“Intuition,” she explained with a breezy wave of her hand.
“Just how deeply are you involved with this family, Soph?” he asked, a troubled look on his face.
“Deeply enough,” she said quietly. Then she slowed her mount as they approached the village. The fireflies dispersed almost as quickly as they’d arrived. A boy ran out of the stables and took their leads, and one helped Sophia to dismount as Marcus did the same.
“There’s not enough magic in the world to help you locate that child,” Marcus warned.
But then Sophia heard it. She heard a series of taunts and leering jeers. And a shrill shriek as a small girl child screamed as though tormented by the devil himself. Sophia’s heart stopped beating for a moment. Then she ran toward the sound.
When she turned the corner into a dark alleyway, she found Lady Anne standing with her back to a rubbish pile. Before her stood four taunting, teasing boys, each brandishing weapons of their own making. None of them would allow Anne to pass.
Anne stomped her foot and screamed in her most unladylike voice as tears streamed down her reddened cheeks. “My father will make you pay. All of you.”
One boy snorted loudly. “Your father the murderer? What will he do? Kill us?”
Another boy chimed in with a crude jest. “He’ll throw us from the tower of the castle, the same way he did his duchess.”
Anne’s eyes grew round. “He did no such thing!” Tears poured down her cheeks. “My father didn’t kill anyone.”
“Your father killed your mother. But since he’s a duke, he didn’t have to pay for it. He should have been hanged.” The other boys agreed with even louder jests.
“Take it back!” Anne yelled, barely able to get the words out over her tears.
Sophia approached on slow feet, not daring to make a sound. But Anne saw her and made a move toward her. Sophia held up her hand to stop her. With her other hand, she reached into her reticule and drew forth a vial of shimmery dust.
“Don’t, Soph,” Marcus warned, reaching for the vial, but Sophia had already poured the dust in her palm, and with one heavy breath, she blew it into the air. The boys didn’t even know she was there behind them, until she said the wo
rds:
“The truth be too difficult to bear,
yet with this spell you will wear,
the truth as though it were a cloak,
giving meaning to the words you spoke.”
The dust shimmered in the air like a great glittery ball until it formed over the heads of each of the boys. Above each boy, the particles glimmered and formed a moving picture, a memory of each boy’s weakness.
“Pay close attention, Anne,” Sophia instructed. The boys froze, each looking at the great bubbles of shimmering dust with fear and trepidation. Then the dust began to take shape. “Each of us has insecurities, and it’s the most insecure of us all who would tease and torment a girl you don’t even know.” The dust painted a portrait, yet the pieces of the portrait moved like living, breathing people in the shimmering lights above the boys’ heads.
The biggest boy’s portrait was of himself, cowering in a cupboard as a man slapped a woman across her face. The woman’s eyes shone with tears, as did the boy’s. It was a scene the boy saw often at home perhaps. He ducked his head in shame. Then Sophia poked a finger into his bubble and it burst like shooting sparks. He kicked at a stone at his feet, confusion on his face. But she sensed something awakening in him as well.
The other boys had similar thoughts in their heads, but of different proportions. One had a drunken father who spent more time with the bottle than he did his family. And another had a father who spent more time with his mistress and their children than he did his wife and theirs. And another was born on the wrong side of the blanket, yet no one knew.
“I’ll not ask you to apologize, but I’ll ask you not to condemn a girl for something you know nothing of, for we all have secrets, do we not?” Sophia asked in her most stern voice.
“Yes, miss,” the boys chimed as one.
Sophia swirled her finger in the air, making all the images disappear and, with them, the dust. Along with that went the memory of what each boy had just seen, except for the boy’s own self-portrait. The glittering images would remind each of them that their own truths could easily be distorted.
“Apologize,” Sophia ordered.
“I’m sorry,” they all chimed at once.
“You may go,” Sophia said as she stepped to the side to let the boys pass. But they took two steps and stopped, their eyes growing wide.
“Your Grace,” the oldest boy said as he dropped into a clumsy bow. The other boys followed suit. The Duke of Robinsworth stepped to the side and they all scurried past him.