Page 37 of House of Furies
“Not at all.” He lifted one foot and turned it this way and that. I watched, sickened, as the bones rearranged themselves, reverting to how his feet had been before—backward. Backward like a demon’s. My mother had told stories of cursed beings with wrong-facing feet, born that way so as to confuse when their tracks seemed always to lead away when in truth they followed. A shudder ran through me. He seemed to stand more like some satyr of myth than a man now, his calves curving away, his beautiful, shiny shoes made absurd by the disjointed position.
“Better?”
“No,” I breathed, shutting my eyes again.
“It’s a glamour. Simple magicks, really, at least for me. It would be for you, too, I suspect, if you had the willingness to try.”
Now I wanted to look at him even less. I pressed my forehead hard into the worn wood of the door. “You’re a liar.”
“Often, yes, but not right now.”
My hand slipped from the knob but I grabbed it again, holding myself up, torn between running away from this thing that spoke as prettily and confidently as any fine gentleman. But he was no fine gentleman. He was... He was... “Whatareyou?”
I opened my eyes slowly, but he had not moved. And his feet were normal again. Had he changed them in the face of my obvious disgust? Mr. Morningside brushed his hair back, though the perfect black curls needed no rearranging.
“Do you sincerely wish to know?”
“I don’t know,” I whispered truthfully. “I don’t know.”
“It’s in the book, Louisa, should your curiosity resurface.” He sighed, taking one small step toward me. “Stop cowering that way, it’s upsetting.”
I straightened, but slowly, refusing to shed tears and look even more the pathetic little fly. My hands were still pressed tightly to the door, and I had every intention of going that minute, to at least seek some shelter in the hayloft again, but it was then that Mrs. Haylam and the doctor emerged from the Red Room. I heard their soft conversation and watched them cross the portion of the corridor open to the foyer.
They were going to fetch the widow’s body, and hers would not be the last.
“Rawleigh Brimble doesn’t belong here, you know,” I said, succeeding somehow in keeping the tremor from my voice.
“Who?”
My head flew up at that, and I scoffed. “Rawleigh... Lee Brimble. The young man. He’s one of yourguests.”
“Oh.” Mr. Morningside shrugged and crossed his arms. “Well, if he’s one of my guests, then he belongs here and he will meet his end here; that is all but woven into the tapestry of fate.”
“He hasn’t done anything wrong! You’ve made a mistake.”
He shook his head and squinted, studying me more carefully. Slowly, laughingly, he said, “I never make mistakes. He’s here for a reason.”
“No, no, he’s a good person. It would be wrong to hurt him.” Of course Lee might have lied to me, but that seemed impossible. I had looked into his face as he told me of his guardian. The whole thing was a misunderstanding. An accident. “He doesn’t belong on your twisted list.”
“Why? Because you like him? Louisa, please, I implore you—be better than this.”
“Than what?” I demanded, feeling bolder.
“A gullible little girl.”
That only emboldened me further. “Do you know how to speak to anyone at all without being a condescending git?”
“Not really, no.” He shrugged again, elegantly, and wandered closer. I recoiled, but he either didn’t notice or pretended not to. A thin, mischievous smile spread across his face, and that, more than his proximity, frightened me. “But I’ll entertain your theory, Louisa, and should you find proof that this Brimble boy is truly an innocent soul, then do bring it to my attention.”
“You’re serious. Do... Youwilllisten to me if I can prove he isn’t a killer?”
He nodded once, pressing his lips together.
“But why? I thought... I thought you never made mistakes.”
“Because I’m beginning to like you, and because you remind me of someone I knew once. You’re both bold as brass and stubborn to a fault. Not that I should be encouraging these things, but everyone has their weakness.” He stopped a hand’s width from me and pulled something from his cravat. It was a goldpin, shiny and perhaps the size of a shilling, and he offered it to me in his palm. “Or, of course, you could leave.”
What?
