by A. C. Cobble
The man who’d opened the door for them cleared his throat. “Duke Wellesley, please, you must understand we did not recognize you at first. If we did—”
“Answer the question,” he interjected. “We’re trying to solve a murder.”
“Robertson is the one missing,” offered Senior Inspector Gallen. He turned to the leader. “He did not come tonight?”
“He did not,” confirmed the leader. “When neither of you arrived on time, we elected to begin the ritual. I thought there must have been… We couldn’t miss the moon cycle.”
Sam snorted from the corner, her eyes boring into the back of Senior Inspector Gallen.
“It’s not real, I know,” muttered Gallen, his eyes on his feet. “Truly, I did not know the assassin was… I did not know the man was an associate of Robertson’s. I don’t know where the merchant is now.”
“Who is being initiated?” inquired Oliver, interrupting the inspector. “And whose spot are they filling?”
A young man, back pressed against the wall, raised his hand. “I-I’m to be initiated this evening, sir. M’lord, I mean.”
An older woman hovered protectively by his side, a hand reaching out to brush the edge of his robes.
Oliver dismissed the young man quickly and turned back to the apparent leader. “If he is being initiated, then who left?”
“Robertson’s wife,” said the man, shifting his weight nervously. “She left Robertson and Harwick two weeks ago. We do our initiations at the new moon, the height of its—”
Sam guffawed.
Oliver turned to her. “What?”
“First and third quarter,” she said, shaking her head. “First and third quarter moons are the height of its power. Half light, half dark, in balance, everyone knows… Ah, never mind. Duke, I do not think these people are involved in what happened at the apothecary. We should find Merchant Robertson.”
He turned and scanned the group one more time then demanded, “No one leave Harwick. No one speak of this outside of the group. No one remove or destroy any item associated with this society. Consider that a royal order. The harbormaster and railmaster will be given each of your names and descriptions with strict orders to keep you here. If you flee, I can only assume you were involved in the murder of a countess and crown inspector. Understood?”
They received quick, murmured assent, and Oliver led his party back out the door, waving for the trembling Senior Inspector Gallen to follow. They exited the home, and Oliver glanced between Sam and Gallen.
“I agree we should find Robertson,” remarked Sam, “but there’s more we could—”
“No,” replied Duke. “There may be more clues in that room, but we need to find Merchant Robertson before he hears what is happening and has a chance to flee. We can always come back to the Mouth of Set. Besides, we have the senior inspector with us, and I suspect he’s going to be very cooperative.”
Gallen rubbed his bulbous nose. “Robertson’s house, then?”
The house, befitting a mildly successful merchant, was vacant. Neither the man Robertson nor his servants answered when Oliver banged on the door.
“Is it usual for a house to be unattended like this in Harwick?” the duke demanded, staring at the senior inspector. “Not even night staff?”
The senior inspector swallowed. “I-I am not sure, m’lord. I have no servants of my own.”
Grumbling, Oliver instructed the man to batter down the door. The senior inspector shook it a bit, pushed on it, and then jumped when the duke snapped at him to get out of the way. He reared back and smashed a boot against the handle, bursting the door open on the first kick.
“Let’s go see what we can find,” said Oliver, stepping through the threshold.
The first thing of note that they found was the body of Merchant Robertson. He was lying dead in his study, just off the foyer, leaning back in the chair behind his desk. A bloody puncture in the center of his chest told them all they needed to know about his cause of death. The second thing of note was a slept-in guest bedroom with a trunk of clothing suitable for a lady of the peerage. The third thing of note was the body of Miss Robertson, a nasty slash across her throat, her body crammed into the icebox in the kitchen.
“They sent the servants away,” guessed Oliver, “Sometime after that, Miss Robertson was murdered. Unless the man hasn’t eaten food from the icebox in two weeks, her husband had to be in on it. It looks as if once the servants and wife were out of the way, he put up Countess Dalyrimple. She was killed three days ago, and he was killed sometime this evening.”
“It appears that way,” agreed Sam, “but why?”
The duke ran a hand over his hair, checking the knot in the back, and then shrugged. He had no answer to that. He glanced at Senior Inspector Gallen.
The man swallowed and held up his hands, “I was with you most of the evening, m’lord. I saw Robertson some few days past for pipes at the Cliffwatch, but nothing seemed amiss. I didn’t notice any distress or suspicious behavior.”
“You don’t notice much, do you?” chastised Sam.
Gallen looked away, his face beet red. Oliver thought the man showed honest remorse at the loss of Inspector McCready, even if he showed little else of value.
Wishing it wasn’t necessary, but with no other insight from Gallen, they shuffled through what they believed were the Countess Dalyrimple’s possessions and then returned to the study to look through the dead Merchant Robertson’s documents and effects. Oliver tried to ignore the man’s stiffening body as he brushed past it, opening the drawers in the desk.
“Robertson owned three vessels used in whaling, it seems,” remarked Oliver a quarter hour later, leafing through a thick stack of papers. “He could have brought her onshore from the United Territories easily, but I doubt any whaling vessel is seaworthy enough to make the journey to Archtan Atoll.”
Sam, standing from where she’d crouched by the merchant’s body, grunted in acknowledgement. She began to pace around the room, opening boxes and peering inside, shuffling through the knickknacks that were stored on a shelf behind the desk.
Suddenly, she turned, holding up a shining golden object. “What is this?”
“We used it at the equinox,” explained Gallen. “It… it’s an ankh.”
“It’s covered in golden paint,” muttered Sam. “To be effective, it would need to be pure gold.”
“I-I thought it was just some item Robertson had come up with,” stammered Gallen. “It… We never tried to do real, ah, real sorcery with it. We used it in a ceremony at the equinox. It’s just some iron, I think. Painted iron. Robertson claimed to have bought it in a market in the United Territories. Said it was from a merchant out of Archtan Atoll, but no one believed him.”
“The gem is real enough,” mused Sam, holding the ankh up and turning it so a blood-red ruby caught the lamplight. “It’s an accurate model of a true ankh, and the gem alone would sell for quite a bit. From Archtan Atoll, you said?”
Oliver glanced at Gallen. “The United Territories do not trade with Archtan Atoll. That’s a Company colony, and the harbor is restricted.”
Gallen shrugged.
“Duke,” said Sam. “We know the countess came from Archtan Atoll, but we do not know of any reason why she would be in Harwick or how she got here. The assassin that killed McCready had piercings typical of that place, and now this artifact is purported to be from Archtan Atoll as well?”
“It could be coincidence,” he said. He shrugged at her look. “Maybe it is not, but three points do not make a pattern.”
“No, not a pattern, but a line perhaps,” she said and then turned back to her inspection of the shelves.
He roved around the rest of the room, his fingers trailing over the objects in Merchant Robertson’s study, looking for… something. He stopped in front of the fireplace and knelt, peering at the charred wood and ash that hadn’t been swept off the bricks in weeks. Smiling, he noticed something and reached out to push a small scrap of c
har-fringed paper loose.
“What does it say?” asked Sam from behind him.
“I don’t know,” he said, “it’s the corner of a glae worm transmission. There is a unique multi-layered paper the operators copy the messages onto. One sheet is torn away and handed to the recipient, and the other is stored in the station for a time. It’s a relic of when my great grandfather first learned of the glae worms and had the filament inside of them extracted and stretched to form the transmission wires. He was worried the technology could be used against him and he thought keeping duplicates would minimize the threat, as if a band of potential rebels would be unwilling to bribe a station operator. Regardless, it appears Merchant Robertson had some message in the last two weeks that he felt was worth destroying. A record of it should be at the station.”
“I’ll get the carriage,” murmured Senior Inspector Gallen.
“Not much to it, is there?” complained Oliver.
“Enough, I think,” remarked Sam.
“Enough?” challenged the duke, shaking his head. “How do you figure? We know Robertson received the message, but we don’t know who sent it. I don’t even know why he burnt the thing. It’s total nonsense.”
“It’s code, a confirmation of receipt of what he sent,” speculated Sam.
“That is even more confusing,” grumbled Oliver. “None of this makes any kind of sense to me.”
He slapped the message down on the table, startling the filament operator, who appeared to be wishing he was anywhere but there.
He ignored the man and began to stalk back and forth across the tiny room. In the corner, Senior Inspector Gallen huddled, eyes closed, and Sam collected the paper the operator had handed them. She read it aloud:
“The Mouth is in the dark. The castle is empty. A box is prepared to hide the blessing. Your sacrifice and blood will pay for your rebirth. You shall rise and I with you.”
“The Mouth could refer to the Mouth of Set as Robertson was a member. Set is a powerful spirit in the underworld,” murmured Sam. “A prince, you might say, a bit above a duke…”
Oliver didn’t rise to take her bait. Instead, he turned from her and saw the senior inspector’s face rise in interest. He scowled at the man, guessing Gallen had no idea the name of his silly society referred to an actual spirit.
Continuing, Sam added, “The castle is empty. This was sent… two weeks ago? Approximately the same time Miss Robertson went missing. The box and blessing… I am not sure what those mean, but the sacrifice and blood undoubtedly refer to the ritual.”
“The countess died during the ritual,” remarked Oliver.
“You must die to be reborn,” retorted Sam.
“That’s rather grim, isn’t it?” asked the duke. “Cutting off one’s face to gain new powers?”
“No one said sorcerers are a cheerful bunch,” responded Sam. She continued to study the slip of paper, lost in thought. “There was a box in the apothecary’s quarters, was there not?”
“An empty one,” he responded.
“A blessing… A blessing could refer to a favor granted from the underworld,” murmured Sam. “The Church would call it a taint. A powerful enough spirit is rumored to be able to touch the world of the living unbound. Perhaps the spirit of Set granted some gift or touched something in Countess Dalyrimple’s possession?”
“And she and Robertson were attempting to hide it?”
“Unsuccessfully, maybe,” speculated Sam. “Why was she in Harwick? She could have been avoiding another sorcerer, trying to hide… something. She was too late or the ritual didn’t work, and they killed her and Robertson?”
“It appeared Robertson was killed by his own man,” reminded Oliver.
“But why?” asked Sam. “That man had been exposed to sorcery. Duke, he was a crewman on a whaling vessel, I doubt he was a secret sorcerer. That means someone else was in town, someone else aimed him at us… or at the inspector.”
Oliver grunted. “I don’t have a better theory.”
“It is just that, a theory,” admitted Sam.
“The other end was in Southundon?” the duke asked the filament operator.
Silently, the man nodded.
Oliver closed his eyes and reopened them. “We need those manifests from the Company. I’m confident we’ll find Countess Dalyrimple arrived on an airship to Southundon then perhaps traveled here in a public rail coach or even on one of Robertson’s whaling ships. I don’t think the other members of the Mouth of Set know anything, which means the trail goes cold here.”
In the corner, Senior Inspector Gallen let out a slow sigh. Duke eyed the man and shook his head, turning back to Sam.
“The trail here is cold,” she agreed. “I don’t expect we’ll find out much more in Southundon, though. Both the Crown and Company are well aware of her murder, now. If anyone in the ministry, the peerage, or the Company knew of her arrival, they would have commented on it. I believe if anything, we’ll find she merely passed through in secrecy on her way to Harwick.”
“If not Southundon, it goes back to Archtan Atoll,” agreed Oliver, grim-faced. “If she was involved in… in these types of things, the evidence of it would be there.” He sighed and stood. “We’ve accomplished what we set out to do in Harwick. We have an idea of what happened to the countess. We have enough to inform her husband the particulars, and we have a line of inquiry for the inspectors to pursue.”
“Shall I-I…” stammered Senior Inspector Gallen.
“I did not mean you,” snapped Oliver, glaring at the man. “You should do nothing except preserve the evidence and ensure the members of your society stay in place. I’m going to request an inspector from Eastundon tie up the loose ends here. That means talking to you and your friends. Gallen, whether you have a job, whether you see the light of the sun again, will depend heavily on the assistance you give that inspector. If you obfuscate, if you steer them astray, I will personally become involved again. I trust I do not need to detail what that will mean for you?”
“I understand,” mumbled the senior inspector, his face crestfallen.
“Sam, I’ll send a wire to my brother. Then, let’s collect our bags and catch the evening rail.”
The Director I
“You saw a copy of the transmission that arrived on the glae worm filament this morning?”
“Of course,” muttered Bishop Yates, crossing and then recrossing his legs.
Director Randolph Raffles tamped down the snuff in his pipe, pushing the dark leaves with his thumb. He collected a match from the smoking table and brushed it against the striker. He took his time drawing on the carved ivory pipe, pulling in the flame, igniting the leaves, inhaling the smoke, and exhaling a fragrant gray cloud.
Through the haze he watched Bishop Yates shift nervously. The man sipped at his sherry, not meeting the director’s gaze, not answering any of the obvious questions that were to come. The white ring of hair that surrounded the man’s bald head stuck out like he hadn’t brushed it since the night before. His robe, strained with the task of containing his prodigious belly in the best of times, looked rumpled from where Raffles guessed the man had been nervously clutching it.
A slender man attired in the tight gray livery and crimson red neckerchief of the Oak & Ivy appeared at his elbow.
“Sirs?”
“Another round of sherry, I think,” remarked Director Raffles. “Yates, will you be joining me for the evening meal tonight, or do you have somewhere to be?”
The bishop glared at him but didn’t respond.
“Dinner service for one, then. Perhaps in half a turn of the clock when I finish my pipe.”
“Very well, sir,” said the attendant before moving away to fetch their sherry.
“You know I’m not comfortable meeting in such a public setting, Director,” chastised Bishop Yates.
“There could be nothing more suspicious than me appearing at the Church so late in the evening,” reminded Raffles. “And you can’t be seen around Co
mpany House without raising the ire of your subordinate priests. What do you suggest, Yates? We hide somewhere in the shadows? Everyone knows you enjoy a sherry or two, and I’m at the Oak & Ivy several times a week. This is the most natural place we could meet. This early in the evening, we have the place practically to ourselves.” He waved around the sparsely populated smoking room.
The walls were adorned with luxurious polished-oak paneling on the bottom half and dark green paint on the top. Spaced at even intervals, half a dozen uniformed attendants waited to rush to the arm of a gentleman the moment they saw need. A line of heavily leaded windows let in the only light so early in the evening. All of the other over-stuffed leather chairs clustered in groups throughout the room were empty. Only a booth in the far corner was occupied with a pair of merchants huddled close, boxing in a shipowner. They had no interest in he and the bishop. From the way the merchants were pressing the unfortunate shipowner, he’d be half surprised if they’d even noticed the bishop come in.
Before taking another puff on his pipe, he advised, “Hide in plain sight, my man.”
Bishop Yates grunted and tossed back the rest of his sherry. The portly churchman glanced behind his shoulder, looking for the attendant.
“What did you think of Senior Inspector Gallen’s report?” wondered Director Raffles. “Sorcery here in Enhover? It’s sure to stir the interest of senior Church officials, don’t you think?”
“I will handle it,” muttered Yates.
“Will you?” questioned Raffles. “Who was the girl that Gallen mentioned? I thought you sent an older man to accompany the duke.”
“The Church has the apparatus to address matters like this, you know that as well as I,” snapped Yates. “The girl is part of our organization, an apprentice to one of our knives. I had asked her mentor, a man named Thotham, to accompany Duke Wellesley. For his own reasons, he sent the girl instead. It’s better this way, I believe.”