Page 78 of A Rare Find

“I was thinking right now,” they said.

“I’m not sure,” she breathed. “I’m not sure if my feelings are neutral enough for kissing.”

They lowered their face until there was just a whisper of separation. “Are you teasing me?”

“Yes,” she said, and tilted up her chin.

Their mouth was wet with rain and carried the warmth of a thousand suns. It made sense when the velvety black behind her eyes went wine dark and then berry red. Georgie kissed her and kissed her, and everything made sense, every mad thing ever done for love, or lust, or whatever this was that braided hot ribbons inside her, that pulled the silk tight, so that a stroke of their tongue shivered all the way down to her belly.

Red was glowing there, in her belly, and between her legs, and behind her eyes, especially behind her eyes. Smears of red, changing shape.

Her lids flew open. Georgie’s mouth dragged over her jaw, her throat, and she was blinking against the rain at a flaming treetop.

Hungry sparks.

“My God.”

Smoke twisted as it rose, far blacker than the clouds, and the flames bathed Georgie in demonic light as they turned.

“Is that branch…?”

They didn’t complete the thought. The branch crashed down, trailing streamers of light. Sparks burst into the air as it hit the ground with a boom and a crackle. Elfreda felt the shudder of the impact and the rush of heat. Fiery leaves writhed less than a yard from her face.

Georgie was on their feet. She shot up, slammed into them, and clung. Their arm came around her waist. Another bolt forked from the clouds. She saw jagged gold reflected in their eyes, and sparks whirling overhead, and she could see them seeing her, every dark region of her body and soul lit with ecstatic terror. She pushed up, and electricity seemed to snap between her mouth and theirs. Both of them gasped into the kiss. The next thunderclap might have been an earthquake. Everything shook. She staggered, and then she was running, blinded by rain, slapped by brambles, holding tight to Georgie’s hand.

21

Mrs. Pegg screamed when Elfreda led Georgie into the kitchen.

In the firelight, Elfreda could see why. They were caked with mud from head to toe, and she was too.

“I’ll mop up these puddles,” she promised, looking down at the dirty water gathering by her ruined shoes. Georgie sidled up to the hearth, extending their arms.

“Who’s this?” demanded Mrs. Pegg. “A boggart from the rotten fens?”

“Georgie Redmayne.” Elfreda blotted her face with a rag, then stepped on it and swiped it back and forth on the floor. “From across the park.”

“How do you do,” said Georgie, through chattering teeth.

“Hmph.” Mrs. Pegg made a doubting noise.

“May I trouble you for a cup of tea?” they asked.

Still muttering about boggarts, Mrs. Pegg put the kettle on the hob and laid the tea things on the table.

“Not with those dirty hands,” she said when Elfreda reached for the milk jug. “You’re as sorry a sight as that one. What am I to do with you duckies? Always running into trouble. I was about to send Billy out to find you.”

“Billy?” Elfreda rounded the table and looked toward the larder. Mrs. Pegg’s grandnephew was sitting on the cabbage crate, nibbling a pickled egg.

“Off home with you, Billy.” Mrs. Pegg made a shooing motion. “Stop by the manor on the way. Tell them Miss Redmayne is staying the night.”

“Staying the night?” echoed Elfreda, just as Georgie said, “I can go, surely.”

Mrs. Pegg shot them her quelling look. “And belike catch your death. I’ll not hear it. A bath and then bed.”

Elfreda bathed first. She was dozing under the covers in her bed when Georgie opened the door to her chamber.

A creak. The glimmer of a candle.