sit right,” I added.
Mrs. Brindle’s eyes sparkled. “He was a scamp then, and he’s a scamp now, but that doesn’t mean a mere shopkeeper like you has a right to call a duke by his given name.”
I grinned. It was an Amusementist tradition to call all members of the Order by their Christian names. I had grown so used to calling the Duke of Chadwick “Oliver” that I’d forgotten the company I kept. “I beg your pardon. That should be His Grace, the Duke of Scamps.” I placed the picture back on its perch. “The wedding will be breathtaking. I can hardly wait.”
“If you manage to stay awake during the ceremony.” Mrs. Brindle took the tray. “Go clean up. I’ll have the tea waiting when you return.”
I readied myself for the day, trying to shake off my exhaustion as I donned my full mourning dress for the last time. My year in mourning was over, but the sadness remained. I intended to go to the cemetery to tend my parents’ graves. Every time I did, my guilt overwhelmed me. I felt responsible for their loss, and I felt it deeply. I’d had a chance to use Rathford’s time machine to return to the night of the fire. I could have warned them to escape. I’d had the choice to save them, but I couldn’t do it and risk the consequences of playing God. Instead I’d shattered the heart of the machine that could have brought them back to life.
I knew it was no use wallowing in my guilt, but I couldn’t help it. To let go of the guilt, I’d have to forgive myself.
Throughout the morning, memories of my parents plagued me. I thought about how if my father were alive, he’d tease me for putting too much sugar in my tea, and I wondered what my mother would have worn to church. It would have all been so normal, a quiet life, without frogs or fear.
But it wasn’t the life I was meant to have. For better or worse I chose to live in a world where I knew the truth, even if knowing that truth meant knowing the danger I faced. In spite of my parents’ efforts to keep me away from the Order, living in this world was better than living blindly.
Bob, one of Mrs. Brindle’s middle sons, which put him at a burly and youthful sixty, poked his bald head into the parlor through the door that led in from the kitchen.
“Beg your pardon, Miss Whitlock, Mother,” he said, his kindly face wrinkling around his deep-set eyes. Lucinda had hired him to care for the mews out back and act as a driver for Mrs. Brindle and me. But I knew about the pistol Bob kept in his pocket. He was here for protection, and I was glad for it, but he tended to stay to the back of the house, leaving the front vulnerable.
“Bob, did you hear anything strange during the night?” I asked.
“No, miss. Not a thing. A caller has arrived for you.” He tipped his hat, then left the way he’d come.
A caller?
Will.
I smoothed the knot of braids at the back of my neck even as a deep twisting sensation pulled at my middle.
My composure completely abandoned me as soon as he entered the parlor.
“Will,” I breathed.
He stood in the doorway with the light from the kitchen touching the dark waves of his hair. His skin had been kissed with gold from the country sun, and the low sweep of his lashes gave his shadowed eyes a sinful depth. He held a fistful of wildflowers he must have picked on his way to London from Chadwick Hall. He held them out to me as the corner of his lips turned up in a smile.
He looked stunning, like a changeling prince stolen away from this world to be raised in a realm of mystery and illusion.
I threw myself into his arms, and he held me, dropping the flowers to the floor. I smiled as I gained my senses and tried to put at least a modicum of respectable distance between us.
Mrs. Brindle cleared her throat.
I ducked my head as she skewered me with a single look. Will walked straight to her and flashed a charming smile, then kissed her hand. “Mrs. Brindle, you are looking as lovely as ever.”
“And you are a
Mrs. Brindle’s eyes sparkled. “He was a scamp then, and he’s a scamp now, but that doesn’t mean a mere shopkeeper like you has a right to call a duke by his given name.”
I grinned. It was an Amusementist tradition to call all members of the Order by their Christian names. I had grown so used to calling the Duke of Chadwick “Oliver” that I’d forgotten the company I kept. “I beg your pardon. That should be His Grace, the Duke of Scamps.” I placed the picture back on its perch. “The wedding will be breathtaking. I can hardly wait.”
“If you manage to stay awake during the ceremony.” Mrs. Brindle took the tray. “Go clean up. I’ll have the tea waiting when you return.”
I readied myself for the day, trying to shake off my exhaustion as I donned my full mourning dress for the last time. My year in mourning was over, but the sadness remained. I intended to go to the cemetery to tend my parents’ graves. Every time I did, my guilt overwhelmed me. I felt responsible for their loss, and I felt it deeply. I’d had a chance to use Rathford’s time machine to return to the night of the fire. I could have warned them to escape. I’d had the choice to save them, but I couldn’t do it and risk the consequences of playing God. Instead I’d shattered the heart of the machine that could have brought them back to life.
I knew it was no use wallowing in my guilt, but I couldn’t help it. To let go of the guilt, I’d have to forgive myself.
Throughout the morning, memories of my parents plagued me. I thought about how if my father were alive, he’d tease me for putting too much sugar in my tea, and I wondered what my mother would have worn to church. It would have all been so normal, a quiet life, without frogs or fear.
But it wasn’t the life I was meant to have. For better or worse I chose to live in a world where I knew the truth, even if knowing that truth meant knowing the danger I faced. In spite of my parents’ efforts to keep me away from the Order, living in this world was better than living blindly.
Bob, one of Mrs. Brindle’s middle sons, which put him at a burly and youthful sixty, poked his bald head into the parlor through the door that led in from the kitchen.
“Beg your pardon, Miss Whitlock, Mother,” he said, his kindly face wrinkling around his deep-set eyes. Lucinda had hired him to care for the mews out back and act as a driver for Mrs. Brindle and me. But I knew about the pistol Bob kept in his pocket. He was here for protection, and I was glad for it, but he tended to stay to the back of the house, leaving the front vulnerable.
“Bob, did you hear anything strange during the night?” I asked.
“No, miss. Not a thing. A caller has arrived for you.” He tipped his hat, then left the way he’d come.
A caller?
Will.
I smoothed the knot of braids at the back of my neck even as a deep twisting sensation pulled at my middle.
My composure completely abandoned me as soon as he entered the parlor.
“Will,” I breathed.
He stood in the doorway with the light from the kitchen touching the dark waves of his hair. His skin had been kissed with gold from the country sun, and the low sweep of his lashes gave his shadowed eyes a sinful depth. He held a fistful of wildflowers he must have picked on his way to London from Chadwick Hall. He held them out to me as the corner of his lips turned up in a smile.
He looked stunning, like a changeling prince stolen away from this world to be raised in a realm of mystery and illusion.
I threw myself into his arms, and he held me, dropping the flowers to the floor. I smiled as I gained my senses and tried to put at least a modicum of respectable distance between us.
Mrs. Brindle cleared her throat.
I ducked my head as she skewered me with a single look. Will walked straight to her and flashed a charming smile, then kissed her hand. “Mrs. Brindle, you are looking as lovely as ever.”
“And you are a
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