A Treason of Thorns

by Laura E. Weymouth

  Falmouth orders his servants to remain in the stable, and the two of us hurry into the conservatory as fat raindrops begin to fall from the sky. They drum against the glass, and the sound lulls me. When I shiver, a fire springs to life in the grate and I draw closer to warm my hands. We’d be warmer in the study, but brambles are beginning to take over the corners, and the conservatory is still unmarked by Burleigh’s malaise.

  “His Majesty did say the House is oddly attentive to you,” Falmouth remarks from where he stands looking out at the rainy grounds. “And I’m prepared to let you stay here permanently in some capacity. As a scullery maid, perhaps.”

  The fire leaps higher, licking at the chimney in a sudden flare of flame.

  “Do you have much experience with Great Houses?” I ask, because he must think I plan to step aside at summer’s end. “Burleigh will need a great deal of attention and a very deft touch if it’s to recover from its present state.”

  Lord Falmouth turns and looks me up and down. The back of my neck prickles. I don’t like his proprietary air at all—standing there, you’d think he owns everything around him. “Miss Sterling, the king and I are of one mind in this. Burleigh’s been coddled by your family for centuries. What it needs is to be broken. A firm hand would do wonders for this place, and if it’s really that obstinate, well. It’s only one House. There are others, should Burleigh choose to go down in flames.”

  “It’s not a matter of choice,” I tell him sharply. “Burleigh is ailing because of the binding that was placed on it. It was ailing before my father’s arrest, and would still be sickening even if I had the key in hand at this moment.”

  I’m not sure if Burleigh is feeding off my agitation, or if I’m channeling the House’s anger. But the fire snaps and roars and rain lashes at the windows.

  Please, Burleigh, I beg silently. Calm yourself.

  But inside my own chest, my heart beats at a furious pace.

  Falmouth pays the House no mind. Instead, he crosses the room and stands next to me at the hearth, far closer than I’d like. I grip the mantel with one hand, both Burleigh and I needing the gesture of support.

  “Then perhaps,” Falmouth says softly, “I’d better go back to His Majesty tomorrow, and tell him a torch is all Burleigh House is good for.”

  Outside, wind shrieks in the eaves of the House, and the ground trembles beneath our feet. Fool that he is, Falmouth ignores it.

  “Hush, Burleigh,” I murmur beneath my breath, running a hand along the mantel. “Settle yourself, my love.”

  But the House’s distress builds and builds, until I want to crawl out of my skin. Lord Falmouth, who can obviously feel nothing of it, looks at me as if I’m about to fall into hysterics. Perhaps I am.

  “Burleigh, you mustn’t—” I begin, but the words are drowned out by shattering glass as vines burst into the conservatory from outside. They twine around the Duke of Falmouth’s wrists and ankles, pinning him fast and driving him to his knees. I stumble under the sudden weight of the House’s full attention bearing down on the two of us.

  “The king will hear of this,” the duke chokes out furiously as Burleigh drags him away, back through the garden and toward the front gate. It’s raining still, and before long Lord Falmouth is plastered in mud. I follow along, pleading with Burleigh to stop, but the House rages on. Falmouth’s servants run out of the stable, drawn by the commotion. They stop a few paces back, not wanting to interfere.

  “Do you think for a moment that His Majesty will let you stay on once he hears Burleigh has gone wild?” Lord Falmouth carries on. “The king’s army will be here in three days, with torches and kerosene.”

  The duke’s words are like a knife in my heart as Burleigh dumps him in the roadway. But then, in an instant, Burleigh’s attention swings away from us and toward something else. The knife twists.

  “Go!” I bark at Falmouth’s servants, who scurry out just before the brambles twine shut, thorny vines sealing the House’s grounds more securely than any lock ever could.

  “What about my horse?” Falmouth calls after me.

  “You’ll have to do without him,” I shout back over one shoulder. “I’ve got more pressing things to take care of.”

  The clouds above have grown darker since Burleigh’s fit of temper, and rain continues to pour down. Something hits the back of my neck with an unpleasant spatter, and when I reach instinctively to wipe at it, my hand comes away gritty and coated in wet mortar. The sound and substance of the rainfall changes, growing softer, fuller, more sinister, as mortar begins to coat the grass and clog the puddles. I’ve never seen such a thing, not in all my father’s time as Caretaker, and fear eats away at my insides as I hurry around the House.

  Even as I run through the overgrown vegetable garden, my fear turns to a sickening premonition. There’s nothing to be heard but the damp, thick plashing of falling mortar. Wyn’s ax has gone silent.

  He’s still near the woodshed, propped against a mound of neatly stacked logs. Wyn looks for all the world as if he could be sleeping. But when I shake him frantically by the shoulders, he doesn’t wake.

  “Wyn. Come on, Wyn. Open your eyes.”

  The full weight of Burleigh’s attention is still bent on him, and the unnatural rain hasn’t slackened yet. I sink my hands into a slurry of mud and mortar.

  “Burleigh House,” I plead, “please stop. Please let him be.”

  Resistance and frustration leak up through my skin.

  “I’m begging you,” I say to my House. “If you’ve ever loved me, turn away from him now.”

  Ever so slowly, Burleigh’s focus begins to shift. The clouds thin little by little, bit by bit, and finally dissipate.

  “Wyn?”

  His hands are cold. I chafe them between my own, but he still doesn’t wake. Glancing over one shoulder in an agony, I calculate the distance to the kitchen door. It’s a hundred yards away, and though I hate to leave Wyn, I can’t move him on my own.

  “Don’t move,” I breathe. “I’m coming back for you straightaway. Burleigh, if you touch him again, I’ll never forgive you.”

  The House rumbles, but a single beam of sunlight cuts through the cloud cover and spills over Wyn’s unconscious form.

  Scrambling to my feet, I bolt across the kitchen garden and in through the door.

  “Mira?” I shout. “Mira, where are you?”

  There’s no sign of her. I rattle through the halls, calling her name as I go. At last I hear a faint answer and hurry toward the sound of her voice.

  Mira’s in the conservatory and, as soon as I enter the room, descends upon me, taking my face in her hands and looking me over as if I’m likely to have lost an arm.

  “Violet, are you alright?” she asks in a panic. “What happened in here?”

  “His Majesty sent the Duke of Falmouth to look in on the House,” I say mechanically. “He was awful, and Burleigh lost its temper. The House dragged him off the grounds, but then it started losing control of its magic. There was mortar, raining from the sky, and Wyn tried to stop it—he did House magic, but now I can’t wake him. Mira, please, I need your help.”

  It’s only as I speak of what’s happened that the true horror of it strikes me. Brutish Lord Falmouth and Burleigh’s rage and Wyn, still where I left him.

  “Where’s Wyn?” Mira asks as I press a hand to my mouth and tears spill from my eyes. “Vi. Where is he?”

  “Out by the woodshed,” I say, pulling myself together. “We’ve got to get him inside.”

  Puddles of mortar are already drying out along the garden path. The weeds are flattened by it, borne down by the weight of that unnatural rain. Everything smells like damp, cold stone.

  And when we come out in front of the woodshed, my heart jackknifes in my chest. There’s no sign of Wyn.

  “He was just here,” I say, casting about us. “I swear, Mira. Where could he have gone?”

  Mira has two fingers to her temple, as if her head aches.

  “
Has Wyn done House magic before?” she asks slowly.

  I bite my lip and look down at the mortar-slick ground. “Yes.”

  “Have you done House magic since we got back? Violet Helena Sterling, I expect the truth from you.”

  I’ve never seen Mira so stern before.

  “. . . Not on purpose,” I answer weakly.

  “Which is a yes. Get inside and pack your bag, young lady. We’re leaving.”

  “What?” I gasp. “Mira, you can’t—”

  “I can think of two things that might have happened to that boy,” she says, cutting me off. “Either he realized this place is a danger to him, and left like he planned to at first, or—”

  “Or what?” I cross my arms and scowl.

  “You said yourself Burleigh dragged Falmouth off the grounds. This House isn’t right anymore. What if it did the same to Wyn? What if it broke its bond and did away with him?”

  “Did away with him?” The anger that courses through me is a hot and electric thing. “Are you calling Burleigh a murderer? My House would never.”

  Mira looks profoundly weary. “Violet, my love. Your House already has. And I know what your father taught you to be. What you’ve always thought was your role. But can you, Violet Sterling, really put this House before anything else when it comes down to it? Before anyone? Think on that. Think long and hard. And do it while you’re packing—I can’t, in good conscience, let you stay in a place that constantly puts you in harm’s way.”

  For a moment, I think of stamping my feet or raging at her, but my anger’s already collapsing into grief. If Mira looks weary, I feel as if I’ve lived on this Earth for a thousand years.

  “It doesn’t matter if you don’t want me to stay,” I tell her, and my voice breaks on the words because I love Jed and Mira with my whole heart. I’d be lost without them. “I can’t go. Not until I’ve unbound this House or it lies in ashes.”

  Violets spread around my feet like ripples as I speak.

  “Why?” Mira asks. “Help me to understand, Vi. Why can’t you just leave this place behind?”

  I sniff, and give her a long look through my tears. “Who else does Burleigh House have to speak on its behalf? No one, Mira. No one. Without me, it would be entirely alone.”

  “Where are you going?” she calls after me as I stumble off.

  “To look for Wyn. He can’t have got far.”

  16

  WYN IS WELL AND TRULY GONE.

  I search the House from top to bottom. I scour the gardens, and the meadow, and the graveyard. I look in every outbuilding. At last, I have to leave for the Shilling, but going without having found Wyn tears me to pieces. The knowledge that either he left or came to some sort of harm sits inside me, cold and poisonous as mortar.

  At the Shilling, there’s no sign of Esperanza and Alfred—presumably they’re in hiding, avoiding an encounter with Falmouth, who’s still in residence at the inn. But he’s sequestered in the gentlemen’s gaming room so I see nothing of him until late in the evening. Then a clatter sounds from the kitchen. At the end of the bar, Frey glances over her shoulder toward the corridor.

  “Here, Vi.” She hands me a tray of glasses filled with strong, expensive whiskey. “You take this into the gaming room while I see what’s going on out back.”

  I do as I’m bid. As I go, I repeat over and over to myself, You will not lose your temper you will not lose your temper you will not lose your temper.

  But as I walk into the smoky, lamplit room, I can feel my shoulders tense and my stomach tie itself up into knots. Falmouth sits at the farthest table, intent on a hand of what looks to be whist. I weave through the tables, replacing empty whiskey glasses and ignoring the bawdier comments from traveling merchant men—the folk of the Halt who frequent the public room never pester me so. As I work, I watch Falmouth. I watch him win his hand and smile, as if he expects the world to hand him whatever he wishes for. I think of him forcing his way through Burleigh House’s wall, leaving a wound that even now hasn’t really healed. I recall my House’s rage at his presence. And I think of the fact that when I go home tonight, barring some miracle, there’ll be no Wyn faithfully keeping watch over my bedroom door. All because of Lord Falmouth.

  “Well, here she is, the Caretaker turned barmaid,” Falmouth drawls as I freshen the table. “I was just telling these gentlemen that I’m off to Bath first thing in the morning, to recommend His Majesty torch your foul-tempered House. No one wants another Ripley Castle, now do they?”

  I grit my teeth and silently replace his glass.

  But the Duke of Falmouth keeps speaking, his voice low and his words insidious. “Did you know I was acquainted with Marianne Ingilby, too? Yes. The girl who brought down the Sixth House and ruined all of Yorkshire. We were thick as thieves back in the day, Marianne and your father and me. I rather think George fancied Marianne, until Ripley Castle finished her off and he had to settle for your mother.”

  Everyone’s attention is fixed on us, and I keep my face a careful blank.

  “You don’t like hearing about the Sixth House, do you?” Falmouth taunts. “It always struck a nerve with your father, too. And isn’t it odd how history seems to be repeating itself? Another failing House. Another desperate girl. Another county on its way to ruin.”

  A discontented murmur runs between the listening travelers, and I swallow. Of all the things I’m risking, trying to set Burleigh free, the good of the West Country weighs heaviest on my shoulders.

  “Burleigh is nothing like Ripley,” I answer sharply. “For eight hundred years it’s guarded this piece of the country, and been only gentle.”

  With slow, deliberate motions, Falmouth rolls up his shirtsleeves, revealing the angry red welts at his wrists where Burleigh’s vines caught and dragged him. “Is this how your House deals gently with people?”

  The murmurs among those watching grow louder.

  “You deliberately provoked my House!” I say. “You walked onto its grounds and did nothing but bluster and threaten and speak of its death as if it can’t hear or feel a thing.”

  “It isn’t human, Miss Sterling.” Falmouth shakes his head, as if I’ve taken leave of my senses. Blood and mortar, I think I hate him worse than the king.

  “No. No, it isn’t. But Burleigh is alive,” I insist. “It can think and it has a will of its own and it knows what everyone’s saying about it—that it’s not worth saving. That it would be better to just let it burn. So yes, of course my House is on edge. It’s suffering.”

  “And what is the kindest thing to do for a suffering creature?” Falmouth purrs smoothly. “Put it down. The greatest impediment to the well-being of the West Country right now is not Burleigh House, Miss Sterling. In point of fact, it’s you, and your foolish insistence on attempting the impossible. If your father, a Caretaker in good standing, was unable to save Burleigh, what makes you think you have the slightest chance? What exactly is it you’re doing to try and restore Burleigh House?”

  I clamp my jaws together and glare at him wordlessly. I’ve said too much already, but I’m not foolish enough to let this arrogant nobleman goad me into acknowledging my own treason.

  Falmouth drops a handful of banknotes onto the table and gets to his feet.

  “I’ll bid you good night, gentlemen,” he says to all those listening in. “The company’s been fine, but the staff here leave something to be desired.”

  I let him go. I stuff my anger down so deep inside my very bones ache, but I let him go.

  The last few hours of my shift are a blur. At the end of them, I step out into the cool night air and draw in a long breath. I don’t know how much time I’ve got left with Burleigh, but every moment I have I plan to spend working on its behalf.

  And come morning, I’ll search again for Wyn, though I’m beginning to suspect he’s gone. Perhaps this last brush with Burleigh’s magic brought him to his senses—made him see how desperately dangerous all this is. In the interest of self-preservation, perhaps he
finally left me and my beleaguered House behind.

  For now, though, it’s time to go home, and scour Papa’s ledger for a question about the deed my House can bear to answer.

  As I step away from the Shilling, rough hands pull me back into the shadows and shove me up against the tavern wall. Though I wriggle like a landed fish, the Duke of Falmouth’s grip on my wrists is sure and cruel.

  “You dare to disrespect me in company, Miss Sterling?” he mutters hot in my ear, and I am all at once blindingly afraid and so furious I can’t speak. “I will teach you to still that rebellious tongue.”

  He presses one arm across my throat, choking me, and my field of vision narrows.

  “Tell me you’re sorry for answering back,” Falmouth growls. “And use my title while you do it.”

  But I can’t speak. Falmouth leans forward, putting more weight on my throat. My eyelids flutter as everything begins to go dark.

  The sharp click of the hammer on a flintlock pistol rings through the night.

  “Step away from my serving girl,” Frey says coolly, standing on the threshold of the Shilling’s back door.

  The duke hesitates, but his weight shifts and I gasp hungrily for air. Frey takes a step forward.

  “Walk on,” she orders, her pistol still trained on Falmouth. “Keep walking until you’ve left this village, and don’t come back.”

  The duke gives Frey a killing look. “I will run your little tavern out of business, once I’ve seen Burleigh House burned to the ground. I’ll ensure that no one reputable ever stops here again.”

  Frey only shakes her head. “Do you think you’re the first disgruntled gentleman I’ve chased off for getting rough with a serving girl? Not the first and not the last. I’ve heard the same threats a dozen times, and they never come to anything. No, folk recognize a devil in fine clothes when they see one.”