Page 33 of The Trick of It

Seph sighed, her eye already drawn to several thick tomes with gold-brushed pages between their leather bindings.

She reached for her coin purse yet again.

Chapter Ten

They took dinner at the Hoppy Hare and agreed to rest prior to their sojourn out to the priory at the strike of twelve, each taking to their separate rooms until such a time as the clock struck eleven.

Mr. Cagney had offered to wake up with them and drive them down to the ruined priory, provided they find their own way back, but Rhys had declined, and thank God for that. He’d thought he’d save a coin or two by sharing the room with Mr. Cagney, but he was sorely mistaken. Once the man had fallen asleep, waking him would have been downright impossible.

He snored so loudly that Rhys feared the innkeeper would demand additional pay come morning. After all, their bodies were only taking one room, but the noise was occupying all of them.

When finally he had been driven from the ruckus back down to the dining hall to beg for a third room, he’d been told smugly that none were to be had. He could either sleep with the lion’s roar or make a cot out in the stables.

So, Rhys just stayed awake and regretted having packed the books he’d bought into the coach already.

Actually, maybe he could sleep in there.

It was a thought.

“Rhys Caradoc, you are early,” came Seph’s voice, somewhere into his third pint. “And not dressed at all for the cold.”

He turned, giving her a wobbly, little smile as he took in her cloaked dress; prim, little gloves; and fur-lined collar. Plum and navy today, he noted. Always two colors.

“Why do you call me by my full name all the time?” he asked, rather than acknowledging her observations. “Like I’m Tom bloody Thumb?”

She hesitated, a flicker of self-conscious amusement flashing over her face. “‘Tom Thumb’? Surely you mean Rumpelstiltskin?”

“Never met him,” Rhys told her, motioning to the barman for another pint. “Sit down. We’ve still a little time.”

“Surely, some people at King Arthur’s court called him simply ‘Tom.’ ‘Sir Tom’? ‘Mr. Thumb.’”

Rhys laughed, sliding the bubbling cider over to her, still warm from the cauldron. “He was a knight, wasn’t he? I always forget that part.”

“Because it is ridiculous,” Seph agreed. “Do you really not know Rumpelstiltskin? Haven’t you read the Grimm anthology? It was all anyone could talk about for an entire year. Maybe two.”

“Sounds foreign,” he observed, sipping his own cider and watching her through the steam. “But you can lend me your copy.”

“I could,” she agreed, taking up her own glass. “But will I?”

“Oh, I think so,” he said. “I didn’t get a chance to peek at what you bought at the bookstore, by the by.”

“I peeked at yours,” she told him, raising those tawny brows. “Southern Mycelia of Britain, Illustrated Royal Mistresses,” she listed off, counting off her gloved fingers, “and Scota, African Queen of the Scots, Mother of Gauls. None of which I’d have pegged as interesting to you.”

“Not even Scota?” he said, affronted. “A pharaoh’s daughter, an exiled prince, a swarthy Scottish motherhead?”

She frowned. “All right,” she said. “Maybe Scota.”

“They’re gifts,” he told her, leaning back to tip the cinnamon-dusted dregs of his cider into his mouth. “Errol keeps confusing Artist’s Conks for Wild Beef and he’s going to get himself killed if I’m not there to check the mushroom logs with him someday. Monica wanted some inspiration beyond queens and duchesses, and I made a joke about Nell Gwyn that seemed to pique her more than pester her. And the last one is for Malcolm. He never remembers to be Scottish enough, on account of his complexion.”

She blinked a few times. “Oh.”

He grinned at her.

“‘Wild Beef’?” she said, still blinking.

“Aye, I learned to forage before I learned to read,” Rhys told her. “And that particular mushroom is a gem. You can fry it up like the beefsteak it’s named for and it even bleeds a little. Delicious. Don’t tell me your people don’t find food from the soil as they travel.”

“I’m certain they do,” she said. “But you have to remember, until recently, we’ve been stranded in Brighton since I was fourteen. If there was to come a time for lessons on gathering things that wouldn’t poison the whole caravan, I think it likely would have happened during those missed trips to the Continent.”