Chemistry of Magic: Unexpected Magic Book Five (Unexpected Magic #5)(64)

Emilia patted her shoulder. “You’re not the first and certainly won’t be the last to fall for a handsome face. We’re all animals in some ways. It’s our nature. You’ll know better next time and look past his face to see a man who is good to you.”

Thinking it was a very good thing that they’d married before Dare turned his seductive charms on her, Emilia couldn’t condemn this young girl for falling for kisses and promises.

She fixed a poultice, using some of the foreign arnica her grandfather had grown after receiving seeds from an herbalist in the Americas. Unlike ginger root, it thrived in his garden now. By the time Tess had a compress held to her bruise, the servants were trickling back—empty-handed.

Bridey arrived. Emilia looked up hopefully but her friend’s dire expression did not bode well.

Bridey shook her head in answer to Emilia’s silent question. “I think Tess should go to her room and lie down. We probably ought to fix her some lavender-chamomile tea to help her calm down.”

Looking shame-faced, Tess was easily persuaded to return to her room while a maid ran to fix the tea. Bridey paced the cell until the girl was out of hearing.

“What happened?” the baronetess demanded.

“I could ask the same,” Emilia replied, leaning against her counter. “Did Pascoe not catch up with the brute?”

“The wretch had a horse waiting outside. By the time Pascoe had his saddled, the thief was long gone. We don’t know the fields and woods here as well as the thief does, apparently. Pascoe sent a groom back to say he’s asking questions along the road toward Harrogate, but capture is not imminent.”

“We know who he is. We just need to find out where he lives,” Emilia said, not believing it would be that easy but trying to relieve her pregnant friend. “I should return to Dare, tell him that his plans are being threatened.” Emilia explained all she knew from Tess’s halting information.

Bridey’s fierce expression enhanced her appearance as a red-haired warrior. “But you still have the fair copy, don’t you? We’ll need to take it directly to the duke. He’ll stop anyone else from publishing it.”

“I think it may be more complicated than that, but I don’t understand how,” Emilia said, crouching down to pick up spilled papers. “Crenshaw used the book as a threat against lawsuits. I need to ask Dare what that means.”

“Countersuits, probably, or pressing charges against us for practicing medicine without a license, or witchcraft, for all we know. They seem desperate.” Bridey sounded furious as she stooped down to help with the papers.

“Witchcraft? That’s ridiculous.”

“I’ve had my own village turn against me on such charges,” Bridey warned. “Once people are afraid, they’ll steer away for no good reason at all. People are not brave. They find safety in numbers and the familiar, and what we are doing is not usual. Once rumors begin, the school may never open.”

Emilia knew Bridey’s past gave her reason to fear the worst, but she simply couldn’t accept that all their hard work would come to naught because of one brute. She might curl up and die along with Dare if she believed her book was truly lost.

“I will not believe people are so stupid and cowardly as to hide behind bullies. If so, then we can fight them by being brave.” With the papers gathered, Emilia stood. Her basket had been crushed, so she shuffled the manual into an orderly pile. “And there is nothing of witchcraft in a pharmacopeia. I think they are just desperate. My concern is for poor Tess—to be so used by her father and her lover!”

“There is your compassion and optimism speaking again. If you’ll use your head, you’ll realize that she is the one responsible for telling people about your book,” Bridey warned. “I do not know if we can trust her again.”

“I have spent my life writing that book. I will spend the rest of my life defending it, if necessary. We will take her with us to confront her father,” Emilia said, trying to prevent panic but fearing she sounded like an hysteric. “If Crenshaw was telling the truth, that’s where he’ll take the book.”

“Sommersville first,” Bridey suggested. “Then we will tackle Tess’s father.”

The yip of hounds ended any planning. William Ives-Madden appeared in the doorway, holding the leashes of straining dogs. “Do you have anything the thief handled?”

“Besides me and Tess?” Emilia asked, shuddering. “And the book he stole?”

Mr. Madden was nearly as large as Crenshaw, but his wide chest tapered to a narrow waist and hips, and even though he was dressed in a farmer’s jerkin and leather, he carried himself with the same air of nobility as his relations. He bent her a wry look that hid his concern. “He hit you?”

“Shoved me.” She pointed at her smashed basket. “I don’t know if straw helps, but he crushed that.”

She thought he might have growled, or perhaps that was his dogs. He let them sniff the basket, sniff her, and sniff the ground. They took off howling at some silent command, with William fast on their heels.

“How do they know which smell is which?” Emilia asked, preparing to leave. She needed the comfort and safety of her own four walls. And Dare. How would she tell Dare?

“I think Will talks to animals much as Pascoe’s son does,” Bridey said. “Who knows what he tells them?”