Free Rogue's Home by Hilari Bell

servant’s stained apron and a white cap, from which frizzy brown curls escaped. For some reason, our hair had always been similar and not like that of either of our parents. Her eyes widened with recognition, then lit with joy.
    â€œNonny!” It was a shriek to split eardrums, but I didn’t care—the crushing hug that followed it would have made up for anything, although…
    â€œYou know, Annie, I’ve been asking you to call me Fisk since I was nine. I’d think you could manage it by now.”
    â€œI know.” She stepped free of my arms and wipedher cheeks, looking me over anxiously. “It’s just I don’t think of you that way.” Her arms went round me again, not only hugging but pulling me over the threshold. “Oh, Judith, look. Non—Fisk is here.”
    â€œSo I heard.” Judith too wore an apron, and smelled of silver polish. She was thin as a rail and hatchet-faced, with Father’s lank hair. “Hello, Fisk. I see nobody’s hanged you yet.”
    Anna gasped, but the sardonic grin that went with the words was surprisingly companionable, and I found myself grinning in return. “Hello, Judith. I see nobody’s married you yet.” It should have pricked, at least a little, but her grin only twitched a bit wider.
    Max came out of a room to the left of the entryway, probably his study. He was a small, neat man, and if his hair was a bit thinner, and his face a bit more lined, that was only to be expected. The anger hardening his expression was new, for he’d had the cursed gall to be sorry for me the few times we’d met.
    Anna stepped forward and said firmly, “Stop looking like that, Max. He only came because I wrote and asked him to. I think he might be able help us. And you know we need it.”
    Confusion washed over his face, and when it receded, he looked tired. “Without consulting me? I’d think, my dear…” I lost track of what he was sayingfor a girl—no, a young woman—was peering out of the study behind him. I knew who she had to be, for her resemblance to Anna was marked, though her hair was darker and more softly curled. If I’d passed her on the street, I wouldn’t have known her. Ten to fifteen is a long time, and when I’d imagined her growing up, it had been as an awkward schoolgirl, like Michael’s sister, not a young beauty.
    â€œLissy?” I asked, still not quite believing it.
    â€œOh.” Her eyes were wide. “Oh, Nonny!” She rushed forward and kissed my cheek, suddenly the impulsive little girl I remembered. But her shape as she hugged me was not at all familiar, and I held her away and looked her up and down incredulously. “You grew up!”
    It shouldn’t have surprised me, and Judith snickered. But Lissy laughed, and the flirtatious sparkle in her eyes stunned me further. “So did you. You were only a boy when you left.”
    There was an awkward pause as all eyes turned to Maxwell, and I felt my hackles rise. Lissy was the only one of my sisters not wearing an apron, and if this was how he kept his part of the bargain…
    â€œOh, very well.” His exasperated sigh left him thinner than before, as if something in him had deflated. “The way things are now, they could hardly get worse.You’re welcome to stay, young Fisk.” He held out his hand.
    I folded my arms. “What, exactly, is going on here?”
    â€œMistress Anna!” A slamming door and a clatter of feet heralded the arrival of an oldish woman in the good gray gown of an upper servant. “Mistress! The pots on the stove look to boil their lids off. Who’s this?” Her dark eyes were sharp as a crow’s.
    â€œI still want to know—” I began.
    â€œOh, dear!” Anna started toward the rear of the house, where the kitchen presumably lurked. “This is my brother, Non—Fisk, Mrs. Trimmer. He’ll be staying with