Betraying Season (18 page)

“You should have thought of that before you started joining political groups.” Pen wanted to poke him in the chest as she would
have her little brother if he were misbehaving, but she didn’t. “Right now you’re hurt. You’ll never get away from them.”

“I know I won’t, if you don’t let me g—” Another burst of whistles and shouts sounded behind them. Doherty’s face paled where it wasn’t covered in blood. Pen looked from him to the mist beyond them and made a quick decision.

“Niall, give me your hat.” The tone of command in her voice surprised even her.

He looked at her, then handed the tall beaver hat to her.

“Christ, Miss Leland, what are you doing?” Doherty groped for his handkerchief and blotted the blood that dripped into his eyes.

“Saving your neck. Now be quiet while I do this.” Could she do a spell in the middle of a foggy street, on the edges of a riot? And which one should she use? Not concealment, surely—she could do that for herself, but not for another person. She held Niall’s hat in both hands and stared into it. Ah, that might do. But how? She’d have to improvise and hope for the best.

“Dona speciem tui domini . . . er . . . cuiquam gerat te,”
she whispered, narrowing her attention on the silk band inside the crown, where Niall’s initials had been embroidered. The anxiety of the moment receded for a few seconds, and she felt the hat shift in her hands, as if it had altered its shape slightly. The brushed felt surface dulled and grew subtly paler.

“There,” she said after a moment, and shoved the hat at Doherty. “Niall, will you please walk ahead of us and catch the first hackney home you can find? This won’t work if you’re here. I’m going to take Mr. Doherty back to the Carrighars’.”

Niall frowned. “I can’t let you do that.”

Pen didn’t bother keeping the impatience out of her voice. “Yes,
you can. I won’t be alone, and Mr. Doherty is known to me. And besides, I can take care of myself.”

“But—”

She looked at him very hard.
“Please.”

He opened his mouth, then closed it. “All right,” he finally growled. “But I’ll be calling at the Carrighars’ in exactly thirty minutes to make sure you’ve made it there safely. Do you understand? Thirty minutes.” He glared at her, then at Doherty, and stalked off.

Relieved, Pen turned back to Doherty, still swaying beside her. “Put that hat on, quickly.”

“I will not,” he said, trying to draw himself up and look indignant. She reached up and jammed it on his head. He gasped and tried to twist away.

“Look, do you want the constables to catch you? I put a temporary enchantment on the hat so that you’ll take Mr. Keating’s appearance while you’re wearing it. It should last long enough to get us back to the Carrighars’, maybe longer if we’re lucky. Now are you coming with me, or do I have to walk home alone? The least you can damned well do, after nearly mowing me down, is accompany me back to my house.”

“Miss Leland!” Good; her unladylike language had shaken him out of his indignation, just as she’d hoped it would.

“Will you please come?” she asked, in quieter tones. “I assure you, you are quite changed.”

He looked down at her, then at himself, with Niall’s blue eyes widened in shock. She doubted the real Niall had ever worn such a comically affronted expression.

“I’ll take that as a yes.” She took his arm and began to propel him
up the street. “We can walk quickly without being noticed, just like everyone else is. If a constable stops us, just shake your head and look concerned and let me do the talking. I don’t think this spell will disguise your voice as well. Now, come on.”

He didn’t offer any further protest. Pen set as quick a pace as she thought he could manage and kept an iron grip on his arm, lest he stumble. They met a pair of constables on the street who hurried by them with hardly a glance. Her spell had worked.

“How is your head?” she asked softly, after a few minutes.

“It’s bleeding a lot. I can feel it running over me.” He slowed, reaching his free hand to touch his face, then stared at his clean fingers. “But I can’t see it. What the hell kind of spell did you put on this hat?”

“I don’t know. I just made it up. Come on. Let’s get you safe before you lose too much blood. I don’t want to risk you fainting and having the hat fall off.” She tugged impatiently on his arm.

“Why aren’t you fainting, then? I thought gentle-born young ladies always did at the sight of blood.”

Pen ignored him, but began to walk faster.

“All right, that was uncalled-for. I’m sorry. But why are you helping me, anyway?” He scowled at her, then winced.

“I don’t know. Does it matter? Come
on.
Just a few more blocks.”

At the Carrighars’ house she didn’t ring and wait for Norah to let her in, but opened the door herself. “Downstairs,” she mouthed at him, pushing him toward the door to the cellars.

Halfway down the stairs, she created a bubble of cool flame and tossed it into the air above them to light their way. Doherty paused and blinked up at it as it bobbed along ahead of them but said nothing. She led him into Corkwobble’s room and pulled the door shut.

“There aren’t any chairs, so you’ll have to sit on the table.” She gestured toward it, then turned away. “Corkwobble? Are you there?”

An annoyed sniff came from behind the ale casks. “And since when are ye bringing strangers unannounced down to me home, me only sanctuary in this cold, cruel—”

“What the—” Doherty exclaimed, jumping and knocking the table over the stone floor.

Pen tsked and bent to right it. “Sit down,” she commanded. “And don’t be so jumpy. It’s just the Carrighars’ clurichaun.”

“Pardon me,
bean draoi,
but I’m just me own clurichaun, if ye please.” Corkwobble sounded even more annoyed.

“I know you are, Corkwobble, and I’m sorry to disturb you, but I needed to bring Mr. Doherty somewhere.” Pen pushed Doherty back down on the table and took Niall’s hat off. Instantly he was himself again, bloodstained and disarrayed.

“Mr. Doherty, is it?” Corkwobble appeared next to her and cackled. “Oh, ho ho! One of
Draiodoir
Carrighar’s students, then? Not a pretty sight, I’m thinking. So did ye finally get tired of him sneering at ye and give him what he deserved,
cailin
? Ye must have a mean right arm on ye.”

“Could you find me some wine or brandy to give Mr. Doherty while I figure out what to do for him?” Pen tried not to laugh at the mental picture Corkwobble’s words had drawn.

“Ho, could I!” Corkwobble chuckled evilly.

“
Human
spirits, if you please. Not any of that fairy stuff you once offered me. I don’t want him asleep in the cellar for the next twelve hours.”

“Ye’ve no sense of humor,” said the little clurichaun, looking disappointed.

“Yes, well, it would be your cellar he’d be snoring in.” Pen gestured the ball of light into place above Eamon’s head and began to examine his injuries. “You choose.”

“Ah.” Corkwobble put a finger next to his nose and nodded. “When ye put it that way . . . I’ll be right back.” He vanished in a small
pop!
of displaced air.

“Th-th—” Doherty swallowed hard. “That was a clurichaun.”

“Yes, I know it was.” Pen took his chin in her hand. “Hold still. I want to see if I can heal this on my own.”

“B-but you were talking to him . . . and he . . . he was real . . . I saw him.”

“Jolly good, yes. You saw him. Well done.” Why wouldn’t he stop babbling and let her think? It would be so much easier to just close his cuts and sneak him out of the house than to bring Dr. Carrighar or anyone else into this. First thing was to get rid of the blood and see how badly he was hurt.

“Purgare,”
she murmured, and the blood vanished. The wound that had produced it all was above his left eyebrow, a gash that trailed into a shallow cut. It still oozed, though not as profusely as it had before. Blood seeped from his nose as well—it must have been broken—and now it was obvious that both his eyes had been blackened.

“Aye, I was right. A pretty sight indeed, isn’t he?” Corkwobble reappeared next to her, holding a bottle. “Give him a swig o’ that. It’ll take his mind off whatever ye’re going to do to him next.”

Doherty flinched.

Pen thought about stepping on Corkwobble’s toes but didn’t. “Thank you,” she said instead, taking the bottle from him and uncorking it. Plain brandy, good. Nothing from the fairy world. “Drink.” She shoved it into Doherty’s hand.

“Miss Leland—”

She sighed. “Yes?”

“What are you . . . why are you doing all this? I’ve . . .” He stared at her, the pupils of his eyes slightly dilated.

Had he been hit over the head and concussed? Ally had given them a course of practical training in medical emergencies two years ago and had discussed head injuries. “I saw no reason for you to be tossed into jail and prosecuted, or worse, just because you’re a hotheaded idiot,” she replied tartly. “Dr. Carrighar might have been dragged into it, which I did not want to have happen.”

His pupils contracted again as his eyes narrowed in anger that blazed up briefly, then died. Good. Probably not concussed, then. She wasn’t sure she could do anything for a concussion without help.

“I’m not an idiot, I’m a patriot,” he said automatically. “And why are you helping me, after the way I’ve treated you in Dr. Carrighar’s classes? That spell”—he picked up Niall’s hat and looked at it, shaking his head—“I didn’t think you had it in you.”

“I know you didn’t. Now take a drink of that brandy and let me treat you. The sooner you’re healed, the sooner you can leave my odious presence.”

“That’s not what I—”

Pen snatched the bottle from his hand and shoved it toward his mouth. He reached up quickly and took it from her before she could break his teeth with it, tipping it up and downing a good mouthful.

“Good. Now, for the last time, hold still.” She held his chin in her left hand and leaned forward till they were nearly nose to nose. She very gently ran her right index finger over the bridge of his nose until a muddy brown feeling of not-rightness told her where his injury was. Ah, there. Definitely broken. So what now? Ally had said that most healing spells were simple in form but required an immense amount of concentration: “You must exert your will on the injury and undo it. Not all that hard to do on yourself, but on someone else’s injuries, it can be difficult, indeed. Many witches never learn to do healing magic, though some excel at it.”

Hah. Doherty would just
love
it if she tried to heal him and couldn’t. So failure was not an option. Straightening her shoulders and doing her best to ignore his eyes, fixed on hers, she told the bone to heal.

An enormous pressure seemed to build inside her head as she concentrated, along with a buzzing sound in her ears and, oddly, a burning sensation over her scalp. Then all awareness of her body abruptly ceased. All she knew was that there was a broken place in front of her, and that when she willed it to, it would heal.

The thin seepage of blood from Doherty’s nose stopped.

“All right,” she murmured, exhaling. When had she held her breath? But she’d done it! The muddy, not-right feeling was gone when she touched the bridge of his nose again. She swallowed a triumphant “so there!” and said instead, “I can’t promise you won’t have a bump there, but it should stop hurting.”

He stared at her.

“Is that all right, Mr. Doherty? Shall I continue?”

“D’ye think ye ought to,
cailin
?” Corkwobble interjected. “He doesn’t seem as appreciative as he ought, I’m thinkin’.”

“Hush, Corkwobble.” She flexed her hands, then brushed her fingertips several times under first one of his eyes, then the other, willing the lurid bruising to undo itself. The purple streaks faded to green, then yellow, then disappeared completely. As when she had healed the bone, all sense of self disappeared. Only when she let her hands fall to her sides was she aware of a peculiar throbbing, half tickle, half pain, running through them.

Doherty’s stiff posture relaxed slightly. “My head’s almost stopped aching,” he said, sounding surprised.

“How amazing,” she muttered. His head may have stopped aching, but hers had begun to feel like an anvil under a blacksmith’s hammer, and a deep weariness had settled on her shoulders. Ally hadn’t exaggerated when she said healing spells were difficult ones, and Pen had never tried to do more than one at a time before. But there was still that gash above his left eye to take care of. She sighed and blinked, willing her eyes to stay open and focus properly.

This time she stroked the skin all around the cut, murmuring softly, asking it to close and be whole. This spell felt a little easier. The gash was where she could see it, which made focusing easier. The edges of the torn flesh slowly pulled together, like a flower closing at sunset. She leaned forward and breathed gently on his brow, barely an inch above it, and the skin once more was white and unbroken. She felt a tremor run through him as she did, and had to smother an exclamation of annoyance. Good God, she was helping him. He didn’t have to shudder with dislike quite so openly.

“I’m sorry if my closeness was distasteful, Mr. Doherty,” she said, pulling away and dropping her hand from his face as the last of the
power ebbed from her fingertips. “But I think you will find that your injuries are mostly gone.”

Her head was pounding so hard that it was difficult to see clearly, and her entire right hand had gone icy and numb, but an excited elation filled her. She’d done it. The power she’d felt coursing through her in those seconds was stronger and more pure than anything she’d felt before.
This
was what true magic felt like. All her work of the last months had begun to bear fruit. Persy might have been able to do what she’d done without missing a beat, but Persy wasn’t here. She, Pen, had done it!

Doherty raised tentative hands to his brow, then stared, wide-eyed, at his clean, unbloodied fingers. Now if only he would leave, so that she could go lie down with a cold cloth on her head and savor the triumph of the magic she’d just performed.

“There’s a door out the back of the cellar, which is probably the easiest way to leave without anyone seeing you,” she said pointedly. “Wear the hat. No one will stop you if you look like Mr. Keating. But don’t dawdle. I can keep the spell going another half hour, but I’m a little tired.” She gestured to the light that still hovered above them and closed her eyes, feeling herself sway slightly. “And take that to see by. I can find my way up without it.”