Chapter 17 Honeymoon Hideaway
HONEYMOON HIDEAWAY
Temple was raising the hammer high when the summoning stone began to burn a hole through his pocket. He leaned the hammer against the table and pulled the stone out. He’d told the king he’d be away from London for a fortnight, but the man couldn’t wait two more days.
Temple wouldn’t go. He had plans.
Involving his wife. And whatever surface he found her closest to. And the other increasingly uncomfortable tool in his trousers demanding his attention. Diana was the only thing currently on his schedule other than pretending to work in his forge.
But the stone still glowed.
He placed it on the worktable and heard the knock, soft. Then, softer, her voice.
“Temple?”
He abandoned the hammer on his worktable, wiped a bead of sweat from his forehead and threw a shirt over his head. Sweat hugged it close to his skin as he made it through the forge and into the stables.
She stood alone in the alley, peeking inside the stables. A horse nickered at her, and she laughed. “Temple!” she called again.
“Here.” He strode into the doorway and leaned against the frame.
“Is something wrong?” He knew there wasn’t.
He’d have felt it through the iron band on his finger.
She looked fine, perfectly so. God damn it.
She looked wonderful, her hair a bit messy, strands clinging to her neck and falling in her eyes.
Her cheeks were rosy, and he knew what every curve on her lovely little body felt like beneath that pretty new gown. The sensation a part of him now.
She looked like a cream puff. The sleeves sectioned into smaller and smaller puffs the lower down the sleeve they went, a row of little bows marching down the skirt. A delectable bit of fluff he wanted to tear his teeth into.
“Temple?” She tilted her head to the side.
“Oh, yes.” He blinked away from the images his very active imagination had been weaving of peeling that dress away from her body. “Right. Is something wrong?” If not, he could take her upstairs. He’d hit a dead end with his own project. Might as well stimulate the mind and body with other pursuits.
She shook her head. “Nothing is wrong.” Then she frowned. “Not wrong wrong, but… I’m out of books. Again.”
In the last twelve days since their wedding—no, in the last nine days since he’d let her leave the bedroom—she’d gone through boxes of books. And then even more boxes.
“I’ll send to Nickleby for another box.”
“Or…” Her hips swayed as she made her careful way to him. “I could go. We could go, and—”
“Not yet.” Leaving too risky. A woman like her wasn’t supposed to exist. If anyone found out—a chill ripped up his spine, and it was damned difficult for an alchemist to feel cold.
Hell, he’d been shocked when he’d seen her with a glamour.
He’d been unable, for several agonizing moments to reassure her he’d never harm her.
The implications were astonishing. Transcendent talent, despite what the ton claimed, likely had little to do with the blood.
Or not everything to do with it. And Diana had taught herself to control it.
Clever, clever woman.
And he’d managed to marry her.
“The king,” she said in the dark, “has already sent two letters asking you to return to town.”
“I’m already in town.”
“You lied. To the king.”
“So that we could have time to learn one another without interruption. And to keep you safe.” That more important now than ever.
Though it did complicate his own ends. How could he keep the king pleased with a wife he could not name?
How could he care for his family without the approval of the king?
He pushed through the door into his forge at the back of the stables, and he slid open the large wall that opened into another alley. Cooler air rushed in, and Diana gulped it down.
She didn’t seem to notice, even though her lungs did. She spun in slow circles, her gaze dashing about, unable to focus on one thing longer than a few seconds.
“What do you think?” he asked.
“It seems to be like any blacksmith shop I’ve seen. But… cleaner.”
“A good forge is a tidy forge.”
She laughed. “That sounds like a maxim you heard often growing up.”
“My mother’s favorite saying.”
“And your father’s?”
“Metals are…” He’d started it. Might as well finish it. Though it was the damned idea that had gotten the Grants in the mess they were in. “Metals are stronger together.”
“Literal or metaphorical?”
“Both.”
But she was already inspecting something else, creeping too close to the fire he never let die. “Who is that above the fire?” She reached out to touch the image carved into the stones above the large fireplace.
“Careful.” He pulled her back with an arm around her waist.
“I would venture to say Hephaestus.”
“Too Greek. It’s Vulcan.”
She glowered at him. “Same god, Temple. Different culture.”
“There are important differences. Some call him Gobannus, a Celtic god of smithing. But he was combined with the Roman Vulcan. Whatever you call him, though, he creates.”
“It makes sense he’s an important figure to alchemists.”
“Every alchemist’s forge has an image of Vulcan. Or Gobannus. We are Vulcan. The undesired making treasures for the gods.”
“You should stop. Make treasures for yourselves instead.” She kissed his cheek then pulled out of his arms.
“It’s not that simple.” If he gave up the king’s patronage, his family would have nothing. “There are alchemists who have done that, but they have… lost sight of many things that have long been important to us.”
“Such as?”
“Progress. They see only the progress of their bank accounts, and they no longer care how many people they maim, kill, or enslave to do it.”
“That, I’m afraid, is common everywhere and with most peoples.”
“Alchemists used to stand for something. We used to work to free people from their chains.” The chains transcendents had always wielded against them.
Diana ran her palm down the long worktable and traced her fingers over the tops of the scattered tools littering it. “What are you working on?”
“I told you the king wants a summoning stone that can communicate with the dead.”
“You said it was impossible.”
“But I must create something to show him I’m trying.”
“You cannot simply tell him the truth?”
“Do kings like truth?” Truth would certainly not keep the Grants in his majesty’s good graces.
Diana stopped at the summoning stone. It sat where he’d left it. No longer glowing. She circled a finger over the top of it, and with the other hand, she teased her lovely bottom lip, pinching it, pulling it.
Temple’s body tightened, and he moved behind her, so close he could feel her heat.
“My teeth can do that for you,” he said, bending to whisper near her ear.
She glanced over her shoulder at him. “Do what for me?”
Fitting his hands to her hips, he spun her, pinned her against the edge of the table, and cupped her cheek before kissing her.
She tasted of tea and something sweeter.
Her taste was growing familiar, as was everything about her.
He had not expected to feel as he did about all those now familiar things.
He’d not thought about them at all. He’d married a sensible, pretty woman he didn’t hate.
She’d needed a safe nest to hide in, and since he’d planned to get something out of her, it seemed only fair she get something in return. A mutually beneficial arrangement.
But by all the molten metals deep in the dark earth, he felt sometimes—all the fucking time—like he was in a dream that started with a single drop of love potion.
He wanted to kiss her fast and slow at the same time, to consume her and savor her, to hide her away to keep her safe, no matter what his family needed him to do, no matter his king’s commands.
He pulled away from the kiss but not from her. Couldn’t make himself give up a delectable inch. He nudged her nose with his own, hand curled tight at her nape, tangled in the thick silky hair there.
“What have you been studying today?” he asked.
“Oh, everything.”
“That narrows it down.”
She chuckled. Then her head drooped, and she picked at her gown.
“I am torn, Temple. I do not wish to stay hidden forever, but I’ve been unable to find any answers in the books you’ve brought me.
They are filled with fascinating insights.
An entire world I never knew. And some of what I’m learning is helping me with my talent, but nothing about how to get rid of it. ”
That’s what she was looking for. He scratched his jaw. She’d be safer without the talent, but the idea of excising a part of her made him uneasy. “A talent is a skill like any other. Once you learn, you are never rid of the knowledge.”
She shook her head and bit her thumbnail. “No. I did not cultivate this. It was forced on me. If I can be rid of it, I must be. Or it will always be a shadow hanging over me. And you. Over your family. I will never know a moment of true peace. Neither will you.”
“Everyone has secrets, little queen. Silence and peace are possible at the same time.”
“What if…” She laid her hands over her belly. “I am with child? What then? Will this magic inside me hurt it? Will the child carry it?”
He grinned. Couldn’t help. The idea of Diana growing their babe—it seemed a dream he’d never known he’d had. He couldn’t seem to share her worry. “Our child will be fine.”
Her gaze grew distant, and she shook her head. “No. It can only be passed on through death. At least I thought, but…” She gave a tiny, adorable growl, like an upset kitten.
He kissed the back of her hand. She was getting that thoughtful look in her eye, and it made him want to strip her to her very skin.
Her cheeks flushed a pretty pink. That the only sign she’d registered his attentions. “There’s a book by a fellow named Reginald Baxter.”
“Mm?” He rotated her hand, kissed her palm. “Tell me exactly what you think of old Reginald.”
“Do you know him?”
“Not at all, but I will know what I need to after you speak.”