by Tracy Sumner
“You’re taking on too much. We could bring in more men. Faster repairs.” Humphrey held his silence a beat, then suggested, “We have funds, what with the successful investments. And your titled estates are sound.”
Julian turned to find his friend loading cracked slate into the rather pathetic field cart that had come with the property. “My thoughts haven’t changed on this subject. We risk exposure if anyone living or working at Harbingdon lacks a supernatural gift or at the very least, a direct familial connection to the occult. It’s the easiest method to ensure we protect each other. Julian frowned as he remembered Finn’s dream and how shaken the boy had been. “Security is paramount. Much due to your efforts, our reach is growing with new contacts in Wales and Scotland. I’m not a patient man, but we’re building a foundation, and the simple answer is, it takes time. My dream to have an underground network for those in need is still years away, let’s be honest. A place to harbor them is the first step.”
Humphrey stepped away from the cart and mopped his brow with his sleeve. “You saved my life by pulling me out of Seven Dials, Jule. Giving me a future, a path to follow when I never had one, not once in my life before I met you. So, you’ll have to pardon me for worrying like hell about the breadth of what you’re taking on, building the League beyond what Piper’s fool grandpa thought it should be. Though I admire your strategy and on my life will do anything to see it prospers.”
Humphrey had saved him, not the other way around. But it was an old argument between friends—one he’d never win. “Tomorrow’s arrival?”
“Pickpocket. Maybe mudlarking, too.” Humphrey grunted as he shouldered a decaying timber they’d removed from the cottage. “Mighty dangerous business, that.”
“Mud-what?”
Humphrey dumped the timber in the cart and propped his hands on his hips, stretching until his back cracked. “Mudlarking. Stealing from the barges. The boy was living with a gang above the flash-house where they sold their goods. Silk scarves, reticules, the like. Maybe a pocket watch on a blessed day. We were unable to find any family, and we searched every inch of St Giles. Not a single soul caring for or about the poor bugger.” Grasping a piece of slate the size of a washbasin, he tossed it in the cart where it landed with a thud. “Word of caution. He’s an angry little bastard. Shrewd enough to realize a warm bed and food from those you can’t trust is better than living in squalor with those you can’t trust. Will likely steal us blind.”
Julian hung his bootheel on the wheel’s spoke and gave his aching shoulders a roll. “Who better to deal with a furious gutter rat from me, you, and Finn?” No one had been angrier than Julian in those days. Both when he arrived in Seven Dials and when he left. The time in between had simply included a multitude of brutal learnings.
And he was an incredibly apt pupil.
“I reckon there’s truth to that.” Humphrey climbed atop the cart’s warped seat and grasped the reins. “The boy’s hand trickeries, I tell you, I’ve never seen the like. A magician could do no better.”
Julian dusted his hands on trousers now sporting a jagged tear in one knee. “His gift?”
“A new one around here, all right. He sees people.”
“People?”
Humphrey slapped the reins on his thigh. “Dead ones.”
“There’s a section in the chronology—”
“Oh, not that thing, please,” Humphrey groaned.
Julian tilted his head toward the gardener’s cottage. “We can’t house him here like we usually do with new arrivals. A boy alone…” The words faded as he realized he had no idea what to do with a vagrant urchin whose skills were so astounding that in a city of a thousand pickpockets, he’d garnered undue attention. “The bedchamber next to Piper is vacant.”
Humphrey had the good grace to check the smile, bringing the hand holding the reins to his mouth. The swift movement sent the horse into a nervous sidestep.
“Two hellions with only a wall separating them. Just bloody wonderful. I can’t imagine what trouble she’ll create with a willing, and dreadfully young, participant.” He rubbed his temple, a headache surging. The visions—touching tools and supplies in the village—had completely drained him.
Humphrey turned on the plank seat, the setting sun casting him in shadow. “Move her here. Two bedrooms are livable.” He clicked his tongue. “Mostly.”
“And have to secure this outbuilding like we are the main house?” Julian flicked away the suggestion like an errant fly. “She’s unhappy with the amount of protection trailing after her already.”
Humphrey paused, a muscle in his jaw tensing. Uh, oh, Julian thought, here it comes. Humphrey didn’t like to give advice, which was vital to their friendship, because Julian didn’t like to take it. “Maybe, uh…you could approach her in another way. Soften her up for what you want by giving her something she does.”
Julian slipped on his waistcoat, buttoning slowly. “I’m listening.”
Humphrey withdrew a cheroot from his coat pocket and twirled it between his fingers. He insisted on Burmese-made, ridiculously expensive, and even harder to obtain. A sugary tang stained the air, overwhelming the match’s sulfur. “I only provide advice because I’ve years of diligent observation, watching the two of you circle like bleeding prizefighters since you were in the schoolroom.” He blew out a blue-black gust, gestured to the walled gardens surrounding them. “Give Scamp a project. One she accepts in coordination with any protection you chose to place on her. Make it a negotiation. Remember those? These gardens are of little importance but in need just the same. Dump it on her and have her manage. She seems to like flowers and plants and what-all if you recall.”
Julian did not recall, likely because he recalled everything else.
He could still smell her scent from this morning, a singular blend of floral and spice, honied and at turns biting. Just like her.
This might work. The gardens needed care, and aside from bringing her gradually back into the League, she needed something else—besides him—to occupy her time. Their current gardener, Mr. Knotworth, a retired professor of horticulture with a vast knowledge of the occult, was revising the earl’s chronology one deliberate page at a time.
Hence abandonment of the gardens.
“Let her rejoin the League.” He stabbed his cheroot at Julian, the crimson tip glowing. “With responsibilities this time. Make her grow the hell up. You making the path so smooth for her has only made her unable to walk a less-than-smooth path.”
“I already did.” Julian shrugged into his coat and settled the lapels to rights, which was ridiculous as filthy as he was. “It’s her legacy. I’d gladly give it up, but it’s far too late for that.”
“I know, I know,” Humphrey said, smoke snaking past his face. “We’re set to conquer the world, one soothsayer at a time.”
Julian motioned Humphrey over on the seat and climbed up beside him. A ride to the house was welcome. His brain was screaming inside his skull. “With her stepping back in, who’s in grave need of healing?”
Humphrey flicked the reins, and the horse fell into a trot. Julian caught the concern that shot across his friend’s face as he studied him with a critical eye. “Aside from you?”
“Next, please.”
Humphrey chewed thoughtfully on the cheroot. “The new footman. Come from Lady Northhampton’s household. Lucky us, the first person we’ve employed actually trained for their position. He dreams one night, whatever he dreams happens the next. He tripped over a wrinkle in the carpet today and sent a serving dish to the floor. Cook looked ready to beat the life from him.” Humphrey stubbed the cheroot out on the seat and released a final wisp of smoke. “Took about a month to get him past thinking he was losing his mind, so he’s made progress. But still shaky.”
“It’s a challenge to ask Piper to solve anyone else’s dustup while she’s so busy creating her own.” Julian didn’t want to consider the feelings she aroused in him. He positively didn’t want to consider his compu
lsion to strip yellow silk from her body while standing in a churchyard of all places.
The urge to show her what he’d failed to that long-ago summer was powerful.
“A person with no purpose invites trouble. And you gain no loyalty without accountability.” Humphrey tightened the reins around his fist and urged the horse into a canter. “The waffle bit is your problem.”
Julian sprawled against the cart’s rough backing. The sun had bled into the horizon, layering Humphrey in silhouette, but Julian saw him smile. This from a man who did not smile often. “Waffle?”
Humphrey cleared his throat. “Minnie said you look at Scamp like something you’d pour over a waffle. And that, my friend, is your dilemma to overcome. Or not, should it come to it.”
Julian looked to the sky, the stars like diamonds peeking from a twist of black silk. He could just make out Canis Minor, the small dog, two bright winks he’d gazed upon often as a child. Celestial happenings had been of comfort to the boy living in a filthy warren, driven out by an atrocious excuse of a father and making his way from nothing. The universe was steadfast. Unaffected by a sound beating, hunger tearing through your gut, and fathers who loathed you because of strange abilities you couldn’t control.
The universe was faithful. Secure.
He was tempted to tell Humphrey this chatter was silly, inane, simply untrue. Instead, he dug a flask from his pocket and took a healthy drink. “The waffle can sod off,” was all he said.
Humphrey sobered, too honorable to beat a man when he was down. “Don’t take offense. Minnie was a good choice for added protection. The woman has skills. When we were practicing, she closed her eyes, and that knife hit dead center from ten paces. Just slipped out of her boot like a ghost and whack, no hands. It was damned amazing, though she put a decent tear in that painting of your father. Got him right above his ear. I guess her aim isn’t completely true.”
Julian took another drink, brandy burning a path to his belly. He wished it’d complete its mission and cloud his mind. “Rey, please don’t share that information”—he tapped the flask on his thigh—“if you have a care for me. The added protection part. If Piper knew Minnie was guarding her bedchamber after hours, she’d have my head.”
They fell silent amidst the clip of the horse’s hooves and the creak of the cart. Julian drew a breath laced with the earthy, dense aroma he always associated with Harbingdon, with home. Wondering if he was going to regret this, he took another sip and agreed to Humphrey’s suggestion. “Start her with the footman. We don’t want more broken dishes or sleepless nights. I’ll handle proposing the garden project.” He also needed to help categorize her auras, as promised, but this involved exposing a part of himself he’d kept hidden when she’d gotten too close and was learning too much about him.
A decision based on survival, then and now.
“Are you sure?”
“My good man, where Lady Elizabeth Scott is concerned, I’m not sure of anything.”
Humphrey halted by the side of the house, a lantern in the morning room spilling light on the lawn. “The plan is, we pick apart everything in Finn’s dreams. Every piece of furniture, every tapestry, even the rings on that crazy bitch’s fingers. Something will lead us to her, Jule.”
But they both left this unsaid: if Finn’s dreams didn’t lead her to them first.
Julian braced his hands on the cart and vaulted to the ground. The wind blew his hair in his eyes, obscuring the apprehension he’d seen cross Humphrey’s face. A sharp crack of thunder shook the ground, and his heart stuttered as he imagined those he sought to protect. Those he’d come to love. The knife in his boot was a welcome presence pressed against his skin.
“We must prepare,” Humphrey whispered and circled the cart away from the house.
Julian stood transfixed under the kitchen eave, watching Humphrey fade into the night. The guard patrolling the back lawn nodded, their only communication. Something brushed his ankle, and he looked to find Henry sitting by his side. The dog had appeared one morning, and he, like many Harbingdon sheltered, now seemed a natural part of the household. A most mixed-up family. He dropped to his knee, searching the sky until he located Canis Minor. “Do you hear that fella? We must prepare.”
Sidonie trailed her finger over the lines of text, London’s incessant clamor oozing through the window of her hotel room—a modest dwelling in a mundane neighborhood where coin bought silence. And every room on the floor. Her condition required isolation. Should she be drawn to companionship, because loneliness was its own kind of madness, she only had to recall the blood on the steps of the theatre in Lyon. The look of scorn and revulsion on the faces of those she had once called friends.
Lovers.
Frenzied, she flipped pages of the geological survey, searching for the small stone edifice she’d seen in the boy’s mind. He’d been traversing a country lane, and an intense surge of longing had swept her when she gazed upon the edifice through his eyes. It was the same sensation she felt when she returned to her family’s estate after being away. Shelter, security. Belonging. There would be no sleep until she located the town.
Because, she’d felt the presence of another at his side.
A formidable presence, sedative. Healing. Jamming the heel of her hand into her eye until she saw stars, she kicked the discarded pile of books, sending them tumbling across the carpet.
Her father had taken her to Stonehenge years ago, and she would never forget pressing her palms against moist sandstone and imagining those who had come before her seeking divine intervention when none was forthcoming. Raising their faces to the heavens and demanding deliverance. For one breathtaking moment, standing there in a ring of towering rock, she’d felt invincible, powerful, healthy.
Normal.
When normalcy had never been hers—would never be hers.
Unless the healer was able to cure her, as those towering stones had been unable to. She’d walked beside the boy on that country path, the two of them joined in protection and love. Sidonie was sure of it.
The edifice had also been made of sandstone. Filled with pock mocks and worn etchings. Prehistoric. Unusual, although she hadn’t been able to look long because the boy had shoved her out of his mind quite violently when he realized she’d taken hold of him. She would know it if she ever—
She turned a page, and the air ripped from her lungs.
Sarsen stone. King Alfred. Saxons. Danes. She traced the sketch with her ragged thumbnail. The Blowing Stone.
Kingston Lisle. Oxfordshire.
“Rebirth will be mine at any cost,” she vowed and dropped her head as tears soaked the bodice of her dress.
Chapter 7
Those who make us feel, must feel themselves.
~Charles Churchill
Piper woke with the sun and shoved aside the bed curtain to find her maid prowling the chamber like a restless feline. Disconcerted but forced to suppress it—after all, this relationship had been forced upon them both—Piper asked Minnie for assistance with dressing. It was just as well as she’d left her front-fastening corsets at the hotel. Piper refused a breakfast tray, deciding to face Julian and the discussion he’d threatened her with in the church courtyard. Why hide under the bedcovers or in scented bathwater when he’d run her down soon enough? She grabbed her folio in the unlikely event the conversation moved to her research and headed from the room with Minnie’s keen gaze heating her back.
Her luck did not hold, as she found only Humphrey in the dining room, patrolling the mahogany sideboard with a menacing expression. They exchanged the requisite hello-good mornings, then settled across from each other at a table seating fourteen by her count. Family portraits lined the wall opposite her, a morose group Piper guessed had come with the house.
They looked on disapprovingly.
Unsurprisingly, Humphrey finished eating quickly, as if a master stood behind him with a pocket watch and a whip. He instructed her to wait for Edward to arrive, a footman in need of a he
aler. After their mystical consultation was complete, Julian would fetch her.
She wrinkled her nose in displeasure. Fetch, as if she were his wiry little dog.
Directive delivered, Humphrey strode from the room, ducking at the doorway to avoid hitting his thick head, leaving her to snap her mouth shut lest this morning’s well-prepared eggs fall from it.
Julian was fulfilling his promise to bring her back into the League.
From a polite distance, of course.
While Piper pondered the change in strategy, Edward stumbled in, slumped shoulders and bowed head, little more than an overgrown boy. A large boy, as was typical for his position, another absurd fixation of society when most did nothing but open doors and serve meals. She observed the dark crescents beneath his eyes when he fixed his gaze on her as if searching for a miracle and expecting to find none.
Piper made notes as he told her about his dreams—ones that foretold truths. Like most, he had begun to disclose his abilities when he was too young to understand he should hide his gift. Because, sadly, no one but another forced into their world understood. His parents, servants in a modest household in Portman Square, had gained him employ with a baron’s family through a connection. Partly to remove him from their residence. They feared Edward’s condition could infect his seven brothers and sisters. He’d come to Julian’s attention after a minor incident in a public house, emphasizing how the organization’s network had grown since her grandfather’s death.
Piper grasped Edward’s hands and focused her entire being on his rasping inhalations, the pulse skipping beneath her fingers. “Calm your mind. Learn to control your gift and redirect,” she whispered. Her heartbeat leapt to match his, so she struggled to calm her own mind, visualizing a mantle of snow blanketing a sallow field. The verdant woodlands bordering Harbingdon bathed in a foggy haze. Julian’s face, which always, even if she denied it deep in her heart, quietened her. Although she didn’t see Edward’s dreams, his terror flowed through her, pricking her skin like she’d run through a patch of nettles. A rainbow exploded behind her closed lids, the scent of oranges, cinnamon, vinegar.