Flametouched Read online

  “I hope I haven’t kept you waiting, Lady Hightower,” he said. “I wasn’t sure at what hour you customarily took dinner.”

  She started toward the house. “You haven’t missed it yet, Mr. Harper, though I have been eager to see you. I had a rather interesting morning, but I refuse to bother you with the details until you’ve had your fill of dinner. Have you ridden far today?”

  “Quite far, yes,” he said. “I rode to the Elder Wood near here. I had to work the horse quite hard to get back in time, so I would be in your debt if you could inform your stablemen to rub him down and give him water. I could do it myself, if you feel it more appropriate. I don’t wish to burden you or your household.”

  Arianne stopped him. “After the way my mother treated you yesterday, your horse certainly deserves the best care we can give. I regret to inform you that my mother left earlier today.”

  “Did she?” he said, a little relief sneaking into his tone. “I hope it wasn’t on my account. I don’t wish to be any trouble.”

  “Enough of that nonsense, Mr. Harper,” Arianne answered. “The Countess received some urgent correspondence that pushed her out the door.”

  “Did your sister go with her?” he asked.

  “No, and I’m sure she is anxious to hear of your adventures in the Elder Wood today.”

  The servants opened the door for them and Baron Carver, fake limp and all, played his part as the commoner to the letter, which Arianne found amusing. None of the Lords she knew could have acted like a commoner convincingly for one minute, even if they had good reason to do so.

  Elaine waited for them in the dining room and Arianne nearly choked upon seeing her—she wore a beautiful red gown and had done her hair in curls and ribbons. She had apparently dressed to flirt with Baron Carver! Arianne felt plainly dressed and horribly drab by comparison.

  “Hello, Mr. Harper,” Elaine said brightly. “Welcome back to Hightower.”

  “Thank you, Miss,” he returned after a little bow, which forced him to push his glasses back up to the bridge of his nose.

  “Do you know, Mr. Harper,” Elaine began as they were seated, “that I think the figurine you carved for me is alive? This morning there was a dead mouse on floor with two puncture wounds to its belly. I think your sabercat killed it!”

  Arianne frowned. “Elaine! Really, dear.” She looked toward Baron Carver, who seemed troubled. “Let’s not make up stories. And a bloody mouse is hardly a topic for the dinner table.”

  “But it’s true, Arianne! Just ask Missa!”

  Arianne thought it best to let the subject drop. Food stifled their conversation, though Arianne ate little. While she normally would have been fascinated by Baron Carver’s recounting of his day’s journey, she wanted nothing more than to shove the ledgers in front of his face and force him to get to it. She noticed his eye evaluating her, and after eating quickly and refusing seconds, he asked to hear the news. She dismissed an unhappy Elaine and eagerly told him of her run in with her clerk and steward, his face clouding over at her story.

  She reached out and touched his forearm without realizing what she was doing. “I know it’s a bit late, Mr. Harper, but would you mind having a look?”

  He stood, breaking from her touch. Only then did Arianne realize his discomfort. “I’ll take a look, Lady Hightower, but I warn you this is likely something that will take a number of hours. I assure you, I’ll do my best. I know you have a lot at stake financially.”

  “It’s hardly the money I’ve missed, Mr. Harper,” she said, standing and leading him toward the drawing room. She noted that he forgot to limp until about halfway there, and even then used a different leg. “It is the uncertainty of the whole aggravating affair, and I fear there will be some damage to the reputation of Hightower as a result.”

  He nodded in understanding. “Just remember, Lady Hightower, that none of this was your doing. I know it would pain you to see your estate under a cloud of bad opinion, but your honor and good name you will keep, regardless of what the books may uncover. I will stand witness for you in this regard, if it comes to it.”

  She nodded. “Thank you, Mr. Harper. I have appreciated your calm demeanor during this mess. The ledgers are there on the desk. Are the arrangements to your liking?”

  He sat down. “I will be perfectly comfortable, thank you.”

  Arianne paced around the drawing room, biting her lip and fidgeting. Baron Carver cracked the books and with quill and paper began making notations, pausing from time to time to think. Despite her best efforts not to annoy Baron Carver with her fretting, she found herself staring at him or wandering near him to try to sneak a peek at what he was writing. She knew she was being insufferable, but Baron Carver bore it well.

  A soft step in the hall pulled Arianne’s attention away from her worried musings. Elaine turned the corner with a glass and a decanter of wine. She beamed, looking quite fetching in her dress. Immediately Arianne felt guilty. She had been so overwhelmed with thoughts of the ledgers that she had neglected to take thought for Baron Carver’s comfort.

  Elaine stepped forward tentatively. “Mr. Harper?”

  He glanced up and stood. “Hello, Miss.”

  “I brought you something to drink.”

  “Why, thank you, Miss! I was just getting a bit parched. You should really let the servants do that. No need to trouble yourself over an underclerk.”

  “Mr. Harper, please do not imply that you are troubling us again,” Arianne said, her tone a bit more grating than she had intended.

  “My apologies, Lady Hightower.”

  Elaine frowned as she poured the drink. “Why are you scolding Mr. Harper, Arianne?”

  Arianne sighed. All she wanted to do was show Baron Carver the quality of her house, and his comments made it clear that she had failed. “Well, I’m afraid that we haven’t treated Mr. Harper as well as we should and so he is convinced he is a bother. He is doing us a good service and I am trying to break Mr. Harper of implying that he is some sort of nuisance.”

  Elaine grinned. “Oh. You don’t want to cross Arianne, Mr. Harper. She can be severe. You should have heard the way she was yelling at the steward and the clerk this morning. Woke the neighbors, I’m sure.”

  Baron Carver took a drink. “I will do my best not to cross Lady Hightower. I’m just not used to being in company with nobility and I’m always afraid I will cause offense.”

  Arianne smirked at what seemed a disingenuous statement, but revised her opinion after a moment. Hadn’t the Queen told her that he avoided court? And if his wife had been half the unaffectionate shrew that Arianne suspected she was, the poor man had probably spent the last few years walking softly and trying to stay out of the way. How did he remain so good natured after so many years of neglect? Her own distant, formal relationship with her late husband had nearly driven her mad, and their marriage was at least amicable.

  “Are you headed to a ball or an assembly this evening, Miss?” Baron Carver asked Elaine as he finished his drink.

  “What makes you think I am headed out, Mr. Harper?” Elaine asked with a sly grin.

  Baron Carver cleared his throat and plowed into a ledger. “I…I was just wondering. Well, I should get back to it. Thank you for the refreshment.”

  Elaine winked and smiled at Arianne. “I will leave the wine here for you, in case you need it.”

  Arianne shook her head. Her sister could be incorrigible, but flirting with a clerk was just unpardonable behavior. Her mother would have carted her back to Brighton for sure if she had known what the girl had planned; Arianne thought she might send Elaine packing herself if she kept it up. She could sympathize, however. He was handsome—or would be if he would shave the beard—and had been surprisingly kind. But he was at least ten years Elaine’s senior. And too tall for her.

  Elaine was just about to the drawing room door when Baron Carver looked up suddenly, face troubled, and stood.

  Arianne’s brow furrowed. “Is everything well, Mr.�
��” A thunderous crack from an impact on the front door shook the house. Baron Carver sprung to a petrified Elaine and dragged her back into the drawing room by the arm. Another crushing blow to the door and wood squealed and cracked. Servants yelled, and a gunshot turned yells to screams.

  A harsh voice filled the hall. “Get back! Where’s Lady Hightower?”

  Arianne’s face drained of blood as Baron Carver guided her and Elaine behind a couch at the far end of the drawing room.

  “Stay down,” he said. “Under no circumstances are you to stand up. Do you understand?”

  Arianne nodded. That fire she had found missing in Baron Carver earlier had returned, flashing in his eyes as he turned and walked back toward the door.

  In the hallway, the boot-steps on the wooden floor pounded ever closer until they came inside the drawing room, the stench of sweat and beer wafting inside with the intruder.

  “Who are you?” the harsh voice demanded disdainfully.

  “David Harper, underclerk to the Queen of Bellshire. I believe what you want is here on the desk.”

  Arianne peeked around the corner of the couch. She could just make out the intruder holding a rifle and concealing his nose and mouth with a dirty brown scarf. He wore the clothes of a poor outdoorsman—thick leather boots up to his knees, worn pants, and dark bison hide coat. His eyes had wandered to the desk from where he stood at the entrance to the drawing room, rifle pointing at Baron Carver’s chest.

  How could her steward stoop so low as to hire such a brute thug to retrieve the ledgers? He probably found the thief in the Horned Head, a disreputable drinking establishment in Hightower.

  “Where is the Lady Hightower?” the intruder barked.

  “Why does it matter?” Baron Carver answered smoothly. “Take the ledgers.”

  The man pulled the rifle’s hammer back threateningly. “I hear she’s a fine woman. I’d like a look at her.”

  He was clearly drunk. Arianne watched surreptitiously as Baron Carver collected the ledgers and walked cautiously forward. “Look, friend,” he said, “don’t trouble the Lady. Here they are. Just take them and go.”

  The man raised the rifle to Baron Carver’s head. “Now you stop right there. I was supposed to burn these ledgers, but if they’re valuable, how about you just pay me more than the one that sent me?”

  Arianne smirked. And thus the problem of hiring common rabble to do sensitive work.

  “How much do you want?”

  “Two hundred pounds,” he answered evenly.

  “Done,” Baron Carver said. “Let me call for the manservant to fetch it.”

  “No. I want Lady Hightower to bring it to me herself.”

  Baron Carver opened his mouth to protest, but the robber brandished the rifle and struck him across the face. The ledgers fell to the floor as Baron Carver caught the edge of the couch to balance himself. Arianne gasped involuntarily.

  “Who’s over there?” the intruder asked. “Stand up!” The gun swung in their direction. Arianne retreated next to Elaine who was crying silently, her hand over her mouth to muffle her sobs.

  “I said stand up or I’ll put a bullet over there and see if any of those couches bleed!”

  Arianne, fearing for the safety of Elaine, went against Baron Carver’s instructions and rose. He and the gunman turned toward her. A shallow gash on Baron Carver’s forehead trickled blood down his face. Baron Carver immediately put himself between her and the gun, while the ill-favored man cocked his head and leered at her.

  “Pretty little thing, ain’t she?” he said lustily. “Now you go on and get the money, Lady Hightower, or I’ll blow this one’s brains all over your little white room.”

  Arianne looked to Baron Carver who nodded, keeping himself between her and the gun as she slowly walked to the door.

  “Get out of the way! I want to see her walk!” The man raised the gun and swung it at Baron Carver’s head again, but Baron Carver leaned backwards slightly and the barrel passed to his left. Then, just as she had seen in the forest the day of the assassination, the underclerk changed from a man of books to a lord of war. His left hand shot out and grabbed the barrel of the rifle, pushing it up toward the ceiling and away from anyone in the room. Simultaneously, he flipped up the back of his coat and with his right hand pulled a white dagger the likes of which Arianne had never seen.

  The gun discharged, raking her nerves, as Baron Carver slashed the arm of his assailant, who cried out in pain and then dropped the weapon. Realizing his danger, the ruffian turned for the door as Baron Carver pulled an identical dagger with his left hand.

  “Stay here,” he ordered as he sprang forward to pursue. Arianne walked back toward Elaine, but when she heard the robber scream in agony and surprise, she ran forward into the hallway instead.

  The intruder lay upon the ground in front of the staircase writhing, grabbing at his neck. Baron Carver sheathed his knives and bent down to minister to the wounded man, ordering him to stay still. Blood spurted from the robber’s throat, spraying on the wall, and Baron Carver clamped down on the wound, trying to stifle the gushing.

  His patient’s eyes shot wide with terror, face paling with every gout of blood. In the dim light of the hallway, Arianne spotted the small wooden figurine of a sabercat lying in a crimson pool next to the writhing man, hunk of flesh still trapped in its lifeless jaws. The Lady Hightower brought her hand to her mouth as servants emerged from their hiding places.

  Despite Baron Carver’s fervent ministrations, the man died moments later.

  Chapter 18

  Davon whittled his newest carving, the motions almost unconscious. What is happening to me? He paused for a moment to regard the burned imprints of the Eternal Flame on his palms. It had all started after the ceremony in the Flame Cathedral. But he wasn’t sure. The strange ability to carve came after that, but the preternatural ability to sense, to think, to act with unusual quickness had come before then. When he had survived the onslaught of Dales Marter, he had considered himself lucky. When he had dropped the three fleeing assassins from their horses, he credited his own skill and extraordinary, unbelievable luck.

  But what had happened last night was completely different. Somehow he had sensed that danger was close, just as a deer might raise its head because it smells something off or hears an unexpected sound. He had seen it a hundred times on his hunting trips in the wild when stalking prey. But none of his usual senses had registered anything out of the ordinary; he just knew that something bad had arrived at Lady Hightower’s door.

  And then his carving had leaped from the staircase onto the robber’s neck and tore out his artery. Davon had removed the sabercat from the scene before the City Watch came, and he and Lady Hightower agreed to leave that little detail out of the report when the sheriff came to interview them all a while later. Just an unfortunate stab of his knife, they told him.

  The Lady Hightower had retired immediately to comfort a visibly shaken Elaine, and Davon provided the shockingly young sheriff with the rest of the details. Thankfully, the chirurgeon tasked with sewing a few stitches into his head had some gray hair. The sheriff promised to send a couple of men in the morning to guard the place against further attack, but Davon wasn’t content to return to the Inn and leave the house unguarded. He had fetched his gun and sat on the front steps to watch the night through. He had barely sat five minutes when a little piece of wood—part of a broken branch beneath a nearby elm—called to him.

  When the shapes had first started appearing in the wood, he thought his mind had started to fail him. Everywhere he went a fallen branch or a plank of wood would transform before his eyes into something else. From time to time, he could even sense to whom the objects would belong. As soon as he had met Elaine Brighton, he knew the sabercat was hers. The life-like figurine of Lord Ember in his bag was to go to Lord Ember, which seemed silly; why would he want a carving of himself? And he knew that the nearly finished rosebud pendant in his hand would go to the Viscountess Arianne H
ightower. He hadn’t even needed light to carve it. The skill had come without any work or study; it was as if someone else’s hands were attached to his body.

  He stared at the rosebud, smoothing the edges with his carving knife. How he would give the gift to a Lady without seeming incredibly forward was something he had yet to figure out. She probably already thought him an oddity that attracted trouble to her household. Still, she had been kind. If more of the nobles would have been like her, he might not have avoided court so assiduously during his days as Baron Carver. She was as pretty as a spring blossom, to boot.

  He chastised himself for the stray thought and blew the dust and wood curls off the rosebud. He had killed her husband, and now that he knew what kind of a woman she was, he felt more guilty for it than ever. Why hadn’t he thought of her before issuing his challenge? Emile was all that had occupied his mind then, and he cursed himself for his shortsightedness. At least now he had some chance to offer restitution by keeping her safe and seeing her through the odd ordeal of her ledgers.

  The light had just started to conquer the dark for good as he twirled the rose pendant between his thumb and forefinger. He inspected its curves and the delicate stem. It was a perfection. He still couldn’t believe how easy it was.

  The roughly patched-up door to the manor house creaked and squealed angrily and Davon turned, surprised to find a puffy-eyed Lady Hightower wrapped in a shawl striding toward his place on the stair. Davon stood and bowed. She appeared out of sorts, eyes hard, and he hoped nothing bad had happened inside the house.

  “Mr. Harper!” she exclaimed. “Am I to understand that you have been out here all night long? I thought you had returned to the Inn!”

  He wiped bits of wood off of his coat and pants, returning the knife to his carving pouch. “I’m sorry to distress you, Lady Hightower. The sheriff said he would send men this morning to watch over the house, and I didn’t want to leave you unprotected overnight in case of some further villainy.”