Whisper of Magic (24 page)

“Erran?” She tried the intimacy of it and liked it. “And I
am Celeste, please. I have too few people to call me so these days. Your mother
died young?”

“My mother died before I had any memory of her. My
grandfather had all sons, legitimate and otherwise, as did my father, and there
was quite a collection of boys at Iveston when I was in the nursery. You’ve met
my Uncle Pascoe, he’s only about six years older than I am, so he and other
uncles and cousins were still at home, many of them young bachelors. At some
point, my father gave up on hiring nannies and nursemaids and hired tutors. The
upstairs maids gradually departed. It became a family joke that any woman
looking for employment at Iveston was hoping to better herself by becoming a
mistress. Aside for brief visits from ex-fiancées, Aster is the first lady in
decades who dared descend on our household and stay.”

“My word,” Celeste murmured. “It’s a wonder you didn’t all
turn out like beasts in the field. You must have had good tutors.”

“They pointed our studies in the direction of our interests
to keep us tame. Dunc had the estate, of course, and our father kept him busy.
Theo always had his head in books and was good at mathematics and was dreamer
enough to study the stars. That kept him occupied, and so forth. We didn’t know
anything different.”

“And you?” she asked. “How did they tame you?”

“I was the youngest.” His voice conveyed a verbal shrug. “I
just followed the others around. I liked taking things apart, but tutors
couldn’t help me put them together again. As the baby, I couldn’t fight boys
bigger than I was, so I learned to argue instead of punch. You need to be
getting some sleep. Tomorrow is likely to be a miserable, long day.”

There were so very many things she’d like to ask . . . .
But she feared the questions would only stir this longing their kiss had set
aflame. “Thank you for not hating me,” she whispered. “Good night.”

He reached across the pillows and found her hand. “I have no
earthly reason to hate you. I just cannot be what you need.”

She clasped his rough hand and felt a melting away of so
many fears . . . that alone should have made her fearful. But
she didn’t push him away. “I don’t need a man to take care of me,” she
whispered back. “But I need a friend.”

He squeezed her hand but released it quickly.

He’d already made himself clear—he wasn’t the marrying sort
and he didn’t have lady friends. She’d have to cast aside any hope of more
kisses—that way lay certain disaster.

***

With no good means of appeasing his arousal, Erran barely
slept and woke in the same state. Rather than shock his lady
friend
, he grabbed his coat and boots
and slipped out to wash in cold water at the pump.

She wanted to be
friends
!
No wonder men and women shared little more than beds. He glared at his
whiskered face in the bent metal mirror and attempted to scrape off the worst
of his stubble. Men were furry, lust-crazed beasts. Women were . . .
obviously oblivious to beasts.

They saw pretty coats and shiny boots and heard flattery and
dreamed romantical notions. Ladies needed a basic
education in the Care and Feeding of Men and Other Animals. That would
discourage them from owning man or beast.

He ordered breakfast sent up for the lady but ate his
downstairs. When he thought he’d given her enough time, he rapped on the door
before entering. At her call, he stepped inside to help carry out their trunks.

She was still brushing out her hair—her waist-length,
shimmering waterfall of mahogany tresses. Erran nearly swallowed his eloquent
tongue.

She glanced guiltily up at him. “I didn’t braid it properly
last night and now I’m a mess and we’ll be meeting the Malcolm ladies today and
I thought—”

Impatiently, he crossed the room and grabbed the brush. “The
ladies will be so busy talking that they won’t notice if you walked in
upside-down.” He buried his crude hands in smooth silk and was as aroused as
he’d been before he’d doused himself in cold water. Gritting his teeth, forcing
himself not to hold tight and tip her head back so he could kiss her again, he
stroked out the last of the knots. He began braiding, when all he wanted was to
feel all that glorious silk falling across his naked chest as he crushed his
mouth against her lush lips.

“What are you doing?” She tried to take away the brush,
obviously not following the path of his lust. “I can’t go in braids.”

“We will be riding sorry nags in rotten weather for miles.
Braids are the only thing that will hold. How many of them do you want?” He
sounded grouchy but couldn’t help it while fighting the need to stroke her
slender throat and drag her into his arms.

She grabbed a hank of thick tresses and began separating out
strands. “Whatever it takes,” she said in frustration. “I’ll just pin it all
together and secure it with ribbons. I should just chop it all off.”

“Don’t you dare!” he roared in horror, torturing himself by
running his fingers through the softness to start a smaller braid. “I’ve never
seen hair so rich and thick. It doesn’t even curl about in wisps but lies just
where you put it. It’s enchanting.” And he knew he was fully insane to say any
such thing, except he was appalled at the thought of all that beauty falling on
a barber’s floor.

“It is a nuisance without a maid. If you can wear mufflers
instead of starched linen when traveling, then I should have better ways of
managing. I am sorry to delay the start of our journey.” She began another
braid.

Apparently she’d noticed that he wasn’t wearing a starched
collar this morning. How much else did she notice? That she’d been observing
him as he observed her stirred him almost as much as their kiss last night.
Almost.

He’d never been kissed with such gentleness and genuine
passion in his life, and he was starved for more. Maybe he should have kissed
more ladies and fewer maids. Whores never kissed at all. He hadn’t thought
ladies would either.

“If I had known the difficulty, I would not have allowed you
to come,” he said curtly, to distract himself. “But I wasn’t thinking of hair
at the time.” He had been thinking of exactly what had happened last night. And
what he wanted to do tonight.

“Neither was I,” she admitted. “I’ve always had Nana or
Sylvia to help me. I had the maid at the inn yesterday, but I didn’t want to
ask here.”

“I’ve made note of the condition of this place to tell
Duncan when we return.” He finished off the braid and reluctantly let her pin
and tuck the ends into a chignon.

He couldn’t prevent visions of how all that glorious dark
silk would look hanging over bare breasts. He wasn’t even certain a bruising
ride would cure what ailed him—not that the nags the inn provided would manage
more than a trot. They’d sent the post boy away in favor of a cart and horses
that might better traverse the muddy lane through the woods ahead.

Celeste tied a cap over her hair and let him help her into
the cloak. Even buried in layers of wool and fur, she had the power to arouse
him just by her subtle scent. Erran heaved a trunk to his shoulder, put a hand
to her back, and escorted her out to their waiting mares.

It was too early for most of the vagrants to be hanging
about. Erran loaded the trunks into the small pony cart he’d hired for their
baggage, making certain his pistol and sword were visible to discourage any
brigands who fancied the lady’s cloak.
Celeste’s
cloak. He wanted to savor the intimacy of her name and knew he was in deep
trouble.

She handed a coin to the boy holding the horses’ reins. “I
would appreciate it if you would tell your friends that I do not have any more
coins,” she said in that throaty tone that could make grown men weep. “But if
we travel safely, the marquess will reward those willing to do an honest day’s
work. I can see you’re a hard worker, and I shall tell him that once we see him
again.”

On the surface, this was pure silliness, Erran knew. No
thief would care about an honest day’s work. But she was weaving spells again,
convincing the boy that it would be dangerous to follow them and beneficial to
leave them alone. Erran hoped the message reached those who needed to hear it.
He glanced at the few loungers by the door. They’d heard.

The pony cart driver merely looked stoic. Dunc had
recommended him, so Erran had some hope the baggage would ultimately arrive at
Wystan.

“Perhaps we ought to experiment sometime to see who is
seduced into behaving and who responds to the threat of weapons,” Erran said
dryly as he lifted her into the saddle.

“The power here is different,” she said, revealing her
bewilderment. “It’s more . . . feminine . . . somehow
than the house in town. I think experimentation requires controlled
circumstances, correct?”

He snorted his disbelief. “Correct, if one understands what
needs to be controlled.
Power
that
cannot be measured or seen or heard is not a tangible control.”

More loudly, so anyone listening could hear, he added, “My
pistol fires five shots. You do not need to worry, my dear. Thieves have no
chance against it.”

He could not interpret the look she shot him as he helped
her into the side saddle, then mounted his own nag, and led the way into the
forest around Wystan.

Once they were far enough down the road, she rode close
enough to ask, “Do you really have such a horrible gun?”

“I do. It was mostly a matter of balancing the percussion
level and gunpowder amounts so it wouldn’t blow up.”

“Can you not patent such an invention as you said you might
the sewing mechanism?” she asked in curiosity.

Erran glared ahead. He’d had this argument before. “I could.
I won’t. Can you imagine what these roads would be like if every thief had a
weapon like that?”

He waited for her to jump on him as his brothers had, saying
honest men could better protect their homes, soldiers could win wars, and the
world would be a safer place.

Celeste didn’t say anything. She frowned and worked his
argument through that frightening female mind of hers.

“You have given up the chance for great wealth in order to
keep more people from dying,” she said in what sounded like honest wonder, and
not her magic vocalization. “A gun like that would be a killing machine in the
wrong hands, and it would mostly be the wrong hands that it would fall
into—people who like killing and think human life can be wasted.”

Erran wanted to hug her. He wanted to more than hug her, but
fortunately, they were on horseback. “Thank you,” he said in relief. “I know it
is only a matter of time before someone else does what I have done, but I’d
rather not be known as the father of modern murder.”

She turned those intriguing light blue eyes up to him in
wonder. “It would be easy to love a man as wise as you.”

Celeste knew she had erred by mentioning
love,
but she had not been able to help
herself. He had invented a gun that could kill five people at once—and he
refused to sell it! Lord Erran’s mind was a fascinating place she would like to
explore more. But they rode along in silence after that. She debated all the
other things she could have said, but how else did one express such admiration?

It didn’t help that this damp forest in the midst of a
glorious autumn felt more like spring. She could feel the earth’s burgeoning
fecundity here. Or perhaps she was just remembering his kiss and how it had
felt sleeping beside him last night. She seemed compelled to do stupid things
around this brilliant, honorable, annoying man.

They kept their horses to the pace of the baggage cart. Lord
Erran . . .
Erran
 . . .
rode back and forth, keeping an eye on their surroundings but not leaving her
out of his sight, as she feared he might do. As he probably wanted to do, she
admitted. He looked dashing in his tall hat and caped redingote, every inch the
nobleman. Just watching him was cause for excitement.

Fortunately, that was all the excitement they encountered. They
rode into the village about noon. Enchanted by the neat cottages, nodding
Michaelmas daisies, and a few late roses, Celeste exclaimed in pleasure. “I
thought this would be a dismal place! It is lovely. Your family should visit
more often!”

Erran rode up beside her, pointing out a cottage almost
inundated in rose canes and surrounded by aromatic herbs. “That’s my
great-granny’s home, the Malcolm who was a cousin of your ancestor. I don’t
know who is living there these days. This was all owned by Malcolms once,
according to family legend, until they made the mistake of marrying into the
Ives family.”

“The mistake?” she asked in amusement. “From rural anonymity
to marriage to nobility is a mistake?”

He shrugged. “I don’t pay much attention to the stories. But
after the fifth Earl of Ives and Wystan married my great-grandmother, she gave
birth to my grandfather, who became the first Marquess of Ashford. There are
those in the family who claimed he had magical talents as strong as his
mother’s, and that was the reason he was so successful. You can ask the ladies
when we reach the tower.”

Magical talents
.
Celeste was wary of talking about magic. Native magic was often associated with
evil intent, and her own might be used that way. She’d rather just call it
talent
. She didn’t know if she dared ask
anyone anything so personal as to what kind of
talents
they possessed.

“Why do you call it the tower?” she asked, skipping over the
question his reply had opened.

“It was once a medieval fortress, but we’ve only maintained
the original hall—which was quite a large tower for the time. The bailey walls
have crumbled and been carried off to build the village. Once upon a time, this
must have been a bustling little town that supported a busy fort of knights and
courtiers and their households, but that’s all gone now. There is not much here
now that we have no need to guard against Scots barbarians.”