Page 50 of A Treason of Thorns

17

IT’S NOT EVEN DAWN YET WHEN I WAKE TO SOMEONEknocking determinedly at my door. My heart leaps—Jed’s left the House by this time of day and Mira never knocks.

I tumble out of bed, pulling my dressing gown on as I go.

“Wyn—”

But his name dies on my lips. It’s Esperanza standing in the hallway, neat as a fashion plate in her riding habit.

“I’m off to Bath,” she tells me, everything about her brisk and businesslike. “Somebody’s going to have to convince my father that Falmouth’s being an absolute boor about Burleigh, and I’m the best person for the job. But I’m leaving you Alfred, in case you need anything, and in case anything new comes up. I think we’re close, though, darling—we’ve got a list of two dozen port towns in Cornwall that my father apparently visits every time he’s about to leave England. And maybe I can winkle something out of Falmouth while I’m in Bath.”

She kisses my cheek and I catch a breath of her jasmine scent.

“Espie,” I say. “Be careful, won’t you? Falmouth, he’s—”

“Oh, believe me, I know,” Esperanza answers. “But I’m quiteclever, as it turns out, and I know the mostshockingthings about that hideous man. Secrets that would severely dent his reputation if they came to light.”

I shake my head. I don’t know how she manages, in her world of espionage and underhanded dealings and perpetual gossip. I’d wither and die if I had to live that way.

“Where on earth do you get your information?” I ask.

Esperanza waves a dismissive hand. “From all the girls at court, of course. No one takes us girls seriously, so we make the most wonderful spies. Now I’ve got to be going if I’m to beat Falmouth into Bath. Be good. Don’t do anything I wouldn’t.”

And then she’s gone, as quickly as she came.

I walk over to the window seat and pull Papa’s ledger onto my lap, not so much because I intend to look through it at the moment but from force of habit. Though I leaf through the pages, I can’t concentrate. The eastern sky is growing grey, and after a few minutes of restless fidgeting I dress hastily, then slip out of the House.

The back woods are misty and green, though patches of mortar pockmark the forest floor. Birds sing in the trees overhead and a few bluebells still hold their bloom.

“Wyn?” I call as I wander here and there, not bothering to keep to the path. “Are you there, Wyn?”

I don’t really hope to find him. The truth is, he’s been on his way out since I got home—I think I just delayed the process. But I can’t reconcile myself to his absence until I’ve looked everywhere, and left no stone unturned. If something terriblehashappened, and he hasn’t simply left, I’d never forgive myself for not keeping up the search.

“Wyn?”

Somewhere overhead, a robin begins to sing, the liquid notes of its song carrying through the wood. There’s a flash of russet as a red squirrel hurries up a tree. I shut my eyes for a moment, breathing in the smell and sounds of the forest. I can almost imagine the past seven years away. Can almost picture a better life.

Mama is still with us. Wyn is down by the stream, and presently Mira will call us in for breakfast. Papa is Caretaker—

But no. Even if Papa was still Caretaker, Burleigh would still be slowly dying, sickening a little more every day thanks to the binding placed upon it.

I open my eyes, and when I do, Wyn is standing not ten yards away from me on the forest path. I squint, to make sure he’s real and solid, not a memory of the House’s, but there’s no watery cast of light playing over him, just sun through the leaves.

Wyn seems well. Better than he has in days, now that I think about it. The hollows are gone from beneath his eyes, and his untidy hair curls damp around his collar, as if he’s just washed up in the stream.

All the worry on his account that I forced endlessly down for seven years, and that I could not really feel last night for fear of falling apart, hits me like a storm surge. My hands shake, and I feel as if I’m going to be sick. Suddenly I can’t bear to look at him. I turn on my heel and rush blindly through the woods, though I can hear him following after me.

“Violet!” Wyn calls. “Vi, stop a moment!”

But I don’t, not till I’ve got out of the cover of the woods and stand in the middle of the wildflower meadow. The blossoms have taken on strange, twisted shapes, and as I clench my fists togetherand try to catch my breath, a hedge of brambles rises up around me, waist-high and bristling with thorns.

Wyn stops short.

“Look, I’m sorry,” he says, his voice low and strained. “I wouldn’t have left if I could have helped it.”

I shake my head, desperate not to feel the things I’m feeling, or to remember what it was like being left behind by Mama and then made a homeless orphan by Papa. But to my heart, it doesn’t matter why Wyn left. All that matters is that he went. That without warning, I found him gone. Yet I know my heart to be relentless and unfair, so with a supreme effort, I force down every scrap of loneliness and hurt.

“No,” I tell Wyn. “It’s alright. I shouldn’t expect what you can’t give; you made it clear from the beginning that you’re not planning to stay for long. I’m being foolish. Don’t mind me.”