Scales and Sensibility by Stephanie Burgis

Chapter 5

The first thing Elinor noticed the next morning when she woke was the warmth of bright sunshine against her eyelids—too-bright sunshine.

She never slept late! She certainly couldn’t afford to sleep late today of all days, not if she wanted to leave the inn in time to avoid—

“I tell you, that girl is my niece, and I will see her account for her crime!” bellowed an all-too-familiar voice outside her door.

Too late! Elinor met Sir Jessamyn’s golden gaze. He was sitting perched at the far end of the bed, shivering, with his long tail wrapped tightly around his body.

Elinor jumped out of bed, her pulse beating against her throat like a pair of wings fighting to get free. She ran to the window—

No. It was a three-storey drop onto the hard stone innyard. She would never survive that jump. Neither could Sir Jessamyn, with his poor, clipped wings.

“Sir John, really.” That was Mr. Hawkins’s voice, somehow managing to sound placating even when pitched at an unnaturally loud volume. “I’m sure there must have been some mistake. There’s certainly no need to go charging into a lady’s chamber before she’s even dressed, is there? If you just wait downstairs and have a pint of ale to calm yourself before she wakes…”

He was trying to give her a warning—and an escape route.

Elinor bit her lip, torn between humiliation and gratitude. If it worked—if he could persuade Sir John out of the way—she could slip down the back stairs quickly with Sir Jessamyn. It would give her a slight head-start, anyway.

But to where? She hadn’t the money for a trip to London or Bristol, to register with any employment agency. She hadn’t even funds enough for a single meal.

She took a deep breath and looked back at Sir Jessamyn as the heavy weight of practicality sank through her. The little dragon was gazing up at her from the bed with trusting golden eyes. Something seemed oddly different about his face, but she hadn’t time to worry about that, either.

Freedom had been such a beautiful dream. But it was long past time for Elinor to be sensible again, for both of their sakes.

“I can’t let you starve,” she whispered to Sir Jessamyn. “I cannot.”

She squared her shoulders and reached for the valise that held all of her clothing. Before she could even pull out her only clean morning gown, though, she heard Sir John’s voice rise with unmistakable finality.

“Damn it, man, my daughter will have her due!”

Sighing, Elinor snatched up her dressing gown, instead, from the spindly wooden chair beside the bed. She wrapped it tightly around herself as she hurried to the door, and turned the handle just as her uncle’s fist sailed through the air to knock. Past him, Benedict Hawkins was reaching out to Sir John’s bull-like shoulder, as if he were about to physically pull the older man away.

Both of them stopped and stared at her with as much horrified astonishment as if they’d seen a ghost. Her uncle’s fist hung as if frozen in mid-air. Benedict Hawkins took a full step backwards, blinking.

Oh, for goodness’ sake!Crow-like Elinor might be, but her appearance—even directly after a night of sleep, before she’d washed her face, dressed, or brushed her hair—couldn’t be that frightening, could it? Or at the very least, they could pretend otherwise for courtesy’s sake.

She lifted her chin, pride swelling to push aside her fear. “Well, Sir John?” she said coldly. If she was to be disgraced in front of Mr. Hawkins, at least she would bear it with dignity.

Her uncle shook his head. Then he shook it again, his big jowls quivering. His meaty fist lowered; he gave it a horrified look.

“I beg your pardon,” he said, to his fist. “I had no idea—that is, I thought—I was led to believe—” He whirled around to face Mr. Hawkins. “That fool of a maid said this was my niece’s room, didn’t she? You heard her as well as I did! I’ll see her sacked for this. I’ll—”

Elinor interrupted him for the first time ever. “Sir John? What is happening?”

He drew a deep breath that filled his broad chest, straining at the gold buttons on his striped waistcoat. “Mrs. De Lacey,” he said heavily, and bowed. “I am so sorry to have disturbed you.”

* * *

As Elinor’suncle bowed before her, she felt the world spin around her for the second time in two days.

I am dreaming, she thought. I must still be asleep.

She didn’t feel asleep, though. She could smell the rich, well-spiced scent of cooking meat drifting up the staircase from the inn’s kitchens, and she could hear men’s voices far below. A clock was ticking nearby, her back still ached badly from her accident the day before, and she didn’t think she could have dreamed the small brown mole in the middle of her uncle’s pink bald spot. She had never even seen that before; he had never bowed to her.

And Benedict Hawkins was staring at her with gape-mouthed astonishment...until her gaze met his.

He closed his mouth with a snap. Then he visibly swallowed and straightened his shoulders. “Mrs. De Lacey, please forgive me for addressing you without any introduction, and in such awkward circumstances, too, but—”

“Mr. Hawkins?” She smiled weakly.

His eyebrows shot up. “You know who I am?”

“Ah…” She clutched the neck of her dressing gown.

He cleared his throat. “Forgive me, Mrs. De Lacey, but the young lady who was here last night—do you know if she’s safe and well? Or—”

“Of if she took my daughter’s stolen dragon with her!” Sir John straightened, glowering anew. “I’ll see her locked away for that treachery, family or no!”

Elinor stared at the two men. “Forgive me,” she said. “I was asleep until a moment ago, and I can’t—I don’t seem to understand—”

“Of course.” Mr. Hawkins winced. “We’ve woken you. Our apologies, truly.”

“Oh! Yes,” Sir John said, and bowed again. “Deepest apologies, Mrs. De Lacey. I can only hope it hasn’t given you too much of a distaste—gad, if I’ve offended you, my daughter will have my head! Now that you’ve finally condescended to visit us after all—that is, if I haven’t changed your mind—Good God, if I have…!”

He stopped, breathing hard, and snatched a handkerchief from the inner pocket of his bright red coat. He wiped it across his glistening forehead and then clutched it in his hand, crumpling it with the force of his grip. “Please do tell me you can forgive my rudeness, ma’am!”

Elinor swallowed hard and put one hand out to the corner of the doorway for balance.

“Perhaps you might do us the honor of meeting us downstairs when you’re ready?” Mr. Hawkins suggested. “There is a private drawing room—”

“On the second storey,” Elinor finished for him, sighing in relief.

His hazel eyes narrowed. “Yes. It is on the second storey.”

“What a fortunate guess.” Smiling weakly, Elinor shut the door on both of them. Then she slid directly to the floor and landed with a thump.

Sir Jessamyn was watching her from the bed. He cocked his head in curiosity as the men’s footsteps thumped down the stairs beyond the door, their voices fading.

“They’ve gone mad,” she told him blankly. “Completely mad. Both of them. They actually thought—well, I don’t look that different in the mornings before I wash my face, do I?”

Sir Jessamyn chirped and craned his neck to look meaningfully at the door.

“I know.” Elinor sighed. “You’re hungry. I will find you breakfast. I’m sure that Sir John will agree to feed you, at least. But…” She frowned and stood up to cross to the bed. “Your face.” She touched it with gentle fingers, stroking across his warm scales. “That’s what’s different! You never had any gold streaks around your mouth before.”

Sir Jessamyn preened, half-closing his eyes, stretching his tail out luxuriantly along the bed, and clicking happily in the back of his throat as she inspected every detail. Round curlicues of gold swirled from the left edge of his mouth and along his chin, shining brightly against his glittering blue and green scales.

“Your new pattern is very beautiful,” said Elinor. “But what on earth caused it?”

He opened his eyes and looked up at her...and Elinor suddenly remembered: that feeling of strange intensity burning through his gaze; Sir Jessamyn’s scales glowing in the dark; flaming heat against her skin…

Her hand dropped away from his face as if she’d been scalded. “That was only a dream!”

Sir Jessamyn looked up at her steadily, his golden eyes glinting knowingly beside his startling new golden streak.

Elinor drew a deep breath. “I must get dressed. There’s no more time for nonsense!”

She took the time to arrange every layer of her clothing with painstaking care, despite her uncontrollably trembling fingers. Finally, though, when she was fully dressed, she slowly turned towards the tiny, warped silver mirror that hung above her wash basin, a full five feet away and still angled safely away from her. She couldn’t arrange her hair for the day without looking at that mirror, but she couldn’t bring herself to move any closer to it, either.

It was utterly foolish to feel so nervous, she reminded herself. Even if the two gentlemen outside her door had somehow become confused…

She reached back to un-do her plait. A long waterfall of hair fell loose over her left shoulder.

Her throat clenched.

Her hair was an entirely unremarkable shade of thick, straight brown. To be kind, her mother had always called its shade chestnut.

Luxuriantly curling waves of black hair tumbled over her shoulder now. Elinor reached up to stroke them, numb with disbelief.

She still felt her own hair, straight and thick, against her skin. But she saw her fingertip rise and fall over round curls that she couldn’t feel. The contrast made her stomach swoop. A low whimper sounded from her throat, against her will.

Elinor stepped towards the mirror, feeling as if she were floating outside her own body.

The woman whose eyes she met there was at least fifteen years older than Elinor. She wasn’t adorably beautiful like Penelope. Her nose was too strong for that and her chin too wide. No, she wasn’t pretty or soft. No one would mistake her for a china doll.

But there was something about the striking curves and angles of her face and the confident glint in her dark blue eyes…something that Elinor recognized immediately, even though she’d never glimpsed it in her own expression.

It was the look of a woman who knew that she held power...and no wonder. It was, after all, the face of the most powerful woman she’d ever heard of.

“Oh, my,” Elinor said faintly. “Oh, my heavens.”

She turned to stare at Sir Jessamyn. He chirruped proudly as he looked back at her. Gold glinted to the left of his mouth in the light that streamed from the square window.

“Oh, Sir Jessamyn,” Elinor breathed. “What have you done?”