Emily Wilde's Encyclopaedia of Faeries (Emily Wilde, #1)(16)
He motioned to the students and then swept up the stairs and past me into the cottage. The students bent to collect a large quantity of luggage—several bags each, and a trunk. They too tromped into the cottage.
“Oh, God,” I said to no one in particular. And I had thought I had been at my wit’s end with the sheep.
“This place looks as if it’s being tenanted by raccoons,” Bambleby noted, looking about him. His graceful Irish brogue formed a bizarre contrast with the recent din, which still rang in my ears. “And why isn’t the fire lit? Enjoy the cold, do we, Em?”
Now, I have never once suggested he call me Em, and am in fact accustomed to greeting the sobriquet with a stony glare. “The fire isn’t lit because I am nearly out of firewood,” I said. I settled myself in the chair in an attempt to collect my scattered wits. “Perhaps you’d care to rectify that?”
He frowned at the fireplace. He was such a picture in his splendid blacks (collar upturned), framed against the dusty dishabille of the cottage, that I had to laugh; it was as probable a sight as a prince in a cowshed. I know Bambleby has been in the field, and I suspect he was somewhere else entirely before that, but I only know him set against his oak-panelled Cambridge office, the warm cathedral of the library, the manicured leafiness of the university grounds with their stone fountains and statuary.
“Henry will take care of all that—won’t you, dear?” Bambleby said. The faintest alarm had come upon his face at my suggestion—either he hadn’t any idea of how a fire came to be or he was in terror of dirtying his sleeves.
The hapless Henry, who had the sharp-edged proportions of a man not a day over twenty, nodded eagerly and set to prodding the sullen wet logs with one of the candlesticks. Now, I was no enemy of poor Henry’s and should not have been amused by his ineptitude, but I will admit that I watched this performance for several minutes without comment. Wendell drifted off down the hall with his unnamed and equally hapless admirer, clearly viewing his duty as complete.
“There are only two additional bedrooms,” he informed Henry upon his return. “I shall give you two the larger of them. See to all that later,” he instructed Lady Hapless, who had begun to lift the trunk again. “We must first make this place liveable. Emily, I must warn you away from your own bedroom temporarily. If you hadn’t already noticed, the sheep have been in there too, and they’ve given it rather a smell. Em?”
He seemed to look at me properly. “What have you done to yourself? Is this some sort of camouflage, to fool the Folk into thinking you’re one of the flock? Oh, don’t look at me like that, you’re the one who turned our cottage into a byre.”
“Our cottage!”
He ignored me. Tsking over the empty cauldron, he said, “Henry, let’s collect water. I noticed a stream out back. Lizzie, perhaps we could gather up the rubbish?”
In the space of a few minutes, Henry had water bubbling over the fire (started with pages of my ruined books), and I had a cup of tea in my hand. The two of them were sweeping and scrubbing up the mess while Wendell leaned back in the other armchair he had dragged over to the fire, offering occasional directives phrased as suggestions. I had changed clothes and done what I could to wash off in the stream out back, which wasn’t much, if I’m being honest. I could still feel the mud clumping in my hair.
“This is quite good,” Bambleby said, helping himself to another piece of toast. It was the faerie’s bread, warmed over the fire. He looked perfectly comfortable slouched in his chair in that gracefully boneless way of his, clad in a fresh cardigan. “You say the creature is a brownie?”
“Yes—tree. Though he also seems to act as a guardian of the spring, which is unusual.” I do not like to admit it, but I was in better spirits, and this was not only due to the tea. Unwelcome as his presence was, Bambleby was a piece of Cambridge, and I felt more myself with him there.
Bambleby stretched, interlacing his hands behind his head. “Dunne noted a similar phenomenon among the Finnish keiju. What did she call it? Elemental decoupling?”
I snorted. “Dunne invents theories to hide her shoddy methodology. You cannot generalize about such things with her sample sizes.”
Bambleby murmured assent. I realized that he was smiling at me sleepily. Lizzie would have been beside herself with blushes at that smile, but I was too used to him. I simply gazed levelly back, waiting for him to explain this latest outrageousness.
“I missed you, Em,” he said. “It was strange not having you across the hall, scowling at me.”
“I wonder at your ability to detect my scowls through the wall. Are your senses heightened in other ways?”
I was needling him. I do this sometimes. I believe Bambleby knows my suspicions about him.
“You alone have the talent of scowling loudly. I’ve often wondered how you manage it.” He turned to Henry. “Summon our host, would you? I’ve a mind to have a hot meal before I retire. And do ask after the possibility of dessert. Nothing elaborate—an apple tart or bread pudding will suit. God in Heaven, but I am tired of fish stew and sailor’s bread.”
I could not imagine such a message eliciting a favourable response from Krystjan Egilson, so naturally I said nothing. Bambleby leaned forward and took my hand. “I suppose you’ve guessed why I’m here. Let me assure you, it’s not what you think.”