by Emma Newman
One of us. He’d never liked that phrase. It always meant there was a “them,” and he was usually in the latter. “If the others don’t think the same way, what ‘us’ are you talking about?”
“The Elemental Court,” she replied as the car slowed. “Just keep an open mind—you’ll understand what I mean soon.”
“Have you brought any of the others here?”
She shook her head. “This is your place. Not theirs.”
He saw a sign for Clearwell Caves. “Why are you so keen for me to become part of the Court?”
“Because we all need each other,” she replied. “And because I’m worried that if you don’t, you’ll make more enemies than you can handle. You’re planning to fight them, aren’t you?”
“Not all at once.”
“Don’t.” The car stopped. “We’re here. Remember, keep an open mind.”
• • •
The only advantage of being born a Poppy was that the Charm to put oneself into a deep, peaceful sleep was one of the first ones Cathy was taught. That night, she was tempted to use it for the first time.
It had taken over an hour to stop shaking and even now, after a poor night’s sleep, she could still see the Dame’s face every time she closed her eyes. When she was able to think with any clarity at all, she made Will promise that he wouldn’t send Wilhelmina home until they’d discussed a long-term solution. Will seemed to recover much faster and had agreed.
The last thing Dame Iris had tried to do was give her a pregnancy Charm. That Lord Iris would murder her over such a failure both terrified and enraged her. Yet more proof that women were disposable things. Would he have done the same to Sir Iris for a similar misdemeanour? She doubted it.
Regardless, she felt responsible, even though she’d had to defend herself to maintain sovereignty over her own body. Dame Iris was determined to rule her life, and she couldn’t endure her harassment. She clung to the idea that Lord Iris didn’t have to kill Dame Iris to make his point. It wasn’t her fault he was such a cold, inhuman bastard.
But there was no getting away from the fact that he was capable of such things, and that she had avoided pregnancy longer than he wanted. Will simply refused to discuss the topic, as if their having a child was inevitable. He was more concerned that they conceive the child enjoyably, rather than having something foisted upon them with Fae magic. He just didn’t understand.
It felt like every conversation they had now was just a breath away from another argument. She could see him just switching off whenever she tried to explain her actions, as if he’d already decided she’d done the wrong thing and the reasoning behind it was irrelevant. If anything, she felt she was making things worse. The longer he was Duke, the more motivated he was to keep all the men happy. What did she expect? They perpetuated their own dominance.
She’d pretended to be asleep when he woke, his slow stirring into consciousness enough to make her wide awake in moments. He’d been wrapped around her and his arm had felt heavy. She’d wanted to push him off and run out of the house, out of the Nether, just keep running from this toxic life where women could be turned into death statues just to form an exclamation mark at the end of an order. But she stayed still, waited until he had stretched and held her breath when he kissed her experimentally in the hope she’d wake. She felt wretched, needing comfort but frightened that if she reached out to him, he’d be lustful again. She was certain the death of Dame Iris had made him all the keener to give his patron the child he desired.
Will left and in the silent bedroom she could feel the pull of despair. She’d considered her freedom from Dame Iris one of the few victories she’d had, and now it was a source of guilt and fear. She’d managed to save Natasha, free Charlotte from her curse, and inspire Wilhelmina to ask for help, but what else? The fabled Ladies’ Court still didn’t have a date for its first session, and she had never even wanted a separate court. She was planning to use it as an opportunity to tell more women about how the Agency treated its staff, and to urge more of them to do what she had. Max’s news about Ekstrand made it riskier, though. Not that Ekstrand would have defended her against any retribution, but at least Max would have been able to warn her, maybe.
Margritte had stopped answering her letters, and she doubted Will was going to even consider a change to the law regarding the status of wives as property. Once word of what she’d done got out, she knew the number of hate-filled letters would increase. Not that the idiotic ones sent by frightened men really bothered her; it was the more considered ones from women that really stung. The ones begging her to consider the example she was setting for the younger women of the city, the ones trying to persuade her that being a woman in Society was all about subtlety and the persuasive arts. One even offered to teach her how to manipulate her husband into doing what she wished. It made her want to scream.
It felt as if she were a very angry ant waving its antennae at an elephant to make it change its course. The elephantine mass of Society just lumbered on, oblivious, uncaring.
What if staying to fight had been the wrong decision?
A Letterboxer rattled the door and three letters shot through before the gilded letterbox disappeared. From the bed she could see that one was from Charlotte. She would save that one until last.
She pulled on her dressing gown and padded over to collect them, yawning. She didn’t recognise the handwriting on the other two and she was tempted to just throw them onto the fire. Most of the worst letters were sent to her privately, with only a handful a week coming through the household post. She decided to open one of them. Nothing inside a letter could be worse that what had been delivered last night.
You will send Mr Digitalis’s wife home immediately. You have no right to interfere in a marriage. If she is not at home within the hour, there will be consequences.
“Oh, piss off,” she muttered to the letters as they slid from the page. She caught the dust in the envelope—at least she’d learned the best way to deal with anonymous threats—and threw it onto the fire to catch on the last embers.
She opened the second.
This is your final warning. We told you to stop. Return Mr Digitalis’s wife to him immediately, or the next time you leave your house, you will be taken from your carriage and I’ll show you what a real man—
She crushed the letter in her fist, taking a deep breath before she threw that onto the fire too. “Well, Mr Digitalis, what noble friends you have,” she said to the flames.
She pulled the cord, needing caffeine, before opening Charlotte’s letter.
Cathy, I need you. Come at once, please. Don’t tell any of my staff you are coming, and pretend you haven’t been invited. It’s about Emmeline.
Yours,
C
Charlotte’s daughter? Cathy remembered her from the secret meeting at Mr B’s bookshop and how gentle she was. She couldn’t bear the thought of something happening to her. Cathy opened the door to find her lady’s maid on the other side of it, about to knock. “Help me get dressed, quick, I have to go out.” She spotted one of the parlourmaids lurking a few steps away, probably wondering if a new fire should be set in her bedroom. “Tell Carter to ready the carriage, I’m leaving as soon as I’m dressed.”
As soon as she was ready she flew downstairs. Just as she was reaching the bottom, the front door was opened by Morgan. She’d thought he was doing it to let her out and realised too late that it was actually to admit Bertrand Viola.
Bertrand was far more attractive than his late brother Freddy, but the cold glare he always reserved for her made him unappealing in the extreme. “Good morning, your Grace.”
Cathy endured the usual scan of his eyes up and down her body. “I suppose you’re here to see the Duke.”
“Indeed. There are some matters regarding Londinium that need to be discussed in private.”
“Oh, in private? You mean, between men.”
His smile was as sharp and cold as a knife. “Yes.”
&nbs
p; “And there was me thinking that business relating to Londinium was supposed to be raised at the Court. I have the feeling you prefer to discuss politics without women present, though.”
“The complexities of running a city can only be truly understood by the male mind, madam. It’s better suited to problem solving.”
She looked pointedly at his groin. “If you have a problem that can only be understood by a man, perhaps a doctor would be a better person to confide in.”
A small patch of red flared across his pale cheeks. “How dare you imply—”
“I do hope that whatever ails you improves soon, and that the Duke and I will see you at the next Court.”
Bertrand stepped towards her, the half cape of the coat making him seem even taller and broader. “The Duke of Londinium is a fine man, and I am constantly impressed by his ability to rule in such difficult circumstances.” She could smell aniseed on his breath. “Though I do think he could benefit from some advice regarding wives and boundaries.”
“I hardly think you’d be the most qualified to give it,” she replied, having to crane her neck to look up at him even though she was standing as tall and straight as she could. “After all, the Duke isn’t the kind of man who would gag his wife with a Charm because he can’t cope with her having an opinion.” Cathy watched his nostrils flare and knew she’d gone too far. “Yes, I guessed. There’s no other explanation for the gulf between the man she speaks of and the man I’ve actually met. Why don’t you prove me wrong by lifting it from the poor woman?”
“You are simply the most dis—”
“Your carriage is ready, your Grace,” Morgan said, and Bertrand stepped aside, unwilling to cause a scene in front of the staff.
“The sooner you realise how unnatural your behaviour is, the better,” Bertrand said as she passed him to go out. “For all of us.”
Cathy tried to think of a retort, but the moment passed before she could. Once he’d stalked off towards Will’s study she realised how much she was shaking. She looked at Morgan’s concerned expression. “Don’t worry, Morgan. One more enemy isn’t going to make a whole lot of difference, is it?”
“I fear it isn’t the quantity you’re acquiring, your Grace, rather the quality.”
She headed for the carriage, hoping she’d managed to cover her mistake. She wasn’t sure who’d come out of that encounter as the victor, but at least she knew that Bertrand wouldn’t be at home when she arrived at his house.
• • •
Sam had followed Mazzi and the guide that greeted them at the visitors’ centre down into the caves under the Forest of Dean. He’d skidded down slopes, knocked his hard hat against uneven rock, and gazed across a cavern with an underground pool. He felt fantastic.
At first he’d thought it was just the change of scenery after being stuck in his study, drafting that email to Copper. But as they went deeper into the old mine, he suspected there was something more. Every now and again, Mazzi would twist round to check on him, reciprocating his excited grins with broad smiles as the guide chattered to them about the long history of the place and the ochre that was still being mined there.
“This is as far as we can go on the tour,” the man said eventually.
“Could you give us a few minutes before we go back?” Mazzi asked, and the man nodded.
“I need to check on some safety rail repairs, seems as good a time as any,” he said, and left.
Mazzi came to Sam’s side, leaning against the same outcrop of rock. “Well?”
Sam tried to put it into words. “I feel…brilliant. Like I could run a marathon or climb a mountain. Not just a physical thing…like I could do that and write the most amazing code at the same time. I can’t remember the last time I felt like this.”
She nodded.
“You knew I’d feel this way,” he said. “Did Amir like it here too?”
“He did. It’s how I felt when I visited Ravensthorpe in Australia.”
“A nickel mine?”
She nodded. “I don’t feel it here. If I’d just told you this is how you’d feel here, you’d never have believed me, right?”
“Right.”
“This is what makes you one of us,” she said with certainty. “We all feel this, for our own elements. None of the others really talk about it. Copper thinks this feeling is all about the numbers, the tonnes being extracted per day and the sheer thrill of the money being made. But he’s wrong. It’s deeper than that. Amir understood. I think you do too.”
And in that moment, he did. He could feel the iron in the rock around them, not in any amount worth mining out as ore, but still there. Below them, some metres below, he knew there was a richer deposit, just like he knew that his feet were at the ends of his legs. When he focused on the feeling, his pulse increased and he wanted to get that iron out, with a pickaxe and brute strength if needed. He just knew it had to come out of the ground.
Then it frightened him. What was making him feel this way? It wasn’t natural. Was this what Amir had done to him? Infected him somehow with his blood? This was all part of being Lord Iron. Breaking Fae magic was just another facet. When he beat the iron in the forge and felt solid and real and fully himself, that was just another facet too. Was there any of his old self left?
When Sam pushed aside the high from being in this place, the sense of the iron ore deposits just begging to be mined, the hankering to be back in the forge, all he could find were two things he believed about himself. He wanted to protect people from the Fae. That started way before Amir got his hooks into him, he was just better equipped now. The second was that he wanted to protect the environment. Now Sam was starting to realise that the roots of humanity’s drive to rip the ground open and take everything that was there, regardless of the consequences, were in the very court Mazzi wanted him to feel part of. She was hoping that if he felt this way, his talk of environmental responsibility would be forgotten.
Now Sam knew there was no reasoning with them. Satisfying this craving was all they cared about. And money.
“This is why,” Mazzi said, “I want you to get along with everyone else. I know it’s not your scene, but we’re all just doing what we’re made to do. Maybe you could remember that when you next deal with them?”
Sam looked at her. “I won’t forget it,” he said, forcing a smile. “Thanks for bringing me down here. Everything is so much clearer now. Let’s go back up; I need to make a phone call.”
17
“Come in.” Will was expecting to see Cathy, thankful that she hadn’t bumped into the foul-tempered Bertrand whilst he was in his study earlier. “Ah, Elizabeth.”
“Is this a better time?”
He stood and went round his desk to her. “Yes. Did you manage to sleep?”
“A little.”
“Do you want to sit down? There was something you wanted to discuss with me.”
He gestured to the sofa and she sat, taking a moment to arrange herself in a way Cathy never did. Despite the shock of the night before and the poor sleep that resulted, Elizabeth’s face was still just as fresh and pretty as it always was. Will sat down on the other sofa, the coffee table between them.
“Who was that lady in the…”
“That’s nothing for you to worry about. It was an Iris matter.”
She looked frightened, and understandably so. “What happened to her?”
“She died and the case was removed from the house.”
“Why—”
“Forgive me, Elizabeth, but it’s all over now and I have no desire to speak of it. Now, what did you want to tell me last night?”
The worry in her eyes was rapidly replaced by a flash of mischievous excitement. “Oh, yes, that.” She edged forwards. “I discovered a secret yesterday, one that I thought might interest you.”
There was a wicked glint in her eye. Will doubted that any secret she might value would interest him, but he played along for the sake of keeping her happy. “Oh?”
“D
o you recall the Sorcerer who appeared at the ball in Aquae Sulis before you married my sister?”
“It would be impossible to forget him.”
“Well,” Elizabeth paused, ostensibly to take a breath, but he knew she was trying to build anticipation. “He’s dead.”
“Dead? Are you sure?”
“Yes. I am absolutely positive. He had something to do with the Agency, but now he’s dead, there’s no one who really cares about it, which is why I’m telling you.”
Will stayed quiet. There was no way she could know his desire to take over the Agency, surely.
“Because of Catherine,” Elizabeth continued. “She’s planning to do something that will upset the Agency, but the Sorcerer who used to look after it is dead now, so she won’t have any protection. As her husband, I felt you should know.” She smiled, clearly delighted with herself.
Will smiled back, pleased that the way was clear to seize control of the Agency. “How did you discover this?”
“I overheard a conversation—purely by accident—between Catherine and a man called Max.” She bit her lip, revelling in the attention. “I wonder if they might be having—”
“Max is an Arbiter of Aquae Sulis,” Will said, noting Elizabeth’s disappointment. “They met?”
“She phoned him! On a telephone! In Mundanus, the schoolroom.”
His breath caught in his throat. Did this vile girl know about Sophia? Then he remembered that Vincent had taken her out on a day trip the day before. The secret was still safe, but he decided to have the door locked as long as Elizabeth was snooping around the house.
“The mundane schoolroom in the nursery wing? That you just happened to be in at the same time?”
Elizabeth didn’t blush like Cathy would have; she simply smiled sweetly and fluttered her eyelashes a little. “Pure luck!”