Antebellum Awakening (The Network Series #2)(37)

His words set fire to my rage, making the hair on the back of my neck stand up. What did he know anyway?

“You think you know me so well?” I hissed. “Nothing is holding me back! I’m learning just fine. I executed each task today just as you ordered me.”

“I didn’t say your footwork was a problem,” he said in a calm, unapologetic tone. “Your footwork is fine.”

“Then what is my problem?”

“I can’t tell you that. Only you can.”

I growled, grabbed the two buckets, and left without another word.

???

With Leda and Camille occupied by their studies, I took the opportunity to visit Miss Celia—one of the teachers at Miss Mabel’s School for Girls and Master of the kitchen—later that day.

Without girls to fill the school, the usual bustle and hum of life had drained away. No stray giggles. No candles in the windows. It made me feel decidedly lonely as I approached the old manor. Even with the bright sun illuminating the green strands of ivy, it looked bleak and forgotten.

I pushed the creaky iron gate open with trepidation. My eyes flickered to the attic and then away again. Magic stirred within, annoyed by the sudden flood of memories. I turned the power away and opened the heavy front door.

A tall, expansive foyer with a silver chandelier greeted me. I ran my eyes over the twirling stairs, the ivy carved into the railing, and the crimson rug that ran along each step. The comforting sound of Miss Celia humming drifted through the empty corridor, pulling me from the dark reveries the magic threatened to pull me into. Smiling, I closed the door behind me and called out. If I startled Miss Celia she’d clobber me with a rolling pin.

“Miss Celia?”

The humming ceased.

“Who’s there?” she called back. I followed her voice down the hall and turned into the kitchen on the left.

“Oh, blessed be!” she cried, her rosy cheeks lighting up. “Bianca, what are you doing here?”

Miss Celia looked the way she always did, with a little pouf of gray and white hair on top of her head and her favorite old apron with flour splotches covering her torso. Her wrinkled, kind face lit up in a smile. I recognized a familiar rectangle of dough on the counter in front of her. She must be making a batch of her famous cinnamon buns! Good timing indeed.

“Merry meet, Miss Celia,” I said, laughing. “Are you busy?”

“Not too busy to talk! Come in, come in and have a seat! I’d love a little chat. Heaven knows it’s too quiet here with only me and Scarlett around. How are you?”

I obeyed, taking a seat on a stool near the cupboard where she worked the dough, not realizing how much I had missed her. When she didn’t have forty hungry girls to cook for and a gaggle of students coming in and out of the kitchen all the time, she seemed more like a friend than a teacher. We dispatched with the trivialities about my time at Chatham Castle quickly.

“And Camille?” she asked. “How is she enjoying the castle?”

“She’s the center of attention with the Guardians,” I said. Miss Celia’s eyes sparkled.

“Yes, yes I can see that. Sounds like a lovely time. And Leda is holed up in the library doing classes, I hear.”

“Yes, and Michelle is the pride of the kitchens.”

Miss Celia waved a hand through the air, spreading a slight puff of flour as she went. “Of course,” she cried. “Michelle is one of the brightest girls I’d ever met, that’s why I recommended her so highly to Fina.”

“Miss Celia,” I asked, making sure to keep my tone light and sweet. “I came for a specific reason. May I ask you a few questions?”

“Of course! Ask me anything.”

Ha! We’ll see about that.

“It’s in regards to Mabel.”

Her countenance dropped a little, suddenly not as bright as it had been.

“Miss Mabel?” she repeated, forcing nonchalance. “She’s been quite busy these past few months and I haven’t—”

“No,” I said, pulling Mildred’s Resistance from my bag and setting it in front of me with a loud thud. It sounded like the final gong before a death blow. “Her grandmother.”

Miss Celia paled beneath her flushed cheeks, her rolling pin poised just above the dough. She stared at the book for a second, and her eyes darted back to mine.

“Why?” she asked in a faint voice.

“I need information.”

Miss Celia dropped the rolling pin and turned away, dodging some of the cast iron frying pans and copper pots suspended from the ceiling. She opened a long cupboard and fumbled through several glass jars of spices with a trembling hand.

“I’d prefer not to talk about her, if you don’t mind,” she said in a clipped tone, dissolving her previous joviality.

“But I do mind,” I said, sliding off the stool. “I need to know about her, and you worked with her all the time. You are probably the one person alive that knows her best, except Miss Mabel. Please, Miss Celia?”

She cast me a suspicious look from the corner of her eyes.

“I can’t imagine why anyone needs to know about her. She was not a nice witch.”

“Because I need to find out more about Miss Mabel,” I said. “Learning about the original Mabel may give me some more clues.”