Rose by Holly Webb Page A

that’s all. Like I said,” Freddie told her firmly. A little bit of Rose couldn’t help wondering if he was trying to convince himself as much as he was trying to persuade her. But he was a magician’s apprentice. He could summon monsters, even if he did have to be rescued from them afterward. His dark eyes were wide and sincere now, and Rose felt herself wrapped in their velvety blackness. He looked so certain. He must know. He did know.
    Rose dropped a little curtsy. “Thank you, sir,” she murmured. “I’m so sorry to have interrupted your…studies.” She couldn’t quite hold back a laugh on the last word, but she was staring at her boots, like a model servant.
    Freddie glared at her, his fingers clenched into fists, but he said nothing.
    â€œThank you, girl!” the cat called after her as she opened the door. “I’ll be down for some salmon later, if you please!”
    Rose clicked the door shut and leaned against it for a second. That hadn’t been what she planned to happen, not at all. But at least she knew it wasn’t magic that was making all these strange things keep happening to her. Magic was messy and difficult and not her place to know. She was having nothing to do with it.
    So how do you make pictures on bathtubs? a little voice demanded in her head. And pour treacle on men on big horses? And why can’t Bill and the others hear the cat? But Rose was very carefully not listening. It was too nice, knowing that she was normal after all. She didn’t want anything to spoil it.
    ***
    By the time she’d helped Bill fetch all the shoes for cleaning and taken Miss Anstruther her bedtime cocoa (Mrs. Jones had laced it with brandy), Rose was exhausted. Even her pretty china candlestick felt too heavy to carry up the shadowy stairs. She was too weary to care if the steps stretched and weaved beneath her. It was only that she was tired, and the candle flame was flickering. She was imagining it, like Bill had said. All she wanted to do now was get to her little room and sleep.
    She jerked awake sometime in the blackest part of the night, quite certain that someone was in the room with her. She could hear breathing. At once, she was convinced that it was the mist creature back again—she could feel it. It was swirling over her face, coiling around her throat, about to rush into her mouth and nose and suffocate her—
    â€œShe’s going to scream,” an interested voice remarked from next to her left ear.
    â€œDon’t!” This voice was panicked and familiar. Freddie.
    â€œWhat are you doing in my room?” Rose hissed angrily. She was quite shocked. The matrons at St. Bridget’s would have had fits about this, and she couldn’t imagine Miss Bridges being very happy either.
    â€œIt’s all right, I brought Gustavus as a chaperone,” Freddie explained reassuringly. There was a rustling noise, which turned out to be Freddie getting a candle stub from his dressing gown pocket and blowing on it. It flared at once, lighting up Freddie’s pale, ghostly face, and the white cat perched on the edge of Rose’s pillow.
    â€œA chaperone? He’s a cat! And nobody else can hear him!” Rose snarled. Somehow Freddie’s easy, thoughtless display of magic made her hate him even more. “Get out! And how did you get in, anyway?” she added, imagining them flying in through the window on a magic carpet. But the window was shut.
    â€œWe walked up the stairs and opened the door,” Gustavus said wearily.
    â€œActually, I carried you because you were moaning so much. And he’s awfully heavy. Can I sit down?” Freddie made to sit on the end of her bed.
    â€œNO!” Rose pulled the bedclothes up to her chin in horror.
    â€œBut we need to talk to you, and I can’t stand up for much longer. There isn’t room. I’m practically sitting in your washstand at the moment. Your