Miss Morgan and the Gypsy

Five: Prikaza: Nothing is an Accident

*

Nicu was surprisingly exhausted by the time his limbs reached the entrance to Marshwood Castle. Before he could even figure out how to knock, Esma had ripped open the door with a fuming butler shaking his head in dismay at her antics.

"Phal, I was so worried." Esma went to fling herself on him but stopped abruptly when she saw him carrying a sleeping woman and young girl over his shoulder. "Come get inside. The fall nights are cold."

Nicu made his way through the luxurious entrance and the butler brought him to a dark sitting room. He placed Harriet down on a settee and she didn't even flinch from her sleep. Nicu had been annoyed at her for falling asleep instead of answering more of his questions, but he had to remember the young woman had gone through a lot. But he knew there was something about her that caused the hairs on his neck to rise when she touched him. She was hiding something, and Nico was never wrong about his intuition. The way his bones twisted and vibrated always told him there were secrets to be told, truth to be sought. Esma came behind him to try to take the child from his shoulder.

"No, Phen, she is no longer with the living."

Esma's endlessly dark exotic eyes filled with sorrow. "How?"

"She was ill, died while they were traveling. How are the others?"

Esma shook her head in disbelief. "They were starved, rail thin and tired. Even their spirits were dehydrated. These poor things. They were so weary but refused to sleep, saying they needed to be with their teacher Miss Morgan. I had told them all their teachers had perished but they insisted that one lived and helped them escape."

"They were right," Nicu answered. His gaze fell on Harriet's unmoving form clad in darkness, except for the quiet moon's glow that peeked through the dark clouds every so often and touched her delicate form. "I found her right before some men were about to have their way with her."

"What are we to do with this innocent one?" Esma asked. "She can't be more than thirteen."

Nicu shifted Gracie in his arms. "How long until Scotland Yard is here?"

"They should be here any minute."

At the same moment, a loud knock echoed and Nicu told Esma to stay while he handled the constables. He took Gracie with him and gave her over to the officers and informed them that he would be taking the case.

Derek Holland, the one constable that didn't seem to mind Nicu's heritage or eccentricity, explained to Nicu that they had found the caravans, but they were emptied. They had followed tracks to the Thames River where any signs of the girls or their captors were washed away.

Nicu bid the men goodbye and went to the sitting room. When he entered the place was lit and Esma was sitting in the settee he had laid Harriet in, who was now gone.

"Mr. Hughes took her to a guest room and she's sound asleep. The poor thing."

Nicu couldn't help but note how his sister had grown even more exotically beautiful. One would think leading a life of an aristocrat's wife in a sheltered box would've tamed her, but it strangely appeared to have made her heritage shine through more.

Her thick raven hair was uncombed and worn down as it had been prior to her marriage when she lived with Nicu. Typically, Roma women once married braided their hair or tied it up, but Esma always loved wearing hers down. She would always claim it needed to breathe just as much as she did.