Spellbreaker (Spellbreaker Duology, #1)(35)

Ripping his hand away, he balled it into a fist. He would not give up. If he had to travel all of Europe, scour the Americas . . . he’d find a way somehow.

He barreled out of the auction house with Rainer on his heels, ignoring the whispers that followed them.





CHAPTER 10



If all three of Elsie’s employers ever demanded her attention at once, she would be in quite a pinch. As it was, Mr. Kelsey was preoccupied, the stonemasonry shop was in shape, and Ogden was busy, giving Elsie a rare chance to redeem herself to the Cowls.

The letter that had been tucked into her things after her dinner at the duke’s residence had not mentioned the door spell at all, to her surprise. Instead, she’d been given another task. She was to disenchant a carriage that had been hired to transport local poachers to court. It was a time-sensitive matter, and so Elsie moved quickly, even when it meant cutting through traffic or overpaying a cab driver to run his horses wild. Her personal funds were depleting quickly, but the Cowls hadn’t sent coin for travel in their last missive. Perhaps this was to be her punishment.

Not that it mattered. If no one intervened, men, boys, would be hanged for hunting animals on land owned by rich men. They just wanted to feed their families, and yet the neck of a human was priced the same as that of a pheasant. If Elsie could help them escape, she would do her part. Whatever it cost. She yawned, so many short nights catching up to her, but sleep was hardly important.

She went to London and found the public carriage house in question; the man she presumed ran it sat just outside, a newspaper in his hands and a cigar in his mouth, his hat pulled low to keep out the sun. Elsie walked past him, casual, before glancing over her shoulder and slipping inside the carriage house.

She nearly bumped into the tack on the wall and quickly sidestepped it, hiding herself among the vehicles stored within the space. The first spells she sensed were those on the wheels of a hansom cab. However, she doubted the Cowls would have sent her to intervene if the vehicle in question were a self-propelling carriage. Disabled by a spellbreaker, it wouldn’t be able to leave the carriage house much less be used for transporting anyone. So she moved on, searching for a vehicle with strengthening spells, bars, anything to denote the kind of vessel that might deliver “criminals” to their doom.

The farther into the carriage house she stepped, the darker it became, and everything began to look the same. What a bother.

Elsie persisted in her search, knowing the driver and authorities could come at any moment. Finally, she found it—a carriage bolstered by glowing runes of protection and fortification, which she pulled apart like hot ribbon candy. They pulsed light once before fading, like the last drag on a cigarette.

Voices at the front of the carriage house sent gooseflesh over her arms; Elsie hid behind a cab and held her breath. To her relief, they didn’t come any nearer. A vehicle was pulled out and driven away, and the man in charge resumed his reading of the day’s paper.

Holding her skirt close to prevent sullying it, Elsie carefully tiptoed her way toward freedom. Just as she stepped into the light, however, the caretaker looked up, his eyes beady and questioning.

Elsie put her hands on her hips. “I don’t suppose you rent omnibuses?”

He looked at her like she was mad. “Omnibuses? What does this look like, a rail station?”

Acting offended, Elsie turned on her heel and stalked away, going around the back of the carriage house to access the road home. Having spoken of omnibuses, she was reminded she could save a penny or two by taking one, and so she headed toward the market, eyes searching for one.

She’d just reached the sprawl of shoppers when a familiar voice reached her ears and stopped her in her tracks. She turned slowly, searching the crowd until she saw his face.

Alfred.

Alarm rushed up her limbs like a swarm of termites. She hadn’t seen him in nearly two years. He didn’t look any different, except for his hair. The ginger locks were a bit longer, styled differently. He was only one shop down from her, walking to a carriage with two heavy bags on his arm. A smile split his freckled face. It sent a knifepoint into the center of Elsie’s chest.

“You don’t have to carry those.” The handsome stranger who would later introduce himself as Alfred hurried across the street, outstretching his hand, offering to take the sack laden with canvas.

Elsie flushed at his approach and stuck her nose up. “Good sir, I am perfectly capable of carrying my own things, else I would not have purchased them.”

But she had let him carry her bags. And walk her to a carriage. And ask her name and where she lived, starting something he would kill just as easily months later.

Elsie blinked, coming back to the present just in time to spy Alfred’s companion, which only twisted the metaphorical blade piercing her breast.

The widow. The one they’d met when Alfred had taken Elsie out to dinner for her birthday. But . . . not a widow anymore. Not by the way they touched each other, shared a carriage, and—yes, that was a ring on her finger, wasn’t it?

Heat spread from her ribs, clawing down her legs and arms before turning to ice. So the woman hadn’t been a passing infatuation. Hadn’t left him for the weasel he was. He’d married her.

Married her.

Alfred turned just then, meeting Elsie’s eyes for a split second. She panicked. There was no use hiding. What would she say? What would—