The Curse of Lord Stanstead

by Mia Marlowe

  That suited him. He was accustomed to being alone.

  Miss Darkin shot a furtive glance at Sterling that was answered with a quick wink. Camden knew their relationship was unusually intimate out of necessity, but something was different between those two. Camden couldn’t quite put his finger on it. Perhaps their first mission together on behalf of the Order of the M.U.S.E. had cemented their partnership. As the duke pondered this, Sterling sent Miss Darkin a genuine smile, an expression of pleasure and admiration Camden had never seen on the younger man’s face before.

  This was more than a partnership, Camden realized suddenly. Once, he’d looked at Mercedes that way. His love for his wife had been a palpable thing, a big lump of caring that had threatened to burst out of his chest. Now he hugged his empty solitude around himself like a shroud.

  Vesta would change that aloneness if he’d let her. She’d hack through the barrier he’d erected and fill the void in his heart with her unique brand of chaos. But he couldn’t allow that. Not so long as Mercedes’s death remained such an enigma.

  So he sat on his side of the breakfast table, alone amid a small crowd. Of course, even if Vesta were in residence at Camden House, she wouldn’t be at his side now. It was a point of honor to the courtesan never to rise before noon. And then she was more likely to spend a few hours breakfasting and lounging in her boudoir before she dressed to receive visitors.

  Against his better judgment, Camden indulged in the memory of the idyllic time spent in Vesta’s company. Those hours after noontide had been the only ones when she could be said to be restful. He’d spent a week of lovely late risings with her, awash in her scent, letting her feed him slices of fruit from her breakfast tray and read aloud to him from the gossipy on dit section of the latest tabloid.

  Bernard’s appearance in the breakfast room roused Camden out of his reverie. The steward bore a single sealed missive along with a letter opener on a silver salver. He laid it down at Camden’s left side.

  “I beg your indulgence for interrupting your meal, Your Grace, but if you notice the seal, you will understand my urgency.”

  The red wax closing the note was embossed with the convoluted seal of the House of Badewyn, one of Camden’s most trusted sources of information. He opened it immediately and scanned the contents.

  “Sterling, Miss Darkin, I regret to inform you that I shall have to rescind the rest of your time for recuperation. A situation has risen which requires our immediate attention.”

  “And what might that be?” Sterling asked with interest instead of his typical snide resignation.

  “My source assures me that the ASP has arrived on English soil and is currently in Brighton.”

  “Does this source say anything about what the ASP is?” Miss Anthony asked. Her oval face was pale.

  “I regret that I cannot assist you, Miss Anthony,” Camden said. “This particular Watcher enjoys exceptionally long vision but not necessarily specificity. However, if he says the ASP is there, we may rest assured it is.”

  He looked around the table at his assets. It was lamentable that both Westfall and Miss Anthony were not yet ready to make a foray into the psychic field. Meg still lacked the polish necessary to move in the higher circles. And while Westfall was making progress in controlling his gift, his mental faculties were fragile after years in Bedlam. Camden couldn’t risk sending him into a disastrous relapse. The Order of the M.U.S.E stretched across Britain and even into the wilds of Scotland. Camden was in communication with a small group of Sensory Extraordinaires in northern France, but the few gathered around his table were closest to Brighton and therefore, the only ones available for this task.

  It would have to be Miss Darkin and the gentleman who was smiling besottedly at her across the table, as if Camden weren’t discussing a matter of utmost importance.

  “Mr. Sterling, I do hope the security of the royal family isn’t boring you,” Camden said gruffly. “Apparently, the Earl of Stanstead is planning to host certain galas at his Brighton residence in the coming days. It would cause no comment were you to visit your uncle there.”

  Garret snorted. “No comment except from the old man himself.”

  “I take it your relations with him are no more cordial that your relations with anyone else,” Camden said.

  “Your powers of deduction are astute as always.” Garret took a sip of his tea. “The earl went through four wives trying to sire a son, but to no effect. His title will still go to me. He’s never forgiven me for being his heir.”

  “Then, perhaps a feminine buffer would be appropriate,” Camden’s sister said in her soft cultured voice. Lady Easton possessed no psychic gift, but she was invaluable to the Order. She routinely smoothed the way for his Extraordinaires when they were out and about in Society. “If Miss Darkin and I accompany Mr. Sterling to Brighton as his guests, he may find it easier to deal with his uncle.”

  “True,” Garret agreed. “The earl would never turn away the sister of a duke and he’ll welcome Miss Darkin on the strength of her loveliness alone. The old fellow never could resist a pretty girl.”

  Miss Darkin flushed with pleasure. Yes, something had definitely changed between the two of them. Camden frowned. Given the unique nature of their association, it was almost inevitable for their relationship to become personal, but the duke worried that such a change between them might be a distraction to the vital work they were called to perform.

  After all, he’d given up Vesta for that very reason.

  “Very well. Bernard, send a message to the Earl of Stanstead that his nephew, Lady Easton, and Miss Darkin will arrive for a visit a few days hence,” Camden said, then turned to his sister. “The three of you will prepare to leave on the morrow. Mr. Sterling, will you accompany me to my study for a moment?”

  He phrased it as a question, but he knew Sterling recognized a command when he heard one. The younger man rose without complaint and followed him out. The pair of them walked in silent lockstep until Camden’s study door was closed behind them.

  “Why the private audience?” Sterling asked.

  “Two reasons.” Camden motioned for Sterling to sit in the chair before his desk. It was measure of the change in his protégé that Sterling sat without raising an objection. The younger man was learning to pick his fights. Camden took his seat behind the desk. “First, to impress you with the importance of this commission without alarming Miss Darkin or my sister. You see, the Prince Regent is planning to remove his court from Winchester to his pavilion in Brighton next week.”

  Sterling nodded in understanding. “So the ASP will come into play sooner rather than later.”

  “Quite. But there is another reason I wished to see you privily.” Even if Camden were not blessed with psychic sensitivity, he would have had to be blind to miss the way Sterling and Miss Darkin were mooning over each other. They were evidently unable to set aside their feelings for the greater good as he had. “I’m concerned that you and Miss Darkin are not focused exclusively on the business of the Order.”

  “Only you are exclusively focused on that.” Sterling laughed and hitched a leg over the arm of the chair, the better to adopt his habitual lounging posture. There was the devil-may-care fellow Camden had come to expect. He did not welcome this Garret Sterling’s return.

  Camden brought his fist down hard on his desk. “Dammit, man, this is our future king we are trying to protect.”

  All traces of levity faded from Sterling’s face and he sat upright. “And I will do my utmost in that regard, but beyond my actions to further the work of the Order, you have no say about what transpires between Miss Darkin and myself.”

  Camden steepled his hands and decided to take a different tack. “I read the report on your activities during the masquerade. You don’t believe Bellefonte penetrated your disguises?”

  “No. I’m certain of it.”

  “I’m equally certain there were a number of details about your activities that night which were omitted from the repo
rt. No plan could have gone that hopelessly wrong without significant deviation from your intended program.”

  Sterling frowned darkly at him. “If there were omissions to the report, it is because the events left out were not germane to the completion of the task.”

  “Nevertheless, I recognize personal attachment when I see it. And personal attachments have a way of endangering not only the success of the mission, but the operatives involved.” Camden suffered regular pangs over the thought that somehow Mercedes and their child would still be alive had he shielded them from his psychic gifts and the activities of the Order. “If you would guard Miss Darkin, the first person you must protect her from is yourself.”

  A shadow passed over Sterling’s features. “I know that.”

  “If you care about Miss Darkin, and I believe you do, kindly maintain a professional distance from her while you are in Brighton. Lives may well depend upon it. Miss Darkin’s included.”

  Sterling said nothing, but his thoughtful expression spoke volumes.

  “I have the utmost confidence that you will make the right decision,” Camden said. “That will be all, Sterling.”

  The young man didn’t rise. “No, it won’t. Not quite. I wish to give notice that once Cassandra and I recover the ASP for you, my association with the Order of the M.U.S.E. will end.”

  Once admitted, no one had ever left the Order. Its psychically gifted members were usually so grateful to learn they were not alone in the world, they couldn’t be pried away. Camden wanted to launch into a blistering set-down worthy of his station, but he forced himself to temper his response. “May I ask why you feel it necessary to sever our connection?”

  “You have failed to assist me as promised.”

  “To be fair, you’ve only recently taken my mental exercises seriously. You don’t know yet whether they will work or not.” Camden considered Sterling through narrowed eyelids. “Have you had another dream?”

  Sterling nodded. “It happened before I began my work with Westfall.”

  “And the subject of this dream was Miss Darkin, I take it?”

  Sterling rose and prowled the room in a way reminiscent of Camden’s own restless circuits.

  “If you feel Miss Darkin is endangered by something from your nightmare, then I don’t understand your need to leave the Order.”

  “I hope to convince her to leave as well,” Sterling said. “If I’m to keep her safe, I must stay close, and not distance myself from her. I cannot dance to your tune. I need to be answerable only to myself.”

  Just once, Camden wished Sterling would dance to his tune. Of all his Extraordinaires, Sterling had fought him every step of the way, but he bit back that thought. “I hope you know I would never wish Miss Darkin to be harmed.”

  “And yet you send her into harm’s way in Brighton without a second thought. We don’t know what the ASP is or what potential damage it may inflict and still you expect us to acquire and deliver it to you, no matter what the cost. It astounds me the way you expect to rule by fiat as if you were God Almighty.”

  Camden’s patience dangled by a thread. “And it astounds me to see you show the yellow stripe.”

  Cowardice was a serious accusation. Sterling’s fingers balled into fists and his eyes blazed. “If you were any other man, I would call you out for that. But because I am grateful to you for bringing Cassandra into my life, I will let it pass. This time.”

  “So, I take it your fear of retrieving the ASP is for Miss Darkin, not yourself. That bodes well. I have resisted doing this on the chance that the ASP is sensitive to probing. However, let me see if I can ascertain anything useful about the object,” Camden said. “Now sit down and let me concentrate.”

  Without waiting to see if Sterling heeded him, Camden closed his eyes and emptied his mind of all conscious thought. Slowly, like the unfurling of a tightly closed bud, he opened himself to the psychic realm. Emanations of power spilled from all the members of the Order in residence—the bright, hot sparks that indicated Miss Darkin’s presence, Lord Westfall’s cool green competence and the soft tendrils of Miss Anthony’s shy, yet formidable, questing spirit. Camden could tell Sterling was making a conscious effort to bridle his ability to broadcast thoughts, but he still felt a frisson of power coming from the younger man. It was like the ripple of static electricity that raised the hairs on one’s arms if one dragged one’s feet over a thick Turkish rug.

  He reached out with his mind beyond the confines of Camden House searching for metaphysically charged artifacts and others who were gifted. Across the spider-legged streets of London, he sensed and recognized Vesta’s white-hot signature burning across the back of his eyes. Surprisingly enough, she seemed to be awake at, what was for her, an early hour and using her power in a limited way—lighting a candle perhaps—somewhere within the city proper.

  Camden expanded his sights and peered further into the psychic void, seeking bursts of supernatural energy being released into the universe. The rolling hills of the English countryside, green and fresh, seemed to spread beneath him as he stretched his mind toward the seacoast town of Brighton.

  Then he recoiled against something entirely new to his experience. It was like running at full speed into a brick wall, but before his projected mind bounced back, he was able to take the entity’s measure.

  Whatever else it was, the ASP was ancient. Old beyond counting. Camden tasted malevolence on his tongue, but it was not a ruthless, grinding malice. Instead it was the more spiteful, but no less damaging, mischief of a Loki or a Puck.

  Camden’s eyes popped open. He was in his study in his Mayfair town house, collapsed back in his chair. If he’d been standing, he had no doubt he’d have returned to himself sprawled on the carpet.

  Leaning chin in hand, elbow resting on Camden’s desk, Sterling was staring at him in consternation.

  “Well?” he said. “What can you tell me about the ASP that will help me protect Cassandra?”

  A sharp pain lanced his brain behind his right eye, a final smack from his brush with the ASP.

  “It’s old and it doesn’t relish being touched,” he said. “Wear gloves. This should bode well for Miss Darkin since women often are so attired.”

  “Wear gloves? That’s the best you can do?” Sterling stood, shook his head, and strode to the door. “And you wonder that I’m leaving your precious Order. When I do, I’ll take Cassie away with me. She may be in danger from my dreams, but at least I know what’s coming with them even if I don’t know when. I’ll protect her in my own way, if I have to sling her over my shoulder and carry her off.”

  Chapter Seventeen

  The queerest of all the queer sights

  I’ve set sights on;

  Is the what d’ye call’t thing, here,

  The Folly at Brighton.

  —William Hone, from The Queen’s Matrimonial Ladder

  Contrary to Garret’s dire expectations, his uncle made them welcome at his Brighton residence. Or rather, his staff did. The earl’s disappointment over his much-begrudged heir was not evident in the reception given them by his servants. Lord Stanstead was indisposed and unable to leave his sick bed, but he ordered guest rooms prepared for them, with instructions that Garret be shown to the finest room available after his own.

  Cassandra wished her chamber had a view of the shore. She’d heard so much about the bathing machines and the long stretch of shingle beach. Instead she looked out on other pleasure homes of the rich and well born that had sprung up around the Prince Regent’s Pavilion. Lady Easton’s room had an outlook toward the park that ringed the Pavilion.

  The Folly itself was an atrocious collection of spires and onion domes no architect worthy of the name would admit to having designed. Some wags claimed the Pavilion was the perfect embodiment of Prinny’s court—gaudy, decadent, and inconsistent.

  Somewhere in that collection of mismatched towers and pepper-pot-shaped domes, the ASP lurked. Cassie wished she had Meg Anthony’s ability to sense obj
ects. Perhaps it had been a mistake for her to come to Brighton instead of Meg. Maybe if Miss Anthony could have gotten close enough to the ASP, she would have been able to locate it even without knowing exactly what it was.

  But at least Cassandra and Garret would be able to search for the ASP the old-fashioned way. Despite his incapacity, Lord Stanstead made arrangements for Garret, Cassandra, and Lady Easton to attend a recital at the Pavilion that evening. According to the earl’s butler, Mr. Clive, his lordship had been quite taken with the young pianist performing there. He was eager for his nephew and guests to hear the artist, as well.

  “This is just the thing we need,” Garret had said to Cassie after learning about the concert. “We’ll use the recital as an excuse to poke around before the Prince Regent arrives next week.”

  The trip from London had taken two days in the Duke of Camden’s coach. Lady Easton, who suffered from motion sickness at times, was too fatigued to attend the recital with them, but she lent Cassandra her maid, Nellie, to help her prepare for the evening. After a relaxing soak in a copper hip tub, Cassandra donned a celery-colored silk gown with Nellie’s help. It wasn’t quite ornate enough for a ball, but would be appropriate for an evening concert. The thin fabric was perfect for the seaside and if she ever wished to wear it to the shore, her mantua-maker had fashioned a matching parasol and bonnet.

  “You and Mr. Sterling don’t need me to serve as chaperone,” Lady Easton said. “We are close enough to the Pavilion for you to walk, and there will be any number of other concertgoers headed the same way. Besides, what could be more wholesome than a piano recital?”

  Wholesome. That was certainly not a word Cassandra could use to describe her relationship with Garret.