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“How is it then,” he continued as he lowered the cover, “that you seem to be so skilled, that you know so much about giving yourself willingly, and pleasuring a man?” He asked the question in a forthright manner, as seemed to be his way.
But how was she to answer? The explanation would sound strange to anyone she might offer it to, and she would not blame a man for not believing it.
A virgin who was highly educated about fornication.
It was little wonder his brow was so furrowed. Maisie could not give her answer aloud. Instead, she rose up to kiss his firm, masculine mouth, in order to distract him.
It is because I was taught everything I would ever need to know by my guardian, my keeper, and that included detailed study of the nature of physical congress and all it can bring for a woman such as I.
CHAPTER SIX
At his wife’s request Cyrus Lafayette allowed “young Margaret” several weeks to grow accustomed to her new life in their Islington home before he began her education. Even though her guardian waited for her to settle in, Maisie could tell he was impatient. He wanted her instruction to begin. She soon discovered that her education was of great importance to Cyrus, although it was not until she was much older that she fully understood the reasons why.
The Lafayette house was large and overwhelming, and it took some time for Margaret to think of it as her home. The hallways were filled with sculptures and paintings, and the many rooms each had a different purpose, unlike the small croft cottage in which she had spent her infancy, and later the rented room she and her siblings had shared with their mother in the Lowlands. Maisie’s favorite place was the garden, where she felt closer to nature, but also safe, because of the high walls that surrounded it and kept it private. There were mulberry and crab apple trees, and neatly planted borders either side of the path. Cyrus often reminded her that she was safe inside those walls, indicating that would not be the case if she ventured beyond.
Margaret learned that the house was located in London, close to the cabinet where Cyrus was known as an influential government orator, and near the fashionable coffeehouses where he engaged in intellectual discourse with other important men. In those ostentatious environs Cyrus discussed subject matter for many of the articles he wrote on important issues of the time, essays that were circulated far and wide in books and then pamphlets and newspapers.
The passage of time did settle her, eventually, and it helped that the Lafayette household was run with strict routine, according to the master’s instructions, the servants and the mistress of the house following his orders without fail. So it was that Maisie adopted their strange but somehow comforting regimen. As the Lafayette ward, she did not want for anything, and that was strange, for it was very far from what she had known in her life before. The horrific memory of witnessing her mother’s death made her lower her gaze and be grateful that she and her siblings had been spared. During this time she did not even dare to think of her magic, let alone use it, lest her saviors cast her out to face a death like her mother’s.
Almost everything of a feminine nature was introduced to her life by Mama Beth. It was the master of the house who took control of her education—and through that, ultimately, took control of her.
“Young lady.” He beckoned her over one evening before Mama Beth and the upstairs maid prepared her for bed. “You must begin your classes tomorrow.”
Maisie instinctively went to his side, nerves building within her as she grew concerned about his meaning.
When she stood beside his winged armchair, he took her hand in his. “If you are to become a proper young lady you must learn about the world.” He looked at her with a searching gaze, his opaque eyes shrewd, his black hair shot through here and there with gray strands, drawing her attention, for he didn’t wear a wig in the informal setting of his home. “Can you read?”
“No, sire.” It was not a question she had been asked before, but she felt shameful, knowing she was amongst privileged people now and did not want to disappoint them.
“That can soon be remedied. Your schoolmistress arrives on the morrow. You will begin your lessons then.” He tapped Margaret on the end of her nose with one finger. “She will have you reading in no time, and then we can study together.” He showed great interest in that prospect, and his faith in her potential made her a little less afraid.
From then on her mornings were devoted to lessons with a schoolmistress, lessons that might be considered normal fare for a girl of her age. Under the governess’s instruction her reading and writing skills quickly improved, and her mind broadened as she took on geography, history and arithmetic. Her teacher, Mistress Hinchcliffe, was a widow. She had nut-brown hair and sad eyes, and her smile was so rare and special that Maisie soon learned its immense value. Mistress Hinchcliffe was a keen teacher, and she rewarded Maisie for her enthusiasm. Sometimes with her smile.
Maisie quickly learned things that she recognized to be useful and important—things that were not often afforded to young women of her age, and especially not those of her questionable background.
Once her reading skills were addressed, Master Cyrus began to undertake some of her tutoring himself, just as he had promised. He studied with her after Mistress Hinchcliffe returned to her lodgings, and the books he shared with Margaret were very different from the ones she studied with her morning tutor. At first he kept the volumes in a locked wooden cabinet in the schoolroom. However, Mistress Hinchcliffe often looked at it with a dubious glance, and eventually it and its contents were moved back to the library, from whence they had come.
“You must not share the nature of the lessons we look at together,” Master Cyrus instructed her after the cabinet was moved, “for neither Mama Beth nor your tutor would understand the precious subject matter, and it is my duty to protect you from those who would wish to harm you...the way your mother was harmed.”
He told her this as he led her to his personal library.
Her grip on his hand tightened.
In those early days he didn’t often refer to her mother’s demise. He did not have to remind her of it, but when he did so it was always in warning.
The books they studied were never shared with his wife. Neither did Mama Beth partake in any of the special lessons.
“I want you to know and understand your beginnings,” he informed Margaret. “You come from a long line of witches, and you are gifted and special. It is not my intention to quell that part of your nature. In fact, I mean to encourage it, but only in private. It is to be our secret.”
“Why are you so generous to me, Master Cyrus?”
“Because I have a great interest in your skills, and if we learn about them together I can protect you, and you can perhaps help me in return, one day in the future.”
“You might need me to undertake healing?”
“Perhaps.”
She was innocent of his real intentions.
