Alma Katsu - The Taker

I nodded.

“And do you have a place to stay? Forgive me for presuming, but you have the air of an orphan about you. Homeless, friendless?” The woman stroked my arm while he asked this.

“Thank you for your concern. Perhaps you could point me in the direction of the nearest public house,” I began, shifting the weight of the satchel in my hand.

By then, the tall, haughty man had descended from the carriage, too, and snatched my bag away from me. “We’ll do better than that. We’ll give you a place to stay. Tonight.”

The woman took my arm and steered me toward the coach. “We’re going to a party. You like parties, don’t you?”

“I-don’t know,” I stammered, my senses tingling in warning. How could three people of means just come from out of nowhere to rescue me? It seemed natural-prudent, even-to be skeptical.

“Don’t speak nonsense. How can you not know if you like to go to parties? Everyone likes parties. There will be food and plenty of drink, and fun. And at the end of it, there will be a warm bed for you.” The haughty man heaved my satchel into the coach. “Besides, do you have a better offer? Would you rather sleep on the street? I think not.”

He was right and, intuition aside, I had no choice except to obey. I even convinced myself that this chance meeting was a matter of good fortune. My needs had been answered, at least for the time being. They were expensively dressed and it stood to reason, well off; they could hardly be planning to rob me. Nor did they look like murderers. Why they were so eager to take a stranger to a party with them was a complete mystery, however, but it seemed risky to question my good fortune too strenuously.

We rode along in tense silence for a few minutes. I sat between the woman and the convivial dark-haired man and tried not to notice as the blond man picked me over with his eyes. When I couldn’t contain my curiosity any longer I asked, “Excuse me, but why is it, exactly, that you require my attendance at this party? Won’t the host be annoyed to receive an unexpected guest?”

The woman and the haughty man snorted, as though I’d told a joke. “Oh, don’t worry about that. The host is our friend, you see, and we happen to know for a fact that he enjoys entertaining pretty young women,” the blond man said with another snort. The woman rapped her fan across the back of his hand.

“Don’t mind these two,” the dark-haired man said. “They are making merry at your expense. You have my word that you will be entirely welcome. As you said, you need a place to stay the night and, I suspect, to put your troubles aside for one evening. Perhaps you’ll find something else you need there as well,” he said, and he had such a gentle way about him that I softened. There were many things I needed, but most of all I wanted to trust him. Trust that he knew what would be best for me when I myself didn’t know.

We rattled up and down streets in the dark trap. I kept watch out the window and tried to memorize the route, like a child in a fairy tale who might need to find her way home. It was a waste of time; I couldn’t hope to retrace my journey, not in the state I was in. Eventually, the carriage pulled up in front of a mansion of brick and stone, lit up for a party, so grand it took the breath from me. But apparently the party hadn’t started; there was no activity to be seen, no men and women in evening dress, no other carriages pulling up to the curb.

Footmen opened the doors to the mansion and the woman led the way as though she was the mistress of the house, pulling her gloves off finger by finger. “Where is he?” she snapped at a liveried butler.

His eyes briefly rolled skyward. “Upstairs, ma’am.”

As we climbed the stairs, I felt more and more self-conscious. Here I was, dressed in a shabby, homemade frock. I reeked of the ship and of seawater and my hair was tangled and tossed with salt spray. I looked down at my feet to see my simple, rustic shoes crusted with mud from the streets, the toes curling up from hard use.

I touched the woman’s arm. “I shouldn’t be here. I’m in no state for a fancy affair. I’m not even fit to be a kitchen girl in this fine house. I will take my leave-”

“You will stay until we give you permission to leave.” She whirled and dug her fingernails into my forearm, making me gasp at the pain. “Now stop being a ninny and come along. I guarantee you will enjoy yourself tonight.” Her tone told me that my enjoyment was the last thing on her mind.

The four of us burst through a set of doors into a bedchamber, a massive room as big as my family’s entire house back in St. Andrew. The woman led us straight into the dressing room where a man stood with his back to us. He was obviously the master of the house, a valet waiting at his side. The master was dressed in bright blue velvet breeches and white silk stockings, fancy slippers on his feet. He wore a lace-edged shirt and waistcoat to match the breeches. He hadn’t donned his frock coat, so I had a clear view of his true form without a tailor’s tricks to enhance his build. He wasn’t as tall and athletic as Jonathan-my yardstick for the masculine ideal-but nonetheless possessed a magnificent physique. A broad back and shoulders blossomed from his narrow hips. He’d be terrifically strong, judging from those shoulders, like some of the axmen back in St. Andrew, stocky and powerful. And then he turned around and I tried not to show my surprise.

He was much younger than I expected, in his twenties I would have guessed, older than I by only a few years. And he was good-looking in an unfamiliar way, vaguely savage. He had an olive complexion, which I’d never seen before in our village of Scots and Scandinavians. His dark mustache and beard were wispy along a square jaw, as though they’d not been growing in for long. But his strangest feature was his eyes, olive colored and struck through with gray and gold. They were like two jewels in their beauty, and yet his stare was wolfish and mesmerizing.

“We’ve brought another entertainment for your party,” the woman announced.

His appraising gaze was as rough as a pair of hands; after one look, I felt I had no secrets from him. My throat went dry, my knees soft.

“This is our host.” The woman’s voice drifted over my shoulder. “Curtsy, you simpleton. You are in the presence of royalty. This is the Count cel Rau.”

“My name is Adair.” He stretched a hand toward me, as though to keep me from bowing. “We are in America, Tilde. I understand Americans will not have royalty in their country and so they will not bow to anyone. We must not expect Americans to bow to us.”

“You’ve just arrived in America?” Somehow I found the courage to speak to him.

“A fortnight ago.” He dropped my hand and turned back to his valet.

“From Hungary,” the short, dark man added. “Do you know where that is?”

My head swam. “No, I’m afraid not.” More snorts of laughter sounded behind my back.

“It’s not important,” this Adair, the master of the house, snapped at his minions. “We cannot expect anyone to know of our homeland. Home is farther away than the miles of land and sea we have put behind us. It is another world from this place. That is why I have come here-because it is another world.” He gestured toward me. “You-do you have a name?”

“Lanore.”

“You are from here?”

“From Boston? No, I just arrived today. My family”-I stumbled over a hitch in my throat-“lives in the Maine territory, to the north. Have you heard of it?”

“No,” he answered.

“Then we are even.” I don’t know where I found the nerve to joke with him.

“Perhaps we are.” He let the valet adjust his cravat, eyeing me curiously before addressing the trio. “Don’t just stand there,” he said. “Get her ready for the party.”