Page 33 of Tales of a Monstrous Heart
He shrugged, rubbing his hands together as crumbs of dirt dropped to the tiled floor. ‘It was a long time ago.’
‘How did you meet Emrys?’ Perhaps I should have kept my questions to myself, but I felt an ease speaking to another fey, finally unwatched.
‘My father tried to sell me on the east roads to one of the pleasure markets, deeming me queer enough to get a profit,’ he continued in a horrifyingly conversational tone. ‘I was six then.’
My magic surged at the mere mention of those roads, my hands clutching the stool beneath me, wood creaking in my grip. Alma rushed down my arm to slip into my dress pocket.
The east roads were a prolific slave route, where most menageries’ victims were recruited, and lords got cheap servants. The same roads I assumed Alma had been sold on, and where I would have been too if Master Hale hadn’t taken me in.
‘Emrys happened to be working a case in town when I escaped,’ he continued, unaware of my internal struggle, or just how closely linked we could all be. ‘He was about to leave. I still don’t know what made him stop.’ There was a sad amusement in his smile, a distance in his gaze as I watched him relive it.
‘I’m sorry, William.’ I was – sorrier than he could ever know, that any of it had happened at all.
‘I’ve never given much credence to the notion of fate or ancestral guidance, but I can’t deny someone was looking out for me that day.’ He smiled weakly, pulling in a deep breath before pushing away from the table. ‘I should go and start on dinner.’
There was a loneliness about this boy. One that made me instantly annoyed with Emrys for leaving him behind, but also grateful to him for taking him in and protecting him from the cruelty of the world.
‘I can help.’ I reached into my bag, rummaging until I was elbow deep in my things before pulling out a small notepad filled with a few pages of recipes my father had taught me. ‘We can work on one of these together.’ I held out the offering to him, suddenly anxious he wouldn’t want such a troublesome friend as me.
‘Are you sure?’ He frowned but didn’t hide the excitement in his eyes. ‘I thought you’d want to get to the Institute to check over the records?’
The key Master Hale had given me felt like a dead weight where it still rested in my pocket. That strange unease from I’d felt the last time I’d been in the hallway slipped over my skin before I shook it away.
‘I need some time away from occult papers, and it’s been a very long time since I was in a kitchen,’ I said by way of explanation. ‘Maybe tomorrow is the day for the Institute.’
Coward.The word came hissed into the back of my mind and for once I couldn’t shake it away.
‘If the house wants to let you go,’ William warned playfully. ‘It has a habit of messing up plans.’
I had noticed, hearing the constant creaking groans of the wood, almost passing comment.
‘Let’s get Alma some cheese,’ he offered cheerily, making her appear from my pocket with a squeak and scurry up my arm.
‘Emrys taught me how to make bread, but everything else is a mystery to me,’ William continued with a grin, extending his arm to guide me to the kitchen.
Chapter Eleven
Madman, elusive lord or the cursed offspring of a witch? I told myself I didn’t care as I sank lower into the hot bath, relishing the feeling of stretching my legs and dipping beneath the water into the peaceful silence beneath. The small metal tub in my room at the Institute was by now a distant memory. The discomfort for myself and Alma as we had to share the shallow water. Too tired by the end of the tedious days to lug more up the narrow stairs.
The memory of the confining cruelty of the place made me linger beneath the surface of the water. Hoping to drown away the shame and anger of it all.
However, no matter how much I wished it, I couldn’t dwell in the bath all morning. If I hadn’t worked that out myself, Alma’s squeaking from the chair in the corner told me as much.
Begrudgingly, I pulled myself from the warm water and set about the gruelling task of getting dressed without help once again.
Despite William’s endless conversation and reassurances in the kitchen as he made dinner, I couldn’t shake the feeling of unease that had followed me like a dark shadow into the next few days. My inability to study my own papers, the darkevents still taking place in this world and the fey that seemed to suffer the most from it.
Alma was still a mouse, more unable to communicate with me than before. Emrys hadn’t returned, and I began to worry he never would. I should have been relishing the calm, but it appeared I wasn’t made for the quiet as I found myself dressed, damp hair tied back into a sensible bun as I approached the west wing portal, which William had shown me during a house tour when we both grew bored after dinner.
However, on my journey to find it, the rug beneath me suddenly curled up of its own volition, making me skid into the sideboard.
I waited to hear the rattle of drawers or creak of the wood panelling echoing with the house’s dark amusement, but nothing followed. I put the incident down to my own foolishness, despite my unease thatmaybethe house was trying to stop me. With accusations of my madness already rampant, the last thing I needed was to be talking to houses.
I found the door I needed. Reluctantly and with an unsteady hand, I slid the instruction paper I’d written into the slot, listening to the creaking groan of the cogs turning. A soft glow emitted from the edges of the door as I opened it and stepped through into one of the Institute’s opulent greeting halls.
Apprehension rolled through me as I saw the stone archways carved with ancient runes leading in various directions and depictions of ancient beasts carved around their bases. The eternal lanterns omitting sharp white light, making the gold they were cast in glow.
It had been mere days and yet the place suddenly seemed foreign, too big as every tiny sound echoed back to me.
