Entrancing the Earl

by Patricia Rice

  Spotting an urchin loitering by a lamppost, Gerard leaped from the carriage the instant it halted and chased the brat off with a few threats. He stood guard to be certain no other appeared until Iona had climbed in—without his aid, of course. Gentlemen did not aid servants. With a sigh of exasperation, he joined her.

  “He’ll be back,” she said complacently. “If he’s any good, he’ll have notified the rest of his gang, who will be watching this carriage from every street corner. I may not have spent much time in the city, but I know how bees scout. It’s a basic instinct.”

  “I don’t care.” Gerard sat across from her, grateful for the larger vehicle. But the distance didn’t help much. Now that she was out of public view, the little countess sat like a proper lady, her hands on the knob of a walking stick she must have picked up on her way out. “You’re the one hiding behind that ridiculous garb. I’d just as soon shoot anyone who approached you.”

  “Are you carrying a pistol?” she asked with interest.

  “I am. And a knife, if you’re thinking bloodthirsty thoughts. But like you, I prefer a brass-handled walking stick and my fists.” In fact, his fists were itching to plant themselves in her stepfather’s fatuous face. That didn’t help his humor.

  “I shall attempt to stay out of trouble,” she said soberly. “I do appreciate all you’ve done, even if it is in the interest of a reward I fear you’ll never see.”

  “Rainford is investigating the terms of the reward. I have legitimately found you and your sister. We can arrange to meet Mortimer and White in some safe place with authorities present. It’s your desire to marry the wretch that is causing complications.” He sounded stiff, even to himself.

  “I apologize. But even should we split the reward, I still need another level of protection before I will feel safe once you have left for London. I know of no other means to make Mortimer go away.” She almost sounded regretful.

  He’d like to test the knob she was clutching to see if it gave off vibrations like the map she’d drawn, but he didn’t feel inclined to explain his curiosity. It wasn’t as if he sensed much on anything else he touched, so perhaps it was only Iona’s fears he felt.

  He wanted to feel her happiness the next time he touched an object of hers.

  That twisted his gut. Was she sensing his unhappiness?

  He wasn’t a man prone to noticing the sentiments of others. He brushed off his own now. “We’ll talk to the lawyers, see what they say.”

  The lawyers were less than helpful. They agreed to draw up a strict settlement document as requested, but admitted there was very little they could do to Mortimer unless he physically abducted one of his stepdaughters. And then it was up to the criminal courts, which wasn’t their bailiwick.

  They agreed to ask about Iona’s request for her letters patent, but they didn’t seem optimistic that it would be accomplished any time soon.

  Clenching his teeth, Gerard sent Iona from the solicitor’s office in the company of a bevy of maids. For a few coins, the women agreed to lead the drably-garbed lady down to the slums Iona insisted on visiting. Recalling her comment about urchins following the carriage, Gerard sent a message to Dare’s driver. Then he folded up his top hat, borrowed a cloak, and left the building from the rear. Taking alleys and cutting corners to the more crowded thoroughfare, he easily caught up with the sauntering women and passed them as if they weren’t there.

  Lady Iona seemed to be enjoying herself, chattering with uneducated servants as if they were the queen’s court. He supposed her sensitivities allowed her to react to how the women felt as much as she did to their words. That would be a useful ability, although as with all Malcolm gifts, there had to be a drawback.

  As far as he could tell, his gift was singularly useless, and voices in his head were a distinct drawback.

  He left Iona flitting about the shops while he turned down the narrow alley Dare called a wynd—for obvious reasons. The towering tenements had been built along the side of a steep hill on a path fit only for wandering cattle. Gerard removed a glove and circumspectly brushed his hand over ancient stones and ornaments but nothing interesting leapt out at him. He assumed his encounter with Iona’s map was a fluke.

  Zane was already at the construction site, talking to Andrew Blair, Phoebe’s husband, and a man holding what appeared to be blueprints. Gerard acknowledged them with a gesture but left them talking while he wandered into the littered lot that had once held several old tenements. Remnants of the ancient foundation remained, along with construction debris. The medallion in his pocket made no comment.

  He kicked the rubble about, looking for anything besides stone and brick. He sensed Iona’s arrival before he saw her. It was as if the universe shifted subtly—sound became more acute, light brightened. He heard her converse with Zane as he hadn’t heard the male conversation earlier. He knew when she approached, although he hadn’t noticed the foreman strolling the perimeter until he looked up now.

  “Lord Dare says hundreds of people, including Lady Phoebe and her mother, once lived here,” she said in amazement, removing her fake spectacles and putting them in her pocket. “And Mr. Blair started the project after Lady Phoebe’s building collapsed. They had a dreadful time finding housing for all the tenants. I cannot even begin to imagine the immensity of such an undertaking.” She crouched down to examine a pile of crumbling old brick.

  “You’ll get filthy,” Gerard warned.

  She shot him one of those bright smiles that smote his hard heart with a thousand darts.

  “Have you ever smoked a bee’s nest out of a tree? Sheared a sheep? A little brick dust is nothing. I am smelling something interesting here.” She poked the dirt beneath the bricks.

  “Besides a urinal?” he asked in derision. But he crouched down beside her and used a sharp piece of wood to dig a little deeper.

  She chuckled and let him dig. “I generally only smell live people, as a bee would sense live flowers. Dead ones hold no interest. But every so often—a child’s loved blanket, a bride’s hand-stitched linen—I can smell emotion embedded in an object. Perhaps a little bit of our souls? I am not smelling love, though, but a murkier sensation, perhaps some combination of hate and guilt?”

  She spoke so easily of her extra sense—as if everyone understood her ability.

  “Not exactly an object one wishes to touch then. How did you learn what each emotion smells like?” His stick hit a hard object, and he dug deeper, suppressing any excitement.

  “Trial and error mostly. Children learn easily, so perhaps it was like learning the differences in word sounds.”

  A lesson he had thankfully missed. He couldn’t imagine going through life sorting out the complicated feelings of the many people around him.

  “Isolation probably helped,” he concluded. “It must be easier to sort and study when there are only a few familiar faces about instead of hordes.”

  “I’ve never given it much thought, but you might be right. The scent is stronger now. Do you feel anything?”

  He thought for a second she was referencing his peculiar ability, but then realized she meant his digging.

  In fact—he did feel the object, as he often did when an artifact called to him. He simply thought of it as an object speaking to him in the same way an artist might say a subject spoke to him.

  Not the same, the soldier protested.

  Gerard refused to argue with a voice in his head. That way lay insanity.

  He uncovered filth-encrusted metal. Producing a penknife from his pocket, he pried around the edges until it loosened. “Possibly a knife,” he concluded. “I think I see insignia beneath the dirt.”

  “Kitchen knife or long ago murder weapon?” she asked, as if he’d know.

  And he did know, the instant he pried the blade from the clay and held it in his bare palm. “Someone’s prized dagger, reluctantly buried after an unfortunate fight.”

  He regretted his observation the instant he uttered it.

  Eighte
en

  As if just seeing him, Iona regarded Gerard with shock. “You have a gift. Or you’re a very good storyteller. But I don’t smell the lie on you.”

  Cursing himself, still shaken by his reaction to the dagger, he handed her the filthy object. The tip of the blade had broken. “I doubt it’s precious metal,” he said dismissively, attempting to brush aside the incident.

  “You’re only interested in the monetary value?” Disturbed by his reply, she didn’t appear to notice that he hadn’t answered her observation.

  “That would be practical,” he agreed. “But no. I’m interested in the history. We could take it to someone knowledgeable, but what would be the point?”

  She scraped at the dirt-embedded insignia with a hatpin. “We’ll never know the history if you can’t read more. I wonder how long ago it happened?”

  Knowing better than to expose himself this way, but challenged by her question, Gerard removed the medallion from his pocket. He set it aside so as not to have two nags in his head and took the dagger back. His mind sought an inner voice as he’d learned to do as a curious child.

  He had the vague sensation of rude curses but not an actual voice. “Medieval, like the tenement,” he guessed, hoping that sounded as if he could identify the hilt by its looks, which he couldn’t.

  She reached for the object, and for a moment, both their hands gripped it.

  A violent, dimly-lit scene struck him. A whirlwind of anger, betrayal, and pain swept through his head, followed by the slicing of flesh, a cry of anguish, and a wave of terror.

  Iona dropped the knife and backed away. “Did you feel that?”

  He flung the knife back in its hole and picked up his more sensible medallion to steady himself. The old soldier grunted in his head. Gerard refused to interpret grunts.

  Iona snatched up the knife and shoved it in her waistband beneath her bodice.

  Bolting down his anger at exposing her to that sordid scene, unable to deny what they experienced, Gerard took her elbow and steered her from the debris. “That’s not edifying history. That’s human nature at its lowest.”

  She shifted her straw bag, lifted her too-short skirt, and let him support her across the rocky lot. “That’s never happened to me before. You are gifted. How does that work? Do you always feel things on objects?”

  Gerard cursed his wayward tongue and her Malcolm curiosity. “Until this moment, I have never seen things on objects. Let us find the carriage and return to the house for luncheon, like sensible people. I’ll send a messenger to your flat to see if any mail has arrived, although I can assure you that the queen hasn’t replied. Your letter is still sitting on some underling’s desk.”

  She refused to be distracted. “I had an odd sensation of a knife fight and all the dark emotions one might feel at such a time. It was no cold-blooded murder. Smell was only a small part of the feeling, so I’m assuming the rest was you? You made me feel the scene?”

  “Odd things happen occasionally,” he muttered, hurrying her down the street with only a wave to the others. “There is no profit in them.”

  She shook her arm free and responded irately. “Our gifts are meant to be used to help others, not to profit from them. Did your mother not teach you better?”

  “She knows nothing of it, and I’d thank you to not mention it. I have quite enough to do without having people shove their prized possessions into my hands to satisfy their curiosity.” He’d heard tales of family members with the peculiar ability to sense powerful emotions on objects. It wasn’t a pleasant experience and in most cases, not productive. And it wasn’t as if he’d done it. . .

  Except when Iona had been involved.

  “Yes, I suppose, for a busy, important man, such importunities would be a nuisance, especially if you failed to feel anything,” she said stiffly, not sounding as if she really excused him. “Life is all about learning from failure. If you practiced more, you might develop a better sense of the artifacts you seek.”

  “If I ever had the opportunity to seek them,” he grumbled.

  “Ah, that is the reason for your wish to go to Italy! Yes, I can see that might be an exciting opportunity to explore your abilities without anyone watching you fail.”

  “There is nothing there to fail at,” he said curtly, insulted. He led her down the street, keeping an eye out for urchins.

  “Touching that knife at the same time as you produced visions far more detailed than my sense of smell ever has. It was exciting! Wasn’t it the same for you?”

  Damn, double damn, and hellfire. Why did she have to be a human lie detector? Once he admitted they had a psychic connection. . . He’d never hear the end of it.

  “Yes,” he said curtly. “Now, did you want to explore the Royal Mile or do I hail a hackney?”

  She shot him an enigmatic glance but politely responded to his suggestion. “Explore, please. There are bees in the steeple of that church. That’s a good sign. Let us go in and find something pleasant we can touch. It would be interesting to see if perhaps an organ would produce memories.” She hurried into the old cathedral.

  Gerard watched the tower warily for bees but didn’t see what she saw. He had to admit that St. Giles was an excellent place to explore antiquities, if one could find them beneath the fire damage and debris of centuries of fighting, neglect, and partitioning.

  “I doubt the place has an organ any longer,” he warned. “Most of the medieval ornament was stripped when Scotland rejected Rome. I don’t think touching walls and floors will be of much use.”

  The old Catholic cathedral had been walled off into four different parish churches. Even finding the original medieval walls might be a challenge. But Gerard assumed the lady was safer here, out of sight of the public, so he followed along as she trailed through the once grand cathedral.

  “I’m not accustomed to seeking scents on objects.” She refused to drop the subject. “How did I sense the knife?”

  “My masculine proximity enhances your gift?” he suggested sardonically, using that excuse to take her arm.

  Thinking lewd thoughts in church would probably send him directly to hell, but even in drab servants’ garb and spouting nonsense, the lady aroused his lust. And he could see her ankles beneath that too-short skirt. She wore stockings with bees embroidered on them, and his imagination traveled dangerous paths.

  “Interesting theory but not feasible.” She relaxed and leaned into him just a bit as she studied the soaring ceiling and inhaled. “So much sorrow! I was hoping for peace and contentment.”

  “The old chancel, perhaps? If we go straight back, there might be remnants of the original.” Although straight was relative. As they worked their way past partitions to the back of the church, her arm still on his, Gerard realized he was picking up vibrations. He could almost feel the memories stored in the ancient walls.

  He’d thought he found his artifacts by luck. Had he actually been picking up on their vibrations? Could memory leave physical energy on objects—and Iona was intensifying the effect? Or forcing him to focus on his surroundings more?

  And how did that differ from the spirit voices in his head?

  She drifted toward the walls, ignoring pews and chairs. “All the old pieces are gone. We’d have to ask the church warden to see whatever they’ve tucked away. A few of these memorials maybe. . .” She touched a brass plaque of two women representing Justice and Religion. “There’s a haunting scent here that I cannot identify.”

  To humor her, Gerard removed a glove and flattened his palm on the brass. He thought he felt a connection, but it was too complex and didn’t speak to him as his medallion did.

  Iona laid her bare hand over his, skin to skin.

  Satisfaction and peace settled over him. A brief vision of a clergyman in garb too old for him to identify hovered in his mind’s eye. The spirit image rubbed the plaque and offered a grateful prayer in mangled English for the end to conflict and. . .

  “He’s grateful that the sinful Catholic
adornments were removed?” Gerard yanked back his hand to free his head of the vision but a headache lingered. “He’s grateful that they destroyed centuries of history and craftsmanship? That’s appalling, not peaceful.”

  * * *

  Iona caressed the brass, astounded by the clarity of that vision. “That’s religion. Faith is not logical. The poor man sincerely believed the stained glass and statues were devil worship. How sad for him not to understand a human need for beauty and the familiarity of a shared history.”

  She glanced up at the stunned earl. Lord Ives did not look happy with their combined history lesson. “Our Malcolm ancestors worshipped trees and goddesses, remember,” she said with a hint of mischief. “The clergyman would most likely have burned us at the stake for what we just did.”

  “There are some who would still do the same today,” he said gruffly. “People can be judgmental, bigoted, and ignorant about anyone different from themselves. That was even more clear than the knife. I’ve never seen visions like that before. Is that your work?”

  “Never? I thought I was simply amplifying your gift the way Isobel and I occasionally augment each other. But you’ve never seen visions?” She studied the plaque. “Perhaps it’s something in the brass?”

  “That doesn’t explain the knife. Enough of this experiment.” He pulled his glove back on. “This does not solve your problem with Mortimer unless we can reach into his head and slosh his pickled brain around. Is he always drunk?”

  Sharing a gift with her sister and mother was second nature to Iona. She was not quite as shocked as he was by the apparition they’d raised. It brought them closer, though, and they both had reason to resist that.

  “More or less.” Unthinkingly, she hooked her hand through the crook of his elbow. It felt natural somehow. She heard the bees in the steeple humming their approval, so she didn’t withdraw it as he strode out the nearest exit. “Since Mortimer’s scheming seems more in the moment than long-term, I assume touching anything of his would be fruitless. Perhaps we should learn more about Mr. Winter. It would be good to know that he’ll honor any agreement we make.”