My Dear Mary,—What shall I say about Lord Winterly but that he is the most compelling, maddening creature I have ever met. And were it not an insult to your monastic mores, I should be quite convinced of his being a wicked monk! With all respect and love,
Emma.
Postscript:—Milli has been adopted by a peevish ginger cat.
The morning rays streaming through the window promised a day free of fog and rain. Well, sunlight was certainly long overdue. Despite the beautiful morning, Emma rolled over and buried her head beneath her pillows, loath to get up. She had been turning Ana’s warning over in her mind since the ball, nearly a sennight ago, which was challenging enough for the mind without Winterly’s kiss besieging it at every turn.
Oh, how that kiss bedeviled and consumed her sleepless thoughts in the darkest hours, every moment since he’d imparted it. And tomorrow they would depart for Winterthurse; tomorrow she would be a day closer to seeing him again.
A sudden weight on the bed startled Emma and she emerged from under her pillows to see the cat perched at the foot of her bed.
“Come to demand a saucer of cat-lap, have you?”
It gave no answer, only stared with unblinking yellow eyes, the pupils no more than reptilian black slits in the sunbeams. To their uncle’s great disgust, the creature seemed quite fixed to Milli’s side no matter how often he’d had it evicted. Boudicca found her way back night after night, and at length their uncle had surrendered to Milli’s pleading and the cat was then suffered to remain.
Emma threw her legs over the side of the bed and marched past the cat to dress herself. When she turned back to the bed, the cat was glaring at the window. Curious, Emma proceeded there and peered outside, but there was naught to see, save the usual flood of pedestrians, a passing brougham, and an impertinent raven perched on the branch outside the glazing. It gave a sudden croak of menace and then launched its great heft off the branch and disappeared.
She was about to turn away when, out of habit, her eyes shifted to the iron latch. The strand of hair looped around the hasp was, as ever, intact. Emma was immediately vexed at herself for having set the trap in the first place, all because she’d had some eidetic dream. Did she really think she’d catch a bogey this way? When had she become so fanciful? Milli was right, those books were corrupting her sanity.
With rapidity and disgust, Emma removed the strand of hair from the hasp and flung it out the window, then she marched back to her bed and promised herself that today would be the day she finally returned that blasted Vampyris to its rightful ownership. Tomorrow at the very latest. And if Ana condemned her for the thief she was (like her silly pet had done) and vowed never to see her again, all the better; Emma was better off severing all ties to the occult and anyone who shared her morbid interests.
She could feel the cat’s yellow gaze watching as she freed Vampyris from the cloth she’d used to protect it. Emma looked up to see the cat’s tail flicking knowingly as the silence stretched on.
“Don’t look at me like that,” she said, “I only meant to borrow the damnable thing.”
The cat was spared the task of answering, for Milli suddenly sashayed into the room uninvited. She was carrying a little parcel wrapped in brown paper, a sprig of rosemary tucked into the twine that secured it. Also attached was a letter.
“You and your cat need to learn how to knock,” said Emma, pushing Vampyris out of sight beneath her pillow.
Milli dropped the parcel onto Emma’s bed and sat beside her, looking as excited as though it was her name elegantly scrawled on the paper and not Emma’s. “Open it, I want to see who it’s from. Oh, I’m sure it’s from your viscount, how wickedly romantic!”
Emma rolled her eyes. “If you’re so sure then I wonder that you’re still here, prying.” Inside her chest, though, her heart was skipping and fluttering. But the crest stamped into the wax was not Winterly’s, she soon realized, and the thrill that had quickened her blood ceased almost instantly.
“Well?” Milli leaned back and scratched the cat’s ears, which the cat bore with condescension, watching eagerly as Emma removed the letter.
“It is from Ana De Grigori.”
Disinclined to hide her own disappointment, Milli gave a snort and leapt off the bed. “You really ought not get too friendly with them, Emma. Victoria said to keep vigilant around that lot.”
“And is Victoria’s word to be trusted above every other? Besides, Ana said the same about the Winterlys.”
“Oh, fiddle-faddle.” With affected indifference, Milli examined the letter over her sister’s shoulder. “Does she mention her brother? He’s quite the bounder, you know, Victoria herself told me to mind his ogles.”
“No, she doesn’t.” Emma compressed her lips. “And Victoria seems to have a long tongue.”
“Come on, Boudicca,” said Milli, summoning the cat with another scratch, “Sister Strange can have nothing to say that will interest me.” And off she went, the cat stalking out ahead of her.
Now that Emma had her room to herself, she wandered over to the window again to give the letter her full attention.
Dear Emma,—I find myself so much at my ease in your society that, consequently, it is easy to forget that I am not yet at liberty to act with such familiarity as I did at the ball, speaking so freely when our friendship is only in its nascence. For that I must atone. I have been perfectly uncomfortable since last I saw you for fear the intelligence I felt duty bound to share has made you uneasy. Let me assure you that my motives are disinterested. I wish you and your sister only happiness and good health during your stay at Winterthurse and hope you will accept the small gift that accompanies this letter as a token of my high esteem for you both.
In the parcel you will find the antidotal elixir your sister bespoke in jest, though she little comprehended her own prudence. You may well think it a strange gift, this ward against evil dreams—all evil things, in fact—but I desire that you will forgive a superstitious friend her untoward eccentricities and use it nonetheless, if indeed the need arises, which I hope it shall not.
And if it is in my power to assist you, howsoever that may be, while you are away among strangers in a strange place, you must write directly, you know the address. Indulge my concern, however excessive, and let me hear from you as soon as you arrive, and regularly thereafter for the sake of my heartsease. Perhaps on your return you shall allow me to tell you everything. Adieu, my friend and good journey. Yours sincerely,
Ana.
Emma read the letter twice over before she finally came away from the window and took up the parcel, wary of what strangeness she might find beneath the paper and twine.
It turned out to be a small, plain cedar box no bigger than the span of her open hand. Within it, on a bed of red velveteen, lay the mysterious gift—a curious, little vial. An antique perfume bottle, in fact, of rose-tinted finished crystal that was entirely embowered in ornate, silver filigree of leaves and sprigs. To the neck, either side of the stopper, was attached a long, argentine chain so that the vial might be worn as a necklace. It was of such excellent craftsmanship that Emma was momentarily distracted from its contents.
What on earth did Ana mean by giving away such a costly trinket, and to somebody in whose company she had spent very little time? There was an engraving on the small banderole between the leaves of silver that suddenly drew Emma’s notice as she turned the little bottle over. Devil’s Bane, it read in fine cursive. Strange gift indeed, thought Emma. And what was Devil’s Bane exactly? An antidotal elixir of some sort, apparently, but antidotal to what? To venom? To strange dreams? Some preternatural entity? No, likely cat dander, she thought with a chuckle.