“As if I had anywhere else to go.” Alicia struggled to a sitting position, cradling her belly. “I’m stuck here, living on strangers’ charity, while you go gallivanting about with a handsome husband.” She scowled.
Kate scowled back, ignoring the telltale signs of Alicia’s magical anger thickening the air. “You don’t know anything about my marriage.”
“You have one.”
“You could have! All you had to do was tell us who—”
“No!” The word came out as a shriek, and Kate felt the air inside her ears go hollow. “It’s my life! Stop taking charge!” The wood of the hayloft beneath them began to groan, as if it was under a heavy weight.
Kate stood. “You need to calm down.”
“Don’t tell me what to do!”
“Then pay attention to what you are doing!” Kate leaned forward and grabbed her sister’s arm. “Look!” The walls were beginning to bow under the pressure of Alicia’s anger. “They’ve been giving you lessons, damn you! Haven’t you been paying attention? Or have you been too busy feeling sorry for yourself?”
Alicia burst into tears, and the hay around them burst into flames.
~ ~ ~
“To be honest, I’m not sure anything I’ve said has gotten through to her,” Fiona said. “I know she’s young, and in a difficult situation, so it’s hard to press her, but . . .” She trailed off, turning to Duncan for support.
“She’s spoiled,” Duncan said. “You know the type.”
Jack did know the type. He’d married on a rash impulse to escape them, in fact. Weeks of dances with insipid girls who’d never faced any struggle in their lives, who expected a prospective husband to fall into their laps and worship them, hadn’t appealed in the least. Sensible, intelligent Kate had come along and rescued him just in the nick of time. Now it seemed he needed to rescue his friends from her sister.
“Should I take her to the Duchess?”
Fiona’s face twisted in concern. “I’m not sure London is the best place for her.”
“Her Grace managed to keep your husband from burning the city down around the King’s ears, I should think she could manage one girl.”
“One pregnant adult woman is rather different from an impressionable boy,” Fiona said. “No offense, darling.”
“None taken. I agree with you. Especially as I remember when you were pregnant,” Duncan said mildly. “I wouldn’t have taken you anywhere with breakables.”
“You’re sweet,” his wife said dryly.
“She could go to Edgebourne Hall,” Jack suggested.
“She doesn’t need a new location,” Duncan said. “She needs a new attitude.”
“What do you suggest?”
Nobody had time to answer Jack’s question. A footman came rushing into the room. “Fire! My lord, fire in the stables!”
Duncan swore and leapt out of his seat, Jack and Fiona right behind him. Duncan and Fiona’s young sons appeared terrified, but stayed in their seats. Jack suspected they’d been drilled in emergency protocols, knowing their parents. As he followed Duncan out of the room, he caught a glimpse of a maid going to kneel in front of them, offering a comforting arm to each boy.
“Where’s Kate?” They rounded the final corner to the front door as Jack asked.
“Better to ask where Alicia is,” Duncan said grimly and yanked the door open.
The courtyard was full of scurrying people, acting under some kind of direction. Jack followed their movements until he discovered the eye of the storm: his wife, her dress torn and the ends of her hair singed, with her arms around her hysterically weeping sister, giving commands like a war-hardened general.
The Kilgoran servants were lining up into a fire brigade, and a few were leading panicked horses toward the other end of the courtyard, where an old door led toward the kitchen gardens and safety. The flames leaping out of the stable roof crackled fiercely, resisting all of the servants’ attempts to calm them.
Jack scowled. “This is going to take rain,” he muttered, pausing to find a good place to center himself.
Duncan nodded, distracted. “And she’s still feeding it. Look.” He gestured toward Alicia, and Jack could see the magic pulsing from her in scattered bursts.
“I’ll get the rest of the horses out,” Fiona said.
“Need a shield?”
She shook her head at her husband. “Better to shield the source and cut it off. I can handle it if it’s not being fueled. And Jack will put out the rest.”
Jack nodded distractedly, keeping one eye on Kate as he went rapidly through the magical motions he’d been doing for nearly as long as he could remember. Ground, center, shield and summon. He longed to run to his grimy, burned bride, but instead he sent his consciousness winging toward the skies in search of clouds.
~ ~ ~
Kate felt somebody take Alicia from her, and the air around her felt suddenly heavy, as though someone had flung an invisible blanket over them. She swayed, and somebody propped her up with a shoulder. “Easy.” It was the rumbling voice of the Earl of Kilgoran. “I’m shielding her. If you can calm her down, it’ll go easier. Her magic is battering her from both sides.”
She nodded and leaned to catch her sister’s hands. “Alicia. Alicia. I’m here.” She squeezed, feeling the chill in her sister’s body. “Leesey.” The childhood nickname seemed to get through and Alicia raised her head. “Deep breaths.” Alicia nodded and took a few shaky breaths, hiccupping as she tried to contain her tears.
Duncan’s low voice chimed in. “Remember, ground and center. Close your eyes if it helps, and feel the earth . . .”
Alicia closed her eyes obediently, and Kate could feel the magic retreating into her sister once more. When Alicia’s fingers unclenched from around hers, she drew away a bit and looked around. A brisk breeze was scudding clouds into the courtyard, and fat droplets of rain were hissing onto the fire in an increasingly fast patter. The servants were tossing buckets full of water around the edges of the building, and she saw Fiona leading three inexplicably calm horses out of the wide door, stepping as gracefully as though she were walking toward an audience with the young Queen. Kate admired the countess’s steadiness. She felt remarkably unsteady herself, even as she realized she’d been snapping out orders to marshal the servants into a brigade for what felt like hours.
Where was Jack? She’d found herself thinking only of him as she’d tumbled down the ladder, yanking her sister after her. How they’d managed to get out of the stable, let alone the hayloft, she didn’t really remember. She spotted her husband, finally, leaning lightly against the courtyard wall out of the way of the chaos, eyes fixed blankly on the sky. Ah, yes. The rain.
She looked back at the stable, now being merrily drenched by an oddly specific downpour. The rest of the courtyard and keep were mostly dry, hosting only an occasional droplet of rain or bit of mist. The stable was decidedly soaked. The speed at which Jack had been able to summon rain and Duncan had managed to shield Alicia had saved most of the building, she thought. Only the roof and hayloft were utterly destroyed, and the damage hadn’t spread to any of the other outbuildings.
A hand on her arm distracted her from the mental calculations of repair costs her brain was launching into. “Are you all right?” Fiona asked.
Kate took a quick mental inventory of her parts and person. “I think so.” She glanced down at herself and winced.
“Thank goodness you were here,” Fiona said. “You’ve saved the horses and the stable.”
“I think Jack had far more to do with it than I did.”
“Jack was sitting at his ease at the breakfast table,” Fiona said. “You summoned us and him, and had the servants working to minimize the damage, all while dealing with . . . well.”
Kate sighed. “It wouldn’t have hap
pened if I hadn’t provoked her.”
“Trust me, it would have happened.” Fiona’s lips quirked. “Nobody wants to remind me of it, but when I was pregnant I destroyed the kitchen ovens.”
“What?”
“Oh, yes. We had to replace the ovens and the entire kitchen floor because of the melted lead.”
“But—”
“And I felt myself to be entirely in control after a lifetime of training. So you can imagine that your sister, who’s out of her element and new to her abilities, was going to do something eventually. I’m just glad you made it here in time to be here for it. Without your help, I suspect it would have been far worse.”
“You’d make an excellent general,” Duncan said from where he stood with Alicia, who snorted. Her color had returned, and she seemed calmer.
“I’ll be sure to take it up with Lord Bradley the next time I talk to him,” Jack said. She felt his arm slip around her, and leaned into the comforting solidity of his body. “Is that enough rain, do you think?”
“I’d say so.” Duncan faced the narrow river now running through the courtyard. “You can wiggle your fingers anytime.”
“As if I’d do anything so undignified.” Jack straightened, and Kate felt his body stiffen momentarily against hers as his fingers went lax against her waist. Then he relaxed, and the rain began to lighten as a gentle breeze sprang up to tug at the edges of the clouds over the keep.
“Efficient,” Fiona said.
“I learn, occasionally,” Jack said, tugging Kate further against him. “Are you all right?” He raised a hand to her face, and cradled her cheek as he turned her toward him.
“Yes. A bit singed.” She fingered the edges of her hair regretfully.
“Fiona can trim it for you.”
She nodded. “I’d like a bath, if Alicia’s all right.”
“I’m all right.” Alicia stepped away from Duncan, and then swayed. “I think I’d like to lie down.”
Jack watched Fiona take Alicia back into the keep, frowning. “Is she still shielded?”
Duncan nodded, lips twisting ruefully. “To be honest, we probably should have shielded her ourselves from the beginning instead of trying to teach her to shield. Fiona’s right that teaching adults is different from teaching children. Just because the Duke didn’t shield us . . .”
“I soaked him in rainwater once,” Jack said dreamily.
Duncan snorted. “I set his socks on fire. That’s when he sent me to Her Grace.”
Jack chuckled, then turned back to Kate. “Bath and bed for you, Lady Rothwell.”
Kate was too tired to do anything but nod. Further discussion about Alicia’s precarious situation was going to have to wait.
Chapter 20
Kate woke up to sunlight streaming in through her window, just as it had been when she’d fallen asleep. Jack had gently bathed her, tended to the scratches and bruises she hadn’t realized were there, and then tucked her into the spacious bed in their room. Now, he was nowhere to be found.
She stretched and yawned then shifted the covers aside. Before she could get out of bed, the door opened and a maid came in with a tea service.
“Good morning, my lady,” the girl said cheerfully as she set the tray down on the table.
Kate eyed the scones steaming on a plate with a predatory gaze. “How long was I asleep?”
“All day and all night, my lady.” The maid tugged the curtains further open and went to open the clothespress, oblivious to Kate’s start of dismay.
“All— Good lord. How is my sister?”
“Still asleep, my lady. Lord and Lady Kilgoran asked that you both come to the parlor when you’re ready.”
“And my husband?” Probably should have asked about him straightaway. Whoops. Marriage was a strange sort of life. She still wasn’t used to putting anybody before Alicia.
“I believe he went to town with the lads to get materials for the stable roof.”
“No message from him?”
“Er, no, my lady.” The maid shot her a glance, and Kate tried not to analyze it for pity. Jack wasn’t so used to marriage either, for all they’d been in it together for a few weeks now. A life of travel didn’t really lend itself to marital intimacy, particularly when one of the maritals was planning to board ship as soon as possible.
No matter. She could deal with all of this alone, if she needed to. She was used to it. “Thank you. You can let Lord and Lady Kilgoran know I’ll be down as soon as I’m done here.” She gestured at the scones, still sitting deliciously on the plate.
“Very good, my lady.” The maid left, and Kate set about the utter destruction of the scones with single-minded intensity.
~ ~ ~
Jack stretched, feeling his muscles pop and crackle. He’d spent most of yesterday helping to clear the rubble from the stable roof so that Duncan and his steward could evaluate the damage better. This morning, after checking in on his still-sleeping wife, he’d hopped aboard the farm wagon that had been headed to the village, willing to lend a hand with gathering supplies. Now, he was devouring scones in the parlor while Duncan watched him, amused.
“You’re going to get fat,” the Earl of Kilgoran said.
“You’re the one who lives with the cook.”
“Yes, but I ride the borders of my estate and work the land. No room for scones here.” He patted his belly smugly.
Jack snorted. “I assure you, shipboard life is enough to keep me trim.”
“So you’re still set on it?”
Jack set his scone down. “Why wouldn’t I be?”
Duncan shrugged. “You have a lovely wife, a pleasant estate—” Jack snorted, and Duncan rolled his eyes. “Don’t try to fool me. I’ve been inside Rothwell Manor.”
“You have? When?”
“Years ago.”
“Why?”
Duncan shrugged again, a liquid move he’d learned from Jack himself. “Investigating the previous viscount. Or maybe the one before that. Shady finances, or something. Turned out to be nothing.”
Jack frowned. He hated secrets, unless he was the one keeping them. “You never mentioned anything.” Did the mysterious mission have something to do with how the title had landed on Jack? Given Lord Bradley’s machinations, he might never know. How deeply annoying, and just like the man.
“You don’t tell me everything either, buttercup,” Duncan said dryly. “Or have you forgotten that you showed up here married?”
Jack waved his hands airily. “Water under the bridge, my friend.” Duncan snorted. “So, what—” He was interrupted by the door, opened by Fiona. He rose and bowed to her elaborately, mostly because he knew it would annoy Duncan.
“Do stop, Jack,” Fiona said absently. “The servants told me that Kate has woken and will be down shortly.”
“Should I go up to her?”
Fiona shook her head. “No, it’s fine. I’ve sent somebody to wake Alicia, too. She’s had a long enough rest to recover, I suspect, and she certainly needs to eat.”
Reminded, Jack picked up the rest of his scone. “Send her some of these,” he said. “I hear they’ll fatten her right up.”
The door opened again, this time with Kate on the other side. “Who are you fattening?” She glanced around the room. “Those scones are delicious. I’m going to need your cook’s recipe. Or your cook.” She grinned at Fiona.
“Nobody’s stealing my cook,” Duncan said.
Jack smiled. “If my wife wants something, I’m happy to steal it for her.”
“You can’t steal people, Jack.”
“Maybe you can’t.”
“If you try it, I’ll pinch you black and blue,” Fiona told him. “I need those scones.”
Kate came to sit in a chair near
Jack’s. “Good morning,” she murmured.
He smiled at her, discovering anew that he rather enjoyed seeing her face in the morning. It was certainly prettier than his first mate’s. He stored up the feeling in his memory, to sustain him on dreary mornings at sea.
His reflections on solitude were interrupted by the door yet again, this time opened by the Kilgoran steward, Ermidge, who gestured for Alicia to enter.
“Miss Ashe,” the steward announced, as if they didn’t know already.
“Thank you, Ermidge,” Duncan said. “Try not to spend too much time listening at the door.”
The steward sniffed loftily and turned smartly around, closing the door behind him. Not all the way, of course, Jack noted with an internal smile. Gossip was a valuable commodity.
Alicia seated herself in the chair nearest the fireplace and tucked her skirts around her legs. She wasn’t particularly good at hiding her expression and she appeared rather desolate. Fortunately, she was still shielded, so no matter how upset she got, the furniture was safe. Probably. He didn’t know just how strong her gift was. But between Duncan and Fiona, the shields ought to be strong enough to hold just about anything short of a volcano.
His eyes were drawn back to Kate, who was watching her sister with concern. “Good morning, Alicia. Are you all right?” she asked.
Alicia nodded. “Are you?”
“Yes. I’ve even had a lovely haircut,” Kate said drily.
Alicia winced. “I’m sorry.”
“I’m just glad you’re all right, and nobody else was hurt.”
Duncan rose and turned to his wife. “I think we’ll leave you to your discussion.” He offered his arm to Fiona, who seemed as though she might want to say something different. “Right, my dear?”
“Yes, of course.” Fiona took his arm, and the Kilgorans exited the room, leaving Jack and Kate facing Alicia.
The three of them sat in silence for a few moments. Finally, Jack broke it. “So, now what?”
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