Outcrossing: Mysterious Charm: book 1 by Celia Lake

Author:Celia Lake
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Celia Lake

Twenty

True Eyeworth

They permitted Rufus to escape the direct attentions of Johnny and Will after one final reminder of where his loyalties ought to lie. It involved a sharp elbow to his ribs, enough to ache for three days, he reckoned. Not long enough to limit him in the job itself.

They had told him to make his way back to the pub in about half an hour, to sit and listen and learn. Which meant money for drinks, his own at least, and he really didn’t have it.

The alternative was to go back to a leaking cottage and no light outside the fireplace, and less company, and that was also not at all appealing. Besides the fact it would make Johnny angry. So to the pub it was.

He was most of the way there, walking from the bench where he’d sat down after the elbow, when he caught an odd movement near the pub and inn. Something that wasn’t there but there enough to notice. Something that felt a little queer, a little twisted in the world.

Rufus blinked at it several times, trying to get his eyes to focus. Then he saw it, a transparent outline of a man, if he looked away and then back. Just a flicker. So easy to overlook and ignore. He could see why no one else was noticing.

On the one hand, the man was listening at the pub. Where there were smugglers plotting. On the other hand, who was Rufus to do something about that? He couldn’t do much himself without violence. He could tell Johnny, which was violence. And the man was out in the alley, not sneaking up on someone. Just listening at the window, to a conversation anyone could hear if they stood at just the right angle.

It occurred to Rufus for the first time that maybe Johnny didn’t know about that corner. They cracked the window sometimes, to let a little fresh air in among the pipe smoke and the beer fumes. When they did, something odd happened with the sound, and it echoed to a particular spot in the alley.

Johnny was never the one standing outside, wanting to be inside. Johnny was in the centre of things. Always had been. It made Rufus stop in his tracks, trying to wrestle with the cascade of thoughts.

Rufus had always been on the outside. Youngest of his brothers, and by enough he wasn’t able to keep up with them when he was younger. Before they went, one by one, to war, without him.

He’d been cleverer than most in school. Not clever enough to pass the exams for Schola, there had been questions he couldn’t begin to answer, about things he’d never ever heard of. But much more than the average at the village schools.

He liked reading; the teacher lent him books. He liked being outside, watching the animals; they encouraged him to keep observation notebooks. And he loved the ponies, figuring out what made each of their little herd happiest, how they liked to have things done, treating them like the individual queens they were.

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.