By Any Other Name

I. Rose

1776

THE IMPERILLED LOVERS

OR, THE TRUE HISTORY OF PRINCE OLIVER AND CELIA THE NUN

R. BYRNE

Rose Byrne read the hand-scrawled letters again, unable to believe it.

After months of equally delightful and torturous writing and revision, she had finally finished her manuscript.

The tears that reached her eyes might have been attributed to great emotion, but Rose was not one to cry easily. Thus, she knew they could only be blamed as a sign of smoke wafting up from the level below her, which could only mean one thing.

The print shop was on fire again.

Rose bolted out of her chair, tying a scratchy flannel dressing robe over her thin muslin shift, and shoved her feet into slippers. She shoved the stack of papers securely into the pocket of her robe, knotted its belt, and raced down the stairs to assess the damage. The scent of smoke surrounded her, a haze of fog stinging her eyes. She stayed low to the ground as best as she could, covering her face with the her sleeve and trying to breathe.

"Father?" Rose called out, her voice muffled. "Father!"

"Over here." His voice was a muffled groan. The smoke cleared briefly and she saw him, his arm crushed beneath a beam.

Had he been drinking again?

Though Rose knew printing was a profession with long hours that often led printers to be drunks, she had hoped that her father's drinking habits weren't so bad as to endanger the life of his only daughter. Then again, she was likely hoping for too much.

"I'll go and fetch someone to help you out!" she cried; she knew she wouldn't be able to lift the beam by herself, and this fire looked worse than previous ones.

Running out onto the cobbled streets of London, she dodged a chamber pot being thrown out, keeping her sleeve over her face to block out the stench. "Help! There's been a fire at the print shop! Please help my father!"

The butcher—who also hung the sign of a surgeon, pulling teeth and committing all other sorts of nasty deeds for a few shillings—happened to be walking by. Rose seized him by the arm. "Ben! My father is trapped in the shop. Won't you help him?"

In his blood-spattered leather apron with his long hair tied back in a queue, paired with his broad shoulders and hulking stature, Benedict Chisholm was about as intimidating a man as one could expect from the streets of London. Well, as intimidating as a man who didn't commit crimes, pick pockets, or work as a highwayman. Fortunately for Rose, he was also her oldest friend, who had taken over his father's practice after the man had died a few years ago.

"Of course, Rose. I was just coming out to see what all the commotion was about. Stay out here, alright?" He pointed at a spot in the street that would be somewhat protected from both carriages going by and the emptying of chamber pots.

Benedict seemed to be in the shop for what felt like an age. Without a pocket watch, she could only tell time by the chiming of the bell towers. She listened closely for one, but in the middle of the day, she could only hear the clopping of horses' hooves, the gossip of neighbours as they chattered about the print shop without coming to her and her father's aid, and the shouting of newspaper boys as they delivered the latest news of executions at the Old Bailey.

Finally, the clock struck three in the afternoon just as Benedict exited, carrying her unconscious father in his arms, both of them smeared with soot and breathing with some difficulty. Ben panted, gesturing with his chin for her to go into the surgeon's quarters.

She obeyed, entering the cramped shop where various metal implements hanging on the walls made her queasy. Ben unceremoniously deposited her father on the table where he usually ate his meals. John Byrne's head lolled back. He gave a soft snore.

"Is his arm alright?" she asked Ben. "It seemed to be trapped under a fallen beam."

Benedict shook his head. "I thought so too. But fortunately, it was only a plank, which was far easier to lift. The larger challenge was convincing your father to leave the shop."

"The press... He loves that old printing press," she said. "But did he have to risk his life for it?"

She stared down at her father's ash-covered face; she had loved and hated him in equal measure, but she could not stand to see him die.

"The shop is everything to him, isn't it?" Benedict said, carrying over a basin of water and a washcloth.

Rose immediately leaped into action, braiding back her reddish-brown curls into a plait before she began washing the soot off of her father's face. She held up a mug of tea and pressed it to his lips for him to drink.

Although her hands were kept busy, her mind was fixed on the fire roaring in the print shop behind them. Only moments ago, she had been impassioned with fire for the writing of her manuscript. Now, her father's entire livelihood was on fire.

***

"Your father will be just fine, Miss Byrne," said the doctor. "However, he will require a few months to recover from his injuries, though the worst of them were caused by his insistence on not leaving the print shop and staying to inhale the smoke. It appears, however, as though his shop has not been as fortunate."

"No..." She brushed aside the curtain at the window of the butcher's shop, seeing the charred remains of what had once been her home. A tear might have slid down her face, but she ought to have expected it. Printing was a risky business, and one with long hours. It demanded far more than her father ever should have given it. "I suppose it has not."

"Miss Byrne?" The doctor asked. "Are you all right?"

"Where will we live?"