“As one would only expect, and as she should,” Bessie said matter-of-factly, shifting a piece of bread from her plate onto mine when she saw I’d taken to my food rather quickly. I caught her winking at me. I returned a wink when Father wasn’t looking.
Bessie must have been encouraging Father not to be so worried about Lord Denbury’s proposal, as he simply didn’t press the issue further after her comment. She knew all too well the damage various familial pressures could do to true love across boundaries.
Father shifted the conversation to acquisitions, and I mentioned what I thought the collection lacked, and then we were all off to our respective duties and errands.
I spent a little longer on my appearance, pinning up my hair with seed pearl pins Mrs. Northe had gifted me, sure to wear the nicer of my two lace-trimmed cream blouses, noting the slight tear in the sleeve had been repaired. Bless you, Bessie. I wore my best overskirt with its slight bustling at the back, a deep plum, my favorite color, with a little matching plum vest trimmed in mauve that made the piece seem like a whole ensemble. After the delicious kisses he gifted me the night prior, I wanted to be at my feminine best, though my best dresses were ball gowns I’d been given as gifts. A mere trip to Mrs. Northe’s parlor did not necessitate a ball gown, fine as the parlor was.
The maid let me in, gesturing me into the parlor, and ran down the list of who was in, who had been in, and who was out. It was quite the rotating guest list. Mrs. Northe and Lord Denbury were both evidently out, but Lavinia was looking a bit lost in the parlor. The maid was quick to fetch us both tea. The black-clad girl, hair partly up and partly streaming down her back in a fetching deep red stream, looked like a Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood painting in mourning.
“Natalie, I’m very glad to see you. I wanted to tell you something I heard. One of my associates dropped this note for me.” She referenced a small card in her lap. “He was out at the new White Horse Tavern, downtown, and he thinks he got a sense of the man who was behind the substance. And he said he thought someone looked familiar, someone who...interrupted the man in question, just as he was pressuring a group of lads. I don’t suppose...Lord Denbury is on the trail of anyone, is he?” she asked hopefully, as if my Jonathon could be the hero she seemed to need.
I shrugged. I wasn’t sure that we were letting on any word of our activities to anyone. It wasn’t that I didn’t trust Lavinia, there was something about her that compelled me, but I would let Jonathon be the one to share what he’d been up to. I assumed perhaps he was taking Mrs. Northe to the location in question, from whence he’d followed Stevens. Before Lavinia could press me further, there was some commotion at the front door.
Suddenly, I heard a familiar British accent crying out: “Darling, I’ve come for you!”
Lavinia looked up, wide-eyed, partly in ecstasy, partly in shock, as if she couldn’t believe her ears. And then her cheeks turned as red as her hair. We both knew exactly who that voice belonged to.
Nathaniel Veil had returned from England. And it would seem he was on a mission.
I could hear the maid protesting with him that he needed to be announced, but he charged right into the parlor in an imperious swoop of black fabric and flying locks of hair, not bothering to take off his cloak, tossing aside his top hat onto a nearby chair, and practically diving across the parlor and onto his knees before the divan where Lavinia perched so gracefully.
Enter Nathaniel Veil.
Tall and wild, the Gothic actor—all in the finest black, tailored vestments—did not leave his persona behind on the stage once he took his bow. Instead, he lived his theatricality in every moment, to the fullest, the energy and powerful presence entirely overtaking a room. I had to stop myself from laughing, not because I found him foolish, but merely because I was so entertained by his full commitment to being unquestionably dramatic. It was contagiously delightful.
And Lavinia’s expression was rather priceless. I could see the joy on her face, but as he took her hands in his and kissed them with flourish, a fierce pain took over, and her whole demeanor darkened.
“Ah, you finally pay attention to me now that I’ve gone and done something terrible?” she murmured. “You fly to the side of your injured toy?” He looked up at her in horror. “And you might want to be just a touch less rude, Mister Veil,” she added, “and say hello to Miss Stewart, who does happen to be in the room with us at present.”
“Hello, Mister Veil,” I said gently from across the room. “It is so good of you to come. I am sure your Association will derive great comfort from your presence.”
Veil sprang up and instantly was across the room and back down on his knees again, taking up my hands in his this time. He did not kiss them, thankfully, for poor Lavinia’s sake, but he did hold them to his breast and spoke with absolute earnestness, his accent every bit as delectable to me as Jonathon’s was. “Miss Stewart, I am so frightfully glad to see you, too, have you been taking good care of my dove here and my best, bosom friend? Where is that glorious cad Den, anyway?”
“I… You mean Lord Denbury?” I said, trying to hold back a chuckle, having forgotten Veil’s pet name for Jonathon, a name I was not allowed to utter under any circumstance. Ever.
“Yes. Where the devil is the man?” Veil jumped back to his feet again. A towering presence, he paced a few steps before throwing himself onto a pouf. I opened my mouth to answer, but he was onto another subject, addressing Miss Kent. “I’ve sent a call to round up my Association. We can’t have anyone trying to take advantage of them again, so we’ll rally the troops here. How are they, Vin?”
It seemed everyone important to Nathaniel had a pet name. I cringed at “Vin.” He dared not call me “Nat”; he could save that nickname for himself, surely.
“They are all passable. Trying to mitigate any damage done,” Lavinia answered, her tone even. “As Miss Stewart said, your presence will do them good. However, I suggest setting a firm tone. We can’t have this seem like errant behavior will make you come running.” She stared into her teacup. “And before you ask or assume, I was not trying to do that to you. I was genuinely interested in…options.”
Veil crossed the room to her again in a mere step. Even though there wasn’t room for him, he sat down beside Lavinia, edging her over, her own skirts spilling over his trousers, the two of them a streaming splay of black fabric. If his next words were an act, then he was a very good actor indeed, for he seemed utterly sincere. There was nothing he did by halves, but his truly contrite and earnest tone could not be denied.
“Promise me you’ll talk to me before you turn to anything else,” Veil said gently. “All of you. I want all of you to feel supported. Is that clear, Vin? I didn’t start my Association out of ego. I started it to save lives. Do you remember how many near suicides we had our first year as acquaintances, all brought together by some old dark loneliness that was sown down deep in our bones?”
“I do remember,” she whispered, barely audible.
“The point is we have each other, rather than substances, rather than drastic measures. In the Association, all are cared for,” he murmured. Lavinia wouldn’t look at him, merely nodded. He took a black-gloved finger and placed it under her chin, forcing her to look up at him. “And some are cared for more than others.”
“Nathaniel, please don’t,” she murmured. Even though he had turned her face to him, her eyes still refused to meet his. Blushing furiously, she was surely uncomfortable that I was in the room still. This kind of intimacy was rather shocking to be shared with an acquaintance in the room, but Veil didn’t seem to care; he flaunted custom regularly, the whole of his life and his actions public and unapologetic. I was amenable to honest conversation between lovers, but Lavinia didn’t know me well enough to know I would not judge her for it.
“Where are you and your Association meeting, Mister Veil?” I asked, lest he try to press the intimacy issue further and publicly kiss her, a shock indeed.
“Why here, of course,” Veil repli
ed as if that were obvious. “Mrs. Northe did say I was welcome in her home when she wired me.”
“Ah. Yes.” I smiled. “But does…Mrs. Northe know about potential…company?”
Veil blinked a moment. “You don’t think she’ll mind, do you?”
I took a moment to choose words carefully, stifling a surprised chuckle at his oblivious regard for anyone but himself and his own. “I’d think she’d appreciate a bit of an advanced notice, as would the staff, Mister Veil,” I finally replied.
Lavinia just stared at me with a wide, horrified stare, trying to mouth an apology. It only made me want to laugh again, until I imagined what it would be like if I were the staff. Maybe I’d go help them. I had benefited from Mrs. Northe’s acquaintance, learning how the upper echelon lived, but when one was as distinctly middle-class as I was, life could go either way and so would my empathy.
“Yes… I suppose you’ve a point there, Miss Stewart…” Veil murmured. “Did I mention you’re looking lovely? Purple. Suits you. One of the rare colors I’m fond of.”
He bounded up again and darted into the hall; it was impressive how quickly he moved, preternatural almost. It fit with his persona eerily well. I heard him call into the hall: =
“Lovely young miss who I entirely, rudely, bowled past at the door, would you do me the kind favor of preparing for guests?”
My jaw hung open at the sheer cheek of the man.
“How… many…” I heard the poor, beleaguered young maid reply.
“Oh, I’d say about forty,” he offered cheerfully. “Give or take a few.”
“For…ty…give or take…” came the frightened response. There was a scuffle down the stairs to the kitchens below, and I heard a clatter of a few pans and fire irons.
“Thank you, beautiful!” Veil cried after her and bounded back again to Lavinia’s side. She had been able to do nothing but stare after him, helpless to stop the tumbling, sweeping force of nature that was the man she so clearly couldn’t help but adore. “So. Darling,” he said, edging back onto the seat, practically in her lap. “I think just a good meeting, all of us, among friends, would do a lot for morale, don’t you think?”
Lavinia nodded.
Veil then looked over at me, remembering his earlier question that had gone unanswered. “I say. Where is that charmer of yours, Miss Stewart?”
“I appreciate that you think I’m the keeper of Lord Denbury’s whereabouts, Mister Veil,” I said with a chuckle. “But I haven’t a clue.”
“Well, would you find a way to fetch him?” Veil said as if exasperated. “Otherwise, he’ll miss a bloody good show! Impromptu parlor shows are my favorite.”
“Neither Mrs. Northe nor Lord Denbury seem to be in at present, Mister Veil,” I said in response to Nathaniel’s insistent belief that I should know the whereabouts and goings-on of my suitor at all times. “So we’ll just have to wait.”
“Unless they ran away together,” Nathaniel said dramatically. Lavinia snorted.
I didn’t bother replying. Considering Mrs. Northe was the wisest woman I knew, I didn’t think she was the type to run off with someone who could be her son, no matter how attractive he was. But then again, jealousy was a funny creature and flared up at the most inopportune moments. She had always been keenly interested in his welfare and well-being…
Before the green-eyed monster could entirely run away with my sensibilities, the maid I recognized as having been with Mrs. Northe for years, a thin woman who must have been hiding from all the commotion, bobbed her head at me before handing me an envelope. I could feel Nathaniel’s keen, dark eyes upon me like a hawk.
“This place is full of secrets and missives!” he exclaimed. “I felt, from the moment I entered this fine house, caught up amid plots and espionage!”
Lavinia leaned forward from the settee, a fond smile on her face as she said in a stage whisper: “Everything, even the smallest thing, feeds his imagination.”
“Oh, but it is espionage, Mister Veil,” I replied with a wink and opened the note.
“Ha!” he exclaimed, seeming rather delighted. But my humor was short lived.
My heart faltered a bit. The letter was from Maggie. Nathaniel and Lavinia were lost to a bit of banter as I was lost to the words of the misguided young lady who was as much enemy as friend, yet a girl whose destiny I felt was awkwardly entwined with mine.
Dear Natalie,
I write this to you from Chicago, which is an odious place compared to New York City. It’s crowded, loud, smelly. Not that New York doesn’t have its foul districts, but this swine-butchering city seems so uncultured comparatively. But Karen is trying to endear Chicago to me, and day by day she wins a bit of it over to me.
I’m sure this letter sounds very frivolous thus far. That’s probably what you think of me. Frivolous, shallow, with no idea what I’ve done.
But I do know. Please don’t think the worst of me. I realize I nearly died. And I nearly dragged you with me into the madness.
I realize I nearly killed you.
I do not know what else to say but that I am sorry. And I am so very glad that you, Jonathon, and Rachel, and whatever forces were on your side, managed to save us. I owe you my life, misguided as it is. But seeing as I’m still alive, I might as well make the best of it. Though the fashion here in Chicago is at least a year behind New York. Not that I’ve had much time for shopping.
Karen is teaching me myriad mysteries I don’t even begin to know how to describe to you. Perhaps you will see them in person. I long to return to New York, but I am advised that the dark magic needs space and separation. Something you probably already knew.
But things are afoot here in Chicago, Natalie. There are other “doctors” doing other “experiments.” Auntie was out here, having left us to our own devices, and her and Karen and the late Amelia did a bit of snooping, and it seems there’s a subterranean racket of missing bodies and body parts, of possessions and soul-ripping. Karen said other recent instances might also be related to the collective trying to grab hold in the strangest ways.
But really, is what they’re doing entirely evil? Is there not a point to experimentation? Asking questions? Seeing what the limits of the body, mind, and spirit may be?
I wonder these things, and then I wake with carvings on my arms and Karen has to bless me and wash my arms down with holy water. Karen says that Amelia is watching over me, she’s sure of it.
I cannot help but wonder if Karen and Amelia were more than friends and were actually in one of those “Boston Marriages.” Could you imagine? How scandalous. You should ask Auntie about it, though I doubt she’d tell me the truth. She never did like me being nosy in other peoples’ business. I can’t blame her. It has gotten me into trouble.
Karen said that Auntie told her that you suffered the same markings as I have. Runes? Some ancient language repurposed for something terrible? Perhaps you can share with me your thoughts and how the terror of it made you feel, for right now I am feeling rather put upon and wholly alone. I’ve never done well with solitude. Perhaps that’s something I could learn from you too.
Not that you’re alone, now, with Lord Denbury… I burn with shame. I don’t know what else to say upon that count. That’s another apology and contrite plea for forgiveness for another day. Though I doubt it would surprise you to hear I’m still rather jealous. What woman wouldn’t be with such a catch as he?
Rachel has been by to check on me, not that we can communicate other than by notes we write one another. I can’t imagine what it would be like not to be able to speak, and yet she is full of joy and hope, the sweetest soul. I can learn a lot from her about being grateful. That’s another thing Auntie always said about me. Ungrateful. But not Rachel, who bears her burdens lightly and with grace.
Rachel says, well, wrote, when she came over for tea, that she’s very busy putting all the souls to rest that were pulled to the reanimate body that a researcher here was working on. She says she feels a sense of purpose in fi
ghting all this dark nonsense and that sense of purpose is something I’m trying to cling to.
What about voices? Do you hear voices, Natalie? Whatever you can tell me of your experiences with the forces that Karen refers to as “the Society’s darkness,” will likely be of great help.
Or, you might tear this letter up, wanting nothing to do with me ever again, and I could not blame you for that, even though I would be sad. I might not have ever been a good friend, but maybe, in the end, I can be.
With hope,
Margaret Hathorn
I sat with these words, a ponderous weight upon my heart, not sure whether to be amused or appalled by Maggie’s flippant, socialite tone shifting so effortlessly between gossip, deadly matters, and plaintive soul-searching. I went back and reread her previous paragraphs.
She was so close to what I would consider a redemptive tone, and yet she still justified the experimentation. Until she entirely denounced them, it was likely that the dark magic would still cling to her, call to her, and worse. It might still work through her.
I had denounced the demons entirely, and yet the runes had still managed to invade, carving their ways onto my arm as the dark magic sought me out. What was it doing to her, when she so clearly was still tainted?
I had been staring so intently at Maggie’s words, as if I could somehow will further meaning, insight, and direction from the paper itself. Frankly, I wasn’t sure how much time had passed. But at the sound of rustling fabrics and soft murmurs, I looked up.
The number of persons in the room and milling in the halls and stairs beyond had increased dramatically, though the sound had not. Mister Veil’s Association could be an eerily quiet bunch.
“Oh...” I murmured, my cheeks burning from the realization of sudden, further company. “I see it is time for a show...”
Chapter Ten
There was a cluster of dark-clad persons shifting silently in the hall, moving slightly on their feet as if they were feathers on a breeze or ghosts not touching the floor. Others had quietly entered the parlor.
The Double Life of Incorporate Things (Magic Most Foul) Page 9