We sat in teams of two. Eldric and I at one side of the dining room table, smelling of plant squish and rotten eggs. Father and Mr. Clayborne at the other side, smelling of strong tea and leftover sleep.
It brought to mind the day Eldric arrived. I remembered standing in the dining room with all those men gobbling up the air and clogging up the mirror. But the numbers had changed, the alliances shifted. The teams were equal now.
Mr. Clayborne cleared his throat. “Eldric!” But instead of looking at Eldric, he looked at Father. Father looked at Mr. Clayborne, who cleared his throat again. “I always thought you good-hearted, despite your eternal pranks and mucking about.”
“I like mucking about.” Eldric turned a couple of toothpicks into swords, which leapt into mortal combat.
“But I never thought you could do anything so wicked.”
“Wicked,” said Father.
Wicked? I was the wicked one.
“Mucking about isn’t wicked.” Eldric wore his lazy lion’s smile. He didn’t mind what he was called. He was a sticks-and-stones sort of person.
“Imagine my surprise,” said Father, “when I came to look in on the girls and what do I find?”
His voice hadn’t undergone its morning ironing. “Or, rather, what I don’t find. I don’t find Briony.”
“You check on us at night?” How horridly reminiscent of Dracula, a Dracula clergyman, who has just a little trouble with crosses.
“From time to time.” Father drew his palms down his cheeks. “It takes me back to the days when we’d sing together at night.” He stretched out his eye-wrinkles.
“But I was awake then,” I said.
“Yes,” said Father, his eye-wrinkle insides all soft and raw. “You were awake then.”
“En guard!” Eldric’s toothpick-swords leapt to ready position. “Parry—thrust!” The toothpick-sword leapt at my finger.
“Don’t touch my daughter!” Father’s scratch-lips ripped apart. His teeth were too big.
A horrid, heavy silence followed, a Dracu-clerge silence, while Father reset his lips into their proper scratches.
“So that’s what you think.” Eldric rolled the toothpicks between his thumb and forefinger.
“What else are we to think?” said Father’s wrinkled voice. “The two of you, missing all night.”
“Have a little trust!” Eldric’s voice rose. “I may lounge about and laugh, but to think you’d believe I’d behave—that is to say, your daughter and I—and I, a guest in your house!”
Snap! Bits of toothpick-sword fell to the table.
Understanding came like a kick to the stomach. They thought Eldric and I were together—together the way boys are with girls.
“Returning at dawn,” said Mr. Clayborne. “Together.”
“For God’s sake!” shouted Eldric. My shoulder-wings jumped. Now they were all shouting, Eldric, Father, Mr. Clayborne.
I plugged my ears. I hate shouting. It makes my ribs go tight.
It was stupid to think I could be a bad boy. Of course I couldn’t. There’s no point in trying anything new.
You try your first step. What then? You have to walk everywhere.
You have your first conversation with the Boggy Mun. What then? Your sister gets the swamp cough.
You try your first initiation. What then? You have to—
Eldric tapped my arm. I unplugged my ears.
“We appear to have misjudged the situation.” Father’s eye-wrinkles had slipped back into place. “Mr. Clayborne and I are sorry.”
I waited for the but part. There was bound to be a but.
“It seems I am a bad influence on you,” said Eldric. “This comes as quite a surprise, as I have found you wonderfully impervious to influence.”
They were to forbid me to see Eldric, weren’t they? I needed a safe place to put my gaze. It was easiest to look at the bits of toothpick-sword.
“It’s really more that you’re a bad influence on Eldric.” Mr. Clayborne smiled to show he wasn’t serious. “Eldric’s new tutor, Mr. Thorpe, is to arrive next week. You and Eldric were to have lessons together, as you know—”
“I’m not to share Eldric’s tutor?”
“I told them you help me learn, but they didn’t listen,” said Eldric.
“I miss Fitz,” I said. My brilliant Fitz. “When shall I ever have lessons?”
“Fitz was hardly suited to be a tutor,” said Father.
“Just because of the arsenic?” I said. “It never interfered with our lessons.”
“One doesn’t leave one’s daughter alone with such a man,” said Father.
“Why ever not?”
But of course he wouldn’t tell me. Which means, of course, he couldn’t think of a single reason why.
The early light came in at the window and glanced off the stubble on Father’s jaw. Father hadn’t ironed his voice, and he hadn’t shaved, either. But Father always shaved. Where was the father who left me alone?
“It’s not that you’re a bad influence on Eldric,” said Mr. Clayborne. “Of course not. But I’ve come to see that he’s steadier, more level-headed, with young women who are rather older than you.”
Not Leanne!
Not that rather older young lady!
Yes, Leanne. “She is a clever young lady,” said Mr. Clayborne, “and has been wanting to continue her studies, but her circumstances have been rather straitened of late.”
Leanne to study with Eldric? To sit across from him, every day? She’d take pains, I supposed, to resemble a painting by this mysterious Klimt—all in gold, flowers in her hair, in a state of tasteful undress.
The rather older young lady, who was very old, indeed. Or so she’d told Rose, oh how terrifically funny, ha-ha, top marks! I let myself imagine she was telling the truth. If she were very old indeed, she’d have to be an Old One, and Eldric would discover her true nature and cast her off in her petticoat . . . No, best keep her in her clothes. I was an Old One, but I’d never be very old indeed. Unfair that we witches live only a mortal lifespan, that we’re deprived of the infinity of experience that makes the Boggy Mun so tricky.
The Boggy Mun and his tricks . . . How had I not seen it before? I had a perfectly trick-free bargain to offer the Boggy Mun. A bargain he’d be glad to accept: He’d cure Rose and get what he wanted.
Up you get then, Briony. Put an end to this affecting scene. Paste on your angelic face, tell one of your pretty lies. It’s not Father’s business where you’re going. It’s just between you and the Boggy Mun.