Author's Note: That's right, two updates within the same year! I know, I know, it's very exciting for all of us. I am sorry, though, for the shifting perspective in this chapter, and for the sad lack of Childermass here. I promise, we'll be seeing him again soon!
If you'll allow me a quick aside, I just want to point out that there's a line in Chapter 59 of the book, when Dr. Greysteel is being pestered by Drawlight-they're warning each other of all the rumors they've heard about Strange and his Black Tower, and Greysteel says (among other things), "People say he has summoned witches and made a servant for himself out of fire." For some reason, that line really stood out to me when I first read the book, and it ended up being a very inspirational mental image for me in crafting this story and Georgiana's character. I'm so glad to finally have this chapter written, and to present my idea of the possible origins of such an exciting rumor.
Anyway, thank you for indulging me, and thank you so much for reading! Please let me know what you think!
December 1816
Most days passed peaceably enough at Starecross Hall. Lady Pole's illness made her feel very tired throughout the day, and Segundus, Miss Erquistoune, and Mr. Honeyfoot (on his visits) endeavored to give her as much rest and comfort as they could. The Lady's needs were few—her wants fewer—but Segundus prided himself on the fact that all were met adequately, save one: the cure of what afflicted her. If ever there was a disruption to their quiet existence, it was only when their charge tried to communicate to them what she believed her ailment to be; or when she imagined some sinister persons were attempting to perform a feat of magic in the house or upon its grounds; or, on occasion, when first she woke from sleep.
This had proven to be one such distressing morning.
In her fits, Segundus had regularly seen Lady Pole so frantic, but rarely so single-minded. " George ," she cried, over and over again. "I must tell George! "
An extraordinary request, made all the more so by the pronounced distrust that lay so evidently between the two women. All the same, John Segundus found himself, quite against his natural inclination, to be standing at Miss Erquistoune's door just after dawn, hammering upon the wood to wake her.
"Miss Erquistoune? Please, Miss Erquistoune, we need you!"
"Yes, one moment!" she called, sounding strained, and Segundus tried to wait patiently until she opened the door. "What has happened?"
For a moment, Segundus was too stunned to speak—inside the room stood a pillar of darkness, a blaze of fire.
But no, no —it was simply Miss Erquistoune, of course. There was a scarf of golden silk wrapped around her crimson hair, the colors of which together had been blurred by his tired eyes into an idea of flames. And she had thrown on a man's coat over her night-gown, a worn and very shabby thing (and one which he thought vaguely familiar, though he was certain he had never seen it on her person before); it was only the darkness of the wool that made it appear as though she had cloaked herself in shadows.
Segundus shook his head of the lingering remnants of so strange a vision, and remembered why he had come. "I am sorry for the hour—but Lady Pole says she must speak with you. She is...most adamant."
"Let us go," she rasped, voice still rough with sleep, and hurried along beside him bare-footed down darkened hallways to the Lady's rooms.
They found her still abed, eyes wide and wary. " I saw him ," she hissed when she spotted Miss Erquistoune. " But he did not come for us!"
"Who? Who did you see?" the woman demanded.
Lady Pole narrowed her eyes and tried to speak, but it seemed to take a great deal of effort. "Once there was a man— augh! He...left his family and went out onto black roads, to stand upon a bridge."
"My Lady—" Segundus said, stepping forward to soothe her evident fit; but Georgiana pushed in front of him.
"Try to speak around it," she urged. "What did the man do?"
Their charge took a deep breath. "He wished to speak to the river," she groaned. "Through all manner of trickery, he bribed and threatened and ordered the waters to teach him their secrets."
"Secrets... You saw a magician? Emma, was it Childermass?"
The Lady's expression soured, and she shook her head. "I have not seen your lover since I shot him," she spat.
Miss Erquistoune looked pained at her viciousness, but only for the instant before her expression shifted into wretched understanding. " God's bones ," she cursed. "You saw Jonathan ."
" He did not come for us! " Lady Pole screeched.
"No, no; he did not believe me! He did not believe you were there at all." Her assurance did not appear to give either woman any particular comfort, and Miss Erquistoune shook her head. "I must go to him. If he can get to you—"
" No longer ," she hissed, shaking her head wildly. She seemed trying to say something else, but could only repeat, " No longer ."
"He can't get there any longer?" Georgiana asked. Their charge nodded her head, screwing her eyes shut as though the mere action pained her. "But he saw you there. My lady, did he see Arabella? "
Lady Pole opened her mouth, but all that came forth was a terrible screech.
Miss Erquistoune cursed harshly, then grabbed Lady Pole by the shoulders. "Listen to me, now: if he saw Arabella there, Jonathan will stop at nothing to force his way back." She pulled back, shucked herself out of the overlarge coat and thrust it into Segundus' hands. "Keep this safe for me."
"W-what are you doing?"
She turned, her expression fearsome to behold, looking upon him as though she had entirely forgotten he was there. "I must go to him—to Jonathan Strange."
Segundus shook his head. "He—he is in Venice! It will take weeks to get there, and longer to find him!"
Miss Erquistoune barked a short laugh, her eyes gleaming despite the low light. "Oh, dear Segundus. I will owe you many explanations, and I swear you shall have them, but not until this is done. Do take care of my coat?"
"I shall, miss, but—"
"Thank you. I will return as swiftly as I can."
With that, Miss Erquistoune crossed to the fireplace, stepped inside it despite the eager, crackling blaze and, to Segundus' great cry of shock, disappeared.
There was no part of the mouse tincture that could accurately be described as pleasant . Certainly not the process of extracting it, nor its flavor—pungent and shocking, even diluted in as much brandy as he could manage, and Strange could manage quite a lot. But, he had to admit, there was something most delicious in the effect it had on the mind, in allowing his sanity to fall away like scales from his eyes.
Once, in some far-flung past, his thoughts had seemed so pressing, so... important . Now, they trickled past him like water down a babbling brook, occasionally splashing at him and spurring him to some action, but then continuing to hurry along their way. There was such a peacefulness to be found in not having to pay his own consciousness any attention.
But the effects were fading now, only the last dregs of madness yet clinging to the edges of his mind. That hideous self-awareness was returning—and with it, the full force of all his stifled thoughts, a dam bursting and flooding the brook with a rush of knowledge and horror.
He had journeyed to Faerie.
He had seen Arabella.
Georgiana had been right .
Had it been simple grief or mere pride that made him doubt the word of his dearest cousin, his oldest friend? She had been so angry at his distrust—he'd thought she were about to hit him! But he could understand, now, what he'd done to her, the blow he'd dealt by not believing all she said. He, who had always been her most vehement supporter, her steadfast accomplice. But in this, the most important of all their conflicts, he had not believed her .
There was no question that he had broken her heart, and now Arabella was suffering for it—his beloved Arabella, imprisoned at the hands of that creature!
Together, surely, they could have prevented this, could have rescued her—Strange and Erquistoune, an unbeatable pair! But he had said such things to her... He very much doubted that she would ever speak to him again.
The thought pained him—another grief, another log upon the pyre of his misery—and he threw himself at his notes and scraps of books, certain he could find a way to make all right. He was alone in this, but he was Jonathan Strange! Why had he been granted the gift of magic in the first place, if not for this? He would find a spell, or craft one himself, to free Arabella and return her to England.
And then, once she was saved, he would go crawling upon his hands and knees in search of Georgiana's forgiveness.
It was only then, staring down at the mess of papers in his hands and quite unable to read them, that he looked all about him and realized the profundity of the darkness in the room. This was no mere cloak of night...
Cursing, he thrust the papers back down and patted all his pockets until he could retrieve a box of matches, then fumbled along the table for the nearest candle. It did not wish to light—truly, the match itself put off only a feeble sputter of flame, and when he brought it to the wick it seemed to scramble up the match-stick and away! He burned his fingers twice, and used up three more matches before managing to corner the spit of fire for long enough to ignite the wick, which threw off only enough light to illuminate his own face.
In the next instant, every candle in the room burst to life; the sudden shock of even their meagre glow seemed blinding in this impenetrable darkness.
" Ahh ," whispered a voice like a hiss of flame, " there you are... "
Like berries plucked by countless invisible hands from beeswax branches, each candle-flame pulled free of their wicks and floated across the room to converge and burn and grow into a whirlwind— no , a figure , of human shape and size.
Had he accidentally slipped too much mouse tincture into this dose? Or perhaps this was the brandy's doing? Or both?
But no, no —he could feel the heat of the flames brushing his skin, could feel the sweat that dotted his brow in response, as the figure stepped closer. This was no hallucination, no drunken imagining. This was...
" Georgiana? "
The fire laughed . "Oh, Jonathan Strange... After all this time, and all the wonders you have done, only now do you truly see me?"
"I..." He reached out a hand, watching in equal parts fear and awe as the flames parted before his touch, refusing to burn his skin. "I thought what you did were... parlor tricks , mostly."
Her short, harsh bark of laughter caused those tongues of flame to surge and snap, and he drew his hand back quickly. "You have said many unkind things to me of late, cousin, but this may be the cruelest."
" Georgiana —" he began, but she did not allow him even the attempt to apologize.
"Tell me, what is this darkness? Why can I not step through to you? Oh, what have you done, Jonathan?"
"I... I ..." What had he done? Great things, surely. Countless wonders. Magic the like of which had not been seen in England in three hundred years or more. Yet none of this could matter, in the face of what he hadn't done. "I saw Arabella," he gasped. "I could not save her."
"Yes, I know," Georgiana sighed, and there was more kindness in her tone than he could deserve. "And greatly angered her captor in trying, I take it. It must have settled some very old debts, to have cursed you with such as this—and accrued many more, to deny me passage. This will not be forgotten."
"What ever do you mean, George?"
The fire-woman shook her head, tendrils of flame sweeping through the air with the movement. "Nothing of great matter. Can you tell me, Jonathan, where you were?"
"In Faerie! " he cried. "In a brugh! "
"Yes, yes, but which? "
"What?"
" Which brugh? " she asked, sounding exasperated. "I cannot navigate that land, but if you can tell me..! Did you hear anyone speak the name of the brugh? Were there any landmarks?"
Strange frowned, and tried to remember. "There was... I thought... There was a courtyard full of bones. And a great house, but much dilapidated. And a wood of cruel trees..."
"I'm afraid that does little to narrow it down."
Strange thought some more. "One of the dancers told me something... That there had been forty-seven magicians to leave their bones behind in that place."
"Oh, if I am to fly about from brugh to brugh counting dead magicians to see which holds exactly forty-seven on the word of some—" (this word was unintelligible, made up of the hiss and splutter of flames that have just split through a log) "—I shall be over there 'til Judgement Day."
"...Oh."
Georgiana sighed, her form flickering. "Still, it is something. And the fact that you have been expelled so forcefully is something more. That creature must be very frightened of what you can do. So what will you do? Have you a plan for how to get back to her?"
He looked around at the papers scattered about the room, at his silver dish of water. "There is more magic to be done, more spells I've yet to try. He can bar me from his house but cannot keep me off the Roads entirely; if I must, I'll even go to Norrell."
"I suppose if you must ," George scoffed, the displeasure in her voice perhaps more stark than he had ever heard from her before. "Jonathan—"
The door to the room swung open. Behind it, the servant he had hired for his stay in Santa Maria Zobenigo stood with a tray of food, a terrified expression already present on his face. The man took one look at the woman of fire and dropped the tray, crossed himself, and fled back the way he had come.
"Well," she huffed, the closest thing to her usual easy humour that Strange had heard in quite some time, "I suppose that is as good a sign as any. I must return to Starecross."
"Wait, Georgiana..." he began, and this time she allowed him to speak. "I am sorry. I should have listened to you long ago."
For a long moment, the fire just burned there, unspeaking. Yet somehow he could feel her gaze on him, taking his measure, weighing his contrition against the hurt he had done.
"...I am sorry, too," she finally said, voice soft, though what she could have to apologize for he had no idea. "You are my cousin and I am always your friend, no matter what words we have said to one another. And I have loved your Arabella dearly. What ever I can do to help you fetch her back, you need only ask. Keep a candle burning, and I will be near. And I will keep up my own search for the way to go—perhaps, with the creature distracted by you, it will be less inclined to notice my presence in its lands."
"You think it will be so easy?"
"No, I doubt very much that it will be. But I must try something ."
Segundus sat with Lady Pole in her room, together eating the porridge Mrs. Riley, their cook, had prepared, his gaze fixed carefully upon the fire in the hearth.
It would seem that the Lady's frenzy had abated, now that the urgency with which she wished to speak with Miss Erquistoune had been satisfied. Or perhaps she had simply managed, somehow, to pass it along to Segundus, whose thoughts were racing, flitting from one to the other without ever stopping long enough for him to get any sort of handle on them.
The "practical ability" that Strange once hinted at was true! Miss Erquistoune could perform great feats of magic! Certainly not English magic—he had never even heard of anything like she had just done! And without any words of power spoken, nor any strange or mystical gestures! Most assuredly without any charts! How had she done it? Simply here one moment, then into the fire, then gone the next! And gone where? Surely she could not truly be on her way to Venice as she said, while he merely sat at home eating his breakfast! But, then... Well, he had never before known Miss Erquistoune to lie. Why would she have begun now?
In that same vein, she had promised to return soon, and then perhaps he would have a resolution to all this wondering. He would simply have to be patient until then, waiting here with Lady Pole.
Lady Pole ...
"You did not seem at all surprised," he said suddenly, the words stumbling out of his mouth before his thoughts had properly arranged themselves, "when Miss Erquistoune...disappeared."
"Hm?" Lady Pole looked up from her bowl. "Oh. No, I was not."
"You have...seen her do so before?"
"No, never."
"Then..?" Segundus trailed off, frowning deeply into his own breakfast. All his years dedicated to the study of magic, and he had never even heard of anything like what she had done! And yet Emma Pole, of no magical education whatsoever—and, indeed, a deeply-held dislike of it—had not batted an eye. "Then how did you know?"
She chewed slowly, shrugging her shoulders as though his question was of no consequence whatever. "You do not see Georgiana as I do," she said lightly, and turned her gaze to the fireplace. "Ah. That did not take long."
He turned, just in time to see the flames flare up, out into the room, almost as though reaching for them! The fire moved of its own accord, out of the grate and onto the carpet, burning hotter and higher until it grew tall, nearly the height and shape of a man, and took one horrible step forward.
With a cry, Segundus lurched to his feet and scrambled between the creature and the bed. "Stay back! I will not let you harm her!"
"Oh, do calm down," Lady Pole said evenly. "It is only George."
He watched in stunned silence as the person of flame stepped forward and then bent down, taking up the shabby, dark coat that he had knocked to the ground in his haste, and clutching the fabric to its breast.
With a hiss, the flames receded and diminished, revealing the crimson hair and brown skin and tall, elegant figure of Miss Erquistoune, an expression of such beleaguered sadness the like of which Segundus had never before seen on her face.
" Parlor tricks ..." she murmured, her voice barely a whisper, screwing her eyes tightly closed.
" Well? " Lady Pole demanded, too impatient to regard this display of sorrow. "Have you seen him?"
"Yes, of course," Miss Erquistoune sighed, straightening up and shaking out the coat, then slipping her arms into its sleeves and pulling it on over her night-gown. "The curse on him is a wretched thing—even I could not break it. But he understands, now, and is very determined to find his way back, and knows how to contact me. I will do all I can, Emma, to aid him—and you —I swear it."
John Segundus reached out a hand to grip the nearest bedpost, and stumbled back to a seat on the foot of the Lady's bed, feeling suddenly very dizzy and unbalanced. "You... You've just been to Italy and back?" he asked. "Within the hour?"
"If I could have brought you proof, sir, I would have done so gladly," she answered with a tired shake of her head, taking two steps over to half-sit, half- fall into the chair beside the bed that he had recently vacated. She slipped her fingers beneath the collar of her gown, and lifted up and over her head the gold chain she always wore—and its mysterious and long-hidden pendant, which was now revealed to be...a ring . "The curse was nearly impenetrable, and I could not bring my body through, or else I should go now and bring back some token that might convince you. But I can tell you this; Jonathan Strange is shrouded in a vicious and perpetual darkness, of a sort which the good people of Venice are not like to miss. I am sure we will hear word of it soon—or you may write to him for confirmation of my visit, and then you will perhaps believe that I mean what I say."
"Oh! Oh, no, I did not mean that I doubted you, Miss Erquistoune—"
" Childermass ," she said suddenly, sharply, shoulders stiffening beneath the wool coat.
"I... I beg your pardon?"
"My name is Georgiana Childermass ." She undid the clasp of the chain and slid the ring free and onto her finger. "You asked me once why we did not marry, and I deceived you. You may call me Georgiana if it is an easier adjustment; but here, at least, I will be known as all I am. I have become too weary of secrets to maintain them any longer. Ask anything you wish to know, John Segundus, and I will answer."
John Segundus gaped at her, trying to make some sense of all of this. He took a deep, steadying breath, and asked the first question to occur to him. "Will you teach me the magic you have done?"
For the first time since walking through the fire, Georgiana looked at him, eyes widening in surprise. Then she smiled. Then she laughed —a great, heaving, hearty laugh that caused her to toss her head back.
"Oh! How dear you are!" she cried, her voice a little hoarse, touching her fingers to her lips. "How sweetly you surprise us, even still. Of course that would be your chief desire, sir. Oh, how sorry we are to tell you we cannot. No, please do not look so troubled, dear friend. I would be very glad to teach you all I know, and more besides; but your magic and my own are not the same, and neither strain is...fond of sharing."
"What sort of magic is it, Miss— Mrs. Childermass?"
She smiled again. "Oh, will not he be displeased that I have told you so soon, after how long he was denied? Poor man. All the same, we said we would tell you, and so I shall. Lady Emma thinks me a demon, or a witch; I know you have heard her say so before. But you have also read about your old magicians, who believed that all parts of the world were filled with a life and a spirit of their own. I am merely the latest to play host to the spirit of Fire."
And Segundus listened, rapt and awed and wondering, as she told him of her own bleak and difficult origin, and of the spirit that bound itself to hers and, in so doing, saved her. She told him of the ageless and mercurial being that made a home within her body—of its great curiosity about the lives of these human creatures who had learned to summon and harness it—of its great pleasure in the stories they told about it, and the potent and primeval magic those stories had to shape what it would become.
"We are very sorry, Emma," Georgiana said softly, "for the fear we caused you back at Harley-street, whenever we were near. You have every good reason to be wary of magic and magicians, but I assure you both, I mean no threat to anyone—save, perhaps, for Misters Lascelles and Norrell...and my first husband's mother...and that woman with the laundry who was so unkind to me last week... I hope you will not begrudge me these pet grievances, for I do feel as though I've earned them."
"I think you should be free to despise whoever you should like," said Lady Pole with all seriousness.
Mrs. Childermass laughed. "You are very obliging; I thank you."
Segundus looked between the two women, heartened to see them for once speaking to each other with a cordiality that seemed verging on friendship. And then a thought struck him quite viciously, and he gasped. "Oh! But—do you know what it is that afflicts Lady Pole? Will you tell me?"
The woman smiled, and inclined her head, and answered, "No. "
"...I beg your pardon?" Segundus asked; but Mrs. Childermass looked easily as confused and uncertain as he did.
"I mean to say... no . No! " She leapt to her feet, eyes narrowing in evident fury. " The barn door was latched from the outside ," she hissed.
Segundus stood as well, reaching a hand out to her arm to comfort her—in the instant before she pulled away from him, he thought he saw...a rose at her mouth ...
" She was trapped inside for days before the fire but no one heard and no one cared. " She clapped both hands over her mouth to stop herself talking, equal parts anguish and fury in her eyes, the fire in the hearth roaring bright and loud and hot.
"Mrs...Childermass..." Segundus tried, but she did not seem to hear him at all. Instead, she stepped over to the window and flung it open and screamed out into the dawn.
A great flock of large, dark birds started at the sound, and flew up and out of the trees surrounding Starecross, calling out to one another in the pale morning sky.
Segundus drew near the poor woman, and saw that she was shaking, her hands trembling where they gripped the window-frame. He placed a gentle, comforting hand on her shoulder, wondering absently whether he might become, now, the caretaker of two madwomen.
But no, no... No, after all he'd seen and heard this morning, he was more than ever beginning to doubt that he even cared for the one.
"Please calm yourself, Georgiana," he said softly, hoping the use of her Christian name might break through whatever this horror was that gripped her.
She turned to him, but did not seem even to see him. "It would curse me? It would put those words in my mouth?!"
"Oh, do get over it, George," snapped Lady Pole.
At this, the woman seemed almost to return to herself, whirling away from the window with a gasp, casting her gaze about the room as though she might find something there to rectify whatever had happened to her. "I... I... I need to— bake something," she spat, the words flinging from her lips like a threat.
"First, here," said Lady Pole, holding out her empty bowl and spoon. "Fetch another, won't you?"
"Yes, fine ," Georgiana muttered absently, hardly seeming to take notice of what she was agreeing to, grabbing the dishware as she hurried out of the room.
With a sigh, Segundus pulled the window closed again and latched it, and turned to his charge. "I am sorry for that, my Lady."
She shook her head, pulling her shawl tighter about her shoulders. "It takes her very badly, though I suppose that's to be expected. I'm sure she'll be alright, in time."
"Yes," Segundus agreed. He supposed he should go after her, but then supposed he should grant her her privacy—then he supposed he should grant the same courtesy to Lady Pole, who seemed in relatively easy spirits aside from her customary unhappiness. But... Well, he did have his note-book and a pencil here in the pockets of his white coat, and it would be best if he got all that had happened down on paper now, before he began to forget any part of it. He retrieved these now, and asked, "I wonder, my Lady, if you would mind terribly if I...?"
"No, no, help yourself," she murmured with a disinterested wave of her hand, grown accustomed to his regular and urgent note-taking in her presence.
"Thank you," he said, settling back into the chair and flipping open the book to the first blank page, then beginning to scrawl out the incredible events of the morning.
A short time later, Georgiana Childermass returned. Segundus glanced up and attempted to offer her a comforting smile which she took no notice of—and then he watched in some surprise as Lady Pole politely refused the proffered bowl, and patted the space on the bed beside her. "No, it's for you. Sit and eat, George."
The woman blinked confusedly, but only for a moment. Then her stormy expression managed, somehow, to darken further. "I am not some child who needs told what to do."
"No, but you are impulsive and rash," Lady Pole replied, appearing untroubled by Georgiana's anger. "It is easier to plot revenge on a full stomach."
Mrs. Childermass opened her mouth, only to close it again, then turned and seated herself on the edge of the bed with a huff. "I suppose you would know," she muttered darkly, stuffing a spoonful of porridge into her mouth. "Shot John just after tea, did you?"
"After breakfast, in fact."
"Hm." Georgiana took a moment to look down into her bowl, seeming to reconsider the porridge in this new light. She took another bite.
Segundus watched the women a little uneasily; but there was no further sniping as Georgiana chewed and swallowed, so he returned his gaze to his work.
"I am sorry I shot your husband," said Emma Pole.
Segundus snapped his head back up.
Mrs. Childermass had frozen, spoon lifted halfway to her mouth; she turned to look at Lady Pole. After a moment's pause, she lowered the spoon and replied, "Well, I know he was not your target."
" No . He grabbed the barrel from me, like a fool ."
"Yes." Georgiana sighed heavily. "That man is too loyal for his own good."
"Yes." Lady Pole allowed her three entire bites of her breakfast, before turning to ask, "And...he is loyal to you? "
"Wh— yes , of course! " Georgiana fixed the younger woman with an incredulous stare, and then—broke into a laugh. "Who, John Childermass? I do not think it would ever occur to him that he could be otherwise. It certainly had not occurred to me ."
John Segundus began to think that perhaps his notes might be better taken in the library, in the other wing of the house. But he did not know how to extract himself from the chair and around the bed and out the door without drawing the ladies' notice.
Lady Pole scoffed. "I did not take you for a fool, Georgiana, to put such trust in an Englishman."
Perhaps he could go out to the garden for a time? It was not so very cold for December, surely.
Georgiana gave a sad and tired laugh, lifting up another spoonful. "I think I am the queen of fools, to have fallen for the trap I've found myself in. And I trust John Childermass entirely. But I assure you, the latter has not been the cause of the former."
"Hmm." Lady Pole fell silent for a moment; when she spoke again, she seemed to be putting a deal of thought into the careful wording of her question. "And what...do you intend to do, about the former?"
"I do not know. I suppose I could throw Blencathra down on his head?" When this was met with only blank looks from Pole and Segundus both, Georgiana heaved a sigh, and poked miserably with the spoon at the last of her porridge. "Well, John would have laughed at that..."
Lady Pole made a very unladylike sound of displeasure, and rolled her eyes. "I cannot begin to imagine what you must see in that man, to sigh and pine for him so."
Mrs. Childermass did sigh then, and smiled very softly to think of her husband. "You do not know him as I do. I miss him very much... I know neither of you can have any very kind thoughts for the man, but he is...the best thing that ever happened to me."
Emma Pole was silent for a moment, giving her an appraising look. Segundus did not know what she searched for, nor what she found, but eventually her coolness seemed to warm some slight degree. "I am...sorry, Georgiana."
The woman snorted, and flashed a wry grin. "Why? Because he is so far from me? Or because you think my life so bleak, to have him as its apogee?"
Lady Pole gave her a wicked grin in return, and answered, " Both ," and the two women fell to laughter together.
Whatever curses had been laid upon the ladies of this house, whatever sad fate had befallen Jonathan Strange, however abject the prospect of their ever managing to overcome these great and terrible challenges—as Lady Pole reached across, and took Georgiana's hand, and held it kindly, John Segundus could not help but feel some glimmer, long thought lost, of hope.
