Half a Soul by Olivia Atwater

Author:Olivia Atwater
Language: eng
Format: azw3, epub
Published: 2020-03-29T04:00:00+00:00

Chapter 11

Lady Carroway gave Dora one of her older dresses—it was a very lovely mint green silk that was so far beyond Dora’s means that it looked somewhat ridiculous, especially with the bust so obviously fitted for another woman. Still, one of the maids helped Dora change in Lady Carroway’s room, pinning back the extra material so that it looked nearly right. They eventually tracked down the matching slippers too, which fit her feet tolerably well.

“I will see how quickly I may return this to you,” Dora promised the viscountess. “It is so expensive, I almost fear to wear it at all.”

Lady Carroway shook her head. “I have not worn this in years,” she said. “I still think fondly of it, but it is a style fit for a younger woman, and it is time I gave it up.” She smiled at Dora. “I do not think that I have ever seen such grace and calm under pressure. I am suitably impressed with you tonight, Miss Ettings.”

Dora blinked at that. Somewhere distant, the words gently nudged themselves against a pile of misery, knocking away a few of the other ugly words that had nested there.

“That is... most kind of you,” Dora told her. “But I fear it is more of an affliction than a grace. I am often not emotional enough, my lady.”

“You were quite emotional enough to calm an angry magician and drive him to tears,” Lady Carroway said wryly. “I ought to have died of shock to hear an apology cross that man’s lips, Miss Ettings. But he seems truly chastened tonight, and now in a more generous and contrite state of being than ever before. If you continue to perform such miracles, you may yet be in danger of being canonised.”

Dora looked down at the green slippers on her feet. “I will ask the priest on Sunday,” she said absently. “But I suspect I must be dead before I may be canonised, Lady Carroway. The thought does not immediately appeal, so I shall do my best to refrain from further miracles.”

The viscountess laughed at that. It was a warmer sound, now that they were away from dinner and behind closed doors. “Miss Ettings,” she said. “It is a terrible shame that you will not marry Albert. I would have loved you as a daughter.”

Dora froze in place. A warm, flustered confusion beat at the inside of her chest. “I... I don’t know what you mean by that,” she said.

Lady Carroway patted her shoulder. “Albert has set himself against it,” she said. “For the life of me, I could not understand why at first. But I have seen now what he must have seen from the beginning. You have a rare sorcery indeed, to wring a few such smiles from the Lord Sorcier, Miss Ettings. And I think you must be nearly as taken with him as my son is.“

Dora gave a few slow blinks. The hundred or so implications of this little speech moved like molasses through her head.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.