr. Westgate away so urgently?” Lady Cosgrave’s tone gentled, her shoulders sagging. “You must know he is always the first to be summoned whenever one of his officers of magic goes missing.”

  Missing.

  The word pealed through me like a bell.

  I hardly noticed Jonathan closing his arms around me from behind, or Amy taking my hands in a firm grip. I was floating high and untethered above my body, cut loose by that one impossible word. Their sudden stream of questions and exclamations couldn’t reach me.

  “He can’t be missing,” I said numbly to myself. “I would know...”

  Wait. The words stuck in my mouth as memory suddenly swamped me.

  My dream last night—then my panic this morning when I’d first awoken—it had all felt so overwhelming and so irrational. I’d felt such a crushing urge to check that he was safe! But of course, I had forced myself to ignore it.

  How could I have been such a fool?

  A door slammed in the distance, cutting off Jonathan’s and Amy’s agitated interrogation. Gasps sounded in the cluster of students by the library’s entrance. Miss Rosenthal cried out near the back of the group, “Oh, Professor Luton, you’re safe!”

  Oh, for...!

  At least the irritation knocked me back into myself. Ignoring the latest episode of Luton-induced chaos, I addressed Lady Cosgrave urgently. “Did Mr. Westgate tell you when he would be back?”

  If not, I would have to find a magician of my own to transport me across the nation to my husband’s temporary quarters...but of course, the path along the way would need to be carefully checked as well.

  Wrexham had been strained to the limit by both magic and exhaustion. If his transportation spell had gone awry and landed him in danger while he was weakened by the trip... If it had turned against him entirely, as in those nightmarish warning stories of severed body parts that were told to young students as cautions for their own magical training... If he was lying injured in some isolated bog, alone and in pain, without anyone to help...

  That final, much-too-vivid image froze the last of my whirling panic into icily focused determination.

  He will not be left alone. No matter how many magicians I had to abduct to aid me in the search, my husband would be found—and quickly, too.

  “There you are, Miss Harwood. Finally!” With a put-upon sigh, Gregory Luton pushed himself into place beside me, carelessly nudging Lady Cosgrave aside. Completely missing her outraged reaction, he tossed his hat through the air to land on the back of the closest wing-backed chair and ran both hands through his rumpled lion’s mane of golden locks. Casually, he plucked out a single green leaf. “I thought I’d never hunt you down!” he said. “This place is an utter madhouse tonight. No one to be found in the dining hall despite the lateness of the hour; all of that food going to waste; no one out in the gardens but scowling servants—and there’s a great big fence sticking up around my house, which I think I should have been consulted about beforehand! There wasn’t so much as a doorway cut into it, so I couldn’t even change my clothes before I—”

  “Professor Luton!” I had been pushed beyond all womanly endurance. “No one cares about your attire. Right now we are attempting to address various important and urgent issues—”

  “Why do you think I’ve been trying and trying to find you?” Luton shook his head at me pityingly. “Fey are notoriously bad listeners, you see, no matter how clearly anyone tries to explain the most obvious of magical points to them. I finally had to give up on getting through to her, myself, at all. But still...”

  Shrugging, he dropped his gaze from mine and straightened his cravat with care. “I thought you’d wish to know: that fellow Wrackham—Wreckham?—whatever your husband’s name may be”—he waved one hand dismissively—“he’s been a prisoner in those woods of yours for hours, and things are getting dashed unpleasant in there. If you want any chance at seeing him again, you should
probably do something about it.”

  13

  I still remembered my mother’s first lesson to me, which she’d repeated again and again in her nursery visits: “You’re a Harwood, Cassandra. Never forget that! Work hard, hold fast, never let anyone see your fear—and you will astonish the world with your accomplishments.”

  In that, if in no other area of my life, I had listened to her. Over the decades, I had thrown myself at every seemingly impossible challenge with passionate determination and my head held high before all onlookers. Even after last year’s spectacular, life-shattering failure, I had somehow convinced myself that I could build new dreams from the ashes of my old ones, and this time, if only I worked hard enough and held fast to my vision, it would all work...

  And this was the moment to which that path had led me. At that realization, every difficult, distracting emotion drained away, leaving me finally, perfectly at peace.

  I knew exactly what I had to do.

  My voice, when it emerged, sounded pleasingly cool and steady. “Would you all please excuse me?” There. No one could object to that request, surely.

  From the reactions of everyone around me, I might as well have shouted the most violent profanities.

  “Cassandra?” Amy’s grip on my arm tightened as her voice rose with unhidden alarm. “What are you doing?”

  Lady Cosgrave’s brows drew into an ominous frown. “I beg your pardon? Cassandra—”

  “Did you not hear what I just said?” Luton demanded. “Your own husband—”

  “Thank you,” I murmured. “All of you. I heard what you said. Now I need a moment, please.” As gently as I could, I tugged forward, and my relatives’ hands fell reluctantly away.

  “Cassandra...” Jonathan began.

  “Thank you,” I repeated sweetly, and started for the door.

  My students were all clustered around it, wide-eyed and looking terribly worried. I smiled reassuringly as I gestured for them to clear my path.