Ravensclaw by Maggie MacKeever Page A

Michael’s highly polished boots. “And that is a cat.”
    Michael hastily moved his foot away. Machka followed, a hunter stalking prey. “I dislike felines,” he said. “Shoo. Go away.”
    Emily snatched up the cat and sank down in a chair. Machka hissed. “Stop that or I’ll pull your tail. Pray be seated, Michael.”
    Lady Alberta gestured toward her magazine. “Are you familiar with Mr. Polidori’s The Vampyre, Mr. Ross? ‘... his dead eyes sparkled with more fire than that of the cat whilst dallying with the half-dead mouse ...’ ”
    “I’ve no taste for popular fiction.” Michael deposited his hat and gloves on a nearby table and arranged himself elegantly on an upholstered chair.
     Zizi arrived with the tea tray. Lady Alberta put down her magazine. “Ah, black buns! I am especially fond of black buns.” She picked up the plumpest, sweetest specimen and popped it in her mouth. Drogo edged closer to her chair.
    Michael’s vraja— or one remarkably like it — dangled from his watch fob, Emily noted, and a sprig of hawthorn adorned his lapel. Hawthorn was useful in repelling the nonliving, according to the literature, which had thus far been proved wrong more often than right.
    He was fidgeting about as if he expected Ravensclaw to pop out of the teapot and bite him in the neck. Emily murmured, “Compose yourself, Michael. The devil’s spawn is out cavorting with his fellow fiends from hell. You’ve nothing to fear.”
    “You should not jest about such matters!” Michael drew in a deep breath. “Is there somewhere we may be private? I must speak with you.”
    Emily hadn’t the least desire to be private with Michael. Unlike Ravensclaw. “You needn’t mind Aunt Bertie, she’s deaf as a post. What is it you want to talk about?”
    Michael glanced dubiously at Lady Alberta, who had polished off her black bun and returned to her magazine. “I apologize for my behavior yestere’en. If I seemed a trifle high-handed, it is because I have your best interests at heart. Toward that end, I have made arrangements for your return home. I will join you there as soon as my business here is done.”
    And what about her business? Michael really did flatter himself that she would let him lead her around by the nose. “You may un-make your arrangements. I am perfectly comfortable where I am.”
    “What you are,” hissed Michael, “is all about in the head. Someone must look after your concerns and Lady Alberta is clearly not up to the task. I see nothing for it but that you leave Society matters in my hands.”
    Emily saw a number of things. Michael’s concern for her well-being was not among them. She watched Machka leap onto the table, settle down near his hat. “What you mean is that you consider me incapable of bearing responsibility for the Society.”
    Michael leaned closer. “You know bloody well you aren’t. And then there is the matter of offspring.”
    “Offspring?”
    “Children to carry on the Dinwiddie name. It was the Professor’s dearest wish.”
    Emily tried, and failed, to imagine Michael touching her the way Ravensclaw had touched her in her dreams — and hadn’t what he’d done to her bosom been interesting? Emily had not realized that bosoms could be the source of such intense sensations. She was curious to find out what else she didn’t know.
    But she didn’t care to learn from Michael. And if Michael told her once more what her papa had wanted, she would box his ears. “Aunt Bertie! Did my papa ever tell you that his fondest wish was for me to bear offspring?”
    Lady Alberta marked her place in her magazine with her fingertip. “Why no, I don’t believe he did. Although perhaps he wouldn’t have,because he knew that I was unable to bear offspring myself. Such a tragedy, I felt at the time. Although I have since changed my mind. Children are so unpredictable. You never know how they’ll turn out. Why, I have a friend…”
    “Why would he tell her anything?”