Free Unobtainium 1: Kate on a Hot Tin Roof by Niall Teasdale

decided to go out as soon as the sun showed itself, but now that was proving a problem and she really needed to be away from the hall.
    Lifting the front of her skirt high, she turned and walked off into the wilderness, where there were no people to disturb her calm.
    ~~~
    ‘Dalton, have you seen Miss Felix?’ Charles asked when there was no sign of the girl at breakfast.
    Dalton was an older man who fitted the role of butler well. Alexander had persuaded him away from some Edinburgh family and it had been one of the elder Barstow-Hall’s best decisions. Dalton ran a tight ship and he missed nothing that went on under the roof he was responsible for. That meant he almost certainly knew of Gall’s nocturnal activities which made Charles wonder why he had not called the man up on it.
    ‘Miss Kate,’ Dalton replied in a voice which had had every ounce of Scottish accent eradicated from it, ‘left the hall not long after sunrise, sir, dressed in her walking attire.’ He always used her first name because she had insisted that she was not of sufficient rank to be treated as a lady, and Dalton was of sufficient breeding that he could not treat her any other way. So she was always ‘Miss Kate’ because if he slipped into using ‘Miss Felix’ he would never stop. ‘She appeared somewhat distracted. Disquieted, one might say.’
    Charles glanced at Antonia. This was the forty-seventh day and Kate was out in the hills again. ‘Did you see which way she went, Dalton?’ Antonia asked.
    ‘North and east, Mrs Wooster. I might add that I believe I detected a slight limp in her stride, favouring her left leg.’
    ‘I’ll get my medical bag before we go,’ Charles said, frowning.
    ‘I believe it would be best if I were to go alone, Doctor Barstow-Hall,’ Antonia said. ‘I believe I have some idea what has been troubling your young charge and your presence will merely exacerbate matters.’
    Charles’s frown deepened. ‘You’re sure, Mrs Wooster?’
    ‘I am quite sure, Doctor, though I need to speak with Kate to be certain.’
    ~~~
    Kate had stopped in the most secluded spot she knew, in the lee of a rock outcrop where the wind, not terribly cold at this time of year but still not pleasant, was abated. She knew people had looked for her before and never found her in the small depression. It was difficult to see into from any of the surrounding land and someone would have had to practically fall over it to discover her there.
    Antonia Wooster, however, was skilled at tracking wild animals through dense jungle or across open plains. Following a woman in skirts was not such a difficult task, so she found Kate, sitting in the sun with her skirt pulled up into her lap, without too much difficulty.
    ‘Oh!’ Kate squeaked, rushing to cover her legs.
    ‘You’ll keep that thigh where I can see it, young lady,’ Antonia ordered sharply. ‘When we heard you were favouring one of your legs, we assumed that you had received a burn from the reactor. I brought a balm to ease it.’
    Kate bit her lip but pulled her skirt back up to show the red, flaking skin on the inside of her left thigh. ‘We?’
    Antonia busied herself with squatting beside her patient and taking a jar from her satchel. ‘Charles and I. I am the better tracker and was more likely to discover your whereabouts so I came alone.’
    ‘That’s… good. I don’t wish Charles to see me like this.’
    ‘You don’t merely mean with your skirts around your waist, because we both know he’s seen you in less.’
    ‘That feeling is back. The restlessness.’
    ‘Yes, we assumed that was the case.’
    ‘You knew?!’
    ‘We suspected. Hold still, this may sting a little at first.’ Antonia began smoothing a thick, translucent gel onto Kate’s wound and the girl’s breath came as a sharp gasp. ‘It was forty-six days between your first two episodes, and this is the forty-seventh since your last one. Since it has now begun, we can assume a relatively constant