Read Rite of Summer: Treading the Boards, Book 1 for Free Online Page A

be a pair of bedrooms and a sitting room with high, arched bay windows that caught the afternoon sun. The room was done in the pale yellows and greens that had been so fashionable a few years before. Their trunks had been brought up, one just beyond the open door to each bedchamber.
    Stephen made his way to the window and twitched aside the curtain. Their view was of the back gardens, brilliantly colored flowerbeds leading the eye down a gravel path toward a copse of trees, and off to the left, a hedge maze of some complexity. It was brilliantly green, well tended and dreadfully pastoral. The countryside’s beauty paled in comparison to the vibrancy, the urgency of a single day in London.
    His boyhood had been surrounded by a different sort of nature, the fenced-in swaths of crops and pasture on either side of the long dirt road that wound down to the schoolhouse. He’d seen them in the dark, half the time, trailing along behind his father with books wrapped in a leather belt to keep them from falling. He could still feel water seeping in through poorly patched holes in the bottoms of his boots, feel Margaret’s little hand clenched in his, hear the lowing of the cattle and Farmer Benton’s enormous mean, old bull that liked to charge the fence until it shook. The schoolhouse was always cold when they arrived, the room only beginning to warm hours after Father started the fire.
    Stephen shivered. Oh, for the cozy closeness of their lodgings. It might not have brocade upholstery, but they had only a flight of stairs dividing them from tavern tables full of jolly companions and the pulsing heartbeat of the city.
    “Dinner will be served at five,” Gregory said, not entering much farther than the door. “Clare shall be up to draw you baths in the meantime, that you may recover from the arduousness of your journey.” His message delivered, he retreated, closing the door behind him with a stately click.
    Evander turned once to take it all in and flopped down on the ivory settee, still in his boots. He held out his hand and Stephen crossed the room to claim it, glancing back at the door over his shoulder. It remained closed, secure against intruding eyes.
    He squeezed Evander’s ink-stained fingers in his own, and Evander beamed at him with satisfaction and wonder.
    “We’ve managed it, Stephen—look at us. A vicar’s son and a schoolmaster’s boy, received by a peer of the realm and hosted in luxury. We are here .”
    Later, the road dust washed away, Stephen stood in front of the glass and tugged his cravat into place. The suit was not a fancy, bespoke thing like Coventry’s, but it fit him well enough. The black-wool dress coat closed neatly across his chest, his frame trim but not overmuscled. The green waistcoat had been Evander’s suggestion. Something about bringing out the green flecks in his eyes, which he himself had always considered to be more of a muddy brown. Still, it all sat well enough that he could go down to dinner feeling rather dashing, rather than the awkward country boy he still was inside.
    Evander wandered out of his bedroom then, looking as much the fashion plate as ever. His golden curls hung perfectly in place—all but one, which drooped ever so slightly across his forehead, as though daring someone to loop a finger in it and tug. He looked Stephen over, and all he said was “hm”.
    Stephen frowned back, trepidation rising in his chest and squeezing gently at his throat. “What’s wrong with it?”
    Evander stepped in closer and refolded his lapels, brushing away an invisible speck of dust from Stephen’s shoulder. “Nothing!” he replied, though he worried again at his lower lip. “Certainly nothing. Only— No, never you mind. It will be fine, I’m sure.”
    And what good did that do, to hint that something was wrong but refuse to follow through? He bit back the urge to pursue the issue, tugging his coat into place with a sharp gesture instead. “We’ve a little time before