Chapter 43
Chapter
We lay together, watching thin clouds drift across the moon and letting our breathing steady. There would be time later to think about what came next. Things would change. They always did. But it was enough to lay with Henry now, still naked and warm, with quickly cooling sweat on my skin.
That’s what I thought, at least, until Henry ruined it.
My thighs were pale, my belly soft and bare. The cool wind rippled the fine hairs of my legs and arms, and caught my braid, tangled and loose from our lovemaking. I felt like some kind of pagan goddess, of lust and earth.
“Pass me my chemise, would you?” I slipped it on, as Henry stepped into his own trousers.
We grinned at each other, half-dressed.
“You have no idea how long I have wanted that,” he said, and kissed my bare shoulder before helping me adjust my blouse. Then he pressed his brow to mine.
“I love you, Mary,” he said solemnly.
I felt like I was falling from a great height.
“I never stopped loving you, I swear it.” He said it so tenderly, and earnestly, that it cut all the deeper.
I stared. My mouth worked, but no words came out.
When Henry broke our engagement all those years ago, it had wrecked me.
This man had left me shattered. But, with time, I picked up the pieces.
And with wire and plaster and a bit of hubris, I put myself back together, just as I would reconstruct a particularly unruly fossil.
I had managed all of that because I knew Henry didn’t love me.
I stumbled back. Henry came after me, and I caught him in the chest with my palm.
“No. No. Don’t you dare.”
He frowned, then his eyes widened. “It’s all right if you don’t feel the same. I only wanted you to know.”
“Oh, I love you, too.” I laughed. “I wish I didn’t. I wish to God I didn’t love you, Henry Stanton, but I do.”
He reached for me, but I stepped away, feeling terribly, bitterly sorry for myself. My voice was a soft, broken-winged thing. “But that wasn’t enough before, was it? I was never enough.”
He opened and closed his mouth twice, then spread his hands, fingers wide. They fell at his sides. “Oh, Mary. Is that what you thought?”
“What else was I to think?” I flinched, mouth trembling. I squeezed my eyes shut, remembering the letters I burned to ash on the sand, and all the others he never bothered to write.
“Look at me.” Henry pressed a hand to my cheek and raised my face to his. “You have always been enough.”
“Then why didn’t you fight for me?” I could only whisper, choking back tears. “I would have fought for you.”
“I know.” He nodded, his chin jerking as he gripped my shoulder. “And if I could do it over, I swear to you, I would.”
He bowed his head to kiss me again, but I pushed him back, gently but firmly, and wrapped my fingers around his muscled forearms.
“Will you fight for me now, Henry?”
Buckland had warned me: He can’t be trusted. Stanton will ruin it all, he said. And I’d promised, because I hadn’t known Henry—the adult Henry, as he was now. This Henry had been nothing but an ally and a friend. And he loved me, he said. And—God help me—I loved him, too.
“Every day. Until my last breath.” He brushed a strand of hair behind my ear, and I leaned into his palm.
I swallowed at the tingle that raced down my neck at his touch.
“Then help me. Buckland plans to nominate me to the Society at the annual meeting. Help me get the votes.”
I hadn’t known what to expect, but I’d only imagined two potential outcomes: immediate agreement or rejection. What I didn’t expect was confusion. It spread across his face, straightening his lip and pulling down his brows.
“He plans to…what?”
“I just said: Buckland’s going to nominate me.”
“To the Society?”
“No, to Parliament,” I huffed. “Yes, to the Society. Is that so incredible?”
I didn’t understand what was happening. Why was this so confusing? And why was there something of a smile twitching over his mouth?
“I know a woman’s never been nominated before, but you said yourself I deserve—”
“No, Mary.” He shook his head. “It’s not that a woman has never been nominated before. It’s that a woman can’t be nominated.”
I didn’t understand. Or I did. “What are you saying?”
“I knew it. I knew he had some other scheme!” He began to pace. “Let me guess, the professor made you swear not to tell me?”
“How did you know?” I stepped back, my heart lead in my chest. “What do you mean?”
“He can’t do it, Mary.” Henry spun toward me.
“And he knew I would tell you the truth. Buckland can’t nominate a woman, Mary.
Even I couldn’t nominate you. ‘A male person of full age, having the qualifications in formal education or practical experience befitting a geomagician, may be nominated for election by any Fellow in good standing with the Society,’ ” Henry quoted.
“But that’s not in the Charter.” I shook my head. “I’ve read it; I specifically checked. It never mentions men or women.” My head spun. I was afraid I might vomit.
“No, it’s not in the Charter. That’s from the bylaws. You wouldn’t have seen them. They’re kept at Palmanaeus, under key. For Society-member reference only.”
I hardly felt the sting of the betrayal. I was too numb—it was like Henry was speaking a language I’d never heard. Something so foreign, my brain couldn’t even recognize it.
“That can’t be right,” I mumbled. “It can’t be. He promised.”
“And I suspect I know why he felt confident enough to make such a promise,” Henry said.
“Because if Buckland was elected president of the Society, he could amend those bylaws by unilateral decree. And it would take a two-thirds vote to overrule him. He was gambling, you see—if the professor won the presidency, he would be able to keep his promise to you.”
“But if he lost…”
“You don’t need to worry about that,” Henry said fiercely. He took my right hand and kissed the center of my palm. “I only wish I’d known sooner; I could have set your mind at ease. Listen, Mary—whether it’s Buckland or myself who wins the presidency doesn’t matter.”
“You’ll rewrite the bylaws, then? If you win instead?” I asked sharply.
“Mary,” he said, eyes solemn. “I would rewrite the whole world for you.”
My fury burned white-hot as I marched back to the campsite, Henry at my side. I slipped my hand out of his as we came into view of the fire, and the others turned to greet us.
Henry had tried his best to re-plait my hair and pluck out the grass, but I’d been in a rush to confront Buckland, and from the knowing smirk on Lucy’s face, I gathered it hadn’t been sufficient.
I pushed aside the embarrassment. Let them think what they wanted. It didn’t matter anymore.
I walked straight to Buckland, cutting between Goldsmild and Mantell in their chairs.
“Ah, Mary,” Buckland said cheerfully, “we were just saying you should—”
“A male person of full age.” I was standing too close to the fire, his face caught in my shadow. The heat seared my back, and sweat broke out across my brow and lip.
Buckland’s mouth constricted, then slackened. His gaze flickered to Catherine beside him, and she stiffened. My heart was rent again. She had known.
“It’s true, then,” I said flatly.
I felt like I’d been punched in the gut, and my knees nearly gave way.
Ajax had woken at the sound of my voice, and he ambled over from the basket to rub his head against my knees. I scooped him onto my shoulder.
The other geomagicians were speaking—to me, to Buckland, to one another—things like, What is the meaning of this? Buckland? Surely this is a misunderstanding—but I ignored them, and Catherine and Elizabeth, too.
“I was going to tell you. I swear it. I was going to tell you when we returned to London,” Buckland said.
“You lied,” I spat. Ajax made an angry hissing sound in echo, spreading his wings.
“Mary, wait, please.” Buckland clasped his hands. “Whatever Stanton told you, it wasn’t like that.”
“Wasn’t it, though?” Henry folded his arms and stepped half in front of me, blocking Buckland’s view. “Did you or did you not neglect to mention that section of the bylaws when you made your promise to Mary?”
Buckland flinched but ignored him, speaking to me. “I told you from the first, Mary, these kinds of things take time, and careful maneuvering. But you made me swear to nominate you; do you not remember? You made it a condition of selling Ajax. What else could I say?”
“You lied!”
Elizabeth and Catherine were grim-faced in the firelight behind him, hands clasped together.
“I did not!” Buckland protested. “I never did. I intended to be president. I still intend it. And as president, I can change the bylaws. Not just for you, Mary, but for—”
“You’re a liar!” I shouted. My throat stung with it. Elizabeth gasped as Ajax rose and spread his wings behind my head.
“You lie, and lie, and lie, and always, you find some way to justify it. You lie as you breathe, and tell yourself God will understand. Even then, I trusted you.” I laughed, and Lucy gave me a worried look. “But no more. We are finished, Professor.”
My heel ground the dirt as I turned. Ajax’s claws tightened with the sudden movement, drawing blood. “Take us away from here, Henry.”
He smiled grimly. “Gladly.”
But Lucy didn’t follow. She looked between me and the Bucklands—between me and Elizabeth, I suppose.
“Lucy?”
Perhaps I should have told Lucy she didn’t need to choose sides; this wasn’t her war. Maybe I should have said that this wasn’t Elizabeth’s fault. That I wouldn’t blame Lucy, if she stayed. But I was full of fury.
So instead I said, sharply, “You wanted to go back to London, didn’t you? Here’s your chance.” And Lucy came with us.