Agamemnon Frost and the House of Death

by Kim Knox

  “They look like us, because they are us. Or a template of what you’ll give and what I’ll become.”

  Frost was aware of his thoughts again. Even strapped to a chair and facing his death, that fact still unnerved Mason. His gaze returned to Frost and he cursed the bands and leather that made only eye movement possible. “Why are they doing this, sir?”

  “Because they can? Because we have something they want? Their ambitions are obscure.”

  Sir Randolph’s laughter echoed. He glanced back from the spectres. “You little apes at Station X. So pompous. So self-important. Believing you’re so clever. Believing you can fool me.” His voice changed briefly to a tone that Mason had only ever heard from the most senior of officers. “‘Saving the Empire.’ You know nothing. Your feeble minds can’t comprehend the breadth of our ambition.”

  “Is that important? Your ambition?”

  Frost’s question surprised Mason. He thought the man would make another cutting remark, rebuke Sir Randolph for his overblown speech, but he hadn’t. There was the other side of Frost again. The man behind the fashion plate. Had Sir Randolph noticed?

  “Ambition is everything.”

  “Perhaps.”

  Sir Randolph’s hands waved though the images, the shapes rippling from a slow wake at the turn of his fingers, the press of his palm. “You were adrift, Mr. Frost, playing with the wealth procured by your ancestors, shunning the drive that bought the fine family hall and its grounds.”

  His movements quickened, became sharper and less fluid, less graceful. He was warming to his subject. “You drank and whored your way through Oxford. Followed the same path when you left. Did your masters think your charm would work on me? On my daughter?” His laughter was harsh. “Though, perhaps, I expect too much of you. Mason—with his Distinguished Conduct Medal—has done little with it in the ten years since it was awarded.”

  Mason kept his expression fixed. The man knew nothing about him. And he did a disservice to the men who hadn’t survived the long trek back to Kandahar.

  Frost pulled his attention again. “I did what was expected of me.”

  “Your family expected you to wallow in vice?”

  Now Sir Randolph sounded like the old women who beat drums and rattled tambourines outside the pub every night.

  “I was the spare.”

  “And each son should see his brother as his first rival. And form his plans against him.”

  That sounded like a quote, but from no book Mason had ever read.

  Sir Randolph pulled his hands into fists and stepped back from the spectres. A low creaking jerked Mason’s gaze upwards. The snarl of copper twisted against the metal that held it, moving like a nest of gleaming snakes, so slowly that Mason did doubt his eyes. It was yet more of their strange machinery.

  He fought not to strain against the straps that bound him. It would only sharpen the pain.

  “Yes, stay calm.” Sir Randolph linked his hands behind his back and crossed the distance between the floating images and the platform. “The kardax love to observe this procedure, but I’m afraid Mr. Frost here annoys them immensely.” A thin smile touched his lips. “I’m sure Theodora will enjoy her time with you after. She’ll make a good wife.”

  A flicker of disbelief crossed Frost’s face. Sir Randolph caught it too.

  “A kardax has no interest in the pleasures of the flesh.” He tilted his head and appeared thoughtful. “Though, perhaps they do, just not in the way that you understand it. Her enjoyment will come from your pain.”

  Anger pushed through Mason. “And yet you want to use him.”

  “The dog defending its master.” Sir Randolph lifted his shoulders and focused on the writhing metal above their heads. The copper shone, the sound now more of a sinuous hiss than a groan as it eased free of the disc. “The river has cleared the fog and its interference with the metal will be minimal tonight.”

  Mason had little idea what he was talking about. He simply knew that the mass of copper, moving through the air, almost giving the appearance of scenting, of seeking, pushed towards him. His chest tightened, the fierce, hard thud of his heart making his breath short. He couldn’t panic. He still held to the possibly insane belief that Frost had a way out.

  The ends of the pipes swayed before him and every other thought left his mind. Metal moved, the blunt end of the copper opening and closing, almost a rounded, toothless mouth. How was Sir Randolph going to use him to make over Frost’s body? Mason swallowed, the strap around his neck digging into his flesh. Sweat slicked his skin. Breathe. He had to breathe and stay calm.

  “You’d disappoint my kardax, Mason.” Sir Randolph’s voice was a vague sound off to his left. “Most men are screaming by now.”

  “I’m happy to disappoint.” The words came out of a dry mouth, fear pushing at him, his attention fixed on the fat copper pipe only inches from his chest. It looked hungry. “And after this?”

  “Mr. Frost will belong to us.”

  There’d been no promise that he’d come out of this alive. One night’s work. Just one. And now he faced his death. He stared at the man who had dragged him into this, but he couldn’t hang the blame solely on him. Even if he hadn’t followed Frost out into the night, he would be strapped into the chair with an...alien device before him. It inched closer.

  His heart tightened, the panicked cramps in his gut emptying his thoughts. Reasoning fled. Fuck. Fuck. He couldn’t catch his breath—

  “Stay calm. Breathe. Focus on something. On my offer.”

  Frost’s voice pushed over him, rich and deep, and Mason grabbed at the assurance of it. Grabbed at the thought of it being more than the security of work, but also the hint of what Sir Randolph had derided. Of mouths, and skin scented with sandalwood and vanilla, of sleek muscles and fierce strength. Of Frost taking him hard and fast. Mason’s breath hitched and the cut of the leather straps only sharpened the sudden need in his flesh.

  “You’d be incredible to...work for, sir.”

  Frost’s grin was deliciously wicked. “I know.”

  For one second, he could ignore the terror. The promise hung there between them, thick and hot. Wanted. But then, the copper snake jerked forward. It carved a hole through his chest to devour his heart. And Mason screamed.

  5. The Transfiguration of Edgar Mason

  Sound bloomed through his head, deep and aching. Mason groaned and tried to lift his palms to the pain in his skull. But his hands wouldn’t obey him. Fire cut into his arms and chest, burst across his stomach as he strained to move.

  He couldn’t see. His vision was patches of light, a mess of colour, and his senses surged. The heavy thud of sound came with the overwhelming scent of wet stone, metal and blood. The blood mixed with the tang of copper and steel. And was everywhere.

  Fuck. He had to get out of whatever hell he’d landed in. He jerked again at the bonds that pinned him, groaning at the stabs of pain in his muscles.

  “Sit.”

  A woman’s voice, cool and commanding, and with it came the light press of a gloved hand on his shoulder. He breathed in the sharp hint of cloves, and the thought of Lady Cadwallader pushed through his mind. Yes, that was her voice.

  “Sit, Mason.”

  Mason sank back and a warm wash of relief fell over him. His shoulders sagged. He closed his eyes and let his chest rise and fall in easy breaths. The last thing he remembered was...dying. Pain. Screaming. His bones stripped away, torn and cracked from his flesh. Agony and the blackness of death. How could that be? Dead was dead. He couldn’t still be alive.

  “Fucking atmosphere.”

  Sir Randolph’s voice. Disbelief was a quick dart of heat through Mason’s chest that a man of Sir Randolph’s standing would curse before his wife. Memory pushed at him. His temporary employer had been the cause of his torture.
Therefore, he obviously had little worry about manners and decency.

  “The imaging of their bodies revealed nothing irregular. I lost five good automata—my mechane can’t analyse why—and I have a valet in return.” More oaths followed, foul enough to make a Tommy blush. “Nowhere on this planet works as it should.”

  “They can act as a pair.” Lady Cadwallader’s voice was calm and smooth, not the excitable tone he remembered from earlier in the evening. “Frost as your eyes above stairs, Mason below.”

  “When I ask for your opinion, Kardax-1, this planet will freeze over.”

  “I apologise, sir.”

  “Unstrap him, wake him up. Get him and Frost to the North Western Hotel. The settlement room is ready. Send a change of clothes.” A harsh laugh escaped him. “Frost’s trunk has more than enough to spare. I want them set and then Frost interrogated. Our final moves are in play and he’ll tell me everything he knows of Station X.”

  “Yes, sir.” Lady Cadwallader stepped back, he could...feel her movement through the platform. A change in weight, in pressure. Mason stopped himself from frowning. He’d come back. But what had he come back as?

  Small fingers moved over his body and unbuckled the leather. Arabella, from the warm scent of violets, to his right, Theodora, with the hint of jasmine lingering on her skin, to his left. Behind his eyelids he could almost imagine a picture in scent, mirroring the ghostly shapes Sir Randolph had pulled out of the wall.

  “Wake up.”

  Mason’s head jerked to the left and pain ballooned in his jaw. Theodora’s slap was more of a thwack with a bat. His tongue ran over his teeth and tasted his blood. “I’m awake,” he muttered, and before he could protest, each young woman grabbed an arm and hauled him out of the chair. His body felt heavy and he stumbled from the platform, only their incredible strength keeping him upright and walking.

  He willed his eyes to stay open, the shining white of the room burning, and caught only fuzzy movement and the dark stain scorching the sandstone walls. The odour deepened. Sandstone mixed with blood and bone, cloth, metal and a sharp, bitter odour he couldn’t place. The footmen had stood there. Five of them.

  Mason didn’t know how he could be so certain, but he was. He could even name them, and that thought twisted sour in his gut. What had these insane people done to him?

  The two girls dragged him outside. Dawn lit the sky over the river and the wind still whipped his face, but the cold didn’t touch him. He could see the underbelly of a gull gilded by morning light. See it as clearly as if he stood on the scrubby head of land out by the river. But then it blurred and the rush of sound, the snort of the waiting horses, the creak of wood burst through his mind again. And he wasn’t shivering.

  The memory of Theodora and Arabella standing in the icy cold of the street and not shivering pushed back through his thoughts. Had they made him into one of them? One of their puppets? He’d sat like a dog when Lady Cadwallader had told him to. Sat with relief that someone else was taking command.

  “Here.” Lady Cadwallader thrust a greatcoat at her daughter. “Put this on him. The trunk is on the landau. He can change at the hotel.”

  He was manhandled into the heavy material of the greatcoat and someone—Williams from his scent—opened the door.

  They shoved him up and he clambered the rest of the way. With relief, he fell back into his seat. Williams slammed the door and Lady Cadwallader stepped up to the carriage window. “A room is prepared. You need time to rest. To become...used to what you are. Understood?”

  Mason kept his face its usual mask of blank attention. He had little clue what she was talking about, but since he was meant to, he nodded. “Understood.”

  She pushed the window up and stepped back. She looked to the driver and at that signal the carriage jerked forward.

  The familiar odours of the carriage washed over him. He sat where Theodora had hours before. He caught Arabella’s and his own scent, the same, and yet with touches of difference that perplexed him. And there was one more odour... “Frost.”

  The name burst from him and he turned his head to the right. In the heavy shadow, he knew the man sat, bundled in a matching greatcoat.

  “How am I still alive?”

  “By the grace of the Ilarches.”

  Mason frowned. The word sounded familiar, as if it moved somewhere in the dark recesses of his mind. It touched other words, kardax and the Frost names of Agamemnon and Menelaus. It was all bound up together in a way he had yet to understand. “Yes.” His tongue thickened over the word sir. He didn’t need it. Something had evened out between the two of them. And he couldn’t understand that either.

  The carriage clattered onto the cobbled lane and Mason stared down over the slip of land, still thick with the frost that they’d scrambled over the previous night. A low fog curled around the hedges and trees edging it, palling the still flickering gas lamps. They were his memories...but they had a dull edge to them now. He frowned. No, he hadn’t been truly alive then.

  The landscape swirled, colours merging, and Mason closed his eyes, letting his head fall back against the padding. Birds chirruped, their sharp song pecking at his brain. He needed a distraction and Frost was it. “And now? What happens now?”

  “We become what we are.”

  Frost was back to being enigmatic. Mason risked opening an eye. The man huddled in the corner of the carriage, as if he could be cold, the collar of his greatcoat pulled up, his hands buried in the deep pockets and drawing the heavy material tight around his body. His normally immaculate hair had strands loose around his face, and there was a coldness to his gaze that pricked at Mason.

  He’d died and the Martians—he couldn’t think they were simple foreign agents now—had brought him back. He didn’t intend to waste precious time with Frost’s riddles. “And that means?”

  “We are automata, made to do his bidding without question.” He lifted an eyebrow and Mason thought he saw something of the true man, that little touch of wickedness that had eased his terror at the end. “You have to work with that. Always.”

  So Sir Randolph was the Ilarches. His superior. His master. Mason rubbed a hand across his face, the confusion after he’d woken up in the chair still with him, only thinning slightly. There should be certainty in his head. His instincts were changing, which only confused him further.

  What had they done to him? Under the command of the mechane, copper pipes had eaten through him and remade his body in their wake. Was he flesh? Or was he machine? In the grey light, his hand looked like his hand, with skin, bone, muscle and a dusting of hair. But the pipes had torn through every inch of him and made him different.

  He scored his thumbnail across his palm, digging deep. Blood beaded against his skin, but there was only an echo of pain. His palm tingled and he smeared away the blood, watching the quick knit of his skin. A repair that left no scar. With his thoughts scrambled, he could only assume that he was a sickening mash of mechanics and man.

  The strangely mechanical precision of his heart jumped, the added touch of horror forcing him to draw in a breath. He still needed to breathe then, though the taste of the air was foul and burned his new lungs.

  Mason glanced out of the window at the people already filling the streets, young apprentices pulling down the boards from numerous shops, the morning smoke from hundreds of chimneys browning the air. The city was coming alive. And they had no idea what strangeness travelled by. The scent of smoke and ash, cut with the aromas of bread, meat and coffee teased through the creaking gaps of the landau, and Mason felt the first push of hunger. So he still had that need too.

  “What do we do for him? Our Ilarches.”

  “Automata are his soldiers. But we, we’re messengers, his ears and eyes. We could have no greater office.”

  Did he believe what he said, or was he saying it for the benefit
of someone else? The driver? He could hardly hear them over the clatter of the wheels and hooves and the general noise of the street. But then Sir Randolph had machinery the like of which Mason had never seen. The old Frost had said that the aeolipile was the work of the Martians. Who knew what other strange devices would be put to work by them?

  “Finding the truth through service and duty is important.”

  “Exactly.” Mason thought a smile touched Frost’s mouth, but he couldn’t be certain. The man sat forward and stared out of the carriage window. “We’re turning into Lime Street.”

  Mason’s confusion had compressed time. Almost an hour had passed in what seemed a fraction of the time. The road thickened with horse-trams, clerks alighting and heading for the county court, passengers swarming from the station. The clatter, the shouts, the stink of horse shit already thick on the morning air surged over him. The people, the noise, everything pushed against his skull, and Mason sank back into the half shadow of his seat.

  “We’re almost there.”

  Frost’s smooth, deep voice was a balm. “Good.”

  The landau turned and settled to a stop outside the canopied entrance to the hotel. A doorman opened the carriage. Mason pressed his hand to his eyes, pushing hard against his brow as pain lanced. Frost stepped out before him and then the man’s strong hand pulled him from the carriage.

  Everything was a blur. The entrance with its stink of polish and beeswax, the lift, cramped and thick with the liniment on the young boy operating it. The smells clogged the air, making it impossible to breathe, to think. Frost gripped his arm and marched along the carpeted corridor. There was another shape of a man in a starched uniform. He opened the lock to their suite, and then Frost closed the door.

  Silence, emptiness hit him and Mason almost staggered. Frost pushed him towards one of the beds and let him collapse against it. He pulled in a deep breath, finding only freshness, and dragged up the energy to crawl farther onto the mattress, uncaring about his coat or boots. The pillow was scented with grass and he pressed his face into it.