Eros Element (6 page)

She lit all the lamps in the office and told herself she needed the light to see, not to dispel the eerie feeling of impending threat the volcano egg gave her. She piled books and objects on the desk, attempting to figure out what she needed, but she found it difficult to concentrate. The volcano egg's force poked at the edge of her consciousness with the persistence of a street urchin begging for a shilling to buy his dinner, and Iris found herself with a dull headache. The situation horrified as well as intrigued her. She'd never come upon an object that called to her with the strength to force her to read it. Finally, she gave up and cradled it in her palms. This time it didn't put off dread but rather urgency as if its original emanations were some sort of scream to get her attention.

“What do you want to tell me?” she asked it in a low voice and focused on that question in her mind. She turned the volcano egg over in her hand, and her thumbnail traced one of the deeper striations. It gave, and she worked her nails further into the crack until the stone popped in half, revealing a center of small crystals so red and sharp Iris checked her own fingertips to make sure she hadn't cut herself. A sense of the air around her sighing accompanied the egg's opening, and some primitive part of her told her to freeze and listen.

A small gold box covered with strange symbols sat inside the stone. Iris pried it out. This object gave off dread, betrayal and fear, but the only image she got from it was of a pair of gloved hands tearing open a packet of powder, which was poured into a drink. She tried to see if the gold box, which was the size and shape of a flattened cigar, could be opened, but it was impossible with her fingers as sore as they were from prying apart its hiding place. It was either stuck or had some sort of catch she couldn't find. She slipped it into her pocket after checking to ensure there were no holes, closed the stone, and placed the volcano egg on the shelf where she found it.

Interesting. I need to figure out what the symbols on the box mean so perhaps it will tell me how to open it.
She looked at the books on the shelves with renewed interest in finding something that would give her a key to deciphering the box's symbols, but she shook her head to clear the sense of waking from a vivid dream where reality blurred with imagination.
I can play with it later. I need to prepare for the journey first.

Iris returned to her sorting and organizing, but a thunk against the window drew her attention and set her heart thrumming in the spot below her throat. The curtains were drawn, so she was sure no one could see in. Still, she paused, her senses on high alert.

Another thud and a series of scratches made her race for the fireplace poker and brandish it toward the windows. Like most gentlemen of the age, her father had inherited guns and pistols, but they were in the sitting room, not his office, and she wasn't sure she would know how to shoot one if she could find them. She counted a hundred breaths before she dared move, and she doused the lights. After her eyes adjusted to the darkness, she peeked through the curtains. No intruder or creature could be seen, but a circle with a box inside had been etched on the glass pane.

Iris suspected she and her father might share a special talent, but it hadn't occurred to her that others might also be able to sense objects. Now it became apparent they could, and someone knew she'd found the box. As for who and what they wanted with it—or her—she didn't know.

Iris slept with the fire poker and one of her father's ancient swords in the bed beside her.

Chapter Seven

Haywood House, 10 June 1870

Edward woke with a sense of dread and looked at the clock beside his bed, which the early morning light illuminated. It told him it was five thirty, and he rolled over, relieved he had another two hours to sleep. He'd been having an awful dream of having to pack his things for a journey he didn't want to take, and a woman whose dark blue eyes bored into him and gave him the feeling she could read the tale of his failures with Lily. Thankfully he could look forward to a productive day at the office with his new aetherometer, and—

A pounding on his door roused him.

“Come on, Edward, it's time to get up,” Johann Bledsoe, who must have risen earlier, called. “The train leaves in an hour.”

The memories of the past few days rushed in with the inexorable force of a large engine. Edward's reality wasn't a quiet, productive summer free of teaching responsibilities and clumsy students. It was a horrifying journey including women and the possibility of him losing his position and indeed his beloved Aetherics department if he didn't go.

Edward rolled out of bed and dressed without assistance. He was sure the servants were busy packing last-minute things, whatever that might include, and he didn't want to call for anyone. He suspected these would be his last few moments of quiet for a while.

He packed a couple of books, the last two he deemed necessary, in his valise before someone knocked on his door for his personal trunk. He allowed the two burly servants to take it but held on to his own travel case so at least he would have his books and important notes with him. He saw his niece Mary's paper on earthworms and grabbed it as well. It would make a useful bookmark.

Johann breakfasted in the dining room of the Duke of Waltham's town house, where Edward lived in one of the extra bedrooms. The family rarely came to town and bothered him since the duchess seemed determined to have a child each year and deemed the country air to be better for her babies. The musician looked chipper in spite of having been out the previous night for a “farewell tour of the pubs” with his favorite actress.

“What time did you go to bed?” Edward asked, prepared to remark on his friend's profligate lifestyle. Not that Johann deserved it, but Edward wanted to scold someone for something, and he wasn't going to take his irritability out on his brother's servants, who did their best for the family.

“Haven't been yet,” Johann said around a mouthful of eggs. “The train is for sleeping. Bloody boring.”

“Are you still drunk?” Edward asked with a horrifying premonition that his friend might vomit in the middle of their journey.

Johann gestured to his plate, which in spite of his working on breakfast for a while, held a large amount of food. “That's what all this absorbent material is for.”

“Right.” Edward sat at the table and buttered his toast. A servant poured a cup of tea for him without allowing Edward to put cream in his cup first, but he didn't say anything. He would have to deal with all sorts of privations soon enough—might as well get used to it now. He put a whole sugar cube in the tea as well.

“Getting ready to rough it, eh?” Johann asked.

Edward glared at him, and his butter knife went through his toast. He dropped it on the plate and checked his fingers for injury.

“Your brother thinks this will be good for you.”

“He would.” He put jam on one of his asymmetrical toast fragments and ate it in misery alternating with sips of his too-sweet tea.

No matter how much he sulked or tried to do anticipatory penance for his sins of pickiness, Edward couldn't revert everything to the way it once was or delay their departure forever. Even his brother came to see them off.

“Where is Miss McTavish?” Johann asked and checked his pocket watch. “We weren't supposed to pick her up, were we?”

Grange House, 10 June 1870

Iris woke to a very quiet house, sure she had forgotten something important. This was the fifth time her sleep had been disturbed by such panic, but this time, she couldn't shake the feeling something was wrong.

Although it was dark outside, she got out of bed and touched her trunk, valise and reticule in turn, then moved toward Sophie's luggage. Instead of leather-covered wood, air met Iris's questing hand, and she hurriedly lit a lamp to reveal that Sophie's trunk was gone. She ran into Sophie's room, a small bedroom off Iris's, and found it to be empty of Sophie and all of her things. Her sleep-fogged mind told her Sophie had been taken by whatever had made the strange symbol on her father's office window, which had remained the following morning. She found herself jumping at every little sound the previous day, when she and Sophie had finished their packing.

“Sophie?” Iris called. “Sophie, where are you?”

She dashed down the stairs and found Cook in the kitchen. Her eyes were red from crying.

“Cook, where is Sophie? She's been kidnapped with all her things.” As she said it, Iris knew how silly it sounded, and her brain put together Sophie's strange absences and distant looks of the past weeks.

“Yes, Miss, but not in the way you think.” Cook gestured to a letter on the table. Iris picked up the folded sheet of vellum with trembling fingers and sensed regret and fear but also joy and excitement.

The emotions must be intense for a material as flimsy as paper to hold them.

Dear Miss Iris,

I am sorry to leave you like this, but I can't bear to go on a journey. I've been seeing the Scotts' footman and was hoping you'd accept Lord Jeremy's suit so we could be together, but since you're determined to go on your adventure rather than being sensible and marrying him, I had to take matters into my own hands. With Lord Jeremy's help, we've run off to Scotland to be married. I will see you when you return and would be happy to resume my position as your lady's maid.

Best, Sophie

Accept her back after she's run off like that? Hardly. Cheeky wench!
Iris's cheeks burned, and she crumpled the vellum. What was she going to do now? She couldn't go on the journey without her maid.

“Miss, begging your pardon for bothering you at such a time because I know how much Miss Sophie meant to you, and I'll miss her too,” Cook said. “But I need to buy eggs today since our chickens aren't laying, and I need money for the market.”

“Of course,” Iris said. “The hens seem to know when something is amiss. I'll get some money for you and leave enough for the household while I'm gone.”

“Yes, Miss. Are you still going on your journey?” Cook shot her a concerned glance, but unlike Sophie had never voiced her opinion of Iris's actions.

“I need a moment to think.”

Iris went into the office, where she fetched the key for her father's strongbox, and she opened it and counted the money remaining. Even if they were down to a household of two—and Iris would need another maid if she were to maintain the appearance of her social class—she needed to bring in an income. She closed her eyes and thought about her options—stay and accept Lord Jeremy's offer of marriage or go on the journey by herself. The thought of his shocked look when she turned him down and the way the scone crumbs clung to his puffy lips made her stomach turn, but thinking about how he would desecrate her father's study and ruin his work made up her mind.

I cannot marry him. There's no other option. I'll go on the journey unchaperoned. If I return with my reputation ruined, it will be with enough income that Cook and I can go somewhere and start over. And if I don't return…

She refused to consider the possibility.

A line from Sophie's letter came to mind—
with Lord Scott's help.
What if she had revealed the plan for the journey to her lover's employer?

The grind of wheels on the stones outside made Iris grab enough money for two months of household expenses for Cook, some for herself for the journey—in case of emergencies, she admonished herself, since Parnaby Cobb had promised he would pay their expenses—and slam the lid of the box. She locked it, hid it and the key and ran into the kitchen. Three loud booms echoed through the house, but from the office Iris couldn't tell whether it was the front or side door.

“Cook, go to the door and see who it is,” she called. “If it is Lord Scott, please tell him I am not at home. If it is a porter for my trunk, send him in.”

“Yes, Miss.”

Iris dashed upstairs and finished her toilette. She attempted to pin her hair up and hoped her buttons in the back weren't askew, but there was little she could do about either. Her fingers trembled too much.

Cook appeared in the doorway followed by a tall young man whose eyes took in everything about the bedroom including Iris herself. The look he gave her made her stand straighter and lift her chin to show she wouldn't be intimidated. Instead of bowing or looking away, his lips peeled back into the sort of smile one expected to see on the patron of a naughty peep show.

“These your things, Miss?” he asked, his tone respectful unlike his expression.

“Y-yes,” Iris said. The whole situation seemed ill put-together, so she asked, “And who are you?”

“Name's Lamar. I work for Mister Cobb. Your train's in fifteen minutes. We better get a move on.”

Once again, the sound of the knocker on the front door echoed through the house. Iris went to her window, where she saw the familiar lines of the Scott coach with its matched four chestnut geldings in front of the house. She couldn't remember what the itinerary had said about who would pick her up, but Lamar seemed close enough.

“Yes, we should. Take the trunk down, and I'll meet you by the back gate. Don't argue, just do it.”

He complied, again looking more amused than anything else. What did he find so funny?

She embraced Cook, who grasped her upper arms.

“Oh, right.” Iris pressed the household money into her hands. “This should be enough to take care of you for a couple of months.”

“I don't like the feel of this, Miss.” Cook's face, which looked like it had been fashioned by a pastry chef to resemble the holiday dough-dolls children received on Christmas morning, fell in lines of concern. “You're going to go off with that strange gentleman?”

“It's either that or be forced to marry Jeremy Scott. He's lazy but clever, and I have no doubt he will trap me in a compromising situation such that I will have to wed him or suffer my reputation ruined.”

She pecked Cook on the cheek, grabbed her reticule, traveling hat, and valise, and rushed down the stairs. “Wait five minutes and then answer the door!” she called over her shoulder. “Stall them so they won't follow me. If he catches me, he'll make me miss the train.”

“Yes, Miss.” Cook huffed down the stairs behind her. “I've fresh scones. That's always good for stopping a man.”

Especially that one.
Iris smiled, rushed through the kitchen, and into the garden. Her trunk was loaded onto an open carriage, where Lamar sat behind… Not horses, but a long cylinder that puffed out plumes of white steam.

“An open steamcoach,” Iris sighed. She would have been more excited—only the wealthiest had smaller vehicles good for racing as well as driving, and she hadn't had the chance to ride in one—but she wasn't sure it could outrun the Scott team. No matter, it was better than waiting to face her doom. She tossed her valise and reticule onto the seat and climbed in before the driver could get down to hand her up. He handed back a set of goggles—
lovely, more goggles
—instead. She tried to tie her hat on while he drove away but found herself having to hold on to the side of the carriage for balance with one hand and grabbing her things with the other.

“Can you take it easier?” she asked. “I'm about to lose everything.”

A whinny behind her told her that they had been spotted.

“On the other hand, hurry,” she said.

“Doing the best I can, Miss McTavish. The train in front of us is more important to me than the coach behind us.” He shot her a look of mixed amusement and irritation. “You were supposed to be the easy one to fetch. Those gentlemen have no idea what they're getting into with you, do they?”

Iris spared another glance behind her, where she swore the Scott coach was catching up with them. How far away was the train station? She'd often gone with her mother and the footman when they had one to drop her father off before his expeditions, but this man was taking a different route. A hard bump made her lose her grip and bang her elbow when she grabbed again for the side.

“Careful,” she hissed around the pain that radiated to her collarbone. She got a hold on the carriage door handle, her fingers tingling. “Do you know where you're going?”

“I'm taking the smaller streets a steamcoach can manage better than a coach and four,” he said. “Don't worry, they're falling behind.”

Iris looked behind her, but a sharp pain in her neck made her have to take his word for it. After what seemed to be hours when they alternated evading their pursuers and seeming to almost fall into their clutches, the bulk of the train station rose in front of them, the train itself there. It huffed and hissed, and Iris hoped it was settling in after stopping, not getting ready to depart without her.

A shout drew her attention to a group of men by the door, and a tall blond figure she recognized as Johann Bledsoe ran to the coach. She rose on shaky feet.

“You're about to miss it,” he said and lifted her down without her permission. “Hurry, now.”

The clattering sound of the Scott coach cut off Iris's sharp retort, and she nodded. He grabbed her things, and, followed by Lamar with the trunk, they ran through the train station and into a car, where Lamar dropped off her trunk and exited before she could thank him. She wished she'd had the chance to ask why he looked so amused.