She clicks the snuffbox shut emphatically. “Well, I’m confused. Whatever would he want with you? You’re lovely, but you haven’t a drop of magical blood in you. He never concerns himself with commoners. Oh, sorry. Here.” She holds out an embroidered handkerchief, and I take it to dab my nose, glaring at her.
“I could have told you I have nothing to do with the secret magical societies apparently flourishing in Albion.”
“Uncle will want to hear about this. Oh, he will be simply livid when he finds that Lord Downpike has revealed himself to you! It’s not done, you see.”
“You’ve just done it. I had no idea whether you were capable of magic.”
She waves a hand dismissively. “I am barely fit to fill a teacup with the amount of power I have. No one cares about me.”
“So it’s true then, that all the gentry can do these things?”
“More or less. Some of us barely bother, we can do so little. We’re all required to learn the basics, is all. But some, like Uncle and Downpike, could move mountains. I think Uncle has, now that I am on the topic. Ernest studies as hard as he can, hoping to join their ranks among the powerful someday. However, I aspire only to join the ranks of the well-dressed and fashionably late.”
I frown, stirring my chocolate. “But if I recall my lessons correctly, wasn’t there a period in Alben history where accused witches were hunted and burned at the stake? How did you all become gentry, then?” I had thought the accusations of witchcraft and magic were entirely false, but apparently not.
“Oh, that. It was a nasty business. You know how men can . . . sow seeds where seeds ought not be sown? Well, we had just come through the Lily War, and the royal line was finally settled. The king thought magical power ought to be consolidated to loyal families, and that the security of the crown depended on keeping power with the wealthy and educated. So, those who had been born outside of the approved family lines . . .”
“Were exterminated.” I set down my cup, no longer thirsty. “That is horrible.”
“Worse things have been done in the name of crown and country. But yes. I think we can both agree it was.” She frowns and then shakes her head as though shaking away bad associations and thoughts. “Back to you! This is very exciting. We haven’t had a real shake-up in the hierarchy since Lord Ackerly showed up two years ago, all dashing and aloof and powerful. Ever since then it’s been the most dreary sort of political posturing without any action. I loathe politics. But if Downpike is misbehaving, things are bound to get interesting! Whatever did you do to catch his eye?”
The door to the parlor opens. We look up to see Finn, cane in hand and none too pleased. Mr. Carlisle is next to him. “Lord Ackerly here to see you, milady. He said it was urgent.” Carlisle bows and backs away, closing the door.
“Lord Ackerly!” Eleanor stands, dropping a slight curtsy. “To what do we owe the pleasure?”
“Spying again, were you?” I glare at him.
Eleanor follows my scowl to where it meets Finn’s, and then back, as though watching a game of tennis. The silence is a heavy thing, as electric as the overhead chandelier. She frowns, clearly puzzled, then looks down at the floor at my feet and bursts out with a sharp laugh. “Oh, dear spirits below, this is the best thing that I have ever been privy to. Lord Ackerly shadowed a commoner from the colonies!”
“That’s enough,” Finn snaps.
She leans in to me conspiratorially. “You must tell me your secret. There isn’t a girl out in society who hasn’t tried to catch his eye, and here you are with the greatest prize of them all.”
He is not amused. “You will kindly bite your tongue, Eleanor.”
“Or you will bite it for me?”
He taps his cane once on the tiles, and Eleanor sits as though her legs have been knocked out from beneath her.
“I may well at that,” he says.
She smiles, delight undampened. “This explains Lord Downpike’s interest in Jessamin. You know, he’s been trying to get you on his side for so long. It would be such a coup for his anti-Iverian cause. Everyone’s been too afraid of you to really support him. I am beside myself with nerves! This changes everything. Lord Ackerly is
no longer untouchable in the infernal machinations and subtleties of political blackmail and extortion. How will it all play out?”
“Without your aid,” Finn says, tone dismissive. “Now.” He sits near me on the couch, takes off his hat, and leans in, carrying with him a whiff of clove and something richer, darker, something that reminds me of heady velvet nights of a year ago, when I would sneak out of my house at night and run like a wild thing through the trees with my friends. I am pulled to his eyes. They seem to be larger than before, depthless, with flecks of gold dancing in them, and I have never seen anything so beautiful.
My hand is in his before I realize it. “We’ll be going then,” he says, and I nod. Of course I will go with him. He’s pretty, so very, very pretty, and I would be a fool to say no to anything he asks of me.
I blink. No, I think. And then I manage to say it out loud. “No.”
He sits back with an angry huff, now exhausted with dark circles under his eyes. It’s as though a fog has been lifted from my brain. Magic! He tried to use magic on me! And I realize it is not the first time. “If you ever try that again,” I say, taking a sip of chocolate to wet my suddenly parched throat, “I will beat you silly with your own cane.”
“This is the best day of my life,” Eleanor says.
I cannot agree with her.
Fourteen