A Hanging at Lotus Hall

by Corrina Lawson

  “With the duchess, saving her life, as I just said.”

  He swore. “Unavailable then. Damn it all. We must talk. But not here.”

  The walls have eyes, Vai had said. Dale suggested a strategic retreat. Joan could see no other option, despite her promise to watch over Anne. This was the duke’s home, he ruled here, and she had no chance of countering him without Gregor.

  And, surely, he was not a danger to his own wife and daughter. He’d protect them.

  A scream, muffled by closed doors, echoed from upstairs. Victoria.

  “Bloody hell, Vai was right, as she always is. And you’re right, Miss Krieger, we need Gregor. Now. If we leave, we should be able to meet the flying carriage on its way home and inform him before he walks into the house.”

  Footmen arrived in the hallway, likely called by the duke from the nursery. The lead footman, a burly man, cast his eyes downward. “We’re here to escort you out, Mr. Dale, Miss Krieger.”

  “My things are in my room,” she said.

  “The housekeeper will pack them up and have them delivered, miss.” His voice grew colder. “And yours as well, Mr. Dale.”

  Apparently, the duke had made up his mind about her before he’d entered the nursery.

  “As you wish,” Joan said. For now.

  Chapter 20

  As they entered the entrance foyer, Agnes ran down the main steps with Joan’s cashmere coat. “Can’t leave without this, miss. It’s looking to rain hard outside.”

  “Thank you. How is the duchess?”

  “Her Grace is fighting and winning. That’s what I was told to tell you.”

  Agnes curtsied, glanced in the direction of the looming footmen, and beat a quick retreat.

  Mr. Dale helped her into the coat. Joan thanked him, never breaking manners, unwilling to say anything else with the footmen lurking. Outside, a steam carriage awaited them, the newest model, but not, of course, the flying carriage. Gregor must be still in transit.

  As Joan and Dale exited Lotus Hall and made their way down the main steps, Joan pulled the coat tight around her. A distinct chill had crept into the air. The murky skies threatened rain.

  It echoed the storm inside the Hall.

  As they reached the bottom of the steps, another man burst past the columns and hurried down to them.

  Reg, with his open coat flapping in the wind.

  “It took you long enough to join us, Mr. Benedict,” Dale said.

  “I was contemplating the truth of what you said. Then I grabbed all my weapons. Then all hell broke loose. The duke certainly has some menacing footmen.” He glanced behind him. “Seems he’s clearing house.”

  “Save for Mr. Moriarty,” Joan muttered. “Moriarty claimed that you, Mr. Dale, the dowager duchess, and Lord Nicholas are conspiring against the duke. Jared’s convinced you want to replace him. That may explain why the duke lost his temper so quickly.”

  “Indeed,” Dale agreed, “that’s likely part of it. But I only want to help Jared.”

  Their driver started the carriage and began to descend the windy drive to the bottom, where the village sat nestled against the riverside. Outside, the light rain became a sheet.

  Another carriage hurrying up to the gate cut off their exit. “Hail, Humphrey!” yelled the other driver. “Let us through first. We’ve got an injured man.”

  Humphrey pulled off to the side to let the other carriage past. Joan scrambled out of her seat and stepped into the pouring rain and in front of the carriage. “What’s happened?” she yelled.

  The driver halted and rolled down his window.

  No one she recognized.

  “I’m sorry to give ye the bad news, miss, but the flying carriage crashed when coming back over the river. Our Henry here—” he pointed at a passenger stretched in the back, “—he’s the only one they fished out of the river. He keeps asking about Lord Gregor and Lord Nicholas, but there was no sign of them.”

  Gregor!

  Reg jumped from the carriage. “God, man, where? Where was the crash?”

  “About a mile downstream. Constables are already there. I’m not sure there’s anything you can do, sir. The current is something fierce there.” He tipped his cap to Joan and Reg. “Sorry to be the bearer of the news, miss, sir, but I’ve got to get Henry somewhere warm and dry.”

  Joan let the carriage pass her.

  The current is something fierce there.

  She stood in the rain, without her hat, becoming more soaked by the second. Gregor.

  Dale dragged her back into the steam carriage. Reg scrambled in behind them. “Get to that accident scene, Humphrey!” Dale ordered.

  The carriage set off with a lurch. Dale gave Joan his handkerchief to dry off her face. She took it with boneless, frozen fingers.

  No, it could not be true.

  Someone is hunting Sherringfords.

  No, she would not believe Gregor dead, not without a body, and maybe not even then.

  She handed Dale back his handkerchief and saw his face was ashen. “My boys,” he whispered. “I’ve failed all my boys.”

  “Your boys?” Joan said.

  “They’re mine as much as Jasper’s,” Dale answered.

  “We don’t know they’re lost yet,” Reg snapped. “What could have happened to the flying carriage?”

  “If they went down over the water, that means Henry decided it was calm enough to fly over it,” Joan said.

  “Or Nick decided to be reckless,” Reg said, grimly.

  Rain battered against the windows.

  The journey passed in a blur, jarring them as the driver took corners at a speed faster than he should. Joan bit her tongue several times to avoid haranguing the man for recklessness.

  She would have driven faster.

  Dale sat tall and straight and grim. Reg fiddled with his hat.

  The carriage ground to a halt. Joan jumped out and landed on soft, squishy ground. The river burbled and spat in front of them, the current as strong as the other driver had claimed. This was near the place where she and Gregor had flown across the water only two mornings ago. She’d laughed at the delight of it all.

  That woman seemed to belong to another time.

  The older constable walked up to them. Joan brushed wet hair away from her cheek.

  “Miss, sirs, I can understand your concern but there’s nothing you can do here.” He shook his head. “I’ve got men watching downstream.”

  Downstream. Where the current would push the bodies.

  “Point out the spot, please, where you found Henry,” she asked.

  “There.” He pointed to the bank, just below a tree that overlooked the waters.

  Joan climbed down with as much dignity as she could muster. She feared if her composure faltered, she would never regain it.

  Reg and Dale followed her.

  “Please, stop.” She turned to them. “I need to examine this area carefully before rain and any more footprints muck up evidence.”

  “But—” Reg started.

  “Perhaps you could travel along the bank downstream and help in the search for…survivors,” she suggested. Yes, survivors. Not victims. “There also might be debris downstream that could tell the story of exactly what happened.”

  “Good idea.” Dale led Reg away. “Good luck in your search. And be careful, Miss Krieger. We’ll be back in a jiff.”

  Joan nodded. The less said at this stage, the better.

  She picked her way over the soft ground as it gave way to mud, glad for her coat and short boots. She held on to the tree branches for balance as she looked at the area where Henry had been found. The steering wheel from the flying carriage was stuck in the mud, halfway in, halfway out. Odd, that. She’d have expected it to lie flat, like washed-up debris.

  What a mess.

  She needn’t have worried about footprints wrecking any evidence. The ground was already thoroughly trod by the rescuers. If there had been traces of Gregor or Nick here, they were already lost.
>
  Still, she picked her way to the wheel, having spotted something round and wooden next to it, also buried half in and half out of the mud. She plucked it out of the mire and it was revealed as the knob to the device that allowed magic to flow into the carriage.

  No magic now, simply flotsam.

  If she were Gregor, she’d have remembered to carry a magnifying glass and a torch with her, to examine the knob as carefully as possible. But both items were packed away and unavailable in her trunk, still at Lotus Hall, like her hat and gloves.

  She held tight to her find, picking her way through the mud and mire, hoping to spot something else, anything, that told her the story of what happened.

  A second perusal only yielded a lug nut hidden among the pebbles on the shore. The river had spat up Henry, the steering wheel, a lug nut, and the knob. Yet, no tires. Rubber might have floated, however, so they could be downstream. Still, there was nothing else from the interior of the carriage.

  She could easily imagine Henry being thrown clear from the front seat if the carriage slammed into the water. But what force could have pulled off the steering wheel and the knob from inside the carriage and yet sent the rest to the deep?

  The items she’d found were too odd an assortment to be random. Gregor might have tossed them here to create the illusion of a crash, she supposed, for reasons she could not fathom. After all, he’d not told her Dale wrote the list.

  No, Henry had been injured, and that meant a crash had happened.

  If Gregor had survived the destruction of the carriage, why did he not stay around to ensure Henry received treatment?

  The sun finally broke through the gray. She screened her eyes and scanned the river. Nothing but water rushing by, as it had done for centuries, erasing all trace of the fate of the two men. She retreated to the tree, her throat tight with the fear she would not acknowledge. She brushed dirt off the knob and brought it closer to her eyes.

  She squeezed her fingers tight around the smooth wood.

  Gregor, where are you?

  The knob should not have come loose in any normal sequence of events. Perhaps someone had tampered with it. She picked the rest of the dirt off with her nails.

  That revealed something burned into it. A word?

  No, it was the Hebrew symbol meaning “hope.”

  Joan curled the knob against her chest and choked back a sob.

  A message from Gregor. Have hope that he lived? Have faith even if he were gone?

  No, think. This message revealed more than just the symbol for hope. It would’ve taken magic to etch this into the knob. That meant Nick had done it at Gregor’s command, because Nick would not have known the symbol by himself. The brothers had lived long enough after the crash to leave this clue.

  So where had they gone?

  Something was very wrong, or Gregor would have come to her directly instead of leaving this mysterious message while letting the rest of the world assume he and his brother were dead.

  This carriage accident had been no accident. Sabotage.

  Gregor, where are you?

  She heard the wheels of a steam carriage returning and slipped the knob into her coat. Better to tell Reg and Mr. Dale in privacy, if they could find it. Somewhere in the village, perhaps?

  “I found nothing of consequence,” she said to Reg.

  “Neither did we. No sign of anything, really. The current is fierce.” Dale patted her shoulder awkwardly. “I’m so sorry, Joan.”

  If he’d lived, Gregor could vanish easily with his ability to become one with the darkness. He could cover Nick too. But why would he abandon Henry? Had he been fighting an attacker or taken by an enemy for some other purpose?

  Joan straightened her shoulders. “I will hold out hope until we know for certain.”

  “Of course.” Mr. Dale nodded. “Gregor and Nick have more lives than any cat.”

  But his words lacked conviction. She curled her hand around the knob hidden in her palm. She traced the single curly imprint next to the larger one.

  Hope.

  “What now?” Humphrey asked.

  “Drop us at my family cottage, Humphrey. It’s mine, still. Jared can’t toss me out of there. Then consider your duty to take us off the property finished,” Dale said.

  “That I can do, sir.” Humphrey nodded.

  The carriage started the journey again. Joan’s emotions were numb. Her intellect was fine. The only problem was that her intellect told her to follow logic and that logic said no one survived an accident like that.

  She hugged herself. Reg squeezed her fingers. He was as miserable as she was.

  What had Gregor wanted her to do by sending such a message? Pretend to be Gregor. Think like him. If a dangerous mage had killed Cooper, violated Anne’s mind, and sabotaged the carriage, the safest thing for Gregor and Nick to do might well be to pretend they were dead.

  Then there would be no more attempts, and this would allow Gregor a chance to operate in the shadows, as he much preferred. Assuming Gregor had vanished to continue the investigation and protect Nick (and assuming that Nick was not the killer), that meant Gregor trusted her to handle being a target. Uncovering Mr. Dale’s secret was now her charge.

  Yes. That all felt logical. It felt like what Gregor would have done.

  “We must get back into Lotus Hall tonight, somehow,” she whispered to the other men.

  “Agreed,” Dale said. “I have a way. When we have privacy in my cottage. I’ve things you should know first.”

  “I certainly hope so. It’s past time we know what you’re hiding.” She let the anger lace her voice.

  “I hear your judgment, Miss Krieger. No question I’ve botched this. But I’ll make it up to you and them.” He paused. “If I can.”

  The drive passed in a blur as her mind swirled with ideas and plans that pushed away her fears. Agnes might be a help inside Lotus Hall. She might pass a message to Vai.

  Oh, God, here she was drowning in her own fears while Victoria and her son still likely fought for their lives.

  Joan’s shoulders sagged. She closed her eyes. Reg squeezed her hand. She squeezed it back. She might have once doubted him but the tears in his eyes proved he was only just holding in his grief. She must tell him about the knob, as soon as possible. She might have now but Humphrey would have overheard.

  How had this gone so ill so fast?

  In the space of two days, someone had tried to remove four of the six known Sherringfords, not counting Vai. That was not a coincidence. Find who killed Cooper, find the answers to the rest of this.

  Mr. Dale tapped her shoulder. “We’re here.”

  He led them through mud, onto a porch, and into a one-story country cottage. Dale waved his hand and lights flickered on in every room.

  “Gas lamps, activated by magic,” he explained.

  “I guessed,” Reg said.

  They crossed the threshold, and Dale led them to the study at the back of the house. It was the guest library from Lotus Hall but in miniature, complete with a bar next to the cherry wood roll-top desk that dominated the room.

  Dale poured two drinks, offered one to Reg and one to her. She shed her coat, hung it on the coat rack, and took the glass. One sip told her it was brandy. She took a longer swallow and felt the warmth spread through her body.

  But not her soul.

  “No more delays. Tell us now what’s going on, Mr. Dale,” she ordered. She avoided the shadows in the room. Gregor could be there, hiding, in case Dale turned into a threat.

  God, she hoped he was hiding. She caressed the knob in her pocket. Hope.

  Dale tossed back his glass, finished the drink, and set it down with a thud. “You’re right. I thought delaying this until just the right time would help. Instead, I’ve put my family in jeopardy. I’d wanted the boys here but…it’s past time.”

  Joan and Reg watched in fascination as the air around Edward Dale wavered, obscuring his body. Joan called her shields, wary.

  Bu
t when the magical fog cleared, another man stood revealed before them.

  Still gray-haired, still resembling Gregor, but this man had a closer-cropped beard, wider shoulders, and a slightly crooked nose.

  He was one of the paintings at Lotus Hall come to life.

  “Jasper?” Joan exclaimed. “Jasper Sherringford, the late duke?”

  “Jasper Sherringford,” the man echoed. “Pleased to finally make your acquaintance, Miss Krieger.”

  “Oh fuck!” Reg snapped to his feet. “You Sherringfords take the cake for secrets! Am I to understand you’re not Edward Dale, Nick’s uncle, but Jasper Sherringford, his supposedly dead father?”

  Jasper nodded. “Yes.”

  Reg sank back into his chair. “That’s entirely screwed up, my man.”

  “I knew it,” a voice said from behind them.

  Joan turned. Shadows flitted away, revealing Gregor and his brother, Nick, very much alive.

  “Fuck,” Joan echoed, swearing perhaps for the first time in her life.

  Chapter 21

  Joan rounded on Gregor. “How dare you! How dare you pretend to be dead? How dare you keep another secret from me! You say you want to be married, to be full partners in life and you lie.”

  “That is not the greeting I expected, Joan,” he said mildly.

  “I told Nick once that his love of dramatic entrances would boomerang on him at some point. Guess it bit you first, Gregor.” Reg rose, grinning. “But, dammit, Nick, you flighty English lord, I’m glad to see you.”

  Nick and Reg embraced, dispelling some of Joan’s temper. But, not all. Gregor had much to answer for.

  He approached her carefully. “I gave you a sign,” he said in a low voice.

  “You could have whispered in my ear as soon as I realized you were missing!”

  “I thought that might give it away and—”

  “What you mean is you didn’t trust me enough for the full truth.”

  “I thought it would be safer—”

  “And how safe have I been for the past day?”