The Might of Evil Dreams (A Novel of the Elemental Chronicles)

Twelve - A United Front

Emmeline

Tom kept his word. Johnny's mother came around noon on Christmas Day, four children all dressed in ragged clothes trailing after her. The eldest child, a dark-eyed girl with wild curls and an already dour expression carried a baby on her hip. But she couldn't have been older than ten or eleven.

Tom and I stood in the entrance hall to receive them. Lucian showed them in, and the children all looked round them in wonder, their eyes big as saucers.

"Bella, it was good of you to come." Tom stepped forward, grasping her shaking arms.

"Johnny..." she said faintly. "Where is he?"

"Here," I said, motioning him forward from where he was hovering, just behind me. Gently I guided him towards her with a hand on his shoulder. It shook under my touch.

Her eyes darted to my hand. That made her reach for him and pull him away, eyes narrowing at me.

"Get your filthy fingers off my son, you trollop."

"Bella!" Tom exclaimed, his face blanching. "That is my wife you're speaking to!"

"I'm sorry," I said. "I didn't think I was..."

"When you said you got married, Tom, I din't think it were someone like her." She spat the last word at me, like an insult, before rounding on Tom.

"'Like her?'" Tom seemed both confused and offended. "Whatever do you mean?"

"I 'eard the rumours," Bella said viciously. "Shelterin' some girl. Probably married 'er to escape suspicion, din't you?"

"Bella, this is not the time..." Tom cast a desperate apologetic glance at me. "Come into the drawing room. There's something important we must discuss."

"Is she coming?" Bella's dark eyes narrowed at me, even as Tom restrained her. If he had not been holding her, I was sure she would have lunged for me.

"No. Come on, Bella." Tom dragged her towards the drawing room, the children following silently. When the door finally shut behind them, I let out a heavy sigh, rubbing at my temple where a pulse was beginning to tap. I was the source of many rumours, almost too many. There had to be a way to get my memories back. It was the only way either of us would get any rest.

||

Tom and I did not get much of a chance to talk about it as the day progressed. He sent Bella and the children back to the village, promising he would go to the Dunbar estate as soon as possible. Then we changed, starting early before our guests arrived. Lord Radford and Lady Violet would be attending, and because of obligation or some other thing, Lord and Lady Eden. Tom did not like them and neither did I, but he told me they would see it as a slight if they learned they were passed over. And since their son-in-law was also one of Tom's closest friends, it would not do to draw that kind of attention as well. Or so Tom said.

"Since when have you cared what society thinks?" I asked him as Peggy laced up my corset as tight as it would go with the baby in the way.

"It's not society, exactly," he said from the adjoining room. "But Ray was as much a brother to me as my real brother, and where family is concerned, I thought it only right."

"I see." My thoughts wandered to Bella again, the way her expression had twisted into something ugly, and her words.

Get your filthy fingers off my son, you trollop.

"I must apologise for Bella's behaviour earlier," he said, poking his head in as I was being laced into my dress. "I had no idea she felt so strongly about this."