rix_scaedu

I wrote this piece in response to ellenmillion's prompt (or possibly prompts) "I love friends-to-lovers. Something with a printing press. Magical hats." As it came in at just over 9,000 words. I have broken it in to 3 parts. This is the second part. The first is here, and the third is here. I hope that you all enjoy them. This part runs for 3, 067 words.

Marisa returned to the newspaper office twice that day, turned down a vast number of straw hats, and made three more referrals to Arcanum's. Arcanum's sent around a clerk to find out what was going on because they were curious about the new source of business. Mr Carden was a precisely dressed man whose clothing featured an antique dragon suede waistcoat - an item he had either inherited or found in an expensive second-hand clothes store. His subdued but fashionable bespoke suit sported the membership pin of one of the more sober magical brotherhoods, and Artemius mentally placed him in Arcanum's hierarchy as a coming man. Mr Carden also introduced himself to Marisa as a friend of several of her Tormald cousins and proceeded to mildly flirt with her. Artemius surprised himself by bristling territorially at the man, and then hoped that it hadn't shown.

After he'd closed the office up that night, Artemius went home and reflected quietly on the matter. It hadn't occurred to him before that he might be jealous of anyone, but apparently he could be. And over Marisa Tormald. Interesting.

After dinner, while they sat in the parlor knitting and crocheting, Marisa asked her mother, "Did you ever find that you were seeing someone you'd known for years in a different light?" When her mother looked up quizzically from the book she was reading while she knitted, Marisa clarified, "An unexpectedly potentially romantic one."

Her mother considered. "I can't say that I have. Your father and I were introduced by aunts who knew each other. There have been several interested men since he died, but their approaches have been practical rather than romantic - at first, they generally wanted a housekeeper or needed someone to look after their children, but more recently they've been more interested that we have a nice little business that brings in a decent income." She added, "Is this potentially romantic interest anyone I know?"

"Do you remember Artemius Inkman from when I was in school?"

Mrs Guiliana Tormald continued knitting as she replied. "Nice boy. Followed his parents into printing and newspapers, didn't he? Unless he's changed a lot, I'd have no objections if the two of you were to make a go of it. I don't see that the extended family would have any issues either - from what I've seen and heard he has a good business with the newspaper and the print shop, and printing and writing for mass consumption are practically magic adjacent skills."

"I don't know that he thinks the same about me," clarified Marisa. "Besides I'm not sure that my feelings at the moment are anything more than noticing that he's a reasonably attractive adult male."

"But you have noticed," replied her mother, "and you need to keep seeing him at the moment because of the advertisement about the hat. You have some time to work out how you do feel."

The next morning when Marisa arrived at the newspaper office and disabused the waiting crowd of the notion that any of the hats they were presenting for her inspection were the missing hat, a man remained after the hat bearers had dispersed. His clothing, although relatively new, was in an old-fashioned style that fairly screamed to her that he was a servant from a magical household. It was Artemius who spoke to him first, it being his office.

"Good morning, sir. How can I help you?" Artemius merely thought the man old-fashioned, not being au fait with the customs of magical households.

"I have come in response to the warning notice about the magical hat that was in yesterday's paper," explained the man. "I have reason to believe that the hat has come into the m- my employer's possession. I also believe that it is having an insidious effect upon him."

"That's quite possible," Marisa nodded as she spoke. "The person who enchanted the hat wasn't a particularly nice person. I assume you would like me to come and look at the hat as soon as possible to confirm that it is the one we are missing?"

"I would appreciate that, miss." The man bowed his head slightly, acknowledging her as being one of those who employed people like him. "My employer's property is near Seldon, on the ridge overlooking the bridge on the Great West Road."

Marisa hesitated, reviewing her knowledge of the magical families that lived in the area and their characters, then asked, "The orange brick house or the grey granite facade and corners? Will you be able to arrange my transport there and back?""

"The grey granite, miss, and yes, I will arrange your transport in both directions, miss. Might I have the honour of your name, miss? Also, will Mr Inkman be accompanying you?" He waited for their reply.

"I am Miss Marisa Tormald," she replied calmly. "If Mr Inkman is available, then I would appreciate his company on this trip. And you are, sir?"

"Forman, miss." The man bowed slightly. "Of the Seldon Formans, miss. I believe you may have recently employed my first cousin once removed's daughter as a maid of all work."

"You're a relative of Clara's?" Marisa beamed at him. "How wonderful. We are very happy with her, you know."

"We strive to give satisfaction, miss. I will pass on your kind words to her mother. Needless to say, the family is happy to see her in a good position." The man seemed slightly warmer in his attitude towards Marisa while he made arrangements to return with a carriage to transport the three of them to his place of work.

As Marisa wrote a note to her mother to tell her what was going on she said to Artemius, "Thank you for coming with me. I know of and about the Wishmoulds, but I don't know them. I think I met the late head of the family at a wedding when I was ten or so, but I've never met the heir, and he's the one who lives in that house now."

"Do you believe Mr Forman?" Artemius was considering whether he should make more arrangements for the trip than telling the office boy and the head printer where he was going and making sure that he had enough money tucked away in his wallet and pockets to pay for a room for the night and transport back to Gullhaven.

"I'm sure that there's something relevant that he knows that he's not telling us because that would violate his employer's confidence," replied Marisa. "Something like how the hat came into the man's possession. Mr Forman seems to be very old fashioned - you probably noticed that he almost did call his employer "the master". I think that the only reason he came here today is because he thinks that his employer is in real trouble with the hat."

"He couldn't have been sent to inveigle the hat's owner into his employer's clutches?" Reporting from the Assizes had broadened Artemius' experience of plain human villainy.

"He might have," said Marisa thoughtfully, "except that he's a Wishmould. They tend to be good people, because that's what they're raised to be. I'd be much more worried if we were talking about a Pemlow." She flashed a smile at him. "I'm still glad that you're coming with me."

When Mr Forman returned, he was in a landau that was being drawn a pair of horses that were matched in size and conformation but not colour. They were good horses that the hired driver kept to a steady pace that would allow him to drive the same pair back to Gullhaven later without having to change horses first, so the journey took them about an hour. Mr Forman opened the property's front gate to let the carriage in, and then locked it behind them.

Artemius looked perturbed but then Marisa leant over and whispered to him, "I wonder what animals they allow to roam the grounds. Pet dogs do you think, or something exotic like silver deer?"

He just had time to whisper back, "Maybe they are just trying to discourage hawkers and salesmen," before Mr Forman rejoined them in the carriage.

At Mr Forman's direction, the coachman drove them straight around to the stables where the horses could rest and be tended to before the three passengers climbed down from the carriage. With much apologising, he led them into the house through the kitchen where their appearance startled the cook and the kitchen maid. The housekeeper appeared from somewhere, and after a low-voiced consultation with her, Mr Forman led Marisa and Artemius through a green baize covered door and into their employer's part of the house.

The hallway that they had been led into was decorated in a style that Marisa thought of as 'late last century magical'. White walls, dark wood skirting boards and picture rails, a mirror framed in dark wood facing each door or doorway, original artworks hanging from the picture rail at irregular intervals between the doorways and the mirrors, a white ceiling with an ornamental cornice picked out with violet and gold, and a violet and gold runner over polished dark wood floorboards. The hallway led into the foyer, and Marisa realised that the mirror facing the front door was on the first landing of the main staircase leading up from the foyer to the upper levels of the house. Mr Forman did not linger in the foyer but led them through it and then down a hallway that paralleled the one they had entered the foyer from.

Mr Forman stopped when they reached the second door on the right. "This is my employer's study," he told them quietly. "The housekeeper informs me that he is inside. With the hat. She is also concerned for his wellbeing." He took a deep breath. "I will knock on the door and then announce you. You will have to take it from there."

"I think that I can do that." Marisa smiled at him reassuringly. "Shall we get on with this?"

"As you wish, Miss." Mr Forman took a few steps and then knocked on the door. At the sound of a voice from inside he opened the door, stepped inside and to one side, then said, "Miss Marisa Tormald and Mr Artemius Inkman to see you, sir."

Marisa sailed into the room as the man seated at the desk looked up and said irritably, "Don't be ridiculous, I can't see them now. I have to finish this assessment by the time Professor Waldren returns."

"I'm sorry to intrude," put in Marisa sweetly, "but we are here looking for a magical hat that was stolen from my home a few nights ago. It looks exactly like the one in front of you right now." She curtsied.

"That's not possible," replied the dark-haired man with silver at his temples. "This hat is one of the samples I have to identify in order to satisfy the requirements of my uncle's will and it was delivered to me yesterday by the executor. It can't be your missing hat."

"Sir, if it is the hat taken from my home, it has a ribbon sewn around the inside of the base of the crown. The ribbon is pink, and hand stamped with yellow birds. Perhaps you would be kind enough to look?" Marisa straightened her back and looked at the man behind the desk as if she were channelling every dowager in her lineage. Artemius thought she looked magnificent.

The man at the desk carefully turned over the hat and looked inside. Artemius thought he winced as he did so.

"Pink ribbon with yellow birds on it." He looked at Marisa. "What do you know about this hat, young lady?"

"What I am going to tell you," replied Marisa, "is that my mother inherited it from her grandmother who, in her turn, had inherited it from her great-aunt who was its maker. The hat was stolen from our house the night before last by someone who used magic to stupefy the household. My mother wants the hat back."

"Then she can come and get me back herself." The only place that voice could have come from was the hat. "I'm having too much fun with young Wishmould here to leave otherwise." It chuckled.

The man at the desk picked up a pen and made a note in the journal on the desk. "Verbal and a personality fragment," he said out loud as he wrote.

"I am not a fragment," snapped back the hat, rustling its flowers as it did so. "I am a fully rounded personality!"

"I'm sure that you are now," replied Mr Wishmould soothingly, "but it is likely that your creator began with a fragment of her own personality." He turned to Marisa, "Miss Tormald, is this hat normally this talkative?"

Marisa considered. "Only when she is trying to give us what she considers to be good advice. She likes to make sure that we are listening to her."

"She?" Mr Wishmould asked the question simply as a question.

"I am a lady, young man, not an it!" The hat flipped up in the air and swiped him with her brim.

Marisa said, "Ah. Mr Wishmould? Have you been feeding her? If not deliberately, perhaps accidentally? She's not usually so active."

Mr Wishmould gave the hat on his desk a hard look. "So, you're a predatory feeder, are you? Vampiric or ambient absorption?"

The hat visibly preened but said nothing.

"And the longer I stay here trying to figure you out, the longer you get to feed and the stronger you are." He shook himself, stood up and moved away from the table. "I think it's time to end this session. I will see you later, ma'am." He bowed to the hat, walked over to his guests, and ushered them out of the study and closed the door behind him. He turned to the manservant who was still standing there. "Forman, how long was I in there for?"

"Since late yesterday morning, sir. Mrs Halney and I became concerned, sir," replied Forman.

"And so you did your best to track down the owner of the hat. Well done," Mr Wishmould said.

"We advertised yesterday morning, that may have helped," pointed out Marisa.

"Indeed, miss," replied Mr Forman. "It cut down on the need for enquiries considerably."

Mr Wishmould gave his head another shake. "I must remember to add mesmeric abilities to my notes," he said. "And maybe befuddlement. If the hat was stolen from you the night before last, then it can't have been one of the items my uncle left for his executor to test me with so I can claim my full inheritance. What is the man playing at?"

"Something dodgy," offered up Artemius. "If you can't claim your full inheritance, what happens to it?"
"I'm not sure," Mr Wishmould confessed. "The trustees won't tell me, and I have asked. By the way," he turned to Marisa, "what does the hat do?"

"We don't know. My great-grandmother may have known but she didn't tell us before she died. There may have been instructions that got lost when her great-aunt died - I have heard that some of the relatives got a bit carried away when her possessions were distributed." Marisa sighed. "I mean, we know that the hat can be dangerous - that's why we advertised for its return."

"I should stay here, it's my house and staff," said Mr Wishmould. "Miss Tormald can you and Mr Inkman go back to, where did you say you came from?"

"Gullhaven," suppled Artemius.

"Gullhaven," repeated Mr Wishmould, "and bring Mrs Tormald back here to claim the hat? At least she does seem to recognise your mother as her owner."

The journey back to Gullhaven was delayed while the coachman and the horses finished their refreshments and had a short rest. Inside the carriage on the way back, Marisa and Artemius were alone. Together. No-one carrying on with their own lives at the next table or on the other side of the office, no-one in the other seats of the carriage, and the only person who could hear them was the coachman. When she realised this Marisa suddenly felt shy and awkward. Then she blushed.

Artemius cleared his throat awkwardly and said, "This is a new one for us, isn't it? Really alone together, with no-one else around and no task on hand."

"Well, we are in the middle of fetching my mother, but I get your point," replied Marisa. "We aren't actively occupied - our minds and hands are at leisure."

"Perhaps we should have brought along a pack of cards," remarked Artemius. "Or I could mention that, and I hope you don't take this the wrong way, I think that you're prettier now than when we were in school."

She blushed. "Thank you. I think we all needed time to grow into ourselves. No-one we were at school with had their adult faces back then. Most of you boys hadn't finished growing into your bodies."

"Oh, my height hasn't changed much since then, but I broadened out, later on. Not that I'm boasting about that," he hastened to assure her.

"I didn't think you were," she smiled back at him. "I remember you complaining about your new suit for work getting too tight across the shoulders when you'd only had it a few months."

Artemius blurted out, "Marisa, would you like to come and see a play with me? The Riverview Theatre is putting on The Third Season this month. I saw it last week to write a review for the paper, and it's very good."

Marisa looked at him for a moment, sitting bolt upright on her seat, and really looking at him. "I think that I would like that very much," she said quietly. "Yes, please. I would like to go and see a play with you."

"I'll get the tickets then when we've finished with this business," replied Artemius. "I may not be able to get to the theatre until tomorrow morning, of course. When I've got them, I'll let you know the day, shall I?"

"Yes, thank you." Marisa smiled shyly at him again, and they spent the rest of the journey to Gullhaven sitting together and being careful not to poke too roughly at something new, precious, and perhaps fragile.