Exile for Dreamers (17 page)

I decided to try chiseling it free with the sharp edge of my tongue. “As I recall, for my honesty on that occasion, you called me a witch.”

“I did.” His voice dropped to a low whisper. “Because you were right.”

My lungs filled in a jubilant rush.

His grip on me softened. He stared at his fingers wrapped around my arm and loosened them so that his hand barely grazed my skin. “Truth is, to keep you here, I'd drop to my knees this instant and beg for your hand. That is, if I could stomach being that cruel to you. I want you, Tess, but you deserve a better man than me. A man with some semblance of a heart left. A man who would coddle you and treat you as you deserve. Not someone as worthless, and lame, and scarred—”

“Stop! Stop saying such things about yourself. You are worth ten of any other man I know.”

He let go of me and the absence of his hand made me feel unnerved, as if an important article of clothing had been stripped away and I sat there half naked. But I could hardly grab his hand and slap it back on my arm. So I settled on words. “Do you think so little of me? Can you honestly believe I have my sights set on a man who would coddle me? What do I care about fine jewels, or carriages, or trips to the theater? Look at me. Am I a china doll to be petted and cosseted?”

I waited, but he didn't answer.

“Now who is blind?” I asked.

He stared at me, his lips parted as if he meant to say something, and then he closed them.

Lost.

Gabriel is normally a powerful man. Even though he bears a limp from the wound his brother gave him, it only proves his strength. He is a man who could not be cut down, even by a death blow. But all this—his height, his bearing, the powerful muscles in his shoulders and arms—only made that
lost
expression on his face all the more heartbreaking. I ached to throw my arms around him.

Instead, I clasped my palms together as if praying at an altar. “You can't truly believe your scars bother me. How can you? When, God help me, I yearn to trace each and every one with my lips.”

Color returned to his face in a blazing crimson flood. He looked away as if my declaration pained him.

I stood, careful to keep my gaze from his, ashamed of my boldness but not yet finished with my confession. “Here is the saddest truth of all, my lord. My feelings are of no consequence. We have no future, Gabriel. Because there is only death ahead of me.”

I gave his cheek a sorrow-drenched kiss and ran.

Ran away, back to Stranje House. I didn't run elegantly like a deer, or fierce like a wolf, or even like a frightened rabbit. I ran with no grace at all. Like a lost girl. A stupid, foolish lost girl. Half blind with wild thoughts, I stumbled on the stairs.

I never stumble.

Only death ahead of me.

I slammed through the garden door and practically flew through the corridors, up the staircase, down the hall, and flung wide the doors to the ballroom. She was there, as I knew she would be.

Madame Cho.

Waiting. Sitting beside the mats where we practice grappling and throwing one another.

The ballroom is the best of all the rooms in Stranje House. Better than even the dark maze of secret passages and deep hiding places. This is my favorite room.
My haven.
A climbing rope dangles from the two-story ceiling. Miss Stranje had it installed especially for me. I knew every knot intimately. Off to the side stood a full-size cloth man stuffed with sand and wadding, built so that we could learn to throw our punches and kicks more accurately. I remembered the day Sera inked a moustache and face on him. I passed the case of sabers, a pile of bamboo swords, the throwing knives, and the rack of foils we used for fencing lessons.

Only death lay ahead of me.

I clenched my fists. I didn't want to leave Stranje House. And I didn't want to die. Not because death frightened me. It didn't. Not anymore. I'd died a hundred times in dreams and visions. Death had lost its mystery long ago. No, I wanted the one thing I could never have—a life with Ravencross.

I wanted to live.

My teacher sat, calm as sunlight, waiting for me, watching, as if her ancient dark eyes saw centuries beyond my pain. In a desperate childish rush, I ran and threw myself into Madame Cho's lap. Dry choking sounds came from my heaving chest. I wasn't crying.

I never cry.

 

Twelve

FIGHT

Once my outburst subsided, Cho lifted my shoulders, and although there was kindness in her eyes, I saw no pity. “You must fight.”

With that she dumped me off her knees and stood.

I don't know how old Cho is. There's no way to tell. She has only a few gray hairs, but there is an ancientness about her that stretches beyond the years she may or may not have. She may be old, but there is still a formidable hardness about her that speaks of youth. There is no weakness in her. I can tell she has been hardened by too many difficulties, but where some women might have broken, Madame Cho's difficulties have turned her as sinewy and tough as dried leather.

She picked up her bamboo staff and struck the mat with it. “Practice.”

I blinked away whatever water remained in my eyes, knowing from experience that if I did not get up, I would soon feel that bamboo on my backside. She tossed me a staff of equal length and gave me time to tuck my skirts up. “I don't feel like fighting.”

“Yes, you do. You have been fighting since you came out of the womb.” She swung her stick, and I met it in the air. The clash of wood against wood awakened the heat inside me. I whirled and swung a sweeping arc where she stood. She leapt over my stick as if she were a girl of twelve and brought hers down over my head. I dodged, but it grazed my arm, and the sting made me grit my teeth.

“See,” she said triumphantly, and swung around for another blow. “Practice clears the mind.”

I barely deflected it with my staff. “No. It only makes me angry.”

“Too bad.” She shifted her pole to parry my strike. Our weapons collided with a ripple that I felt all the way up my arm. She whirled and hooked her foot around my ankle, sending me sprawling across the mat on my back. “Anger is not good. It makes—”

“I like being angry.” I raised my staff in the nick of time to stop hers from chopping down on me.

“It feels like power, but it makes you reckless. Sloppy,” she said, backing off for a minute. “Anger shifts the balance. Makes you forget who you are.”

I rolled to my feet and brought my staff up with me in a jarring clash against hers. “Maybe I
want
to forget.”

“Forgetting is not possible.” She flipped the pole around her shoulder. “You must concentrate on something else.” She caught the bamboo with her left hand and rapped me on my shoulder so hard that I dropped my weapon. “Like how to block my attack.”

She stood patiently, waiting for me to collect myself.

“Where did you learn to fight like this? Who taught you?” I dared ask my oft-repeated question, expecting the same answer she had always given me over the years, a sharp rap with one weapon or another.

She stared at me, contemplating, and a whisker of sadness flitted through her dark eyes. Without answering, she picked up my staff that had rolled to the edge of the mat.

“I learned this in my village, near where the Xi and Tan Rivers meet.” I saw pride in the set of her chin and an ache for something lost. “My father taught me.”

She tossed the bamboo to me, and I knew that our time for speaking had come to an end. And so we fought. Again and again, until I was red faced, tired, and bruised, and the turmoil in my heart was no longer the only thing I could feel.

 

Thirteen

SCHEMES

A half hour later, I slipped into the small parlor to meet with Miss Stranje and the others at the appointed time. I arrived late. They were all there. Somehow Madame Cho had gotten there before me. Even Lord Ravencross was there.
Why had Miss Stranje allowed him in?
He did not look at me at first, even though I know he saw me come in. He'd probably taken a disgust of me after my brazen declaration.

Good
. Now that he knew the truth, he would pull back from me and guard his heart.
How very wise of him.

“Ah, there you are.” Miss Stranje did not scold me for being late as she would normally have done.
Because she knows I'm leaving and that she will no longer be training me.

In the time it takes to snap one's fingers, the churning tempest returned to my heart.

I looked around at the inhabitants of Stranje House, at the people I cared about, storing up each movement, each word for the long, dreary years I would spend without them. Lady Jane leaned over the table, watching Georgie sketch a diagram of Stranje House and our grounds. Sera pointed out the location of a copse of trees on the drawing that required correcting.

Jane trailed the handle of a watercolor brush over a section of the map. “I doubt Lady Daneska will bother coming in by the main gate. We ought to post sentries here, here, and here.” She tapped the brush on the garden door, the servants' entrance, and the underground passage through the sea cave.

“What of the secret exit on the side?” Georgie asked, and placed another X on the drawing.

Mr. Sinclair glanced over Jane's shoulder. “It might be easier and more efficient to batten down those sneaky entrances and make them inaccessible.” When Jane turned and glared at him, he added, “Temporarily, of course.”

She acted as if he had insulted her personally. “What do you mean,
sneaky
entrances?”

“Well, that's what they are, aren't they? Entrances for sneaking in and sneaking out.”

“Of course not.” Jane practically vibrated at his callous assessment of her beloved Stranje House. It didn't matter that he was right. “And what's more, I'm not at all certain
you
should even be allowed to
look
at this map.”

He had the audacity to grin at her. “Don't fret yourself, Lady Jane. Your precious diagram is safe with me.” He jabbed at his temple as if the information was stored there. “Like a bear trap. Besides, I already know my way around the house fairly well. And I knocked on enough walls to figure out there might be a hidden staircase or two.”

“Ladies and gentlemen.” Miss Stranje clapped her hands softly. “We must return to the matter at hand. How might we best protect ourselves against possible intruders?”

Maya hummed quietly and looked on.

This might've been any other afternoon in our workroom. Except there were two men here working among us, and this wasn't simply a fictitious strategy problem our teacher challenged us with today. This was a painfully real discussion about Lady Daneska stealing into Stranje House with her band of French assassins.

Sera stood up abruptly and glanced self-consciously about the room, avoiding the men who were present, but her shyness did not deter her from speaking. “Before we can settle on the best way to protect ourselves, it seems to me we must first figure out exactly what Lady Daneska
and
…” She caught her lip, glancing nervously at Lord Ravencross. “And the
other
members of the Iron Crown are after.”

“Georgie's ink, of course,” Jane blurted.

I frowned. I knew Daneska better than they did. “I think it is more than that. Lady Daneska does not like to have anything taken from her. She wants revenge.”

Lord Ravencross rumbled. “That would explain why she wanted me killed as well. Retribution for my brother's life.”

No one said anything. Even Mr. Sinclair, who knew nothing of Ghost, kept respectfully quiet.

Maya broke through the awkwardness. “It is understandable that she wants revenge. We have stolen her valued prizes, Georgie's formula and the information Lord Wyatt would have given her. Surely, she will want them back. Does that not place Georgiana in great peril? She knows the formula and could also be used as a pawn to lure Lord Wyatt.”

“Yes,” Sera agreed. “But we must not forget about Mr. Sinclair and whatever inventions they wanted from him.”

We all turned to stare at our American inventor.

“Tess and Maya make valid points. The attack yesterday reeked of vengeance.” Miss Stranje pressed her knuckles against the edge of our worktable. “Lady Daneska's hand was all over it, although it certainly wasn't one of her more organized schemes.”

Almost as if she intended for it to fail.
But there was no room for me to make that observation. Everyone started talking at once.

Georgie rose. “The men were poorly trained. Some were French, some English, it's as if they'd been thrown together on the spur of the moment.”

Sera shook her head. “I don't know. Mr. Chadwick is convinced they must've been watching the house for days. Otherwise how would they have known exactly when you usually go for your run, er, your brisk walk?”

“It's the Iron Crown,” Georgie defended her point. “Surely they always have someone watching the house.”

Mr. Sinclair shot an alarmed look at Lady Jane. Under his breath he muttered, “You were right, they
will
be looking here first.”

Jane responded with a cocky lift of her eyebrows, clearly saying,
I told you as much.

“That can't be true!” I burst into the fray. I am not good at arguing points. I lowered my voice to a more respectful pitch and attempted to make my case. “About them watching the house, I mean. I'd have known if someone had been in the woods. I would've seen them. At the very least, I would've sensed their presence.” Judging by their skeptical expressions I could tell they were not persuaded. I exhaled with considerable irritation. “Oh, for pity's sake, Phobos and Tromos would've warned me if anyone was hiding nearby.”