Page 56 of A Rare Find

They inched away, closer to the mattress’s edge.

Contented snores sawed the air.

“Elf,” they whispered. “Is that you?”

“That’s Hilda,” she murmured. The blanket tugged off Georgie’s body completely, a sign that she’d rolled over.

When they’d imagined sharing a bed with Elf, they hadn’t imagined snoring six-year-olds turning somersaults between them.

“You drew those diagrams,” they whispered. “Your father should have admitted it.” They listened to the bed creak, more soft snores. “I’ll tell the Barrow Prince. I’ll tell him that and everything else. I’ll rise at dawn. Depend on it.”

Rising at dawn was not their forte. But they did so. Groggily. Dependably.

Unfortunately, the Barrow Prince had risen even earlier, to walk on the moors. Georgie, Elf, and the twins were loaded into the stagecoach and rolling south in disgrace before he returned.

16

The stagecoach passed through Thornton, not Twynham. A hack post chaise waited outside the Yellow Lion, ready for hire, and Georgie stood with the luggage, and Hilda and Matilda, while Elf talked with the postillion.

She hadn’t talked with Georgie on the drive. She’d read continuously from Sepulchral Anecdotes. Nothing but books in her portmanteau, as it turned out. They’d watched her read out of the corner of their eye, considering the way forward.

There was a way forward. A way shadowy, watery, and as yet obscure.

They were considering it still.

“Let’s be off,” called Elf, walking briskly back to them. She wore the same brown dress as yesterday, more wrinkled, and her eyes were tired. She opened her portmanteau. Besides the books, she had packed a few articles of clothing, and when Mr. Marsden had handed her a small coin purse at breakfast, she’d stuffed that inside too. She dug out the purse and shook the contents into her palm.

“Oh.” The syllable was small and dismayed.

Georgie stepped closer and peered. One shilling, two thrupenny bits, five metal buttons, and a tooth.

“That isn’t human?” they asked. “No,” they answered their own question, because Elf seemed frozen. “Stag, maybe.”

“He didn’t give me enough.” She lifted her blanched face. “He put us on a stagecoach, and he didn’t give me enough to hire a carriage home. If it were only me, but…” She looked at the twins, who were sitting now on Georgie’s valise, oblivious.

“Even if it were only you,” said Georgie, “it’s wicked.”

“He forgot to check.” She slid the coins and buttons, and the tooth, back into the purse and tested its weight. “It feels full.”

“It is full. Full of buttons.”

“He thought it was money.”

“There’s no one here but us. You don’t have to defend him.”

Elf returned the purse to the portmanteau mechanically, not meeting their gaze. But of course. She’d been defending her Papa to herself.

His actions weren’t defensible. Mr. Marsden had stayed in the Peak, with his cronies, because he’d rather poke around for Saxon skulls than see his daughters safely home.

They felt a tug. Matilda had grabbed onto their skirt.

“May I sit on your lap in the carriage?”

“Erm.” Georgie caught Elf’s eye. “No?”

For a split second, she looked even more tired, shoulders bowed, but she straightened and smiled, and said, in a deceptively cheery voice, “We’re going to walk.”

“May I sit on your lap?” Matilda kept tugging.