Tempered: Book Four of The St. Croix Chronicles

by Karina Cooper

  No lights had been lit. Perhaps it was that we lacked staff to do it, or perhaps Ashmore had not remembered that I was in the library. Whatever the case, the foyer I crossed echoed my footsteps back at me with a sibilant repeat that rustled and whispered long after it should have ended.

  The watchfulness I’d marked by day grew to an unnerving intensity. My skin prickled, fine hairs lifting at my nape, and the need I suffered tangled with the certainty that I meandered through the belly of a manor that would swallow me forever in its crumbling maw.

  My heart slammed so hard in my chest, I could feel the juddering force of it all the way to my toes. The cold night arm slipped beneath my wrapper, battered at the candle in its chamberstick and sent shadows dancing over the walls. The molding that might have looked charming if the paper it crowned were not peeling now looked little more than a streak of crusted scab affixed to a ramshackle wall. I glowered at the black just beyond the reach of my candle.

  “You don’t scare me,” I muttered, lying baldly through my teeth to do it.

  The candle’s flame flickered.

  I did not know where Ashmore might be, but I suspected he had changed his room entirely. Given the hour, I wasn’t sure that he’d be abed already. He struck me as an individual who enjoyed the night.

  Wishful thinking, perhaps. With every step away from the library, a feeling of loneliness gripped me tighter and tighter.

  The house was large—too large for me to explore all on my own. I left the foyer, slipping into one of the doors left ajar, and held my candle high.

  Pale ghosts rose in sharp relief, fingers of pallid white thrusting suddenly from the faded seam of my weak light. I jumped, candle guttering, and almost shrieked before I recognized the distinctive curve at the top of a large harp beneath a protective cloth.

  The floor groaned beneath my weight as I stepped further inside what seemed to be a music room of some sort. Dust clung to every surface, turned even the floor to a paler version of itself where a rug had not been laid down to dampen the echoes.

  In the corner, tucked beside a large window, the pallid shape of a piano beckoned. Heavy drapes concealed the windows, turning the protective cloth into an ashen blur.

  Curious, I padded across the music room, my slippered steps evoking that rustling echo once more.

  The sound raised the hair on the back of my neck.

  I turned, chamberstick thrust out as if I could will the light to pierce through to every corner and reveal whatever it was I felt breathing in the room beside me.

  My imagination would not be so easily resolved.

  Grimacing at myself, I rubbed the back of my neck and approached the piano with deliberate carelessness—as though I could not give a toss for whatever shadows haunted me.

  As I twitched the covering clear of one corner, that lie became truth.

  Wood gleamed in the candle light, smooth as glass and richly hued. No dust touched the surface, no smudges stained the varnish.

  Despite my surroundings, despite the hours and hours of forced tutelage, I could not help myself. Sympathy filled me. How shameful that such a beautiful instrument go unused.

  I had no true skill with the piano or the pianoforte—similar instruments but for the softer refrain of the latter and a lesser range of tonal quality in the former. While I was often reminded of my mother’s great skill on both instruments, I could only passingly pluck out a composition or two—assuming it was not complicated.

  It was because of my academic education on the matter that I recognized a Broadwood and Sons piano for what it was.

  I tugged aside more of the cloth, revealing the wood it was carved from. The beautiful finish was unmarred, the grain vertical and the Indian Rosewood exquisite. This was a gorgeous instrument, like as not the pride of any owner.

  Was it my mother’s? Had she grown up learning to play it?

  Was my grandfather the man who’d bought it?

  The company had been in residence in London since the early eighteenth century, specializing first in harpsichords and pianofortes. This beautiful instrument couldn’t be more than mid-eighteenth century at the earliest.

  Was it purchased by my grandfather’s parents? His grandparents?

  Trembling at the weight of this discovery, my fingers stroked across the uncovered keys. That the protective cover had not been pulled down, even despite the cloth shrouding the whole, surprised me. Surely, whoever had shrouded the piece would have thought to take better care of an heirloom.

  Plink. The delicate note tinkled like a sweet bell, shockingly in tune.

  The sound arrowed through the room’s thick silence, only to be swallowed by the surrounding black.

  As if irritated with my meddling, the house groaned in reply. I felt as a child might, caught with her fingers in the tin of sweets.

  Quickly, I dropped the cloth back into place, shuddering. Even despite my knowledge of the old estate’s ways, I hurried to make my exit.

  Of course my surroundings would make sounds. This manor had like as not been crumbling slowly for decades—possibly longer. I did not know if my father had ever taken up residence here after my grandfather’s death, but it did not seem to be the case.

  Tugging my wrapper more firmly about me, I held the candle aloft and hurried into the hall.

  The vacant shadows huddled together, marking my passage with a startling creak from within the walls I passed beside.

  Heart pounding, I abandoned all thoughts of finding Ashmore and fled to the dubious safety of the library once more.

  If I imagined that ghostly hands reached out to snag my trailing hem, I could blame nothing but my own recent reading of outrageous Gothic romances.

  The warm air inside the library seemed to welcome me with open arms. I inhaled deeply, relieved the moment I set foot inside. Blinking in the remarkably brighter glow—my eyes readjusting quickly after the gloom—I noted that Maddie Ruth had not moved.

  To be so innocent as to sleep with such sound faith.

  I envied her.

  I crossed the open expanse of the floor, my heart slowing its frenetic beat. Though the longing in me had not eased, I resolved to bend all my attentions on something else instead.

  I would make it through this night as I did all nights since waking in Ashmore’s care.

  What else could I do?

  I rounded the sofa and Maddie Ruth’s slumbering figure quietly, intent on stoking the fire and feeding to it the wood Ashmore had seen piled in an iron grate beside it. As I passed the desk, I blew out the candle and set it down.

  I paused, confused when the desk proved to be less bare than I remembered.

  A book rested just under the chamberstick I set down, its dark leather cover so old as to be nearly black in the dull firelight. What words had been embossed into the front were no longer gilded, and the facing was worn away.

  My head tilted.

  All thoughts of loneliness and want abandoned, I moved the chamberstick aside and picked up the book with care. The binding bore signs of weakening, but on inspection I found it not so frail as to worry me.

  Bemused, I opened the cover.

  A bit of parchment slid out, nearly fluttering out of my grasp but for a quick gesture to catch it. The ink upon it was dark enough to read easily.

  Perhaps this will interest you. — A.

  The initial caused my eyebrows to raise. Had Ashmore come to the library while I was searching for him? Such missed connections were usually vexing, but I could find no irritation within me. He’d brought me a book, which was rather sweet. I certainly couldn’t deny that I enjoyed books, and loved that I could be surrounded by them and still acquire the more.

  I turned the first page, cautious so that the parchment—rough and dry, as good stock was wont to turn with age—did not tear or rustle so loud as to wake my companion.

  Beneath the title—A Journal, was all it said—a name had been scripted.

  Hamish Pepperidge Carberry.

  My gra
ndfather’s journal.

  Such joy—such eternal delight—filled me upon reading the narrow handwriting. Ashmore, despite his assertions that none existed, had found for me a journal belonging to my grandfather.

  He understood.

  Smiling so boldly as to feel it ache from ear to ear, I clasped the book to my chest and hurried to stoke the fire once more into a crackling blaze.

  So prepared, I returned without rancor to my place upon the sofa and began to decipher my grandfather’s hand.

  Chapter Ten

  By most standards, I read quicker than expected of me. I enjoyed doing so, for my speed allowed me to read more of the books I liked than considered appropriate. The only preoccupation that ever kept me from spending all my pocket money on acquired tomes was the need to save it for the opium grains or draught of laudanum I’d consumed instead.

  Despite this, I found myself struggling through my grandfather’s writings. He often wrote with a strong hand, but on occasion would fall to a shortened variation I could only surmise was his method of writing quickly or of matters he did not necessarily wish any readers other than himself to know.

  Much of what I read was a day to day accounting. He spoke of matters of philosophy and of finances; of trade and of authors he admired or refuted. He did not often speak of his family in this journal, and there were no dates per entry to allow me an understanding of his age at the time of scribing.

  All night, I ensconced myself in front of the library fire, brow furrowed deeply as I worked my way page to page. When daybreak struck, turning the sky beyond the windows into a subtle wash of pale gray and pink, I had still seen no sign of Ashmore—a fact I only recognized because I wanted to thank him for the gift.

  When the craving gathered in my belly and my mouth dried for want of the bliss, I buried myself in my grandfather’s myriad thoughts instead. It became something of a game; when the need came to me, I made it a point to read every word, sound it out in my thoughts and hold on to each until I was sure I recalled the entirety of the sentence.

  It was a game no child would ever play, no soiree would ever host, but word by word, sentence by sentence, I made it through each hour.

  Maddie Ruth exhibited discomfort from her night spent in the chair, greeting me when she woke with an exclamation quite crude in formation.

  I chuckled outright, but did not complain when she fetched tea and toast from the kitchen I had not yet visited. Her portions were larger than Ashmore’s, and she included eggs and cold sausage.

  She busied herself without me for most of the day, content to leave me to my reading when she realized I was happiest there. On occasion, I dozed for half of an hour or some lesser time, only to start awake when I felt myself no longer alone.

  The first it happened, I rose up from my slumber like a puppet pulled on strings. Startled into abrupt wakefulness, I found myself sitting up, gripping the back of the sofa and gaping at nothing at all.

  For what reason my pulse pounded and my senses prickled into paranoid awareness, I didn’t know. I surveyed the library with wide eyes made dry by a fitful sleep. A black shape gathered in the far depths of my environs did not move, as I warily expected, but became the shadow spilled by the overhang of the shelves beside it. The drapes by each window did not move, or mold to the silhouette of a man eager to wrap his hands around my throat; what dreams I spun in my restless sleep to imagine such a thing.

  Whimsy, mostly. The library remained warm and bright, and the book heavy in my lap, but no one came to keep me company.

  Come midday, Maddie Ruth coaxed me upstairs, foregoing the too-heavy chair but allowing me to lean on her as we navigated the steps.

  I felt better today than I had prior.

  After the bath she surprised me with, I felt even more so. For the first in far too long, I was able to wash my hair without fear of drowning myself from the effort.

  In the end, she dressed me in a tea gown that fit rather more comfortably than I expected, and I thrilled at the opportunity to own one. Tea gowns were a type of dress Fanny had never allowed me to acquire. Designed to allow women such as myself to move about our homes with comfort, rather than the rigid structure demanded by corsets and bustles, tea gowns were informal things to be worn among close friends at relaxed dinner engagements or when not expecting company.

  They were, in the eyes of my dear Fanny, only one step away from scandalous nudity.

  That I could wear one now, its rose-colored material spilling a froth of lace at elbow and bodice and its waist structured so as to allow for no corset, only made me miss her all the more.

  A part of me yearned to hear her scandalized lecture.

  The rest of me delighted in my appearance as I admired my new dress.

  “Where did it come from?” I asked. Such a fashion had not been in evidence during my mother’s time, so it could not have come from her trunks.

  “Mr. Ashmore’s man had me pick it up from a London shop before I came,” she replied, twitching my hair into place and pinning it loosely. She was no lady’s maid, but I didn’t much care for anything more than the coiled plait she made of my hair. I was enjoying my freedoms far more than I expected to. “I altered it some in the carriage here.”

  Another thing for which I was grateful. Would Ashmore show his face so that I might thank him?

  My smile died as I looked at my hands, and the book I’d left just by my hip as I sat upon the vanity chair.

  “There,” Maddie Ruth said, beaming. “You look like a dream.”

  I scoffed at that. “I look like an invalid.”

  “That too,” she acknowledged, nodding rather more sagely than the observation required.

  I waved her teasing away, picking up the book and cradling it in the crook of my arm. From what I’d read so far, my grandfather was a man who was not given to display of overt humor. He was a stern man, with a startling intellect I found rather sharp. He did not hold with fools, nor with those who could not grasp the most basic concepts of science, mathematics, naturo-philosopy and the fundamentals of music theory.

  A demanding man.

  It was no wonder my mother had turned into the accomplished woman she was reputed to be.

  As Maddie Ruth once more escorted me down to the library, busying herself with putting away the books I did not intend to read again, I returned to the journal.

  I gleaned that he had, some years before writing this particular volume, been taught the precepts of alchemy. His references to it were minimal, at first, but grew in evidence as time passed—which I noted when I finally realized the small numbers in the corner of each page marked the passing of the months and not of days. An odd way of doing it.

  Another meal came and went—another plate I did not wholly finish, though I was suitably impressed when I looked up from my reading to find the food left upon it to be rather less than I expected. Maddie Ruth praised my efforts when she came to collect the tray.

  For the rest of the evening, I whiled away the time deciphering the script that turned more and more puzzling. The occasional symbol jostled my recollection, turning out a flash of recognition here and there. The combined letters I had once mistaken for Ey were instead an ornately scripted Fu—one of the alchemical symbols for fusion. The letters DG represented digestion. The man who had taught me that much, Mr. Pettigrew, had been murdered shortly thereafter by the woman utilizing those alchemical symbols in her stolen formula. It was I that had been tracking Miss Hensworth, though I had not known it was her until too late.

  Another instance in which my meddling had cost a good man his life. Mr. Pettigrew—who had insisted I call him Gus with refreshing informality—had been a bookseller of remarkable age, whose shelves held many of the rare delights I loved to read. I’d gone to his shop near London’s Philosopher’s Square, where many such intellectual activities could be pursued, searching for a book stolen from my possession by my erstwhile quarry. He had offered to translate the formula I’d acquired, and his generosity ear
ned him a murdering at Miss Hensworth’s hands.

  The logical, indubitably rational steps taken by both myself and the suitably intelligent—if drastically misguided—Miss Hensworth in pursuit of our respective goals did nothing to salve the hurt of his loss. Mr. Pettigrew had been a wonderful gentleman, and thinking of his squinting, myopic stare and warm smile now put a trembling ache deep in my heart.

  Alchemy. Not all that long ago, I’d considered it the domain of scientists nearing the onset of death, too afraid to face it with courage. Since my father’s attempt on my life, I had stumbled more and more over the scientific application I had once dismissed out of hand.

  When my mother’s journal had discussed the applications of aether and alchemy, my belief had begun to change. I was not so ignorant of my own foibles; I assumed that my mother’s interests colored mine, as my father’s intellectual pursuits had long done so. Whether I strived to mimic them or simply utilized both as an excuse to continue educating myself of such matters Society claimed as beyond my natural reach, I couldn’t be certain.

  Now I read of alchemy in my grandfather’s journal, proving that my family had long concerned themselves with this strange scientific art, and thought it considerably less strange.

  When supper had ended and I could no longer convince Maddie Ruth to allow me to stay in the library—lacking also the cruelty to force her to sleep in the chair a second night—I went to bed, candles stocked and book in hand.

  I did not sleep. I was no longer tired, feeling as if each page I successfully deciphered filled me with a new strength.

  My grandfather spoke little of his immediate family, though occasionally of J, whom I took to mean his daughter, Josephine. Often, he seemed convinced that his weakening body was the result of a conspiracy to end his life—a refrain that echoed many times in the later chapters he penned. I wondered if madness was a thing that came part and parcel with genuinely towering intellect or if this was the inevitable onset of age, and that what it did to a mind suffering it. Sometimes, his ramblings of such things reached overwrought heights eerily reminiscent of my own manic episodes at the worst of my cravings.