the window’s broad ledge, one steadying hand on her waist.
Another slide and a step and he was directly before the window, climbing up to rest one knee on the cold stone sill. With a grunt, he got his hands onto the thick wood and iron shutters and hoisted the rest of his bulk up, struggling to not be indecently near her ladyship’s prone form. It was difficult, maintaining appropriate decorum during a rescue.
He slid past her and dropped his feet to the floor before scooping her up. Crossing the floor to her bed, he laid her down and freed her from the quilts and blankets.
She was nearly as quiet as the statues gracing the cemeteries near the middle of the Hill—where the elegant people were buried, if they couldn’t afford a proper tomb or a Bone Shrining. He shivered at the thought of being Bone Shrined—to have the flesh stripped from your bones so your bony bits could be strung up as chandeliers or stacked as walls or doors in your chosen church, where you could forever watch your fellow parishioners and descendants …
His thoughts straying, he stepped away, backing to the door and opening it. He slid into the blessedly dark hall and locked the door before making his way to find either Cynda or Laura.
Or best yet, Chloe.
John found both Laura and Cynda seated outside on a stone bench in the gardens, huddled together over the remnants of one of his lordship’s cigarettes. He should have asked how they came by it, he knew he should, but the way they hung so close together, wary eyes on the house, words soft and sad, he no longer cared.
They startled when they saw him approaching and there was a brief fumble as Cynda tried to hide the smoking thing.
John put his hand out, shaking his head.
They lowered their eyes and Cynda presented the cigarette to him. He hesitated, watching them, before raising it to his lips and sucking down one long breath. He coughed a moment and the girls shared a giggle as he passed it back to them. “S’been a long time,” he muttered. He turned to look at the house, too, at the trellis he’d clambered over and the veranda Miss Jordan and her friends had been entertained on not many hours before. “We have a problem,” he said, looking over his shoulder at Laura.
She snatched the cigarette from Cynda and, eyes wide and wild, placed it to her lips. She nodded.
“You both had best know ’bout it.”
Laura shook her head and ducked when Cynda tried to reclaim their stolen prize. From around the cigarette she said, “Cynda’s got herself a job offer. She’ll be leaving tomorrow.”
“Where?”
“The Bertrams,” Cynda said.
John appraised Cynda with a long, slow look. The girl had nice features, long curling blond hair, and an easy smile that was never far from her generous lips. She was not the most efficient household servant but most understood that what Lord Bertram wished for in household servants had less to do with efficiency and more to do with easy attitudes. “If that is what you wish…”
Cynda pouted. “Yes, John. ’Tis. To be cared for in a household free of magicking and witchery is what I wish.”
“Then you had best step away from us now before we begin our conversation,” he warned. “I would not wish to entangle you in family matters.”
She recoiled as if she’d taken the verbal slap physically. Rising from the bench, she snapped her fingers, reclaimed the cigarette, and stalked a distance off, strides so long her skirt swished angrily.
John glanced at the bench and Laura scooted as far over on it as possible so he might sit down and still no one could remark on the closeness of their proximity.
“It’s my fault,” she whispered. “I should not have…” She closed her eyes tight and swallowed hard. “And now Chloe has been taken by the Council…”
John’s lips thinned, pressed so hard together. “Is no one person’s fault. She did not have to do such a thing.”
“I think such a thing is only done when a person feels there is nothing else a person can do.” Laura shook her head. “They have Chloe. Say she’s the one murdered the Kruses.”
John pulled away so fast he nearly fell off the bench’s back. “Chloe could not hurt anyone.”
“Still. They took her and have her locked away. They mean to try her for the Kruses. And maybe this. Somehow.”
“They cannot…”
But the look she gave him said what he did not wish to admit. They most certainly could try her for both. If they wanted a scapegoat they could certainly find her guilty of both—and a dozen other things she had nothing to do with. Attaching a string of known crimes to a single low-ranking person was the easiest way to keep the crime rate appearing manageable.
John sighed. “You must know things about Lady Astraea,” he said. “Things her body servant would be privy to.” He looked at the space between them—the foot and a half of bench—and he scooted closer to her, closing the gap.
She gave a snort of disapproval, saying, “This is highly improper…”
“These are not the times for proper behavior, Miss Laura. These are the times when we must correct things that have gone horribly wrong best we can and trust the other knows our motivation.”
She pressed her lips together now, too, nodding slowly.
John leaned forward to whisper all he knew about Lady Astraea’s strange new condition, hoping her new body servant would prove loyal.
Bran woke in the middle of the night, the sound of his own scream filling his ears. He clutched the covers, his body shaking and damp with the sweat drying all across it.
A wind rattled his shutters and he went to them, crossing the cold floor in bare feet as fast as he could. He tugged the shutters tight and latched them at one more spot before straightening, his face full of wonder.
He picked the small journal off his bedside table and flipped through it to the day’s date. He had scheduled no wind. The water in the pitcher he used for washing sloshed as if shaken.
His shutters shook again in defiance. He closed the journal and stepped back to the window. Was an intruder outside on his balcony? Did someone mean to finally murder him in his sleep? Tiptoeing to his fireplace’s mantel, he took down his father’s sword. Another relic from the war that might yet serve him well. He unsheathed it and only jumped a little when the shutters rattled again.
Sliding up to the shutters, he unlatched them and pressed forward to gain the advantage on his attacker. He threw them wide open with a shout. But no one was there. The air was still, the humble balcony empty except for the pineapple plant Maude had obtained for him that he’d forgotten to water.
Blustering into existence again, the wind tore at him, twisting and biting its way around his body and blowing past his head with such force and such a chill that all his hair stood on end and bumps rose on his arms.
Then it was over and there was no wind, no breeze.
The cruel, chill air was gone and the night was once more still and warm, but with a touch more dampness—and darkness—than before.
Bran tugged the shutters tight and, leaning the sword beside his bedside table, slid into bed and drew the covers up as tight as he used to when his father stormed around in a drunken rage to forget his son’s very existence—that Bran’s birth had ruined everything that was good in his father’s life. Somehow the cold, unwanted wind reminded Bran of the aspects of his father few knew, aspects he’d rather forget.
Jordan woke to a pounding on her door. She tumbled out of bed in the dark, trying to tighten her dress’s back but getting caught up in a struggle. Had she been of lower rank she might have cursed, but saying such words only showed a lack of a more elegant vocabulary.
And class, she remembered. It showed a definite lack of class. Although she was on her way to wherever they took Weather Witches and most of an evening’s travel from home, still she was a day closer to proving her
