Chapter 9

CHAPTER 9

A melia knew that her declaration had shocked Max, but perhaps that was what he needed—someone to knock him out of the rut he had fallen into of always waiting for the worst to happen.

She did sympathize with him. His life was worth more than a curse that had not even been his fault.

But it was up to him to break it and find a way to make atonement for his family’s sins.

For, as he said, there was no one else left to do it.

Amelia would do what she could to understand Isolde and her curse, but she knew she couldn’t do it alone. They needed help.

Help she sensed Max could acquire if he would give in to the powers that were begging to be released, but he was still far too stubborn.

In time.

In the meantime, over the next few days she mixed the remainder of her paints as she awaited new arrivals.

This time, her list had included plenty of extra so that she would be in no danger of running out were she to need them to go on the offensive again.

She rather hoped that Isolde would cooperate.

Amelia did, however, have another painting she needed to work on before setting to work with Isolde.

Max was clearly hurting.

He needed his spirits cheered – and she knew just how to do it.

Closing her eyes and casting her mind over the acres of land and what she knew of the grounds, Amelia tried to decide where he would find the most joy.

Perhaps it was outside because of his choice of manual work, but where?

Finally, it came to her, and she closed her eyes and began to paint.

A few hours later, she had just set down her paintbrush when Max’s broad shoulders filled the doorway of the music room. He pretended that his visits were conducted out of interest in her work, but Amelia was well aware that he was checking on her – and perhaps on Isolde.

Instead of being annoyed, however, it was actually rather comforting to have his visit to anticipate.

“How is progress today?” he asked in clipped tones, and she smiled to ease his discomfort from opening himself up with such vulnerability the previous evening.

“Slow, but we are getting somewhere,” she said. “The colors are nearly perfect. I do wish I knew a little more about Isolde herself, but I do not think that I am going to solve that problem today.”

“No, I gather not, although I feel as though we probably know too much already,” he said, leaning against the door frame, watching her. “Were you painting yourself?”

“I was,” she said, suddenly concerned about what he might think of her artwork. She stood up, stepped back, and waved a hand toward the canvas.

“For you,” she said.

“What is for me?”

“This painting.”

“Is this part of a nefarious plan to convince me to give you all of my riches? Because I can assure you there are nearly none left.”

“No,” she laughed at his look of trepidation. “This painting isn’t for anything. It is just for you to enjoy. If I had wanted to steal from you, I would have done so already.”

“How reassuring,” he said dryly, coming to stand beside her, likely so that he could better examine the painting.

“What do you think?” she asked, putting slight pressure on the small of his back and urging him forward.

“I think…” he began before stopping and pausing for a moment, truly taking in what was in front of him. Eventually he turned to her, his eyes wide. “I think that it is beautiful.”

“Truly?” she said, her heart beating faster.

“Truly,” he agreed, stepping forward and stopping right in front of it now. His breath caught slightly. “It feels….” His voice lowered to a whisper. “Joyful. How I remember my childhood, from before I lost my parents.”

She could have sworn he was choking back tears, not that he would ever actually allow them to fall.

“It’s my family,” he finished with a sense of completeness.

She nodded. “I hoped the likeness would be close enough. It’s the three of you, sitting on a blanket in the grass. Of course, I do not know what your parents looked like, so I decided I would use silhouettes instead.”

“How did you know which backdrop to include?”

“It’s part of the landscape beyond what I would assume to be your bedroom window. It looks over the grounds, which presumably were well maintained at the time, a place where a mother would endeavor to take her child.”

She could see the joy flowing out of him, both practically and spiritually. It was exactly what she had wanted – to add a touch of happiness to what had become a rather depressing life.

“Take it,” she said softly, sensing that he didn’t want to be vulnerable with her once more and open himself up to his emotions. She leaned forward, waving her hand in front of it, using her powers to dry the paint to the canvas, before she unfastened the clippings, and passed him the unfurled canvas. “Do with it what you will. It’s a gift.”

“You are the one with the gift.”

She ran her hand along his face, surprised at how comfortable it felt to do so.

“Thank you,” she said. “You have one too. Don’t be afraid to use it.”

And with that, she released him and he slowly backed out of the room, canvas in his hands.

Max paced back and forth down the drawing room floor, wondering if he was wearing holes into it.

He couldn’t stop looking at the painting Amelia had created for him. Why had she done it?

He was mustering up the courage to ask her when a yell sounded in the direction of the library, and he took off as quickly as he could to find the source.

He was unsurprised to find Amelia standing before the door of the music room. It was the wall of fire that took him off guard.

Instead of a doorway between Amelia and the music room, flames licked the wall. While they didn’t seem to be burning any material, heat emanated from them, and he had to stifle the urge to reach out and grab Amelia to pull her back to safety.

“Isolde,” she said calmly, hands held up in front of her. “I am only trying to enter for my paints. That is all.”

“Amelia, back away from that thing!” he shouted, and she looked back in surprise.

“It is only Isolde,” she said with a sigh and a roll of her eyes as she placed her hands on her hips as though she was chastising a child. “She is trying to prevent me from entering.”

“Why?” he asked, wondering why he was even entertaining this mad conversation between Isolde and Amelia, but knowing he had no choice now.

“She thinks I am a danger to her portrait. I promise you, Isolde, I am not.”

You want my secrets and my curse.

“I do not. I want to help you.”

Max blinked. He had heard Isolde many times before, but he never realized that Amelia could actually talk to her as well.

Odd.

“Amelia. Back. Away,” he said through clenched teeth. “I will find servants and we will?—”

“You will do nothing,” she said firmly. “That will only scare her.”

“I am not going to stand here and watch a wall of flame attack you.”

“She won’t attack me.”

A lick of fire burst out and shot right by Amelia.

“She’s just trying to scare me,” Amelia reasoned, and Max sighed. If Amelia wasn’t going to see reason, then he would have to show it to her.

“Amelia—”

Before he could make it all the way to her, however, Isolde began casting even more fiery bursts Amelia’s way. They both dove to the floor to escape them, Max throwing his body over Amelia’s.

As her soft body huddled beneath him, a strange sensation of coolness poured over him, beginning from his back and growing out from around him. When he finally risked a look above him, he was shocked by what he saw.

He and Amelia seemed to be hiding within a watery bubble, one that he hoped wouldn’t pop until this fire was finished, for it seemed to be rejecting Isolde’s flames.

“What did you do?” he called out to Amelia, but she wrinkled her nose from her position beneath him.

“ I didn’t do anything,” she said. “ You did!”

“This looks like it is protecting us.”

“That’s because it is.” Her green eyes shone toward him, giving him far more credit than he deserved. “You created a protection spell. A ward – using the elements. It seems that water will bend to your will as well.”

“How?”

“When you threw yourself over me, you were thinking of protecting me. It must have triggered it,” she said before her expression softened. “Thank you.”

“Thank me , after everything you have done for me so far?”

“Woefully nothing as of yet, I’m afraid.”

“As lovely as this is, do you suppose it is time we concern ourselves with this massive fireball in front of us?”

“Most likely,” she said, her eyes calculating. “We have two options.”

“I’m listening.”

“First, we paint our way out of it – except that my paints are beyond the fire, which I’m sure Isolde well knows. Or… you battle it.”

“Alone?”

“I’m here,” she said. “I’ll help you as I did before and infuse you with as much of my power as I possibly can. That worked before.”

Determined, Max nodded, the weight of the responsibility to, most importantly, see Amelia through this safely, resting on his shoulders.

He wasn’t sure he believed that he had the power to take on an angry spirit, but Amelia’s belief would have to be enough to buoy him forward.

She fit her much smaller hand into his larger one, squeezing it to urge him on. Using his other hand to lift her up with him, they rose within their protective bubble, Max with newfound resolve.

She’s right. You can do this if you actually believe in yourself, although that would be a first.

Max was about to tell the voice where it could shove itself but, remembering Amelia’s words, took a breath and decided that perhaps he just might ask it a question instead.

What am I supposed to do?

Solve the problem. Connect with the fire. Use your power to speak to it, not to control it.

Max nodded and steeled himself in front of the wall of flame as energy coursed through him, emanating from their joined hands. From Amelia.

Drawing strength from her magical abilities, power surged within him, and Max stood undaunted as he faced the crackling flames roaring higher than any fire he had ever seen.

Closing his eyes, he reached deep within himself, searching for any hidden reservoir of strength.

With a steady hand and a focused mind, Max used that same mental pathway he spoke to the voices in his head with and began to search for the fire, as ridiculous at that felt.

Wisps of magic danced around his fingertips as he crafted a counterbalance to Isolde's fiery onslaught.

Embers , he thought, picturing the fire fading to nothing, and when he opened his eyes he was shocked to find that while the fire had not yet retreated, a swirling vortex of water and light was beginning to form in front of him.

“The fire is Isolde’s,” Amelia’s voice called out. “You cannot affect it – unless it is through your own elements. You are on the right path.”

He nodded, reaching out and using a hand to move the vortex closer to the fiery wall until it was right before it.

The fire seemed to hesitate, as though it was unsure of what to expect – and then Max sent the water crashing through it.

His heart stopped for a moment as he waited to see the result of his actions. The water clashed against the flames, creating a steamy barrier that hissed and crackled with energy. Max held his breath, fearing that he had only further angered Isolde.

But to his surprise, the wall of fire began to sizzle and shrink back, as if recoiling from the onslaught of water. The room filled with a hissing sound, and slowly but surely, the flames diminished until they were nothing but flickering embers on the floor – just as he had pictured.

Max watched in awe as the last remnants of fire faded away, leaving behind only a faint wisp of smoke in the air. He turned to look at Amelia, who was gazing at him with a mixture of relief and admiration in her eyes.

"You did it," she whispered, her voice tinged with awe.

Triumph and relief washed over Max in equal measures. He had never felt such a rush of power before and knowing that he had protected Amelia filled him with a sense of accomplishment unlike anything he had experienced.

They had been connected from the very beginning, yes, but their joined effort to overcome Isolde strengthened their bond to one that he couldn’t quite put into words.

As they stood amidst the dissipating mist of the extinguished flames, Max couldn't help but feel a newfound respect for Amelia's abilities—and a fair bit of jealousy at her belief in herself and what she could accomplish.

Amelia stepped closer to him, her hand still clasped in his, a smile playing on her lips. "I knew you had it in you, Max,” she said softly, her eyes searching his. “I think you are more powerful than you even realize.”

Max was at a loss for words, his mind racing with the events that had just unfolded. He could harness his own elemental power to protect other people? Unbelievable.

Until tonight, he would have said it was impossible.

"We make quite the team, don't we?" Amelia said softly, her gaze meeting his with a warmth that sent a shiver down his spine.

"We do," Max replied, only right now he didn’t care about spells or curses or even the fact that Isolde’s portrait was sitting there on the other side of what had been, moments ago, a wall of fire.

He didn’t care that he was an earl on the brink of ruin due to a curse that was entirely based on a love affair between two people from very different stations.

All he cared about were Amelia’s very plump, very pink lips.

Lips that were currently caught between her teeth, setting his every nerve on edge.

Kiss her.

He wanted to tell the voice to shut up.

But for once, it had a very good idea.