Weather Witch (24 page)

Still, it was better than what most had left behind. “The War across the Water,” as the Americans now called it, was the most treacherous sort of war: a magickal one.

He would ask no questions about his family’s whereabouts until he reached the Below, and he would take the long way down. Past the Vanmoer estate. It seemed there were more roses that needed some of his particular form of attention.

Holgate

In the dark of her Reckoning Tank, Jordan Astraea held two words in her head: be brave. It was these two words that kept her from crying out when something rustled in the straw beside her. It was those two words that kept her from screaming when something scurried across the top of her right foot.

Be brave
.

She clutched the pin hidden in her sleeve and willed herself to follow its engraved instructions, simple as they were.

Whereas most of her fellow prisoners were dragged from their Tanks needing to be pushed and prodded to bring them before the Maker for the Reckoning, Jordan Astraea walked proudly (if not a bit stiffly, worn as she was from travel) all the way down the remaining dank hall, up the stairs at its far side, and all the way to him as a proper lady should when faced with the knowledge that someone’s comeuppance was due.

The room was large and filled from floor to ceiling with books, their shelves sporting stormlight lanterns so there was no spot wanting light.

With no introduction, the first instructions came. “Remove her accessories.”

The Wardens made quick work of it, taking her shawl, plucking her bracelets and even the fan off her hip.

The man giving orders looked up from behind a desk where he tallied the objects she’d come in with. “Gloves, too,” he reminded a moment before the Wardens peeled them off her arms. “Leave the necklace.”

Jordan would have worried about the proceedings were she not certain everything would be handed back (in a most apologetic manner) momentarily. Besides, she still had her butterfly wing necklace, the paper star, and Rowen’s heart to remind her of who she was.

The man behind the desk could not have been more than a dozen years her senior. Golden-haired, he had barely looked up from where he was scrawling notes in a journal when Jordan had entered the room flanked by two Wardens. She gathered her wits, gave a disdainful little sniff and a rattle of the leather manacles and metal links connecting them that they’d again placed her in for her appearance.

A towheaded little girl appeared from behind him, sipping from a cup, a stuffed toy with long ears tucked in the crook of her elbow. She blinked at Jordan. And then she smiled.

“Go on,” the man urged the child. “I need to return to my work.”

The child looked back at him. “Is she a—a—abom…?”

“
Abomination?
” Bran said, matter-of-factly. “Yes, little love, she is, so steer clear.”

The child’s eyes grew wide and she obeyed, giving Jordan and her Wardens wide berth.

Bran looked up at Jordan then, brow wrinkling. “Name?”

Be brave.

“It doesn’t matter, as you will not need to enter it in whatever that book of yours is,” she assured. “I am no Weather Witch. I cannot be Made.”

Bran drew in a deep breath and tapped his pen against the inkwell’s lip. “Name?”

“Are you deaf or daft?” Jordan retorted. “I am no Witch. I cannot be Made. You must set this horrible situation to rights before we have a problem.”

Bran’s eyebrows rose on his forehead and his mouth turned up at its very ends. But his expression hardened. “Do you know how many times I hear that on a Reckoning Day?” he asked, stepping around his desk to better make clear that he was the dominant force in the room. The pen still in his hand dripped once on his boot, leaving a mark like a black teardrop. He was unfazed. “Cooperate and things will go easier on you.”

“But—”

“No,” he said with a shake of his head. “Hold her.”

The Wardens clamped their hands around her arms and dragged her closer to him.

“Name,” he repeated.

She opened her mouth to refuse him again, but saw something spark in his eyes and thought better of it. “Jordan of House Astraea,” she whispered.

He stepped back around and brought his journal forward. “City?”

She again tried to protest and was again shut down by a look from his sharp golden eyes. “Philadelphia,” she replied.

“Excellent well. And”—he dipped the nib of his pen into the ink and tapped it off again—“when did you first discover your affinity for weather and storms?”

“I have no affinity for either,” she said, her tone sharp.

He shook his head. “Why do they never simply admit to the fact?” he asked the Wardens.

They remained mute as was their nature.

“If you only admitted to being what you are we could move along with the process. And it would go ever so much more gently.”

“But I have no…”

Putting on a pair of gloves, he slid open a drawer in his desk and withdrew a long needle. “No worries about infection. It is freshly cleaned and as sterile as anything in Holgate gets.” He walked back to where she stood, pinned in place by the cruel grips of the Wardens, their fingers looped into the links binding the manacles and pressed into her flesh. “Now tell me what I need to know or I Reckon we’ll get it out of you the hard way.”

“No,” she whispered, struggling. “I can’t … I’m not…”

“Jordan of House Astraea, ranked Fifth of the Nine, your rank is forfeit, your life is ours, our pleasure your duty, and that duty a great one.” He grabbed her right hand and turned it over so that her palm was face up. It trembled like a frightened animal, independent of Jordan’s will. “Say the words,” he urged.

But her brows arched over the delicate bridge of her nose and she shook her head as tears welled up at the edges of her eyes.

He sighed and dug the needle into the tip of her finger until she screamed. Sparks flared all along the beautiful embroidery of her dress, and danced across her bare skin as she screamed again.

“Thank you,” Bran whispered, tugging the needle free. He held the journal open before her. “Please sign.”

Whimpering, she asked, “A pen?”

He chuckled and grabbed her bleeding finger. “Not necessary. Sign with your internal ink, please.”

Quivering, she signed his book in blood.

“You may take the Witch away.”

And although she had walked proudly to her Reckoning, Jordan of House Astraea, Fifth of the Nine, had to be dragged most of the way back to her Tank.

The moment they dumped her inside and slammed her door shut, she plunged her bleeding fingertip into her mouth. Tears ran down her face and filled her mouth so that around her white and perfect teeth the tastes of saltwater and blood mingled.

Such a seemingly small pain, and yet it was as if something within her had died.

Philadelphia

The stormcells glittered along Lady Astraea’s neckline, like three dozen stars strung together. Laura swallowed hard, watching the way her ladyship reached a trembling hand toward the fine collar of crystals. “Why do I not remember this necklace?” Lady Astraea asked the servant girl, her eyes catching on her reflection. “And these bracelets … truly, is one on each wrist a necessity? It seems quite garish. Especially over long gloves…” She reached for the clasp of one to undo it, but Laura’s hand was on her own, the girl’s voice thin but insistent.

“Milady, it is quite in keeping with the style in France. I do recall you mentioning having read so in one of the more popular journals before you ordered your own,” Laura assured. “I believe you said the style now is all a matter of balance of design. Which, I may only presume, is why even your shoes are thusly adorned.”

Lady Astraea raised her skirts modestly and stuck out the toe of one shoe for examination. “That seems quite wasteful. Who will ever see my shoes? I have not once danced a dance so immodest as to show off my feet and certainly never”—she blew out a little puff of air—“my ankles, for heaven’s sake.”

“Perhaps milady might yet find something about which to kick up her heels,” Laura suggested, carefully adjusting the smaller crystals threaded throughout her ladyship’s hair.

“I truly doubt I will have much of anything to celebrate now that my daughter is stolen and my good name is sullied.”

“They might yet make amends,” Laura whispered.

Lady Astraea snorted at the idea. “The Council? Make amends? You are so very young, dear, aren’t you?”

Laura blushed. “If by young you mean naïve … I suppose so, milady. But I have discovered much to assuage my naïveté in just these past few days. And much of it is far less than I ever wished to discover.”

“Life is full of disappointments,” Lady Astraea agreed, rubbing slowly at her gloved wrists. “But it is still life—still something we are expected to muddle through.”

Laura winked at her. “Why muddle through when you might dance through it instead?”

“Who has ever made a life for themselves by dancing through their existence? Oh.” She waved a hand at herself. “I must sit down. I do not feel quite … myself.”

Holgate

He pulled out his journal and let the pages flop open to the day’s date, the cover’s brass-tipped corners tapping against his desk as the book’s spine settled and flattened. The Tanks were nearly full again, even though there would be the inevitable shuffle from the Reckoning Tanks to the Making Tanks. Still, there was never anything quite like a full house …

Not far from his feet Meg played with the doll she called Somebunny.

Bran scoured the day’s pages, his finger skimming over his notes as he searched for the information he felt certain he had overlooked.

Received Today for Reckoning:

1 female…17…..Philadelphia….House Astraea….Jordan

2 males..5 and 18..German Towne..…House Merridale.…Patrick and Hussong

1 female……12..…Amity…..…House Jerard.………Sophia

1 male…23……New Baltimore…..House Ravendale…..Christian

7 males and females…4 through 9…Boston and Surrounding….Houses Martin, Arran, O’Connor, Sampson, Smith, Fenstermacher, and Andreia

His finger went back to the page’s top and he paused at one name in particular. Astraea. Why did that name seem so very familiar? He rose and stepped to one of the library’s many bookshelves, bumping his fingers across each spine as he read their titles aloud.

“Ah.” He stopped, pulled one out and opened it. The interior was lined with marbleized paper and the spine was trimmed in gilt design and lettering.
“The Hill Families of Philadelphia.”
He paged through it carefully until he found the Astraea entry. Walking back to his seat, he sat and propped his heels on the edge of his desk and leaned back, beginning to read.

The Astraea Family

The Astraeas trace a long and distinguished history of landholdings and titles back to the Old World and at the time of the Cleansing boarded a ship to the New World not due to political or religious reasons as many did but rather for the good of economic and territorial expansion. Having holdings in India where they own several hundred acres of tea plantations, and sugar cane plantations in the West Indies, the only thing the Astraeas lack is a suitable number of male heirs, the last generation yielding only Morgan Astraea, the only direct male family survivor of the Fever that swept the region. Losing his mother, his father, his elder brother, and one of his three sisters, Morgan became a risk-taker in business, and, at nineteen, swept up many entrepreneurial opportunities that the deaths of others left behind (expanding local holdings so they included two taverns, a clockmaker’s shop, a modiste’s shop, a haberdashery, two tea houses, and rumored holdings in the Below).

Morgan married Cynthia Wallsingham, the youngest daughter of Albertus Wallsingham (holder of the Wallsingham estates) after a three-year courtship, rumor being that he waited so long to see that her elder sisters bore children readily. Cynthia bore him three children nearly one on top of the other and all of them girls. The three, Morgana, Loretta, and Jordan, were taught the skills required of young ladies of standing including flirting and courting, embroidery and needlepoint, dance, music, and polite conversation. Morgana married up, Loretta married laterally, and Jordan, as of this edition, has yet to come of age.

The Astraea Holdings

Theirs is one of the oldest and grandest houses on the Hill. Three and three-quarters stories high and an architect’s nightmare, the house ambles across three acres, the original structure being built of fieldstone in a seemingly haphazard fashion, long flat stones jigsawed together in herringbone patterns creating a busy-ness of design that was at once striking and enough of an oddity that the last generation of Astraeas decided—rather than living in a stone spectacle—that section of the estate would house their growing multitude of servants. As a result, the servants are one of the best housed in all of Philadelphia, that too being a distinguishing oddity—and a costly one.

The interior of the house includes such luxuries as dumbwaiters, summoning bells, running water, decorative molding, wainscoting and chair rails, the first elevator in the New World, stormlighting—