The Wizard of London (21 page)

She
had looked wildly about for the source of the internal voice, but had seen
nothing.

A
pity such beauty is mortal, too
, the voice continued, and as she
watched in horror, the image before her aged, aged rapidly, until what stood
before her was a hideously distorted reflection of an old, senile and withered
crone wearing her clothing, which sagged and bagged on the shrunken, bent body.
With a gasp, she had stepped forward and involuntarily touched the mirror.

You
do not like what you see
? The voice had been sardonic.
Oh, of course
not. You silly mayfly mortals, who do not understand preservation, only
consumption. You devour in moments what has taken long years to produce, then
wonder why everything about you withers, including yourselves. Look at yourself
!
You who are the very epitome of the eroding property of Air, instead of the
slow preserving of Ice. You could remain ageless in your beauty, and instead,
you fling yourself headlong into the Abyss to whirl yourself away to
nothingness
.

That
had caught her attention, but she was cautious enough not to grasp for what the
voice had hinted at. Instead, she had stepped back. “You imply a great
deal,” she had said boldly. “But Ice is only the other side of the
element of Fire. I am a Master of Air, and even if I do not yet know how to
control you, whoever you are, I have the means to destroy you.”

A
silent laugh had been her only answer. And the mirror dispersed into icy mist
again, the guide woke from his frozen state without knowing he had ever been in
it, and the two of them left the ice cave.

But
she had come back… oh, yes. She had come back again, this time alone.

This
time determined to have some answers.

She
had gotten them, too. Some of them, anyway, though she was still not entirely
sure what the creature of the ice cave called itself. Possibly an Ice Dragon;
it was more powerful than any Phoenix or Firebird she had ever encountered, and
the only Elemental of the flame aspect of Fire that was more powerful was an
avatar of a fire god, or a dragon. In return for subjugating her Power of Air
to the Power of Ice, she would be granted a force far more effective than that
of Air alone. It didn’t matter to Cordelia; she had gotten what she
wanted, and near as she could tell, the only thing the entity wanted in return
was for more control to be exerted in the world by Ice. Sometimes it was
difficult to fathom the motives of Elementals; by definition they didn’t
think like humans.

But
that was not pertinent to the moment; at this juncture, she faced an obstacle
in her path, in the form of a child medium and the woman who guarded that
child.

The
other Masters who had taught her made little or no use of Revenants and other
lingering spirits, either from foolish sentimentality, or the mistaken
conviction that they were by-and-large powerless. And that might well be true
of those that had been created of random tragedy, or out of their own will and
reluctance to leave the earth.

But
at the promptings of the Elemental in the ice cave, Cordelia had done some
specific and very secret research. She learned it was not true of those who
were created and bound from the beginning… and though the power was
subtle, it was sure, when properly guided. Cordelia had been creating such
servants for decades now, a few at a time.

In
any time and place, there were always the poor, and in any given time and
place, three-fourths of the poor were children. Now, setting aside the
difficulties inherent in their immaturity, children were the best and easiest
human beings to manipulate, and thus the best subjects for someone looking for
immaterial servants. They were used to obeying orders without question, they
would believe anything told them with authority, and they were disinclined to
rebellion. They were trivially easy to lure away from parents who had little
time for them anyway at best, and at worse were brutish and brutal. Cordelia
exploited all of these aspects of childhood.

First,
she found children with a certain amount of Elemental or psychical power. Then
she lured them into the hands of one of her agents with the promise of food and
shelter; using “agents” who were not much older than the children
themselves. Where street children were wary of adults, they were often inclined
to trust one of their own. With great care and subtlety, she gradually
introduced them to herself as the authority figure to which they owed
everything. And when they were accustomed to obeying her orders, even those
which seemed odd or even bizarre, she killed them.

Quietly.
Peacefully. So that they were not even aware that they were dead. A dose of
morphia in their evening meal, and then, cold that enveloped them, stilled
their hearts, their breathing, their lives. Painlessly, without trauma, they
“woke” when she called them and went about the business she sent
them on, and even when they eventually realized what had happened to them, it
took weeks, months, years before they had that revelation. By then, of course,
they were used to their situation. In many ways it was an improvement over
their old life. They were no longer hungry, cold, or in need, and none of those
Cordelia selected were acquainted enough with Christianity or any other
religion to have any expectation of a joyful afterlife. Most, in fact, had been
told repeatedly that they were destined for hell, and were not in any hurry to
proceed on the next leg of that journey. They had each other for company, and
in the endless twilight of their new existence, without the powerful and
developed personality that an adult would have to hold them together, they
gradually faded into passive, obedient wraiths, all looking very much alike.

So
they served her. And the few that rebelled, she was able to control despite
their willfulness.

And
this was what they could do.

They
slipped inside the thoughts of the unwary.

They
drifted into dreams, whispering whatever message Cordelia wished the victim to
hear. They hovered, waiting for the right moment, to murmur Cordelia’s
words when there was a flash of doubt. They could, and did, haunt individuals
tirelessly, relentlessly, feeding them what Cordelia wanted them to think until
the victim became convinced that Cordelia’s thoughts were his own. Not
even Elemental Masters were immune to this, for it was not an attack, and the
wraiths drifted in past the shields and protections effortlessly.

So
Cordelia had won higher title, then position, then property. So she had won
social status in the highest of circles, and amusingly enough, only the fact
that she did not want the position, and in fact had worked tirelessly to prevent
anyone from offering it, had kept her from being appointed one of the
Queen’s ladies-in-waiting. Firstly, she found Victoria herself to be a
terrible bore, with her obsession with her dead husband and her living children
and complete lack of understanding of politics both domestic and international.
And secondly, it was an appointment with less than no power. So one child
spirit was assigned permanently to the Queen, murmuring that Lady Cordelia was
an admirable woman, perfect in all ways… that Victoria herself was not
really interesting enough to be worthy of Lady Cordelia’s
friendship… that Lady Cordelia already had so many good works in hand
that Victoria would be imposing to offer her the position… that other
honors would certainly be much more appropriate…

There
really was only one group standing in the way of Cordelia’s ambitions.

Men.

The
world was owned and ruled by men. Women were distinctly second-class citizens;
cherished pets at best, or chattel at worst. Men maneuvering for positions of
power who listened to the advice of women were thought weak. Only the artistic
could grant status to women, and the artistic had no power except in their own
circles. No matter what she did, no matter how many little whisperers she
created, she would never have the position of power she required. Men were
particularly resistant to those whispers of self-doubt that were so effective
against women.

The
day that Cordelia had finally given in to that truth had been one of the few
times she had indulged herself in rage. But she had not permitted the rage to
last long. Instead, she had gotten down to work, and knowing that she would
never have the secular power she craved in her own name, she had set about
finding a proper vehicle to be her puppet.

David
Alderscroft had not been the first, but he had proven to be the most malleable.
Unlike many, he was susceptible to those whispers of negativity, especially
when he began his University studies, left the relative isolation of tutors and
small private academies, and found himself no longer the leading light of his
group.

Once
he accepted that, and once he accepted her as his mentor in Magic, he was hers.
There had been the small diversion of that girl, but it, and she, were easily
dealt with.

Or
so Cordelia had thought.

She
pursed her lips. Bad enough that there was a true medium in London now who was
strong enough to hear her whisperers and free them, but that this child was
being guarded by the same person Cordelia had separated from David—that
smacked not of coincidence, but of the intervention of something or someone.

“You
may go,” she told the Ice Wurm, who vanished, taking its mirror with it.

To
say this was displeasing was an understatement. But it was by no means a major
setback.

Yet.

Patience.
That was the byword here, patience and vigilance. She would have to make sure
that her control over her whisperers was absolute, and make certain the child
in Isabelle’s custody never got the opportunity to spot one of them. She
would also have to investigate Isabelle Harton and her school, looking more
thoroughly for chinks in the armor, weaknesses to be exploited, ways to bring
the school into disrepute, perhaps.

Or
put them on ground of Cordelia’s choosing. It would be enough merely to
drive the school and the woman into the countryside, for instance. Or perhaps
not even “drive”—perhaps, if she could manipulate matters,
the offer of a suitable building would suffice. A building of Cordelia’s
selection, of course, and one in which any number of accidents could happen
should it become necessary to try and kill the child again. But the main thing
was to be patient and enterprising—and no more use of intermediaries.
That mad Irish anarchist Earth Master had managed to get himself shot by the
police only just in time to keep the others from tracing him back to Cordelia.

The
first step: investigation, this time as thorough and as exacting as even the
fictional Sherlock Holmes would appreciate. That was one thing she had truly
learned back there that day on the ice: there was never enough time to rush
into something, because the amount of effort you would spend undoing hasty
mistakes would more than exceed the time you spent doing things carefully. Thus
was the path of the glacier: slow, relentless, unstoppable.

She left the room to
itself, closed the hidden door behind her, and set her mind on that path.

NAN and Neville held
themselves very still in the darkness of the closet. This was no time for the
adults to discover her listening post. Neville did not so much as flick a
feather.

Mem’sab
was pacing, and Mem’sab never paced; Nan recognized the quick light
sounds of her footsteps going up and down, up and down the room. Sahib was not
pacing, but Mem’sab was restless enough for both of them.

And
Mem’sab was not at all happy. The mysterious friends of hers who were
going to find out who had lured Nan and Sarah into the clutches of that
horrible haunt had found out the “who”—but not the
“why.” And as for the “who,” well, he was, in
Nan’s cynical mind, all too conveniently dead. In Nan’s world, when
you wanted to make sure no one spilled a secret, you made him a
“grave” man.

“There
are more things left unanswered than answered,” she complained, an edge
of anger to her voice. “Why would an Irish anarchist who had only been in
London for two months set a trap to harm or kill two obscure British
children?”

That
was a very good question. The only Irish Nan knew were not the sort to use a
haunt to get revenge when a boot to the head was so much more immediate and
satisfying. And she rather doubted Sarah knew any Irishmen at all.

“The
workings of a damaged mind?” asked Karamjit, doubtfully. Mem’sab
tsk’ed.

“And
he came to learn of them, how?” replied Agansing. “An Elemental
Master was he, not in psychical circles. And why? This makes no sense, even for
a madman. Madmen follow their own logic, it is true, but it
is
logic.
The children could have been of no threat, no rivalry to him, no real interest.
He could have made no use of them, and their harm would not help him in any
way.”

“He
was working for someone else, obviously,” replied Sahib. “Someone
who does see one or both of the girls as a potential threat, now or in the
future. We’ll never know who, now. And having gotten their immediate
answer, the Masters are disinclined to look further into the matter. Sometimes,
my dove, these people make me very annoyed.”

Mem’sab
sighed. “Trying to get them to work together is, as Bea says, like trying
to herd cats. Not that our kind is very much easier, but at least we are a bit
more inclined to gather in groups than they are, and to think on the larger
scale than personal rivalry and alliance. I wish David Alderscroft joy of
them.”

“Hmm.
One hears that he has succeeded in reviving a Master’s Circle from the
days of Mad King George,” said Agansing. “With some success, if
rumors I have heard are true. He and his followers have laid some troublesome
things to rest.”