The soldiers moved on.
“You are an admirable liar,” I murmured to Hopgood as we carried on.
“Wish I didn’t have to be,” Hopgood muttered.
We crossed one of the bridges to the island and sooncame to the constable’s house. My heart was in my throat by the time we mounted the stairs and he unlocked the door.
The house was hushed, save for the ticking of a clock.
“I sent my family out of the city soon as matters went south,” Hopgood told me, closing the door and locking it again behind us.
“And good you did.” A voice came from the parlor and there, through the door, I saw a familiar figure reclined on a worn sofa. He pushed himself more upright as I came in, his face soft and apologetic and saddened all at once. “Miss Fleet, my dear woman. I am so sorry.”
There were tears in my eyes as I sank down on a chair across from him. He looked terrible, face swollen and discolored with bruises, one leg heavily splinted. Bulging bandages betrayed other wounds beneath his loose clothing.
Ronny growled from inside his bag and I finally opened it, letting the cat leap out onto the rug, his hair on end, and shoot off into the shadows.
“I am so very glad… very glad that you are not dead,” I said, fumbling the words.
He laughed, and I laughed, and for an instant I could imagine us back in his office on a normal, mundane day.
“I owe you an explanation,” he said. “It will be thorough, I promise.”
Hopgood cleared his throat and excused himself, leaving Mr. Stoke and I alone with the skulking cat.
I looked at my employer expectantly, and the tale began.
Mr. Stoke began to speak. “In making my inquiries about Lord Stillwell’s artifact, I did, perhaps, a little more than due diligence. Stillwell clearly did not want to attract attention to the matter, otherwise he would not have come to me, a has-been who owed him a debt. Someone he believed he could control.”
I frowned at Stoke’s description of himself, but he waved me off.
“I interviewed Professor Maddeson in the course of my research, and he was only too proud to inform me his work on Old Arasi and the Landsdown Trove was funded by Baffin.He agreed to compile some relevant information for me and sent it to my home address.”
“I found that,” I said. I felt as though something were bubbling up in the back of my throat, but it was no pleasant thing. My surprise and relief were fading, and beneath them, I was still frustrated and injured. It needed more than facts and a systematic explanation.
It needed to know why he left me alone.
There was a flicker of pride, and a little chagrin, in Mr. Stoke’s eyes. “I thought you might.”
“Why did you not warn me?” I asked. “The evening you sent me away. The night Wake attacked you, and you fled with the artifact.”
Mr. Stoke cleared his throat and tried to sit up a little more. “At first, I believed involving you would do more harm than good. I believed your innocence was your best protection, and that Lord Stillwell would never stoop to threatening my secretary. I did not anticipate Mr. Wake’s intervention that night, nor his nature, nor the rapid involvement of the Guild. It is no excuse, but matters escalated swiftly.”
I waited for him to go on.
“Mr. Wake appeared that night, posing as Stillwell’s valet. I know—knew—Stillwell’s valet, however, and immediately realized something was amiss. I made the mistake of voicing my suspicion. We fought, and I was given reason to suspect he was a Silver—a Guild agent, I surmised—and feared for you.”
“You had realized I was Entwined,” I observed.
Mr. Stoke nodded. “Some months ago, though you hide it well.”
“Not well enough,” I said wearily.
He did not comment on that, but filled the silence with continued explanation. “Now, at this juncture, I suspected the Guild to be puppeting Mr. Wake and making a play for the artifact, but I could not rule out that Stillwell had hired a Rogue mage to ensure my cooperation. And in light of what I had learned of Baffin’s interest in relics, like the artifact I then held—I realized turning over the item was about far more than money. I needed time, so I went into hiding.”
“Yet you still did not warn me,” I added, unable to swallow my bitterness.
“By the time I realized innocence would not protect you, I could not find you,” Mr. Stoke said. “I did try.”
