Witch Hunt Read online

  There was silence as they both crunched, and then, as she swallowed the last salty crumb of cheese, she realized something else.

  ‘I’m thirsty.’

  ‘D’you drink beer?’ Luke said shortly, around a mouthful of bread. ‘Sorry there’s only one glass.’

  ‘I’m not sure. I’ve never tried it.’

  ‘Here.’ He held it out, tankard handle towards her.

  Rosa took it from his hand and sniffed at the golden liquid. The smell was not particularly pleasant, but she was horribly thirsty and, wrinkling her nose, she took a great swig.

  Her first impulse was to spit it out, but she screwed up her face, pressed her lips together and swallowed heroically.

  ‘Urgh!’ she spluttered when her mouth was clear. ‘That’s revolting!’

  ‘Your face!’ Luke was laughing properly now, but not too hard to grab the tankard before she spilt it in revulsion. ‘You’ve really never tried it?’

  ‘How can you drink that stuff? It’s so – so sour!’

  ‘It’s not sour! It’s – well, it’s beer. It’s the hops that make it bitter. I suppose I can remember not liking it much when I was a kid. But I was six, I didn’t like cabbage or Brussels sprouts, neither!’

  Rosa shuddered, and went over to the washstand to see if the ewer had water in it to wash her mouth out. The jug was half full, but there was a layer of dust on the surface and a dead fly floating in it.

  ‘Come on,’ Luke said, his face still twisted in a grin. She saw that the dimple was back, skewered deep into his right cheek. He patted the bed beside him. ‘It’s not that bad. Try another go.’

  ‘I’d rather die of thirst!’ Rosa retorted as she sat beside him, the mattress squeaking. But she took the glass and managed a tiny sip. It was not so bad, now she was expecting the bitterness and she took another, slightly larger mouthful. ‘It’s still revolting. But it’s better than drinking dead flies, I suppose.’

  ‘Glad you approve.’ He took a gulp himself and then passed her back the tankard.

  ‘Do you think Brimstone’s all right?’ Rosa asked. Luke nodded.

  ‘He’ll be fine. They had a good stables round the back. Nice and clean. Four other horses besides him.’

  ‘I wonder what Alexis is doing right now.’ The thought made her draw her knees up to her chest, hugging them uneasily. ‘Scrying maybe.’

  ‘Scrying?’ Luke stood and put the tankard down on the washstand. ‘What’s that?’

  ‘You can use water or oil, or runes. It’s like a form of divination. Some people use it to tell the future, but you can see the present too. Find things.’

  ‘Find things?’ Luke’s face was suddenly alarmed, the grin gone as if it had never been. ‘Like, people?’

  ‘Yes. But it’s not very accurate. Not unless you’re very good. And Alexis isn’t.’

  ‘God damn it.’ Luke sat again on the bed, the springs squeaking, protesting under his weight. ‘Isn’t there anything we can do?’

  ‘Keep moving. And get as far away as possible. It’s most accurate with still objects, and the closer you are, the better chance you have.’ She felt muzzy-headed and wondered if this was the drunkenness Mama had warned about, or if she was just tired. ‘There are charms too – countermeasures, ways to confuse the searchers. I don’t know much about it. If only I had Mama’s Grimoire . . .’

  Luke was chewing his lip.

  ‘Magic might be the least of our worries. We should try to dye Brimstone tomorrow – maybe cover his blaze. They’ll put out a description soon, and we’re pretty recognizable put together. There’s not much to say about me, except for my height maybe. That’s the only thing anyone’d notice. I don’t know what we do about you though.’

  ‘About me?’ Rosa frowned. ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘There’s not many red-haired sixteen-year-olds on the run, specially not ones brought up in Knightsbridge with the accent to match.’

  ‘You – you don’t think I’ll pass for your sister then?’ Rosa said. Luke shook his head.

  ‘I don’t know if the landlady believed us, but even if she did, there’s others won’t. We don’t look like brother and sister. I wonder . . .’ He took a handful of her hair, pulling it away from her face, looking at her appraisingly. ‘D’you think you could pass for a boy if we cropped your hair?’

  ‘Maybe,’ Rosa said doubtfully. Luke sighed and let his hand drop, and they sat in silence, Rosa watching the backs of his hands as he played with the empty plate in his lap, turning it this way and that. They were covered with burns, old ones from the forge, fresh ones from the factory.

  ‘Thank you, Luke,’ she said quietly. He looked up, his face puzzled.

  ‘For what?’

  ‘For coming back for me. You didn’t have to. I had no choice in this but you did. You could have—’

  ‘No, listen.’ He cut her off, his voice rough, his words tumbling in their urgency. ‘This was my fault, all of it. When I chose your name, when I did – what I did, God forgive me . . .’ He still could not bear to say it, what he’d tried to do. ‘What I’m trying to say is, we neither of us had much of a choice. Thank me? God! What for? You went back when I wouldn’t – you saved Minna. I’ll never be done being sorry for what I tried to do to you.’

  ‘But what about what I tried to do to you?’ Rosa said, her voice very low. ‘I took your memories, I ripped them out of your mind. And my people enslaved yours.’ She dropped the words like cold pebbles of truth into the pool of silence between them. ‘I’m one of them, Luke, the people you’re sworn to kill.’

  ‘Not any more,’ he said. ‘I’m not a Brother any more.’

  His face in the lamplight was all shadows, impossible to tell if he spoke the words with sorrow, or relief. Perhaps both.

  She was trying to think of something to say when, with a little sigh, the lamp went out, leaving them in darkness. Rosa heard Luke swear, soft and vehement.

  ‘That bitch. I might have known she’d cheat us on the oil on top of everything else.’

  ‘It doesn’t matter.’ She put out a hand, feeling for the bed to stand up, but touched his knee instead. She snatched it away. ‘I’m t-tired,’ she stammered. ‘It’s time for bed anyway.’

  Bed. There was a sudden silence, full of feeling, as the word hung between them, and then dropped, like a stone into a well, sending its ripples into the darkness.

  ‘I’ll sleep on the floor,’ Luke said gruffly.

  ‘Don’t be silly.’ Her voice caught in her throat. ‘There’s only one blanket. You’ll freeze. There’s plenty of room for us both. It’s a big bed.’

  He did not call her on the lie.

  She heard a thump, as Luke pulled off one boot, very slowly, and then the other. And she let a tiny witchlight flare in her palm as she did her own boot buttons, wishing for a button hook. If only she could loosen her corset . . . but she could not possibly start undressing in front of Luke. She would just have to endure the discomfort.

  She let her boots fall to the floor, pulled out the last of her hairpins and then turned to face Luke. His face was grave, uncomfortable.

  ‘Are you sure?’

  ‘Sure,’ she said with a braveness she did not feel. She crawled across the bed to lie pressed against the wall, with the chill of the plaster against her right side. The last thing she saw before she let the witchlight die out was Luke sitting on the edge of the thin mattress, his hands clasped as if he was praying. Then she heard the bed springs squeak and felt his warmth as he lay beside her, barely touching, their bodies just the fraction of an inch apart that the space permitted.

  She pulled the thin blanket up, over them both.

  ‘Goodnight, Luke,’ she whispered into the darkness, and she felt his weight shift minutely beside her as he tried and failed to find a comfortable position, his body perched precariously on the metal edge, as far away as he could get without falling out.

  ‘Goodnight, Rose,’ he whispered back. His voice melded into the darkness, it
s Cockney twang comforting: G’nigh’ Rose . . .

  And then silence . . . just the sound of his breathing, first shallow, then slowing and deepening by degrees.

  She should have been tired. She should have been exhausted. But she could not sleep. She lay in the darkness, feeling Luke’s presence beside her and pondering the impossibility of it all.

  You’re ruined, she thought, remembering Clemency’s words. If anyone knew you’d spent the night with a man . . . And not just a man. A stable-hand. An outwith. Luke.

  Beside her Luke’s muscles had begun to relax in sleep and his arm had fallen by his side, touching hers. She thought again of the smooth bare skin beneath his coat and shirt, the blue veins, the muscles that flexed and shaped as he moved, and the mark of the brand on his shoulder – how different it was from her own sharp curves and narrow bones. He was the first man whose body she had touched, and now she was lying in bed with him, so close she could have reached out and slipped her hand beneath his shirt as he slept.

  At the thought she felt blood flush through her like a fire, her cheeks blazing. The ring on her finger seemed to pinch agonizingly tight, and she could not breathe.

  It’s Luke, she thought furiously. Stop it, stop thinking like this.

  Thank God he was asleep and knew nothing of what was passing through her mind. She closed her eyes in the darkness, listening to the slow, regular rhythm of Luke’s breathing, and slowly, slowly, she let it lull her into sleep.

  ‘Well!’

  The voice cut through Luke’s dream like a knife, and he jerked out of sleep, his heart pounding wildly, trying to work out where he was and what was happening.

  There was something heavy on his chest and shoulder, a warm and yielding weight, and as his blinking eyes adjusted to the light he realized, with a tingle of shock, that it was Rosa, curled inside his encircling arm. Her cheek was pressed against his shoulder, her mouth warm in the crook of his neck, and her arm was flung across his ribs, pinning him down as he struggled to sit up and face the landlady standing at the foot of the bed.

  ‘Funny way for a brother and sister to carry on,’ she said with a sour triumph.

  ‘Get out!’ Luke found he was shaking with rage. He managed to extricate himself from beneath Rosa’s arm and stood, pulling his shirt straight with hands that trembled. ‘How dare you come into a room we’ve paid for?’

  ‘It’s past ten. You’ve paid for one night and unless you want to pay for another, it’s you that’ll be getting out, my lad, and your “sister” with you. Little slut,’ she added under her breath as she turned away.

  Luke’s fist clenched. He shut his eyes, forcing himself to count to ten as William had taught him as a boy. Nothing to be gained by hitting out, Luke lad. That only puts you in the wrong as well.

  ‘We’ll be out,’ he said stonily. ‘We need to be on our way in any case.’

  ‘Ten minutes,’ the woman snapped. ‘A moment longer and I’ll send Henry up here to throw you both out.’

  ‘Get out,’ Luke snarled.

  ‘With pleasure,’ the woman snapped, and she banged the door behind her so hard the windowpane rattled in its frame.

  In the bed, Rosa opened her eyes and sat up, blinking and astonished, raking her long red hair out of her eyes.

  ‘What was that noise?’

  ‘Landlady,’ Luke said shortly. ‘We overslept.’

  ‘Wh-what?’ She gave a great yawn. ‘What time is it?’

  ‘Gone ten, she said.’

  ‘Ten?’ Rosa was up and out of bed in one movement. ‘You said we had to be on the road by dawn!’

  ‘Like I said, I overslept.’

  ‘Oh God, we need to leave, now.’ She began pulling on her boots, her face pale.

  ‘You need to heal yourself,’ Luke said, watching her as she struggled with the small buttons, her burnt, blistered fingers clumsy.

  ‘I know.’ She spoke shortly. ‘I will. But I haven’t got much magic to spare. I want to conserve it – you know, in case.’

  In case Sebastian turned up. Luke shivered. He wanted to argue, but he could see her point. Better a scarred arm than a dead body. And he could see she was right to be worried about having enough to spare: her magic was still a thin, pale thing compared to the roaring flame of a few weeks ago. The realization made him frown.

  ‘Look, your magic . . .’

  ‘Mmm?’ Her head was down, tugging at the buttons.

  ‘How long does it usually take, to – you know, to come back?’

  ‘Depends. On how tired I am. On how much rest I get.’

  ‘But still . . .’ He trailed off. But still, he wanted to say. Shouldn’t it be coming back by now? It was true that she’d given all she had at the factory, wrung out every drop of magic in an effort to keep them both alive. But that was one, two nights ago. And she had barely more strength now than when they’d woken up on the banks of the Thames, wet and cold and covered in ashes.

  ‘I need gloves,’ Rosa said, looking ruefully at her burnt hands, and the ruby, like a great red eye on her knuckle. With a wincing effort she turned the ring, the tight band grating over her sore red skin, so that the stone was inwards, towards her palm.

  ‘I don’t know,’ Luke said. ‘You’re supposed to be my sister. My kind doesn’t wear gloves.’

  Rosa bit her lip and stood, twisting the shawl about her shoulders and head.

  ‘Well, if it comes to it, that didn’t go so well, did it? The brother–sister thing. I don’t think the landlady was fooled, even last night.’

  ‘They don’t need to be fooled,’ Luke said impatiently. ‘They just need to give us a bed and not drum us out of the place for adulterers. What else can we tell them – that we’re married?’

  ‘Maybe,’ Rosa said defiantly. There was a flush high on her cheek. ‘It’s more believable than pretending we’re related. We look nothing alike.’

  Luke turned away, pulling his greatcoat on, and snatched up the bundle from beneath the bed.

  ‘Come on. Let’s get Brimstone before they try to charge us another night’s lodging. We’ve already been robbed once. I’m not giving that woman any more money.’

  Down in the yard Rosa waited, huddled into Phoebe’s shawl, while Luke fetched Brimstone from the stables. It was a cold, crisp morning, the sky as blue as speedwell, and there was ice in the puddles. She rested her boot on the thin skin, waiting for the satisfying crack as she put her weight on her heel.

  ‘Hey, you!’ A man’s voice rang across the yard, above the sound of a horse’s hooves, and she looked up. ‘Yes, you,’ he said impatiently. He was a runner of some kind, in a uniform. ‘D’you work here?’

  She was about to say no, but he pulled a piece of printed paper out of his saddlebag and shoved it into her hand, without waiting for an answer.

  ‘Here, get that put up in your mother’s bar, will you?’ he said, and then turned his horse around and cantered out of the yard.

  Rosa was about to call after him that she was a guest, not his errand girl, when her eye fell on the page. It was a poster.

  She crumpled the paper in her fist, her heart beating. Then slowly she edged the shawl further up around her face, trying to hide her bright, incriminating hair. It seemed almost impossible that the man should have failed to notice, failed to make the connection. Thank God she had not spoken.

  The sound of hooves came again, from the other corner of the yard, and her heart quickened horribly until she thought she might throw up, there on the straw of the yard.

  But as the rider turned the corner she saw, with a great lurch of relief, that it was Luke.

  ‘Rosa?’ Luke stared down at her from Brimstone’s high back. ‘What’s happened? You look like you’ve seen a ghost.’

  For a moment she could not speak, she only scrabbled desperately for a hold on Brimstone’s saddle, until Luke grabbed her arm and hauled her up in front of him.

  ‘What’s the matter?’ he asked again. ‘You’re shaking.’

  ‘I’l
l tell you in a moment,’ she managed, and she gave Brimstone a kick that set the poor horse into motion with an indignant lurch. ‘Let’s just get out of here.’

  ‘Hair dye!’ laughed the young lady behind the counter. She put her hand to her own beautifully sculpted coiffure. ‘What’s that for then?’

  ‘That’s my business,’ Luke said uncomfortably. He felt in his pocket for the shillings that rattled there. Already the cache felt uncomfortably lighter than last night.

  ‘Surely you’re too young to be going grey?’ the girl said. She looked up at him through lowered lashes, her eyes sparkling.

  ‘As the gentleman said, that’s his business, Millicent!’ barked a man from further up the counter. He came down and put a small box in front of Luke. ‘I do apologize, sir. Young ladies like their joke. Will this shade do, sir?’

  Luke looked at the box. It was called ‘Autumn Gold’ and a coloured spot on the lid showed an odd clay-like beige.

  ‘I’d like it a bit darker if you have it, please.’

  ‘In that case . . .’ He rummaged in a cupboard behind his head and then turned back with a second little box. ‘Try Beech Grove, sir. Gives a lovely mahogany tone.’

  ‘And how do I – you know . . .’ Luke wished the stupid girl behind the counter would stop making eyes and laughing at him from behind her hand. He wanted to sink through the floor. ‘How do you put it on?’

  ‘Make a paste with a little water, rub it on and then wash off after half an hour. It will stain clothing while it’s wet, so we recommend drying the hair thoroughly before dressing.’

  ‘Thanks.’ Luke took the box. The spot on the top looked mud-coloured, which was probably as good as they were going to get. ‘How much?’

  ‘One and thruppence.’

  Christ. Luke nearly groaned aloud. Another chip off their precious stash. He pushed the coins across the counter and pocketed the small box, and then strode bad-temperedly across the town square and down to the river where Rosa was waiting.