Agrippa and I sat before the fire while I ate supper. It was only a little cold mutton, but it tasted heavenly. He watched the flames, distant.
“Are you all right, sir?” I asked.
“Hmm?” He smiled. “Just distracted. Imagine, this time tomorrow night you’ll be a commended sorcerer.”
“I hope so.” I gripped my teacup, savoring the warmth.
“It’s impossible to be otherwise.” He looked into the flames again. “I would have had this talk with her, you know.” He sighed. “My Gwen.”
“You must have been proud.”
“More than words can say. She was my only child. There should have been brothers and sisters for her, but when her mother died, I couldn’t bring myself to marry again. Everyone thought I yearned for a son, but Gwen was enough for me.” He shook his head. “They told me I shouldn’t train her. They even told me to give her a stave, then take it back immediately and bind it to leave her powerless.”
What a monstrous idea.
“When I saw she could be a sorcerer,” Agrippa said, “I couldn’t have been more pleased. And then that awful, terrible disease.” He closed his eyes.
“I’m so sorry.”
“Sometimes I go over and over that night—was there anything I could have done differently?”
“You can’t alter the course of a fever, Master Agrippa.” I stood, a bit awkward, and placed my hand on his shoulder. He gripped my fingers.
“Thank you, Henrietta. You’ve been such a comfort. It’s wonderful to have a young woman in the house again.”
“I never met my father, but I know that you’ve shown me as much kindness and care as he ever could have,” I said.
Agrippa began to sob. His whole body shook as he leaned against an armrest, burying his face in his hands.
“I’m so sorry. Did I say something wrong?” Oh, what was I thinking? “I didn’t mean to say I feel I’m your daughter. It was awkward and stupid of me.” Was there no end to my idiocy today?
“Not at all, my dear.” He wiped his eyes with a handkerchief and kissed my hand. “It will be so hard to let you go.”
“Let me go?” My heart swelled. Was his concern that I would leave him once I had been commended? I wanted to tell him that I’d stay if he needed me, but before the words could pass my lips, he said, “Henrietta, perhaps you should go to bed. Rest for tomorrow. You’ll need it.”
“Of course. Good night, sir.” I left him and moved up the stairs, feeling lighter than ever. What a difference a few hours make. Agrippa didn’t want me to leave. I’d approach the subject after the commendation, but already I imagined him embracing me in joy.
And Rook? If the situation became more permanent, perhaps his status would change. Perhaps we could discuss his shadow powers with Agrippa. I kept calm, reminding myself that nothing was certain. But if I made it through tomorrow, all might be well.
I dreamed of Gwendolyn Agrippa lying in bed, her pale yellow hair arranged around her on the pillow. She looked peaceful and beautiful even in death. I was dressed in ragged boys’ clothes, my hands and face dirty as a beggar’s. I went to take a ring off her finger and put it on my own, but the mattress erupted in a fountain of blood.
I woke to a sharp knocking. Waiting for my heart to slow, I crept to the door and whispered, “Who is it?”
“Me,” Blackwood said. I put on my wrap and opened the door a crack. His appearance shocked me. His black hair was wild and unruly. His shirt was undone at the throat, his white cravat rumpled under his chin. With his eyes rimmed in red, he looked as if he’d been drinking. “I need to speak with you. The library.”
When I found him before the fire, he frightened me. Usually so composed and elegant, he clung to the marble ledge and leaned his head against it, his eyes closed tight. He muttered something to himself. All I could make out were the words lost and time.
“What on earth is the matter?”
“Please sit down.” He ushered me into an armchair, then turned, a dark silhouette against the flames. “What I’m about to tell you I’ve never told another living soul. Not even my mother or sister knows this secret.” I waited, hands clasped in my lap. “Before my father died, he told me something that he begged me never to repeat to anyone else.”
“What on earth are you talking about?”
“My father had an open mind,” Blackwood said, rubbing his chin. “He believed in making England stronger through harnessing forces beyond our natural understanding.”
“Like magicians?”
“Yes. Magicians. Listen,” Blackwood said, kneeling before me. “Do you know why I pay Jenkins Hargrove?”
“Out of charity.”
“No. Not really. It’s part charity, part…debt, I should say.”
“I don’t understand.”
“I pay him because his real name isn’t Jenkins Hargrove. It’s Howard Mickelmas.”
I almost jumped out of my seat. Howard Mickelmas? The evil magician who had worked with Mary Willoughby to bring our world to an end? That was the man who had trained me? If anyone ever knew, I’d die.
I couldn’t reconcile the untidy, rather drunk fellow I knew with the insane monster he was supposed to be. No, they couldn’t be the same person.
“How do you know he’s Howard Mickelmas?” I gasped.
“Because my father told me who he was and to pay him.”
“Why would he have done that?”
“Mary Willoughby and Howard Mickelmas brought ruin down on this country, yes, and they tore open the breach that allowed the monsters to cross over. But they needed a third to complete the trinity of power, and that third,” he said, his face twisting in pain, “was my father. And no one,” he snapped, noting my look of horror, “outside myself and those concerned has known about this. Not until tonight. Not until you.” He moved away from me to the fire. “My father, once the Ancients had been unleashed, knew what word of it would do to the Blackwood family. He fixed it so that it would appear Willoughby and Mickelmas were to blame, not he.”
My mind raced but settled on one detail. “You said no one knows but yourself and those concerned. Who else?”
“Mickelmas, obviously. And Master Palehook,” he said. “I can’t imagine how, but he knows what my father did.”
“That’s why he’s so free to be rude to you?”
“Precisely. Father knew how unscrupulous Palehook was. I was instructed to obey him in all things. I did.” He looked at me again, guilt written upon his face. “Until recently.”
“What did you do?”
“He wanted something I’d no right to give.”
Like a burst of light I saw the scene again: Blackwood coming into the magician’s home, with Rook of all people…Blackwood hurrying me along, leaving Rook behind…his burst of insight, when he thought—no, when he knew—Rook would be in trouble. I leaped from my seat. He caught my wrists.
“How could you?” I cried.
“I couldn’t. It’s why we went back. Whatever he had planned, I knew I’d no right to sacrifice Rook to save myself.”
“What does Palehook want with him?”
“I’ve no idea. I swear.” He fell to his knees, his hands clasped together. He looked as if he were praying. “I’m so sorry.”
Trying to breathe out the anger, I sat. “Why are you telling me this?”
“Master Palehook said that if I didn’t give him Rook, he’d reveal my family’s secret. I received a letter this morning. Every sorcerer in the city will know by breakfast tomorrow. I’ve failed.”
“Why tell me now?”
“Because I wanted to give you a chance,” he said, his eyes wild. “I called you low, pretended I was your born superior. Here.” He gripped my wrists and put his face in my hands. “Strike me, burn me, do whatever you want. I deserve your punishment more than anyone else’s.” He looked half mad.
The younger, less complicated me would have gladly attacked him. But I knew how it felt to lie for my own survival. Tentatively, I stroked his hair.
“This must have been a terrible burden to bear alone.”