Alexander seized the opportunity. His power blasted through the air in a tightly focused gale of wind that sent the knife flying out of her hands and across the clearing.
I spun around, pulling up my own power. For a moment, I could see him hesitate as she dived forward and scooped the knife back up. Then he nodded, with a rueful half-smile, and moved away, dropping the magic-working that had lit the clearing.
He trusted me to fight my own battles.
Darkness descended around us, but it didn’t stop me. Within less than a minute, I had Mrs. Montrose’s knife pinned to the ground beneath my left foot. She was muttering rapidly under her breath, casting vicious spells at me as quickly as she could, but I snapped them each as quickly as they appeared with the ease of long practice. All of my own focus was on the magic-working I was building for her in my mind, crafting it step by careful step until…there!
Magic swept her up through the air and pressed her against the prickly hedge, with her hands and feet clamped together and her mouth pressed firmly shut.
Perfect.
Dusting off my hands on my gown, I turned away, leaving the poisonous Mrs. Montrose imprisoned and gagged for good measure. We were finished, but the others weren’t. In the center of the clearing, Alexander and Mr. Packenham were still locked in battle, and I’d been right in my judgment a few minutes ago: Mr. Packenham might be a drunken fool, but he was a drunken fool with serious magical power, and he knew how to use it.
All of his attention was fixed now on Alexander, their magic-workings buffeting against each other in the air between them like rams with their horns locked in combat. He didn’t even twitch as I approached. Clearly, he had already decided who was his most dangerous current opponent in the garden.
I rolled my eyes. “Lucy?” I said. “If you please?”
I couldn’t see her face clearly enough to make out her grin, but I could hear it in her voice. “Why, I’d be delighted,” she said, as if I’d just invited her to dance.
A rock from the ground by her feet rose into the air, aimed itself—and flew. It knocked into the back of Mr. Packenham’s head at exactly the same moment that I threw my own power in support behind Alexander’s and shattered Mr. Packenham’s magic-working entirely.
The rogue Guardian tottered, stumbled, and fell to the ground with a groan. But we weren’t finished after all. As Mr. Packenham’s head hit the grass, the Marquess of Lanham appeared at the gap in the hedge…
…Followed by at least half of the guests from the ballroom.
CHAPTER TWELVE
“Lucy!” the Marquess bellowed.
I clapped my hands to my ears, my head ringing. Really, it was a very small clearing. There had been no need to shout.
Alexander was already moving to place himself between me and Mrs. Montrose, hiding her from the view of the excited guests who were peering over the Marquess’s shoulder into the constricted area. Several of the new arrivals were armed with candles, which cast flickering streams of light across the clearing. I threw a magic-working of invisibility over Mrs. Montrose before any of them could see the unnatural, magically bound way in which she sat.
The Marquess didn’t even seem to notice our onlookers, though, as his gaze swiveled back and forth between Lucy’s demure figure and Packenham’s downed body. He looked positively deranged.
“Was Packenham—did he—?”
Lucy fluttered her eyelashes and looked mischievous. “I was terrified,” she said primly. “He was ungentlemanly.”
Alexander snorted. I raised my eyebrows.
The Marquess lunged across Packenham’s fallen body and threw his arms around my cousin. “You are never—ever—to take such a risk again. Ever!”
“Mmmph,” Lucy said. “Mmmph.” She looked too tightly squeezed against his coat to manage anything more coherent in reply.
She still managed to lower one eyelid in a wink aimed directly at me, though.
The Marquess drew back and stared at her. Then he lunged again.
Oh, my. As the Marquess became most ungentlemanly indeed, I looked away as quickly as I could, feeling my cheeks turn red.
This time, Lucy certainly didn’t seem to be objecting to the impropriety.
“Ah,” I said. “Um.” The observers who crowded the gap in the hedge were all openly gawping now. “Perhaps—a bit of privacy might be in order?” I waved my hands at them as if I could shoo them all away like chickens. “Or—”
“Katherine Ann Stephenson!” The peacock feather in Stepmama’s hair quivered with outrage as she pushed her way to the front of the crowd. “What exactly is going on here?”
Oh, no. My shoulders slumped. “I…ah…” I looked around helplessly, trying to gather up my wits for a truly convincing story.
For once, I couldn’t think of a single explanation. Worse yet, both of my older sisters stood behind her, their faces set in obvious horror.
Of all the ways in which I could have publicly ruined my début, this might just have been the most spectacular.
The Marquess separated from Lucy with a gasp. And no wonder: he must have been absolutely starved for air, after the devouring way that he’d been kissing her.
“Mrs. Stephenson,” he said, straightening his cravat with a wince. “Mrs. Carlyle. Mrs. Collingwood.” His cheeks were flushed, but he nodded courteously to each of them. Then he put one firm hand on Lucy’s shoulder. “May I present my fiancée, Miss Lucy MacTavish?”
Angeline’s eyes widened. She darted me a quick look. I shook my head swiftly, pressing my lips together in a pointed message.
The Marquess, after all, knew Lucy’s real name already. No one else ever needed to find out.
Lucy let out a peal of laughter that filled the tiny clearing but only broke the tension for an instant. “Oh, Alistair,” she said to the Marquess, patting his arm. “You don’t really think you have to marry me now, do you? I wasn’t expecting anything of the sort. You know I can always retire to Scotland and simply forget about having a Season. Then you’ll be free to marry a viscount’s daughter.”
“No I won’t.” His smile looked as awkward as if it were a new move he would have to practice, but the look he gave her was unmistakably heartfelt. “I’d chase you all the way to Scotland, if that was what it took to make you finally listen to me for once,” he told her. “But I’d never stop asking you to marry me until you gave in. I couldn’t bear to marry anyone but you.”
“Really?” Lucy’s mouth dropped open.
Then she threw herself back into his arms in the most blatantly unladylike move I had ever seen.
I let out a sigh of pleasure that was more than slightly tinged with envy. Alexander stood just behind me. I fought not to turn and meet his gaze, but I felt him with every inch of my skin.
Then Angeline cleared her throat, breaking the moment entirely. “Ahem,” she said. “I’m sure we’re all extremely happy for you, my lord and Miss MacTavish…” She raised one eyebrow. “But perhaps you could also explain the rest of this situation?” She tilted her head toward me. “And how my sister and Mr. Harding…and the apparently unconscious Mr. Packenham…all came to share in your romantic moment?”
Lucy beamed as she nestled into the stunned-looking Marquess’s side. “It is romantic, isn’t it?” she said happily. “You see, Lord Lanham must have been planning all along to propose to me here in the garden, but he couldn’t bear to compromise my reputation, so he asked that we all meet outside as a group. But then he was unavoidably detained, and meanwhile, Mr. Packenham was most ungentlemanly, so Kat and—that is, what I meant to say was, Mr. Harding alone had to fight him off for both of us! Wasn’t that impressive of him?”
The onlookers whispered and rustled with excitement, jostling each other to get better glimpses of Mr. Packenham’s fallen figure. Behind her invisibility working, Mrs. Montrose was positively vibrating with fury as she struggled against her magical bonds, but in public, my stepmother had just visibly relaxed. Lucy’s version of the story had been p
erfect.
My début had apparently not been ruined, after all.
“Impressive indeed,” said Angeline. Her piercing gaze moved to Alexander, and then back to me. “And a very persuasive explanation,” she added dryly. “But if the happy couple wouldn’t mind returning to the ballroom at this point, I believe it’s late enough that our own family should return to our homes. Don’t you think so, Elissa?”
“Oh, yes,” Elissa said. Her eyes narrowed as she took in the narrow amount of space between me and Alexander. “Very much so.”
I hesitated.
Don’t worry, Alexander whispered inside my mind. I’ll take care of transporting both of our magical twins to the Golden Hall. You and Lanham can provide your evidence later.
I’ll come as soon as I can, I promised.
The intimacy of speaking inside his mind was almost too much to bear. It made me vibrate all the way down to my bones in a way that felt so raw, it was almost painful. Worse yet, it brought everything else we’d shared vividly to mind…along with the sickening knowledge that it was all coming to an end.
We would all provide our versions of the evidence to Mr. Gregson, and then the Order would punish the wrongdoers. Society had been saved from magical malfeasance once again…
And Alexander would be on his way, sent back to his old Order. He might even be gone by tomorrow morning.
My throat was so tight, I could have choked on it. I said to Angeline in a near-croak, “You meant to invite Lord Lanham and Mr. Harding to dinner on Wednesday, didn’t you?”
Her eyes narrowed, and I knew she was remembering the lecture she’d given me earlier. Still, I’d asked her in public, so there was only one acceptable response. “Of course they are,” she said smoothly. “And Miss…MacTavish? If you and your chaperone would care to attend as well?”
“We’d be delighted,” Lucy said, leaning into her fiancé’s side and giving a bounce as if she couldn’t help herself.
The Marquess gave us a positively brainless grin as his arm tightened around her.
But Alexander’s voice was tight with strain. “I’m afraid I may not be able to attend your dinner, Mrs. Carlyle. You see, I’m expecting to be called out of town any day now.”
I bit down hard on my tongue. My hands fisted at my sides.
“I understand,” said Angeline. Her face softened. “I wish you luck, Mr. Harding, I truly do.”
Elissa stepped forward, holding out her hand. “Come, Kat. It’s been a long night for everyone.”
“Yes, it has,” I whispered.
I didn’t turn to look back at Alexander. I followed my sisters back to the house and then the carriages, walking farther and farther away from him with every step.
We never even said good-bye.
***
I was afraid they would make me talk, but they didn’t. Over the next few days, Angeline took me to a circulating library, to Gunther’s for ices, and to the park to see the whole social world promenading past, but she never made a single comment about the fact that I was barely saying a word about anything to anyone.
Whenever we were at home, Elissa released all three of her children from their nursery and let them run riot around us to cheer me up. It didn’t work, but it did help to hold their wriggling little bodies close against me for a moment and feel their sticky, jammy kisses on my cheek before they leapt on to their next chaotic adventures.
When Angeline and Frederick shared the news that there would finally be a child in their family, too, after all their years of waiting, it broke through my haze of misery for a moment. After Papa and Elissa had had their turns, I hugged Angeline close, and I didn’t even try to avoid her too-knowing eyes.
“You’ll be a wonderful mother,” I said, and I forced a smile. “A dangerous one, too. They’ll never get away with anything.”
Frederick let out a shout of laughter and clapped me on the shoulder. “Come now, Kat. Angeline’s children? Oh, they’ll get away with everything, if they’re anything near as clever as their mother. They’ll be terrifying me into white hairs by the time I’m nine-and-twenty.” He grinned and put his hand on Angeline’s lower back, his grin blinding. “I can’t wait.”
Angeline didn’t smile, though. Instead, she smoothed a hand over my hair and sighed. “Oh, Kat,” she said. “I do wish…”
But she left it at that, and I was glad. I went back to where Elissa’s children were rampaging with a set of soldiers, and I threw myself into the game while my sisters and brothers-in-law and parents all talked about the practicalities.
There were times when I wished I hadn’t had to grow out of my nieces’ and nephews’ world of childhood. It felt safer there, when I looked back on it…and it hurt so, so much less.
I didn’t see Alexander at the Golden Hall when I presented my evidence against the magical twins in front of the rest of my Order, including their shaken and deeply shamed Guardian father. I told the truth as clearly and as fairly as I could, and even when the other Guardians left, I didn’t ask Mr. Gregson where Alexander had gone.
I hadn’t even asked Angeline’s butler, Henshawe, even though he worked with Alexander’s Order, so it had felt like swallowing hairpins to hold the questions back every time I had stepped into my sister’s house.
Mr. Gregson stopped me before I could leave the Golden Hall. “Kat,” he said, “we haven’t yet discussed the matter of rewards for you and Mr. Harding. I know you were only doing your duty, as always, but in this particular case, the Crown is eager to show its personal gratitude. The scandal that would have erupted, had Mr. Packenham succeeded in impersonating the Prince of Wales in his crimes—”
“It doesn’t matter,” I said wearily. “I don’t need any reward.”
Mr. Gregson frowned, his expression far too intent for comfort. “Kat…”
“Just give it all to Alexander,” I said. “I mean, Mr. Harding.” It hardly even hurt to say his name, I felt so tired and numb. “I have everything I need.”
And I did. Unlike Alexander, I had a family who loved me. I had a home. I had security. I had everything…except a piece of myself that had walked away with him.
What did honors from the Crown mean next to that?
“Hmm,” said Mr. Gregson, giving me a thoughtful look. “If you insist, I will pass on your request that Mr. Harding be alone in accepting any honors or monetary rewards.”
I nodded, trying to keep my voice steady. “It’s the least that he deserves from our Order. When you consider everything he’s done—and everything he should have inherited from his father, if…oh, never mind.” I sighed, cutting myself off and reaching for my amethyst ring.
I couldn’t let myself think about Alexander anymore—not if I wanted to keep my safe, numb shell in place. Luckily, all I had to do was twist the ring on my forefinger to carry myself back to Elissa’s house and wrap myself up in my blankets for hours. There, I wouldn’t have to think about anything.
But Mr. Gregson spoke before I could leave. “Did you know that your sister Mrs. Carlyle has invited me to a dinner at her house on Wednesday?”
“Has she?” I blinked, struggling through my fog to remember the right social cue for the situation. “Well. It will be lovely to see you, of course.”
He frowned slightly, his spectacles shifting as he cocked his head. “Is there anything amiss, Kat?”
“Nothing,” I said. “What could there be?”
There was nothing to be done, so nothing was amiss, and I would simply have to accustom myself to the gaping hole inside me where everything bright and colorful and right had ever been.
Perhaps it would come back in time. But it hadn’t returned by Wednesday evening as I helped Angeline make the final sweep of her perfectly elegant drawing room and dining room, with their rich red-and-gold furnishings and tall sprays of flowers.
Mr. Gregson was one of the first arrivals, greeting my father with obvious pleasure. Within minutes, they were huddled in a corner together, vigorously debating a set of an
cient texts that no one else in the room had ever heard of. Soon afterward, various couples arrived who were friends of Angeline and Frederick, followed by Lucy and her aunt, who were jointly escorted by a still-foolishly-smiling Lord Lanham. The drawing room filled more and more until finally only one guest was left, judging by the number of place settings that I’d overseen on my sister’s dinner table.
It wouldn’t be Alexander, of course. Angeline knew that he wouldn’t be coming. I only hoped it wasn’t an eligible young man. Even for my sisters, I didn’t think I could pretend to any interest in one tonight.
The butler, Henshawe, cleared his throat as he stepped into the drawing room’s doorway. “Ladies and gentlemen,” he announced, in a tone of weary condescension, “Lord Ravenscroft has arrived.”
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
“Lord Ravenscroft?!” I said, into the sudden thunderstruck silence.
Lord Lanham had leapt to his feet on the other side of the room, but I had no attention to spare for him. All of my focus was on Henshawe’s looming figure, and on his impossible announcement.
Lord Ravenscroft was dead, and his title had died with him. There could be no other Lord Ravenscroft. The man who’d tried to murder my brother and steal my magic, the Guardian who’d threatened all England with his treason…
Henshawe stepped aside, and Alexander walked into the room.
The numb shell I’d carried around me for days cracked straight through. Emotions flooded in on me, leaving me shaking with reaction. Suddenly it hurt to breathe. It hurt to feel…but I couldn’t look away from him.
He was wearing the same closely fitted black coat and fawn-colored breeches that he had worn to the ball on Friday, paired with a deep forest-green waistcoat that matched his eyes and an elaborately knotted white cravat. His chin was raised high, and his face wore the haughty expression that I knew signaled deep uncertainty from him, but in the dimly lit drawing room, the outfit made him look almost forbidding in its elegance.
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