But she did not cry. She folded her handkerchief in half with trembling fingers, and then folded it over itself lengthwise. Grasping the resultant strip of fabric by the ends, she laid it across her face.
Across her mouth, to be specific. Like a gag.
“Are you saying the spell will not allow you to speak about it?” But she had just told him about it! No, she had not – she had asked if he could determine whether someone was under spell, not if she was. Clever girl. He should have expected as much from Frederica’s cousin.
She nodded fiercely.
Now what was he supposed to do? He still had no evidence of sorcery, and he was reluctant to use the spell which could expose her innermost thoughts to him. “Can you write the answers?”
“No. I have tried.”
Blood wards had worked to block sorcery at Rosings Park. He had no blood wards here, but perhaps... “I have an idea. There is a set of wards I use when practicing a new spell. They keep magic from escaping in case the spell goes out of control. Perhaps they can also block magic getting in. That might release you from the spell temporarily.”
He took four black pawns from the desk drawer and waved her to a chair. He set one pawn to the north of her, one to the south, and then east and west. Crouching down, he touched his forefinger to the north pawn and spoke the words of the warding spell, feeling it flicker to life. “Miss Darcy, does that change anything?”
The girl clasped her hands to her face and the words began to pour out of her. “Oh, God forgive me! A man wanted to elope with me. He put his hands on my neck and started speaking Latin. He said it was Latin love poetry, but it did not sound like poetry. After that I agreed to the elopement even though I did not want to. I could not say no. My brother discovered us before we left, and he frightened the man away, but later he started sending me notes whenever my brother was out of town asking me where he had gone and what he was doing, and I had to answer them. I tried so hard not to, but my hands would not obey me.” Tears began to run down her cheeks.
For once he did not mind the tears. They were nothing compared to the reality of knowing there truly was an active sorcerer living in their midst. “Who is the man?”
She dabbed at her eyes with her handkerchief. “His name is Wickham.”
“George Wickham?” he asked sharply.
She nodded. “Do you know him?” she asked anxiously.
Eversleigh sat down hard. The pieces fit together all too well. Wickham wanting to know Darcy’s whereabouts so he could choose the locations for his dry wells. Wickham possessing the sorcery to force his friends to persecute Darcy to the point of unreason. There was still the matter of the missing water mage, but that could wait.
A living sorcerer. Why had he ever wished to be Master of the Collegium?
He had to do this properly. “He was once a member of the Collegium. Thank you for telling me. You are very brave. I believe you, but now I do need to check you for the presence of sorcery. I will need to touch your...” He almost said neck, but that was what Wickham had done to her. “Your wrist.” He would have to use wild magic that way, but after all the other rules he had broken in the last few weeks, what was onemore?
Silently she pulled off her glove and held out her wrist.
With his fingers on her pulse, Eversleigh closed his eyes and saw himself sailing through an ocean, a bright red ocean, in an ancient trireme. The current pulled his boat forward, and the wind was at his back. A green island loomed ahead. He landed the boat on a rocky beach and disembarked into a garden. Some of it was neatly planted, some of it grew riotously, and some parts were shrouded in mist.
There it was, a snake slithering between two rosebushes. With a lightning speed he did not possess in real life, Eversleigh grabbed it behind the head and drew its fangs. The snake screamed and slithered away. Eversleigh stared after it for a moment before returning to his ship. He pushed off into the ocean... and was sitting in his study with his fingers on Miss Darcy’s wrist.
... and holding dripping snake fangs in his other hand. Sorcerous snake fangs. With an oath, he jumped up, ran to his desk and dropped the fangs in the top drawer, slammed it shut and turned the key. He wiped the remaining venom off his hand with his handkerchief and poured half a bottle of brandy over his palm for good measure, heedless of the mess. His housekeeper was going to kill him.
He had not expected any of that. There was a reason they called it wild magic.
“What was that?” Miss Darcy’s voice quavered.
“That would be rather complicated to explain, but I did something that may weaken the spell.”
“Can you not remove it?”
He chose his words with care. “I could, but it might damage your mind. There are better ways of dealing with that.” Like asking Aelfric to help, or killing George Wickham. He was not usually a bloodthirsty man, but the latter sounded quite appealing at the moment.
“I do not mind the risk. I cannot stand having it in me.”
“I mind the risk very much indeed. We will keep you safe until it can be removed. First, I am going to take you home, and we will explain this to your brother. He can set up wards like this for you.”
“He is not there,” she said in a small voice. “He left this morning for Portugal to serve with Wellington.”
“He did what? Never mind; I heard you.” He could hardly leave a young girl under a sorcerer’s spell without protection, especially with the sorcerer still free. Lord Matlock was her uncle and could defend her better than anyone, but he was at Rosings preparing for the revel. “Whose care did Darcy leave you in?”
“He made my cousin, Richard Fitzwilliam, my guardian, but he is at Rosings.”
