by Amber Benson
“We hope,” William replied.
Tamara nodded. “We hope. How does it feel?”
He winced. “It stings quite a bit, but I’m mostly worried about wandering around with bloodstained clothes.”
“Here?” Tamara asked wryly. “No one will notice.”
With that the terror left her, and the excitement of the moment subsided. She smiled and began to laugh softly.
It must have been contagious, for William joined in.
“How did you manage that, anyway?” she asked. “I’ve never seen that spell work so intensely before. It consumed that creature until there was almost nothing left. Tremendous magicianship, Will.”
William shook his head. “I don’t know, Tam. I was afraid for you, and then it just happened. All in a day’s work, I’m afraid.”
But despite his casual words, he beamed at her compliment.
DEMONS WEREN’T NECESSARILY confined to darkness, but they did seem often to prefer the night. So Tamara and William had been surprised by the daylight attack in that filthy alley, and as they proceeded toward their destination they moved with a new wariness.
They sought the temporary hospital that Colonel Dunstan had reported, which the locals had set up. Twice Tamara pressured William to ask people for directions as they passed on the street, which he did, but they received no cooperation. In the end, they found the place largely by the stench of sickness and human waste, baking in the spring sunshine.
“Tamara!” a familiar voice called as they walked toward the building, from which issued the moans of the suffering.
She and William turned and saw a doorway lost in shadows; upon the doorstep were the gossamer images of a pair of ghosts, the specters of Admiral Nelson and Colonel Dunstan. The way they wavered with the interplay of sunshine and shadow, passersby would hardly have noticed a disturbance in the air. Tamara herself might not have been able to see them had she not heard Nelson’s voice.
As surreptitiously as possible, William and Tamara pretended they were speaking only to each other. Horatio made his introductions, and Tamara related the tale of the attack that had just taken place. Colonel Dunstan frowned several times and stared at the stains on William’s shirt as Tamara told the tale. Horatio was near apoplectic, particularly that the siblings had not summoned help.
“We were perfectly capable of defending ourselves, thank you,” William sniffed.
Nelson’s ghost stared at him with a dubious expression. “And what is that upon your breast, then, my young friend? Some sort of dye? It was reckless of you not to call upon me, knowing I was so close.”
Tamara sighed. She would never get used to having to smooth the ruffled pride of men. “Honestly, Horatio, it was over almost before it had begun. Had it gone a moment longer, we would have realized our predicament and summoned you straightaway. I should think you’d be pleased that we acquitted ourselves so well.”
The specter calmed at that. “Well, yes, of course, though I expect no less from the two of you. I daresay you’ve come a long way under the tutelage provided by Bodicea and myself.”
William smiled. “Indeed. Thank you.”
Nelson watched him to see if there was any sarcasm in William’s tone, but after a moment he seemed to decide that the response had been genuine. Throughout the entire exchange, Colonel Dunstan only watched with interest, nodding gravely from time to time. Now he gazed at Tamara as he spoke.
“Very few have been the prey of Rakshasa, and lived to tell of it,” Dunstan said. “You are fortunate.”
He was a small figure, like Nelson, and there was a fierce intelligence burning in his translucent eyes. With his thick dark hair and olive skin, Tamara thought him handsome for an older man. Nelson seemed often to tremble with the need for action, but for his part Colonel Dunstan exuded a quiet strength. He was the sort who would examine every aspect of a situation before determining his course, she decided.
“What more can you tell us about them?” William asked. “If we’re to encounter more, it would be helpful to know what it is that we face.”
“Rakshasa,” Dunstan said, “are the ghouls of the Hindu Pantheon. They usually hunt in pairs, though not packs, and their minds are small, easily harnessed with dark magic.”
“They were horrid,” Tamara said, remembering the yellow eyes, the crouched, feral stance, and the sight of those claws slashing at William. “Were it not for our magic, they would have had us for their dinner.”
Suddenly the door to the makeshift hospital opened, and an elderly Indian woman stepped out. William and Tamara glanced at her, but the woman did not seem to even notice them—as if they were ghosts, as well. She turned to the right and started off along the narrow, twisting street, soon disappearing from sight. Then they were alone again.
Just as Tamara was about to speak up, there was a disturbance in the air a few feet away, at the entrance to an alley that ran between buildings, a place so narrow it could barely have been called an alley. The world seemed to flicker there, with a haze like the heat of a summer’s day over dark brick or flagstone, and then the ghost of Queen Bodicea appeared. Like Nelson and Dunstan, she was remarkably transparent, merely a wisp of a phantom, an image upon the air, but she was there nevertheless, spear in hand, and looking as grim as Tamara had ever seen her.
William rushed to her, Tamara close behind him, and soon the two of them were crowding into that narrow gap. Nelson and Dunstan followed at a calmer pace.
“What’s happened, Bodicea? Have you emasculated yet another of our enemies?” William asked archly.
The spectral queen lowered her chin and gazed at him through slitted eyes. Had Tamara not known better, she would have thought Bodicea about to run her brother through.
“I will not apologize. No one lays a hand on Bodicea and lives.”
“Yes, of course,” William replied quickly. “Too right. You went easy on the filthy tadpole, that’s what I think.”
Tamara would have rolled her eyes if she hadn’t been concerned about offending Bodicea herself. Her brother was a strange man, courageous in the face of evil and yet intimidated by a strong-willed woman.
“After the frustration of my failure at Carstairs’s residence last evening,” the spirit continued, “it was a pleasure to have an enemy I was supposed to destroy.
“What do you make of them, my friends? Any connection between these creatures and the sort of hideous transformation Carstairs underwent?”
“There must be,” Tamara said firmly.
Bodicea looked at William. “What of the Algernon Club? Can it truly be coincidence, William, that Carstairs had in his possession an invitation to the very same dinner to which the club has invited you for this evening?”
“The Algernon Club. William?” Tamara asked. “Why did you not tell me we had been invited to dine there?”
“Tam, you see, I, uhm . . .”
“It’s about time we took a closer look at the place, all those magicians, and who knows how many of them knew Grandfather was the Protector. There may be other real magicians among them. I’ve been wondering how we might learn more, and here’s the perfect opportunity!”
“Tam, please, listen to me for a moment—”
“I shall wear my burgundy gown. The one with the beading—”
“Tamara, there is no need to decide which gown you shall wear, since you were not invited,” William said finally. His face was red with discomfort.
“Oh,” Tamara said quietly. “I did not know. I supposed . . . well, that we would both be invited.” She frowned deeply. “I suppose it only makes sense. It is a gentlemen’s club, after all. Yes, that does seem to be the long and the short of it, doesn’t it?” She spoke this last sentence almost to herself, as if she was justifying the slight in her own mind. “Though you’d think if any of them were aware that we shared the duties of Protector . . .”
“I’m sorry, Tam. I shan’t go, if it would upset you,” William said.
“No, you must go. One of us
must make their acquaintance, find out what we can about the club and its members.”
“There is more,” Bodicea said. “Your friend, Tamara, this John Haversham. He has dealings with the club as well. I followed him there this morning.”
“You what?” Tamara said. “Why on Earth would you do that?”
“That is why I was unavailable earlier today. I found his behavior last night quite curious. If his goal was not courtship, then I could not figure why he had gone to so much trouble to arrange for the evening at the Egyptian Hall.”
Tamara shook her head, staring into the strange, ghost-filled shadows of that alley.
“Just a moment, Bodicea. Am I to understand that, in addition to following John this morning, you spied on me while I was in his company last night?”
The ghost gave Tamara the same darkly dangerous look she had given William moments ago, but Tamara wasn’t so easily cowed. After a moment, Bodicea softened.
“You were grief-stricken over the death of Miss Martin, Tamara. I feared that you might not be entirely rational. My apologies for being surreptitious, but I was concerned for your welfare.”
Tamara sneered. “Far too many people seem to think me incapable of looking after myself. I’ll thank you all to mind your own business, from this point forward.”
Nelson, Bodicea, and William all looked properly chastised. Colonel Dunstan seemed to fade somewhat. Tamara didn’t blame him. None of this was his affair.
“In future,” Bodicea replied calmly, “I shall make certain any such action is taken only with your consent. However, it seemed advisable at the time. And regardless of whether or not it was proper, it seems to me that Mr. Haversham must have some other reason to desire your company.”
“Hold on,” Tamara said, interrupting Bodicea and peering at her askance. “You were in the hansom cab last night?” Her voice cracked slightly.
But the ghost merely raised her eyebrows. “I am afraid that I spent the majority of the evening accompanying Farris. He seemed rather lonely, without his sprite at his shoulder to harass him.”
“Thank God that flying pest has seen fit to go back to the forest,” William said. He had found the little creature to be more than a trifle annoying.
“And of course, I had no desire to intrude upon the intimacy of your evening,” Bodicea added.
Tamara felt herself turning a horrible shade of crimson. “There was nothing intimate about it, I assure you.”
William stared at her, and Tamara returned the look, silently daring him to comment further about her night out with John Haversham.
Nelson cleared his throat, catching everyone’s attention.
“My friends, Colonel Dunstan has much to show us. Perhaps we ought to postpone these discussions of drama and deception for another time.”
THE HOSPITAL TENT broke Tamara’s heart. Misery lived there, sucking up what little bit of life was left to the poor, suffering, bedridden patients. She felt ill as they stepped over the threshold and began to walk among the afflicted. The same feeling was mirrored in William’s features, which surprised her. Not that she thought her brother callous, but he could be dreadfully self-absorbed. Yet here, he was overwhelmed by the plight of the people around him.
“This is a terrible place,” Tamara whispered to her brother. They stayed close together as they walked down the slim aisle that separated the cots. “I can feel death lurking in every shadow, Will.”
He nodded, but seemed incapable of speech. He kept the handkerchief clutched to his face. A thin, gape-mouthed woman caught William’s eye, and he knelt down beside her and took her hand.
“Hello,” he said, his voice soft.
The woman turned and stared at him mutely. Tears pooled in the corner of her eye, and slid silently down her cheek.
“What’re you doing?” demanded a hard voice behind him. They turned to find a small Indian man standing across the aisle, glaring at them. William stood up and turned to address the man.
“I . . . she is suffering. I just—” William began.
“I don’t know what you want here. You have no right to be in this place!” The little man’s voice was shrill, almost to the point of hysteria. He looked as if he hadn’t slept in days; there was prickly stubble all over his jaw and upper lip.
“Please, we meant no harm,” Tamara said, coming to her brother’s defense. “We only came to offer our help.”
The man spat on the floor between them. “No one wants your help!”
Tamara took a distressed step backward.
“How dare you behave so in the presence of a lady,” William snapped.
“William, please,” Tamara said. The little man looked as if he was going to cry, and she could not bear to add to his trouble. She grabbed William’s arm and started to lead him away. The man, who seemed pleased to run them off, turned and walked back to the other end of the tent.
“It would do us no good to offend him further, Will,” Tamara said quietly as they walked. “Just look at him. The wreckage of a man.”
He shook his head, confusion and frustration showing on his face. “I cannot bear much more of this. I think I must step outside and take the air.”
Tamara did not follow him. Instead she continued to walk the rows of cots, looking at the strange, round-bellied women and the men who were beginning to show the effects of the curse that had transformed so many others already. Their flesh was tinged with green and brown and yellow and had a rough, scaly texture that would only grow worse.
In the corner of the makeshift hospital tent, Tamara found an old man they had not noticed before, kneeling beside one of the afflicted women. She moved closer so that she might get a better look as he performed his ministrations. There was something strange about the man, and something familiar, too.
He was Indian, in his late middle life, but there was a youthful elasticity to his skin that was odd. She watched him as he spoke quietly to the woman. His words seemed to have some effect on her, because she smiled and lifted her hand.
Tamara smiled sadly, watching the interchange between the much younger woman and the old man. It stabbed at her heart, encouraging painful remembrances of her own father and grandfather. Things she would have rather forgotten.
Suddenly the woman screamed as the things in her belly began to writhe. She reached out, flailing at her distended midsection with both arms, pounding at whatever lay inside.
The old man did not hesitate; he pulled a small dagger from a sheath at his hip and slit the woman’s throat.
Horrified, Tamara covered her mouth with her hand to keep from gagging. She looked around wildly for help, but no one else seemed to have noticed the murder.
Knowing what she must do, she took a step forward, and then another. The murderous old man looked up, sensing Tamara’s presence. He bowed his head as she raced toward him, her hands aloft in front of her, lips just forming the words for a holding spell.
But it was for naught. Tamara never had a chance. He vanished right before her eyes.
Tamara stared, dumbfounded, at the dead woman who lay on the cot in front of her.
The man who had cut her throat had not simply disappeared. He had translocated. A magician, then.
The woman’s blood was pouring onto the cot, dripping onto the floor beneath her. Already her bulging stomach had stopped twitching. The hideous things inside her were no longer moving, and in fact her belly seemed to be diminishing in size. Deflating.
Tamara’s body began shuddering with revulsion and fury, with the need to pay someone back for this crime, this atrocity. She spun around, eyes searching the makeshift hospital for someone who might help or someone to blame.
The air shimmered off to her right, and she saw the terrible old man reappear, twenty paces down the aisle from where she stood. He stared directly at her and moved his head from side to side, as if to warn her away from following him. Then with an agility that seemed uncanny for one so old, he darted down the aisle.
Her skirts fla
pped around her legs as she took off in pursuit of the murderer.
The man was fleet for his age, she would give him that. Thinking back to John Haversham’s attire at the Wintertons’ dinner party, Tamara wondered if the man ahead of her had created some similar façade to trick her into thinking he was old when, in truth, he was nothing of the sort.
At the edge of the tent, the man broke into a gallop, leaving Tamara, who was hindered by her long clothing, far behind him. Escaping the last of the cots that up until now had acted in tandem with her skirts to impede her progress, Tamara picked up speed and raced down the road after the man.
“William! Bodicea!” she yelled as she ran, her voice loud and jarring in her ears, but quickly stolen away by the wind. She tried to listen for some sign that William and the ghosts had heard her entreaty, but she couldn’t wait to be certain.
William, where in Hell are you?
The Indian man reached the street and continued to widen his lead on her. She could feel frustration wash over her in waves. She wanted to scream out a spell, stopping the murderer in his tracks, but if he was indeed a magician, he might have shielded himself, and her hesitation would certainly allow him to escape altogether.
Without warning, Tamara stepped on something large and spongy. Her ankle twisted at an angle, and she stumbled. Her forward motion continued, however, and she fell onto her knees, slamming her hands into the hard cobblestones of the roadway. The wind was knocked from her lungs, and she hissed out a pitiful cry, but immediately tried to stand.
It was impossible. Her right ankle gave way instantly, crumpling rudely underneath her weight.
“William . . . !” Tamara shouted, the physical hurt she felt only intensifying her anger and frustration.
“William?”
She looked up, peering down the alleyway to see how far ahead her quarry had gotten from her, but found that he had disappeared—most likely around a corner. She sat back so that her legs splayed in front of her and pulled at her skirts so that she could see her ankle. It had already begun to swell, but she did not think she had broken it.