Heart's Magic (36 page)

"Magician, are ya?" She
looked him up and down, not bothering to hide her amusement.
"Member of the guild an' everyfing, eh?"

"As a matter of fact, yes."
They hadn't stripped him of his membership, had they? He couldn't
remember. "Though I have fallen down on my luck lately." He
flourished his ruined hand and the pie woman nodded, eyes filled
with sympathy.

"Them burns is nasty
things," she said. "Looks like you're lucky to 'ave the
'and."

Nigel looked down at the
stiffened claw, surprised by the idea. "Actually," he said slowly,
taking note of the burns that couldn't be seen. "I believe that I
am lucky to be alive."

He looked up at the woman.
"Allow me, if you please, a small demonstration of my gratitude for
your assistance in keeping me in that condition." At her blank
look, he amended his verbosity. "Let me thank you for your
help."

"Oh. Well--" She shrugged.
"Didn't do it for the thanks, nor for coin neither, but if ya
want--go on, then."

He lifted his somewhat
zigzag wand and contemplated the materials available for his spell.
He had no potions, not even a blade of grass in the grubby
intersection where Osborn Street let out onto Whitechapel Road. But
her cart was made of wood, little more than a box to hold the pies
and keep them warm for as long as possible, set on wheels to make
it mobile. He wasn't an alchemist, to generate warmth where there
was none, but perhaps he could induce the cart's wood to retain
that heat for a longer space of time.

Nigel touched his new wand
to the cart and sought the magic inside the wood. It was an old
cart, but its inherent magic had never been touched. He stirred it
up, molded it into a new shape to insulate the contents from
outside influence, then spoke his spell, finishing with the word to
set the magic, "
Coinníonn.
"
Preserve.

He checked to see whether
the spell had actually taken hold--it was the first he'd tried
since his injury. It seemed to be humming nicely, settling in to
become part of the wood fibers which, since the magic had come from
the wood to begin with, was how wizardry worked. The spell had
tired him. Obviously, he was not up to his previous strength,
perhaps never would be, but he still had his talent. That dreadful
woman hadn't utterly destroyed him.

"Thank you again, Madame."
Nigel bowed.

"That's done it, your
little spell?" Her gap-toothed smile was indulgent. "I must say,
you're the politest bloke I ever met."

"That's done it," he
agreed. "And you, Madame, are the kindest lady I have ever
met."

He took his pie and his
leave of her, wandering through the streets back to his tumbledown
hideaway. As he was passing down Brick Lane, he heard loud voices
coming toward him from ahead. Loud, familiar voices. He ducked
around the corner into a narrower street, hunting a doorway to hide
in. He wasn't far from his bolthole, but his hobbling pace was too
slow for him to reach it in time.

"I tell you, I sensed it.
Wizardry, in this place." The sound of boots went tramping by on
the cobbles out in the lane, heading toward Whitechapel Road. "It's
got to be Cranshaw."

"Or Dodd, or Allsup, or one
of the others." Another voice heard from.

Nigel saw the striped
Briganti sashes as the two men stamped past his shadow, leaving him
behind. Why would they be hunting Dodd and Allsup? What had been
happening while he'd been in hiding? How long had it been since his
escape? The days and nights had blurred together. Did it
matter?

He had the feeling he was
supposed to be doing something, but he couldn't remember what it
was. Revenge? Yes, that awful woman had done this to him. He should
make her pay. But it seemed too much effort. And what if--when he
tried to wreak his vengeance--what if she did something worse to
him then?

He would think about it
later. After he ate his lovely pie and rested up some.

The creatures clanking
about in his hideaway seemed agitated when he returned and braced
the half-rotted door closed. They kept charging this way and that,
clicking and clacking their bizarre pincers and mandibles. Nigel
paid them no mind as usual, save to kick them out of his way. Were
there more of them? Possibly. But as long as they didn't bother
him, he didn't care. He sat in the center of his mildewed mattress,
folded his legs, and devoured his feast.

Elinor woke to darkness. It
made sense, given that she'd gone to sleep not long before noon.
She'd have slept through the remainder of the day and likely some
of the night as well.

The darkness felt strange,
though. Occupied. She strained to see through it and made out the
darker form of an upholstered chair. A chair that belonged in her
sitting room. Someone had carried it into her bedchamber and was
now sitting in it, watching her.

No, not "someone." Harry.
She recognized his silhouette, partly by the way his hair stood on
end.

"What are you doing here?"
she demanded, sitting up. "This is an outrage!"

"I know." He didn't move,
not a twitch of a single finger. "Sorry. But you're vulnerable when
you sleep. I came to keep watch."

"You're not sorry in the
least, are you?"

"I am. I'm sorry for
upsetting you. But that doesn't mean I'm sorry for doin' it, or
that I won't do it again tonight if we 'aven't caught the bastards
that attacked you." He watched her a moment, while she tried to
think of a suitably cutting retort. "Are you awake then? Not goin'
back to sleep?"

"I'm awake. What time is
it?"

He took out his pocket
watch and flicked a finger at the oil lamp on her dresser, lighting
it. "Nearly a quarter past four."

Elinor collapsed back on
the bed in despair. "I realize that it's too late to fret over
scandal at this late date, given what you said in front of the
whole world yesterday, but I can't help hoping we might avoid
making it worse. Why do you have to do these things to
me?"

"I'm sorry. I truly am. I
wouldn't 'urt you for the world." He sounded sincere and looked it,
leaning forward on elbows propped on knees, head down. "When I lose
my temper, I say things without ever thinkin', and then I wish I
hadn't, but it's too late for wishing. Too late for anything but
sorry."

She sighed and pressed her
fingers into her eyes to ease the ache. "Yes, well-- I'm not sure
what good that does either."

Harry's sigh echoed hers.
Elbows still on his knees, he clasped his hands, steepling his
forefingers, and rested his mouth against them. "I've been thinking
and thinking, since before I came to watch out for you, trying to
find some way to fix it, what I did. And still, the only thing I
can come up with is for us to marry. I know you don't want it,
Elinor, but I don't see any other way out."

He lifted a hand to hold
back her protest, sitting up straight. "We'd live separate--you in
your 'ouse, me in mine. You like the conservatory, so you take this
one. I can find another easy enough. I wouldn't interfere, wouldn't
make any demands. I would move out o' London and leave you to it,
except you lot just made me council head, so I've got to be 'ere
some. And you're magister, so you've got to be here some
too."

Elinor sat up again so she
could watch him, tucking the covers tightly under her arms. "What
about the exchange of blood, our infant familiar bond?"

Once more, he gave a heavy
sigh and held his hand out to her as if offering it up for bloody
sacrifice. "Break it. I won't stop you, not any more. I don't want
to 'old you against your will."

He meant it. She could see
it in his eyes, in the way he held out his hand, in the expression
on his face. "Why? Yesterday you fought me tooth and nail when I
tried to break it. What's changed?"

Harry rubbed a hand over his
mouth--still perfect, damn him--and stared at the ceiling while he
assembled his thoughts. "Me," he said finally. "I've changed. I
figured out one or two things since then. One of 'em is that
you're
not
mine. I
wish you were, but you're not, and I can't make you so.

"Thing is--I'm yours,
Elinor. I'm your man, no matter what, and that means I 'ave to give
you what you want. What you need. And you're the one who knows what
it is you need, not me. So. There we are."

He stood and picked up the
chair where he'd been sitting. "I'll wait out in your sitting room
while you decide. I know I said it before--'Whatever you want.' And
then I tried to make you want what I wanted. I'll do better this
time, if you'll give me the chance to try again."

Awash in confusion, Elinor
could only nod. She didn't recognize this Harry. He left the room
with the chair, closing the door behind him.

That wasn't true. This was
Harry, the man he was when he wasn't trying to rearrange the world
to suit himself. He had shown more of that man, his tender,
affectionate side, when they were alone together. When she wasn't
kicking at him to back off so she could stand on her
own.

Was Amanusa right? That she
could cut him deeper because he cared more about her opinion?
Because he showed her that tender side? What did he mean, anyway,
when he said he was hers?

Elinor fell back on the bed
again, but knew she wouldn't go back to sleep. She rose, washed
quickly in the--
warm
water? The maid hadn't brought it. The maid didn't appear
until later. "Harry, did you warm the water?" she called to him
through the bedroom door.

"Yeah." He didn't need to
raise his voice much to be heard. "Didn't want you to catch a
chill."

He was thoughtful like
that. Not always, but often enough to be noticeable. Elinor didn't
know what to think. She tried, while she dressed. She considered
his proposal. It wasn't any more romantic than any of his previous
ones, but she hadn't planned on marrying. She had never dreamed,
like so many of her contemporaries, about how her future spouse
would propose. She had no preconceived notions as to how it should
go, nor did she mind the lack of romance. Though she found his
offer to give up his house to her--the house he'd bought to show
off his rise from the streets--incredibly romantic.

Romance didn't matter. She
would not live her life tossed about by emotion. A life ruled by
reason brought longer lasting satisfaction. And reason said, given
the situation as it existed, that Harry's solution made sense. She
had encouraged Pearl in her engagement to Grey, though that had
ended up as sappily romantic and emotional as any debutante's
dream. Elinor couldn't ignore that same sensible solution for those
same sensible reasons in her own case. If she had wanted to remain
unencumbered, she should never have fallen into bed with Harry. But
since she had...

She stabbed pins viciously
into her hair, enough to make the slick mass stay up in any but the
fiercest wind--almost more pins than hair--and stomped out of her
bedroom. "What does that mean--you're mine?"

That wasn't what she'd
intended to say, but now she'd said it, she wanted to
know.

"Just what it says. I'm
yours. At your side, guardin' your back, backin' you up. It don't
mean, if you want to jump off London Bridge, I won't do me best to
argue you out of it. But if you manage to jump anyway, I'll be
there in the river to catch you. I'm on your side, Elinor. I always
'ave been."

Dear holy heaven. That made
him even more dangerous. How could she keep her distance? Maintain
her equilibrium?

"All right. I accept." She
realized she was twisting her hands together and made herself stop,
lower them to her side. "You can send the announcement of our
engagement to the newspapers. I do like your house, but perhaps
there is another that will suit me as well."

"We're to live separately,
then?" How could his eyes hold so much sadness?

"It would be best." She did
not want to weep. This was the sensible solution.

"Wot about the familiar
bit?" He lifted his hand, showing the red mark in his thumb from
the glass splinter.

Elinor tightened her lips.
"I don't know," she admitted. "It did prove helpful. Perhaps we
should consult with Amanusa and Pearl before we do anything
decisive."

"And Grey an' Jax." Harry
nodded. "All right."

She smoothed her skirts,
feeling the awkwardness of the moment. "I should go to work. There
are plants in the conservatory needing repotting and pruning and
such. You should get some sleep."

He shrugged, lifting her
cloak from the hood by the door, where it looked very domestic,
hanging snuggled up against his overcoat. "I'm all
right."

"You cannot possibly stay
awake for two straight days and nights and expect to work
magic."

"I didn't stay awake. I
slept in the chair." He shrugged into his coat and followed her
down the stairs. "I set alarms to go off in case of attack and I
went to sleep. I've slept worse places than your comfy chair. But I
needed to be close enough to do something if the alarms went
off."