He practically carried her several feet into the forest before Elise had the wherewithal to balk. She threw her arm back so that she could twist away. “I don’t need—” she started when her gloved outstretched hand hit something.
There was a loud, hurt yelp.
Now Elise practically jumped into Mr. Ruffian’s arms. Her mind scrambled with fear. What had she touched that could make such a sound? Her first thought was of a story about a lion that had escaped from a traveling menagerie in Exeter and had attacked a coach’s horses. Could a lion be out and about with them?
“What?” he shouted at her through the rain. “What is the matter?”
A bark, a snarl sounded close to them. “That’swhat,” she answered. Couldn’t the oaf see?Somethingwas there.
He turned so that his body shielded her from this unseen menace and took a step forward. Thunder rolled overhead, a herald that another crack of lightning could not be far behind.
There was a whimpering sound.
“What the—?” Mr. Ruffian whispered and then knelt. “It’s a dog.” Lightning flashed a hair’s breadth before the sky crackled with it, highlighting the animal’s wet nose, inches from Mr. Ruffian’s offered hand. The dog cowered from the sound. Mr. Ruffian said gently, “It is all right, boy. It can’t harm you.”
“Actually, it can,” Elise had to point out. “Especially if it hits that tree.”
As if he agreed, the dog barked.
Mr. Ruffian stood. “He wants us to follow him.”
“You don’t know that,” Elise answered. She liked dogs and missed the ones at Wiltham, but she couldn’t commune with them. And she wouldn’t follow any of them in a storm. “Dogs don’t do well in storms.”
Instead of listening, he started chasing the dog who had already taken off... almost as if he understood what Mr. Ruffian had said.
Elise waited a moment, the darkness all around, and then there was a series of lightning flashes. She didn’t know if she was safer standing where she was or following the dog. A particularly nasty crack like a tree branch toppling close to her settled the matter. She wasn’t safe here. She might not be safe with Mr. Ruffian, but at least she wouldn’t be alone.
She took off after her disagreeable companion.
He wasn’t hard to follow. She just had to tag after the crashing sounds and the grunt of painas Mr. Ruffian tripped over something on the forest floor.
Then, just as she reached man and dog, they stepped into a clearing.
Lightning lit the area, revealing a small, wayward-looking hut. The dog didn’t waste a moment but ran inside the door that was barely hanging on leather hinges.
Mr. Ruffian and Elise both followed. Anything to get out of this horrid weather. Elise practically threw herself into the room. A shadow blocked the door as the ruffian joined them.
They stood in the dark, dripping wet and catching their breaths.
“You are a good boy,” Mr. Ruffian whispered to the panting dog. “Thank you.” He’d bent down, his movement silhouetted by the doorway.
“Do you imagine he speaks English?” Confusion, fear, and frustration made her sound sharper than she wished. This was not how she’d planned her trip to go. She should have almost been to Liverpool by now.
“Someone is in a foul mood.”
She ignored him and tamped down all the doubts swirling inside her. She moved a few steps into the space surrounding them, her arms outstretched. Her hand felt a wall. She turned, moving slowly in another direction. Seven steps and another wall. There was some wetness in the air, as if the roof leaked. That would not be surprising, and she remembered the stories her Gramhad told her about how fairies and sprites lived in the trunks of trees and inside moss-covered and rotting logs. Elise had imagined their homes as little cottages, and that is exactly what this place seemed. A full-sized fairy home.
Her Gram would have also admonished her to keep her chin up and make the best of what was happening. The storm, the bolting horses, none of it was her fault.
They also weren’this.
She could almost hear Gram’s voice point out how difficult she had been behaving.
Whether Elise liked it or not, they were going to be sharing this shelter until the storm let up and they could reasonably seek help. Some of the tension inside her released. She glanced in the direction of the still half-open door where he stood.
He was holding a hand up as if to ward off something. “Wait, boy—don’t shake.No.” But his admonishment didn’t stop the dog from letting all the drops of rain fly from his fur. They whisked through the air, hitting everything in the small space.
Elise was so wet, she couldn’t tell if she’d been struck. “I doubt if he is a dog at all,” she said.
