Page 49 of Alpha's Magic

She looked uneasy and began wringing her hands. “I should warn you, sir—we had a small fire up in the attic not long ago.” She glanced over at Leo, looking nervous again. “I’m afraid it did some damage. This old wood is so dry. We were lucky to get it put out in time. But Trask is seeing to the repairs.”

“I see. What was the cause of the fire?”

“I don’t know, sir. No one stays here at night. A villager passing by reported seeing the flames and he ran and got everyone’s attention.”

“How was the fire put out then? Surely the whole place would have burned to the ground by the time help arrived.”

“Well, I…” She was wringing her hands again, and Leo put a hand on my arm.

“You’re scaring her, Asher.”

“Me? I’m simply asking her a question.”

“Yes, and you’re being a little scary.” Leo stepped past me and took her hand. “Let’s go somewhere and sit down, so you can tell us.”

She smiled at him gratefully and let him escort her into his father’s study, where they had lit a small fire. It had very little furniture inside, but Leo led her over to the fireplace and pulled up a chair for her to sit on and then knelt beside her.

“Now, please tell us what happened.”

She kept her focus on Leo as she sighed. “There is one who likes to come here sometimes. They live with me and have been with me for many years now—I can’t ask them to leave after so long. They have no place else to go and-and their mind is not quite settled…sometimes they get out and go for walks at night and come here. They put the fire out.”

An odd way to put it—"sometimes they get out at night.” I tamped down my outrage at the idea of some random crazy relation of Amalinia’s roaming around the king’s property and decided to just listen. There was something very strange here.

“This is a relative?”

“More like an old friend.”

“It’s a charity thing, then,” Leo said.

“Yes,” she said, looking relieved that Leo understood. “The poor thing has nowhere else to go. They sleep in my spare room, but there’s a little cot up there in the attic.” Her voice trailed off as she stared into the fire. “They mean no harm. When the fire started, they had a bucket of water nearby and dashed it on the flames. Then ran for more. They got most of it out in time for the villager who was passing to help them with the rest.”

With a bucket or two of water? Again, something was very wrong here. Her story wasn’t adding up.

“But it was this person who started the fire?” Leo was asking her gently.

“Yes, but they didn’t mean it. It was an accident, sir,” she said, glancing over at me in blatant appeal. “Everything will be repaired and cleaned up. I promise you. I’ll pay for it all, and it won’t happen again, sir.”

“Can I see this damage?” I asked, and she nodded, jumping to her feet.

She led us up the stairs to the second floor and then over to a smaller, interior staircase that led up to the attics. We could smell the smoke from the bottom of the steps, but when I opened the door, the damage had been mainly confined to the area in and around the firebox, which was made of red clay, now badly scorched. The mantle had been destroyed, along with the flooring around the fireplace and most of the wall. There was an overturned chair nearby and some buckets on the floor on their sides.

Magic had been used to douse these flames, of course. It hung in the air like the scent of the smoke.

I turned to look at Amalinia. “And this person you mentioned. Were they hurt?”

“A little. But they’re recovering.”

“At your house?” I asked as gently as I could, and she finally nodded, though she wouldn’t look at me.

“Very well, I’ve seen enough. Let’s go back downstairs and find the paperwork in storage. We still need to search through the prince’s papers.”

Chapter Seventeen

By lunchtime, I had discovered the personal papers of the prince, along with Leo’s birth information and his certificate. There was a great deal of old correspondence with the late King Alfrid, who had been a general at the time, as well as some back and forth with the king’s council of Sudfarma, regarding Ludwig taking over the throne when the old king Hendrick died. They made mention of the fact that he was the only legitimate heir.

I put all the relevant papers away for safe-keeping in my pack and checked on Leo, who had been going through his father’s books, putting a few aside to take with him.

Amalinia came in with a tray for our lunch. It was simple fare, but welcome after the long morning we’d had. I stopped her as she left the study by saying, “Amalinia, I’d like to ask you a few questions if I may.”

---