Spellbreaker (Spellbreaker Duology #1) - Charlie N. Holmberg Page 0,87

else to say.

She hoped he didn’t notice her awe.

CHAPTER 20

She could have asked him about it on the way to London. There were so many ways Elsie could have started the conversation. Mr. Ogden, do you know what I am?

Or, I found an interesting knickknack in one of your drawers.

Or even, Why didn’t you tell me you were one of the Cowls?

Granted, Cowls was a nickname Elsie had invented. It wasn’t what the group actually called itself.

In the end, she didn’t say a word, knowing the ride to London would never be long enough for all of her questions. And if Ogden was angry that she’d inadvertently snooped and discovered his true identity . . . What if he did something that forbade her from going to Juniper Down?

She had to go. This was more important than . . . anything.

Elsie purchased a hotel room for the night in Reading, the closest train stop to Juniper Down, although she might as well not have bothered. She paced her small room for hours, then failed to sleep on both the chair and the bed. It wasn’t until near dawn she managed to drift off, only to wake to a rain-choked sunrise with a tiny bit of drool on her pillow.

It was just as well.

She dressed quickly, making herself nearly as presentable as she’d been for the duke’s dinner, though she couldn’t truss up her hair the same way Emmeline did. She would see her family today. The very thought made her heart flutter.

She wondered if Bacchus would still be in England when she returned. Would he want to know about this wonderful turn of events?

Someone had found her. Come back for her. This changed everything.

Smiling at herself in the small mirror on the wall, Elsie pinned her purple hat carefully to her hair. Then she packed up her valise and lugged it downstairs, where a concierge kindly hired her a carriage. The driver took her southwest, toward Juniper Down, a tiny village barely worth a dot on a map. She hadn’t been there since she was six. Never visited, only written. She wondered if it still looked how she remembered it . . . though she mostly just remembered the interior of the Halls’ house.

She wrung her fingers together until her lace gloves threatened blisters. Then she practiced what she would say. If it was her mother or her father—or perhaps both!—she’d of course ask why they had left. Why they’d waited so long to come back for her. But that couldn’t be the first thing out of her mouth. She wanted to start on the right foot. She wanted to make them happy they had at last come for her. The questions would follow.

If it was a sibling . . . Where have you been all this time? Do you remember me? Did they leave you, too?

Her throat constricted on that last one.

Surprisingly, Juniper Down came too soon, even with the driver having to stop to ask a farmer for directions. It was a tiny place, with only one carriage-sized road running alongside it, and it was in poor care, judging by the way Elsie jostled about. The horses stopped, Elsie’s heart leapt into her throat, and the driver opened her door.

“Sure this is it?” he asked, lending a hand to help her down.

Coming around the carriage, Elsie scanned the place. There was farmland off in the distance. The houses weren’t too dissimilar from those of the duke’s tenants, though they varied a little more in size and looked to be in worse repair. Each had a small garden. Narrow dirt paths crisscrossed around. An old man in a chair by a beehive near the road squinted at her.

Sensing her hesitation, the driver shouted, “Ho! This is Juniper Down, is it not?”

The man bellowed back, “’Tis! What’s it to ya?”

Drawing in a large breath, Elsie turned back to the driver. “I’ll find it, thank you.”

The man nodded and pulled down her valise from the back of the carriage. “Good luck to you.”

Elsie nodded and stayed on the road until the carriage turned about and pulled away. Then, trying not to chew on her lip, she approached the old man.

“I’m sorry, but do you know where the Halls live?” she asked.

“Henry’s lot?” he repeated, eyeing her. All his clothes, including his hat, boasted at least one hole, and here she was in one of her best dresses. Perhaps she had made a mistake, primping before coming here. But the man lifted