Spellmaker

His lip quirked in the semblance of a smile, but there was something about his expression that made her uneasy. “What?” she asked, then blanched. “Bacchus, what did you do? Did you pay some unlordly fine?” She would get a second job to pay him back if she had to. Sell anything she had of value . . .

He shook his head and stood, taking her elbow to help her up as well. The delight she felt when he strung her arm through his didn’t fully banish her fear. He still hadn’t answered her. As he began walking through the bailey, toward the exit, she tried again, quieter. “Bacchus?”

“There is . . . one other caveat.” He nodded to a passing guard.

Elsie worried her lip, waiting for him to explain. When he didn’t, she pressed. “What?”

They reached the exterior doors and waited for two guards to open them. They passed through, and an invisible weight lifted from her. Everything felt cleaner and greener and more open. But Bacchus still didn’t answer. He escorted her over the grounds, short bursts of clover and gravel passing under their feet. A carriage Elsie recognized as the Duke of Kent’s waited down at the road, four black horses tethered to it.

Dread filled Elsie like tar. What had Bacchus given up to free her? Money? Lands? His mastership? What could it be?

This was it. Surely his silence was out of anger, or maybe distaste. Perhaps the worst had happened, and Bacchus had discovered her flaw—the quality that made her so distasteful to others—or the system had found it for him. This could be goodbye. She’d be free, but Bacchus . . .

Tears stung her eyes, and she forced them back. Don’t think about it. Just smile and nod, understand. Hold it in until you get home. Then Ogden can erase all of it. You won’t have to feel a thing. Just last a little longer . . .

She bit the inside of her cheek.

Bacchus’s steps slowed, stopped. He dropped her arm. Turned toward her. Elsie tried her best to look cheery and reposed, but found her acting skills had severely waned during her captivity.

He sighed. Gripped her shoulders, his warmth seeping through her sleeves, then suddenly let her go. A feeling of loss seized her. Would that be the last time he ever touched her?

In a voice too weak for her liking, she said, “Bacchus, you’re scaring me.”

He barked a chuckle. “That is my main concern, yes.”

Confused, she waited.

He drew a hand down his face. “I convinced the magistrate that I was a personal witness to your spellbreaking discovery. Because we’ve spent a lot of time together.”

Elsie blinked. “Nothing wrong with that.” It was true.

“Obviously I couldn’t discuss our work arrangement,” he went on. “The witness documents I turned in attest to our . . . courtship. From both the Duke and the Duchess of Kent and Miss Emmeline Pratt.”

She felt the heat work its way up her neck and to her cheeks. She desperately wanted to press her cool fingers to her face, yet such an action would draw Bacchus’s attention to the color. She cleared her throat. “Not so far-fetched.”

He glanced toward the carriage. It wasn’t so far-fetched . . . was it? Or did the idea of a master aspector courting the employee of a stonemason upset him? Her heart gave a quick, unpleasant thud just before he met her eyes once more.

“Elsie.” He looked so uncertain. “I had to sell it, you understand. Convince him of my motivation to be around you. He believes us to be engaged.”

Elsie’s lips parted.

“And.” He hesitated. “Expects to be invited to the wedding.”

She stared at him, again struggling to internalize what he was saying. Engaged? But they weren’t . . . but there was to be a wedding?

She would not faint. Only dramatic damsels fainted.

Bacchus continued, “He led me to believe that his suspicions remain. We must go through with it, Elsie. That is the only way to assuage his doubts.”

Elsie knew she was gawking, but she couldn’t stop herself.

Engaged.

Engaged?

Engaged to Bacchus Kelsey. Master Bacchus Kelsey.

Her numb lips stuttered, “You didn’t . . .” and stopped. You didn’t have to do that, she wanted to say, but he did have to do that if she wanted to walk away from this awful place. And he already had done it. For her.

He was throwing his life away for her.

Oh God, he must hate her.

Her face must have been something to see, for Bacchus notably withdrew into himself. “It won’t be terrible. I’ve already considered . . . We can stay in England, of course.”

“I . . . no. What I mean is . . .” She wrung her hands, searching for words. “I-I’m just surprised, is all. I didn’t expect—”

“Neither did I.”

A laugh escaped her mouth, a nervous sound born of nerves and uncertainty. She tried to reel it back in, but such a thing was impossible. Her stomach growled, and she pressed both hands to it.