Page 42 of A Treason of Thorns

“I can help,” I say. Time for some honesty. “My father knew where Burleigh’s deed was, and I think the House still knows. I can’t ask Burleigh outright, though—the binding would wreak havoc on it if I did. So I’m using Papa’s ledger as a guide, to watch old memories that might point us in the right direction.”

“Oh, well done, you.” Esperanza holds the chocolate box out to me. “Have one, you quite deserve it.”

“No, I can’t,” I say with a shake of my head. “I’ve stayed far too long already, Frey’s waiting for me.”

But I stop at the door and turn. “Espie? Thank you for being kind to Wyn, when you were at the House after the arrest ended. The House showed me.”

She’s got her head on Alfred’s shoulder, and smiles at me. “Of course, darling. I can’t abide to see a suffering creature, and that boy certainly suffered. But he’s got a great deal of faith in you.”

“More than I deserve, I think.”

Esperanza’s smile broadens. “Doubtful.”

The last I see of them as I shut the door is Esperanza popping a chocolate cream into Alfred’s mouth as he tries to carry on with his reading, a look of bemused resignation on his face.

14

I DREAM OF ENGLAND’S INFAMOUS SIXTH HOUSE. ORrather, of the night Mama told me about the Sixth House for the very first time.

In sleep, my memories take on the same watery cast as Burleigh’s. I lie tucked up in bed, not Little Vi but my own self, tall and leggy and nearly grown. Mama smooths the hair back from my forehead and I look past her, to the airing cupboard door. It’s been left ajar. Wyn must be listening from his secret retreat.

“Tell me a story,” I beg Mama, and though my body may be the one I’ve grown into, my voice is still a child’s. “Papa always tells me a story if he’s at home. Where did he go this time?”

“A castle by the sea,” Mama says. She puts a cup of honeyed milk in my hands and I sip at it. “Shall I tell you a story about a castle?”

“Yes, please,” I answer.

“Once upon a time, there was a Great House called Ripley Castle.”

Mama’s voice sounds very far away. Burleigh’s evening rain begins as she speaks, drumming against the roof, running down the windows.

“Is this a made-up story, Mama?” I ask. “There are only five Houses. Burleigh, Hampton Court, the Tower of London, Salisbury Cathedral, and Plas Newydd, though they’ve sometimes changed their shapes and their names. You see, I’ve been studying.”

“You’re very clever,” my mother says. “But once there were six Houses, and they called Ripley Castle the Sixth House. Ripley—”

“What happened to it?” I interrupt.

Mama wrinkles her nose at me. “I’m getting to that, if you’ll just listen.”

“Sorry.” I sink further into bed and pull the covers up to my shoulders. “I’ll be quiet.”

“Ripley Castle was very much like Burleigh House. A family called Ingilby looked after it. Just as the Sterlings have been at Burleigh for a very long time, the Ingilbys had been at Ripley for hundreds of years.”

I listen, wide-eyed. There’s nothing I love better than stories of the Great Houses.

“Before you were born, there was a girl who lived at Ripley Castle—Marianne Ingilby—and when her father died unexpectedly just after the girl’s eighteenth birthday, she wanted to become Caretaker in his stead. She wanted it and Ripley Castle wanted it, but your uncle Edgar did not.”

“Why not?” I ask, sipping my milk.

A frown mars Mama’s beautiful face. “Who knows with your uncle Edgar? But he is the king, and he wanted to give Ripley Castle as a prize to one of his noblemen. Marianne hated the idea. The House hated the idea, too, and chafed against its bindings, refusing to accept the king’s chosen Caretaker.”

I lie with my hands laced together under my chin, enthralled. All of Papa’s stories contain a moment of darkness or an instant of despair, when it seems all will be lost. But then comes the turning point, when House and Caretaker work together in perfect unison, two souls with one purpose, and save the day. I’m sure Mama’s will be the same.

“It broke Marianne Ingilby’s heart to see her House in distress,” my mother continues. She reaches out and runs a gentle hand over my hair. “And she trusted Ripley Castle more than anything else in this world. So she did what no one had yet dared to. She stole the deed to her House, and tried to set it free.”

Outside, there is a sinuous, rustling sound along the walls. Ivy, newly grown, begins to tap-tap at the windows. Green sparks snap from the fire.

“You won’t have heard this story yet, Violet. It’s something your father doesn’t like spoken of here. But secretly, he hopes to follow in Marianne’s footsteps, and to try to set Burleigh free. It’s a dangerous undertaking, though—in order to set a Great House free, you must take its deed to the House’s heart, and there unbind it with blood and mortar, as it was bound.”