LITMIR.BIZ

      Chapter One

      “Uncle Aonghus?”

      Glenys lifted the cellar door a bit higher, peering through the dim candlelight in the room below. Fragrant blue smoke, sparkling with whatever chemicals her uncle had mixed, wafted upward into the hall. Glenys waved the substance away and called more loudly, “Uncle Aonghus?”

      “Mayhap he’s drunk one of his potions again,” Dina, Glenys’s maid, suggested, her eyes widening at the thought. “Do you not remember what happened when last he did such a thing?”

      “May God forbid,” Glenys said fervently, remembering the event—and all the others that had come before it—all too well. “Here, hold the door and I will go down.”

      The steps leading down to the hidden cellar were both narrow and short, and Glenys tread them with care, lifting her heavy skirts high to keep from tripping.

      “Uncle Aonghus? Are you well?” The moment she gained the floor she made for the long table where he kept all of his powders and potions. Furiously waving sparkling blue smoke aside with both hands, she said, “You promised me faithfully that you’d never drink any of your experiments again. And thank a merciful God you’ve but made more smoke this time, and not caused another explosion.”

      She coughed as the smoke grew heavier near the table, and heard an answering cough coming from somewhere behind it. Uncle Aonghus, she discovered, was lying on the floor, arms splayed wide as if he’d been knocked back by a large fist.

      “God’s mercy!” Glenys cried as she knelt beside the elderly man, setting her hands on his shoulders. “Uncle Aonghus!”

      He coughed again and, with her help, sat up. “I’m well,” he insisted. “I’ve come to no harm.”

      “No, stay there a moment,” she said, holding him still when he would have risen. “I’ll fetch a glass of wine. Only rest until you’ve recovered.”

      Moving quickly, Glenys gained her feet, but found that the smoke was thicker than before, and glittering more violently. A few sharp sparks nipped her face and hands, irritating but not painful. A short search revealed the source of the mischief to be a small glass jar set upon her uncle’s worktable.

      She quickly put a lid over the jar, bringing an end to the smoky outpouring. Then, blindly feeling the tabletop with seeking hands, she at last found another jar of equal size and unlidded it. Scooping up a small handful of the cool, crystalline mixture within, Glenys reached back and flung it into the air. More sparkles filled the chamber, purple and white this time. Almost at once the smoke began to dissipate, and within moments was gone altogether. Behind her, she heard Uncle Aonghus give a sigh of relief.

      “I was so close this time,” he said. “I wish I knew what element is missing. I’m so very close.”

      Glenys had already moved to another table to pour her uncle a glass of wine from the decanter set there.

      Returning to kneel and give it to him, she replied, “I’m certain it will come to you soon, Uncle, but you must use greater care. If ’tis reported to the sheriff that more colored smoke has been coming from the chimneys, we will find ourselves in great difficulty. I do not know how I can explain it again in any reasonable manner.”

      Uncle Aonghus drained the cup she’d given him and handed it back to her. He smiled and patted her hand, saying, “Such a good girl you are, Glenys. If not for you, we’d all have been burned at the stake years ago.”

      “Nay, that is not so,” she assured him at once, though her heart knew that he had spoken the truth. She was twenty years of age, and had spent many of those years keeping her aunts and uncles safe. They were as harmless as could be, but so very strange in their ways that she had no doubt they would readily be burned as witches and warlocks if any of those ways became known. She would have kept them all at their ancestral estate in Wales throughout the year, if she could, for in Wales they were always safe. But they insisted upon accompanying Glenys to London for six months out of each year while she took care of the many Seymour businesses. And in London, her aunts and uncles were as vulnerable as newborn rabbits to skilled hunting hawks.

      Glenys had only two defenses in keeping them safe while at Metolius, their palatial dwelling on London’s Strand. The Seymour family was wealthy enough to buy favor from both the church and crown, which Glenys made certain to do. And her brother, Daman, who was a famed knight of the realm, rode throughout the country with his army, gaining goodwill and setting the Seymour name in a favorable light. As long as both the tributes and Daman’s good works continued, the Seymour family was safe, but Glenys was the first to admit that it was a most wearying task. She often longed to be free of it, knowing full well that ’twould never be. She and Daman had long since devoted themselves to the good of the Seymour family name, regardless of what it cost them.

      “Now,” Uncle Aonghus said with renewed energy. “I can’t sit about all day.” Taking the arm she proffered, he let her help him to his feet. “There is much to do before you go. But, oh,” he said with open affection, squeezing her hand, “’twill will be so strange and difficult with you gone.” Releasing her, he returned to his table, his beautiful, long-fingered hands reaching out to rearrange several bottles there. “Metolius will be terribly lonely. Indeed, I hardly know how we shall go on. But that can’t be helped,” he stated with all practicality. “And you must not worry o’er us, my dear. I shall make certain that Mim and Wynne behave themselves until you’ve returned from retrieving the Greth Stone. And I shall strictly forbid your uncle Culain to leave Metolius, save to attend Mass.”

      Glenys smiled at him. “I’m only going to the bank to speak to Master Fairchild, Uncle Aonghus, just as I do every Thursday. I’ll settle the matter of our next shipping venture and return home within two hours. And as for the Greth Stone, you know full well that I’ll not set out for Wales until Daman has returned with his men. ’Tis already planned that they will escort me.”

      “Yes, dearest, I know what’s been planned,” Uncle Aonghus assured her as he scooped up a large handful of the crystals that she’d earlier used to stop the smoke, pouring it into a small leather pouch, “but you must be prepared, nonetheless. Now, here, tie this to your belt and make certain not to lose it.” He pulled the drawstrings to the bag tight and brought it to her.

      Glenys gazed at the offering and gave a slight shake of her head. “But I’m sure I won’t need this for such a short visit, Uncle. Can you think it wise to allow one of your mixtures out of the dwelling? Especially this one? I know ’tis not truly magical, but if it should somehow happen to become lost and fall into unknowing hands…” The thought was too unpleasant to finish aloud.

      “Have no fears for that, Glenys.” He placed the pouch in her hand and curled her fingers about it, smiling at her warmly. “You’ll have need of it in future. Trust what I say, dearest. Now come. We’ll go upstairs together so that I may see you off.”

      He led the way toward the small, child-size stairs, climbing them with nimble grace ahead of Glenys. She watched, amazed, as she ever was, at the elegance and ease with which her elderly uncle moved. He was tall, slender and small-boned, as were his sisters and brother, reminding Glenys not so much of an ordinary human being, but of a creature that might be half human and half animal. Precisely what kind of animal, she wasn’t sure. Her aunts and uncles were as quick and sure-footed as mountain goats, as delicate and careful as great-eyed deer and as difficult to make behave as a group of highly independent cats. Their coloring and features were remarkably similar, as well, although since Aunt Mim and Aunt Wynne were twins that wasn’t so unusual a thing. They all had white hair and

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