Page 21 of The Trick of It

Seph gave a soft chuckle and moved to take the tray from the other woman, whose pregnant belly had been partially supporting the thing.

It wasn’t what she’d meant at all in her comment about Errol, but Hattie had always been a little odd that way. She had always deciphered languages that weren’t primed for her ear. It was her talent.

Behind the baroness, the silhouette of a compact, bouncing pig bounced down the hallway, trotting off to some destination in the house with purpose.

Seph did not comment upon it. An odd choice of pet, yes, but these were odd people. Everyone knew that.

“Will you sit with me?” Seph asked, setting the tray next to the fabric book and taking a seat on the chaise. “I was hoping you would be here. Rhys and I have something to show you.”

“Of course,” Hattie answered. “That is why there are three cups, isn’t it? Did you bring cashews? Or the citrus drops?”

Seph paused, cursing herself for not doing exactly that. “I forgot,” she said, frowning. “But I will set some aside for you the instant I get back to the shop.”

“I’ll give you money before you go,” Hattie said, waving away Seph’s immediate argument against it. “Foreign things are expensive. I should know.”

Rhys reappeared then, popping into view so suddenly, it appeared that he had sprouted from the Ottoman carpet in the hall. “Hattie!” he cried, like he hadn’t seen her in years. “You’re here!”

“I am,” she agreed mildly, pouring her tea. “But no cashews.”

“No?” he said, as though this were a normal declaration. “Which are those, then? The little candies? Or the nuts?”

“They are not nuts,” Seph said immediately. “They are seeds.”

“Are they, indeed?” Hattie said, clasping her hands together under her chin. “From a flower? Or a fruit?”

“A fruit,” Seph told her. “But the fruit doesn’t export. Too delicate. Drives me crazy knowing I can’t taste one.”

“If they are seeds,” Hattie said thoughtfully, “perhaps Errol can grow one. He grew a lemon tree in my bedroom, you know.”

“They’re cooked first, I’m afraid,” Seph said with a little frown. “Roasted. That’s why they’re so shiny. I think they’re poisonous if the coating isn’t burned off.”

“Heat kills the poison, does it?” Rhys said smugly, like he’d just proven some unspoken point to himself. “Did you show her the invitation?”

“Not yet,” Seph replied, patting her sides until she felt the crinkle of paper against her ribs, reminding herself which pocket it was in. “We got an odd missive, Lady Selwyn. We were hoping you could help us decipher a part of it.”

“‘A missive’?” she said, her eyes sharpening. “In what language?”

“English,” Rhys told her. “But the old kind. You know that letter that looks like an ‘a’ and an ‘e’ got stuck in the same tube?”

“Ash,” said Hattie. “Yes. A ligature.”

“That,” said Rhys, nodding toward Seph as she produced the invitation and handed it to the other woman. “We already solved the riddle itself, but we did so without translating those words, so we wanted to make sure we didn’t miss anything.”

Hattie nodded, carefully removing the card from the envelope and examining the symbols on the front, her eyes grazing left to right curiously. “These are letters,” she told them. “Sounds. They’re a fortune-telling technique in Scandinavia. They’re carved onto rocks or bones and jostled and thrown.”

“Do they say anything?” Seph asked, scooting closer to peer down at the marks.

Hattie shook her head. “No. I think they are likely just decoration. Or … Wait …” She tilted her head to the side, mouthing sounds to herself.

“While she goes off to the land of Nod,” Rhys said, reaching behind Hattie’s head with another vellum card in his fingers, “you can look at this one. She might be a moment.”

Seph accepted the card, pulling it into her lap and looking down at the sketch of an open timepiece on the cover. Midnight, it read.

Well, she had to hand it to him.

That was pretty unambiguously the time of the meeting.

“Merlin,” Hattie said, so suddenly, Seph startled. “I think it sounds out Merlin. But it isn’t the word ‘Merlin.’ That word wouldn’t exist in runic language.”