The Ripper Affair (Bannon and Clare) (9 page)

C
lare coughed, wrackingly, and set the knife against his forearm. He was interrupted by a sound not of his own creation, and he blinked rapidly as he watched the last shallow slice slowly congeal. The more he practised, the faster the superficial wounds seemed to seal themselves.

The ramifications were quite fascinating. What had interrupted him?

One step inside his workroom, despite the locked door–this was, to be sure,
her
house, and should she require entry into a portion of it, well, he could not grudge or gainsay her–and Emma’s dark eyes widened dangerously. Of course, the blood spattering the smooth stone walls, the chaos of tools on one of the sturdy wooden tables, and the shattered glass upon the floor–he had swept a few
alembics from its surface in his irritation–were not comforting in the least.

“What on earth are you
doing
?” Emma Bannon demanded, her earrings of shivering cascades of silver wire and splinters of jet trembling as she halted just over the threshold.

She was in black again today, and looked none the worse for wear. In fact, with her eyes so wide and her expression so shocked, she looked more childlike than ever.

Clare, blinking furiously through veils of acrid smoke, actually goggled at her for a few moments before finding his tongue. “Experiments! Must find the limits, you see. This is quite interesting.” He waved the knife absently. “It will make shallow cuts, but no matter how I try, I cannot so much as lop a fingertip off. Controlled explosives merely toss me about a bit. This is very—”

“You’ve gone mad.
S–x’v!
” The collection of sounds she uttered shivered the walls, refusing to stay in Clare’s memory for more than a moment. When the echoes died, he found he could not move. The knife clattered from his nerveless fingers, and she made a short, sharp gesture that gathered up the thick white and grey smoke, compressing it into an ashen sphere that bumbled over her head and drifted out of sight up the stairs, seeking a chimney. “Good heavens.
Look
at all this.”

Mikal appeared behind her, one eyebrow fractionally raised. “Is that… what is it?”

“Dynamite.” She lifted her heavy skirts, stepping briskly through the litter of glass and splinters. “Nitrou-glycerine
and sawdust; it tends to be volatile. Do take care. Clare, what on
earth
?”

He could breathe well enough, but his limbs refused to budge. Invisible bands circled him, gently but firmly, and he had the sudden, quite thought-provoking realisation that she was being rather delicate with him. “Experiments,” he wheezed. “Interfering… damn nuisance.”

“Quite.” She examined the walls, wrinkling her small nose. “What are you hoping to discover, sir?”

“What the… the limits of…” The words fled from him as he stared at her throat. Her pulse beat, a fraction too swiftly. “I say, you are quite agitated. And your dress is fashionable even for mourning, despite the tiny bustle, which means you did not deny what Isobel first proffered. She quite thinks you need a bit more
mode
lately, you have not been yourself. And Madame Noyon is becoming forgetful as she grows older—”

“Clare.” She shook her head, the curls over her ears a bit old-fashioned, but she could simply have been a well-bred young miss with a hidebound guardian or
duenna
choosing her cloth. An observer who did not note the fact of her sorcery would perhaps draw such a conclusion. “You will refrain.”

But I do not wish to
. “I must know what the limits are. What the logical… what I can extrapolate…”

“Did it occur to you to simply
ask
?”

His reply was loosed before he considered its weight or its edge. “Would you answer honestly if I had?”

She made a small spitting noise, expressing very
unladylike irritation. Yet she did not deign to answer more fully, and Clare could hardly blame her. He strained against the invisible ropes holding him fast, and reflected that it was no wonder a woman with her abilities was held in such caution.

It was downright
unnatural
for a female to possess such power.

Miss Bannon examined the workroom once more, turning in a complete circle so as to leave nothing unseen. “You have not slept at all,” she remarked.

“No.”
There is too much to discern, too much to do
.

“You will likely continue in this fashion until you find some means of harming yourself.”

“My dear lady, I cannot—” His struggles increased, and his voice rose. “Turn loose. I
demand
you release me, Emma.”

“Have I been in any way unclear? I am
quite
unwilling to see you harmed, Archibald. I shall take steps to prevent it.”

“You are not my nursemaid!” Why was he
shouting
? A mentath did not lose his temper. It was unheard of. It could not be borne.

Neither could the restraints, and she watched him curiously as he continued to writhe without moving. Could she feel it? Her expression gave no indication. It was frankly maddening to see a slip of a girl, her head cocked slightly, regard a grown man much as a child might a specimen pinned to a board.

“No. I am most definitely not your nursemaid.” She nodded once, briskly, her curls swinging. “But you do need
one at this juncture. And I think it best you sleep now, dear Clare.”

He was about to protest even more hotly, but a rumbling passed through him. More of those damnable unremembered words, her lips shaping incomprehensible,
inhuman
sounds, and blackness swallowed him whole.

L
onging thoughts of rum floated through her head. Emma pressed her fingers delicately against the bridge of her nose. “I cannot keep him in a cocoon.”

“No,” Mikal agreed. He was maddeningly calm, but the high colour in his lean cheeks told her it was mere seeming. “Prima…”

“I know.
You
cannot look after him, I need you elsewhere.” She decided to overlook his very plain sigh of relief, and turned the question over in her mind again.

The workroom was a shambles. Clare was propped upright, trapped in sorcerous restraints she kept steady with threads of ætheric force trickling from the chalcedony pendant at her throat. The blood on the walls troubled her, and the wild-eyed man who had outright
screamed at her troubled her even more. It was so unlike him, and doubly unlike what she knew of mentath temperament.

“Perhaps…” But Mikal shook his sleek, dark head as she glanced at him. Whatever idea he had, perhaps he had discovered a great many holes in it as soon as he gave it voice.

“Finch.” She twitched a slender ætheric thread, and the call bloomed subtly through the house. It took less than a half-minute for the familiar light step to be heard on the stairs outside the workroom–he must have suspected she would summon him.

When he stepped through the flung-open door, his cadaverous face betrayed no surprise or irritation at all. It was a distinct relief to find him as imperturbable as ever. His indenture collar flashed once before subsiding to a steady glow.

Her sigh was only partly theatrical. “I’ve a bit of a quandary, Mr Finch.”

“So it seems, mum.” There was a hint of a curve to his thin mouth, and Emma allowed herself a rueful smile in return.

“I need a minder for Mr Clare. Someone singularly…
useful
. And loyal, though I shall of course require a blood-binding.”

Finch absorbed this, his thin shoulders stooped. He did not immediately answer, which gave her cause for hope. Which was roundly justified when he finally nodded, slowly. Sharp as a knife when he first entered her service,
he had lost none of that edge in the ensuing years. Age sometimes brought a man more fully into dangerousness, and he had experienced enough of treachery to know even its hidden faces.

He was no longer youthful-quick, but he was exceedingly
subtle
.

To prove it, he produced an impossible necessity once more. “I’ve a… cousin, mum. He might do.”

“A cousin?” Her eyebrows rose dangerously high. She could hardly help herself.

“Well, after a fashion. He’s, well—”

Was he
blushing
? She forged onward, twitching her skirts absently as she turned to regard the somnolent, propped-up figure of Clare. Who looked rather peaceful, d—n him, while she was required to solve this problem. “If you think he would suit, Finch, it is enough to set my mind at ease.”

“He’s… well, he’s a molly, mum. If you catch my meaning.”

It was a mark of her distraction that she did not take his meaning immediately. Perhaps Finch was right to blush, though he could hardly think her intolerant of such a thing, considering her acquaintance with, for example, the infamous Prime Dorian Childe, and others of his ilk. Society might very well frown upon the men of Sodom, but Emma had found no few of them bright and above all,
useful
.

If Finch recommended a certain man, it mattered not a whit what that man liked to sport with. Unless said sport
could lead him to treachery, but Finch’s recommendation would mitigate that danger somewhat. “I see. Well, I care little what he buggers, as long as he does his duty. Do we understand each other?”

“Yesmum.” Finch bobbed his head, and she caught a slight movement–as if he would tug his forelock, as he used to before he studied a butler’s manners. “I shall go myself and fetch him.”

“You are a treasure, Finch. Be about your business, then.”
Do hurry. There is much to be done.
She did not add the last, it was unnecessary.

“Yesmum.” And he glided out the door.

“A molly?” Mikal sounded amused, at least. He could not fail to be familiar with the term.

She gathered herself, leashed her temper, and paused once more to determine what should be done and what was the most efficient way to accomplish it. “Perhaps he will feel affectionate toward Clare. Heaven knows our mentath seems to need it, and I rather think he would not receive
my
affection gratefully at the moment.”

“Then he is a fool, Prima.” The warmth of Mikal’s tone was somewhat indecent, but they were alone. Or close to alone, as Clare was unconscious. He would rest until Tideturn, and by then she hoped to have made
some
arrangement for his comfort.

And, incidentally, for her own.

“Perhaps. But he is
our
fool.” She sighed, set her shoulders, and brushed at her skirts, though there was no need to set them to rights. “I had rather hoped to view the second
site today, but that is of little account. Come, help me get him to bed.”

The cousin was a lean foxlike youth, a measure of rust touching his dark curls and no shame in his wide dark eyes. His cloth was indeed flash: a waistcoat very fine but the coat a trifle ill fitting, no doubt bought secondhand. His shoes were not quite fashionable but they were brushed very neatly, and the half-resentful courtesy he afforded the visibly relieved Finch was telling. A watch-chain that had certainly started life in a gentleman’s pocket before being deprived of such surroundings by quick fingers, the dove-grey gloves, and the pomade in his curls all shouted
rough lad
. The only question was whether he paid for his buggering–or was paid for it.

Just where the line was drawn between an Æsthete (or Decadent, for that matter) and a slightly circumspect Merry-Ann was difficult to tell, since those who affected to live for Arte and Beauty often dressed in imitation of the panthers of St Jemes or Jermyn Street. Often in finer fabric, though the end result was the same.

He passed the first inspection, and Emma motioned them further into the room.

“Mum.” Finch inclined slightly from the waist. “May I present my cousin, Mr Philip Pico?”

The drawing room was not the best setting for this lad. He belonged in one of the taverns the Merry-Anns frequented, or along the docks in the darkness wreathed by yellow greasy fog…

… or in some dark corner of Whitchapel, where the trade was less merry and far more rough. Where a gentleman might go to seek danger to spice his buggery, where the panthers, both of Sodom and murder, prowled.

“Mum.” The young man made the same motion Finch almost had that morning–as if to tug his forelock. He caught himself, and offered her a very proper half-bow.

“How do you do,” Emma murmured, not deigning to offer her hand, and examined him closely.

It was in the feet, she decided. Placed just so, his weight balanced nicely, one slightly forward. The fact that his shoulders were broad–though he was at pains to appear slender–was another indicator. He was not averse to violence, and he was alert.

“Your cousin has no doubt informed you of my requirements.” She nodded slightly, and Finch shuffled away to the sideboard. If she found the lad did not suit, she would give him a drink and send him on his way, with a guinea or two for his trouble.

“Discretion, loyalty, efficiency, so on, so forth.” He chanted it sing-song, and she almost missed the flicker of his gaze towards the door as Mikal entered, noiseless. She did not miss the sudden tension in his left hand.

That is where the knife will be, then.
“Yes. You may be amusing, but I do not countenance impoliteness.”

“Your countenance is set very politely, madam.” Quick as a whip, and with a winning smile to boot.

She found herself measuring him against a Neapolitan with a sneer and dirty fingernails, and had to eye him afresh, so she would not find him wanting without reason. “I take pains to preserve it so,” she replied, dryly. “You have no objection to a blood-binding?”

He paled slightly, but set his shoulders. “None at all, mum. He—” A slight tip of his head took in the attentive Finch. “—tells me you do right by those in your service, and that I’m getting too old to molly much more. The gentlemen prefer younger, even with the rough.” A defiant tilt to his chin, watching to see if he could shock her.

Her estimation of his intelligence rose, even though he seemed very young indeed to her. “And just how old are you, Philip?”

“Old ’nough. I don’t enjoy the molly, mum. It’s just easy.”

Ah.
She allowed herself to feel cautiously hopeful. “Your enjoyment of such things, or not, holds no interest for me. I wish to know if you are capable of discharging the duties of a minder for my mentath. He requires a companion of a certain… durability, discretion, and capability to deal with Londinium’s nastier areas.
I
require that you keep his skin whole and your mouth closed on the subject his affairs, and my own, to anyone outside this room. Mr Finch has no doubt negotiated your wages, should you be accepted for the position, and has also given you to understand certain… peculiarities… of said position.”

He waited. Mute and stubborn, giving nothing away.

Very good
. “Mikal?”

The Shield was suddenly across the room, locking the
young man’s wrist and striking the knife from his grasp. Finch did not move, a curious expression–part distaste, part amusement–flickering over his graven features. The youth actually almost managed to strike Mikal once, but the Shield finished by holding him by his scruff and shaking lightly, before dropping him to hands and knees and stalking away.

Her Shield retook his place by the door. “Amateur.”

Which was high praise indeed, coming from a fully trained Shield. At least he hadn’t said
useless
.

Emma found herself suddenly weary, and a sour taste had crept into her mouth. “Very well. You shall do, Mr Philip Pico. Do you wish the hire?”

The youth looked up. With his curls tumbled and high colour in his shaven cheeks, his true age was a little more visible. Yes, he was rather a shade too old for mollying to gentlemen, and a swift pang passed through her. Mikal must be out of sorts, to embarrass the lad so.

He climbed swiftly to his feet, scooping up the knife and slipping it back into its hiding-place behind his left hip. “One condition.”

After that display, I suppose you might be allowed to ask, even if I do not grant
. “Which is?”

He pointed at Mikal. “He’s a fair boxer. He teaches me that. I’ll not shirk, I’ll not talk, and I’ll keep your mentath safe as a babe in cradle.”

She found herself smiling, and Finch’s relief visibly mounted. Of course, she supposed he had to have been very sure of the boy to bring him, and who knew what
their true relationship was? “Cousin” was as good a word as any, and it mattered little, if the youth was dependable.

“I think that is quite possible, and even acceptable, though Mikal is a much harsher taskmaster than myself. As long as his tutelage does not distract from your other duties, you shall do very nicely, Philip. While Finch arranges for your effects to be brought, we shall settle you in a room and you shall see your charge immediately.”
Clare will not like this. But I cannot watch him day and night, and this young enigma will at least keep him occupied while I seek to discern what nastiness is afoot
.

“Yesmum.” Pico bent to retrieve his hat, as well, and darted a venomous look past her, at Mikal. Who would, of course, be entirely unaffected.

The little molly seemed to completely discount her as a threat.

Which was very much how Emma preferred it at the moment. She nodded once again, more to herself than to any man present. “Very well.”