Burning Bright (39 page)

Durrant nodded. “Dismissed, Miss Pembroke.”

She curtsied to Durrant, curtsied to Crawford after a moment’s hesitation, then left quickly, before the admiral could change his mind.
Going home, going home, going home
sang a silly chorus inside her head. She had won. She had stood up to Durrant and bent him to her will. It was hard not to skip down the passage like a child racing home for a promised treat.

She came into the entrance chamber and called out, “Mr. Hervey,” and a man standing near the front door, the only man in the room not dressed in a uniform, turned abruptly.

“
Elinor
,” he said, striding toward her, and Elinor stopped, her whole body gone numb in an instant.

It was her father.

In which Elinor has an unwelcome surprise

ou disobedient
child
,” her father said, his voice low and harsh. “Do you have any idea what you have done to our family? To your
mother
?” He grabbed her upper arm and squeezed.

Elinor cried out and reflexively tried to pull away, but without success. She barely felt the hard pressure of his hand; she was numb with shock and the beginnings of fear. He could not have found her so soon. He could not be there. Uniformed men stared at their tableau and whispered, but no one stepped forward to intervene.

“Papa,” she began.

“Do not address me. I do not wish to hear a single word from you. You will return with me immediately, and we will attempt to mitigate the unparalleled disaster you have brought upon yourself. Everyone knows what you have been about, Elinor. They know you have spent untold hours
alone
with the worst kind of reprobates the Navy can dredge up. Lord Copley himself took great pleasure in telling me where you were; can you imagine my humiliation? Your reputation is in ruins. You have stained the Pembroke name with your behavior—think of what you have done to your sister—do you believe
any
man will want a wife who may be as ungoverned and wanton as her degenerate sister?”

She yanked on his hand, harder, and he crushed her arm with his grip. “Papa, I have done nothing to sully my reputation, I have been—”

“I told you to be silent.” He began dragging her toward one of the hallways leading off the entrance. “We will find a Bounder to take you back to London; I cannot bring myself to call it your home, since your actions prove you think little of those who reared and cared for you.”

“No.” Where was Stratford? He must have been called away. He could not have known she would need him.

She began struggling, drawing more attention to herself, but still no one said a word. Frantically, she slapped at her father’s hand, realizing only when it was too late that her own hand was on fire. Mr. Pembroke thrust her away from him, clutching his burned hand to his chest. “
How dare you!
” he shouted. “You
dare
use your vile talent on your own father!”

“It… it was an accident, papa, forgive me. Forgive me!”

He examined his hand closely. Elinor did not think it looked badly burned, but the fury in his eyes told her it was the same to him as if she’d burned it off entirely. “Ungoverned, ungrateful
wretch
. I thank God for all our sakes Lord Huxley is still willing to offer you the protection of his name. You will have to demonstrate your gratitude to him. Redeem yourself, and someday I may forgive you for your arrogant selfishness.”

“No,” Elinor whispered, her eyes filling with tears. “I will not return with you.”

“You have no choice in the matter. I am your father and you will do as I say.”

“I beg your pardon,” said a familiar, perfectly composed voice, “but Miss Pembroke is not going anywhere.”

“Who the devil are you, interfering in a private matter?” Mr. Pembroke said.

“Captain Miles Ramsay,” Ramsay said, coming to stand close behind Elinor. His warm, strong presence at her back was like an anchor, steadying her against the fear her father always instilled in her. “I’m Miss Pembroke’s commanding officer. I take it you are Mr. Pembroke.”

“The idea that my daughter is a member of His Majesty’s Navy is simply ridiculous,” Mr. Pembroke said. “She has no commanding officer. She owes her obedience to
me
.”

“Miss Pembroke is of age and an Extraordinary and therefore allowed to enter into contracts in her own name. She has served valiantly in several battles. The Navy believes her to be one of its own.”

“I came here to speak to Admiral Durrant. He’ll listen to reason, or I’ll bring suit against him for abduction.”

“I chose this path, papa—”

“If you will not be silent, I will silence you myself!”

“Do not make threats against Miss Pembroke,” Ramsay said, his calm tone turning to anger.

Elinor did not have to see Ramsay to know he would fight this battle for her as surely as she knew she could not allow him to. She looked at her father’s face, contorted with fury, and remembered that long night curled up in the crevice of the rock, and could not understand why she had ever feared him.

“I will not be silent!” she shouted. “You have belittled me, and mocked me, and told me I should be grateful for your attention, paltry as it was, and I owe you
nothing
. I will not return with you, papa, I will not marry according to your dictates, I will not behave as you demand so you will be covered in my reflected glory. And I feel no remorse for taking the action I did!”

“You dare speak to your father—”

Elinor laughed. “My father? Had you ever behaved toward me as a father should toward his daughter, we would not now be having this conversation. I might have remained at home, meek and biddable, living an empty life. So I must thank you for being the impetus that brought me to a place I love, surrounded by people who respect me and my talent.”

She snatched at his wrist and brought his burned hand up to hang, unresisting, between them. “My talent, papa. You thought only of my talent in the abstract, didn’t you? As a chapter in your ongoing thesis? You never realized what the world would think of me. Did you know if I am so much as threatened, my
attacker
will be brought up on charges before a court of law regardless of what I do to him in my defense? That’s how valuable I am, papa, and if you dare lay a hand on me again, I will destroy it and no one,
no one
, will step in to defend you.”

She flung his hand away from her. “Speak to the admiral if you must. He doesn’t like me much, and I am certain you will both have much to talk about with regard to my character. But he will never grant your request, because I am needed here.”

Mr. Pembroke’s face was the color of old brick and his mouth hung open, his jaw slack. He rubbed his wrist as if she’d already carried out her threat. “You are nothing to me,” he whispered. “I disown you. Never return, do you hear? I never want to see your face again. From this moment I have only two daughters.”

“I think, in a sense, that is all you have ever had,” Elinor said.

Mr. Pembroke’s jaw twitched. He pushed past Ramsay like a blind man, striding back toward the entrance hall.

“Mr. Hervey, take Miss Pembroke back to the ship,” Ramsay said in a low voice. “I think I will make sure he doesn’t cause more trouble.” He squeezed Elinor’s shoulder briefly, then went off after her father.

“Clap on,” Stratford said, and there was a moment of insubstantiality and she was on
Athena
again. She didn’t need to see the unique symbol of the Bounding chamber; she could tell by the smell of Dolph’s cooking and the way the ship rocked on the harbor waves that she was home.

“I didn’t know where you were,” she said.

“I went for the captain as soon as I saw there was trouble,” Stratford said. “Was that truly your father?”

Elinor laughed bitterly. “Did you not hear? He disowned me. I have no father.” She pushed open the door of the Bounding chamber and crossed the empty mess deck, propelled by a confusing mixture of emotions. Her family had cast her off—she had finally,
finally
stood up to her father—Ramsay had come when she needed him—she was back on
Athena
, this time for always—
where am I to go when this war is over? Does Selina despise me?

The thought was enough to turn all those emotions into tears, and she sped up her pace, ignoring Stratford’s questions. “I cannot,” she said, “do not ask me,” knowing that did not make sense, and fled to the privacy of what was once again her bedchamber.

It did not appear Ramsay had used it while she was gone. He must have been certain she would come back someday, to give up his comfort for over a month when there was no need for it. She sat on her bed and covered her face with her hands, but no more tears came. Of course not; why would they? She had won two battles today, three if you included intimidating Crawford, which still stirred her heart with fierce joy.

She pictured her father’s face, as shocked by her sudden and violent outburst as the fox must be when the hen turns and savages him. She regretted nothing she had said. She had been entirely right about everything, except possibly for her assertion that she could burn him with impunity. Well, if Ramsay had got away with murder…except her talent was far more terrifying than his, and it was possible the government might actually put her to death if they thought she was capable of indiscriminate killing. She let her hand burn and turned it about, marveling at the colors. She would simply have to avoid killing anyone who was not a pirate. It was such an absurd thought that she laughed.

“If you’re capable of laughing, I will assume you aren’t consumed with remorse,” Ramsay said, his voice muffled by the door.

“I will never feel remorse for what I said,” Elinor said, opening the door to find Ramsay smiling at her. Something about him looked different—his hair, perhaps? “I should have said it all years ago.”

“Mr. Hervey was in such distress when he arrived I thought I might need to rescue you from a dragon,” Ramsay said. “But it seems you didn’t need rescuing.”

“I could never have stood up to him had you not been there. You gave me courage.”

“Then I’m happy to have been of use after all.” He smiled again, and bowed.

That was it. All his teeth were perfectly straight. Why he had had the crooked one fixed after all this time—but then, Elinor knew something of what it was like to finally be driven to fix a problem you had been living with for years.

“Your father went back to London, as far as I could tell,” Ramsay went on. “He didn’t speak with the admiral. I assume he was serious about his threat to disown you.”

“He is always serious about his threats. It is how he makes them convincing.”

Ramsay leaned against the door frame. “And he threatened to make you marry?”

“Yes. But I refuse to marry merely to be some breeding animal.” Elinor’s hands flew up to cover her mouth. “I cannot believe I said anything so indelicate to you!”

Ramsay laughed. “Well, you
have
been spending a great deal of your time among sailors. You’ll be drinking grog next.”

“That will never happen, I assure you, Captain.”

“I feel some anxiety about asking you this question, but did I have Mr. Hervey abduct you?”