God’s grace: a typical Grayle interpretation of the Landing.
I peered through the glass at the guard. What was taking him so long? Perhaps he did not know who I was. He was young enough to have been a child when, ten years ago, the sixty plague ships from the stars crash-landed across the Earth, nine on the estate of my husband, the Earl of Grayle. The fleet was full of dead and dying Celestials from a faraway planet, pleading for help. Instead of help, however, my husband and his family had waited for all of the visitors to perish from their singular plague, then cleaned out the craft with amber and saltpeter and captured all nine without bloodshed. Voila! An instant transport monopoly in England, and one of a four-pronged oligopoly across the rather astonished and rapidly expanding world.
“Our scan indicates a further weapon. Place it in the tray, please.”
“I suspect you do not know who I am,” I said.
Another man—of higher rank and sourer expression—joined him. The new arrival bent and whispered something in his subordinate’s ear. From the chastened look on the boy’s face, he had just been roundly informed of his ignorance.
“I beg your pardon, Countess Grayle. Of course the wary knife can pass with you.”
Of course she could, since she could kill them in an instant if they tried to disarm me. I stroked my silk-clad forearm where Havarr lay sheathed under three layers of my skin. In my mind, I felt the knife’s sentience check my intent, then sigh and settle back. Nothing interesting to see or slice here.
Not yet, anyway.
Both men saw me stroke my arm and quickly crossed themselves. I had seen it so often that it usually did not register, but today it stung.
I was an abomination, a danger to all; everyone knew women did not have the strength of mind or emotional control to wield a wary knife. Especially a woman of the bon ton born only for decoration and breeding heirs, neither of which I had managed to supply in my marriage. Indeed, my husband had privately stepped away from me soon after I partnered Havarr. What man would wish to consort with a woman who was no longer the weaker sex? To be fair, Charles did not totally abandon me: he made it clear to the world that I was still under the political protection of the Grayle family name.
All name, no family.
Still, I had Havarr. Her abrupt entry into my life three years ago had been a terrible—and glorious—accident.
I had been driving my gig to neighbor’s estate and came across a man sprawled upon the road, thrown from his horse. Sir Paul Denby, one of the Wary Brotherhood. I went to his aid, fearing I was too late, but at my touch, he opened his eyes and grasped my forearm.
“Thank God,” he rasped, red spittle wetting his lips. “My knife says I’ve a minute left. It is willing. Are you?”
“Willing? To do what?”
“Partner it. Say yes or it will be untethered. It will kill everything in its path, including you.”
When the wary knives first emerged from the Celestial ships, the carnage had been horrific. Fifty knives powered by some unimaginable sorcery, flying through the air and dismembering everything in their path. Eventually, it was discovered that the knives had to be tethered to a living being to control them and, one by one, they were captured by brave men willing to risk death for such power. And so, the Wary Brotherhood was founded: thieftakers, peacekeepers, and undefeatable force, sworn to uphold the Crown.
“Yes. I’ll partner it,” I had said. What else could I do?
A second later, excruciating pain blazed along my arm and into my head, slamming all the breath from my body. That is all I remember for I woke up upon the road with Sir Paul dead beside me and a wary knife quiescent within my arm, her sentience a curled kernel of potential inside my mind.
The uproar had been both private and public. It did not seem to matter to my husband, the Church, or the Crown that I quickly controlled Havarr. That was beside the point: a woman with a wary knife was, by nature, a threat to public safety. The Prince Regent politely asked me to retire to the family estate. The Wary Brotherhood was not so polite. They banned me from their membership: a woman had no right to hold a knife or sully their righteous order. Without support from any direction—including my own family—I retired to Grayle Hall. For the past three years I had studied every theory about the Celestials, trained to fight with Havarr, and received those friends who trusted my strength of mind enough to take tea with me and my knife.
Would all that training be enough to save me now?
The older RCP soldier leaned to the transmittere. It let out a mechanical crackle and I heard, “Lady Carnford has arranged for your horse to be stabled. Please go to the main entrance.”
If my horse was to be stabled, Isabel expected the call to last more than half an hour. Or perhaps she did not expect me to leave. I felt Havarr stir along my arm, roused by the quickening of my heart.
Her question formed in my mind. Slice?
I mentally shrugged. Perhaps. Then, added: Probably.
The gate ground open, rattling across its tracks. I flicked the reins and drove through into the sound-protected roadway that led to the main buildings. The transparent walls and curved roof provided a view of the lift-off grid and the bustle of men and carts loading cargo into the ship. It did not, however, shield the unearthly caustic odor of fuel that hung over the area.
Although not generally known, the supply of the Celestial fuel around the world was all but gone. The Royal Society had been frantically working to find a combustible replacement—a way to keep our English ships in the air and perhaps one day fly to the stars—but so far nothing adequate had been found.
At the very end of the safety area stood the scout ship, the manifestation of the fuel problem. It had been an escort to the plague fleet, smaller and with weaponry, but its fuel source was even more incomprehensible. So much so, the engineers and scientists had never managed to spark any kind of life within it. And so it had been left to languish at the port, all its potential deteriorating into ruin.
I felt some empathy.
I drew up outside the front portico and waited for the RCP soldier-groom to go to my horse’s head. Above us rose Grayle Tower. I craned my head back to take in all twelve floors of the neoclassical façade. My sister-in-law waited at the top and I did not know if I would be meeting Forgiving Isabel or Vengeful Isabel. The odds were even.
To outside eyes, I knew I looked composed—it was the Grayle way—but every nerve in my body had coiled into readiness. If Charles was dying, or already dead, then his social and political protection was gone. My time had run out. Vengeful Isabel may have already called the Brotherhood. If she had, then forty-nine men and their forty-nine wary knives would be waiting for me inside, all intent on prising Havarr from my dead abomination hands.
#
I paused in the tower doorway, listening. The immense marble entrance hall stood empty, the butler’s desk unattended.
All quiet. Rather too quiet.
Seek the others, I ordered Havarr.
She phased out from her skin-sheath, the sudden loss of her weight within my arm a familiar jolt. Her elegant length hovered at eye level—no handle or hilt, just blade etched with its singular starburst design—then arrowed towards the back wall and disappeared through the marble. I felt her phase and solidify, phase and solidify as she swept through the building to the very edge of our energy bond—a radius of about three hundred feet——each shift like a tiny ebb and flow of power through me.
No other wary knives. No Brotherhood.
Yet I felt her unease as she resheathed into my forearm, only one layer under the skin instead of her usual three. Battle ready.
I stepped into the hall and looked up the impressive marble staircase. Shall we see what this is about? I asked. Her tense assent twanged across my mind.
Onwards, and upwards, then.
To add to the strangeness, Isabel stood at the top of the twelve flights waiting for me, impeccably dressed in a garnet silk gown and a delicate lace cap. No footmen and
no butler. But then each floor had been empty of staff too. The building had been cleared.
She watched me ascend the last few steps. I expected a comment about my breeches and boots, but she only squinted in sartorial pain and gave a nod of welcome.
“Mathilda.”
I returned the nod, but before I could say anything she added, “Charles is dead. You should have given him the knife.”
Two years ago, at our last encounter, Isabel had demanded that I give Havarr to Charles to ensure his survival and the family’s fortune. A wary knife changed a person, their constitution enhanced in many ways including increased stamina and strength. But there has always been only one way to separate a wary knife from its partner: death. I suppose a good and dutiful wife would have at least considered the demand. I, with a regrettable lack of propriety, told her to piss off.
Now, she observed my silence with pursed lips. “Still the same Mathilda, I see. Come, we have business.” She turned and headed down a corridor, the walls lined with portraits of glowering Grayle forebears.
Although I had not seen Charles for nigh on three years, it still felt like I could not breathe. I pressed my hand to my chest as I followed my sister-in-law, feeling my steady heartbeat. One did not spend twelve years alongside a man without some emotion becoming attached to him, good or bad. In our case, good and then very bad.
Isabel stopped outside her private chamber. Her face—so alike her brother’s with its jutting nose and broad forehead—was composed, but bore the swollen evidence of past tears. If Charles was dead, she should be wearing mourning black. The news had not been released.
“When?” I asked softly.
“Early this morning.”
“His heart?”
She bent her head in stiff acknowledgment.
Charles had been born with the Grayle weak heart. “I’ll not make old bones,” he often said in the early years of our arranged marriage. The prophecy had upset me then, when we were still trying to like each other. Later, when I hated him, it had been a hope and a wish. Now it was a piercing regret. We had lost the chance for anything else: forgiveness, friendship, even perhaps an odd sense of family.
“I am following Charles’s last instructions,” Isabel said, voice clipped.
She opened the door and stood aside for me to enter.
The room had been redecorated since I last visited: the walls papered in the new fad for the botanical, and the old heavy mahogany furniture replaced by a deep blue, velvet chaise lounge and a secretaire in the scrolled and gilded Roman style. In pride of place near the window—and somewhat at odds with the Empire theme—stood a command chair from one of the plague ships, its smooth metal lines and attenuated shape built for the strange, elegant length of its Celestial captain.
The door to the adjoining room opened and an older man, dressed in the sober black garb of law, entered and carefully closed the door behind him. He held a number of wax-sealed packets.
“Countess Grayle, may I present Mr. Dorner,” Isabel said behind me. “Charles’s private solicitor.”
Mr. Dorner straightened his waistcoat with a quick tug upon its hem, and bowed.
“My condolences, Countess. Forgive me for rushing through the niceties, but time is of the essence and we must conclude this business before Lord Grayle’s demise is made public. His Lordship gave me instructions to be enacted upon the event of his death. As you know, his estate, including the earldom and Grayle Celestial Transport, is entailed and will pass to his cousin upon his death.”
I winced at the word entailed. The loss of the estate and title to cousin Gregory, a profligate of the first order, was my fault; I had not produced the all-important heir.
Mr. Dorner held up the packet, showing me the unbroken seal with the Grayle bear pressed into the wax. “If I may, I shall open it and read the contents to you both. It is what Lord Grayle wished.”
I nodded. So, Isabel was to be witness. To what?
Mr. Dorner broke the seal with a flick of his thumb and spread the paper. He looked up. “The document is dated yesterday, my ladies.” He began to read. “I, Charles David Paul Hallam, Earl of Grayle, do state that I am the father of the male child George Charles Paul, borne by Miss Katherine Amelia Holland, of London. I also state that, Mathilda Elizabeth Grayle signed the attached divorce settlement and that after that signature I married Miss Katherine Amelia Holland by special license and do hereby acknowledge her issue as my rightful heir.”
“There is a child?” Isabel demanded.
“Yes, my lady.” Mr. Dorner shot an anxious look in my direction. “There is a son. Born one month ago. A currently illegitimate son.” He cleared his throat and addressed me. “It was Lord Grayle’s dying wish that you sign this divorce document…” he held up another packet “…so that his marriage to Miss Holland is—or should I say will be or, more to the point, will have been…” he gave a small shrug at the awkward grammar of fraud “…legal, thus making the child heir to his estate.”
A son. I knew there had been another woman, but a son? I could not seem to make any sound.
“He has already married her?” Isabel asked, not yet following Charles’s twisted path. “But he is still married to you, Mathilda.”
Mr. Dorner’s pasty skin deepened into a flush. “The ceremony occurred yesterday, but the date has not yet been placed upon the document. It will be written in after the date of the divorce has been affixed.”
“A divorce needs to be ratified by an Act of Parliament,” Isabel said sharply. Ah, she had arrived.
“Lord Grayle has a great deal of influence,” Mr. Dorner said. “If Countess Grayle signs, it will be...will have been...ratified last week.”
Fury finally seared through my numb shock. “No!” Havarr phased out of my arm into the air beside me, twirling into a blur, her battle scream rising in my mind.
Mr. Dorner and Isabel flinched, both of them hastily backing away.
“Mathilda!”
The terror in Isabel’s voice broke through my rage. I drew deep breaths, forcing back the violence of my emotions. Havarr’s scream softened into a hum of disquiet, her battle twirl slowing into a gentle rocking in the air.
“Please, Mathilda. You must sign. For the family,” Isabel said.
“Fuck the family.”
Isabel gaped at the monstrous profanity, but rallied admirably. “Fuck you, too. You owe Charles an heir. You owe the family.”
If I signed, even the small protection provided by my widowhood would be stripped from me. So, yes, fuck the family that had thrown me to the wolves once, and was ready to do so again.
“No. We are done here.”
Mr. Dorner held up his hands. “Please, my lady. There is more.” He hastily crossed to the adjoining doorway.
Good God, he had not brought the child here, had he? I was a walking target—anyone near me could be destroyed too. Before I could voice my consternation, Mr. Dorner opened the adjoining door.
“Mr. Wainright, please join us,” he said.
A wiry man with dark skin appeared at the doorway. Thank God, no child.
The man looked to be in his fourth decade, although it was possible his unkempt state belied his age. His hair was long and tied back in an old-fashioned queue and his dress was a deplorable collection of scuffed boots, oil-stained breeches and worn olive jacket. He studied our tableau for a moment then turned his attention fully upon Havarr: a reasonable reaction to a knife rocking in the air. Even so, his face held no fear. Only keen curiosity.
Mr. Dorner ushered him further into the room, “My ladies, allow me to introduce Mr. Elster Wainright, natural philosopher.”
Mr. Wainright bowed, that keen curiosity now directed at me. “I prefer scientist. Allow me to extend my condolences, Countess.”
The name Wainright was familiar. Yes, I had come across it in my reading. “Good God, you are the freed man who discovered how plague ships maintain fresh air.”
“I am, my lady.”
A marve
lous discovery, made even more remarkable since he was self-taught and had been denied membership to the Royal Society. A fellow outcast. Still… “I do not understand Mr. Wainright’s presence at a family meeting, Mr. Dorner.”
The solicitor wet his lips. “Lord Grayle understood that there is no obligation for you to sign the divorce document or indeed any perceivable incentive.” He glanced at Havarr, but did not state the obvious: nor, any way of being forced. “So, he proposed the following. On signature, ownership of the scout ship, and all within it, will pass to you, effective immediately.”
“A wreck?” I stared at him, fighting the desire to slap his plump face. Did he truly think that would prompt me to sign? All the fear I had worked so hard to quash welled up inside me. “I do not think you quite understand the level of danger that is approaching, Mr. Dorner. As soon as my husband’s death is known—and it will be soon, if it is not already discovered—I will be hunted by the Wary Brotherhood until I am dead.” I stopped. Havarr had begun to twirl beside my head again. I drew air through clenched teeth and steadied my mind until Havarr slowed. “I do not need a wreck. I need a bloody army.”
“No, no,” Mr. Wainright said. “She is far from a wreck, my lady. Three years ago, Lord Grayle set me the task to investigate the scout and the possibility of her leaving the Earth. I believe I have found a way.”
“Leave Earth?” The idea was at once full of terror and breathless hope. Could I yet survive this day? “Do you believe you have found a way or do you know, Mr. Wainright?” I demanded.
Mr. Wainright tilted his head thoughtfully. “Well, it is a working hypothesis.” He glanced at my face and added quickly, “A solid one.”
“So, you don’t know.”
“I think it is powered by one or more wary knives and I have not had access to any to test the hypothesis.”
They are here, Havarr said in my mind. She began to spin near my ear.
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