by Vered Ehsani
Nelly’s ears flickered, and she arose from her sleepy state to glance back at me.
“You know where he is?” I asked, grateful most people were still locked away inside. Then again, Nairobi dwellers were accustomed to stranger sights than a woman talking to her horse.
Snorting, Nelly began to trot with just enough energy to fling clumps of sticky mud upward. Now two-thirds of my skirt length was covered in an unwholesome pattern, and all for nothing. Rather than lead me to Prof. Runal’s home, Nelly continued down the length of Victoria Street toward the train station and halted in front of the constabulary.
Tugging at the reins, I said, “I’ll have you know that Mr. Rossenrode is considering opening a small glue factory next to his grocery store. And you do know what a key ingredient of glue is?”
Nelly sniffed at her front hooves, produced a clearly audible bodily eruption and promptly fell asleep.
“Really, what an impossible nag,” I muttered as I slid down and studied the squat, stone building. I suppose it was fitting that the constabulary should be a dismal and unappealing structure. After all, we wouldn’t want the town drunks and other nuisances spending the night in a welcoming place.
Despite being a relatively law-abiding citizen—at least when it suited me—I was far too familiar with the interior layout and decor. Both Simon and I had been interrogated for different crimes, and Simon had spent more than a few nights as the guest of Chief Constable Dougal. I’d also had the pleasure of stealing evidence from under the bed of another constable. It had all been for a good cause, mind you.
Leaving Nelly to her slumber, I mounted the three wooden stairs which led up from the street to the doorway. Using the edge of the top stair to scrape some of the mud from my boots, I entered the small reception area.
The building was stuffy, humid and stunk of mold, sweat, fear and whatever beverage Dougal had imbibed the night before. Facing the door, the man sat slouched over a messy desk. The only other objects in the room were a sorry-looking, wooden filing cabinet and two chairs. As with the man, all the furniture had seen better days. Through another door was a narrow corridor leading to the two holding cells.
Upon hearing the door slam shut, Dougal jerked awake and stared at me, his brow furrowed as if he couldn’t quite remember who I was. While I waited, I studied his mottled red skin, the bleary eyes and the spiderweb of red veins across his cheeks, none of which were the result of the equatorial sun.
“Ah, Miss Knight… er, Mrs. Timmons,” he spluttered as he stood.
“Busy night?” I asked, tapping my walking stick against a stubborn clump of mud sticking tenaciously against one boot. The clod broke loose and disintegrated into a pile of wet dirt.
“Ah, oh, yes,” he replied, glancing at the door leading to the cells. The movement almost caused him to topple. Only a shaking hand against the edge of his desk centered him. “A busy and strange night to end a peculiar week, ma’am.”
Considering our location, I wasn’t overly impressed by his statement. I only considered it strange if a week went by without some peculiar occurrence or sighting.
“Oh?” I said, my tone disinterested as I pondered how I would find Prof. Runal. Despite her obnoxious manners—or lack of any manners—Nelly was seldom wrong. Perhaps the werewolf had just departed after a friendly chat with the constable?
“Yes, ma’am, we’ve had a time of it, I can tell you,” Dougal bristled, perhaps detecting my doubt. He cocked his head toward the back door, his eyes narrowing as if he could see the current occupant of the holding cells. “Nothing you need concern yourself with, of course.”
“I’ll do my best not to,” I replied, trying not to inhale deeply. The constabulary’s stench was more pungent than usual.
As if encouraged by my lack of curiosity, the man continued, “It’s really nothing we can’t handle.”
Rubbing my nose, I said, “I’m sure.”
“Well, if you must know, my deputy swears to me he used one of the cells to lock up a stray dog last night,” Dougal mumbled and rubbed his eyes. “But this morning, instead of a dog, I found a naked man.”
Chapter Nineteen
IT TAKES A lot to astound me. A naked man dwelling in the prison cell at the other end of the corridor couldn’t do so; but learning that the unclothed man had been a dog the night before most definitely could. In fact, the news elicited from me a gasp.
“My apologies, ma’am,” Dougal hastened to add. “I didn’t mean to shock your delicate feminine sensibilities with my disturbing news.”
“Hardly,” I said with an indelicate smile which I quickly covered with a hand and a suitably ladylike cough. “I mean, it’s more than shocking.”
“It is, ma’am,” Dougal said and nodded with the gravitas the situation deserved. “I shouldn’t have mentioned it.”
“Indeed, not,” I said, searching for a befitting excuse to encourage Dougal to leave.
“He’s clothed now,” he continued to reassure me lest I faint away at the notion I was standing in the same building as a nude man. “Or rather, he has a blanket to… ah… cover himself.”
“One can only hope he’s putting the blanket to good use,” I said. “Well, speaking of naked men, I came to inform you that Charlie the Nell is making a spectacle of himself. Again.”
At the mention of Nairobi’s infamous lunatic, Dougal sighed and fell back into his chair. The dilapidated piece of furniture groaned and squeaked its protestations.
“You’d best go,” I insisted. “He has his fork out and is combing his chest hair in the lobby of the Stanley Hotel. It’s thoroughly unhygienic, and what will the touring hunters say when they return to London? That Nairobi is so ill-governed that we allow any sort of behavior. They’ll also think twice about using any of our silverware for eating.”
“Thank you, Mrs. Timmons,” Dougal said as he heaved himself into a vertical position. “I’ll see what I can do with Charlie.”
“You’ll do splendidly,” I said and followed him outside. I watched him meander down the street, in no apparent hurry to confront anyone, least of all a wide-eyed madman with a penchant for combing his chest hairs with a fork.
Once I was confident Dougal wouldn’t change his mind, I mentally apologized for the lie, slipped back into the constabulary and hastened down the narrow corridor to the two holding cells.
The cells were furnished even more meagerly than the reception area, each boasting one wooden bench upon which lay a thin, soiled mattress. A narrow window across from the cells allowed in some light and musty air. Within one of the cells, wrapped in a grungy, gray blanket and projecting an air of utter dejection was none other than Prof. Runal.
“Beatrice,” my former mentor and employer spluttered as he began to stand, then thought better of it when the movement threatened to expose his legs.
Averting my gaze, I waved at him. “Please, do remain seated. I insist.”
“Yes, I suppose you’re right,” Prof. Runal said as he lowered himself to his bench. “Quite right, indeed.”
The creaking of the bench reassured me he was once again seated. Clearing my throat, I lifted my chin but before I could launch my hastily prepared speech, the old werewolf said, “I do apologize, Mrs. Timmons, truly I do.”
Frowning, I studied my two hands as they clenched the top of my walking stick. “And for what do you apologize? I suspect you have a number of crimes from which you can select.”
He didn’t reply immediately. In the resulting silence between us, I stroked the skeletal prosthetic fingers of my left hand, admiring the smooth metallic surface. Through the window behind me, the rumble of wheels and the hee-haw of a donkey floated.
“I suppose all of it,” Prof. Runal finally said, his booming voice echoing against the damp stone walls. “All I’ve done or have somehow approved for others to do, either through my action or inaction.” He rubbed a beefy hand across his chin, creating a scratchy sound of skin against beard.
Swallowing hard, I asked
, “Why are you here? How did they catch you? You’re normally more in control than that. How foolish of you. How will you ever explain it all?”
Prof. Runal shrugged as he peered up at me. “They’ll explain it themselves, and blame it on the constable who put me in here. Does it really matter?”
“No,” I said, turning away from him. “No, I suppose not.”
Shifting his weight, he leaned against the stone wall. “Do you know they dismissed me from my role as Director of the Society for Paranormals?”
Shrugging, I glanced around the dismal space. “I surmised as much.”
“And after all my years of service,” he said, studying his clasped hands. “Decades of service. They banished me to this outpost, sent away to redeem myself. Or not.”
Huffing a short laugh, I touched one of the bars. It was cold and unyielding. “Well, that makes more sense. I find it hard to imagine you voluntarily moving to this place. Then again, it’s rather poetic, really. After all, you arranged our transfer here, forcing the Steward family into bankruptcy to achieve your plan.”
“For your protection.”
I snorted, wondering why I’d bothered to visit the old wolf.
As if divining my thoughts, he asked, “And why are you here, Beatrice?”
The door to the other cell was open; I strolled in and sat on the bench, facing Prof. Runal with only iron bars between us, bars and a chasm of lies and years. I shuddered as I visualized what it would be like to be locked up in this place. Underneath my boots and against my back, rough, heavy blocks of stone emphasized the impossibility of escape. How had Simon managed living in such a condition, especially when he had been innocent of any serious crime?
“Beatrice?”
“It’s nothing,” I muttered and stood up, the smallness of the cell suffocating me. “But you’re probably where you deserve to be, even if you didn’t try to kill me that night.”
Wood creaked as the man shifted under my accusation. “So you remember?”
“Nightmares, dog,” I spat as I thumped the metal tip of my stick against the stone. “I replay my parents’ death every night in my dreams. And you’re there. You were always there. You let them die.” Glancing at him, I whispered, “But not me.”
“Of course I didn’t,” he said, his voice soft. “I couldn’t let you die.”
Glaring at him, I dropped my walking stick, marched to the bars separating us and gripped two of them. “Of course you didn’t? But you had no issue condemning my parents to death, did you?”
“Some things are bigger than us, Beatrice,” he said but he couldn’t meet my gaze.
“Of course they are,” I snarled. “The Society—”
“No,” he interrupted, standing up and staring at me, his werewolf eyes glowing yellow. Gripping the blanket with one beefy hand, he held up the other hand. “Love. Love was bigger than anything I had at that time. Bigger even than my orders.”
“Love,” I repeated, stepping back but unable to release the bars.
Prof. Runal clenched and unclenched his free hand. “You don’t believe me capable?”
“What does that have to do with any of this?” I yelled, kicking at the bars and grateful for the pain it caused my foot. Physical pain was bearable; it would pass.
“Your mother was condemned before you were born,” he said, pacing before me. “Condemned, Beatrice. Not by me. Never by me. Even when she rejected…” He paused, his hand raised in a fist. “Even then, I protected her as long as I could, more than I should have. But there’s a limit to everything.”
Before I realized how close he was, he was standing before me, his large hand clutched over my human hand, trapping it against the cold, unyielding bars. The heat of his nearness warmed my skin. “I protected her until I could no longer do so.” His yellow gaze pierced me. With every word, he squeezed my hand. “And then, for her sake, in her memory, I protected you.”
Shaking, I tugged at my hand but he wouldn’t let go.
“Even as a child, you were powerful,” he continued, his gaze softening. “And they knew it. The real leaders of the Society, the men lurking in the shadows behind the Director, they knew what you could become. And they wanted nothing more than to rid themselves of the potential threat. The daughter of the most powerful witch of the century, half vampire with the energy of a werewolf and powers as-yet untapped.” He sighed. “What a marvel you are. They only let you live when I convinced them I could control you.”
“Why…” I paused, detesting the snivel in my voice, the tremor in my hand. “Why didn’t you ever tell me then?”
He shook his head, hair flinging around as he sniffed. “I was a coward, Beatrice, a miserable coward.”
I had my own theory: he had always been a loyal servant to the Society; it was his first love, if indeed he was capable of such an emotion. Love. My mind retreated from exploring what he’d meant by his statement about love.
Perhaps sensing my doubt, he leaned closer, his large nose almost touching a bar. “I didn’t want you to know that your parents had been murdered, Beatrice. I was afraid you’d ask questions, and that’s never a safe thing to do, not then, not there. It wasn’t safe.”
Finally, he let me go and gestured around him. “And that, my dear, is why I am here.”
I closed my eyes before the moisture gathering there could burst forth. The bars alone kept me upright until I could muster my energy.
“I’m proud of you, Beatrice,” he continued, his voice embracing me with the tenderness of a father.
But he’s not my father, I reminded myself even as the tension in my shoulders loosened.
“I’ve always been proud of you, even from afar,” his words caressed my heart. “You have so much potential, so much more than you know.”
“Koki is training me,” I said before I even realized I wanted to tell him. The knot in my throat and the burning in my eyes faded as I continued, “She’s already taught me a lot.”
“Good,” Prof. Runal said. “That’s very good, my dear. You must continue, persevere, until you have mastered your potential.”
I opened my eyes and stared at him, stared at this creature who had been such a powerful force in my life. Perhaps he had in fact resisted the Society’s orders for as long as possible. And I could well believe those orders included the murder of a child; such were the shenanigans one could expect from those who manipulated the inner workings of the Society for Paranormals.
Despite all the wrong he’d done, what would I be now without Prof. Runal’s presence in my life? Either dead, or even worse, an ignorant woman miserably going through the motions of normalcy even as her inner truth suffocated under the injustice of life as a second class citizen in Victorian England. Certainly I wouldn’t be here, far from the machinations of the Society and the oppressive expectations of English society, married to a devoted man and pregnant with our child.
My hands unclenched from around the bars. Impulsively, I stretched out and placed my hand on Prof. Runal’s arm. “Perhaps, once you get yourself out of here, you can pop by the shop for a cup of tea?”
A tentative smile appeared behind his beard. “I’d like that, Beatrice. Yes, I’d like that very much.”
Stepping out of the cell and into a patch of sunlight sneaking through the narrow window, I smiled and said, “So would I.”
Chapter Twenty
“IF IT WAS up to me, I’d decapitate him.”
As such a statement was entirely within the realm of possibility with the she-demon, I ceased trying to chat with the birds and stared at Koki.
Shrugging, she tilted a hip to one side and lifted one hand to admire her long nails. “What? The world would be a safer place without that dog.”
Nelly stretched her neck over the stall door and chewed at a corner of Koki’s simple, flowing red dress.
“That dog,” I said, “deserves a second chance. And even if he doesn’t, I want to give him one, as I gave you, Koki.”
“I earned it,” s
he said, swatting at Nelly and frowning at me.
“I have to say I agree with the insect,” Gideon whispered as he floated through the barn rafters, playfully chasing Shelby.
“Those are words I’d never thought I’d hear,” I said as I stretched my arms and massaged the knots in my shoulders. How long had we been in the barn, practicing how to talk to birds? And had we missed afternoon tea? It certainly felt like it.
Koki pushed away from the pillar she was leaning against, stepped to my side and touched my arm. “Be careful with him, Miss Knight. He has a lot to atone for. Don’t take him at his word for he can be deceitful. Complicated. As long as he’s alive, he’s dangerous.”
“And he did kill your first husband,” Gideon called out from above. “Don’t forget that. Your best husband, too, I might add.”
Shaking my head at the both of them, I pursed my lips. “I know he’s no angel, but he did the best he could in an awkward situation.”
“Awkward.” There was a heavy pause. “Is that what murder is called these days?” Koki said, her full lips twitching into a smirk as she brushed Nelly’s drool off her dress.
Nelly snorted and peeled her lips in a horsey laugh. Somewhere on the rafters above us, Shelby screeched until Koki wagged a finger at the monkey.
“It was the Society’s orders, not his,” I said, sinking onto a square bale of hay. Pushing damp strands of hair off my forehead, I watched as the birds—several weavers—flew out the barn in a twittering cloud of yellow.
“You lost your birds,” Koki murmured as she sauntered to Nelly’s side and stroked the horse’s nose. Simon’s horse and the ox retreated deeper in their stalls, eyes rolling at the proximity of a formidable predator in their midst.
Using the sleeve of my shirt, I wiped sticky dampness off my neck. “Who knew talking with birds could be so tiresome? Birdbrains, indeed.”
Glancing sideways at me, Koki clicked her tongue once. “Your lack of focus is a reflection on you, not on the birds. I do hope your offspring fares better in that department.”