Aelfric shrugged. “I cannot tell unless they attempt to use a spell. I only noticed the snakes because they were so startled.”
A fine time for Aelfric’s near omnipotence to fail! “Is there any other way to tell?”
Aelfric considered this. “You could ask the phouka. She might know.”
Pepper! Compared to FitzClarence and Aelfric, Pepper was a veritable pillar of dependability, but she had disappeared into the night after leading him here.
“Pepper, I need your help,” he called to the empty air, scanning the sky for a white raven in flight.
Pressure against his ankle made him look down. “Pepper! Good cat.” He squatted down to be closer to her eye level. “Pepper, we have a problem. Those men who are tied up – at least one of them is a sorcerer, a user of dark magic. Can you tell me if the others are sorcerers or just under a spell?”
Pepper meowed, stretched, and strolled leisurely over to the men.
FitzClarence looked discreetly appalled. He must have thought Darcy had lost his mind, talking to a cat.
“She only looks like a cat. She is a phouka.” When Pepper turned her head to glare at him, Darcy added hastily, “Or she is a cat who is also a phouka. I am not certain of the details.”
“Her eyes do not match,” whispered FitzClarence nervously.
Pepper sniffed at one of the unknown men and turned her face away as if displeased by the smell. She repeated the process with the second man. When she came to Biggins, she sniffed one side of his head,walked down the length of his body, sniffed his trousers, and sank her teeth into his leg just above his boots. Biggins’s body jerked, but his shriek was muffled by his gag.
Darcy would not have thought a cat could look disgusted, but Pepper did as she trotted back to him. “Let me see if I understand. Biggins is a sorcerer, but the other two are not. Is that correct?”
Pepper began to purr.
“That is worthy of even more fish.” Darcy straightened. “Gentlemen, I believe our best course of action is to confine these men in a safe place until Eversleigh is able to examine them. The dark cellar at Rosings Park should suit them admirably.”
Chapter 16
“Darcy, what are you doing here?” Eversleigh’s voice, still thick with sleep, interrupted Darcy’s reading.
Darcy closed his book and set it on a side table. “At last! I was starting to wonder if you would ever wake up.”
“How long has it been?”
“A day and a night. You fell asleep after Titania healed your hand. Aelfric dealt with Georgiana’s snake, and she fell asleep, too, so there has been no one to answer my questions. Then things became truly exciting – in all the wrong ways.”
“But how did I get here? I remember being in Faerie.”
“Aelfric brought you back to Rosings, but Titania insisted on keeping Georgiana until she awakes. What in God’s name happened to her?”
Eversleigh sat up and stretched. “She was under a spell placed by George Wickham. Nothing too serious; she simply had to tell him where you were going every time you left London. That solves the mystery of how someone could know all about your travels even when you tried to keep it secret.”
Darcy scowled. “Wickham has become more trouble than I ever thought possible, and that is saying quite a bit. Now we are up to four sorcerers – the late Sir Lewis de Bourgh, Lady Catherine, Wickham and Biggins.”
“Biggins is a sorcerer as well? Damn.”
“I am afraid so. He is locked in the wine cellar, blindfolded and bound, guarded by Richard Fitzwilliam, two footmen, and a very self-satisfied cat. Of course, according to Aelfric, Biggins is also under a sorcerer’s spell, presumably Wickham’s. Biggins’s two cronies are bespelled and locked up. And now they are your problem.” Darcy forced himself to stop before he started tearing his hair out. It had been a very stressful day.
“Good God, what happened while I was asleep? How did you discover he was a sorcerer?” Eversleigh was wide awake now.
“Apparently Aelfric announced it to his face. You may be able to get a clearer story from Aelfric; he just tells me things like ‘snakes are slippery.’ Lord Matlock and Elizabeth are both in fay-induced sleep as well, so that is all I know. I have never felt so out of my depth in my life.”
“Darcy,” said Eversleigh distinctly, “I think you had best start at the beginning and tell me everything that has happened.”
Darcy glared at him. “What does it mean when a woman claims blood right to a man?”
“Could we save the discussion of fay etiquette until we have dealt with the sorcery?” Eversleigh sounded exasperated.
