And to think she had to wait another two weeks to read what happened next.
Oh, wait, here she was. Swallow Street. She glanced up at the rows of large houses, thinking on how many families could fit into one of the behemoths, before walking down the road. The elaborate homes on one side of the street were guarded by wrought iron fences. The houses on the other side were closed in by a high brick wall. She found Mr. Turner’s house easily enough on the brick side. It was three stories high and white with navy tiles, windowed on all sides. Black shutters, blue drapes, a large elm growing up along its east side. Bold white cornices, bay windows, everything a wealthy person could want.
These folk didn’t want the poor traipsing around their doorstep, that was for sure.
Elsie hid her frown as she approached the end of the street, then turned onto the next road and looped back to approach the Turner home from behind. Despite the crowded nature of the city, these estates didn’t have a second row of buildings at their backs. The wealthy demanded nice gardens to accompany their nice houses. Meanwhile, their tenants worked their land and paid their dues without so much as a cheers! sent their way.
Which was precisely why Elsie didn’t feel bad about breaking the law.
It would be sneakier to do it at night. Surely a burglar or the like from one of the tales in her novel reader would have acted at night. But Elsie was already a single woman venturing about on her own; she needn’t ruin herself by doing so after sundown. Times were changing, yes, but people’s minds were slow to keep up.
A man passed by her, tipping his hat in greeting. Elsie smiled and nodded back. Once he’d left, Elsie touched the brick wall encircling the Turner home, letting its roughness pass beneath her fingertips. Searching for anything magicked.
A few feet ahead of her, a rune shimmered once and shied away, as though embarrassed by Elsie’s scrutiny. A physical spell, if she could see it. Different spells manifested themselves to her in different ways. She could feel rational runes, hear spiritual ones, and smell the temporal. Physical spells, however, liked to be seen. They were the dandies of the magic world.
The thing all runes had in common was their knot-like quality. At least, Elsie liked to think of them as knots. And like knots, they could fray over time. The more masterful the spellmaker’s hand, the more stubborn the knot was to untie. The ones she could see—physical spells—were made of light and glitter, bright and pretzel-like, loose if the man casting them had been lazy or simply wasn’t talented.
Aspectors were usually men, anyway.
There were two kinds of wizards in the world—those who cast spells, and those who broke them. The spellmakers, known as aspectors, paid a king’s ransom for the spells they took into their bodies, yet another means of benefitting the rich and rebuffing the poor. But God had a way of making things even. He’d been generous with the other side of the coin, for spellbreakers were born with the ability to dis-spell magic, and it didn’t cost them a farthing.
Elsie couldn’t handle any of the four alignments of magic herself, but she could detect spells and unravel them like knots. This spell was decently tied, but not terribly so. An intermediate or advanced physical spell of hiding. It concealed a door, Elsie was sure of it. And it just so happened that Mr. Turner had a habit of “losing” his tenants’ rent and forcing them to pay double. The people who depended on him for their livelihoods could barely keep food on the table, while this man lounged with the peerage and had servants at his beck and call. This was the sort of injustice the Cowls often addressed—with Elsie’s help. She would disenchant this door, and the Cowls would take back the money he had stolen. Very Robin Hood of them. And Elsie was their Little John.
Pushing her palms into the spell, she pulled on the ends of the knot. There were seven of them, and she would need to unravel them in the reverse order of their placement. Fortunately, Elsie had encountered this spell before. She’d know how to proceed, once she found the loose end.
In a matter of heartbeats, the spell faded, and the creases and hinges of a brick-heavy door became visible to her eye.
“Who goes there?”
Elsie’s heart leapt into her throat. She pulled away from the wall as though it had stung her. It was not a constable, but a man in a fine waistcoat and trousers, a gold watch chain swinging from one of his pockets. Upon recognizing his face against the late-afternoon sun, however, Elsie almost wished it had been a constable.
Squire Douglas Hughes. The squire who presided over her hometown. Brookley was close enough to London that it wasn’t particularly odd for her to see him here. But it was bad luck.
Not because she feared he’d recognize her—despite the fact that she’d worked in his house for a year, she doubted he would—but because Squire Hughes was the epitome of everything she hated. He was rude to the common folk and a sycophant to the aristocrats. He hoarded his money and passed off his squirely duties whenever he could, and when he could not, he bore them with the utmost disdain and didn’t attempt to hide it. He held his nose when he passed farmers. And he’d once trodden upon Elsie’s foot and not even stopped to see if she was all right, let alone apologize for it.
This was the beast the Cowls fought against, though thus far the secretive group had not deemed him important enough for action.
How she wished they would. If the Cowls were Robin Hood, this man was Prince John.
Forcing a relaxed demeanor, Elsie walked up to meet him instead of letting him come to her. She didn’t want him to notice the seams of the door. Mr. Turner was a wealthy man, and therefore the squire might actually care that Elsie had been snooping about his property.
Biting the inside of her cheek, she curtsied. “I apologize if I’m disturbing anyone. I work for a stonemason; I was just admiring the brickwork.” It was only half a lie.
The man raised a fine eyebrow. “The brickwork? Surely you jest.” He eyed her, but not with any recognition. Rather, he seemed confused by her clothing—particularly her skirts, as if it confused him that a woman could work outside of service. Elsie certainly wasn’t dressed as a maid.
Elsie couldn’t make herself blush, but she glanced away as though embarrassed.
Squire Hughes said, “Don’t loiter. Your employer would be angry to see you wasting time.”
She was tempted to snap back, to insist her employer had given his blessing for her to be here, but that wouldn’t strictly be true. While Ogden was undeniably generous with her time, he hadn’t a clue what she spent it on. If she left now, she could get back to Brookley by dinner and he’d be none the wiser.
She curtsied again. “I beg your pardon.”
The squire didn’t so much as nod, so Elsie excused herself wordlessly, walking a little too fast to be casual. Once she turned the corner, she straightened her spine and squared her shoulders.
No, she didn’t feel bad about breaking the law. Not one mite.
The sun was setting when Elsie made it back to Brookley; she’d paid a hansom cab to take her as far as Lambeth and had walked the rest of the way. She shredded the letter from the Cowls in her pocket. The oven would be hot about this time, and she could cast the bits into the coals without any trouble.
Sometimes she wished she had a confidant, but she counted herself lucky all the same. The Cowls had rescued her from the workhouse and lifted her from a destiny of poverty. The least she could do was protect their secrecy.