Keeper of Enchanted Rooms

Managing to stay on his feet, Merritt slid into the back corner between the portrait and the door. When his back hit the wall, he realized the entire room was rotating.

“Owein!” Merritt bellowed. “We have guests!”

And yet the declaration only incited the ghostly wizard to push his magic harder, and the room bucked to a full forty-five-degree angle. Fletcher dropped his suitcase, which went flying into the dining room, and grabbed the stair rail with both hands. Hulda shrieked, stumbled, and fell back toward the door.

Shoving off the wall, Merritt managed to snag her around the waist before she hit. The impact sent her glasses to the very edge of her nose.

But Owein wasn’t finished. The room tilted to fifty degrees, fifty-five, sixty—

Gravity slammed Merritt back into the corner by the portrait. He kept his hold on Hulda, which in turn slammed her into him. He wedged one foot into the doorjamb to keep their place.

“Never fear, Mrs. Larkin.” He smiled even as the room continued to churn. “In a moment we may be able to slip into a stationary room.”

Fletcher shouted something. Beth’s face appeared in the window, but it was difficult to open the door, angled and turning as it was. The room arched enough that Hulda was practically lying on top of him, and his body lit up everywhere she pressed, soft beneath the new dress, hard where the corset hid underneath.

He expected her to berate the house—Owein listened to her above anybody else—but instead she stared at him, her cheeks that lovely shade of pink, her spectacles barely hanging on, a delicate curl drooping over the side of her neck.

They’d reached ninety degrees when she blinked as though waking up and planted both hands on his chest—which he didn’t mind—and pushed herself as upright as she could, given the circumstances. “Owein Mansel! The threat of the library still stands!”

The house seemed to sigh around them. And poor Fletcher dangled from the stairway.

“I did say mostly tame!” Merritt pounded his fist into the wall behind him. “Come on now, or Fletcher will have to go home.”

With a groan, the reception hall slowly began ticking back into place, one degree at a time. Not quick enough for Hulda to be able to right herself with any sort of ease, so Merritt kept one arm encircled around her waist, ensuring she didn’t hurt herself.

She tried to straighten her clothes despite the position. “My apologies, Mr. Fernsby.”

“Hardly your fault.”

“Technically, it is.”

“It’s a very nice dress,” he offered, and she rewarded him with more of that rosy glow. She smelled like rosewater and rosemary . . . and wore roses on her dress. He wondered if she realized what a lovely metaphor she presented.

The room creaked into place. Hulda was slow to pull away from him, and Merritt was slow to let her go. It was not until Beth burst through the door, asking after their welfare, and Fletcher inquired whether the shifting of rooms would be a common occurrence during his stay that Merritt recalled they were not alone in their space, although he wished it were so. His hands fell from Hulda’s person. She brushed off her skirt, her hazel eyes dragging slowly from his. What would he have seen in them had her gaze lingered?

She cleared her throat, breaking him from his reverie. “I will ensure it does not happen again, Mr. Portendorfer. Now, as to your room . . .”

Hulda spent the day finishing her report and assisting both Mr. Babineaux and Miss Taylor; Mr. Portendorfer’s second visit was going much more smoothly than his first. The scents of dinner were starting to waft through the rooms, the sun was bright, and Owein minded himself after the incident with the stairs, though his spells followed Mr. Portendorfer around like a second skin, as though the boy was trying his best to impress him.

She thought for the dozenth time of Mr. Fernsby’s arm snug around her waist, their bodies pressed close enough for her to smell the petitgrain and ink that seemed to emanate from his skin. And for the dozenth time, she pushed the fancy away, though this time it was with more of an internal, desperate pleading to her mind to let it go than a stiff refiling of her thoughts.

She was just finished setting the dining room table when a pecking sounded at the window. Glancing over, she spied a windsource pigeon and wondered if it had flown down here after trying and failing to get through her bedroom window. Hurrying over, Hulda opened the pane and let the weary bird in, took the missive from its foot, and offered it a bread crumb.

She opened the letter, which bore the seal of BIKER. It read, Hulda, I must insist—

“What’s that?”

Jumping, Hulda turned to see Merritt coming in, and instinctually hid the letter behind her person.

“Is that a windsource pigeon?” He crossed the room to eye the bird, who was unfazed by the closeness of another human. “It is! Look at the seals on its feathers. Been a long time since I saw one up close.” He eyed her elbow. “That isn’t a letter from your beau, is it?”