“Mr. Carlyle wouldn’t betray Angeline,” I said. “He’s her true—”
“If anyone utters the words ‘true love’ to me, I shall have strong hysterics,” Stepmama said. “We are leaving tomorrow morning.”
“Why?” I said. “Where?”
She darted a look into Angeline’s bedroom, then turned back to me with a martyr’s sigh. “You girls are each lucky enough to have a small dowry now, gifted by your new brother-in-law. It is too early to make use of yours, but if we wait even a month, it may be too late for Angeline. We cannot hope to outrun the gossip for long.”
“But why?”
“Your sister,” said Stepmama, “is going to find a fiancé.”
Angeline’s voice cut through the air like a rapier. “I have already found one.”
“Any promises Mr. Carlyle made to you are legally invalid. He is not of age. In court, his mother and guardian could—”
“You cannot force me to become betrothed to anyone else in the world,” said Angeline.
“You think not?”
Oh, no. The whole air rippled with the tension of a disaster about to happen. This was the moment when Elissa was supposed to step in. I glanced at the open door, half expecting her to come hurrying out. She always did at this point. She would soothe Stepmama and force Angeline to be quiet and negotiate between them so nothing too desperate could happen, and then …
“I,” said Stepmama, “have done my duty by you and your sisters for over five years. Despite every evidence of ingratitude, misbehavior, and the most shocking want of ladylike propriety—”
“Wait,” I said, and stepped forward. What would Elissa say now? I’d never paid much attention to how she calmed Stepmama down. I was usually too busy shouting back at Stepmama to notice—and too annoyed by Elissa’s interference in our arguments. But now I was beginning to understand just how important that interference had been.
“Stepmama,” I said, and cleared my throat. “Can I make you some tea?”
“Tea?” Stepmama drew herself up like a ruffled hen. “Don’t be absurd. I do not desire tea at a moment like this. What I wish to say is—”
“Eggs!” I said. “There are still hard-boiled eggs and rolls and chicken on the table downstairs. And wedding cake! Why don’t you and I go downstairs and finally eat our breakfast, and then we’ll all feel better.”
“What are you going on about now?” Stepmama blinked at me. “Have you run mad, Kat?”
“No,” I said. “I mean, yes. You have to take me downstairs and feed me before I can do anything dreadful.”
Angeline’s voice spoke again from the bedroom, in a tone as sweet and as lethally cold as a stream deep in the Yorkshire Dales. “What Kat is on about this time, ma’am, is a blatant attempt to distract you. Because she never has been able to tell when something is none of her business.”
Quick footsteps sounded across the bedroom floor, and Angeline appeared at the door.
I gulped at the sight of her. Her thick, dark brown hair was perfectly smooth, still arranged to perfection in its wedding style; her gown, unlike mine, was perfectly clean and unwrinkled. But her face looked as white and stretched as a ghost’s, and her dark eyes burned.
“Tell me,” said Angeline to Stepmama, “what you were about to say.”
“After breakfast!” I said. “We’ll all eat breakfast first, and then …” My voice trailed off as I looked between them. Neither of them was listening to me.
Stepmama’s eyes were on Angeline’s, and her voice was just as inflexible as Angeline’s own. “I have done my duty for the past five years,” she repeated, “but you are a grown woman now, not a girl who can be forgiven for her misbehavior. You have done untold damage to our family with your disobedience and your shocking witchcraft. If you choose to thwart me now and throw aside all of my and your father’s best efforts and hopes for your own welfare—”
“I really don’t think we should—” I began.
“We leave for Bath tomorrow,” Stepmama said to Angeline. “While we are there, you will behave like a modest, respectable young lady who has never even heard of magic. You will do your very best to find an eligible new fiancé before the news of your social ruin can be carried across the country.”
Angeline’s lips curled into a sneer. “And if I do not?”
“If you do not,” said Stepmama, “then when we return home afterward, you will not accompany us.”
Six
We left for Bath the next morning.
The last time we had traveled, Squire Briggs had lent us his second-best traveling carriage. This time, all five of us rode packed like kippers in a crowded public stagecoach: me, Angeline, Stepmama, Papa, and Charles, all squashed so tightly against one another and our baggage that I could barely breathe, much less think.
Luckily, no one was speaking to anyone else by then anyway.
Papa looked too miserable to utter a word. Charles, of course, retreated from the boredom of several days’ travel by sleeping the entire way. Angeline and Stepmama each radiated a rage so icy it was almost enough to keep the whole packed stagecoach cool. There were four other passengers: a woman and her daughter sitting on the roof above us, carrying geese that honked on and off from their baskets throughout the journey, and two boys my own age traveling to meet their family. The goose women laughed and chattered all the way, while the geese honked accompaniment. I thought longing thoughts about changing families, and I wished I could sit up on the roof.
Mama’s mirror stayed quiet and cool inside my reticule. I couldn’t help touching it every so often, though, just in case. Anything could be happening in the Golden Hall. Perhaps Mr. Gregson had talked Lord Ravenscroft into seeing sense. Perhaps Lady Fotherington had felt ashamed and confessed everything. Perhaps … But every time I reached into my reticule and felt the cool, unresponsive—dead—gold against my fingers, I felt sick all over again.
Two stops before Bath, Stepmama made us all get out. Charles groaned, blinked awake, and lurched out of the coach on command, still yawning. Papa followed him into the crowded inn yard, head hanging, without question. Angeline followed Stepmama out with a spine so stiff it could have snapped in two.
I said, “But we aren’t there yet!”
The inn yard was a chaotic mess. Besides our stagecoach, there were three others stopping at the same time. Passengers flooded in and out of the inn and the gathered coaches. Ostlers hurried through the yard, shouting at stableboys. Salesmen wandered in and out of the crowd, hawking ribbons and buttons, and the innkeeper shouted instructions at everybody. I could hear what sounded like drunken carousing coming from the open doors of the inn itself, even though it was only midafternoon.
Stepmama said, “For heaven’s sake, Kat, get down and stop staring. And you!” she snapped at the nearest stableboy. “We’ll need our bags, and quickly.”
“Yes’m,” the boy said, and started forward. He was barely as tall as my shoulder, and terribly skinny.
I reached for the first valise beside me. “I can help you.”
Stepmama’s gloved hand closed around my shoulder. “No, you may not,” she said. “You and your sister will wait in a private room inside the inn, like modest and proper young ladies, until your father and I come for you. Do you understand?”
I twisted away from her. “Fine.” Gritting my teeth, I jumped down onto the muck-covered ground.
“Charles!” Stepmama’s tone made my brother straighten away from the side of the coach with a start. “You will escort your sisters.”
“Yes, ma’am,” he said, and yawned so widely I could see all the way to the back of his tongue. It was disgusting.
Stepmama shuddered and looked away.
Angeline and I followed Charles across the crowded courtyard to the inn. It was surprisingly uncomfortable to have to squeeze through the press of men that surrounded us. Most of them didn’t pay any attention to me, but Angeline attracted notice from all of them. Color mounted in her cheeks as the men she
passed whispered into her ears, but her lips stayed tightly closed and her eyes directed straight ahead. Of course, Charles would have responded for her if he’d been a proper sort of gentlemanly escort … but Charles was Charles, for better or worse. He probably didn’t even realize what was happening behind him.
Only the thought of Stepmama watching us from the carriage stopped me from responding with my fists at least half a dozen times along the way.
But enough was enough. Just as we reached the doorway, one man lurched forward, grabbing for Angeline. His eyes were bleary with drink, his big hand closed over her elbow, and I started forward. Angeline’s lips moved. Before I could do a thing, the scent of lilacs filled the air. The man lurched back as if he’d been struck a blow straight to his gut. He landed in the muck that covered the yard, groaning.
I lowered my fists, grinning. Angeline only smiled demurely, her eyelashes lowered like a modest young lady, and followed Charles into the inn. Thank goodness no one else had been close enough to hear her whisper the spell, and the lout himself was far too intoxicated to understand what had knocked him down.
The taproom of the inn was just as crowded as the yard outside, and full of dense smoke. Charles left me and Angeline in the foyer as he went inside to negotiate with the landlord. We had to flatten ourselves against the striped wallpaper to keep from being trampled by the press of men going in and out.
Still, at least we were out of the carriage, and away from Stepmama. I felt better than I had in days.
“This is rather exciting, isn’t it?” I said. “Perhaps if we went inside for a moment, just to look around—”
“Don’t even think of it,” said Angeline. “The last thing any of us needs right now is for you to provoke a public brawl before we even reach Bath itself.”
“Ha,” I said. “I’m not the one who knocked down that man outside.”
Angeline only gave me a quelling look as another group of men shoved past us. I peered after them into the packed taproom. Charles had disappeared from sight. There seemed to be a card game going on in the back corner, though, which was enough to explain everything. By the time he did reappear, he probably would have lost all his clothes and his allowance for the next ten years. Poor Charles was hopeless at gambling, despite all his practice.
I wouldn’t have minded playing one round of cards myself, just to see what it was like. After all, anything that helped me understand Charles’s recent idiocy was bound to be helpful in the future. When I shot Angeline a speculative glance, though, I found her dark eyes fixed on me in an uncomfortably knowing look.
“No,” she said. “Just wait.”
“Fine.” I slumped against the wall, ignoring all of Stepmama’s and Elissa’s old strictures about ladylike posture. “I don’t know when you became so obedient, though. Why would you care if I outraged Stepmama?”
“I wouldn’t,” Angeline said. “But I have important things on my mind right now, and I can’t be bothered saving you from another of your mad scrapes.”
I jerked upright. “That is so unjust! You have never had to save me from anything.”
“No?” She cocked one eyebrow, an expression I particularly hated. “Let me think. …”
“I’m the one who always saves you!” I said.
“Indeed?” Angeline’s eyebrow arched higher. “How fortunate you are to have such an active imagination. Because I can very clearly recall several times when—”
“It is not my imagination,” I said. “When you cast that spell …” My mind caught up with my tongue, and I stopped myself with a gulp. I really didn’t want to remind her of Mr. Carlyle right now.
“Quite,” Angeline said, looking pointedly at the group of men passing us on their way to the taproom. Luckily, they’d been talking too loudly to hear me.
I winced.
She sighed. “And now, if you wouldn’t mind trying to be quiet, for once? I really do have more important things to think about before we arrive in Bath.”
Well, that was something I did want to ask her about. “Why aren’t we in Bath already? Why did Stepmama insist on all of us getting off the coach so early? It doesn’t make any sense.”
“Oh, Kat,” Angeline said, and my back stiffened. I hated it when she used that world-weary tone of voice. It meant, You are too young to understand anything of significance, but I know it all. She said, “Don’t you understand Stepmama by now? She would never allow us to be seen arriving in Bath in a mere public stagecoach. That would hardly suit her purposes. No, I expect that at this very moment she is hiring us a beautiful private carriage, so that we can sail into Bath in the height of style, impressing everyone who sees us with the illusion of our magnificence. Because as we all know …” Her lips twisted. “The only thing that matters in life is what Society thinks of us.”
“Bravo,” said a deep, unfamiliar voice, only a few feet away. “Magnificent indeed, ma’am, if I may be allowed to say so.”
I spun around.
A gentleman stood just inside the taproom, wearing a greatcoat with so many enveloping capes, his bulky shoulders filled the entire doorway. He raised his gloved hands to clap mockingly. “A remarkable performance,” he said to Angeline. “May I ask when you will be repeating it on the public stage?”
I knew enough about Society to know what an insult he had just paid her. “She is not an actress,” I said, and glared at him.
“Indeed?” He smiled. It was not a pleasant smile, though his face was attractive enough. “But with such affecting talents—”
“You are impertinent, sir,” said Angeline.
“On the contrary, ma’am, I am in awe.” He stepped forward, his greatcoat swishing about his knee-high boots, and reached for her hand. “Beauty matched with style and wit—an irresistible combination. I cannot allow you to remain unprotected in so public a situation.”
Angeline pulled her hand out of his grip. “I am neither unprotected nor unescorted.”
“No?” He looked around pointedly. “And yet …”
“Our brother is escorting us,” I said. “He’ll be back in only a moment.”
“How fortunate for him.” The gentleman’s smile deepened in a way I liked even less. “Then I will only stay and lend my escort until this mysterious brother of yours chooses to make his appearance.”
There wasn’t a mysterious bone in Charles’s body … but, not for the first time, I cursed his hopelessness. If he had been lured into a card game, he might not remember us for hours. From the look on Angeline’s face, she was sending silent curses in our brother’s direction too.
“Truly, sir,” she said through gritted teeth. “You need not trouble yourself.”
“Oh, I assure you, it is no trouble. But I haven’t yet introduced myself, have I?” He swept a bow, removing his beaver hat and revealing black curls so glossy, he must have doused them in hair oil. “Scarwood—Viscount Scarwood—at your service. And most delighted to be so,” he added, looking straight into Angeline’s eyes.
Angeline’s lips only tightened. I clenched my hands into fists and wished that Angeline could knock him over with magic as easily as she’d dealt with the intoxicated ruffian outside. But this was a gentleman of means, an aristocrat, sober enough to recognize witchcraft when he saw it, and we were inside the inn now, in easy view of the taproom. It was far too public a situation for any use of magic, or of fisticuffs. Either tactic would ruin both our reputations. Even Viscount Scarwood’s own report, if he told anyone else what we had done—no matter how ungentlemanly his own behavior—would be enough to ruin us in Society. But without magic or fisticuffs on our side, we were as helpless against him as any pair of tediously proper young ladies.
I should have been able to do so much more. If I had only received my training … I remembered Mr. Gregson’s words in the Golden Hall. With the training of a real Guardian, I could have controlled my power and used it independently, not only in reaction to other people’s magic. Since Guardians didn’t need to cast spoken spel
ls, I might even have been able to safely use my powers to protect us both from insult, without anyone around us guessing that magic had been involved.
If only I hadn’t made that dreadful, stupid mistake—if I had only kept control of my damnable temper …
Viscount Scarwood started talking again, and for a moment, I was actually glad to have a distraction from my thoughts. Then I heard what he was saying to Angeline.
“Come now. Any young lady brave enough to stand in a public inn without any visible escort—and to speak so slightingly of Society—can hardly expect to stand upon convention and wait for proper introductions. You may as well tell me your name yourself, rather than requiring me to hunt it down. I will find it out, you know, in the end—and you wouldn’t like me to be irritated by the trouble you’ve forced upon me.”
“I have no interest in forcing you to do anything,” Angeline said, “except to leave us in peace.”
“Ah, but I’m afraid that isn’t possible. You’ve caught my interest, you see.”
“Not intentionally, I assure you.”
“Nonetheless.” He leaned forward and braced one big hand against the wall beside her head. Angeline stiffened and began to slide away. He trapped her with his other hand, closing her in with scandalous intimacy. “It is far too late now to retreat,” he breathed, so quietly I could barely hear the words.
Then he leaned forward to kiss her.
Angeline twisted her head away. “Release me!”
I grabbed his arm. “Let her go!”
He looked down at me and laughed. “A brave protectress indeed,” he said. “And yet—”
A wholly unexpected voice spoke behind him.
“I say,” said Charles. He was holding a half-empty mug of beer and frowning at us. “Is—that is, is everything perfectly all right here?”
Renegade Magic Page 5
