Sirens and Scales

by Kellie McAllen

  Though Callom looked intrigued by the information, he seemed uncertain what to do with it.

  “I’m not sure what—” The warmth of his grip again wrapped around her arm, this time high up where her skin was bare and cool under his touch.

  “Over there,” he whispered against her ear, “near the piano.”

  She saw the feather far across the way atop a figure shorter than the others. The moment he set on the move, his slightly shorter stature made it difficult to keep an eye on him.

  “Come on,” Callom said, as they followed him through the crowd, darting between exuberant dancers and those who’d already had too much to drink. Several women gasped in protest at their imprudent movements, but Emma ignored them as she kept her eye on the prize.

  Several times, their target glanced over his shoulder, leaving her to wonder if he feared them or someone else.

  They followed him through a side door and down a grand corridor that echoed only remnants of the party left behind. They were completely in the open as they trailed after Graves, and the moment Emma saw his head swinging around in their direction, she turned and grasped at the lapels of Callom’s jacket.

  She smiled up at him, leaning in close as if she was some lusty lover unable to contain herself in the midst of a wild party. Following right along with her ruse, Callom’s hot hand drifted across the deep curve of her waist, leaving her flustered as she heard the man’s shoes click off the marble floors.

  Flashing Callom a weak snarl, she smacked his hand away and hurried after the man she hoped to be Chester Graves. The followed him down another hallway until he turned into an open doorway. They waited a moment, then continued after him. The two of them crept toward the door and peeked inside. An enormous library with high ceilings and books covered every wall. They watched as the last of Chester Grave’s feathered hat disappeared behind a wall of books that slid back into place, sealing his secret escape from them.

  “Ballocks,” Callom said, as he rushed toward the wall and felt for any indentation or marking that might let them open it. The pair pulled upon every book and Callom reached up onto every high shelf.

  Eventually, they resigned themselves to failure and headed for the door when Emma heard a pair of heavy steps coming their way.

  Panic flooded over her as she grasped hard upon the front of Callom’s jacket and jerked him behind the nearest drapery. With the window directly at her back, a cold chill swept over her, sending a rippling sensation down her spine just as Callom tucked himself and his boots out of sight.

  Emma was left pinned entirely between the cold window and the heat of Callom’s body as they kept their breath quiet under the sound of clicking shoes. Emma kept her gaze lowered, settled on the base of Callom’s throat as tobacco smoke filtered through the curtains.

  Her breath quickened every time he shifted minutely against her. She jolted when a radio turned on in the library, filling the air with a muffled tune. Leather squeezed under the stranger’s heavy weight, making it clear they wouldn’t be leaving anytime soon.

  Callom’s ever-intoxicating nearness did improper things to her mind, and Emma was desperate for a reprieve. She tried to find space where there was none and her heartbeat escalated as the seconds ticked on.

  Gently, Callom’s warm hand pressed beneath her chin and brought her gaze upward. Even in the dark she found herself frozen in the hypnotic lure of his amber eyes.

  She should’ve pulled away.

  Turned away.

  Done anything but stand there.

  In an instant, his lips crashed over hers, stunning her into stillness. His hand drifted up into the nape of her hair, cradling her head with a rush of warmth that awakened something in her.

  Emma kissed him back with a fervor she’d never known.

  He tasted of gin and spice, and every touch of his skin against hers felt like a wildfire she wanted to let burn. Pinned hard against the glass behind her, her chest heaved with her gasping breath, giving him far more than she’d bargained for as his lips dipped to trace along her neck.

  Her sensible mind ordered her to stop but. . . she couldn’t. They had masks on, and for tonight, she was not Emma Clearwater. Sensible. Proper. Respectable. She was simply a woman, experiencing real desire for the first—and perhaps only—moment in her life.

  Her fingers dug into the length of his hair, tugging him back up for another possessive kiss that left her breathless. After several more hungry kisses, Emma regained control over herself and stepped back.

  With parted lips and a heavy breath, Callom stood still as stone, respecting her wish to stop but clearly wanting more.

  The tobacco smoke had dissipated, and though the radio still played, Emma was fairly certain they’d been left alone. Had they not, well, she imagined even the deafest of men would have heard them.

  Cautiously she peeked out from the edge of the curtain just as an unusual light drew her eyes downward. Nestled just above the heave of her chest sat her necklace, an old stone amulet that had been passed down to her from her mother. It had been a part of the family for generations, and though it was missing a single stone, she chose never to leave home without it.

  For some reason, one of the stones glowed.

  With a quick shove of the curtain she escaped Callom’s grasp into the empty room. Her cheeks and neck flushed with embarrassment, and she covered the amulet with her hand, shrouding it from his eyes.

  “I need to go home,” she said abruptly. Without giving him a moment to protest, she raced for the door and out into the hallway.

  Charles Graves be damned. Though she was desperate to find him and protect her people, the shame of her actions had won over the reasonable side of her mind.

  Callom ran into the hall after her. “Wait, Emma!”

  “Goodnight, Mr. Smythe,” she called out without looking back. She couldn’t look, not when she was on the edge of the precipice, ready to fall at any moment.

  In a hurry she sprinted through the halls, nearly knocking several people over in her hasty escape. The moment she reached her carriage, she jumped inside without aid and slammed the door shut.

  “Go! Please!” she shouted to the driver, and off they lurched, hurriedly heading home and away from the danger that was Callom Smythe.

  Emma’s father was still awake when she walked through the front door.

  “Father?”

  He looked haggard and exhausted, with bags under his eyes and his gray hair a mess. It was an unusual sight for the man who took great pride in himself and the way he presented the Clearwater name.

  “Oh good, you’re—” As his eyes focused on her, he drew more and more quiet until he reached over to switch on a tableside lamp that hummed the moment a dim, flickering light flooded the room.

  Emma stood tall with the horns still atop her head and a sigh escaping her lips.

  “Goodness dear Emma, what have you done?”

  “It was all the rage, I assure you.” Grasping her mask, she plucked it off and wondered if her lips looked swollen from Callom’s kiss, or if any of her rouge mussed from his touch.

  “Oh.” Thomas’s brow crinkled in thought. “You chose this, then.”

  “I—yes. It’s a fashion . . . from Paris.” Emma’s head shook. The last thing she wanted was to be reminded of the press of Callom against her when she spoke with her father. “It doesn’t matter. Why are you up this late? You look positively exhausted.”

  “I needed to be certain you made it home all right.”

  “Of course I did,” she said, but something in his weary look softened her. “What’s wrong?”

  “Another slayer has been murdered.”

  “Oh,” Emma said, as the weight of it pushed her into the nearest chair.

  “Tomorrow the clans will meet to decide.”

  Unease churned in her gut like a lead weight. “To decide what?”

  “When we go to war with the dragons.”

  7

  Discomfort was the mainstay o
f Emma’s vocabulary when she awoke the morning after the masquerade ball. The meeting of the clans was to be first thing at dawn. Unfortunately or fortunately, she was not yet head of the Clearwaters and could not attend.

  The very thought left her lips downturned as she wondered what would happen to her family name. She was to marry Frederick, and certainly he would want her to become Mrs. Milton. Would the Clearwaters be forgotten to time? Left rudderless without a male heir?

  Angered by the thought, she dressed in a hurry, choosing a high neckline that hid her amulet. In opposition to her usually lackadaisical approach in waking and readying for the day, she was downstairs straightaway. After a quick search of the parlor and dining room, she’d guessed her father had already gone.

  She sat at the table, her nerves leading her to push a piece of buttered toast across her plate with disinterest. Only her tea had been touched, but even that was turning cold. When the front door finally clicked open, she jumped so swiftly the toast on her plate flew free and landed butter down on the table.

  “Dammit,” she whispered under her breath, but apparently not quiet enough since her father walked in, his brows raised in question at her.

  She picked up the piece of toast and blotted the greasy stain with her napkin. “Bit of a mess, I am this morning.” She watched nervously as he took the seat across from her and set his walking cane aside.

  “How did it go?” she finally asked when it seemed he would tell her nothing, and when he sighed at length she stilled.

  “We’ve decided we must act—and soon. We can’t let these killings go on unaccounted for any longer.”

  Emma’s breath caught in her throat, leaving her to clear it loudly before she could manage to speak. “In what way? When?”

  “The families will gather, and in two-day’s time, we’ll launch a full-on assault against the dragonborne.”

  Her gaze drifted across the flowery print of her teacup. She wished to talk to her father about all that had gone on, but she knew she had no proof that the death and mayhem was potentially at the hands of someone else.

  But if she was too late, or wrong, then many more, Callom included, would potentially die in the days to come.

  “Emma?”

  Her gaze met her father’s softened expression. “Are you okay?”

  “Oh yes, perfectly fine.” She reached for her tea cup and drank a large gulp before sneering at the contents. The cold liquid tasted terrible.

  “What is going on, Emma? You’re unlike yourself.”

  Her father was right.

  She would never behave so openly agitated. Her ability to overpower her own emotions had been one of her greatest traits. But her thoughts and dreams of the last evening had been full of questions. Something gnawed at her from deep within.

  “What do you know of mother’s necklace?” Emma asked without fanfare or introduction.

  Confusion washed over his face. “The amulet?”

  “Yes.”

  “I can’t say I know all that much about it,” he admitted. “It was your mother’s, and her mother’s before that. I had a bracelet similar once, but no son to pass it down to.”

  “What did you do with it?”

  “I gave it to the Hudson’s when their son was born. I knew I would never love anyone to the degree I’d loved your mother, so there was no reason to wait for another heir to take it.”

  “Oh. Well, where did they come from? To begin with?”

  “I’m not entirely sure.” He brought his fingers to his lips. “The only place to know would be in the archives.”

  “The what?” Emma asked.

  Her father sighed and pinched his fingers to his temple. “Do you recall the old hospital to the East? The one that shut down amidst great scandal? The one that people fear to touch or demolish?”

  “Yes.”

  “It was no coincidence it was made to shy people away. Within the basement beneath those doors, you can find the historical records of the slayers, some dating back to the beginning.”

  Emma jumped up and toppled her chair over backward. Rattled and confused, her father said nothing as she ran around to kiss his cheek before she grabbed a coat and rushed out the door.

  Emma raced down the sidewalk on swift feet, intent on finding precisely what she needed within the hour. She didn’t have much time.

  Turning a corner, she slammed headfirst into something hard, only to look up into the eyes of a rather angry-looking gentleman.

  “Sorry!”

  Bewildered, the man watched as she ran off. Not even children splashing in puddles bothered Emma as the hem of her gown caught a rain of dreary mud.

  Reaching the abandoned hospital, she dashed up to the door and jerked on the handles only to find they were firmly locked shut. With a deep frown, she made her way around the building’s side, checking every door along the way and not finding a path inside.

  High above where she stood, she saw her entrance in an open window. A handful of gouges in the bricks made up the outer wall, and she again cursed her damn skirts.

  Gathering them up, she shoved them back before she heaved herself up and grasped at the rough, crumbling surface. The first handhold let go, sending her feet slamming back into the ground. Angrily, she stared until a sight over the old fence left her mind spinning.

  Leaning up against a nearby rickety building rested a ladder, left over from the days when proprietors attempted to refurbish the building. Emma need to get it into place to see if it was tall enough.

  Sneaking up beside the building, she peeked into every window she could find in a hasty effort to be certain no one was home. She grasped the ladder with as much strength as she could and took a step back. Immediately, the top-heavy weight sent her plummeting backward as the ladder crashed across a shoddy construction fence.

  Wood splintered loudly, alerting several nearby dogs into a frenzy of yelps. Groaning, Emma shimmied out from beneath the ladder.

  With one end of the ladder in hand, she dragged it into the street before making her way toward the hospital. The wood ground obnoxiously against the street like a siren and would have sparked had it been made of metal. Emma finally had the ladder to where she wanted it. She heaved it up, hoping it wouldn’t tumble back down atop her.

  She fell onto the ground at the ladder’s base, heaving in lengthy breaths. Her skirts were covered in dirt and grime from her fight with the ladder, and already she could feel the heavy soak of sweat beneath the clench of her corset.

  Gaining strength, she hopped up on the ladder and scaled it one slow step at a time. Beneath the weight of her foot, one of the rungs snapped, giving her a minor scare as she scrambled up to the next. Luckily, no more broke as she hurried her way up and clambered into the old, dark building.

  At first, Emma wondered whether her father had been mistaken. Old furniture was upended inside many of the rooms while others were bare and empty except for a thick layer of old dust. Her footprints left a solid trail behind her as she crept farther in, finding nothing of interest. Down another floor she looked and another, until she descended far enough and found herself in a dingy basement devoid of light.

  “This seriously can’t be it,” she said, as the single ray of light filtering down from a crack in the ceiling lit a small table where an old candle and a few matches lay. Snatching it up she hurriedly lit it and inhaled a mouthful of dust at the sight around her.

  Books lined the walls from floor to ceiling while large open-topped drums were stuffed with tightly wound scrolls. Everything smelled musty and old, along with a tinge of cracked leather and melted wax.

  Intrigued, Emma drifted along the old shelves, touching each book that caught her attention. She wished to read so many of them, but time was of the essence and she didn’t know where to start.

  Setting the candle down on a small table at the center of the room, she hunted first for the oldest looking books and made a stack to work through. Hesitantly, she settled herself into the only rickety chai
r.

  With the first book open, she scanned for anything related to the amulet around her neck. It no longer glowed, not since the evening at the masquerade ball.

  She drifted through various books, finding old books on various fighting styles and ways of survival. Many seemed unrelated, and when she was finished with each, she returned them before grabbing more.

  She carefully spread out several across the table in her hunt, only for most of them to branch out in great family trees bearing names she didn’t recognize. Somewhere she imagined there would be a scroll with the Clearwater name, and while her curiosity burned at her to find it, she couldn’t. Not now.

  When her eyes drooped and fatigue weighed on her shoulders, she still hadn’t found any information or drawings of amulets or jewelry pieces for slayers.

  With a bundle of scrolls clutched in her arms, she walked back over to one of the bins. She started dropping them in when something in the bottom captured her attention. It was a book, smaller than the others, with deep engravings across the leather front. Haphazardly she let all of the scrolls in her grasp fall to the floor as she dived in for it.

  Triumphantly she ran back to the table in favor of the dim light she still had. In a hurry, she flipped through, her brow pinched in a sharp line the moment she recognized the old language inscribed within. It wasn’t anything she could read, not when it was written in the dragon’s tongue. Long ago her father had shown her several old pieces of artwork displaying the sharply contoured words of the dragonborne so she could recognize it if the time came.

  Now she did, and along with it was an image of the amulet around her neck and the missing stone she’d never had. She slammed the book shut and jumped to her feet. There was still no time to waste, not if she only had two days before war would strike.

  She needed to know what the book said, and she needed to know now.

  Once more, Emma raced across New York, this time with a book tucked carefully under her arm and her eyes turned forward to avoid any delays.