“You, man, be gone,” Ventnor said to Gilbert. “I shall not harm her.”
Gilbert didn’t move.
Ventnor made a dismissive sound. “Luxborough is looking after you then, Miss Knight. How touching. Adds another meaning to the word ‘protector’.”
“He is not my protector and never was.”
“Cast you off, has he? Never mind. A pretty, lively thing like you, you’ll find another man to take you on soon enough.”
Percy snickered. “I might be interested in a new mistress. How much?”
Without thinking, Thea slapped his smirking face. Hard. It felt so satisfying that she tried to do it again, but this time Percy caught her hand. So she leaned in and kneed him in the bollocks.
Her skirts hampered her, unfortunately, but she mustered enough force to make him yelp and release her and back away. Her palm stung, and her knee was affronted at having to carry out such a repulsive task, but other than that, she felt quite good.
“You little tart!” Percy squeaked.
“You vile snot,” Thea returned.
Ventnor inserted his ebony stick between them. “Now, now, children.”
Percy’s face turned red. “But Father! She hit me!”
“Do grow up, boy. It was exactly what you deserved after speaking to her like that.” Ventnor tapped the silver end of his stick in the dust at his son’s feet. “You disgust me at times, Percy. Let us not forget that it was your malicious, childish attack on Miss Knight that got us here in the first place.”
Thea stared at Ventnor, stunned to have such an unexpected defender. “Then you know, my lord. You know that Percy and Francis Upton told lies about me.”
“I know now. A cunning little pamphlet you penned, my dear.” He opened one hand, palm upward, and the man behind him placed a booklet onto it. “I read it, you know. It’s not too bad, for a lady author.”
“How did you get a copy of that?” Thea realized she had not asked him the most obvious question. “Why are you here?”
“Not much happens in London that I don’t hear about, as everyone knows I pay well for information. Someone at the publisher let me know they were printing a cartoon resembling my son, and I investigated. And here we are.”
“Then you know my story is true and must be told.”
Ventnor waved the pamphlet like a fan. “A conundrum. Percy has behaved very badly, but he is my son, and I must protect my family. What happens to one member affects everyone. You would not believe the things I must do for the sake of my family.”
“Oh, I’d believe it,” Thea said. “Things like trying to kidnap your daughter to lock her in a lunatic asylum. Or threatening to carve up Sally Holt’s face because of false rumors about your wife.”
“Silence!”
“Or what, Lord Ventnor?” Thea demanded. “Will you send your ruffians after me, as you did to other defenseless women?”
“No, my dear. I shall silence you.”
“No, my lord. I shall not be silenced.”
“Will you not?”
Moving so quickly neither she nor Gilbert had a chance to react, Ventnor grabbed Thea by both shoulders and spun her around to face the crates. As she found her feet, it occurred to her that she had been so intent on Ventnor and Percy, she had not noticed what his men were doing.
Even then, she didn’t fully understand, until the first explosion rent the air.
One explosion first, shattering wooden crates and sending booklets flying upward. Then another explosion. And another.
Thea screamed and lunged but Gilbert yelled, “Stay back, miss!” and grabbed her elbows to hold her in place, as more crates exploded.
Pamphlets and pages and splinters, flying into the air, landing, flying up, landing again.
Flames burst out of nowhere, curling around loose pages, engulfing them, hungrily seeking more, fed by dry paper and wooden splinters and further echoing blasts. Thea could not begin to imagine how it was done. All she knew was that her precious pamphlets were in a broken heap and that heap was on fire.
She shook off Gilbert, who whispered, “Oh miss, I am so sorry,” and Thea tried to speak but managed only a croak. Indeed, she was silenced, as she stood surrounded by her enemies, watching it all burn.
Her words, her story, her hopes, going up in flames. A mountain of flame, climbing higher and higher, sending up a column of smoke.
How people around must be wondering at that smoke. Perhaps they would be frightened. Londoners lived in constant dread of fires. They would run to help, forming chains to carry water, to speedily douse the flames.
But Ventnor was too careful for that. Once or twice, she had outsmarted him; how pleased with herself she had been. In the end, it meant nothing. His men watched the fire carefully; they would not let it burn out of control. How cleverly Ventnor had planned this.
And so they had won. Because it wasn’t about who was good or bad, who was right or wrong. It was about who held the power. All those good people listening to her story, that night in the inn with Rafe. That’s a rotten story, they’d said. Whoever heard of a story where the villains don’t get their comeuppance? Yet that was the story playing out right now. The good people could drink with their friends and share tales of defeated villains, while the powerful people burned down their worlds.
A breeze swirled through the yard and rose, lifting fragments of pages into the air. One landed on her, a corner of a page, and she plucked it off her dress to read the disembodied words. Other fragments flew up, rising to the top of the smoke and over the wall, fluttering off to land on houses and streets and people’s heads.
A small laugh bubbled up in Thea’s throat. She had succeeded after all. Her story would be spread all over London, over Hyde Park and St. Paul’s, St. Martin’s and the Thames. Her words would rain down on the city as ash and fragments. “What is this story that is falling from the sky?” someone would say and gather the fragments and piece them together.
No one would, of course.
No one would care about one more story from one more woman, one more lost wanderer, trying to be heard. A lone woman, saying, “but listen, please listen, this matters, this is my life.” They were all trying to be heard, all wandering around their own lives, trying to tell their stories and find their way. They would brush off the ash, let the charred pages fall into the mud, and mutter some curse about the dirt of London, the city they could never leave because this was the place where dreams came true. Off they would rush in pursuit of those dreams, and never guess that someone else’s dreams had, literally, gone up in smoke.
It was a grand bonfire, and Thea stared at it, even as the smoke stung her eyes, even as Ventnor strolled around in front of her. The heat burned her cheeks and she should move away, but instead she closed her eyes, and pretended the heat of the flames was the sun, and she was back at Brinkley End, ready to plunge into the cool lake. Where a pair of strong arms would hold her, keep her anchored to the ground, so she would not be lost on the breeze, like the charred fragments of her dreams.
“I don’t think I’ll be needing this,” Ventnor said.
Thea opened her eyes to see him holding out the last remaining pamphlet. Numbly, she took it.
“A valiant attempt, my dear, but a selfish one,” he added. “After all, your sister is part of my family now, and in harming my family, you would have harmed her. Family is too important. You understand that, don’t you?” He turned to his men. “Make sure everything is burned, and the fire is completely extinguished with no mess left.”