Waistcoats & Weaponry

by Gail Carriger

Sophronia rounded on him. “You!” There was no my lord. She pointed a finger into his chest. She was about two heads shorter and half his weight.

  He didn’t know how to respond. “Yes, little miss?”

  “You’re an Alpha, aren’t you?”

  “Of course, miss.”

  “True Alpha?”

  “Of course, miss!”

  “Bite him.”

  “What!”

  “Go on, bite him!”

  The dewan looked utterly confused at being ordered around by a small bundle of girl who was apparently quite insane.

  But Lady Kingair added her insistence to the demand. “I think you should, my lord. He’d make a fine werewolf. He’s a good lad, strong and fit, nice age for it. Healthy, apart from the bullet wound.”

  “But he’s”—the dewan struggled—“he’s not one of us!”

  Sophronia said, “You take lower class for clavigers all the time. In fact, we were taught that you prefer them, unlike the vampires. What’s wrong with Soap?”

  “He isn’t a claviger! He hasn’t been prepared. He hasn’t been trained in what to expect. He’s not ready. He’s not petitioned. He’s not paid his dues in service. It’s against the supernatural order.” The dewan protested. “He’s not from England!”

  “He most certainly is! He’s from Tooting Beck!” protested Sophronia.

  The dewan said, “I mean, his skin color!”

  “It’s a perfectly lovely color!” protested Dimity. Dimity, of all people.

  “He said he’d consider it. He was talking like he’d try, just the other night,” insisted Sophronia.

  Soap blinked at the argument going on around him. “Yes,” he croaked.

  “See that! Go on, then, you bite him, my lord, prove you’re the superior Alpha.”

  The dewan threw his hands up. “That is not how it works.”

  Sophronia scrabbled for something to threaten him with. She hadn’t a sundowner weapon. She hadn’t even a silver knife. The dewan was too strong for her to attack him outright, anyway; he’d simply brush her aside.

  She had nothing but bargaining left. And she could think of only one thing the dewan might want. She bartered herself. “Do this and when I’m trained I’ll indenture to you as an intelligencer. I’m good, you ask Captain Niall. And when I’m done, I’ll be even better. I’ll be the best there is, just so you won’t regret it.”

  Captain Niall said, “Miss Temminnick, is this wise?”

  The dewan seemed even more startled by this attempt at bribery, but he did pause. He looked down at Soap and then up at Captain Niall. “Is she that good?”

  “One of the best Mademoiselle Geraldine’s has had in a long while. She will be an asset to whoever holds her contract in whatever form.”

  Competitive instinct. Werewolves had a strong competitive instinct; Sophronia played on that. “Mrs. Barnaclegoose wants me.”

  “Mrs. Who?”

  She tried another one. “Lord Akeldama has already given me patron gifts.”

  “Has he, indeed?”

  That was a name he knew.

  The dewan appeared to be considering everything that had happened recently—the fact that Sophronia had kidnapped a train and scared off a duke. But he was no fool. Only a cautious werewolf could have survived so long a loner and sit in the queen’s shadow. “It’s a fair offer. But you understand our deal will stand whether my bite is successful or not?”

  Hope sprang in Sophronia’s chest. Hope and fear and horror, but mostly hope. “I understand Soap’s survival is not a matter of your ability. It is a matter of his soul.”

  “Or lack thereof. And you are willing to risk his life and your future on such a small chance?”

  Soap was limp and silent now, his eyes heavy lidded. They were running out of time.

  Sophronia took a breath, face still tingling with the strain. “I am.”

  The dewan nodded, decided. “Very well, then, I will try. It would be better, ladies, if you were not present. This is not a pretty undertaking. Captain, if you would?”

  Captain Niall limped around and forcibly picked Sophronia and Sidheag up, one under each arm, and carried them away. Meekly, Dimity followed, carrying Bumbersnoot under her own arm in a similar manner.

  Captain Niall deposited them down near the track, far enough away so they could not turn to see what happened, but not so far that they could not hear.

  It was not a pleasant symphony. There were slavering growls and groans, crunches and slurps, moans and cracks. Soap made barely any noise, too weak. There was no doubt he would have screamed if he could. Sophronia knew it was painful. Captain Niall said it hurt every time but it was worse at the beginning. It was an awful way to die, trying for immortality, and most people did die.

  Sidheag was sick all over the rail. This was a little startling, because she was the only one to have seen or heard such a thing before. Captain Niall held her steady and soothed her softly. Perhaps that was the problem, perhaps she knew too much of what was happening. And Soap was her friend, too. Sophronia tried not to think about it.

  Sophronia only sat, shaking. Had she damned Soap to a gruesome death, alone at the jaws of a beast? Had she made everything worse? Had she the right to make such a choice for him at all? Even if he had claimed that this was what he wanted. She had sworn she wouldn’t help, and now she’d made it happen. My word is worth nothing. Dimity huddled next to her, patting her futilely on one shoulder, telling her over and over again that it would be all right. Everything would turn out for the best, in the end.

  Eventually, the sounds stopped and the quiet of night descended and there was nothing but stillness.

  THE PARTING OF THE WAYS

  He will have to stay with me.” The dewan spoke softly over Soap’s sleeping form.

  There was blood smeared about the dewan’s mouth and down into the hair of his chest. He was trying futilely to wipe it off with a rag. It helped to think that he was a very sloppy eater and they had just finished a tomato soup course. Sophronia suppressed a hysterical thought—a Soap course!

  She was sitting with Soap’s head in her lap. It might have been awkward or embarrassing, particularly in public—although after everything that had happened, what did Sophronia care two figs for that anymore?—except that Soap’s head was that of a wolf. So was the rest of him. His fur was very thick and coarse and pitch black, like the coal for his beloved boilers. He’ll never float again, thought Sophronia. He lay in the deep sleep of an exhausted puppy, but his wounds were healing. Right before Sophronia’s eyes the bullet wound was closing and new fur growing over it. And his savaged neck, a gift from the dewan, was knitting back together like cloth under the invisible hand of an expert seamstress. The dewan had explained that newly made werewolves stayed in wolf form for the entirety of their first night. Soap had better do so, anyway, to accelerate his healing.

  “Stay with you? While you deal with the Kingair Pack?”

  “No, Miss Temminnick, I don’t believe you take my meaning. He’ll have to stay with me for a long time. I’m a loner, I have no pack, neither does he, but as I’ve shifted him”—there was pride in the dewan’s voice; to metamorphose a new werewolf successfully was rare—“he must stay with me to learn control. It’s my responsibility to teach him.”

  “How long will it take?” Sophronia was simply glad Soap wasn’t dead. Separation seemed a paltry price to pay.

  “Years, even decades.”

  That is a long time.

  “It depends on who he is.”

  That part, Sophronia could answer. “He’s a good man, my lord. You’ll like him. Smart and capable and hardworking and funny and fun and a leader, in his way, and…”

  “I understand, Miss Temminnick,” and he sounded as if he understood more than he let on, more than just her words, “but sometimes men are different as wolves.”

  “Not my Soap.”

  “We shall see.” The dewan finished with the rag and tossed it aside. If the cold night air g
ave him any trouble, he didn’t show it. “I might have to keep him a secret, for a while.” He didn’t explain the statement, but Sophronia smelled werewolf politics all over it. “I trust you and your friends will be discreet?”

  Sophronia arched a brow at him. “Intelligencer trained, my lord.”

  He chuckled as if at a joke, then sobered. “I won’t hold you to our bargain. A new werewolf is gift enough. It happens so rarely.”

  Sophronia was honestly surprised and even a little touched. “I keep my word, my lord. In this, if nothing else. If you’ll only allow me to finish my schooling first?” Plus, I have Picklemen to thwart. Like it or not, with one bullet Duke Golborne had decided Sophronia’s position. Every part of her was now bent on undermining his plans. She no longer cared what the Picklemen intended, she was going to stop them. No one shot her Soap!

  Captain Niall said, from where he was sitting with Sidheag nearby, “I’d take her up on it, my lord. You’ll be a good fit, all three of you.”

  The dewan nodded. “Very well. Patronage it is. And don’t think I’ve forgotten your commitment, Captain. We need to get back on the run as soon as this new pup has mastered his paws.”

  Sophronia asked, too casually, “Why do you need Captain Niall, sir?”

  “No hidden agenda there, little spy. He’s to take over as Alpha of Kingair. Always was the intent. I can’t leave them leaderless, not as I’m shipping them out with the Coldsteam Guards in a month. Exile as punishment for attempted treason. India is the best place for them, fighting on the front. Keep them distracted from their little plots. Keep them away from Lord Maccon.”

  Sophronia was confused. “But much as I respect the captain, he told us he isn’t a real Alpha.” He’d said as much to the students on several occasions, without any shame. Some werewolves were Alphas, some weren’t. Only Alphas think it matters. Frankly, I prefer not, he’d said. Alphas tend not to live all that long.

  “No, but he’s the best loner I’ve got in England right now. And he is a passing good military captain.”

  “Oh, thank you kindly, dewan.” Captain Niall did not look particularly upset by the insult. Perhaps it wasn’t an insult.

  As the dewan was to be her patron, Sophronia figured he might as well get accustomed to her questioning him, so she said, “But Captain Niall didn’t do anything wrong! It isn’t fair that he be punished with them.”

  “All too often, being a werewolf isn’t fair. Your friend there will have to learn that soon, too.”

  Sophronia reflected on her own reaction to Soap’s affections. “I think that’s one thing he’s accustomed to already, my lord.”

  The dewan said, “I think we can move him now.”

  “I have a suggestion,” said Sophronia. “If we could find some coal and get that train up and running—why not just take it north, as we intended? You can travel during the day and night that way, and won’t lose time tonight while Soap sleeps. You’ll have to take Sidheag with you, of course. She knows how to drive the train.”

  The dewan was intrigued despite himself. “I could declare the train property of the Crown. Vampires stashed some fancy tech on it, you say? Well, if the Picklemen want it, might be a good idea to hide it away in Scotland.”

  Sophronia heartily agreed. “Give the transmitter to Kingair. It’ll be safe in werewolf hands. It’ll be a little while before the pack leaves, correct? By then they will have made it impossible for the Picklemen or the vampires to retrieve it.”

  The dewan was looking at Sophronia with new eyes. “I see what you mean, Captain.”

  Sophronia continued to stroke Soap’s fur, unconcerned by this scrutiny.

  The dewan surprised her, though. “While you have been plotting, little miss, so have I.” He turned to look at Sidheag, who was sitting only slightly too close to Captain Niall.

  “It seems all this bother is because I ignored your request to join the pack, Lady Kingair. I realize now that even if I order you back to that school, you’ll keep running away. Send the pack off to India and next thing I know, you’ll stow away on a steamer.”

  Sidheag gave him an enigmatic look.

  Sophronia watched this exchange from under lowered lids.

  “You’re a little young for marriage,” said the dewan. His eyes were speculative.

  Sidheag looked startled at that.

  “But I think a long engagement would cover all but the sternest of societal sticklers. If you’re in foreign climes, no one will notice how long you take, and if you’re married by the time you get back, no one will be the wiser. Overseas campaigns can take decades.”

  Everyone was looking confused.

  Sidheag said, “I don’t follow, my lord.”

  “I’ll send the announcement to the Chirrup,” said the dewan to Captain Niall.

  Captain Niall nodded. He didn’t look upset, only resigned.

  Sidheag cottoned on at last. “Oh, dear me no! I mean, I couldn’t. I mean, I couldn’t force him into anything. What an awful thing to do!”

  “Enough. You cannot object to an arranged marriage. You, a single young lady, wish to take up residence with a pack of werewolves. Lord Maccon is gone, and in the absence of blood relations, you at least must be engaged!” The dewan was not to be argued with. Not again in the same night.

  Dimity piped up with, “He’s right, you know, Sidheag. And you could always cry off later, I mean overseas, if you really wanted to.”

  Sidheag looked sideways at the handsome werewolf captain. “You don’t object?”

  Captain Niall said, face impassive, “It’s a fair arrangement, and Miss Plumleigh-Teignmott is correct. It would help to cement my claim to Kingair Pack leadership, if I were engaged to the Lady of Kingair.”

  “That sounds sensible enough,” replied Sidheag, sounding a little disappointed.

  Then the werewolf smiled at her, shyly. “You’re far too young for me, of course. But with a long engagement, perhaps I might be given the chance to earn your affection?”

  Sidheag ducked her head, self-conscious. “I’d like that.”

  The dewan looked self-satisfied, as if he’d suspected this result.

  Dimity sighed at the romance of it all. “Imagine, a long overseas engagement, how marvelous!”

  Sophronia’s heart sank a little. First Soap and now Sidheag. Life was going to be lonely at Mademoiselle Geraldine’s. But she was excited for her friend; after all, this was what Sidheag wanted—to be with her pack.

  The dewan slapped his hands together and rubbed them, the clapping sound jarring in the damp night. “Good, that’s settled, then. Now I’m going to go see about some coal for this train of yours. Captain, if you’ll get the party there and settled? Ladies”—he looked severely at Dimity and Sophronia—“I’ll buy you two first-class tickets back to Wootton Bassett at the next station. And some proper attire.”

  Considering the fact that he was still naked, both girls giggled.

  The dewan trudged off into the night, to change shape behind a bush somewhere.

  Captain Niall stood and, like a proper suitor, kept his top hat held in the defensive position. He turned to offer Sidheag his free hand. “My lady?”

  Sidheag took it, graciously. Her long, angular face wore an expression of wonder that made it almost handsome. Whatever this relationship she develops with Captain Niall becomes, it will alter her forever. It wasn’t so awful a thing that Sidheag would not be returning to Mademoiselle Geraldine’s. She doesn’t need finishing school anymore, anyway.

  Dimity bumped against Sophronia. “Don’t be sad, you still have me and Bumbersnoot.”

  Captain Niall let go of Sidheag’s hand and scooped up Soap’s limp wolf body with one arm. He’d recovered entirely from his own bullet wound. Even though Sophronia knew from experience that Soap was no lightweight, Captain Niall made it look easy. Soon Soap, too, would boast that casual werewolf strength. Soon Soap, too, would have that controlled, powerful way of moving. Would he tie a top hat to his head? Sophronia w
ondered.

  She and Sidheag and Dimity trailed behind the captain back to the train.

  “An arranged marriage. Sidheag, are you certain you don’t mind?” asked Sophronia.

  “Who else would have me?” joked Sidheag.

  Dimity said, “You have excellent standing!”

  “And that’s about all I have.”

  “Do stop being silly,” reprimanded Sophronia, perhaps too sharply. She was exhausted by the physical and emotional trials of the last few days.

  Sidheag replied, startled into honesty. “He understands me, I understand him. Good marriages have been built on less.”

  “Why, Sidheag, could it be you are a little enamored with the good captain already?” Dimity’s eyes shone.

  Sidheag said, gruff and sharp, “Of course I am. Who at the school isn’t?”

  Sophronia understood that it wasn’t her own feelings that worried Sidheag. “He will learn to love you. You’re quite worthy of it.”

  “The way he cared for you after the masquerade, I rather think he fancies you already.” Dimity was disposed to be less practical on the matter.

  Sidheag nodded, looking optimistic. “We will learn to love each other; it will all work out in the end.” This was remarkably prosaic, even for her. “And I get to be with my pack, and I get to travel. That’ll be fun.”

  Dimity clasped her hands. “The grand tour!”

  “I hardly think fighting in the front lines of the British Army is a tour,” corrected Sophronia.

  Dimity sighed. “Why must you always crush my fantasies?”

  “Sorry, Dimity, forget I said anything. Well, Sidheag, I, for one, will miss you terribly. How am I going to take down all the Picklemen in England without you?”

  Sidheag laughed. “Oh, you’ll manage.”

  “I’ll help,” said Dimity. “And there’s always Bumbersnoot.” She patted the little mechanimal cheerfully.

  Sophronia grinned. “Quite right, we can’t forget Bumbersnoot.”

  The End

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