The Leopard Prince (Princes #2)(55)
Author: Elizabeth Hoyt

Her sister stared off into space, worrying her lower lip with her teeth. “Mistress Pollard was killed the day before I left?”

“Well, no,” Violet said. “Actually, they’re saying it might’ve been three nights before.”

George suddenly focused on her.

Violet hurried on. “She was seen alive in West Dikey four nights before you left—some people at a tavern saw her—but the farmer swears she wasn’t there the morning after she’d been seen in West Dikey. He distinctly remembers moving his sheep to that pasture the next morning. It was several days before he went back again to the pasture where she was found. And they think, by the condition of the body, because of the… uh”—she wrinkled her nose in disgust—“the deterioration, that it had been on the heath more than three nights. Ugh!” She shuddered.

The tea was brought in, and Violet looked at it queasily. Cook had seen fit to include some cream cakes oozing a pink filling, which under the circumstances were quite disgusting.

George ignored the tea. “Violet, this is very important. You are sure it was three nights before the morning I left that she is thought to have been killed?”

“Mmm.” Violet swallowed and dragged her eyes from the ghastly cream cakes. “Yes, I’m sure.”

“Thank the Lord.” George closed her eyes.

“Georgie, I know you care for him, but you can’t.” Oscar’s voice held a warning. “You simply can’t.”

“His life is at stake.” George leaned toward her brother as if she could infuse him with her passion. “What sort of a woman would I be if I ignored that?”

“What?” Violet looked from one to the other. “I don’t understand.”

“It’s quite simple.” George finally seemed to notice the steaming teapot and reached to pour. “Harry couldn’t have killed Mistress Pollard on that night.” She handed a cup to Violet and met her eyes. “He spent it with me.”

HARRY WAS DREAMING.

In the dream there was an argument going on between an ugly ogre, a young king, and a beautiful princess. The ugly ogre and the young king looked more or less as they should, considering it was a dream. But the princess didn’t have ruby lips or raven black hair. She had ginger hair and Lady Georgina’s lips. Which was just as well. It was his dream after all, and he had a right to make his princess look like anyone he wanted. In his opinion, springy ginger hair was far more beautiful than smooth raven locks any day of the week.

The young king was nattering on about the law and evidence and such in an upper-crust accent so refined it made your teeth ache. Harry could quite understand why the ogre was bellowing in reply, trying to drown out the young king’s monologue. He’d bellow at the blighter if he could. The young king seemed to want the ogre’s tin stag. Harry suppressed a laugh. He wished he could tell the young king that the tin stag wasn’t worth anything. The stag had long ago lost the better part of its rack and stood on only three legs. And besides, the animal wasn’t magic. It couldn’t talk and never had.

But the young king was stubborn. He wanted the stag, and he was going to have the stag, by God. To that end, he was badgering the ogre in that overbearing way the aristocracy had, as if everyone else was put on this earth merely for the joy of licking his lordship’s boots clean. Thank you, m’lord. It’s been a pleasure, it really has.

Harry would have sided with the ogre, just on principle, but something was wrong. Princess Georgina seemed to be weeping. Great drops of liquid rolled down her translucent cheeks and slowly turned to gold as they fell. They tinkled as they hit the stone floor and rolled away.

Harry was mesmerized; he couldn’t take his eyes away from her sorrow. He wanted to yell at the young king, Here is your magic! Look to the lady beside you. But, of course, he couldn’t speak. And it turned out he was wrong: It was actually the princess, not the young king, who wanted the tin stag. The young king was merely acting as the princess’s agent. Well, here was an entirely different matter. If Princess Georgina desired the stag, she should have it, even if it was a ratty old thing.

But the ugly ogre loved the tin stag; it was his most precious possession. To prove it, he threw the stag down and stamped on it until the stag groaned and broke into pieces. The ogre stared at it, lying there at his feet, bleeding lead, and smiled. He looked into the princess’s eyes and pointed. There, take it. I’ve killed it, anyway.

Then a wondrous thing happened.

Princess Georgina knelt beside the shattered stag and wept, and as she did, her golden tears fell upon the beast. Where they lay, they formed a bond, soldering together the tin until the stag was whole again, made of both tin and gold. The princess smiled and held the strange animal to her breast, and there the stag nuzzled his head. She lifted him up, and she and the young king turned with their dubious prize.

But Harry could see over her shoulder that the ogre did not like this outcome. All the love he’d borne the tin stag had now turned to hatred of the princess who had stolen it away. He wanted to shout to the young king, Be careful! Watch the princess’s back! The ogre means her harm and will not rest until he has his revenge! But however much he tried, he could not speak.

You never can in dreams.

GEORGE CRADLED HARRY’S HEAD in her lap and tried not to sob at the terrible marks on his face. His lips and eyes were swollen black. Fresh blood was smeared from a cut across an eyebrow and another beneath an ear. His hair was stringy and dirty, and she very much feared that part of the dirt was actually dried blood.

“The sooner we’re out of here, the better,” Oscar muttered. He slammed the carriage door behind him.

“Indeed.” Tony rapped sharply on the ceiling, signaling the driver.

The carriage pulled away from Granville House. George didn’t need to look back to know that its owner stared malevolently after them. She braced her body to cushion the bumps from Harry as he lay on the seat beside her.

Oscar studied him. “I’ve never seen a man beaten so badly,” he whispered. The words and live hung in the air unspoken.

“Animals.” Tony looked away.

“He’ll live,” George said.

“Lord Granville didn’t think so; otherwise he’d never have let us take him. As it was, I rather had to throw my title around.” Tony’s lips pressed together. “You need to prepare yourself.”

“How?” George almost smiled. “How do I prepare myself for his death? I can’t, so I won’t. I’ll believe in his recovery instead.”