The Age of Witches - Louisa Morgan Page 0,91

the window without difficulty, open just far enough for her to put her fingers underneath the sash. She pushed it all the way up and wriggled through the window frame on her belly. She swiveled and set her feet down inside a dark room crowded with boxes and trunks and unused bits of furniture, the flotsam and jetsam thrown up by a house long occupied. She pulled the window down again, leaving it open as she had found it. She felt her way through the cluttered room and, when she reached a wall, ran her hands along it until she encountered a door frame. This door was unlocked, its iron key hanging, unused, in the keyhole.

The corridor outside was a shade brighter than the storeroom. A window at one end allowed moonlight to fall on the floor and the lowest treads of a narrow staircase. Harriet moved to the stairs and started up, tiptoeing in her boots. On the second floor, she pushed through a baize door and into a much broader corridor, with closed doors set far apart. She saw the head of a grand staircase leading down to the foyer. A set of double doors stood open to an enormous room that might have been a ballroom.

She turned in the opposite direction, moving cautiously, her fingertips trailing over each door as she passed it. When she reached the right one, the ametrine gave a pulse that made her skin tingle. Cautiously, as silently as she could, she eased the door open.

Annis was kneeling beside the limp body of the marquess. She lifted her head at the soft scrape of the door, and even in the darkness Harriet saw how pale the girl’s stricken face was.

Annis gave a low cry. “You’re here! Oh, Aunt Harriet, you’re here!” and burst into tears.

“Is he going to die?”

Annis’s tears didn’t last long. She gulped them back, apologized, and was ready to address the crisis.

Between them they managed to hoist James’s lanky body from the floor to the bed. Annis patted his hands while Harriet tried to get him to swallow a bit of water. He couldn’t do it. The water dribbled down his cheek and onto the pillow, and she gave up the exercise for fear of drowning him. None of their actions roused him in the slightest.

“I don’t know if he’s going to die,” Harriet said, “because I don’t know what’s wrong with him.”

“It’s the maleficia.”

“I assumed that. What happened?”

“I was in bed, and he came in looking like—like I don’t know what. He tried to—that is, he acted as if he were drunk, but he wasn’t, and then he—he attacked me.” Annis sniffled back fresh tears, and her face reddened. “He ripped my nightdress, and he tried—he was going to—” Her voice broke.

“Yes, I understand his intent,” Harriet said briskly. “He didn’t succeed, I gather?”

“No,” Annis said, her voice steadier now. “I got away from him, and then—I used the cantrip, the one you taught me, and I was holding the moonstone, and this happened!” She gestured to the senseless form of the Marquess of Rosefield. “Now I’m afraid I killed him!”

“He’s not dead yet,” Harriet said, trying to speak with confidence. In truth, the young man looked ghastly. Even in the dim light, his color was gray, his breathing shallow. His body felt cold under her hand, as if the spirit had already gone from it. “Come now, don’t spend your energy blaming yourself. We have work ahead of us.”

“What can we do?”

“Did you find something of Frances’s, something we can use?”

“I did. I hope it works.” She turned to her dressing table for her handkerchief and opened it to show Harriet. “It’s the brush she uses for the pearl powder she puts on her face. It still has powder on it.”

Harriet leaned forward to look at it. It was a pretty thing, as much ornament as tool. The brush handle was sterling silver, and the bristles were dark. Mink perhaps, or goat hair, something soft, and nicely saturated with the white powder. “Perfect,” she murmured.

“But we can’t leave James here,” Annis said. “Everyone will think he—that he tried to violate me!”

“He did, didn’t he?” Harriet said, without thinking.

“But it’s the maleficia! He would never do such a thing! Poor James. It’s not fair to him.”

Harriet straightened. “Of course you’re right, Annis. This isn’t fair to either of you.” She turned back to the senseless young man on the bed. His lips were parted, his eyes not quite closed.

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