The Blood Is the Life

by Sharon K Gilbert

  James Stuart wore a grim expression. “Both were spies for Redwing.”

  Nearly all gasped. “But they have our codes, our signs! They know all our operations!” Galton cried out in shock, for William Ankerman had nearly married Galton’s younger sister. He’d been both friend and confident for over fifteen years.

  Only Paul showed no surprise at the duke’s news. “My uncle’s correct. Both men were traitors, and both are now dead. The duke asked me to follow them back in late August. They met separately and together with known Redwing operatives, many of them high up in the organisation. Both men helped in the transportation of scientific materials from a laboratory in Chicago to a warehouse in Hackney. Ankerman’s chemical expertise made him an attractive addition to Redwing, but Swanson had a secret, which he kept hidden even from us.”

  Galton could not believe his ears. “Secret? Paul, you and I have known Swanson since Eton! What secret could have avoided detection for so long?”

  “He is—he was—altered.”

  Reid thought for a moment. “Was?”

  James touched his nephew’s hand. “Paul mustn’t be blamed. I gave the order for their execution, and he merely followed that order. We’ve already seen the effect these chemicals have upon human subjects. The hybridisation experiments grow more and more sinister and bold. Yet, there is an aspect to Redwing’s dark deeds that even you gentlemen are unaware of, and it may be related to their plans for Elizabeth’s child, but I pray not. Lord in heaven, I pray not.”

  “What plans are those?” called a voice from the doorway. Charles Sinclair had entered without making a sound, and he now stood before them, his eyes red from exhaustion and weeping, but his face set.

  “How is she?” Paul asked.

  “Sleeping. What plans?” he asked once more.

  “We’re not yet sure,” the earl answered, holding out a chair for his cousin. “Sit, Charles. You look exhausted.”

  “I am,” he answered, wiping at his eyes. “Forgive me, I’d not realised you’d already begun, sir.”

  “You had other duties, son,” the duke answered.

  “My friends, may I speak with my cousin in private?” the earl asked.

  “Victoria, gentleman, let’s continue this discussion elsewhere.” The others agreed, and soon the two cousins stood alone inside the large room.

  The earl walked to the fireplace, his eyes upon the yellow flames. Charles sat into one of the armchairs, wondering why Aubrey asked to speak to him in private. He’d learnt enough about the man over the years to recognise when his mind was troubled. “What is it you’re keeping back, Paul? I beg you to trust me. You are dear to me, Cousin.”

  The earl turned, wiping at his face. “Yes, as are you to me. And to her—for many years now. I suppose it’s only now hitting me. The baby, I mean. I spoke with Emerson briefly before he left, and he confirmed that Beth’s carrying your child.” He paused momentarily, sighing. “She’s loved you for a very long time, Charles. Longer than you know. It was that day I first saw it. The day you dropped by my home in ‘84. You’d brought me the last documents from H-Division’s files on Patricia’s murder. Though you knew it not, my uncle had already asked Kepelheim to discover all he could about you. I realise now that James must have recognised Beth’s feelings before anyone else. She’d just returned from Scotland, you see, and as Beth always confides in her grandfather—well, I expect she told him.”

  Charles remembered the visit as clearly as if it had occurred only that week. “Told him what?”

  “That she loved you,” the earl replied. “I think about that day often. That pivotal day in ’84. It was early summer, and she’d just turned sixteen. How she had blossomed! The pale girl had matured into a radiant young woman. I’d watched Elizabeth grow up from infancy, and I tell you that her mother’s death was not her first shock. As you know, when Connor died, Beth was witness. It was the wolf that slew him. That same wolf that chased you on the moors; the one we all saw the night it threatened Beth and Adele—the one we hoped we’d killed at Drummond.”

  “If she saw it kill her father, why does she never mention it? How could Beth forget something that traumatic?”

  “Beth’s forgotten many things over the years, Charles, and we’ve yet to discover why. James and Kepelheim believe her mind has been manipulated by someone in Redwing—possibly one of their spirit members. Surely, you can relate to this. Many of your own memories remain in shadow.”

  Sinclair nodded. “Paul, do you have any memory issues?”

  “No. None. Only you and Beth, which may be further proof that it’s always been the plan for the two of you to marry. But would you try to recover yours, even if the events were so traumatic, that they might scar your mind forever?”

  “I’m not sure. Is that why you discourage Beth from recalling her lost memories?”

  Aubrey sighed. “I’ve seen what remembering does to her. Trust me, Cousin, it is more than she can bear. It’s part of what Whitmore meant last week, when he asked if Beth’s ‘old trouble’ had returned. That day, at Drummond, the wolf tore Connor Stuart apart, and she watched it all. He died saving her.”

  Sinclair thought of his great love upstairs, how she had stood up to William as a child at Leman Street, and then protected Adele at Drummond. She could be fearless, but an unborn child now depended upon his mother’s continued calm and safety—and upon his father’s ability to protect that mother.

  “Paul, you and I both saw the damage done to Patricia. Something tore her apart, and though I didn’t see Connor Stuart’s body, your description sounds like the murderer might be the same entity. Could that wolf be Trent in another form?”

  “We believe so. When I saw Trish in your dead room back in ’79, I immediately noticed the similarity. Of course, I could say nothing to you about my suspicions—not then—but it’s why my father suggested we move our conversation to Uncle James’s porch rather than risk Elizabeth’s overhearing.”

  “That’s right, he did. I’d mentioned her fear of an animal; that she’d experienced a seizure when recalling it.”

  “My father and I had seen Beth suffer similar episodes, when recalling this animal. Once at Drummond Castle—a tale you now know—but also at Briarcliff. Beth sometimes calls it the ‘beast’. I’m sure it is a hybrid of some kind.”

  “I wonder how many crimes can be laid at the hands of such altered men.”

  “No one knows,” Aubrey replied. “But Trent seeks greater and greater powers through something Redwing calls blood magic.”

  “And the Ripper killings aid in that search. Have you heard anything more from Susanna Morgan?”

  “No, and I begin to grow concerned,” Stuart told his cousin. “With both MacKey and Morgan on the loose, anything might be in the wind, but this heart, Charles. Is it the one from Kelly?”

  “Only Sunders can tell us that. I’ve dispatched the box to Leman Street for examination. Strange, I received a visit from Romanov this afternoon at the Yard. He warned me of packages. Might he have sent it?”

  Aubrey shrugged. “Who can say? St. Paul spoke of seeing through a ‘glass darkly’, but I feel as if our eyes are bound, causing us to stumble. Never before has Redwing launched this many assaults in so short a period.”

  “It’s because of the child,” Sinclair answered, closing his eyes. He thought of the cavernous rock temple beneath the abbey. “Paul, you’ve not yet seen the place where William murdered Patricia, but it was a quarried and elaborately carved, unholy temple. It lies directly beneath the abbey’s sanctuary in mockery of Christ’s blood sacrifice for us, for in that unholy ground, Trent and his fellow believers performed unspeakable rites. Beth witnessed them. Bestiality, sodomy, and even blood sacrifice were committed there. She watched it all, but being only a child, she was too terrified to understand or even speak of it.”

  The earl fell into a chair, his head droppi
ng against the high back. “We always think of Beth as fragile, and in some ways she is, but to witness such acts as a little girl—I marvel that she has kept her sanity, Charles. During one of my undercover investigations, I witnessed those acts, and they are beyond description. These foul men actually invite demonic possession, for that is the ultimate agent of change for them. In return, the men gain supernatural abilities and powers.”

  Charles pressed the latch on his watch case, reading the engraving there: ‘To my Captain, whom I shall ever love—your Beth’. “Scotland. Beth’s father. When she spoke of it on the train to Branham, I thought your reaction cruel, but now I see more clearly, perhaps.”

  The earl nodded. “I prefer she not remember it, Charles. During the wolf attack that killed Connor, Elizabeth was injured. She only remembers it as falling down a cliff, but the wolf tried to kill her. If that animal was Trent, then perhaps he cannot fully control himself whilst in that form, for I saw the monster rend her small leg as she ran to help her fallen father. Connor saw it, too, and despite his own injuries, he threw himself twixt Beth and the animal. That’s how he died. Saving her. He sacrificed his life to keep her from further harm.”

  “You saw this happen?” Sinclair asked.

  “James and I both saw it. Connor had followed Elizabeth out onto the moors. It was late at night—a blood moon high overhead. We’d been playing cards, talking about Redwing, and we all thought Beth asleep upstairs, but Connor suddenly had a strange premonition. He survived his injuries for almost a day before succumbing, and he told us that he’d heard a voice in his head, warning that Beth was in danger. He left us and went upstairs, but she wasn’t in her room. The voice told him to look out the window, and he saw her walking outside in her night dress—just like Adele did whilst we were there. Terrified for his daughter, Connor ran out to bring her back inside. Beth had been known to sleepwalk even at Branham, but more often in Scotland. James and I heard the front door open, and Connor cried out Beth’s name. As we left the castle, we heard the howls of the wolf, and we ran as quickly as we could. By the time we reached him, Connor’s body was being shaken in the wolf’s massive jaws, and Beth was screaming; her face and hands covered in blood. James shot the monster many times, whilst I went to Elizabeth. She nearly died that night.”

  “That’s when you gave her your blood. She told me about it, but she thought it an accidental fall.”

  “I’m glad that’s all she recalls, Charles. She was under treatment for the injury for many weeks, but it was her mind that we feared for most. Dr. Lemuel, whom we thought we could trust, administered sedatives to keep her calm, but it was as if she could not awaken from a horrible nightmare. She would thrash about and scream for hours on end, and she kept repeating that the Shadow Man had her.”

  Sinclair sat forward, his mind focused. “The Shadow Man? This creature has pursued her since ’71. Paul, if Warren is right, then this Shadow is actually a powerful being that was once imprisoned inside the Mt. Hermon stone.”

  Paul sighed. “I wish I’d believed her from the start, but we thought her just imaginative. Had I known that Trent awaited them at Branham, I’d never have allowed Trish to take her. I cannot tell you how many times I’ve longed to undo that choice. If the wolf was Trent in altered form, then he killed Connor so he might marry Patricia and have access to Elizabeth. Trish never believed in the Shadow Man, Charles. She had little love for the circle and all we tried to do to help her. She did love Christ, and I’ve no doubt she’s with him now, but she wanted nothing to do with her ancestry, nor did she wish to speak of it. Did I tell you that Patricia nearly married my elder brother?”

  Charles’s brows shot up. “Ian? No. Why didn’t she?”

  Paul gazed out the window. “My brother was a wonderful man—or so everyone has told me. As I explained to you in Glasgow, Ian died the year I was born, but I’d never heard it told as resulting from a duel. In some ways, it helps me to understand Patricia. She and my brother were madly in love, so much so that they’d made plans to wed in Scotland. We don’t require bans or even a church wedding. Hand-fasting can be done by nearly anyone.”

  “I’m aware of it,” Sinclair told his cousin. “Greta Green earns many an English pound from that practise.”

  “Trish wasn’t yet sixteen, and her father refused to consent to a marriage with my brother. Uncle James and Duke George led the circle jointly back then, and both believed Trish should marry Connor. She was stubborn and decided to defy them both. She assumed that, once married to Ian, nothing could be done about it. She’d arranged to meet him in Carlisle. Then, they’d cross the border into Scotland together, but he never arrived. When Trish learnt of his death, she immediately hired a coach to Briarcliff and confessed the plan to my mother, who told me shortly before she died in ‘78. I’d always thought my brother’s death a tragic accident. Now I know better. A tall man with a sword of fire murdered Ian. Perhaps it was Trent, perhaps not. The description is more akin to Beth’s Shadow Man.”

  Charles let his head fall against the chair. He began to understand the long history of enmity betwixt the circle and Redwing, and it was an enmity that would continue, he feared. “Paul, I think she still sees him. Since returning here, Elizabeth’s had visions and troubling dreams of shadowy, animalistic creatures. ”

  The earl turned to face his cousin. “Charles, you and I must make certain your son or daughter never sees that Shadow. I fear that Redwing will do all within their power to lure that son into a trap.”

  “What did James mean by plans for our child?”

  “It is the ultimate goal,” Aubrey answered. “The child of the bloodlines that would provide an extension for the Man of Sin. Hellish leader of their infernal order. To do so, may mean altering that son’s human form or cellular construction through blood magic.”

  Sinclair showed no surprise, for he’d already considered such a possibility. “Paul, do you think Redwing would kill any child that isn’t a son?”

  “I’d say yes,” he told his cousin. “But let’s trust in the Lord, shall we?”

  Sinclair nodded, his eyes filled with worry. “I shall, but once the ICI is up and running, I intend to work from home.”

  “That will help Beth more than you can imagine, Cousin,” the earl told him. “It’s why I began this story with talk of ’84. Beth and I had argued about the Shadow Man that day. I’d ordered her to remain at Aubrey House, but she refused, saying she had no wish to continue speaking to me, as I never believed her. As we both know, Beth is headstrong, and my insistence that this Shadow was but a dream angered her considerably. I’d just started after her, when you arrived.”

  Charles nodded, smiling as the memory took hold. “Yes, I remember. Your butler told me you were in the library, and I said I could find it on my own. Beth bumped into me as I entered.”

  “Yes, she did, and she stopped in her tracks at seeing you. Charles, I watched her face change from anger to bright hope—and something else was upon those sweet features: Love. Beth had never looked at me with such eyes, Charles, and I knew then that she loved you. I’m ashamed to say this, but it was I who suggested our uncle send Elizabeth to Paris, and it’s why I didn’t tell her about your wife’s death. She would have come back to support you in your grief; I knew it. I have stood in the way of her love for you from the beginning, and it’s time I step aside.”

  Charles felt no malice towards the earl; rather, he understood completely. “Elizabeth has both of us to love her now, Cousin, and I shall do all within my power to make her happy and keep her safe; I promise you.”

  “Well, Nephews?” Victoria Stuart called out—startling both men, for they’d not heard her enter. “May we now meet, or do you wish to delay us further?”

  Standing, the two cousins laughed. “We have completed our discussion, Tory,” Charles replied. “Forgive us for causing any delay.”

  The earl kissed his aunt’s cheek. “H
as Reid deciphered the map at last?”

  “He believes he found several enticing hints. Charles, you’re still limping. Perhaps, Emerson should have examined you.”

  “My muscles complain, but Mrs. Meyer’s liniment works wonders,” he said, taking her arm. “I’ve some work to finish once supper’s done, and then I intend to sleep until noon.”

  Bella entered, her thick tail wagging, and the three humans followed the dog into the library, where the circle continued until Miles called them to supper.

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  That same evening - Castor Institute

  Bridget O’Sullivan glanced at her reflection in the mirror. The twenty-three-year-old nurse had passed the institute’s rigorous qualifying examination the previous day, and this would be her first night in the lower level.

  “Miss O’Sullivan,” a man’s voice called from the hallway beyond the dressing room. “I am waiting.”

  Using the mirror, O’Sullivan made certain her hair was neatly arranged, her pinafore tied securely, and the pink-ribboned cap sat straight upon her head. She then shut the door and walked towards Dr. Kepler.

  “We must keep to our schedule, Miss O’Sullivan,” the alienist warned.

  “Yes, sir,” she answered, hurrying to catch up with the strict physician. “Shall I be working with Sister MacArthur today?”

  “No. I prefer to begin your training personally. It’s important that you fully appreciate what it is we do here, and Sister MacArthur—whilst a consummate health professional—does not always agree with my methods. I hope I’ll encounter no such difficulties with you, my dear.”

  “No, sir. I promise to follow your orders to the letter, sir.”

  “Very good. Note that we must keep this door locked at all times. You will receive your own keys once you complete your orientation week. After we pass through, we must always lock the door behind us. You will notice there is an electrified bell, here, near the door frame. Press the button, should you find yourself without your key, or if you have need otherwise.”