Chapter Three #2
The last was not news to Taz, who had seen him, a great green dragon, magnificent and terrifying, rising from the inner courtyard with mighty sweeps of his broad wings.
Although Taz’s mage sense was unreliable with people—it worked best with plants—there had been no missing the mage power radiating from the mighty dragon. A glow of emerald light, shot through with gold, had surrounded him to double his already immense size.
And a stronger glow in a paler green, shining from the dragon’s shoulders, must have been Lady Baradine, for Taz had seen just that shade surrounding the mistress of the manor when she walked in the garden.
He reported the contents of each note to Hebog, and then left a note for Miss Thornton each time saying the Hawk had no instructions for her.
Which was true, but not the whole story, for Hebog was excited about all the comings and goings.
He was especially taken by the news that Lady Baradine had gone to London with her husband.
“Something is about to happen, Owl. She never leaves her home, for when she translocates, she has a bad reaction to it. They had a team of healers attending her for weeks after she and the dragon translocated to first appear in London. My information is that it is something to do with the catalyst power—moving suddenly injures her power, and through it, the catalyst herself.”
Poor lady. That would be why she flew. “They could not have gone very far, for they were back again three hours later,” he told Hebog.
“The Palace of Westminster,” Hebog informed him. “The dragon was seen, of course. One could hardly miss a flying beast the size of a cottage. But why did Parliament want to consult with the lady catalyst?”
Taz assumed the question was one Hebog was asking himself, for certainly he must know Taz had no idea.
“Tell the Rose to find out,” Hebog instructed. “That will be all, Owl.”
Dismissed again, Taz went to find paper and a pencil to write Miss Thornton a note.
*
Lord and Lady Baradine—or Cousin Jasper and Cousin Delia, as they insisted she call them—were really good at pretending to be nice to Sephie.
Sephie kept waiting for the cracks to show in their facade, but even when she allowed her own frustration and anger to show, they did not respond as expected.
A few days ago, Cousin Jasper had given her the same tests as the examiner all those years ago—with similar abysmal results.
This time, the bowl had exploded, the apple had divided neatly into peeled quarters, and the block of wood had become an owl.
A bird this time, yes, but not the rooster she had been trying for.
Instead of being angry or dismissive, Cousin Jasper smiled and said she had a powerful gift, and that the next step was to understand it. He told her he had struggled for years with plenty of power and unpredictable results, and had been lucky to find a tutor able to teach him some control.
Which must be rubbish, for he was the dragon lord, was he not? Besides, she had seen him fetch items from other parts of the house with no more than a thought, translocate without disturbing a hair on his head, and even turn into a huge, emerald-green dragon.
Still, she obediently did the exercises he taught her. Breathing first. Slow, deep, and controlled. Today was sensing magic, her own and that of others. That was easy, too. She had been doing it without realizing.
She had often been aware of a tingle across her skin, and a hum in her ears, but hadn’t connected it with the exercise of magic.
Once Cousin Jasper had explained it, he called his secretary and the housekeeper, both of whom had a magical gift.
The secretary could scry using any reflective surface, and the housekeeper was able to levitate objects, which she said was very useful for checking that the housemaids had swept under the beds.
Cousin Jasper and the two servants took it in turns to use their powers, first with Sephie watching and then while Sephie stood behind a screen so she could not see them.
She found it easy to tell the difference between them—both tingle and hum differed depending on who was using magic, and smell was also involved, though she had not realized before that every tingle and hum had come with a particular blend of scent elements.
Cousin Jasper’s magic had the most powerful effect, the tingle almost painful in its intensity, the hum a deep and purposeful bass sound that seemed to vibrate in her bones, while the scent of cinnamon filled the room.
When the secretary used a hand mirror to scry what was happening in the courtyard, the tingle was feather-light, the hum was a thread of a note, and there was a faint smell of almonds.
And to her mage sense, as Cousin Jasper called it, the housekeeper’s magical signature was between the two—a firmer touch, like a fingernail running down her skin, the hum two sweet high notes, and the scent like a fresh-cut orange.
“Cousin Delia smells of violets all the time,” she told Cousin Jasper. “I thought it was a perfume, but whenever she is near, I also feel a soft brush, as if someone is stroking my skin, and hear distant music. Could it be her magic?”
“It is,” the dragon lord confirmed. “I get violets, too, and if I’m far enough away, she glows a pale, minty green. Delia doesn’t so much do magic, as she is magic. Well done, Persephone.”
And so Sephie came away from lessons feeling almost pleased with herself. She had not messed up. Cousin Jasper had been pleased with her.
The satisfaction did not last. By the time she went for her daily walk in the rose garden, reality had dawned. So what if she could feel and smell magic? She still couldn’t do it! Or, at least, her best magical intentions twisted into something else in the final result.
The singing gardener had left a note in the cavity of the sundial. The Hawk wanted her to find out why Lord and Lady Baradine had gone to the Palace of Westminster. How? Did the Welshman think she could just ask?
If she could find Barberry, she would tell him how ridiculous his master was being.
In the past few days, she had observed him several times from the window of her bedchamber, which looked out over this part of the garden.
He seemed to spend most of his time in the rose garden that was to the left of her view, the greenhouse to the right, and the knot garden with the perennial borders that lay between the two.
She went up the stairs from the rose garden into the knot garden, and he was there, crouched down halfway along one of the perennial borders.
He was singing magic again. She was too far away to hear his voice, but she could see his mouth moving, could hear the music, feel it dancing over her skin, and smell a complex scent of flowers and leaves.
Her irritation with the message subdued temporarily by her curiosity, she marched up to him and demanded, “Why are you singing magic to the plants?”
He looked up, breaking off his tune. “Good day, Miss Thornton. I am spelling the plants to reject insects and fungi. I need to renew the spell every week, so I do one side a day, and half of the central beds on the remaining two days.”
“That is six days,” she informed him.
“Sunday is my day off.”
Sephie didn’t have an answer to that, so she changed the subject. “How does the Hawk expect me to find out why Lord and Lady Baradine went to the Palace of Westminster? I didn’t even know that was where they went!”
Barberry stood, straightening slowly. “Just do what you can, Miss Thornton,” he said, his tone soothing, as if he was dealing with a fractious child.
The urge to smack his carefully bland face was almost irresistible.
And she was being completely unreasonable. None of this was Barberry’s fault. He was following orders, just as she was, though no doubt someone in his walk of life could expect no better. On the other hand, he was clearly a mage, so why was he working as a gardener?
Which turned her mind in another direction, and she asked, “Why do you sing your magic?”
That fetched a sigh from the man. “I find my magic is more likely to do what I intend if I sing,” he told her.
The implication was that he, too, had trouble with magic that didn’t behave as expected.
Perhaps, after all, Cousin Jasper had meant just what he had said.
Perhaps she was not the only one whose magic twisted in the making.
She returned to the house determined to try harder in her lessons and not to resist what Cousin Jasper was attempting to teach her.
Her resolution lasted until the next day’s lesson, when everything she did turned out wrong, and Cousin Jasper’s patient voice lacerated her already abraded pride so badly that she lashed out and told him to stop patronizing her.
He called a halt to the lesson, told her to take the rest of the morning off, and left the room.