Weather Witch (16 page)

A trellis ran along most of the wall, old rose canes and ivy warring to reach the rooftop first. Stepping forward, he grabbed the wooden trellis. He shook it, testing its strength.

“Apologies, milady,” he muttered. He adjusted Lady Astraea’s body so she hung across his chest, shoulder, and back like a sack of grain, and, his hands ignoring the prick of the rose thorns, he began the arduous task of hauling them both toward the open shutters marking her windows.

He was puffing out breath by the time he reached her windows. He crossed one last section of trellis and placed his hands on the edge of the nearest windowsill. Slowly he angled over so his head was just above the window ledge and he could glimpse the room’s interior.

Her bed lay freshly made, the wood floor before it shining in the moonlight seeping in. A few candles still burned—brightly—fresh, considering the amount of time that had passed. So someone had been inside.

Cynda or Laura?

Or Chloe?

John wondered only briefly, knowing it made little difference. He would slip her ladyship into her bed, make his way outside the room, and find one or all of the girls.

With a final glance to assure himself no one watched, he braced his feet, bent his knees to squeeze them into the spaces between the trellis’s narrow wooden slats, and lifted her ladyship off his shoulder, resting her on 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.

Holgate

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.

En Route to Holgate

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 innocence and helping put to rights an entire system that had somehow broken down.

Lord Stevenson threw open her door and (obviously having no concern for decorum) stepped inside, holding a lantern before him. A bit of light streamed in from the hallway’s distant window and Jordan struggled to wrap her mind around the time. She barely had a chance to snatch up her shawl before he raised his voice to her.

“Hurry, Witch,” he snapped. “We have places to be today so we may Gather more of your kind.”

“More of my kind?”

“More Witches. They are bringing in their newest Gatherings from all up and down the East Coast. And I will come along at least as far as Holgate. To make sure you arrive safely.” He grabbed her shoulder as she was slipping on her shoes and shoved her forward so that she hopped to maintain balance. Her shoes’ silk ribbons trailed in the dust and she stopped to lift her skirts and tie the laces, saying, “Transport us
all
? But the carriage—”

He shoved her against the wall long enough to bend over her shoes and rip the ribbons free. Then he resumed prodding and pushing her down the hall and the stairs, across the main hall, and finally out into the sunlight.

Her golden gown sparkling in the morning’s first light, she realized there would be no more carriage rides until she cleared her name.

Behind the carriage and its horses stood a wagon with heavy-boned horses all its own. They were harnessed tightly to their wheeled burden, their hooves broad and black, legs and necks thick with cords of muscle.

The wagon reminded her of one she had seen the day Rowen sneaked her into the Below for an incoming circus they would otherwise have not been allowed to attend. There had been wagons much like this one in the long line pulling into Philadelphia. Heavy-framed on wide wooden-spoked and steel-tired wheels, the wagon’s body was framed with long metal bars creating a cage.

Her brain slowed at the thought, realizing how easily she’d moved from caged animals in her birthday’s menagerie to caged people. “You mean to put us in there? Like animals?”

“You are Witches,” Stevenson reminded. “Oh. Oh, you really don’t know, do you? You are no longer afforded any special treatment. You no longer rank.” He looked at her and wiped at the tip of his nose. “Though I daresay you will
smell
rank at the journey’s end.”

She stared at him, stunned.

“It sometimes amazes me,” he admitted, “considering your education and money, how ignorant your rank can be.

“Load the girl,” he ordered a Wraith, shoving her forward one more time.

Hissing, the Wraith closed its hand on her, hauling her along toward the back of the wagon and the door with its bulky antiquated lock.

She scrambled up three slanting steps and fell into the cage, landing on fresh straw spread across the wagon’s bottom. Straw. Like she was livestock! The door clanged shut, and the wagon rattled as the lock snapped closed and the wagon lurched forward, rocking from side to side nearly as much as it crawled ahead.

Jordan tried standing, holding the bars for support, but the jerking and jostling of the wagon over uneven roads pitched her to her knees again and again. Finally she sat, adjusted her skirts so she was as ladylike as could be given such circumstances, and leaned her back on the bars to watch the countryside pass by.

Through forests thick with wildlife that scurried, flew, and sang from the treetops and across cleared swaths of land where small clusters of houses gathered together and called themselves villages they went, the wagon groaning and Jordan becoming increasingly sore. The road narrowed as they climbed into strange foothills. At rare moments Jordan glimpsed water miles away and far below, sparkling like a bed of shifting sapphires.

She scooted to the other side of the wagon, clutched the bars, and pressed her face against them to get a better view. The water was so wide! She had never been allowed to view such a large body of water. Her father said seeing such places (especially the sea) did strange things to a man or a woman—gave them what he called “the longing,” a desire for adventure aboard ship.

Jordan snorted and sat back, her eyes searching for water between the stocky hills. She crossed her arms. Her father was odd about some things. She felt no longing. Yes, she might admit a fascination with such a large body of water but she had heard enough tales of the Merrow to have no desire to board any ship—not even the aptly named Cutter, its hull bristling with blades for slicing waterborne enemies to ribbons. No. She had no longing to be on any ship. Or in any wagon.

She peered out from under the wagon’s roof. No. Not even an airship gliding through the sky and cutting through clouds or stealing thunder for its newly rumored thermo-acoustic engine could tempt her aboard. No. Certainly not. She was Grounded and would stay that way.