Rise of the Arcane Fire (The Secret Order) (23 page)

And I had the sudden urge to take in a stray cat.

Dressing quickly, I wove my hair in a heavy braid and tied it in a simple knot at my neck. There were no lessons at the Academy for the day. My obsessions would have to wait.

As the morning drifted on, I effortlessly balanced the records in the shop and took inventory of the various colorful toys adorning my shelves. It all seemed so quaint.

Four different customers had come into the shop, filling it with the giggles, laughter, and the occasional begging of children without a care in the world beyond the desire for the toys in their arms. I wished I could be like them, to only see the beautiful things before me, and have no knowledge of what mysteries remained hidden just beyond the shelves.

When I scolded a small boy for filling his pockets full of colorful glass marbles he had no intention of paying for, they spilled out of a hole in his pocket and clattered over the polished floor, much to his dramatic chagrin. As I stooped to gather them up, the silver key that always hung around my neck felt heavy as it swung away from my heart.

Just then the bell on the front door rang. A flock of colorful skirts paraded into the shop amid a cackle of familiar laughter.

I took a steadying breath. I should have known I wouldn’t be able to escape. The young boy scampered out, and I wished to follow him, the shop be damned.

“Miss Whitlock, whatever are you doing crawling about on your hands and knees?” The voice of the vapid Thornby daughter drifted through the room. Condescending. Just like it had been at Strompton’s memorial.

Lord have mercy.

I rose, keeping the slick glass marbles held tight in my fists. The girl wasn’t alone. She had three of her friends with her. I hadn’t met them. I didn’t care to either. They looked at me as if I were some sooty blemish on their hems. I tried to recall the Thornby girl’s name. It was something plain, like Alice—no, it was Mary.

“May I help you?” I asked in my politest voice even as I kept a furious grip on the marbles.

Mary drifted over to the marionettes and idly tugged on one of the strings. “We’re only looking,” she said in an overly sweet voice. “Just trying to determine if there is anything here of
worth
.”

The others giggled, and I felt the marbles grow hot in my hand. I gave her my most imperial look and stepped behind the counting desk. I released the marbles into a small box. “Everything you see is of fine quality, provided you can afford it.”

Mary turned, her nose crinkling in an unattractive way. “I can have whatever I wish,” she said as she ran her finger along the lace trim of one of the dolls. She picked it up and toyed with the coils of hair beneath the tiny bonnet. “I do love acquiring fine things.” She let her cool gaze drift over my modest dress. “But I suppose you have little time for refinement, what with all your work.”

“I manage,” I said, quickly calculating my ledgers. Perhaps if I ignored her, she’d spontaneously burst into flame.

“Hmph. If you insist.” She placed the doll back on the shelf and turned to me. “Just the other day the Earl of Strompton spent all morning purchasing a fine thing indeed. According to Prudence he spent a small fortune on a very ornate music box before proceeding on to the monastery.”

That took me aback, and I couldn’t hide it. Lucinda had warned me of the propensity for spying within the ranks of the Society, but this was ridiculous.

Mary clearly felt she’d scored a touch, and decided to lunge again. “Seeing as how a music box trussed up in a silver bow is hardly an average purchase for a young earl, I had to wonder who the gift was intended for.”

I arched an eyebrow. “His mother?”

“Oh, you think you are so clever. You should be careful, dear. Men don’t enjoy the company of plain women with keen minds.” Now her entire face had taken on a crumpled look, and her forced smile reminded me of a small growling dog.

Plain. Honestly. She’d have to do better than that. As if she were some great beauty. “If that is true, and men do in fact prefer the company of frivolous women with dull minds, you should have no shortage of suitors.” I shrugged and went back to my figures.

Mary planted her palms on the counting desk and leaned across it, pure rage alight in her yellow-green eyes.

“Don’t be coy with me. I know what you are. You may think you are so superior with your nomination to the Academy, but you are nothing but a greedy whore. I know about your gypsy lover, and now you have your sights set on Lord Strompton. I will ruin you if you even think you are worthy of Lord Strompton’s attention. The headmaster may have taken you under his wing, but it’s the headmaster’s wife you truly take after.” Her voice hardly came above a whisper, but I felt the slap of it.

I began to quake, feeling suddenly ill as if I had taken a physical blow. Tears burned my eyes, but I absolutely could not release them. How dare she call me a whore. She was the one parading about town with her expensive dresses, tittering friends, and nasty rumors. I was not the one hunting down a rich husband like a mad dog. And here I was on the verge of crying in front of this horrid wretch. I absolutely would not. I would not give her the satisfaction, even though I felt as if she’d just stabbed me with a knife.

She wasn’t worth it. I had to swallow the bitter taste in my mouth. I had a few choice words I could call her. My unspoken insults felt like poison on my tongue, but I refused to sink so low. I’d use the truth instead.

I stepped around the counting desk, keeping one hand on it so as not to tempt myself to strike at her. “Lord Strompton will seek the affection of anyone he desires. If you feel the need to come here to badger me about what he chooses to do with his money and gifts, that says very little about me and volumes about his feelings, or lack thereof, for you.”

Mary huffed, then tried her best to fix a stiff smile on her face, but it did no good. I could see the hate in her, and her frustration showed in the way she crushed her reticule. “Come, ladies. I see nothing of value here.” And as one they marched back out the door, the bell jangling merrily.

I exhaled, letting my hands shake. I had won the battle, but it was clear the war was far from over.

The question was, how far was she willing to take this? She seemed the sort to attempt to ruin me through gossip. A single rumor might be easily dismissed, but there was nothing anyone could do to combat a battalion of lies coming from multiple people. I had no doubt her friends would gleefully set their tongues wagging.

For as terrible and scandalous as those rumors could be, especially the one concerning the headmaster, it was my own words that concerned me. I had practically admitted that David was courting me, and it wouldn’t be long before Mary’s friends spread that rumor all through the Society with or without her prompting.

Our wedding would be planned in a fortnight.

Will would not appreciate hearing the news that I was intended for an earl. Even if it could never be true.

Save for one dance, David and I had hardly exchanged a kind word. No one had any reason whatsoever to believe I held affection for him.

My neck and arms tingled. I crossed them. David was a troublesome problem as well. As soon as he heard about what I had said to Mary, there would be no stop to his pursuit. He’d made his intentions clear.

I would be caught with the only man I wanted hating me, and the one I did not want courting me. It was practically Shakespearean, though not nearly as humorous. I just hoped things wouldn’t end tragically.

I didn’t need this. I didn’t need any of this. I didn’t need the dark stain of my own self-doubt slowly spreading through me like ink soaking through paper. I didn’t need scandal and deceit. I didn’t need the countless small tools, springs, and bolts I constantly had to fish out of my pocket every evening. I’d had enough.

No person in their right mind would continue this torture for absolutely no gain. I had no friends at the Academy, only scorn. I had no accolades, only sabotage, and the admiration given in the form of David’s claim on me, I certainly hadn’t asked for. It wasn’t making my life any easier.

Enough.

I grasped a piece of parchment out of my counting desk and wrote a simple and concise letter to the head of the Order. My script looked unsteady and scrawled, but it was legible enough. I wasn’t foolish, and I wasn’t going to torture myself for nothing, when a perfectly wonderful future awaited me in Scotland.

That was the heart of the matter. At one point I thought that becoming an apprentice to the Order would be a magnificent thing and make me feel whole somehow. So far the Academy had given me nothing but strife.

I was done with it.

Mrs. Brindle walked in just as I finished sealing the envelope. She took one look at me, and concern immediately fell upon her face. “Is everything all right, dear?”

I stood tall, my head high. “Of course.” I handed her the letter with a crisp flick of my hand, though it quavered in the air. “Please post this letter for me immediately, and then send word to Lucinda that she’ll need to find a new shopkeeper. I’m leaving for Scotland in the morning.”

Early the next morning I had the modest things I owned packed into one small case. I set it by the door and waited for Bob to hitch the cart. I had a train to catch to Inverness.

Not a single book had been placed in my luggage. I’d left Simon Pricket’s journals where they belonged, in his workshop. I would have no need of them anymore.

Just as I was finishing out the last of my accounts, the door opened, the bell clanging at my nerves.

“We’re closed,” I snapped.

“Not to me, you’re not.”

I looked up to see Lucinda standing in the door. She had the stern look of a governess who was very disappointed in her pupil. One part of me wanted to rush to her and confess all my woes. The other part hated her for standing there, because I knew her intentions.

“You can’t stop me.” I shut the book on the accounts.

Lucinda didn’t even blink. “I suppose it’s fortunate I was in London, then. I can see you off.”

“Thank you.” Suspicious, I felt her watching my back as I left the shop to gather my bonnet and gloves near the fireplace in the parlor. Lucinda followed me there and remained in the doorway, blocking my path.

“It’s not like you to run away.” She removed her bonnet and held it lightly by the ribbons. How nice of her to settle in. She could put her bonnet right back atop her head, because I wasn’t going to stay.

“It’s over. I’ve had my fill. I was foolish to think I was ever capable of doing this.” I hastily jammed my bonnet on, not caring a whit for how my hair looked beneath it.

Lucinda seemed bemused, but I didn’t bother to straighten it. “From what I understand, you are one of the finest students in the class.” Lucinda removed one glove, then the other. “According to Oliver you show remarkable promise, and have even bested some of his early apprentice designs.”

My shock forced me back a step. But it didn’t take me long to recover from it. “It isn’t the studies. Set a problem before me, and I will find a solution. That is nothing more than stubbornness and a willingness to read.”

“And yet you’re unwilling to solve this problem.”

My face grew hot. “Don’t lecture me. I’ve had enough of it. I’m not here to live out your ambition to be part of the Order. You don’t know what I’ve had to endure.”

Lucinda reached out and took my hand. “Then tell me.” She led me to a seat, and sat down next to me, keeping my hand folded in hers.

Until that moment I hadn’t known how alone I’d truly been. Everything came pouring out of me in a rush. I told her about the scorn from the other apprentices, the accidents, my guilt at having hurt Oliver, then the sabotage. I knew the headmaster wouldn’t want me to say anything about that, but I had to tell
someone
, and I trusted that Lucinda wouldn’t tell a soul, not even Oliver. I told her my fears that the man in the mask was hiding in every shadow, waiting to strike, and confessed how the mystery of what had transpired between Haddock and my two grandfathers made me realize I knew nothing of my family’s history.

With tears in my eyes I told her how alone I felt, and that I couldn’t trust the only friend I thought I had in Peter.

And finally I recounted the argument I’d had with Mary Thornby in the shop the day before. Lucinda seemed surprised at the mention of her brother’s recent behavior toward me, but thankfully she said nothing, only listened. At the end of all of it, I felt hollow and empty, aching for something I could not even define.

When no more words came, Lucinda bowed her head. “I apologize, Meg. I’ve not been a very good friend to you.”

“It doesn’t matter.” I wiped a hasty hand beneath my eyes and turned from her.

“No, it does.” She handed me her handkerchief. “I have been too caught up in my own affairs.”

Speaking all my frustrations aloud may have alleviated some of the pressure in my head, but words were of no real use anymore. “You can’t change anything. The fact is, I’m one person, and I’m tired of facing an army of those determined to see me fail.”

“I don’t wish to see you fail.” Lucinda gave me a determined smile. “And I know you won’t. You concentrate on your studies. Leave Mary to me.”