Scoundrel

by Zoë Archer

  “I’m looming?” he asked London.

  “Yes,” she answered. “Please. I need a bit of…air.”

  Surprisingly, he complied, though a wry smile curved his mouth. “I am your servant, Mrs. Harcourt. Tell me what you desire, and I’ll do everything I can to satisfy you.”

  Athena made a choked sound of exasperated laughter. Even though she and London appeared about the same age, there was a worldliness about the Greek woman that London could never hope to emulate. No doubt, London seemed very foolish to Athena where Bennett Day was concerned, like a smitten schoolgirl dizzy over her first compliment. But London could prove that she was not a child, and had not been one for a long time. Tonight had aged her by decades.

  “Take me back to my father,” she said.

  A shout from the small Greek sailor—London now understood he was the captain—caught everyone’s attention. He yelled orders at his men, who ran to obey, and hurried to the wheel.

  “You see?” Day said over the shouting. “All you have to do is ask and I make your wish come true.” He pointed off the port side, where London could just begin to see white columns of smoke heading toward them. “Here’s your father now.”

  The lanterns on the boom flickered out with a wave of Athena’s hand. All was darkness. Yet Kallas and his men knew the boat, knew the night, and ran to adjust their course without stumbling. They communicated in whispers. The Heirs’ ship had the advantage of steam, however, knifing quickly toward them. Bennett understood little of sailing, and could only shoulder a rifle and tuck a revolver into his belt, should things come to close combat.

  “Where’s our fog, Athena?” he asked.

  Athena looked up from loading a revolver, a difficult task in the dark. “I have never before used the Mist of Thetis. I could not hold the spell for long.”

  “It served our purposes well the first time,” Bennett said, jovial. “Now we get to fight the old-fashioned way.” He enjoyed scrapping with the Heirs, giving him the chance to actually lay hands with the bastards. But usually such fights were done without an innocent woman’s life in the cross fire.

  He glanced over at London Harcourt. Amidst the brisk activity of Kallas and his men, London stood alone at the rail, watching as her father’s ship steamed closer and closer. They soon would be within firing range of the cannons.

  Bennett went to her, cupping his hand over the gentle curve of her shoulder. He felt the slight start in her body when he touched her, the delicate bones and soft flesh in a minute contraction. This had to be a far cry from anything she had ever experienced. Edgeworth had bred her to be a society lady, not a seafaring adventurer. Nor was she prepared to learn that her father and brother were members of a secret and ruthlessly ambitious society trying to acquire the world’s magic for their own dominating agenda. Yet, remarkably, her composure did not waiver. She stood on steady legs to face the oncoming threat.

  “They’re coming for me,” she said, toneless.

  “We’ll give ’em a good tussle.”

  “This little boat against heavy guns? I may not know much about warfare, but there is no way this caique can withstand their firepower.” She turned to face him, and when she spoke, he heard the resolve fortifying her voice. “I must get back.”

  “You don’t have to,” he said. “You can stay here, with us. With me.” He tried to take her hand, but she ducked to one side and evaded him.

  “Joining the Blades of the Rose is unthinkable. I will lose everything, everyone.”

  “Consider what you will gain.” He couldn’t fathom why he wanted her to stay so badly. “You won’t be alone.” She could provide tremendous help to the Blades, and certainly keeping her linguistic knowledge out of the Heirs’ hands was a benefit, but he wasn’t thinking only of strategy. He wanted her close by, close to him, a powerful sensation of need he wasn’t prepared for.

  “I can’t,” she said. “Don’t ask me again.”

  He stifled the quick, hot cut of disappointment. “So you’ll help your father. Translate the ruins for him.”

  “I—”

  “They are aiming the guns,” Kallas hissed in the dark.

  “Let me go,” London said quickly. “Put me in the canoe and send me over to them. They will stop their pursuit if I’m in the water.”

  “I’m not going to stuff you in some bloody little boat like a mutineer,” he growled.

  “I’ll jump overboard, if necessary.”

  Bennett swore. London had a spine of steel that even she did not seem to know about.

  “She is correct,” Athena said. “The Heirs will not give chase if she is out there.”

  The night tore open as the guns fired a warning shot. Everyone on the caique fell to the deck—the two sailors screaming with panic, Kallas cursing in a dense dialect, Athena muttering prayers to sundry goddesses. Without thought, Bennett covered London’s body with his own, shielding her. She felt very small beneath him.

  Thank Ares that the Heirs chose only to fire a warning shot. The caique was far enough away that cannonballs might smash into the water and not the hull, but in a few more minutes, they would be a plum ready to be crushed.

  “Now,” London hissed underneath him. “I have to leave now.” She shoved at him, and he rolled away.

  Hell and damn, there wasn’t a choice. Crouching low, Bennett hurried to the canoe leaning against the quarterdeck house. He and Kallas leaned over the rail and eased the small boat into the water. As Kallas held the boat, Bennett took London by her narrow waist and swung her over the rail.

  “All right, I’m in,” she said. “You can let go of me now.”

  But he didn’t.

  He brought his mouth down to hers, his lips against her own. If there’d been time, he would have lingered, studying her, the soft feel of her. He would have brushed his lips over hers, slowly at first, then, unhurriedly, as she opened to him, he would have delved into her in a long, liquid exploration. Stroked the inside of her mouth, brought their tongues together, velvet to velvet. He would learn her tastes gradually, like an unfolding banquet, course by course. He would have discovered what sounds she made in the throws of a deep, endless kiss. All of these things he would have done, had they time.

  There wasn’t time.

  Rough, animal need. A hasty and fierce devouring. Her mouth was warm and silken, and, God, yes, as demanding as his. She clung to his arms, leaning upward, and met him in the kiss with unrestrained hunger. No, she wasn’t a civilized lady, not truly, and there wasn’t anything that pleased him better. She tasted of cinnamon and oranges and woman, and he wanted her so badly at that moment that he shook with it.

  “Bennett,” Athena said. She had to repeat his name again before it penetrated the thick fog of desire that enfolded him. “We must leave. Let her go, Bennett.”

  With great reluctance, he did so, and his hands wanted London back in them immediately. Instead, he curled them into fists.

  London gazed up at him, eyes glittering and wide with revelation. Her breath came fast. She collected herself with a shudder. “Please release the boat,” London said to Kallas in Greek.

  Shouting from the Heirs’ ship could be heard, growing nearer, commands to reload the cannons, men running on the iron deck, Edgeworth bellowing over it all.

  Kallas relinquished his hold on London’s boat. Immediately, the little craft drifted away, toward the Heirs. Bennett could only watch as the white of London’s robe and nightgown faded off into the night, like a milkweed puff upon the water. It took everything he had not to propel himself over the side of the caique and swim to her. There was nothing to do but listen to her voice as it floated across the water.

  “Father!” he heard her shout. “I’m here!”

  “London?” That had to be Edgeworth.

  “Down here!”

  “Stop the damn ship,” Edgeworth yelled.

  With a groan, the engines were cut. The steamship slowed, and sailors ran about the deck as they readied to pull London Edgeworth f
rom the sea. Free from their pursuers, the caique raced off under the expert guidance of Kallas. He managed their retreat alone, as his crewmen had not recovered themselves from the cannon fire and still lay upon the deck, praying and covering their heads with their arms. Athena stepped over their shuddering bodies to stand beside Bennett at the rail.

  “A surprising creature, that Mrs. Harcourt,” Athena murmured. “I did not believe she had the courage to put herself out into the sea.”

  “She does astonish,” Bennett said hoarsely. He strained to see her out there, somewhere, in the night, but she was lost to him.

  “Will she help her father, do you think?”

  “I think…” He might never see her again. Or, if he did, she might have allied herself with the Heirs, or at least provided the translations that they needed to find the Source. She would be one of them, the enemy. Then his attraction to her would become even more problematic than it already was. One didn’t lust after his foe’s daughter, his enemy’s widow. Made things deuced awkward.

  He still reeled from that kiss, and considered jumping in the water, anyway, to cool himself off.

  Had it been simple lust, then Bennett could have dismissed what he felt for London Harcourt as a simple need of one body for another. It wasn’t simple. Not at all. He felt it in his body, and saw it in her eyes.

  She would ask her father about him. And Edgeworth would tell her whom he truly was. If he ever did see her again, those lovely dark eyes of hers would be clear and glittering with hate. He knew it had to be, and yet couldn’t stop from wishing otherwise. He would have even preferred indifference, that enemy of lovers. But hate him, she must. And with just cause.

  “I think…that I need a drink.” He wandered off in search of a bottle of ouzo.

  Swaddled in a blanket, London sat in her father’s stateroom, a snifter of brandy cupped in her hands. His cabin was larger than hers, but it was only when London observed the nautical charts and equipment scattered about the room that she realized her father had commandeered the captain’s stateroom. Presumably the steamship’s captain had been relocated to another cabin, the first mate’s perhaps, and that sailor was forced somewhere else, and so on, until the entire ship’s crew had been displaced. For some reason, she found the whole idea funny, imagining everyone struggling into clothes that didn’t fit and assembling on deck in too-large pants or too-small shirts.

  “I don’t see what’s so humorous about the situation,” her father said with a confused frown. “These are serious circumstances we’re in.”

  London carefully controlled her smile. “Sorry, Father. Just strained nerves, I suppose.”

  At once, he became contrite, solicitous. “Yes, yes, you’ve been through a terrible ordeal. What else do you need? Shall I fetch Sally? I’ll get her.” He strode to the door of the cabin.

  “No, please,” London said, stopping him. “I’ll be all right soon.”

  “I should dismiss that maid at once,” he grumbled. “Across the passageway from you the whole time, and not a peep from her when you were taken.”

  “Sally is very sick, Father,” London pointed out. “And there were men all over the ship who didn’t help, either. Will you dismiss them, as well?”

  He lowered himself into another chair with a mutter. “Everyone’s gone tense. By God, those rogues have some audacity, to take you right out from our very noses! Next time, we shall be better prepared.”

  “Next time?” London repeated. “Will they come back?”

  “Their kind never give up,” her father said blackly. “Only death stops ’em. But you needn’t worry,” he continued in a reassuring tone. “We’ll find those bad people, and put an end to them for good.”

  The image of Bennett Day lying cold on the deck of the caique made London shiver. She took a warming sip of brandy, hoping to quell her thoughts. But they would neither disappear nor sit quietly in her brain. Everything that Day and Athena Galanos had told her rioted in her mind. Her father. A merciless villain intent on dominating the world. Jonas, Lawrence, even Thomas Fraser, all part of the same merciless cabal. When she had been aboard the caique, listening to the even words of Day and Athena, it seemed almost possible. But now, sitting with her father, his face so familiar to her, his gestures the same she had known her whole life, it all seemed unreal, impossible. Magic? Truly? And her father in the middle of it? And, if what Day said was true, what was London to do about it? Sudden weariness weighted her shoulders.

  “I think I should like to go to bed,” she said, setting the glass on a nearby table.

  “Very soon, London. But before that, I must ask you some questions. Regarding your abduction. This may be difficult, but try to bear up, there’s a good girl.” He grew sharp and serious. “It was the Blades, wasn’t it? They took you.” His words sent fiery ice all throughout London’s chest. So—it was true, not a collection of stories and tricks. Hearing her father even say the name of the Blades made it all so much more real.

  “Yes,” she said quietly.

  His gaze turned shrewd and penetrating. “What did the Blades want with you?”

  London hesitated. She did not know what her father might do if she told him that she had been asked to join the ranks of the Blades of the Rose. He might view her with suspicion, curtail her movements, even keep her guarded by armed men. Caged.

  “They only wanted to know what I knew,” she finally said. “Which was nothing. Until tonight.”

  “Did you get their names?”

  London hesitated. “No. But, Father,” she said, focusing on the coarse weave of the blanket gripped tightly in her hands. “They told me things,” she said quietly. “About you and Jonas and Lawrence and, and everybody. They said…you were monsters.”

  Instead of being angry, her father was amused. “There’s no such thing as monsters, London.” He chuckled. “I’m sure to the Blades, the Heirs are fiends. But only because we do not share their naïve idealism.”

  “But to take things from their rightful owners,” London objected, “at the cost of many lives. Surely that cannot be right.”

  Again, he gave a little laugh, as though entertaining a child’s fancies. He gestured toward the maps piled on the table. “The world is changing, London, whether one wishes it or not. It would be pretty to think that the savage and heathen peoples of the world exist in some prelapsarian paradise where there is no greed, no hate, no sin. Yet we know that isn’t the case. Those godless savages live in misery, deprived of all the good things that English civilization and society can provide. Do you know,” he continued with the air of a schoolmaster, “that the Hindus burn their women? When a husband dies, the wife must throw herself onto a pyre and burn herself alive! Just think, if we practiced suttee in England, you would have been set on fire when Lawrence died. Now, you wouldn’t like that, would you?”

  “What does that have to do with stealing magic?” London wondered.

  “It has everything to do with it,” he said, his tone growing slightly impatient. Clearly, her objections and questions were both unanticipated and unwelcome. “The more Sources the Heirs of Albion acquire, the more powerful they become. The more powerful England becomes. With such tools at our disposal, the Empire can defeat her foes and flourish. Enlightenment and the English way of life will spread like a blaze, illuminating the world.”

  “And those that you trample in your quest for power, do they not matter?”

  Her father waved his hand in airy dismissal. “The lives of a handful of ignorant brutes are nothing compared to the needs of millions. Would it not be better to kill a few men in order to preserve the welfare of entire nations? It is simple arithmetic. Even a woman can understand that,” he said, smiling at her with fond indulgence.

  She was windswept, barren. It seemed so simple from her father’s point of view. England was right. Everyone else was not. Yet nothing existed in uncomplicated binary systems, she was learning. There were many shades of gray. Unfortunately, London was now so mired in gray th
at there was no color anywhere, especially not within the reaches of her soul. After a moment, London asked, “Does Mother know?”

  “Only what I tell her, which is not much. She isn’t like you, London,” he added in a confiding, flattering tone. “I know you’re a clever young woman. Smarter than poor Jonas, too, I’d wager. Even Harcourt hadn’t the intelligence that you have. And that is why the Heirs need your help.”

  “To translate the ruins and find a Source.”

  “Exactly!” He patted her knee. “Come now, won’t you tell your old father how you escaped from those horrid Blades? Hm? Were you a clever girl?”

  London had no desire to tell him what transpired on the caique, and nothing could get her to relate the kiss she’d shared with Bennett Day. Even thinking of it now made her pulse speed. “I think I was allowed to leave, when they realized I wasn’t useful.”

  He nodded, satisfied. “Without your understanding of language, they’ll be running around blind. But we can’t expect them to tuck their tails between their legs and run home. Blades stick like leeches. Until we burn them off.”

  More gruesome images flitted through London’s mind, images that left her rather ill. She pushed the blanket off, then rose to her feet. Her father followed suit. “I really do need to go to bed, Father.”

  “Of course,” he said with a paternal chuckle. “You aren’t used to such activity. Women are fragile flowers.”

  “I don’t feel very floral right now,” London said flatly.

  He had no answer for that, so instead, he tucked her hand in the crook of his arm and led her out of his borrowed stateroom and down the passageway to her cabin. London was reminded of when she had made her debut, in her frothy white dress, entering a ballroom for the first time. And then she thought of her wedding day, being led down the aisle by her father to her waiting groom. She had been so eager, so afraid, close to asphyxiating in her tight corset, but believing it would all be worth it once Lawrence took her as his wife.

  Where was her father leading her now? Into the world of the Heirs of Albion?