"You see the havoc wreaked when women are allowed into the hallowed precincts of magic-working?" The strident tones of the wizard's magister, Cranshaw, filled the corridor. "Women cannot endure the full flare of magic. You see how they collapse when it is unleashed upon their weakness."
Grey whirled, fist cocked and ready. Harry caught it, shoved him back against the door, making it rattle, and held him there by leaning into him.
"Not 'ere," Harry said quietly. "Not while she's in there, bein' seen to."
If she died-Grey swallowed down another howl. If she died, nothing would hold him back. She was his apprentice. Her safety was his responsibility, and as usual, he'd botched it. But she wasn't dead yet. It wasn't time yet. He relaxed his body by force, ceasing to strain against Harry's hold, and after a moment, Harry stepped away. But he kept a hold on Grey's arm. Probably wise.
"She did not faint." Grey spoke loudly and forcefully, riding over top of Cranshaw's continued declamation. "She was pushed. Someone pushed her forcibly into the forge, while the fire was burning."
"Pushed!" The shocked exclamation came from a dozen throats. Most of those in the courtyard had followed to wait for news of Pearl's welfare, and others had gathered from elsewhere in the building.
"Who would want to harm Miss Parkin?" someone asked.
Grey's eyes narrowed on Cranshaw and Harry's grip on his arm tightened. Meade stepped closer on his other side. Grey looked at Cranshaw, but he didn't make a move toward him. Time for that later, if needed. "I can think of one man," he said, "whose fear and hatred of our fair sisters might induce him to stoop so low."
"I-" Cranshaw sputtered. "How dare you accuse me of-"
"You've done worse in the past, I know-though we've never been able to prove it." Grey looked from the wizard to the other men crowded into the corridor, taking note of the ones who'd been in the courtyard, waiting for them to return his gaze.
"Think," he said. "What did you see? A woman overcome with magic, fainting at our feet? Or one propelled forward with enough force to knock the collection device from the furnace cover, and shatter tempered glass? Her hand was ripped from mine with the force of the push."
"Aha!" Cranshaw leaped on the admission. "You were holding her hand. Already her corrupting influence is shown as she tempts you from the path of righ teousness-"
"Sod off, Cranshaw," Harry interrupted. "Grey ain't been anywhere near the path o' righ teousness long as I've known 'im, and we've both known 'im since 'e came to the academy when 'e was eighteen. Grey was long gone down that other path way before Pearl ever turned up. Besides, since when has holding hands been corruption?"
The doorknob sounded behind Grey, and he pivoted and took a step back just as Ferguson appeared, opening the door just enough to fill the opening. "She'll live," the wizard said.
Relief swept so furiously through Grey that he had to grab the doorjamb to keep from collapsing.
"She was badly burned along her arms and side, but the fire was quenched so quickly, it didn't burn deeper than her skin." Ferguson paused.
He was pale and sweating, fat drops forming on his upper lip and forehead. Did he have to work so hard to save Pearl? Grey couldn't help noticing, standing almost atop the man.
"Miss Tavis has a salve . . ." Ferguson's voice took on tones of awe. "Most wondrous in its curative properties. Watercress . . ." He shook off his wonderment. "It is healing her."
"Thank God." Harry sounded as relieved as Grey. Did his knees crumple as well?
"I am requested," Ferguson went on, "to have someone send for clothing for Miss Parkin."
Grey stared. "Do you mean a dressing gown? Something that will not hurt her injuries while we get her home?"
The young wizard shook his head slowly, bemused. "No. I mean clothing. Miss Parkin's injuries are healing."
Ferguson looked into the corridor, at the magister of his guild. "Miss Tavis's potion is healing her. You can watch the blackened skin melt away to raw red and-" He noticed Grey standing over him, turning green at the description. Grey felt green, at any rate.
Ferguson amended his discourse. "The burns are healing as we speak. As we watch. Without scars. It is an amazing practice of wizardry."
"Blasphemy!" Cranshaw hissed. "Women are weak, cor-"
"Shut it, ya bloody sod." Harry's voice had gone all Cockney. He took a threatening step forward and it was Grey's turn to remind him.
"Not here. Not with her in there, working on Pearl." He spoke quietly, but Ferguson heard.
"I must return," he said, swiping at his forehead. "Offer what assistance I can . . ." He trailed off vaguely as he turned away and closed the door.
"Impossible!" Cranshaw looked to get wound up in another tirade, despite Harry's ominous glower.
"Gentlemen-" Grey indicated two of his Briganti. The two who had escorted Cranshaw from the murder scene at the warehouse, as it happened. "Please escort Mr. Cranshaw from the premises."
"The council hall belongs to all magicians!" Cranshaw blustered.
"Briganti offices don't. Take him back to the common room." Grey waved them off and turned back to his waiting.
She could have been killed. She hadn't been, was healing with astonishing speed, thanks to Elinor. But if Elinor hadn't been here-If Harry and the others hadn't been quick enough-
The awful thought made him sweat. It made his heart turn over and his bowels clench and his head go dizzy and all those other clichés of alarm and terror, but they weren't clichés. They were truth. He fell apart, disjointed with fear, at the thought of that ultimate horror coming to Pearl.
I would take care of her, Mary said, hovering worriedly at his shoulder. If the worst happened. But truly, this isn't the worst, is it? The way I am?
"No, dear heart," Grey thought at her. "Except that I cannot hold you in my arms."
Ah. Mary sounded far wiser than she ever had in life. Spirits were like that.
He had known he should not have taken an apprentice. Especially a female. He had known he would grow to care for her, that he would worry about her. He had not known how he would yearn for her smile, or long for her touch. How he would burn with desire. They had been master and apprentice for only three weeks. Most apprenticeships lasted years. Amanusa could not return from Scotland too soon.
He shoved his hands through his hair, resisting the urge to pull at it. He wanted to pace, but the crowd was too thick, and pacing would take him too far from the door. He might not be able to get back in time, if the door opened. Mary curled around him, offering comfort, but just now, her comfort was cold.
Someone had sent a runner for Pearl's clothing. Harry, likely, since Grey hadn't done it, had been too overcome with relief to think. A footman from Harry's house returned, far quicker than Grey would have thought possible, with a valise that was passed through the door into the retiring room. Ferguson came out shortly after.
"She's well," he said. "Amazing." He shook his head and fell silent. Everyone did. Perhaps they, too, needed to see with their own eyes that she was as well as Ferguson claimed. Grey's fears wouldn't go away until he did.
Finally the door opened and the two women emerged, Pearl wrapped in some sort of shroud. Grey's heart pounded with alarm, until he realized it was one of the things Elinor wore in her stillroom in Harry's conservatory. An apron.
He pushed himself off the wall, and the men in his way stepped aside. He assumed so. They could have melted into the aether for all Grey knew. All of his attention was focused on Pearl, on a head-to-toe inspection.
"Well?" he asked Elinor without taking his eyes off Pearl.
"She's still badly bruised where she struck the forge when she fell-"
"Was pushed," he interjected.
Elinor went on as if he hadn't spoken. "Bruises are under the skin, and it takes longer for the magic to reach them. Burns damage the skin itself, and they are healing nicely, especially since the fire was quenched so quickly and so well."
She smiled at the others in the corridor. "Between all the alchemists, the fire was quenched so thoroughly, I doubt the forge will light for a week."
While Elinor occupied the others, Grey's gaze caught Pearl's and held. Her expression was filled with things he didn't want to read as she lifted her hands, offering them up to him. For his inspection. She wouldn't offer him anything more. She was too wise for that, too aware of the sort of man he was.
For a moment, he wished he were a different sort of man, one worthy of her. But he got over it. Kippers must have been bad. He'd speak to McGregor about them.
Grey took her hands in his and brought them higher, closer to the hallway gaslights. The burns down her left forearm where the bell sleeve fell away looked raw and inflamed, and healing. The skin had been black before, hadn't it? When he carried her in? As he watched, the rawness seemed to fade.
"The healing is slower now," Elinor said, watching them. "Much of the magic has been used up, but there will be enough to finish. It is better to finish the job more slowly. Pearl will need to rest. She has been working very hard at healing."