Theory of Magic Page 23

She’d managed a bite of toast and some tea for breakfast before the first business visitor of the day was announced, an industrialist concerned about trade unions. Ash hadn’t emerged from his chamber yet. She really needed him to see, prayed he could see, what they had done and give him time to grasp it. Drat these early callers.

  She heard the footman rap on Duncan’s door, then deliver the industrialist to the study. She’d never grab his attention now.

  She checked the table settings the servants were laying out. She’d ordered mostly foods that people could eat with their fingers to minimize the problem of china and silverware shortage. She thought Ash and Erran had concocted some conspiracy to ply some of the less reliable voters with drink, so she confirmed that the wine and brandy were fully stocked.

  She went upstairs to be certain their few bedrooms had been prepared for any guests who might not be in condition to stumble into a freezing night. Mary had returned to act as her maid and was busy packing clothes to carry down to Ash’s chamber in case they needed to use hers.

  Mary still hadn’t learned to do hair properly. Lady McDowell was bringing over her own maid this evening to help Christie with her limp tresses. The finished gown had been delivered this morning—a rather bold green and pale gold. Christie didn’t know if Ash could see gold as well as yellow, but she hoped he might.

  She had come a long way since that night hiding in the shadows at the only ball she’d ever attended, watching the company gliding by in gales of excited chatter and laughter. She was no longer the pathetic spinster who had waited an hour for a suitor to call. Tonight was one more step into her future as the woman she wished to become.

  She would have to believe she was a help to Ash, not an embarrassment who should be hidden in rural anonymity. She wanted to be strong enough to lock Hidden Harriet in a box where she belonged and never let her out again.

  The Malcolm ladies and their husbands began arriving about an hour before the soiree. Christie had persuaded them to stand in the reception line with her and Ashford. Lady McDowell and Aster had both brought maids to help guests repair and refresh their coiffures and gowns as the evening progressed.

  The men went looking for Ash while Christie led the others upstairs to the family salon. The twins had been told to stay in the schoolroom, although Christie suspected they were rummaging through the attic, looking for mischief.

  “Everything looks spectacular,” Moira raved. “The chandelier in the salon must have taken hours to polish!”

  “Don’t tell the children yet, but Ashford can see light and shadow if there’s enough illumination,” Christie explained. “I was hoping the chandelier might help, although I thought half the staff would quit before it was ready.”

  “He can see light?” Aster exclaimed. “And shadow? Is this new? Might he really be getting better?”

  Christie shrugged helplessly. “I probably should have said nothing. He does not explain because he’s afraid it will all go away tomorrow.”

  Aster raised her eyes to the heavens and clasped her hands, as if in prayer.

  “More mirrors to reflect the light are needed then,” Moira said, more practically.

  “Can he see the yellow we set out?” Aster asked, still excited. Ash’s recovery would most affect her and Theo.

  “I haven’t been able to pry him out of his study all day. It’s been one visitor after another. I thought surely he’s twisted the arms of everyone in the kingdom,” Christie replied. “We’ll have to explain to him while we wait in the reception line.”

  “What Ashford and Erran are doing is crucial to the future of the country,” Celeste said in her soothing voice. “It’s important that we support them in any way we can.”

  “I understand that and agree, but . . .” Christie hesitated, uncertain how to approach the topic that had fretted at her all day.

  “But . . . ?”Aster said in her blunt manner. “What is wrong?”

  Christie took a deep breath, closed her eyes, and removed the barriers she erected to keep too many emotions from bombarding her at once. “But you are worrying—about the unborn babe, perhaps? And Celeste is being polite when she speaks of Erran. She’s angry, and I assume it’s about something he’s done. Lady McDowell, you aren’t really listening but are anxious about . . . maybe the election? Surely, I am not the only one who feels these things?”

  Thunderous silence followed. Squeezing the bridge of her nose, Christie lowered herself into the closest chair. It hurt to let in so much emotion, but she was registering a rising confusion and excitement.

  So it wasn’t just Ash who was damaged—so was she.

  27

  The silence after Christie’s announcement about her feelings erupted into a babble of excitement. Aster waved everyone to silence. Lady McDowell sent for sherry. Christie huddled miserably in her chair, trying to calm herself while surrounded by a storm of emotion she lacked the strength to block.

  “It’s not the babe I’m worried about,” Aster said, “but you and Ashford. Mars is transiting Ash’s moon, squaring with his Saturn. In his case, that’s a direct and immediate threat to his home and family. At the same time, danger points in your family sector could be triggered by the transit. I cannot predict the direction, no matter how deeply I read your charts.”

  Christie winced. Danger points sounded ominous. “How does one go about guarding against cosmic peril?” she asked, a little more sarcastically than she ought.

  “One can’t, of course.” Aster shrugged and added, “Although you are correct that I am also worrying that I won’t be able to reach Wystan in the spring if Theo must oversee the planting. You are very good at interpreting emotion. That’s an intriguing gift.”

  “It’s called survival,” she said a little too tartly, uncomfortable with being the subject of scrutiny. “I observe and surmise.”

  The ladies nodded as if they understood. Aster smiled in delight. “I suppose that is the reason you deal so well with Ashford and his tantrums. You understand how he’s feeling better than we do.”

  Oh dear. Christie squirmed. Now she felt intrusive. If other people didn’t feel strong emotion as she did, then her guessing the reason for their feelings was almost like mind reading. She really could not let others know what she did!

  Celeste added to Christie’s confusion by confessing, “And I am angry at Erran for spending all his time with Ashford, which is selfish. You can tell that? Or is it the ghosts?”

  Christie shook her head, trying to sort through her appalled confusion. She’d always felt different but blamed her size . . . . She hadn’t realized she was the only person—possibly in the world—crippled by the emotions of others.

  “The voices seldom speak to me,” she said slowly, too rattled to think clearly, “or if they do, I don’t hear them for all the noise of my thoughts. Sensing how people feel is different and unavoidable if I’m unprepared. It’s something I do like breathing. I have to deliberately hold my breath to not inhale a roomful of hot, stale air. Does that make sense? And you can’t open your minds and sense how I’m feeling right now? How is this possible? How does anyone ever understand each other?”

  “We can tell how people feel by watching their expressions and gestures or hearing the tone of their voice,” Lady McDowell said with interest. “Some people don’t pay enough attention to others to care how anyone feels. With his blindness and arrogance, a powerful marquess like Ashford is at a distinct disadvantage in even listening to others, much less understanding them. Is that what has you worried? That marriage with a man who cannot appreciate your feelings will be difficult?”

  “I am worried that I am the damaged one here!” Which was selfish, she realized, but right now, she was the only one who understood her horror of being different. She’d spent a lifetime hiding her differences! “I thought everyone could feel as I do and just blocked feelings better. I had no notion . . . I don’t even know where to begin . . .” Shaken, Christie longed for a moment alone, but shortly, she would have to
go downstairs, smile, and pretend all was right with her world.

  “It’s just your gift,” Aster explained. “I’ll find appropriate journals for you to read. Your great-grandmother saw ghosts and talked to them. Everyone considered her deranged, but she saved the duke by listening to spirits, so our gifts are good things. We just need to learn how to use them appropriately. You can provide what Ashford is missing. It’s ideal!”

  “Only, it might not be a good idea to tell Ashford that you can do it,” Celeste said in concern. “He thinks Erran and I are demented when we talk about our ability to persuade people to do what we want.”

  “Ives are like that,” Aster said with a shrug. “They have to be convinced that it’s scientifically possible. The only reason Erran believes you is because he’s gifted too. Theo tries to find excuses for what I do, but at least he listens to me now. He’s downstairs setting guards on the doors in case the danger points in our charts involve the house.”

  She’d already tried to explain to Ashford and he’d looked at her as if she were crazed. Christie winced at her naiveté. “I think I’d like to read those journals,” she said weakly. “I’ve just . . . I’ve always . . . It’s as if I’ve been told I’m reading minds. I’m not.”

  “Just think of it as a very strong empathy,” Lady McDowell said. “You’ve been isolated and haven’t learned to put it to best purposes.”

  “That’s another thing,” Christie interrupted. “Is it possible that I was isolated because people were afraid when I told them things I shouldn’t know?” She couldn’t shake the feeling that her own mother had arranged her isolation.

  “Didn’t you once say that your mother sometimes speaks inside your head?” Aster asked in curiosity. “Could you try asking her?”

  “I’ve never ascertained what triggers the voices. Maybe I really am damaged,” she said sadly.

  “Nonsense. This is the reason other people lose their gifts—they fear them,” Lady McDowell said with firmness.

  “Because they don’t want to be different,” Christie pointed out with wryness. “People tend to be laughed at if they say they have voices in their head.”

  Lady McDowell nodded agreement. “But Malcolms are prepared to understand and experiment. It’s a shame you had no one to teach you, but we’ll help. Try emptying your head. We will be very quiet. Just let everything else fade away and concentrate on what you want to ask.”

  Christie wrinkled her nose in distaste, but when the other women politely sat on the shabby family furniture and waited, she sighed and closed her eyes. Emptying her head was no easy task. But the possibility of accessing her mother . . . was too wonderful not to try. She just wasn’t certain how to form the question.

  But the minute she opened her mind, the voice was there without her needing to ask, as if her mother had been waiting for her to listen.

  You cried, the voice said. You were always a happy child, until your father died. Then you did nothing but cry. I feared it was because I did nothing but cry, so I sent you to stay with your father’s sister. Your cousins were older, but you were larger, and you told your aunt that everyone hated you. When she didn’t believe you, you fought them—even though no one ever saw them do anything to you. You were only happy in the schoolroom.

  Christie vaguely remembered that summer. Her cousins had made her life miserable in small ways, ways that couldn’t easily be traced, but she’d felt their triumph and spite when her favorite doll lost its head or she tripped and fell on objects that disappeared before adults intervened. So she’d known who had done it, but she had no proof and couldn’t understand why no one else could feel their meanness.

  She must have seemed to be a very difficult child when she started fighting for no reason anyone could discern.

  It grew worse when I tried to send you to school, her mother’s voice said sadly. It was only then that I could accept that you suffered my affliction of feeling too much. My only choice was to do as my parents did—hire a governess and keep you home. I had wanted you to be better than me. And now you are! Thank your friends for understanding.

  The voice faded as Christie allowed the buzz of the real world to enter again. Stunned, she simply sat there a moment longer. All this time, she’d had the ability to speak with her mother? And she’d never tried?

  You were not ready to hear me, and I did not understand how to reach into your mind without frightening you.

  “I am an idiot,” Christie said aloud. “My governess used to applaud my superior intellect, but I am an idiot.”

  “You said your mother died when you were twelve. Did you have anyone else to explain about voices or emotions?” Aster asked. “This is the reason for our journals and for trying to keep track of all our family. I hope your mother said something useful just now.”

  “She suffered from the same affliction,” Christie explained, rubbing a tear from her eye . “That is probably why she was content with rural anonymity. There was no one to teach us how to block spite or hatred. We had to learn it on our own. And hiding from the negative feelings of others made us very strange people. I think she tried to teach me this before she died, but I was too young to understand. Or I didn’t want to accept that I was different from everyone else.”

  “But for a politician’s wife, knowing how people feel is ideal,” Lady McDowell pointed out. “You will be able to separate friend from foe and who is teetering on the brink. Come along, let’s see what the men are up to. They’re likely to stay in the study drinking if we don’t line them up.”

  “Oh, and we haven’t shown Ashford the salon yet! Let’s hurry and see if he can see the yellows!” Relieved to have something normal to think about, Christie gathered up her skirt and petticoats and led the way downstairs.

  The men, as predicted, were in the study with their brandy. Refusing to be put off any longer, Christie swept into the room, took her husband’s arm, and insisted that he follow her.

  “It’s early,” he protested. “No one will arrive yet.”

  “Remember I asked you this morning to come to the salon with me? And you didn’t. Now’s the time. The others can drink themselves under the desk, but I need you for this.”

  True to form, the ever-curious Ives men and Viscount McDowell followed them out. Not only were Erran and Theo there, but so was their half-brother, the blond playwright, Jacques, and their sophisticated Uncle Pascoe—wearing a monocle today. The large, bulky gentleman to whom she hadn’t been introduced, she assumed to be half-brother William, the dog trainer. He appeared uncomfortable in his evening suit, and hadn’t shaved yet this evening, but like most Ives, he had striking cheekbones and thick dark hair.

  Ashford was dressed meticulously in proper black, with gleaming white linen fastened by a thin black tie. His silver vest was heavily encrusted with embroidery and the buttons glittered like diamonds. His valet had recently trimmed his hair and shaved him. Christie kissed a drop of shaving soap on his jaw as she drew him into the salon entrance in front of her. He squeezed her hand, then halted in the doorway.

  “By Jove, is that a chandelier?” he asked in amazement. “Or is the ceiling on fire?”

  “You can see it?” Christie asked in excitement. “I’d hoped it would give you enough shadow to see motion.”

  “Go twirl about, let me see,” he ordered.

  Relieved, she did so, letting her green-and-gold striped gown flare out, revealing her ankles to all and sundry. The other Ives men whistled. Ash stood there with his walking stick—turning his head to follow her movement, looking stunned.

  “You’re flickering,” he said. “And what is that yellow blob over there?” He pointed his stick at the mantel.

  “Flowers on the mantel,” she said in triumph. “Can you see anything else? Look around.”

  She danced to the back of the room where the large mirror reflected all the candles and lamps placed around the room.

  Ash stepped in her direction. “What the devil is that? Light and yellow?”


  “A mirror and a gold fan. The light really makes a difference! Now you know where the back of the salon is.”

  The others began to press into the room behind Ashford, who continued following Christie, obviously able to see her movement. They stayed out of his way, however, as she hurried toward the window. This one was a little more difficult. With the draperies pulled against the night, she only had lamps and the shawl to guide him.

  Following her, he smacked the chair with his stick, rubbed the shawl, and settled onto the cushion. He caught Christie’s skirt and dragged her down upon his lap. “You are brilliant. I want to marry you again.”

  She could feel his joy and excitement—and despite all her misgivings, it felt good. Kissing his jaw, she leapt from his grasp. “You’re crushing the silk, my favorite husband. We’ll marry again after the evening is done. If you poke people with your stick to make them move, will you be able to maneuver around the room on your own?”

  “I had planned to follow you around. I don’t want to talk to these jingle-brains anyway. Do you mean to abandon me?” Despite his words, he rose and crossed the room, using his stick to detect objects. “What did you do with the furniture?”

  “Moved it against the walls so you wouldn’t stumble over it in the crush. There should be nothing but people around you unless you walk into a wall, and the yellow ought to show you how close you are to those. You may have to go hungry unless you’re feeling brave, but you should be able to reign over your salon without need of me,” Christie explained.

  He frowned and tapped his stick thoughtfully against the floor. “And what will you do all evening?”

  “Whatever you need me to do, but I’m fairly certain you won’t even notice my presence or absence once the room fills,” she said, now understanding his limitations. He couldn’t feel her as she did him. That made her sad—and more determined to find a way of reaching him.

  “Carriages are arriving,” Lady McDowell announced. “Take your places, please.”