Rise of the Arcane Fire (The Secret Order) Read online

  He drew me closer, keeping his grip firm. “No, I haven’t.”

  I wrenched my arm away and took a step back. “I’m not one of your horses. You can’t lead me around.”

  He paced toward the mechanical aviary and back, like a caged lion.

  I watched him, keeping my fists clenched. My fingernails stung as they dug into my palms. He wasn’t thinking. Leaving made little sense. Everything we were building together was here in London. “How are we to have a future if you are in Scotland?”

  He stopped and splayed his arms out in a flash of indignation. “I’m trying to build our future.” His hands shook as he said it.

  No, he wasn’t. He was trying to leave me. He was trying to run just when we were on the verge of everything we had dreamed of.

  “Then accept the apprenticeship.” I tried to sound reasonable, but my words snapped out. Anger twisted my thoughts until even I couldn’t comprehend them. Words—dangerous, vile words—lingered on the back of my tongue. I needed to be civil, but fighting the impulse to spout all the horrible curses in my head took effort.

  For all the distasteful thoughts forming in my mind, they didn’t compare to the sharp pain beginning to slice through my heart. Will had walked away before. He had always come to his senses and returned to me. This time would be no different. We needed one another. “You must stay here in London.”

  “I can’t.” His voice cracked. He took a breath and raked his hands through his hair, then met my gaze. I could see the torment in his furrowed brow. “I don’t belong here, Meg. I don’t belong anywhere. That’s the problem.”

  “Don’t be ridiculous.” Will was always the practical one. I waved his doubt off with a flip of my hand.

  He looked up at me with such heartbreak in his gaze. “It’s the truth.”

  Truth? The only truth that would come to pass is that the whole of the British Isles would stand between us. “I know you’re worried about the studies, but I’ll help—”

  “We both know it wouldn’t be enough.” He hung his head. “I don’t want you to have to do everything for me because I can barely manage to read.”

  “You read fine!” He might have been a bit slow, but there was hardly anything he couldn’t sound out, and his vocabulary was growing.

  “And my writing? What of my figures?” He counted off his perceived scholarly failings on his fingers as if to make a point.

  “You can learn.” I gripped his hand and held on. “I know you, Will. You can do anything you put your mind to.”

  “You are the one who is good with your mind.” He pulled his hand from mine and turned to lean on the framework of the aviary. He looked at his palms. “I’m good with my hands. I don’t want to live my life studying and drawing out ideas. I want to make things. I want to fit them together and see them work. You’re the dreamer, Meg, not me. When Oliver asked me if I wanted to be an Amusementist, I said yes because I just wanted to be something. But now that MacTavish has made his offer . . .”

  “To be an ironworker? That’s not what you are, Will.”

  “What am I, then?” He sighed. He looked so lost. “A gypsy, a filthy tinker, a bloody Scot, an orphan beggar. It wasn’t that long ago that even being in my presence would have earned you a trip to the gallows.”

  I felt tears gathering as my heart broke for him. He was none of those things to me. He was my Will, my heart, and he was good. Everything about him was good. “Will, you can’t believe—”

  He met my gaze. “I need this.”

  “I’m sure Oliver would—”

  “Oliver has done enough!” Will shouted. I took a step back in shock at his sudden change in demeanor.

  He let out a heavy breath. “You never listen. I will not live on the good grace of others anymore. Not from charity and not from pity. I have to find my way. My own way.” He looked away and his voice turned soft as he said his piece, but it was no less determined. “I can’t do that here.”

  All the words swimming in my head faded down to just one. No. Over and over it echoed in my mind, bringing with it a ripping and tearing pain. It started in my heart, but then it encompassed all of me in relentless waves. The pain was so acute, I felt I would be sick. The words he had left unsaid lingered between us.

  I can’t do that with you.

  I fought my tears as my throat closed around my words. “Don’t you still love me?”

  Will looked back to me, and the stoic expression on his face broke. He looked as heartbroken and shocked as I felt. I had to look away as he approached and gathered my hand in his. He kissed the back of it, the way he always had.

  My fingers suddenly felt so cold. His warm breath shook as it caressed me. One of his hot tears fell onto the back of my hand, and slowly trailed over my skin before it fell to the ground. “I love you with everything I am.” He swallowed, then pressed my hand to his heart. “I just want to deserve you.”

  “You do.” I felt my own tears slide down my cheeks.

  He looked me in the eyes, and the pain receded, washed away by the tide of love I felt for him. “Then marry me,” he said.

  I felt as if he’d just scooped me up and pitched me over a cliff. I pulled my hand from his and took a step back to regain my balance. I still felt as if I were falling. “I beg your pardon?”

  He dropped to his knee. “Marry me. Come away with me to Scotland. We can start a new life in the Highlands, away from bombs and murder, just the two of us. We’ll make our own home. A place that is just ours. Say you’ll be my wife.”

  I blinked in shock. For a moment elation flitted through me.

  His wife?

  In the briefest of moments that seemed to last twenty lifetimes, I pictured us living in a little cottage in a village near Inverness. Will would come through the door while I kneaded the dough for the bread and a shaggy dog snored by the fire. Will would sweep me up in his arms and kiss me until we both succumbed to laughter.

  But the vision fell dark around the edges. There was an emptiness surrounding our little world, a terrible void that turned the joy that had come from my thoughts into panic.

  The chill of it poured through my blood.

  My legs shook as I looked down on Will, his eyes imploring me not to break his heart.

  I wanted to say yes. I wanted to scream it and leap into his arms, but I couldn’t move. It was all so terribly wrong.

  “I can’t,” I whispered, unable to say anything more.

  His gaze fell to the hem of my skirt. We remained there, silent, with Will kneeling like a knight before the queen. He was a good man, strong and loyal. I loved him, and yet I couldn’t say yes. Will rose much like Atlas carrying the weight of the world.

  “You can. You just won’t.” He wouldn’t look up.

  “That’s unfair.” I cast my eyes to the worn stone beneath my feet. A scraggly weed had pushed up in a crack, trying valiantly to grow in a place where it oughtn’t.

  “Is it?” He touched my face, bringing my gaze to his. I’d never seen him so confused, or possibly frightened.

  “I’m not the one leaving,” I protested, throwing my hand back toward the underground carriage bay.

  Will’s expression turned cold. “I’m trying to give you a home where I can provide for you and protect you.” He took a step toward me, trampling on the weed.

  “You don’t want to marry me. You want to keep me.” I tilted my chin so I could look him in the eye.

  He threw his arms out in exasperation. “Isn’t that what a husband does?”

  His words felt like a blow. I turned from him, because I couldn’t stand the pain of it, or the horrible ill feeling that had gripped my middle. He didn’t understand. He didn’t understand at all.

  “I can’t give this up.” I had to be reasonable. Reason and logic would win the day. We’d both do better with him here. We could both have what we wanted. If we traveled to Scotland, he would become something, and I would sit at home, as was expected of me. I couldn’t stand it. “I’ve already
accepted my nomination.”

  “And it will destroy us.” He paused, as if he couldn’t bring himself to say what he was thinking. Finally the words came, softly, so softly. “There’s a greatness in you. It’s a part of the reason I love you, but I fear that greatness will take you from me. Our love would be like tying a bird to a stone.”

  I glanced back at the aviary and the mechanical birds that had become so neglected that they had rusted. They perched still and quiet, diminished from what they could be. “If I don’t take this chance, it will crush me.”

  “What would happen should you fail? You heard them in there.” He waved toward the hall. “Those men have no intention of allowing you to succeed. They will wear you down, and they’ll humiliate you . . .”

  Yes, it was going to be a challenge. Of course I knew it would be difficult. I didn’t need anyone to tell me that it was impossible or that I would fail. I had no room for such doubts. That’s when it struck me.

  I looked at him in disbelief. “You don’t believe I can do it, do you?” I took a long breath to try to steady my heart. The pain returned, the crushing pressure. My head and heart ached in a way they never had before.

  “Of course I do.”

  I shook my head. “No, you don’t. Or you wouldn’t say such things.”

  “You don’t owe them your life.” He reached out and twisted a leaf off the aviary with a snap. He dropped it. The leaf clanged against the stone, and the sound echoed off the walls. I looked around and for the first time noticed that the courtyard was empty.

  “I owe it to myself to try.” I touched the key hanging from the chain around my neck. “I want to be an Amusementist.”

  He gripped the cage so tightly, his knuckles turned white. “Do you love me, Meg?” he whispered.

  “Of course I do.” I answered quickly, but not tenderly. He flinched. I paused, wanting to say something more, but I didn’t know what to say that could make this right.

  His hair hung in his eyes as he stared at the hard stone beneath our feet. His shoulders rose, then fell. “It’s not enough, is it?”

  Once, he had claimed that love alone was not enough to feed us. At the time I’d thought our love was more powerful than anything. Now I wasn’t so sure. I didn’t answer.

  “Well,” he said, his voice resigned. “I suppose love can’t help us, then.” He kept his eyes downcast, focused on the ground just before his feet as he straightened his coat and turned away.

  I panicked, reaching for him and catching his sleeve. “Will?” My voice didn’t sound my own. It sounded as broken as my heart. I clung to him and he turned back to me. “Please don’t say goodbye.”

  Will blinked, his dark lashes sweeping over his glittering eyes. He swallowed; then his lips parted.

  I leaned toward him, hoping he would close the distance between us. His lips touched mine. It was a ghost of a caress against my tender skin, but I felt it in my soul.

  “Farewell, then.” He gently pulled my fingers from his coat, then took a step toward the ramp. His eyes burned with longing as he watched me. I didn’t know if he hoped I would follow, but I couldn’t. “Good luck, Meg.”

  He was leaving. He was leaving me.

  With a final wave of his hand, he turned and disappeared down the ramp.

  No.

  I followed for one step, two, then balked. Bringing my hand to my mouth, I gasped as I turned and retreated back toward the aviary. He’d come back. Any second, he’d realize this was foolish and come rushing up the ramp.

  Holding my breath, I glanced back to the ramp, drawn once again toward it. I had to force my feet to be still as I gripped my skirts so tightly that my knuckles ached. I prayed fervently in my mind. I swore to the good Lord above that I would give up on all wickedness if he would just make Will return. A cold drop of rain landed on my cheek, and a hot tear washed it away.

  Please. Please come back.

  My shoulders and arms shook as I shifted from foot to foot, craning my neck at the ramp. It fell away beneath a vault-like arch. Torches glowed from somewhere below, and the flickering light up the tunnel seemed ghostly. Any moment I would see his face rising from the ground as he ran back to me. He couldn’t leave.

  I love him.

  A crushing agony pressed down on me, and I thought I would die of it. He wasn’t coming back.

  He was gone. I clasped my hands together as I sat in shock on a cold stone bench beneath the silent bower. The beady eyes of the mechanical birds stared at me, corroded and still. A light rain began to fall.

  I pressed my lips to my knuckles.

  My shoulders shook. How was I supposed to do this alone? I needed him. He was the one person I could depend on. The tears streamed down my face, hot and stinging. Will had always been there for me. In the darkest of times, even when he’d wanted nothing to do with me, he’d always returned. I trusted him.

  Now I had to face everything on my own. Somehow I had to find the courage and intelligence to prove myself. He’d left. He’d left me so he could become a laborer instead of something more. Why didn’t he see in himself what I could see in him?

  He had all the potential in the world. I didn’t understand why he didn’t wish to use it.

  I clenched my jaw. It ached, and I bit down harder. The cold rain beat against my neck. I couldn’t stay here like this. While it seemed certain my heart had been torn and would never again feel whole, the rain would not soothe such an ache.

  Nothing would, and so there was nothing for it.

  I rose to my feet. I had to move forward. The first step was to find my way home.

  I followed Will’s path across the courtyard, still silently hoping he’d realize his mistake. I kept picturing him running back to me, apologizing for his lack of faith in himself and us, and sweeping me around the courtyard as he kissed me.

  My steps faltered. Lamplight shimmered on the rain-slicked stones. The entrance to the ramp jutted out from the thick monastery wall. It made the archway adorning the barrel-vaulted tunnel seem like the entrance to an ancient catacomb.

  If I left this place, there would be no chance for Will to come back to me. It really would be over. My wet hair clung to my face, and I had to wipe it away from my eyes. The courtyard was dark, cold, and empty. I had no choice. The torchlight beckoned as I descended the ramp to the underground passage.

  A great tunnel lit by torches stretched out to either side, rising and then turning beyond a bend in each direction. The tunnel was easily as large as one of the streets just beyond the monastery’s walls, yet completely beneath the ground. On the far side of the wide tunnel was another archway and a similar ramp leading farther down into the darkness.

  No light flickered within it. A heaviness settled over me as I turned away.

  Oliver’s fine coach waited for me. The only person remaining in the long tunnel was Oliver’s coachman. He jumped to attention, then immediately offered me a blanket.

  “Are you well, miss?” he asked, opening the door and giving me a hand up. The young man seemed genuinely concerned, but I couldn’t bring myself to even look him in the eye as I settled into the dark corner of the carriage.

  “I will be.” I had to believe it was true.

  “I’ll get you home. A hot cup of tea will set you right.” He closed the door. It creaked like the lid of a coffin as it shut, and I was surrounded by darkness.

  Nothing would be right again.

  CHAPTER SIX

  THE NEXT WEEK PASSED BY in a drudging misery. Even with Mrs. Brindle doing her best to cheer me with fresh biscuits and cream, I found I had little appetite for either her treats or her conversation. The only thing I did seem to have an appetite for was creating a new lock and hidden bells that would ring loudly should anyone come into the shop.

  Once both the front and the back were secure, I hid in Simon’s workshop, spending hours upon hours on the spring in the frog’s leg. No matter what I tried, I still couldn’t get it to compress correctly. For some reason the tiny roo
m tucked away behind the secret door gave me a sense of comfort. My world became very small, and so I felt I could manage it.

  I didn’t wish to go out and face my life. I don’t know how long I concealed myself there. Mrs. Brindle knew about the workshop and kindly would leave me food on my counting desk just beyond the toy-laden shelves that masked the door, but she never dared intrude upon me.

  I tried one more time to set the tension in the spring, then wound the frog. One leg kicked out, followed by the other a second later. As a consequence the poor thing looked like it had just suffered a sudden and painful death.

  It lay on the table, twitching.

  Lovely.

  The door to the workshop creaked open behind me. I stiffened and whipped around, grasping the pistol as I did so.

  “Leave it where it is.” The voice was as feminine as it was gentle.

  Lucinda.

  She stood against the open shelves on the door and straightened one of the hand puppets that had fallen askew. The young widow looked a bit resigned, as if she had once been used to dragging her late husband out of the depths of the workshop as well.

  I leapt from my seat and rushed toward my friend’s open arms. As beautiful as sunlight on a clear spring morning, Lucinda radiated warmth and compassion from her red-gold hair to her dainty toes. She held me tight as I fought tears of relief. I hadn’t let myself feel anything for days. Being with Lucinda brought all the pain rushing back, but at least I didn’t feel so terribly alone.

  She offered me her handkerchief. “Oliver told me what happened.”

  I took the lacy little bit of silk gladly and dried my eyes. Lucinda led me out of the workshop and fixed the door so that it once again became a seamless part of the row of shelves filled with toys in the shop. Then she led me into the parlor. Mrs. Brindle set out tea. It shocked me that so much time had passed. I hadn’t eaten yet that day.

  Lucinda and I sat together, and she immediately fixed a plate.

  “I can’t believe he’s gone,” I said, knowing it was a silly thing to utter aloud. But then, I could hardly express how it felt to have my heart cut out with a hot knife.