The Illusionist's Apprentice by Kristy Cambron

Author:Kristy Cambron
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Thomas Nelson
Published: 2017-02-09T16:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER 13

APRIL 2, 1916

36 BUGLE STREET

SOUTHAMPTON, ENGLAND

“I won’t be made a fool!”

It was a riotous shout that garnered Wren’s attention the instant she’d stepped through the front door of the Duke of Wellington public house. She peered through the small crowd gathered in a back corner of the establishment, trying to see the cause of the commotion past men in threadbare coats, uniformed soldiers, and sailors counting down the hours before they shipped out to the front.

Glasses thudded against the wood of the bar and spoons clinked porcelain bowls as men ate. Murmurs of conversation in French and Spanish—and bawdy pub talk in English—painted the background with the character Wren had expected of a refreshment room in Southampton’s dock district. It was rampant with emigrants desperate for passage to a safe haven from the war, with walls that would shield the eyes for a time, sequestering thought on the scores of wounded who never seemed to stop arriving in the streets outside. The odor of fish hung on the air like a plague, working to turn even the hungriest stomachs sour.

Wren turned away from the activity in the back of the pub.

It wasn’t the way she’d have chosen to spend her birthday. But with her uncle’s death so recent and the war turning the world upside down around her, how could a birthday ever be the same again? She aimed to find a quiet corner somewhere, with a bowl of stew—even if it only had potatoes and thin broth—and a cider to toast her final birthday spent overseas. The plan was to eat quickly, stay out of notice on her way to her boardinghouse a street over, and find her passage on a merchant ship in the morning, leaving the world of war behind for a future back in America.

Another bellow and a fist jingling cutlery on a tabletop drew her attention back to the crowd.

“She’s taken my ticket for passage—”

A young woman’s voice cut in from the center of the small crowd. “You lost it without my help, you mongrel!”

“I’ve never murdered a woman in my life, but I’d make an exception for you, lass.”

“Well, who’s to stop you now? Don’t let the package deter you,” the voice fired back, sure and strong. “I don’t care if you claim you’re King George—your threats mean nothing. I can take care of myself!”

Wren edged around the small crowd until she could catch a glimpse of the activity at its center.

The voice had indeed belonged to a woman—one of slight build and exotic descent, who was flipping a deck of cards on a tabletop. More than seeing a female take charge of the rowdy and cidered-up travelers, it piqued Wren’s notice that she thought she’d seen the young woman before. In London, perhaps? Or was it just that the streets of Southampton harbored any manner of foreigners escaping the war in France and one weary traveler looked like the next? Either way, she couldn’t have been more than Wren’s age—which was entirely too young to have been threatening a group of grown men in a public house.

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