Spellmaker

CHAPTER 9

Two days after the somewhat awkward engagement dinner at Seven Oaks, Elsie was still wondering what it would be like to kiss Bacchus Kelsey. She’d chided herself many times and even tried to start her novel reader, but the pleasure of it had faded—she found she couldn’t care about the fictional baron nearly as much as the real-life master spellmaker, and it made her miserable.

For the briefest moment, she had thought Bacchus might try, there in the duke’s hallway. Kiss her, that was. But that had just been bread crumbs on her chin. Thinking of it made her coil in embarrassment, and pining for the man only flared an uneasy depression. She’d only ever kissed Alfred, unless one were to count that boy at the workhouse when she was nine. His name was . . . Matthew, if memory served her right.

At least Bacchus still tolerated her. He hadn’t yet discovered she was disposable. And if she knew him at all, he might be noble enough to keep her around even once he did.

“Miss Camden?”

Elsie jerked to attention. She sat at the dining table in Ogden’s kitchen, barely a sixth of the size of the one at Seven Oaks, Miss Irene Prescott just across the corner from her. Blast, I missed what she said.

“Hmm?” she inquired sweetly.

Miss Prescott smiled patiently, a small iron rod in her hands. “Do you detect the points of this rune?”

Miss Prescott had brought temporally enchanted items today, as the Temporal Atheneum was all the way in Newcastle upon Tyne, and it was easier to have a local aspector enchant items than take the long trip north. The spell was a reverse aging spell, meant to remove rust. The rod in the spellbreaker’s hands looked fresh and new, but it had the telltale smell of mushrooms.

Elsie touched the rod, detecting the points of its knots. “I think so,” she lied. She knew exactly where they were. She could untie them while standing on her head. Assuming she still had that skill. She hadn’t tried since she was a child.

Miss Prescott went on to discuss the rune for the next fifteen minutes, followed by the assurance that even though Elsie couldn’t see the rune, she could still untie it.

Elsie’s cheeks were beginning to hurt from all the forced smiling, and she was so relieved to untie the bloody thing, she didn’t bother making any mistakes.

“Wonderful!” Miss Prescott set the now-rusted rod on the table. “What a quick learner you are, Miss Camden! It took me a month to feel out temporal runes.”

A month? Elsie tried to remember the first temporal rune she’d come across, and found she couldn’t. “Beginner’s luck,” she offered. She’d need to stall her learning next time. The last thing she wanted was Miss Prescott announcing to important people that Elsie was talented, lest the magistrate determine she’d had more practice than Bacchus had let on.

Thoughts of Bacchus had her fiddling with the ring on her finger. She’d need to procure one for him as well. A nice band . . . But what would Bacchus like? Something simple, most likely. She wouldn’t have much time to look until . . . She wasn’t sure. After the wedding, certainly.

The wedding.

They were going to keep it simple, yet Elsie still had two sheets of paper upstairs filled with discussions on it, mostly inquiries from the duchess, though Bacchus always wrote them out himself. Having a duchess as a guest made her almost as nervous as having Bacchus as the groom.

“Rational spells are the trickiest, in my opinion. We’ll get to those last,” Miss Prescott said, and Elsie became aware once more of the opus spell tucked beneath her dress. “I’ll set up an appointment for us at the Spiritual Atheneum so you can get a feel for that type of magic before we start focusing on individual disciplines. It shouldn’t be hard—the atheneums are always in need of spellbreakers. They’ll be happy to have us.”

Elsie perked up at this. Perhaps she could learn something more of Lily Merton at the Spiritual Atheneum? Could she have left any tracks uncovered? So far, Ogden had had no success in tracking her down, but maybe he’d been looking in the wrong places. “I would very much like that.”

They chatted for another quarter hour, blessedly not about spellbreaking, before Miss Prescott took her leave. The moment she did, Elsie went upstairs—careful not to disturb Emmeline’s hanging laundry—and slipped into the sitting room, where she’d left the copies of the newspaper articles penned under her name. Sitting on the sofa, she spread them out before her, reading each of them in turn. The newspapers from the spirit line still hadn’t come in. She nearly had these ones memorized. The only thing of interest she could find were two lines: The inquirer would gladly pay a high price for the black birds, from the Manchester Guardian. It sounded like a bribe, or it did to Elsie’s mind, which arguably had been made fanciful from novel readers. Then there was the line that stood out in the more recent article, which was a sight less cheery: A shame if things were to take a Turner and end entirely. That sounded like a threat.

Emmeline had set the day’s newspaper on the side table. With a sigh, Elsie opened it, eager to read something sensical.

What she found made her blood run cold.

“Again?” she whispered, setting the pages on her lap. The main headline read, Master Rational Aspector Missing Three Days, Believed to Be Victim of Opus Thief.

Her thoughts jumped to Ogden, but she’d seen him last night. Not that she’d ever report him as a master aspector were he to get lost.

She read the article, which detailed a Mr. Kyle Landon Murray, who was forty-eight years old, a popular aspector in Oxford.

“He has a very strict schedule,” his daughter said. “He’s meticulous. He wouldn’t have just run off.”

Police are still investigating.

“Merton.” Elsie said her name like a curse. Was she so bold as to continue her scheme while in hiding, or was this simply an unrelated disappearance?

No, the coincidence was too great. But this meant Elsie, Ogden, and Bacchus really needed to find some clues or else more people would get hurt, and Merton . . . Merton would do whatever it was she was planning to do.

Merton. Merton.

Elsie’s chest tightened.

Sitting at the edge of her seat, Elsie looked over the last article again. A shame if things were to take a Turner and end entirely. It wasn’t just a misspelling; the word Turner was capitalized.

One of the murders had happened at a Mr. Turner’s home in London.

Elsie held her breath. It couldn’t be happenstance. That line had been intended as a threat. Whomever the articles were intended for . . . Merton had been informing them of what she would do if they didn’t cooperate. Had she gotten impatient, moving from coercion to threats, and then to outright murder? But what did she want?

Elsie pulled up the News Letter article and pored over it, searching for something similar. The vapid writing went on and on about traveling via ships and trains—

And then she finally saw something that stood out. Not a name or a threat, but something else. Letting herself breathe, she read again.

It is difficult to maneuver ships when a neighbor seeks a conversation back home. We must analyze the situation and come together.

Elsie pressed her finger beneath the last sentence and glanced over the rest of the article. Yes, this was different.

For whatever reason, the author had switched to American spelling for those two sentences. Maneuver instead of manoeuvre, neighbor instead of neighbour, and analyze instead of analyse. The words themselves didn’t seem to fit, rendering the writing subpar and clunky. As though Merton really wanted that line to stand out.

Elsie took a pencil and underlined the passage, then returned to the article from the Manchester Guardian, carefully reading that one as well. To her delight, she found a similar passage.

The owner has traveled away, though he is wanted in London. “There is no pretense,” a neighbor said. “We merely want to open a dialogue about the spell.”

Traveled, pretense, and neighbor were all in American English. What spell this neighbor referred to was not detailed. Elsie underlined it and moved on to the Daily Telegraph, finding this line: This behavior is unnecessary; let us labor together for a better end.

Behavior and labor were both American English, while the rest of the article was British.

Getting a new piece of paper, Elsie wrote down all the irregular lines. A neighbor—Merton?—was trying to contact someone who had traveled away from America. One of the other headlines mentioned a spiritual aspector—the American Elsie had met in Juniper Down, surely. So Master Merton wanted to talk to him . . . about a spell? And she was trying to convey that his behavior, the traveling he’d been doing, was unnecessary.

Was he hiding from Merton? Had she paid to publish these articles across random papers in the hopes that he’d take notice? Was that why she’d used American spelling?

Astonishingly enough, it had worked, because the American had come to England. He’d looked up the articles’ author—Elsie Camden—and met her in Juniper Down, her last known residence prior to the burned-down workhouse.

That had happened while Ogden was still under Merton’s spell, but because Ogden hadn’t witnessed it himself, Merton had no way of gleaning the information from him.

Which meant she likely didn’t know the American had come at all.

Elsie tapped her pencil against her lips. She had so many questions, but this was progress. With luck, Ogden would return home tonight with news from the spirit line. Finding more of these articles might reveal more truths, about both Merton and the unknown man from Juniper Down.

“Elsie?” Emmeline poked her head into the room.

Lowering her pencil, Elsie said, “Hmm?”

“Do you want help getting ready?”

Elsie looked up, confused, before understanding dawned on her and she leapt off the sofa. “Emmeline, thank you. I’d nearly forgotten.”

She was to dine at Seven Oaks again tonight. Bacchus had arranged it—in a storybook, he would have done so to spend time with her because they were blissfully in love. In reality, he needed her to get close to the duke again so she could uncover the truth behind the mysterious spell hidden on his person. She hoped she didn’t make a fool of herself, but more so, she hoped she was wrong. That she actually hadn’t sensed a spell, or that the spell was something else entirely. Bacchus was so close to the duke . . . Elsie didn’t want anything to estrange them. Nor did she want Bacchus to taste betrayal. The acrid flavor was still familiar on Elsie’s tongue, and she didn’t wish it upon anyone, least of all the man she lov—

She cleared her throat, reining in her thoughts. At least she’d managed to convince the duke and duchess that she was fine company.

“Do you want to wear my pearls?” Emmeline asked as Elsie stepped through the door. “They look real.”

She was about to say no, but paused. This was a duke’s home, and there was only so much she could do to her dresses to make it look like she belonged. “Yes, Emmeline,” she said, running her thumb over the sapphire on her finger. “That would be wonderful.”

Elsie was especially nervous riding to Seven Oaks this time, and not merely because a bout of rain threatened to unwind her meticulously placed curls. The problem was this: while the duke seemed happy enough to welcome her into his home—he’d always been welcoming, even before her forced engagement to Bacchus—they weren’t chummy. Getting close enough to the duchess to uncover a spell would be trying enough, but to her husband? Elsie had to find a way to do it without looking like she’d gone mad. And even then, if it was a physical spell, she wouldn’t know for sure unless she saw the bloody thing. Perhaps if she tripped while carrying a knife just so, she could slice through the buttons of the duke’s shirt without actually injuring him . . .

Do it for Bacchus, she reminded herself. She didn’t want him to doubt people like she did.

She twisted the ring on her finger until the skin beneath grew raw.

When the carriage pulled through the gates and around the drive, Elsie searched for Bacchus, but he wasn’t there to meet her. Something inside her sank.

A servant opened the carriage, and Elsie hid her discomfort somewhere near her diaphragm, where it bubbled and mewed little enough for her to ignore it. “Miss Camden,” the young man said, “allow me to escort you to the sitting room.”

“Thank you.” Elsie tried her best to sound refined. The servant walked two steps ahead of her, guiding her down an increasingly familiar path to the elaborate sitting room. The duke and his entire family were inside; a harp had been brought over, and Ida played a lovely tune upon it. Bacchus was nowhere to be seen.

Her anxiety sharpened. Was he well? Worried? Should she find him?

“Miss Camden!” exclaimed the duchess, who rose from her chair and crossed to her, grasping Elsie’s hands gently in greeting. “It’s so wonderful to have you with us again.”

Elsie put on a smile. “It’s always wonderful to be here, Your Grace.”

The duchess chuckled. “Please, you must call me Abigail. Come take a seat. I apologize for Bacchus; it’s not like him to be late.”

Elsie glanced back to the way she had come. “No, it’s not.”

The duchess guided her to a settee. Elsie was about to sit, but the duke was leaning against the mantel, watching his daughter play. Sensing her opportunity, she offered up an excuse about stretching her legs and went to stand by him, taking up a place a little too close for comfort.

She could feel it, the spell, with something beyond her five senses. Maybe if she got very close, she would be able to tell whether it was the siphoning spell.

She cleared her throat. “Lovely woods you have.” It was one of her many rehearsed lines. “Do you hunt often, Your Grace?”

The duke chuckled. “Not for some time now. Perhaps you have not noticed, Elsie, but I am beginning to lean toward old.”

Behind her, Miss Josie chuckled.

Elsie smiled. “I hadn’t noticed.” Though, in fact, the Duke of Kent was perhaps the oldest man she knew, short of Two-Thom from Clunwood. “You seem to have recovered from your illness nicely, if I may say so.”

He smiled. “I try my best.”

This was getting nowhere. Elsie racked her brain for something else to say.

“How is your training coming along?” the duke asked.

“Oh fine. Lovely. Quite lovely. Keeps me busy.” She studied his face, that spell pulsing just beyond her reach. An idea struck. “Forgive me for saying so, but I believe your cravat is crooked.” She knew nothing about fixing a cravat, but if she could just reach for it—

The duke raised a hand before she could, his slender fingers tracing the knot. He adjusted it slightly. “It’s actually a new design my valet introduced me to. Not sure how fond of it I am.”

Blast.

The duke looked at her expectantly, so she said the first thing that came to mind. “You haven’t by chance heard from Master Merton, have you?”

He blinked. “No, she hasn’t—”

The door opened, calling Elsie’s attention away. Curse her heart for how it quickened at the sight of Bacchus, looking smart, well groomed, and tired.

The duke straightened. “I suppose we can all head in now. Abigail?” He held out his arm for the duchess.

Bacchus spied Elsie and came toward her, his strides long and purposeful.

Elsie swallowed. “Where were you?”

“I lost track of time.”

She wilted. Touched his elbow. “It’s understandable.”

He rewarded her with a soft smile before rubbing his eyes. “Forgive me, I haven’t slept well.”

“I see that, too. And it’s no wonder,” she added quietly. “But I will forgive you for anything and everything as long as you forgive me for anything absurd I do in that dining room.”

Because she would make a fool of herself, one way or another. If it meant Bacchus’s happiness.

“Anything and everything, hm?” There was a sparkle in his gaze that made her belly warm. She couldn’t muster a sensible reply.

The others had started for the dining room, so Bacchus offered his arm. Elsie took it, relishing the feel of the strong muscles under his sleeve, wishing for . . . everything.

But it was no use feeling sorry for herself. She had a job to do.

They had nearly reached the dining room when Bacchus whispered, “You seem uneasy.”

She scoffed. “I’m about to accost a duke. Of course I’m uneasy.”

Bacchus’s lips pressed into a line, and he said nothing more until they were seated, the first course served. Elsie sat around the table from the duke this time, though not close enough to feel that otherly buzz of his spell.

She considered, as Miss Josie recounted her day shopping in town, what actions she needed to take. She swallowed spoonful after spoonful of white soup as she debated and was surprised when her spoon hit the bottom of the empty bowl.

“What flowers did you decide upon, Miss Camden?” the duchess inquired as a servant took her dish away.

“Flowers?” Her brain remembered too slowly her excuse for pulling Bacchus away at the engagement dinner. “Oh! Well, roses, of course.”

The duchess smiled. “A good, traditional choice.”

In truth, Elsie couldn’t care less about what flowers decorated the chapel when she got married. It seemed so inconsequential, so abstract, compared with her other worries.

“It’s too bad laceleaf doesn’t grow here,” Bacchus added. Elsie could detect the very slightest hint of tension in his voice, something she might not have noticed if this were their first meeting. His English accent was especially crisp. “It’s quite lovely, especially the red variety.”

“Is it native to Barbados?” Elsie asked.

He nodded and took a sip of water.

Elsie’s gaze narrowed in on that glass, and a perfect, mortifying plan sprung into her head.

“What a lovely name,” Miss Ida said. “Laceleaf. Do tell us what it looks like.”

Bacchus set the glass down. “It’s a variety of lily.” The servants came around with the second course, serving the duke first. Elsie waited until they moved away so there would be none to lend aid but herself. “The entire flower is made of a single petal wrapped around the tip of the stem, and the spadix—”

Elsie swiped her arm out and tipped over her full water glass, spilling it over the table and, subsequently, onto the duke’s lap.

No one could say she hadn’t tried.

“Oh no!” she stood immediately, seizing her napkin and coming to the duke’s aid. The spell on his person called to her, but she still wasn’t close enough to read it. “I’m so clumsy. Oh, forgive me.” She needn’t fake her embarrassment.

The duke scooted back, shaking water off his hand. Elsie moved closer. Her initial impressions held out—there was no smell, no sound, and now that she was closer, she didn’t feel the tingle of a rational spell. It had to be physical—

“It’s quite all right. It’s not the first time.” The duke stood.

Now if only he would be so kind as to change his clothes right there in the dining room and allow Elsie a good look at his naked torso.

“Elsie.” Bacchus stood, fingers grazing her elbow.

“I’ve almost got it,” she replied. The others would think she meant the mess, which the servants were now hurrying to clean up. She dared to reach for the duke’s chest with her half-soaked napkin—

Bacchus’s grip tightened, holding her back. Frustrated, she turned to him, but the set of his brow and jaw, like they’d been crafted by a blacksmith, gave her pause.

“Why don’t you change,” the duchess offered. “We’ll wait for you—”

Bacchus’s voice carried over hers. “What spell is on your person?”

The room silenced. Even the servants hushed. Elsie’s lips parted. That’s one way to do it . . .

The duke froze. “Pardon?”

“The spell on your torso,” Bacchus specified. “Is it or is it not the recipient enchantment for a siphoning spell?”

The duke blanched. “I don’t know what you mean.”

“Be straight with me, Isaiah,” Bacchus pressed. “She’s a spellbreaker.”

Elsie guiltily set down her napkin.

The duke glanced at his wife, then settled on the tabletop. “It’s not what you think, Bacchus.”

Bacchus tensed. “Explain it to me, then. Explain why I had a hidden spell on my person since my youth, and why you grew ill immediately following its removal.”

The duchess looked shocked. Had she not known? “Isaiah?”

One of the servants gestured to the other, and they quickly exited the room.

Miss Josie looked back and forth between Bacchus and her father. “What’s going on?”

Bacchus merely waited.

The duke sighed. “I was growing frail, and you were such a strong, healthy boy.”

Bacchus’s hold on Elsie tightened.

“Please”—the Duke of Kent lifted a hand—“I did not mean to take it from you. Your father—”

“My father knew?”

The knob in the duke’s throat bobbed. “Your father gave his consent.”

Bacchus glowered. “It was not his to give.”

“Strictly speaking—”

“I thought I had polio.” Bacchus leaned over the table, finally releasing Elsie so he could press both hands against its surface. “For years I thought I had polio. I thought I would lose the use of my legs. I went to countless doctors.”

“Girls,” the duchess murmured, “let’s wait for your father in the parlor, hm?” She hurriedly ushered them to the door. Elsie’s pulse raced, but she didn’t try to join them. She needed to be here. She needed to stand by Bacchus’s side. Her hand strayed to his triceps, her touch featherlight.

Chagrined, the duke repeated, “Your father knew.”

“And so did you,” Bacchus replied darkly. He straightened, seeming to almost double in size. “Who did it? My father was no spellmaker.”

The duke turned away. “I swore that I would not—”

“Who?” Bacchus pressed. “You owe me at least that much.”

The duke’s shoulders slumped so deeply Elsie thought his fingertips might brush the carpet. “Master Enoch Phillips performed it while you slept.”

Elsie gaped. Wasn’t Master Phillips the head of the London Physical Atheneum?

Bacchus said, “I don’t suppose you’ll share whose vitality you’re drinking from now.”

The duke looked ready to cry.

Elsie started as Bacchus’s hand gripped hers, and suddenly she was being pulled away from the table toward the door, barely able to keep up with his long strides. A maid swept by the passageway, and Bacchus barked, “See a carriage pulled around immediately and ensure Miss Camden is taken care of.”

His presence and his baritone emanated both authority and restrained rage, and the maid didn’t hesitate to respond. “O-Of course. Miss Camden.” She curtsied and, abandoning whatever chore she was about, quickly led Elsie to a cushioned bench in the vestibule by the front door. Meanwhile, Bacchus burst up the stairs, taking the steps three at a time.

The maid bolted in the other direction.

Elsie let out a long breath as she lowered herself onto the bench. This was not how she had expected the evening to go. Peering up at the stairs, she longed to follow Bacchus, to see if he was all right. But of course that was silly. He wasn’t all right. Why would he be? The duke’s revelation had made everything a thousandfold worse. Bacchus’s own father had betrayed him.

She twiddled her thumbs, uneasy. What if one of the family stopped by? What would she say? It was obvious she had told Bacchus about the spell. Surely they’d never want to see her again. Perhaps she should start walking home. Let the carriage catch up, or see if she could find a cab farther into the city. It was raining—pouring, really—but a cold wouldn’t kill her, now would it?

Embarrassment might.

She was just about to rise from the bench when she heard the heavy clamor of hooves outside. A moment later, a man in a very wet driver’s uniform burst in. “Miss Camden? I’m ready for you.”

She nodded and followed him out. A heavy black carriage awaited her, pulled by four horses. An awful lot for a single person, but she wasn’t about to complain—it had a roof. Holding her hands over her head as though they could protect her from the downpour, Elsie hurried to it, grateful for the driver’s assistance as he opened the door. He was so swift he nearly closed it on her skirt.

Leaning back on the bench, she blew a damp curl from her face. What would happen now? Surely Bacchus wouldn’t continue to stay with the duke and duchess. Would he want to return to Barbados? And if so, what would it mean for their plans? She didn’t truly think he would leave her to the magistrate—to the jailers—but her hand moved to her neck at the thought of hanging. Emmeline’s pearls offered a sliver of comfort.

The carriage rocked as the driver took his seat, but before the horses could pull forward, her door ripped open, shooting a cold, wet gust her way. To her surprise, Bacchus stepped in and sat across from her, slamming the door shut behind him. The carriage dipped once more as someone secured a trunk to its back.

“I’m coming with you,” Bacchus announced, and banged his fist on the carriage roof.