The Clockwork Wolf

by Lynn Viehl

  I didn’t understand most of what he was saying, but I knew one thing. “I don’t have it.”

  “You will.” He drew his thumb across my brow, sending some powder to shower down my face. “Now you sleep.”

  Since I didn’t have enough sense to hold my breath that was exactly what I did.

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  “I can’t wake her,” Rina said somewhere near me. “I think that native at the station must have slipped her something.”

  “How long has she been like this?” That was Dredmore, and he sounded even angrier than Rina.

  “Since I took her from the cops.” Footsteps came close. “You’ll be gentle.”

  “Always.”

  I opened one eye to a slit. The bed I occupied was large, sheeted, and canopied by gray silk, and smelled of sandalwood. The spike-and-fist crest embroidered on the pillowcase’s hem confirmed my location.

  Somehow I’d gone from police custody to Lucien’s bed—but why would Rina deliver me to him?

  “Why did you bring her to Morehaven?” Dredmore asked, as if he could hear my thoughts.

  “So she could apologize to your bloody driver, what do you think?” My best friend’s hand gently touched my brow. “I know Kit doesn’t believe in magic, but with all that’s happened to her it has to be a curse or something evil. I don’t like you, but you’re a deathmage, and you fancy her. To my mind you’re the best chance she’s got.”

  “I am the only chance she has.” The bed dipped on my right, and larger, stronger hands took hold of my arm. “Did you see the native who did this?”

  Rina made a disgusted sound. “No one did. That shaman put out all the lights and used some sort of confounding spell on the rest of us before he went to work on Kit. We found her on the floor.”

  Dredmore was still touching me. “I will have to remove this.”

  Now I opened my eyes. “You’re not taking off my arm. I’m rather attached to it.” I glanced down and saw that he was unwrapping a gray and white fur from the offending appendage. “Father and Son, what is this?”

  “A native dressing, I believe.” Dredmore caught my hand and pushed it away. “No, let me see what was done.”

  As he did, I glared at Rina over his head. “Perhaps he should look at your head next. The shaman must have nicked your brains.”

  “Without some help you’re going to die, you daft twit.” She leaned over Dredmore’s shoulder, nodding as he bared my arm. “She’s not bleeding. Maybe he meant only to heal her.”

  “Then why would he do it in the dark?” I demanded. All I could see were bits of bone strung on some sort of vine that had been wrapped from my elbow to wrist. “Cut them off,” I told Dredmore.

  “Calm yourself.” He took out a blade and sliced through the vine. As soon as he freed me I sat up and pushed aside the coverlet. “You’re too weak to get up.”

  “Piss off.” I swung my legs over, stood, and wobbled for a moment before I took a step. Then I fell on purpose into Rina’s arms. “Whatever you do,” I muttered to her, “don’t leave me here with him.”

  “You’re better off, love,” Rina murmured, patting my back. “I can’t look after you in the city, not with those things chasing about after you. Besides, he’s so besotted he’ll do anything to keep you alive.”

  “That’s not exactly reassuring,” I told her.

  “You know I’d stay if I could, but I’m needed at the Nest. We’ve an epidemic of belly gripe. Felicity won’t eat, and Janice, poor gel, hasn’t kept down a meal in days.” She gave Dredmore a narrow look. “I’ll be back to look in on you tomorrow.”

  “Your faith in me is most gratifying, madam.” Dredmore took me from her, lifting me like a child to put me back in bed. “I must have a word with your friend. You are to rest, and not to get up.” He leaned down to say the rest for my ears alone. “If you do again, I’ll shackle you to the posts.”

  “How kind you are.” I suddenly understood why the Wolfmen were so fond of biting. “I feel better already.”

  Dredmore left with Rina, giving me an opportunity to examine my arm closely. The burning had stopped, but the flesh was still tender and the entire limb ached like a tooth going bad. My hand proved nearly useless; I could hardly bear to twitch my fingers.

  With my good hand I picked up a piece of the bones the shaman had knotted round me, which bore saw marks on either end and thin vertical markings scored all round the outer edges. In the marrow hollow I found a bit of green leaf, folded tightly, and removed it. Inside the folds was a fragment of feather in the same vivid blue as the shaman’s cape. The rest of the bones held the same odd stuffing.

  For the first time I felt frustrated by my ignorance of native magic. If the shaman had meant to harm me, he might have easily cut my throat in the dark. The tribes preferred that manner of attack, for it silenced the victim and put an end to him quickly. Binding my arm with this gruesome business might well have been an attempt to heal me; the shaman had killed the second Wolfman.

  Why save my life and risk his own again to attend to me at the station? Did he really believe I could give back to the tribe whatever had been taken from them?

  As I brooded over the night’s events, Dredmore returned, this time alone and carrying a tray of tea. He set it down and poured a cup, bringing it to me. “You must be thirsty.”

  Absently I blew on the surface of the steaming brew before I took a sip and sighed. “I’ve decided to steal Winslow from you. Will he work in far more congenial surroundings for almost nothing, or should I first rob a bank and buy a better house?”

  “There is no better house,” he assured me as he peered down at my face. “Your color is a little improved. Mrs. Eagle said she heard the shaman speaking to you, but could not make out the words. What did he say?”

  I set down my cup. “I’ve been thinking on it, but it made no sense to me.” I repeated the native’s instructions before I added, “The tree-man, that could be Lykaon. The spirits of the Aramanthan were imprisoned in that oak grove by the Druuds, and he is using native magic. Perhaps this War Heart the shaman wants back was the spell he stole.”

  “A spell cannot be cast by words alone,” Dredmore told me. “Something must be paired with them to provide the necessary power. We use stones and runes, as the Aramanthan once did, but the natives use blood ritual.”

  I made a disgusted face. “You mean animal sacrifice.”

  He inclined his head. “They are fiercely protective of their magic. The shamans educate their apprentices only by words spoken in a place of complete isolation. No Torian has ever been permitted any real knowledge of their practices.”

  I gave him an ironic look. “Yet somehow you know the manner in which they teach it.”

  “I like to take long walks in the hills.” He picked up one of the bones. “This is a piece of a small animal’s leg bone. Fox, perhaps.”

  “Blue fox.” My head ached as I said the words. “He chanted those words when he was binding me. He also said little fox.”

  “The natives often take animal names.” Dredmore unfolded one of the leaves and held up another bit of blue feather. “The shaman wore this color?”

  I nodded. “A cap covered with those feathers. Foxes are little, I suppose, but they’re not feathered or blue.”

  “Blue Fox is a name, and given his penchant for the color, probably his.” He produced a small leather bag and carefully put all the vines and bones into it before tying it. “And, if I am interpreting his works correctly, you are Little Fox.”

  I scowled. “I certainly am not.”

  He seemed amused. “As you like. The manner in which he bound you suggests a healing ritual, but the leaves and feathers inside the bones appear to be a different sort of invocation.”

  “Regret for slaughtering a small animal for no bloody good reason?” I suggested.

  “No. One does not relinquish bits of a medicine cloak out of regret.” He tucked the leather bag under my pillow. “I think he meant to extend hi
s powers to cloak you. To protect you, Charmian.”

  “Magic doesn’t work on me,” I reminded him as I removed the bag and tossed it over the side of the bed. “The Aramanthan knows it now, too.”

  “Mrs. Eagle said one of the Wolfmen had managed to bite you this time.” He touched the back of his hand to my brow. “No fever. Do you feel any nausea?”

  I didn’t like how solicitous Dredmore was being; it wasn’t in his nature to fuss like a worried mother. “No, and why do you ask?”

  He took a charred bit of metal from his pocket. “Lady Bestly sent this to me by tube with a note explaining what had happened at her home.” He turned it. “It’s hollow-tipped, and there is part of a valve inside.”

  “I’m sure Docket would understand that,” I said, “but my knowledge of mech is limited to things like steamdogs and carri controls.”

  “Lykaon mechanized the teeth to do more than bite.” Holding the charred metal over the tea tray, Dredmore poured a few drops from the pot into the tooth. When he touched the hollow tip with his finger, the tea dribbled onto his skin. “Whatever is put in the teeth is transferred by the bite.”

  Now I understood why he was worried. “Poison?”

  He used a napkin to dry his hand. “That, or perhaps blood. It is an important component of native rituals.”

  “Yes, and now I am nauseated,” I informed him, but my mind was working away at what he’d told me. “Lady Bestly was bitten by her husband, and so were Rina’s girls when they were attacked in the park. All of the Wolfmen tried to bite me, too, but this was the first one who succeeded, and only because he had mechanized teeth.” I looked at him. “Lucien, were any of the men who were attacked bitten?”

  He shook his head. “The Wolfmen use their claws on them.”

  “The market tram was filled with women.” And the Wolfman had gone berserk trying to get inside. Only I had been able to lure him away . . .

  Felicity won’t eat, Rina had said. And Janice, poor gel, hasn’t kept down a meal in days.

  “Me. Lady Bestly. Rina’s girls and the lady in the park.” I looked at Dredmore. “The men are being attacked only because they’re getting in the way.”

  His dark eyes narrowed. “In the way of what?”

  “I think Lykaon is sending the Wolfmen out to find women. To hunt them.” I yanked the coverlet aside. “We have to go to the morgue and see the bodies from the Hill.”

  “Not until after sunrise.” When I tried to argue he nodded at the bedposts. “Shackles will make your slumber very uncomfortable.”

  “I’m not sleeping here.” If what I suspected was true, I would also need more help than Dredmore could provide. “I must summon Harry.”

  Dredmore’s expression darkened. “To my home? I think not.”

  “Don’t be tiresome—and don’t try to bespell my grandfather again,” I added. “It absolutely infuriated him.”

  He folded his arms. “That is hardly discouraging, Charmian.”

  “This is why you have no friends,” I told him before I closed my eyes. “Come on, Harry. I need you here.”

  The air chilled as a patch of mist appeared at the foot of the bed. Instead of forming itself into my grandfather, it stretched upward and crackled with miniature streaks of lightning.

  “I am Merlin, master of all mages,” a terrible voice boomed, the sound causing the very windows to rattle. “Those who trifle with me and mine do not live to regret it.”

  “Dredmore is very sorry about casting that spell on you,” I told him quickly. “Aren’t you, Lucien?”

  My host gave me an ironic look. “Decidedly.”

  The little bits of lightning stopped, and the mist took on more solid form. “Back in his clutches again, I see.” Harry inspected me. “And now his bed. Haven’t you an ounce of self-respect, gel?”

  “It wasn’t my idea.” I told him about the Wolfmen attacking me at Lady Bestly’s. “I need you to pop over to Rina’s and check the two women there who were attacked in the park.”

  “I’m not a physick,” Harry complained.

  I nodded. “But you are the only one who can tell if they’ve been possessed by Aramanthan spirits.”

  • • •

  Once Harry was dispatched to check on Felicity and Janice I finished my tea and regarded the sorry state of my gown. “Did Rina happen to leave a change of garms for me?”

  “She did not.” Dredmore went to the armoire and opened it to sort through the gowns hanging inside.

  I joined him. “Should I ask why you have an armoire filled with women’s clothing in your bedchamber?”

  “This is not my bedchamber.” He took out a rose-colored waterfall of organza and satin with gilt braiding and delicate embroidery of cascading amaryllis. “You can wear this.”

  I made a rude sound. “To an evening at the opera, perhaps.”

  I took the gown from him and put it back, selecting instead a dark blue paneled skirt with a green and neatly tailored plaid dress jacket. Although the silvery half-lace bodice and the handkerchief hemming were somewhat fripperish for my taste, and the entire ensemble probably cost more than I made in a year, at least I wouldn’t look destined for the ballroom.

  “This will do.” And then, because I couldn’t help myself, I said, “These are very fine. Your lady friends never came back to claim them?”

  “None of them have ever been worn.” He closed the doors to the armoire. “The other things you’ll need are in the dresser there.” He headed for the door.

  “Lucien.” I waited until he looked back at me. “Whose gowns are these?”

  “Yours.” His lips twisted. “I had them made for you,” he said softly, and out he went.

  After that admission I had to have another look in the armoire, which contained three dozen gowns made of the finest fabrics and tailoring and suitable for every possible occasion.

  “But no wedding dress. How remiss.” I stalked over to the dresser and began opening drawers. They were filled to near overflowing with chemises, waisters, petticoats, and tiny little under drawers made of linen, cambric, and Nihon silk in snow white and flowery pastels.

  “Sweet Mary.” I held up one evil-looking confection in jet black satin trimmed narrowly with scarlet velvet, also sized exactly for me. “Just because my best friend is a harlot doesn’t mean I am.”

  I picked out the plainest undergarments I could find, scowling as I stripped and donned them. The scanty things were sinfully comfortable, naturally, and the gown fit as if the seamstress had been dressing me for years.

  Before I put on the dress jacket I checked the gown-maker’s label, and found the initials SD along with the hand-inked face of a smiling, sleeping maiden—the hallmark of the ton’s favorite gown maker and the most exclusive dress shop in Rumsen, the Silken Dream.

  “Bridget.” I jerked on the jacket and did up the jet buttons, wondering how hard it had been for Dredmore to persuade my friend to make up the dreamy wardrobe for me. “I hope you got at least a thousand pounds out of him before you sewed up this lot, you traitor.”

  I tried to brush my hair into some order, but it was a tangle of hopeless snarls. I also found a thumb-size patch of too-short hairs on the side of my nape; someone had cut away a short tress.

  My old boots looked dreadful beneath the silvery lace hem of the glowing paneled skirt, but I stubbornly buttoned them up before I stomped out of the bedchamber. Outside I found Winslow coming to intercept me.

  “Welcome back to Morehaven, Miss Kittredge,” he said, giving me a polite bow. “I am happy to see you have regained your senses.”

  “So I am, Mr. Winslow. Thank you for the tea.” I peered down the hall. “Where is the Master of Connivance?”

  “His lordship asked that I escort you to the viewing gallery,” Winslow said.

  “I have to go to the morgue—”

  “So you will, miss, very shortly.” The butler made a calming gesture. “The master wished me to say that the ice encasing your animech rodent has n
early melted, and you may want to observe his examination of it.”

  I pressed my palm to my brow. “Bloody hell, I forgot about the rat.”

  “It has been an eventful night.” Winslow indicated the center stairwell. “This way, please.”

  I followed the butler up to the third floor of the house and into a corridor that had been recently renovated, judging by the smell of fresh paint and recently sawn wood. “Has Dredmore been redecorating?”

  “The master had the gallery relocated from the second floor last month,” Winslow said as he directed me into one of the rooms. “To provide a safer place of observation for a particular guest.”

  Inside the room I was astonished to see three of the four walls and the entire floor had been replaced by enormous sheets of glass, which stopped me in my tracks.

  “The glass is very thick, miss,” Winslow assured me. “It will not break.”

  I took a cautious step forward, feeling a bit disoriented as I glanced down into another, seven-sided chamber with a dark oak floor that had been precisely inscribed with hundreds of runes. In the center stood an obsidian pedestal upon which sat the ice-encrusted rat in a pool of melted water. It didn’t move, so I assumed it was still partly frozen. Then the glitter of the walls drew my gaze, and I saw every surface had been covered in large tiles of orange rock that sparkled with millions of gold flecks.

  I recognized the rock, of course. “Is that tangerstone on the walls?”

  “It is, miss.”

  I blinked. “It’s flawless.”

  “I believe so, miss.”

  I stared at the butler. “Winslow, in the city they charge fifty pounds an ounce for tangerstone, and that’s for the cracked, damaged sort. I don’t even know how much an ounce of perfect costs.”

  “Rather more than fifty pounds, miss,” he said.

  One of the stone panels opened into the chamber as Dredmore entered in a spell-casting cloak made of mirror weave. I’d seen less elaborate versions with a few of the tiny round looking glasses stitched onto gilded cloth, but every inch of Dredmore’s sparkled.