Chemistry of Magic: Unexpected Magic Book Five (Unexpected Magic #5)(35)

“You are the one who said we should not hire too many people,” she retorted. “I told you Grandfather got by with only a few. And the manservant was elderly when I was little. Mr. Butler mostly polished silver beside the fire. If you wish to bathe in comfort, we will need more help.”

Bessie laid out a gown and scurried out of the room.

Dare rubbed his heavy stubble, coughed, and screwed up his brow in thought. “A steam engine to pump water upstairs, perhaps. We could sell the patent if we made it work.” Coughing harder, he retreated to his own room.

Emilia trailed after him, frowning as he dosed himself from the medicine bottle. She had been mindless last night, lost in so many sensations that she had not felt his pain so much as her joy. But she remembered the unrightness in his gut. Consumption occasionally affected other parts of the body like bones or kidneys, but she didn’t remember reading anything about the digestive organs.

“Or we could catch rain water on the roof and pipe it down,” he continued, his brain outracing his weakening body. “That would be cheaper, although it’s an old idea, and we can’t sell it.”

“You are quite mad, but it’s a happy mad.” She watched where he stowed the bottle while her own ideas mulled about in her brain. “If you are to use Grandfather’s workshop for blowing up things, I’ll use his growing house for my herbs. But I’ll need a place to mix and store them. The abbey is too far away for regular use.”

Dare kissed her hair. “We’ll look after we break our fast. For some reason, I am unreasonably hungry this morning.”

She hoped and prayed that meant she was helping. Consumption often went into remission, she knew. If her healing energy and fresh country air could make that happen. . . They could have years.

Not knowing exactly how she felt about that, she hurried off to dress. She had never particularly wanted to marry, had not seen the need for a demanding male in her life, but now. . . She could see the advantage of sharing the burdens of running the estate. And now that there was no question about whether or not she could endure carnal relations, she could definitely see the benefit of having a husband in bed.

The magical Mrs. Peacock had prepared rashers of bacon, boiled eggs with a savory sauce, and tomatoes cooked with herbs so delicious that Emilia could have eaten them all. The toast arrived hot and buttered. There was even coffee for Dare, and she enjoyed it simply for the effect it had on her husband. Instead of grumbling and poking at his food, he looked blissful, cleaning off every platter placed in front of them after she’d helped herself.

“We are definitely keeping Mrs. Peacock,” he said, putting his linen back on the table and shoving back his chair.

“Then you had best discover how much she wishes to be paid, and if she wants to take up residence in the house. I believe she stayed overnight, but she has a place of her own.”

“I’d better calculate budgets or I’ll be putting my family into the street just so we can pay staff. Will you do the interviews with Mrs. Wiggs?” He stood and offered his hand to help her up.

“I expect she’ll arrive with an army, and I’ll have no say in the matter. Perhaps you had best calculate budgets first so I can tell her when she exceeds it. And I’ll poke around and look for a place for my work.”

She had an ulterior motive in sending Dare off to play with numbers. As soon as she knew he was ensconced in the downstairs study, Emilia hurried up to their shared bedchamber. James had already straightened it up and vanished on his lengthy list of duties. She hurried to the dressing table where Dare had stored his foul Fowler’s Solution. He had several bottles. She borrowed one, tucked it in the apron she wore when she worked, and hurried out to the old glass-roofed house her grandfather had once used for his plant experiments.

The glass was broken in places and covered in ivy. The bedding tables were bare and filthy. One day, she might have it repaired so she could experiment in growing exotic herbs. But for now, it was private, and it had tables, and no one would question if she carried her herbs back here and mixed them.

It wasn’t sanitary enough for making pills. All her reading had convinced her that clean conditions were absolutely necessary, and Bridey agreed with this theory. Emilia knew she had to wait for facilities at the abbey that she could keep sterile. But for now, she could scrub a table, cover it in fresh linen, and set up her mortar and pestle. She poured some of the foul medicine into a cup and sniffed it. There was an old pharmacopeia in the study where Bessie worked, but she didn’t need to consult medicine lists for what she wanted to do. She simply needed to duplicate smell and viscosity. There was a faint odor of lavender. She dipped her finger in the liquid and licked it. There was a vaguely salty taste. She just needed to disguise the flavor of her healing herbs and his healthy mineral water, create a slight oily thickness, and Dare would never notice the difference.

It was an experiment, she told herself. If he actually worsened for drinking her healthy concoction, she’d throw it away, and he could go back to his foul solution.

If her medicine couldn’t help Dare, she’d have to question everything she’d learned and believed about herbs. Her life work would have been a waste.

She couldn’t let that happen. She’d make a perfectly dreadful housewife.





Chapter 11





“There is a dreadful stench coming from that shed,” Bessie said breathlessly, having run past Dare’s workshop to reach Emilia’s glass shed. “And Mrs. Wiggs is here with half the village.”