by R. L. King
Epilogue 1
Three Weeks Later
“And in closing, before I set you all loose to explore what we’ve put together here—and visit the bar, if you’re so inclined—I’d like to extend a special thanks to three men without whom this whole mad plan wouldn’t have come together. I’m sure William Desmond would have been proud of what they’ve accomplished. Ladies and gentlemen: Mr. Eddie Monkton and Mr. Arthur Ward, who’ve taken charge of the magical end of the Caventhorne project, and Mr. Theodore Kerrick, who’s continuing his stewardship of the house itself and the day-to-day operations here. Gentlemen, please come up and take a well-deserved bow.”
Stone stood at the raised podium that had been constructed in Caventhorne’s great room, surveying the crowd gathered around. He’d kept his speech short; these people weren’t here to listen to him bang on, and he could see from their anticipatory auras that they were eager to explore the newly opened rooms and displays.
Eddie, Ward, and Kerrick mounted the steps to stand next to Stone amid a swell of applause. Their eyes shone with pride; they obviously appreciated the recognition, though all three of them looked as if they’d prefer it to be a bit less public. Like the rest of those in attendance, they were dressed in formal evening wear—Eddie fidgeted as if he’d prefer to tear off his jacket and tie and toss them in a corner somewhere, while Ward appeared calmly comfortable. Kerrick, as always, projected quiet dignity, with just a hint of decorous merriment twinkling in his eyes.
“Take a bow, gentlemen,” Stone said. “You’ve earned it.”
All three of them did so, making quick bows as once again the applause rose. Then Eddie strode over and threw an effusive arm around Stone’s shoulders. “And let’s not forget this bloke right ’ere,” he announced. “’E’s had a lot to be gettin’ on with over this last year, but e’s been devoted to makin’ Mr. Desmond’s wishes into a reality. Let’s ’ear it for Alastair Stone.”
“Eddie…” Stone growled, as the crowd began clapping and cheering again.
“Sauce for the goose, mate,” Eddie said with a grin.
“Thank you,” Stone called to the group. “But this night is for you. Please—enjoy yourselves. Look around, see what the place has to offer. Starting next week, Caventhorne’s facilities will be available to the magical community for research, study, and group meetings. Please contact Kerrick for scheduling. Thank you all for coming.”
He hurried off the podium before Eddie could get any other ideas.
Verity met him at the foot of the steps. “Nice speech.” She leaned in closer and lowered her voice. “And damn, you look hot in that tux. You know I’ve got plans for you later tonight, right?”
“I was hoping you might.” He gave her a sly side-eye. “Just make sure you wait until later tonight, please.”
“Damn. I was gonna rip your clothes off and ravish you on top of the grand piano.”
“Well…I suppose it would give the old gaffers something to gossip about. But perhaps a bit of decorum might be in order.” He looked her up and down, admiring her elegant gown of black silk. “You look stunning as always. I’ve been so busy with all the preparations I didn’t get a chance to get a proper look at you. I don’t think I’ve seen you in that one before.”
“It’s new. I went shopping with Poppy a couple days ago. She knows all the good shops in London, and she was pretty eager to spend some of that money you gave her.”
“Brilliant.” He steered her toward the bar, where he picked up a drink. “Well, that’s it for my official duties tonight, aside from answering questions. Let’s enjoy the party. I think we’ve earned it, don’t you?”
“Oh, definitely.”
Stone looked around at the crowd. He recognized many of them, at least by sight. Walter Yarborough stood by a window, drink in hand, gut straining the buttons of his old-fashioned tuxedo, and massive mustache waggling as he tried to chat up an attractive woman who was making a game effort to be polite. His young apprentice, as usual, lounged by the bar attempting to do the same thing with even less success. Lavinia Bromley perched on the edge of a brocaded sofa, deep in conversation with a small group of middle-aged women. On the far side of the room, Ian, resplendent and elegant in his designer evening clothes, leaned in close to a handsome young man with dark auburn hair.
“I’m glad he decided to come,” Verity said, following Stone’s gaze.
“So am I.”
“Are you hoping it might mean he’s ready to settle down and start studying?”
“Oh, I doubt that will happen yet. He’s already talking about a trip to India with some of his mates next month.” He shrugged and sipped his drink. “He’ll do it when he’s ready. There’s no point in my trying to hurry him along.” He took Verity’s arm and deftly steered her away from the bar when he noticed Yarborough’s lecherous apprentice taking an interest in her. “Too bad Jason decided to give this a pass, though.”
“Yeah, well…he said he wouldn’t be comfortable as the only mundane in the middle of a bunch of mages. I get it.” She grinned. “Besides, I’m pretty sure he has a date. So there’s that.”
Stone nodded. “That’s him keeping his priorities straight, then. Good for him.”
For the first time in quite a while, he felt content. The renovation of Caventhorne had been more than a year in the making, taking far longer than any of them had expected, but now everything seemed to be coming together. The soft chamber music and gourmet refreshments aside, this place would soon be a venue for serious study, and hopefully a magnet for magical practitioners from all over the world. Even tonight, he’d already spotted guests dressed in the formal styles of Japan, Africa, and the Middle East. They’d extended invitations far and wide, and even if, as expected, the majority of the guests were from the UK, Europe, and the United States, there were enough representing other parts of the world to prove gratifying. William Desmond’s influence obviously had considerable reach.
He and Verity circulated through the crowd for the next half-hour, chatting with various individuals and small groups. Normally Stone hated small talk, but with the more gregarious Verity on his arm, he soon found himself enjoying the feeling of not being responsible for anything. He let her lead the way, introducing her to those he knew and conversing amiably with those he didn’t.
Eventually, after they’d made the rounds of the great room, she excused herself to refresh her makeup. “Go ahead,” she said, smiling and giving him a little push. “I know you want to go talk shop with Eddie and Arthur. I’ll just mingle around on my own and get to know people, or go see what Ian’s up to. It’s all good.”
He took her up on her offer, but only part of it. In truth, though he did want to chat with Eddie and Ward, he didn’t want to do it right now. There was somewhere he wanted to be, and he wanted to do it alone.
Glancing around to make sure nobody was paying attention to him, he drifted down a hallway past a few open rooms containing shelves of books, conference tables, whiteboards, and other amenities. At the end of the hall was a closed door. He opened it, slipped inside, and flipped a switch. Dim, soothing light bathed the space from multiple sconces along the walls.
This room was not ready for public consumption yet, but Stone nonetheless felt drawn to it. It wasn’t surprising, since its inclusion had been his idea.
He stepped forward, his footsteps making no sound on the plush carpeting, until he stood in front of a small display: a pair of shining glass cases on either side of a large rectangular block of highly polished black marble.
Sipping his drink and swallowing hard, he started at the leftmost glass case, gazing at the few items inside, arranged on black velvet: a jewel-hilted dagger in an ornate scabbard, a collection of gold coins, and an intricate cameo with the face of a beautiful, unknown woman.
In the opposite case, more items were similarly arranged: several gold rings with colorful gemstones, and two golden necklaces with jeweled pendants. All of them glimmered under the cases’ subtly hidden
light.
Stone bowed his head, suddenly feeling a heavy weight settling on his shoulders. His sense of contentment from before vanished, but that was fine. That was why he was here, after all. This wasn’t meant to be a place of contentment.
He moved to the marble block, which had been carved so its top face was at an angle facing the viewer, and studied the names inscribed there.
Some of the spaces were still blank. When the project was finished, the surface would include forty-one names, but right now scarcely half of them had been finished. Stone extended a silent hand and laid it flat against the surface. “We’ll find you,” he said softly. “I’ll see that you’re remembered. I promise.”
He wasn’t sure how long he’d been standing there before he sensed another presence in the room.
He spun, and it took a lot of willpower not to raise his magical shield as he did it. He hadn’t locked the door, so it wasn’t entirely impossible that one of the guests had wandered in here by accident.
But he hadn’t heard the door open.
A man stood just inside, watching him with a calm, serene expression.
“Er—may I help you with something?”
“Thank you, no.” The man’s voice was deep, melodic, and had the faintest hint of an unidentifiable, vaguely British accent.
Stone took a step toward the man, studying him in the dim light. Tall, slim, and broad-shouldered, he appeared to be in his middle to late forties, exuding the easy confidence of a man in the prime of his life. He had medium-brown hair with a hint of silver at the temples, a handsome face with high cheekbones, heavy brows, and a thin, patrician nose, and dark, glittering eyes. He too wore an exquisitely tailored tuxedo as if he were well-accustomed to it. He appeared to be examining Stone with an equal level of interest.
“I’m sorry, but this part of the house isn’t open to the public yet,” Stone said. “Could I direct you somewhere else?”
“No. Thank you. Forgive me for intruding, but I wished to speak with you in private.”
Stone narrowed his eyes, shifting to magical sight. At first, he thought the stranger had a dual-toned aura—deep red close to his body with a brilliant gold around the edge—but as he looked more carefully he spotted a third color, a narrow band of pulsing purple. He tensed, realizing that, aside from this other man, no one else knew where he was. The house was so heavily shielded and warded that it would be difficult to track him even if someone missed him. And the man stood between him and the door.
“You…wished to speak with me? Why? I don’t believe we’ve ever met, Mr.—”
“Dunstan. Edmund Dunstan. And no, I am certain we have not met.” Dunstan took another step forward. He still looked relaxed, perhaps even a trifle amused at Stone’s discomfort. He didn’t offer his hand.
Stone didn’t, either. He searched his mind for the name, trying to recall where he might have heard of Edmund Dunstan. If the man’s aura was any indication, he was likely a powerful mage—but then again, Stone had been seeing more tri-colored auras than ever before since he’d returned from Calanar. Perhaps they were more common than he’d been led to believe.
“I’m afraid you have me at a disadvantage, Mr. Dunstan. Did you receive an invitation to our event tonight? I don’t remember seeing your name on the guest list.”
Dunstan offered a thin-lipped smile. “No. I hope you will excuse my intrusion nonetheless. This is an impressive place you have here. I would like to have met your Mr. Desmond.”
Hmm. So Dunstan wasn’t an old friend or colleague of Desmond’s. That would have been Stone’s first guess. Despite the fact that the man still looked relatively young, you couldn’t always tell a mage’s age from his or her physical appearance. He could be older than he looked.
“Indeed,” he said, glancing past Dunstan to the door. “What did you wish to talk about? I haven’t got a lot of time at the moment, but—”
“Oh, I assure you, I won’t take much of your time, Dr. Stone. In truth, I mostly wanted to meet you. I’ve heard a great deal about you, and I wanted to see for myself how much of it was true.”
“You’ve heard about me? Where?”
Dunstan shrugged. “Ah, here and there. It wasn’t difficult to discover.” He offered another thin smile that didn’t reach his eyes. “I am not surprised you have heard little of me. I’ve been…away for quite some time.”
“Away?” Stone tensed, his mind immediately going to James Brathwaite. Had the necromancer survived and sought out another body to steal? But that seemed unlikely—Verity had told him that when Braithwaite’s spirit had possessed his own body, his normal aura had changed to a dark purple. Even if she hadn’t spotted a third color, she couldn’t have missed a second, nor could she have mistaken this man’s clear, deep red for purple.
“Yes. I have been…sequestered for many years, out of communication with the world as a whole.”
“I see.” Stone glanced at the door again. Something about this man was making him uncomfortable, but he couldn’t identify what it was. Oddly, too, something about him seemed eerily familiar, as if they might have met at some point.
He didn’t have time for this at the moment, though. His friends would miss him if he didn’t show up soon, and likely someone would come looking for him. “Well,” he said at last, “it was a pleasure to meet you, Mr. Dunstan. I’m afraid I must ask you to excuse me now, but perhaps we can talk some other time. I’m not difficult to reach.”
It was an obvious hint, but Dunstan either didn’t pick it up or, more likely, ignored it. “Indeed,” he said unhurriedly. “I would like that very much. I have some…propositions I would like to share with you. I think you might discover you and I have…a few things in common.”
“You’re very cryptic, Mr. Dunstan. That’s all right, though—as I said, I haven’t got time for a discussion right now. But I do hope you’ll reveal more of these propositions at some later date.” Once again, he moved toward the door.
This time, Dunstan stepped aside and allowed Stone to open it. He made a courtly little bow. “Of course. I will look forward to it.” Before stepping through and out into the hall, Dunstan glanced back toward the memorial. “I applaud your efforts to memorialize those who were forgotten, and I hope the renovations to your home don’t prove too arduous.”
Stone froze. “How did you know about that?”
Dunstan raised an eyebrow. “I know many things, Dr. Stone.” He exited the room and closed the door behind him. “Good evening.”
Stone stared at the closed door in confusion. Who was this man? How did he know so much about him? Stone prided himself on knowing most of the Western world’s powerful mages, by reputation if not personally. He’d never heard of Edmund Dunstan; it was as if the man had appeared spontaneously in the world from somewhere else.
Maybe he did, said his little interior voice.
Without giving himself time to ponder, he flung open the door and hurried out into the hall, intending to catch Dunstan before he lost himself in the crowd or left the party. He half expected the man to have vanished completely, with no sign of his passage remaining.
But no, Dunstan was still there.
He had stopped and now stood, facing away from Stone, only a short distance away. His stiff, tense posture shared nothing with his previous confident grace.
For a moment, Stone couldn’t see what might have caused the change. Then he looked past Dunstan, farther down the hall toward the great room.
Another figure stood there.
A familiar figure: Tall, dark-haired, powerfully built, clad in meticulous but old-fashioned black evening clothes.
Stefan?
Stone stopped where he was, his gaze shifting between the two. He couldn’t see Dunstan’s face, but Stefan Kolinsky’s looked every bit as tense, his dark eyes locked on the newcomer. Stone could easily picture Dunstan’s attention similarly focused.
Kolinsky appeared not to have noticed anything else around him, so firmly was he fixed on Dunstan.
Stone had never seen such a cold expression on his old friend’s face. It wasn’t rage, or even anger, but yet it gave the impression of both.
“Er—” Stone began, stepping forward. He wasn’t sure he should have. He got the strong sense that if he strayed into the space between these two men, he might be vaporized where he stood.
Instead, he drew up next to Dunstan and tried, as any good host, to defuse the situation. “Stefan, what a pleasure. I had no idea you were coming tonight. I was sure you’d want to arrange a private visit later on.” They had, of course, sent Kolinsky an invitation to the opening gala, but never in a thousand years did Stone think the reclusive, antisocial black mage would accept it.
Kolinsky’s gaze flicked to Stone for a fraction of a second, then it was locked back on Dunstan again. “Alastair.”
Stone looked between them again. Now that he was closer, he could see he was right: Dunstan was regarding Kolinsky with the same cold, leashed tension.
“Er—” he began again. “Do you two know each other?”
Neither replied to him. Instead, they continued sizing each other up. Despite their unmoving stances, Stone wouldn’t have been at all surprised if the two of them leaped at each other like a pair of predators in a contested territory.
They didn’t do that, though. They continued to hold each other’s gazes for several more seconds, and then Dunstan’s shoulders relaxed and he smiled. “Such a surprise. One never knows whom one might encounter unexpectedly.” He bowed to Kolinsky—unlike the one he’d made to Stone, this one was clearly mocking—and swept past him.
“Good night, Dr. Stone. I will be in touch.” And then he was gone, around the corner that led to the great room.
Kolinsky did not turn to watch him go, but neither did he relax his tense posture. His attention remained fixed down the hall, on the spot where Dunstan had stood.
Stone took a deep breath. Part of him wanted to follow Dunstan to see where he’d gone, but another part was grateful the man had departed and hoped he’d leave Caventhorne completely. Finally, he approached Kolinsky. “Stefan? Are you all right?”