Martha Barwood
Regency Romance Author
The Governess of
thornecrest Hall
thornecrest Hall
Chapter 1- Chapter 2 – Chapter 3
Chapter 1
Evening bled into night, unnoticed by Graham Davenport, as he did the same thing, he had done every evening for the past eight months.
He stared at paper.
Well, it wasn’t really paper, was it? In truth, it was war. It was empire. It was evidence of human triumph carved into ancient fields by hands long turned to dust. It was a map. Graham hunched over the library table, ink-stained fingers moving with obsessive precision along the faint Roman boundary lines. Eight months ago, his brother and sister-in-law had died and left him the title of Viscount Davenport.
Not that Graham had the temperament or the slightest interest for it. But it was the role he was expected to take on. After he grieved, of course.
Grief was a proper nuisance for him. People handled it in all sorts of ways. Some shed tears, some raged, and indeed some gentlemen of otherwise sound mind were reduced to utter folly in their attempts to find balm in the company of ladies whose lineage and virtue were shrouded in a rather convenient obscurity.
But for him? With the passing of his brother and sister-in-law he was presented a difficult situation, leaving him with the estate, its associated responsibilities, and the care of the children. And Graham’s response to this was a quiet immersion in his scholarly pursuits. For if he did not define himself by his intellectual endeavors, by his understanding of the past, then what was he?
If he was not an antiquarian, if he was not a scholar, what was he?
A lord? A guardian?
The thought almost made him laugh until a piercing scream echoed through the corridor.
“Give it back, Thomas!”
“You are but an infant! Infants have no need of swords!” Thomas retorted loudly.
There was a crash, something fragile.
Graham’s quill pen ceased its motion mid-line and his shoulders drew taut. How could he manage children when he could barely manage himself?
Before he could move on to the next map, the library door burst open hard enough to rattle the ancient glass panes.
Mrs. Huxley, the housekeeper, stormed in, cap askew, apron streaked with what looked suspiciously like treacle.
“My Lord.” She practically vibrated with outrage. “Another one’s quit.”
Graham blinked at her, disoriented. “Which one?”
“The housemaid. The third this quarter alone!” Mrs. Huxley declared, her nostrils flaring with indignation. “Entirely due to your nephew and his—” she gestured emphatically with her hands “—reptilian escapade!”
“I beg your pardon, Mrs. Huxley?”
“The snake display, Your Lordship!”
“Snake display?” Graham repeated mildly. He rubbed a thumb absently over a smudge of ink on his palm. “Sounds rather daring.”
“She found it writhing in her cleaning bucket!” Mrs. Huxley was nearly hysterical, and Graham did not fancy outbursts. “She nearly swooned outright, having departed this morning amidst cries of the villain’s work.”
Graham, who had been reading fifth-century Roman curses just yesterday, privately thought she would have been better off being more specific.
“I suppose I could apologise,” he offered. “Or is she already halfway out the door?”
“The door? If she continues her escape, she shall reach the coast by supper time!” Mrs. Huxley snapped. “And that is not even the gravest of concerns.”
“There’s worse?”
Mrs. Huxley charged toward him, flapping her hands at the maps as if trying to banish them by force. “While you’re in here mapping ancient sites, Master Thomas terrorizes the staff! Miss Lockwood resigned after he tried to poke her with a fireplace iron!”
“I believe it was self-defence. She threatened to confiscate his sword.”
“She asked him to complete his multiplication tables!” Mrs. Huxley simpered. “That is not an offence punishable by weaponry.”
Graham leaned back slightly in his chair, looking up at her with weary, bone-deep detachment.
“Is it too soon to invoke Roman law?” he said dryly. “They were quite inventive with public discipline.”
Mrs. Huxley made a strangled noise. Whether it was laughter or outrage, Graham couldn’t tell and didn’t much care.
“Good heavens! They are children, My Lord,” she hissed. “They need discipline. They need a hand to guide them, not a guardian who hides amongst ruins like some melancholy ghost!”
Graham said nothing. Merely twirled the ancient stylus between his fingers, the artifact smooth and familiar where everything else felt unbearable.
Mrs. Huxley exhaled sharply, seeing the futility of the argument.
“Well,” she stated with a hint of foreboding, “the new governess is due to arrive on the morrow.”
“That is satisfactory.” The ink bled slightly at the edges of the map, obscuring some of the finer points he was trying to discern.
“Miss Aurelia Whitfield. Highly recommended,” Mrs. Huxley continued with visible skepticism. “Though I cannot imagine why, she hasn’t much experience.”
Graham drummed his fingers once against the map edge. “Aurelia. Roman name. Good omen.”
“It will take more than Latin to save you,” Mrs. Huxley muttered to herself.
Graham pretended not to hear her. “I shall try to make her welcome.”
“I have confidence in you.” But Mrs. Huxley sounded unconvinced.
Another bang echoed from upstairs, followed by a wail.
Mrs. Huxley turned toward the door, muttering something under her breath that sounded suspiciously like a prayer.
She halted in the threshold. “You might also find it prudent to remove the suit of armor from the nursery.”
“And for what reason?”
“Young Thomas has been employing it as a battering ram against the doors.”
Graham blinked, mentally adjusting his map of Thornecrest Hall to account for structural damage. “Well, at least he’s displaying an understanding of siege warfare. Promising, really.”
Mrs. Huxley threw her hands heavenward and stomped out.
Alone again, Graham stared down at the map, stylus hovering above it, heart thudding under the weight of too many things he could not name.
Research, at least, made sense.
Children, governesses, grief. They did not.
From somewhere above, another loud crash echoed, followed by unrepentant laughter.
Graham picked up his stylus once more, tracing the careful lines of long-buried boundaries, and pretended, for one more night, that his world wasn’t crumbling just as surely as the ruins he loved.
***
Meanwhile, from the skeletal fringe of the woods, a solitary figure adjusted his spyglass with slow, deliberate care.
Josiah Alton fixed his gaze on the glowing window of Thornecrest Hall’s library. Inside, the new Viscount hunched like a grave-robber over his table, ink stains up to his knuckles, wholly consumed by whatever scrap of ancient dirt he was presently worshipping.
Josiah lowered the glass and let out a contemptuous laugh.
A man like that would not last a week in the real world. He would be counting pottery shards while the roof caved in over his head. Perhaps it already had, judging by the shriek he heard float faintly through the night air, some child’s tantrum no doubt.
His thumb grazed the frayed cuff of his coat. The velvet was balding and the seams tugged at the stitches, small humiliations he had once sworn he would never endure.
He drew the crumpled letter from his pocket and smoothed it against his thigh.
FINAL NOTICE.
The words might as well have been written in blood.
Josiah folded it back up. The sum demanded was laughable. Or it would have been, if he’d had the luxury of laughter.
The words screamed at him. A payment demanded. Consequences promised.
The figure in the library bent lower over his precious maps, utterly unaware of anything beyond the brittle borders of ancient Rome. There were whispers everywhere, drunken ones, slurred over cards and cheap wine. Treasure spilling out of Thornecrest’s soil faster than the scholar could count. Roman silver. Artifacts fit for kings and emperors.
Josiah folded the letter again. Graham Davenport did not belong to this world. It would almost be mercy to relieve him of a few priceless artifacts. After all, what did he need with gold? He retreated into the trees.
The scholar could keep digging up the past all he liked. It would not save him from the future. Not when Josiah intended to be the one writing it.
***
Aurelia Whitfield pulled her threadbare shawl tighter around her shoulders, the rain outside the inn blurring the world into a smear of grey. Her father’s battered notebook sat heavy in her lap, ink smudges marking where her restless fingers had touched it.
The door creaked open and the innkeeper bustled in, balancing a battered tray of tea.
“Storm’s getting worse,” he grunted, setting it down with a clatter. He gave her a look over the rim of his spectacles, one that was far too knowing. “You’re heading to Thornecrest Hall, are you not?”
“I am,” Aurelia said, voice steadying. “Starting tomorrow. I am to be their governess.”
The innkeeper snorted. “May Providence aid you.” He poured the tea, slopping some over the rim. “This place devours governesses whole, it does.”
Aurelia offered a wan look. “It cannot be that bad.”
“Cannot?” He chuckled, a rough sound. “The last one absconded a month ago. The young master drove her out with a fireplace poker, vowing he would thump her if she forced him to do his arithmetic.”
Aurelia smoothed the worn fabric of her gray traveling dress, feeling every wrinkle under her palm. “Surely he was only… spirited,” she said.
“Spirited?” The innkeeper gave a bark of laughter. “Wild as a tempestuous storm, indeed. The lad’s a real menace—conceals serpents in the maids’ buckets, locks footmen in the pantries. The staff have been quitting their posts more swiftly than mice desert a sinking vessel.”
“And the girl?” Aurelia asked, throat tightening.
The innkeeper’s face softened, just a little. “Sickly little thing. Never says two words without weeping after her mother.”
Aurelia looked down at the rain streaking the windowpane, words sticking in her throat. She knew grief’s poison too well. It seeped into every corner if you let it.
“And you,” the innkeeper said, squinting at her, “what makes you think you’ll last where others have not?”
Necessity, she wanted to say. Instead, she lifted her chin. “My father died recently,” she said, the words tasting like iron. “His debts are considerable while his manuscripts remain unpublished. I mean to see them printed. I mean to see his name honoured.”
The innkeeper grunted. “And for that you would face the darkness himself.”
“Close enough, by your telling,” Aurelia said with a flicker of dry humor she barely felt.
He gave her a long look, then patted her shoulder with a hand heavy as a spade. “You’ll need all the luck you can find, miss. Those troubled children and their ghost of a guardian.”
He left her then, the door clicking shut behind him, leaving the scent of wet wool and wood-smoke lingering in the air.
Aurelia opened her father’s notebook, forcing herself to read the familiar, looping hand. Lesson plans, old lecture notes, theories half-finished. Her hands trembled against the fragile paper.
Outside, the rain lashed against the glass in furious torrents, the sky black as pitch.
Inside, Aurelia pressed the notebook against her heart and prayed the storm outside was not a prophecy of the storm waiting for her inside Thornecrest Hall.
Chapter 2
Carriages often gave Aurelia nausea. But this time, she could not entirely blame it on the motion. The Viscount’s horses were fine-blooded, the carriage itself polished and well-kept. It was far too fine, really, for a woman wearing a mended gray dress and clutching a battered valise.
The road lurched and jolted under them, the wheels rattling over deep ruts. Aurelia pressed her lips together, knuckles white around the leather handle. Beyond the window, a vast, mist-shrouded shape materialized — not a castle, but not quite a home either.
Thornecrest Hall.
The carriage lurched to a stop with a final, bone-shaking jolt. A solemn footman, stiff in faded livery, opened the door without a word.
Aurelia climbed down carefully, skirt hem brushing the wet gravel.
The footman led her through heavy double doors and down a dim, chill corridor lined with faded tapestries. Somewhere distant, a clock chimed ten.
At the nursery wing, a brisk woman with iron-gray hair awaited her, arms folded.
“So, you’re the new governess,” the woman said briskly, stepping into the entryway without so much as a greeting.
“I am,” Aurelia replied, setting down her valise carefully. “Aurelia Whitfield.”
The woman gave her a stern look, lips pressing into a thin line. “Mrs. Huxley. Housekeeper. You’ll answer to me for anything outside the nursery.”
Aurelia inclined her head politely. “I understand.”
Mrs. Huxley eyed her, unimpressed. “You’re older than the last one.”
“I consider that an advantage,” Aurelia said, her voice steady. “Experience often outpaces youth in such positions.”
Convenient, of course, to omit that she possessed no actual experience as a governess beyond theory and sheer necessity.
“We shall see,” Mrs. Huxley said, turning sharply and motioning for Aurelia to follow. Her heels clicked against the floor as they moved through the hall. “This is Thornecrest Hall. A fine house once. Now, barely kept upright between the master’s moods and the children’s tempers.”
Aurelia noted the peeling paint, the scent of dampness under the perfumed air, the flicker of shadows down long corridors. She tucked the observations away neatly, like slips of paper into a ledger.
“I appreciate honesty, Mrs. Huxley.”
“Good. You’ll get nothing else from me.” They stopped at the base of a narrow staircase; its carpet threadbare underfoot. “You’ll be quartered in the nursery wing. Meals shall be taken with the children; lessons are your responsibility. Lord Davenport keeps to his library. See that you do not disturb him unnecessarily.”
“Of course,” Aurelia said. “How old are the children?”
“Thomas is nearing eleven, and Clara is nine, though she acts and looks far younger.”
“I see.”
Mrs. Huxley folded her arms. “Understand something, Miss Whitfield. These are not ordinary children. They have been… difficult.”
Aurelia willed her nerves into submission. “Children in grief often are. Chaos is their language when words fail them.”
Mrs. Huxley’s brow lifted slightly. “Indeed, your speech is most polished, I must say. Their chaos broke three governesses before you. Master Thomas set fire to a tutor’s wig just last spring.”
“Perhaps he requires a curriculum less reliant on wigs,” Aurelia said simply.
Mrs. Huxley did not appreciate the remark. Her mouth flattened into a line. “Do not expect help from Lord Davenport. He avoids this wing like it’s plagued. Since his brother’s accident, he’s buried himself in ruins and relics.”
“I had not counted on his assistance,” Aurelia said, lifting her father’s notebook from her valise. The familiar leather cover grounded her as she added, “I brought a full academic plan suited to children of their ages and dispositions. I intend to build a structure that respects their minds without provoking their defences.”
Mrs. Huxley’s expression suggested Aurelia might as well have announced plans to tame a hurricane with a teaspoon.
“And if they throw your books into the fire?” the housekeeper asked, dry as dust.
“Then I shall salvage what I can,” Aurelia said evenly, “and teach them resilience alongside arithmetic.”
Mrs. Huxley snorted. “Fancy words. We’ve had governesses with degrees and splendid theories before. They didn’t last a week.”
“My concern is not how splendid I sound, Mrs. Huxley,” Aurelia replied. But before she could continue, they were interrupted.
A boy burst into the room with the force of a cannonball, skidding slightly on the polished floor. Mud splattered up the legs of his woolen breeches, and his waistcoat, which looked like it had once a respectable navy color, was missing half its buttons, one side half untucked. His unruly dark hair looked as if he’d run headfirst through every hedgerow from here to the village. Mischief danced in his sharp brown eyes, along with something darker, more calculating.
He took one look at Aurelia and curled his lip.
“Ugh, not another one,” he said loudly, with the casual cruelty only the young and spoiled can perfect. “You’ll be gone by supper.”
Mrs. Huxley stiffened. “Mind yourself, Thomas.”
Thomas ignored her entirely. “I don’t require another lady to be giving me orders. You may gather up your foolish books and return whence you came.”
Without waiting for a reply, he strode into the room, booted foot swinging out to kick over a nearby chair with a loud clatter.
Aurelia blinked.
Another figure appeared at the doorway — a thin little girl, her fine blonde hair loose and tangled around her pale face. Tear tracks streaked her cheeks as she clutched a broken doll to her chest, the fabric head hanging limp at an unnatural angle.
“He broke her,” the girl whimpered, voice wobbling. “Thomas broke her head.”
Aurelia slowly crossed the room with deliberate calm. She crouched to the girl’s level, voice soft and steady. “We can mend her together if you like.”
The girl only whimpered again and backed away, her bare feet pattering against the wooden floor as she retreated further down the dim hall. She hovered just beyond the threshold, too frightened to step closer.
Before Aurelia could try again, a loud, sneering voice cut across the room.
“Oh, listen to her,” Thomas drawled, mimicking Aurelia’s gentle tone in a cruel falsetto. He pitched his voice high and syrupy. “‘We can mend her, dear. Perhaps we might braid each other’s hair next!'”
He gave an exaggerated shudder of disgust and threw himself sideways onto the window seat, muddy boots scraping the upholstery.
“You’ll be gone by week’s end,” he said, stretching out luxuriously. “Precisely as the previous three governesses. Or was it four? My memory fails me on the exact number.”
Mrs. Huxley sighed heavily, the sound thick with years of resignation. “I hope you are not under the impression that this will not be a rather difficult task, Miss Whitfield.”
How could she? When everyone from the innkeeper to the housekeeper kept warning her.
Mrs. Huxley paused at the door. “Mind your belongings,” she added offhandedly. “From the last governess, he clandestinely took her sewing scissors and cut clean through her cloak. We never did recover the scissors.”
Behind her, Thomas gave a wicked little smirk, clearly proud of himself. As Mrs. Huxley swept out, skirts stiff with disapproval, Thomas turned lazily toward a bookshelf.
With a deliberate flick of his elbow, he knocked a neat stack of books crashing to the floor.
“Oops,” he said without a trace of remorse.
Aurelia knelt to gather the fallen books; her movements steady even as frustration prickled at the edge of her mind.
She looked up once, briefly, catching Thomas’s triumphant gaze.
“Fortunate,” she said, stacking the books back into place, “that education does not require your permission.”
Rain fell in a thin, persistent mist, the kind that dampened everything without drama. Graham barely noticed. He stood at the edge of the trench behind Thornecrest Hall, coat collar half-turned, mud creeping up his trousers. In his hands was a worn notebook, its pages smudged with ink and damp fingers. The soil here was different. Indeed, it looked richer, older, and most importantly it looked promising.
Footsteps squelched behind him.
“Charming weather for a dig,” came David Stirling’s dry voice. David Stirling was his solicitor, and perhaps only semblance of a friend, though neither men would voice it.
Graham looked up, blinking as if seeing the solicitor for the first time. “You’re early.”
“Or mayhap your own punctuality is lacking,” David retorted, his gaze lingering on the disturbed earth with clear disapproval. The mud yielded audibly beneath his boots. “I have been attempting to summon you for the past five minutes.”
“Ah. I was… calculating stratification depth.” Graham gestured vaguely to the trench.
“Indeed, very impressive,” David said, producing a handkerchief to wipe raindrops from his spectacles. “Shame the bills don’t stratify themselves. Your latest invoice reads like an Imperial conquest.”
“It’s not merely expenditure,” Graham said, eyes lighting faintly. “This layer might be pre-Roman. We’ve found tesserae, fragments of Samian ware. If the structure is intact—”
“Yes, yes, the Empire strikes back,” David interrupted. “But before you fund the next Punic War with the family fortune, tell me, have you met the new governess?”
Graham frowned faintly, like the word had reached him through fog. “Not yet.”
David’s jaw tightened. “She arrived this morning.”
“Did she?” Graham flipped to another page, already half-turned back to the trench. “I thought I heard a carriage.”
David stepped forward, planting himself directly between Graham and the dig. “Graham. Three governesses in five weeks. One fled at midnight. Another wrote to her cousin in hysterics about ‘wild children and a madman with potsherds.’”
“That seems hyperbolic.”
David’s voice sharpened. “What is truly hyperbolic is the expectation that children shall raise themselves, whilst their appointed guardian catalogues the shattered crockery in the rain.”
“It’s not crockery,” Graham muttered. “And Thomas hardly listens to anyone anyway.”
“Because he thinks no one is watching. He knows you’re absent, even if you’re just across the lawn with a book in Latin.”
Graham’s mouth twitched. “It’s Oscan, actually.”
“Naturally,” David said flatly. He sighed, removing his hat and giving it a futile shake. “Listen. I’m not proposing you transform into a sentimental uncle. However, the boy ignited a tutor’s wig, and the girl, by all accounts, hasn’t smiled in weeks. They are not relics, Graham. You cannot simply store them away until they cease to be troublesome.”
“I’m not indifferent.”
“Nay. Merely… distant.” David regarded him, the usual dryness absent from his tone. “I am aware that you, too, are experiencing grief. But so are they. And if you are unwilling to converse with the governess for their well-being, at the very least do so before she takes flight, leaving you burdened with yet another tedious round of interviews.”
“There were no interviews for this one,” said Graham.
“Good heavens, that is not any better!”
“Wha is this lady’s name again?”
“Aurelia Whitfield,” David said, his boots squelching in the mud beside Graham. “Mrs. Huxley told you this before as well.”
Graham glanced up, brows furrowing. “Did she? I must have not heard. Well, I was looking at the maps…”
“Without a doubt.” The sarcasm lay thick.
Graham tapped his notebook absently. “She seemed articulate. That was my impression from the letter Mrs. Huxley gave me. She employed the expression “intellectual scaffold” when describing her pedagogical approach.”
“Wonderful. Perhaps she can construct a scaffold tall enough to drag you out of this trench. And how do you remember the contents of her job application letter but not her name?”
Graham ignored the jab, eyes drifting to a partially unearthed tile. “It’s remarkable, David. The curvature on that shard suggests a domed heating structure. Possibly even a hypocaustum. Roman influence this far north—”
“Davenport.”
It was on very rare occasion that David cut through the formalities and did not refer to Graham by his proper title, but he knew that Graham was not someone who cared about social frivolities, and right now, neither was David. His tone cut clean through the drizzle. It wasn’t loud, but it snapped with uncharacteristic lack of title.
Graham blinked. “What?”
“Pottery can wait. It’s waited for a thousand years already. The children cannot.”
The silence between them briefly stretched.
David continued, “I saw Miss Eleanor at the village shop yesterday. She mentioned Thomas told the younger children at Sunday school that the nursery wing is haunted. Claimed he saw a pale-faced ghost, and that all their parents would expire as well.”
Graham exhaled.
“Eleanor said one girl refused to go upstairs afterward. Burst into tears near the sacristy.”
“Thomas is grieving. And dramatics are not uncommon in boys his age—”
“Grieving or not, he’s terrorizing children,” David said. “And without boundaries, that grief turns sharp. The comment about everyone else’s parents dying as well? You cannot keep pretending these issues will sort themselves out.”
“You think Ms. Ramsey should intervene?”
Eleanor Ramsey was the daughter of the vicar. She was kind, observant, pragmatic. These were of course traits that Graham knew only in theory. Whatever he knew about her, Graham had collected secondhand through David’s many, many accounts. Graham doubted he’d personally exchanged more than a nod with the woman in three years.
David cleared his throat. “She has experience in instructing children, particularly the younger members of the parish. Perhaps she might extend Miss Whitfield some counsel or assistance, a sympathetic ear to listen.”
“You seem unusually invested in Miss Ramsey’s opinions.”
A flicker of color touched David’s cheeks. “I respect her judgment. And she cares about the village. That includes your niece and nephew, whether you like it or not.”
There was a pause. Graham glanced back toward the house, where the governess he hadn’t met was likely already regretting taking the post.
“Just introduce yourself to the governess,” David said, turning to leave. “Speak to her, listen, be seen.”
Graham watched his friend retreat, observing the unusual flush upon his visage, but laid the observation aside with the other tranquil revelations of the afternoon.
A shout rose from the trench, one of the workers, waving.
Graham turned halfway toward the house, hesitating.
Then he looked back at the soil, where history waited, undemanding and patient.
And he stepped toward the trench.
Chapter 3
Aurelia Whitfield had come prepared. On her second morning in the cold stone schoolroom, she stacked her papers neatly, opened her arithmetic primer, and braced herself for battle. Not with numbers, but with children. Two small pupils. One delicate lesson plan. And precisely zero patience left in reserve.
“We shall begin,” she announced, with the hopeful tone of someone dangling a carrot before two wary donkeys. “Something light. Just numbers today.”
A pause.
Then a clatter. A clatter that was loud and deliberate. Thomas had knocked his slate to the floor with all the subtlety of a cannon shot.
“These lessons are utterly pointless,” he declared with a petulant air. “I have no need of them whatsoever. What earthly purpose do they serve? My father is deceased, and my uncle’s sole preoccupation lies with antiquated stones.”
Aurelia froze. The words weren’t merely petulant. Oh, this one was practiced in mutiny.
But before she could speak, a soft, miserable sound tugged her attention sideways. Clara had shrunk in on herself like a paper flower in a rainstorm, her shoulders quivering under the weight of Thomas’s careless mention. Her eyes welled. One fat tear slipped down her cheek, then another, until she folded herself beneath the table.
Oh dear. So much for arithmetic.
Aurelia inhaled slowly and deeply. Numbers could wait. Instead, she reached for the box of wooden blocks tucked beside the hearth and carried it to the floor. No grand pronouncements. No scolding. She simply sat and began building.
“One block for the base,” she murmured, more to herself than anyone else. “Two for the arch. The Romans understood strength. Pressure alone could not bring down what was balanced.”
Clink. Another block, precisely placed.
“Columns, aqueducts, roads… entire cities. Built to last.” Her voice drifted like a lullaby. “Even when they were knocked down, they built again.”
Clara peeked from beneath the table. Thomas watched from his perch at the window, his expression a study in suspicion. She could feel it. There was tension in him, coiled like a spring. He was waiting for her to snap, to yell, to cry out enough in the way so many before her must have done.
She didn’t.
Which, naturally, was intolerable.
With slow, theatrical steps, Thomas crossed the room. He approached her little Roman arch, raised one foot and kicked.
Crash. Blocks skittered across the floor like startled mice.
Aurelia didn’t flinch. She simply reached for the nearest piece and began again.
“They had earthquakes, you know,” she said, brushing dust from a red block. “Wars. Fires. Betrayals. But they rebuilt every time.”
Thomas narrowed his eyes. “You’re not going to yell?”
“No.”
“Are you not going to punish me?”
“I don’t think you came here for that.”
He scowled. Then, without a word, he turned and kicked the arch a second time. This time, he looked directly at her, daring a response.
She looked at the scattered blocks for a long moment before looking back at him.
“So, the Romans built it again.”
Silence.
Then from under the table came a voice. “Did Roman children have toys?”
The voice was delicate and tremulous, akin to a string stretched to its breaking point. Clara, nestled beneath the table like a frightened fawn, peered out with flushed cheeks and wide, apprehensive eyes.
Aurelia lifted her gaze from the scattered blocks; a gentle, melancholy ache settled upon her heart. Such a small question, and yet so much need bundled inside it.
She offered a quick tight-lipped smile, one she hoped was both gentle and true. “They did, Clara. Dolls carved from ivory or clay, balls stuffed with feathers, and wooden animals on wheels. They played just as you do, maybe even more, because there were no clocks to tell them to stop.”
“They didn’t,” came Thomas’s voice, low and sullen. Not a shout this time, but a scornful murmur. “Not like we do.” He leaned against the chair leg like a boy trying hard to look like he didn’t care.
Aurelia’s gaze darted toward him. So surly, this one. And yet, beneath all that disdain, so remarkably youthful.
“They did,” Aurelia replied. “Not with whistles or intricate equipment, but with imagination. And one another.”
Clara crept forward on her hands and knees, slow as a cat in the rain. She reached out for one of the blocks, her fingers still slightly trembling. “Did they play together?”
“Oh, yes,” Aurelia replied, shifting to one side to make space for her. “Siblings, cousins, neighbours, even servants’ children. They played house and war and market stalls. They learned how the world worked by pretending first.”
Clara’s mouth curved. It wasn’t quite a smile, but it was the closest thing to one Aurelia had seen all morning. Thomas, meanwhile, had become quite still once more. His arms were folded, no longer in anger, but in a genteel manner, as though uncertain what else to do with them. He tarried a few paces distant, neither fully approaching nor quite withdrawing.
He’s testing me still, Aurelia thought. Waiting to see if I’m another one who breaks.
She did not press him; did not cast so much as a glance his way. Instead, she returned to the arch, her fingers steady, her voice gentle and measured. As she laid each block, she described it with quiet deliberation. Clara added a small square to the apex of the edifice—crooked, unsteady, yet she regarded it with a radiant smile, as if it were the most exquisite marvel of Rome itself.
Thomas inched forward. Not assisting, indeed—not at all. Merely… looming. Observing the stability of the edifice as though he might, perchance, cause it to topple once more, merely to gauge her response. His fists were no longer clenched, though; that much was an improvement.
“Do you think,” he said suddenly, “the Romans ever got tired of building the same thing over and over?”
The inquiry interrupted her and she looked upward, taken aback, blinking once. Ah, there he was—the contemplative youth behind the bluster.
“I imagine they did,” she said carefully, brushing a bit of lint from a block. “But that’s how you make something that lasts. You build. You fix. You learn what doesn’t work. And then you build again.”
Thomas said nothing. What was going through his head? It was difficult to say. Maybe even for him.
He wants to believe me, she realized. But doesn’t quite know how.
Thomas did not depart and as Clara set another block upon the tower, he made no attempt to deter her. And for this day, Aurelia reflected, that was triumph sufficient.
***
On the opposite side of the manor, Graham was deeply engrossed in his work, his attention fixed on the excavation reports scattered across his desk, when Mrs. Huxley entered, her steps firm as always, but her tone unusually measured.
“My Lord,” she began, drawing his attention away from his books. “I thought you might want to know that Miss Whitfield managed a full morning with the children without Thomas reducing her to tears.”
Graham looked up, his brow furrowing in surprise. “What?”
“Indeed, a full morning,” Mrs. Huxley repeated, but her tone carried a hint of skepticism, as though still processing the unusual development herself. “I couldn’t help but overhear. After the first hour, when there was no yelling, I took a look inside to see if something had gone wrong.”
Graham leaned back, raising an eyebrow. “You… overheard?”
Mrs. Huxley’s lips pressed together, and she crossed her arms with an almost imperceptible sigh. “I was concerned, of course. You know how Thomas is, and I hadn’t heard any shouting, so I decided to… observe.” She hesitated, clearly disapproving of her own role as an observer rather than a participant. “What I saw was… interesting.”
Graham was now thoroughly intrigued. “Interesting how?”
Mrs. Huxley shifted her weight from one foot to the other, an expression of reluctant admiration flickering across her face. “Miss Whitfield didn’t try to force the children into any proper lessons, as the others did. She used blocks to build things with them, actually. Roman columns, arches, aqueducts. Something about it caught Thomas’s attention and he didn’t fight it.”
“That’s certainly unconventional.”
Mrs. Huxley gave a stiff nod, clearly not entirely convinced. “Yes. I admit, I was skeptical at first. But she didn’t yell when Thomas knocked over her blocks or refused to follow instructions. She simply started building again. She explained how the Romans rebuilt cities after they were destroyed, using it as an example for patience and resilience. Strange approach, if you ask me. But it was successful.”
“So, you’re telling me she managed to teach Thomas about the Romans without once raising her voice?”
“That’s precisely what I’m saying,” Mrs. Huxley replied, her voice tinged with reluctant admiration, though she clearly found the approach unorthodox. “I suppose there’s no harm in it if it keeps him engaged. But… I’m not sure I’d call it proper education.”
“I suspect Thomas doesn’t need proper education, not in the way we usually think of it. He needs something to hold his interest.”
Mrs. Huxley’s expression softened, though there was still a trace of her usual sharpness. “I’m not sure what kind of ‘interest’ that is, but for now, it has worked. It may be worth contemplating for the future; however, do not anticipate it to serve as a permanent remedy. Such measures tend to diminish with time.”
“I shall keep that in mind.”
“Good,” Mrs. Huxley said briskly. “And, My Lord, might I suggest that you spend some time with the children yourself? Miss Whitfield cannot do it all alone.”
Graham looked at her, his expression thoughtful but tinged with a hint of amusement. “I’m aware. I shall find the time.”
“Not all lessons are in books, My Lord. Some come from simply being there.”
Graham’s brow furrowed as her words lingered in his mind. The boy had never showed interest in his work before.
“If you were to encourage him, just a little, to show that Miss Whitfield’s efforts matter, it might help set him on the right path.”
Graham nodded, though the suggestion unsettled him slightly. He had never done so before, not in any way that mattered.
After Mrs. Huxley departed, Graham attempted to return to his work, but his thoughts kept drifting back to this Miss Whitfield.
She had succeeded where others had failed, and that fact gnawed at him. But what made her different? What had she done to make Thomas engage, if only in her peculiar approach? His usual focus on his reports faltered, replaced by thoughts of her methods. Could Thomas, of all people, develop an interest in something like history? The idea seemed absurd, yet there was an inkling of possibility there. He thought of Robert, his late brother, and how he would have been pleased if Thomas had shown even the smallest spark of curiosity for the past. It had always been something Robert had hoped for, that connection to history that could shape the boy.
Graham stood and moved toward the door; he would observe the lesson. But just as his hand touched the knob…he hesitated. What if his presence disrupted this fragile progress? He wanted to see for himself, but he wasn’t sure he could avoid interrupting something he didn’t yet fully understand. With a sigh, he withdrew his hand from the door, turning back to his desk. Another time, he told himself. He would find a better moment to assess Miss Whitfield’s methods. For now, his work demanded his attention, though his thoughts repeatedly returned to the matter.
***
Beyond the crumbling stone markers that once defined the edge of Thornecrest’s estate, a man crept like a shadow among the trees. The late afternoon sun dappled the forest ground in golden coins, but Josiah Davenport stepped carefully between them, as though unwilling to be seen even by the light.
Every movement was deliberate. He was a man who had learned not to stumble. Not in debt, not in conversation, and certainly not through a patch of dead leaves that might betray his presence. The voices of the excavation crew drifted closer, filtered through the hush of pine and oak. Josiah slowed, pressing a hand to the bark of an old tree, letting the cool dampness anchor him. Just ahead, beyond a screen of hawthorn, the workers moved about the dig site like ants, sorting, cataloguing, brushing specks of soil from ancient treasure.
Treasure.
He leaned forward slightly as a worker bent over a wooden table and carefully unwrapped a small bronze object. It caught the light, gleaming like something sacred. A figurine. A horse, maybe, or a soldier. Something Roman and re-sellable.
That shall command a handsome sum.
His discerning eye for worth remained as keen as ever—perhaps keener, sharpened by hunger and despair. He need not hold the item to ascertain its value. A piece such as that would procure him another fortnight of tranquillity from his most vociferous creditor. Perhaps only three days from the more boisterous one, whose fists were as solid as bricks.
But for him it was never enough.
A voice rose from the site, pitched low but urgent, like someone trying not to be overheard. “I heard they’re increasing security soon. Too many of these finds have gone missing lately.”
Josiah fell silent, quite still. Security, indeed.
He tightened his grip on the branch beside him. It cracked softly beneath his fingers. Not loud, but enough to make him loosen his hold and curse himself silently.
Naturally, they must have observed. One cannot extract a gold ring from the mire without someone eventually inquiring as to who is rifling the coffers.
Nevertheless, he did not retreat. Retreat was not an option he could now entertain. Not at this juncture. His thoughts moved swiftly and deliberately, never allowing panic to surface aloud. There was always a stratagem, a method to extricate oneself from peril. Had he not previously extricated himself from more perilous circumstances, perhaps through a cunning card trick or a forged note? But this, this was a different sort of theft altogether. A game of patience and finesse, prolonged and intricate. And time, alas, was swiftly slipping away.
Footsteps, which were too close, sounded behind him. He crouched instinctively, heart lurching into his throat.
“Pray, do you think we shall be secure with the additional sentinels?” inquired a youthful voice. A lad, by the tone who was quite apprehensive.
“I hope so. But the way things are going…” the second man’s voice dropped lower, suspicious, uncertain, “”I do not believe any soul is truly secure. Too many items are vanishing without explanation. Did you hear the whispers concerning Lord Davenport? He has not been sighted in these parts for several days now.”
Josiah’s jaw locked tight. Graham Davenport.
It was a lamentable matter that a mere dullard such as he should be the Viscount, rather than Josiah. Indeed, Josiah was also of the Davenport blood, though most preferred to keep that fact to themselves. A cousin by kinship, but not by estate or fortune. Gambling, that perilous pursuit, had betrayed him more than once, and yet he remained hopeful that fortune would smile upon him anew. Until that day, he kept his gaze fixed upon a particular prize of great significance.
Josiah stared at the men’s backs as they walked away and then he glanced toward the figurine once more, his mind racing. There’s always a way around it, he thought. He had dealt with worse before. But this? This would take a bit more finesse. As he slipped away from the thrum of the dig site and the low murmur of voices fading behind him, Josiah Davenport turned his steps toward the village. Not toward comfort and certainly not toward rest. There was no rest for men like him. Only the next move. The forest thinned and gave way to the winding lane that curved down toward the village green. With each stride, the cold mist rising off the hills crept closer, coiling about his boots, his coat, the edges of his thoughts. It clung like debt. Unshakable.
“Security changes everything,” he thought.
But then again, he’d always had a knack for making things… simpler. One loose latch, one inattentive guard, one false name, dropped at just the right time.
“You won’t get the best of me,” Josiah muttered under his breath, his eyes narrowing as the first cottage roofs emerged through the fog. “Not yet.”
The village lay tranquil, enfolded in the stillness of early eventide. Lamps cast a flickering glow behind panes of thick glass. Smoke wreathed upward from the chimneys. It appeared most serene. Yet, so did a card table before the dealer’s hand revealed disaster.
He reached his lodgings just as the last of the light drained from the sky. The building sagged like a man who’d been standing too long in the rain. It was three crooked stories of cracked plaster and patchy stone, wedged between a butcher’s shop and an apothecary with a permanent smell of licorice root and vinegar.
A single room, just wide enough to pace in. The hearth was cold, the furniture mismatched and scarred, leftovers from better homes and better times. His hat landed on the small, rickety table with a hollow sound. One of the legs wobbled but managed to hold.
Josiah approached the window with a weary gait. His visage appeared fatigued and hollow-eyed. A gentleman just within the bounds of respectability, his cravat, once of fine linen, now looked crumpled and faded, while his boots, neglected and unpolished for weeks, betrayed signs of wear. There were always options, always opportunities. He would find a way to get what he needed. And if the Davenport heirs obstructed his plans… well, he harboured no qualms about his distant niece and nephew being collateral damage.
