Lily and the Shining Dragons by Holly Webb Read Free Book Online

all covered in lace and feathers every night? I’d rather go back to Mama.’
    Georgie gasped, and Lily hunched her shoulders angrily. ‘All right, so I wouldn’t. But this house is horrible. It’s so cushiony . I feel like I can hardly breathe.’
    ‘The cushions are rather comfortable,’ Henrietta reported from the velvet chaise longue under the window. ‘I think your aunt’s horror of magic has infected the whole house, though.’ She snorted. ‘It’s almost funny. She’s so frightened of magic, she’s using more magic to try and shut it out. It’s a wonder she’s still sane enough to walk. It’s dampening your power, though, this house. It’ll be good practice for you, learning to work round it.’
    ‘I suppose we just keep telling ourselves it’s not for long,’ Lily sighed.
    Georgie sat down next to Henrietta, looking out of the window at the sunny street below. ‘But I don’t think she knows anything. She’s forsworn magic. And we can hardly ask her anyway! She won’t want to talk about her dreadful brother-in-law, will she? Father shamed her by being sent to prison. She said she hadn’t spoken to Mama for over ten years – she must have broken the connection with our family when he was arrested.’
    Lily curled up on the floor, leaning against the chaise longue, her cheek against Henrietta’s smooth side. ‘Actually, I wouldn’t put it past Aunt Clara to have given evidence against him. It would have been the best way to prove she really wasn’t a magician any more, wouldn’t it? To betray one?’
    Henrietta growled in disgust. ‘If she laid information on your father, which I can well believe, then surely she must know where they’re keeping him. She may even have had to go there to give evidence.’
    ‘So we just have to get her to tell us.’ Lily nodded determinedly.

    It was all very well making that sort of decision, but they couldn’t make Aunt Clara talk when they never saw her. The hours of a society lady were very different to those of her young nieces. It turned out that Aunt Clara breakfasted in bed, took luncheon only rarely, and dined at one grand party after another. Lily and Georgie heard from her by means of notes, slipped under the door of their room by a silent maid. A pile of etiquette books appeared on the little table of inlaid wood that stood by the chaise longue, with a note instructing them to practise before the arrival of their governess. And a wardrobeful of pretty, frilled, little-girlish dresses were delivered the day after they arrived. The maid who unpacked them was polite, but would only answer their eager questions with, ‘I couldn’t say, miss,’ or ‘No, indeed, miss.’ It made Lily want to stamp on her foot.
    The same maid – her name was Agnes – accompanied them on polite twice-daily walks in the park close by the house, walking behind them and carrying a black umbrella, in case it should be needed.
    No one had told the girls that they ought to stay in their own quarters, but somehow it was hard to venture out, apart from meals – and even then, supper was served in their room, as their aunt and uncle were always dining away.
    ‘I don’t think I can bear this much longer,’ Lily muttered, on the second day, flinging Elegant Flowers of Conversation for the Young Miss across the room.
    ‘We could ring for Agnes. It’s almost time for a walk,’ Georgie suggested, smoothing out the fabric in her lap admiringly. A workbox had arrived with the books, along with a handbook on embroidery. Lily suspected that her sister was actually enjoying herself, which only made it worse.
    ‘I don’t want a walk!’ she snapped. ‘I want to go home. Oh, I mean the theatre,’ she added crossly, as Georgie’s eyes widened in fear. ‘I never would go back to Merrythought and Mama, Georgie. I only said it that once because of this awful house. It’s still squashing me.’
    There was a scratching noise, and Lily stalked across the room to open the door