Home From The Sea: The Elemental Masters, Book Seven Read Online Free Page A

gaze on the cottage and its promise of safety; the beautiful, bright, sunny day no longer seemed so welcoming. Had that been a promise?
    Or a threat?

    It was a beautiful spring afternoon in London, with enough of a breeze to carry away the stink of the city and the warring smells of the harbor. The ship from France had docked, and it had been a crowded passage. The dock was full of people coming to welcomethose just off it, complicated by porters and passengers disembarking.
    Two young ladies coming down the gangplank were just enough different from the crush of similar young ladies before them that more than one eye fastened on them. It was not that they were pretty—although they were, or rather, the smaller of the two was definitely pretty in the conventional sense, though the taller was what might be described as “handsome.” It might have been their outfits; both wore gowns of brown and gray that were rugged, travel-worthy Rational Dress rather than the constricting, colorful, and rather impractical gowns of the girls who had clearly traveled across the Channel in the luxurious salons. Both had sensible little hats rather than Ascot-worthy confections. But it was probably their laughter that attracted the eye once the ear had been caught; it rang out above the babble of the crowd, honest, clear, and happy. Not stifled little titters, gasping giggles, or wheezy little sounds that had a hint of sadness about them. People turned at the sound, looked, and smiled involuntarily. Both of them beamed answering smiles as if they considered anyone and everyone a potential friend.
    Both of them cradled hatboxes, which was also unusual. Not that it was entirely unheard of for a young lady to be unwilling to entrust her precious new Parisian confection to the hands of a porter—but neither of these two looked at all likely to have purchased such a thing, and even if they had, they did not look likely to have it in such high esteem that they’d hold to it with both arms and such good-natured determination. Most young ladies dangled their boxes by the strings—for after all, a hat doesn’t weigh very much, and such a pose was often part of the illustrations in the fashionable journals. No, these two held their hatboxes as if something inside them was made of glass, and the hatboxes themselves were not festively decorated cardboard, but the same sturdy, boiled and riveted leather as luggage that was expected to go around the world.
    As they made their way down the plank, they scanned the waiting crowd and quickly spotted the woman waving a handkerchiefat them. The taller freed a hand long enough to wave back, then resumed her grip on her hatbox.
    The taller of the two, who might or might not have been a year or two older, was a dark brunette; the smaller had hair of golden brown, blue eyes, and the sort of face that might have been made into a Professional Beauty. Both had healthy, tanned complexions at odds with the fashionably pale faces around them. And as the gangplank cleared in front of them, they hastened their steps toward the one who had signaled to them in a way that suggested they were used to a great deal of walking, and none of it in cities.
    Which, in fact, they were—having walked over a great deal of Africa in the last year or so.
    The woman who had clearly come to meet them continued to wave her handkerchief. She was not a beauty either, but like them, she caught the attention of more than one man. There was something about her that signaled a great deal of experience without bitterness—in fact, it was clear that it was not just the joy of seeing her companions that made her glow with happiness. One fellow in common laborer’s clothing, but who had uncommonly fine hands, even stopped dead to stare at her.
    “By heaven!” he said to his companion, who also stopped for a moment to admire. “There’s someone who’s had a life! I’d give my eye to paint her!”
    “Ask, and you’ll likely
get
a black