The Dastardly Miss Lizzie

by Viola Carr

  She knotted the stinger into a corner of her shift. “Where are we going? Nowhere’s safe.”

  Finch’s hood jerked in surprise. “Henry’s, of course. Where else will we find the tools we need? Assuming it’s still standing. Crumbling hovel, knocked over in a stiff breeze, all that.”

  “The prototype? But Locke knows about that. He could destroy it any minute!”

  “Then we must make haste!” Finch raised his voice. “Merci, Dr. Savage, I’ll take this prisoner for rectal electrode insertion immediately. The little minx is certainly a handful. Double power, you say? Sacre bleu! That ought to blast any disobedience out of her tout de suite.”

  He marched her into the chilly brick corridor. Wind whistled along the low ceiling. In the other cells, prisoners moaned and giggled, sepulchral. Finch prodded her along, humming “La Marseillaise.” “Come along, miscreant! Voltage awaits!”

  “You’re enjoying this, aren’t you?” she muttered, nervous giggles threatening.

  A glint of baby-blue from inside his hood. “Why d’you think I got into alchemy in the first place, eh? Always wanted to be a wizard.”

  “So, you see,” explained Finch an hour later, as they descended the steps to the old laboratory, thoroughly exhausted and covered in flecks of ash and debris, “after Henry made that unexpected appearance—and while I planned your daring rescue, ha ha!—I took the liberty of making a few adjustments. Calibrations, eh? Based on Starling’s equations and my own experiments. And do you know, in my attic I found Quentin’s original diagram.”

  “What a stroke of luck.” Eliza shivered, tucking loose hair around her neck. Wind whispered in the smell of brimstone, and the darkness writhed like a ghostly beast.

  Outside, chaos rumbled, the air shrieking. They’d scuttled their way to Cavendish Square via hellish streets rampant with looting, the sky raining fire and cobblestones slippery with blood. They’d found the house deserted. The Pooles and Charles Brigham had fled. Even Hippocrates had left no sign.

  “On a napkin, you know,” said Finch happily. “They dared him, you see, and we all knew how that would turn out. One of Victor’s ghastly dinner parties, all his opium-addled literary friends. Quentin, I told him, Quentin, you arrogant little jack-rabbit, you can’t smoke yourself silly, scribble schematics for a four-dimensional travel apparatus on a scrap of moth-eaten table linen and expect it to work.” Finch beamed. “To think I’d quite forgotten. And of course, Michael’s ideas helped.”

  “You told Byron Starling you’d never read that book.”

  “Of course I’d tell him that.” Finch still wore his tinfoil hat, and it gleamed unpleasantly in reddish light. “Never did trust that fellow, not after the stories he told about you. You say the second volume’s burned?”

  “Good riddance,” muttered Eliza.

  “Eh? Think of the science! All that knowledge, lost forever. At least until the world spits up another Faraday, which considering the latest crop of selfish buffoons masquerading as inventors won’t be any time soon.” He scratched his head. “Or any time at all, if we can’t fix this.”

  “I don’t know, Marcellus. I used to believe all science was progress. Now I’m not so sure.” She wrapped her black tailcoat tighter. Anything to replace that stinking asylum shift. The only clothing she’d found belonged to Brigham, and she’d crimped the trousers in at her waist and shortened the braces. Brigham was bigger than he looked.

  She and Finch clambered through the unlocked combination door. There sat the machine, coil dead and jeweled brass orbits dark. Dare me, will you? it sneered. Mess with the fabric of time and space? Such hubris. A fool’s game.

  She pulled the main switch. Zzap! Sparks jumped, wires jerking—but the lights buzzed weakly, only a faint glow. “At least we still have power.”

  “But the aether is crumbling like a soggy biscuit. This fellow might not even start, eh, and then where will we be? Stuck in the wrong future, that’s where, and not a sausage to show for it.” Finch rummaged beneath the machine, adjusting a maze of bristling wires. “Give it a blast, say what?”

  Now or never. She grasped the brass handle on the machine’s miniature generator, and pulled.

  Bzzzzt! Her hair bristled on end. Lightning forked along the brass rings, and with a rrripp! of igniting aether, the engine’s coil erupted into blinding blue.

  Whirr! The crystal-studded rings began to rotate slowly, then faster. The air groaned, distorting dangerously.

  Already Finch clambered into the seat, bouncing with excitement. “So when do you want to go? One reversal, and only one. No second chance, eh?”

  Eliza darted under the swinging rings and clambered on beside him . . . but the staggering import of what she was doing struck her momentarily dumb.

  One chance.

  Alter her past. Rescue her abortive career, her botched relationships, the mess with the Soho Slasher. Even her crippling failure with Malachi Todd. Sorrow, regret, pain. All erased, with just a flick of these switches.

  And Lizzie.

  She could put an end to Edward Hyde’s schemes. No elixir for her. No transcendental identity, no threat from Royal Society agents. No worry and trouble and heartache, day after day after day. Freedom. The chance of a lifetime.

  The temptation almost drowned her.

  Do it! Inside her, a child screamed, beating its fists against invisible walls. It’s not fair! Why should everyone else get what they want? What about ME?

  But some things mattered more than selfish happiness. She’d created this mess, with her blind curiosity and misplaced sense of right and wrong. And she’d put things right if she had to die doing it.

  Even if she had to kill Lizzie, too.

  Just what Seymour Locke thought. The thought hissed, guilty. That he’d put things right. One more trip, he’d say, just one more and all will be well.

  Such vanity, to imagine she could change the world.

  But if she didn’t try, she’d never know. And like Henry Jekyll—whose insatiable longing for truth had brought only sorrow and ruin—Eliza had to know.

  The machine juddered and whirred, sparks showering, crystals flashing rainbows. She flung an arm around Marcellus and held on. “The night before New Palace Yard,” she said, “midnight.”

  THE CHANCE OF A LIFETIME

  IN EARLY MORNING, SHE APPROACHED LIZZIE’S RUNDOWN tenement in Soho. She’d sent Marcellus back to his shop to collect supplies, and stole through the streets alone. The eerie quietude hacked at her nerves. No burning sky, no roaring guns, no ugly shimmer of dying aether. Just . . . normal.

  Distant revelers shouted, music drifting with the stench of coal fires and damp wool. Mud squelched, dark clouds gathered and threatened rain. A sickly yellow moon struggled through the clouds. But no moonlit fever burned in Eliza’s blood. No Lizzie stretching, yearning for freedom.

  That wasn’t normal.

  About now, Lizzie was approaching the Magic Flute, her awful discovery still to be made. Another her, roaming the city, oblivious to the looming future. Those precious moments with Remy, her meeting with Newton, the explosion at Finch’s, la Bête’s attack. All yet to happen.

  But was it inevitable, as Seymour Locke believed? Or could the future be changed?

  Hitching up her trousers, she hopped across the wet street. A one-legged beggar crouched in a doorway, shovel hat pulled low, rats skittering around his knees. In Lizzie’s window, no lights yet burned.

  Eliza squeezed into a noisome cranny around the corner. Moldy walls closed in, water trickling in the smell of dead things. Shivering, she hunkered down to wait.

  At last, there he was, a shadow amongst shadows, slipping from alley to porch to doorway. Stealthy like a wraith, barely a rustling footstep as he passed within a few feet of her hide.

  “Don’t go inside,” she whispered.

  He halted. Still a shadow, long and lean—but with a piercing stare of electric-sky blue.

  “Shh.” She grabbed Remy’s hand, and pulled him quietl
y out of sight, with a dirty glance at that snoozing beggar. That mildewed green coat . . . and she flashed back to the fellow she’d seen watching her, that night in Cavendish Square. Inwardly, she snorted. Beggar, indeed. And she’d wondered how those Enforcers had followed her.

  As soon as they were out of hearing, Remy stopped her, in a dilapidated doorway safe from prying eyes. Dusty russet coat, chestnut curls charmingly disheveled, scarf hiding that silver half-moon amulet at his throat. “Eliza, what . . . ? Never mind. Look, I owe you an explanation—”

  “I know.” She gripped his hands, overcome. He was here. He was safe. And she hadn’t ruined everything with her jealous cruelty. Not yet. “I know everything. Your letter, la Bête’s plans. I know why you did it.”

  “But—”

  “I’ve seen the future.” Swiftly, she explained. Their imminent meeting, his capture, her visit to Newton, the catastrophe at New Palace Yard, her escape from prison with Finch. “So here I am,” she finished simply.

  But guilt chewed her. She’d omitted the part about Lizzie the assassin. Another story, for another time—and her heart still burned with shame that Lizzie had abandoned her to her fate. Did her own self despise her so much? Was she so terrible a person?

  But Remy’s gaze glowed. “You’re glorious. Is it wrong that I want to kiss you until you suffocate?”

  “Yes, but it’s tempting—oh!” His lips tasted so good, she swooned. He smelled delightful, of steel and aether and desire, and it occurred to her that she wasn’t wearing a corset. It felt daring, unrestricted, free. Not to mention sensual, a vivid echo of the last time she’d kissed him in this squalid room, legs wrapped around him, his mouth on her skin . . . She swatted him, breathless. “Stop it. This is no time for flirting.”

  “Who said anything about flirting? You just rescued me from certain death. I ought to insist you ravish me without mercy.” He grinned, releasing her. “And I shall. After we’ve avoided capture, saved the Philosopher from his assassin, and stopped la Bête before he begins. Nothing like a challenge.”

  Eliza hesitated. How she’d stop Lizzie was one thing. Thwarting la Bête in all his simultaneous incarnations . . . An idea sparked. “Remy, your amulet.”

  “How did you . . . ? Never mind. It works, if that’s what you’re asking.” He bit his lip. “Eliza, I know you don’t like it. I don’t like it either. But I need you to be safe from me.”

  “I am safe from you—”

  “No.” A firm headshake. “You’re not. I can’t take the chance.”

  For a moment, she faltered. For so long, she’d pretended everything was normal. That his creature—and hers—were just an inconvenience. A ripple to be smoothed over.

  But the darkness had to be dealt with. Surrendering wasn’t an option. But truce?

  You can feed it, or you can fight it, he’d said. Not a cure. A peace offering.

  Was it too late for her and Lizzie to make peace?

  “Fine.” She edged closer, partly to whisper, but partly because he was real and beautiful and alive and she adored him. “Then here’s what we should do.”

  As the clock tower struck a quarter to eleven—it was the gigantic thirteen-ton bell that was named Big Ben, not the clock, but no one ever seemed to care—the same glorious, oblivious morning sun shone down on New Palace Yard. Eliza hurried around the corner at Westminster Bridge, where the ornate façade of the new Houses of Parliament glittered in fresh sunlight. The crowd was already thick, their voices swelling.

  Remy had gone his separate way, as they’d planned. Would he make it in time?

  The irony stung. All these years of fighting Lizzie and Marcellus and Edward Hyde and everyone else who’d tried to help her—only to discover too late that she couldn’t win alone.

  She’d approached from the Thames this time, the opposite direction, to stop red-caped Lizzie before she even reached the podium. Besides, she’d wanted to be sure of avoiding herself. Somewhere across New Palace Yard, another Eliza elbowed through the crowd. Would things happen differently this time? If crisis were averted, la Bête thwarted, assassination foiled—would she, this new Eliza, vanish? Never taken to the asylum, never rescued by loyal Marcellus so she could arrive at this very point in time?

  No wonder Seymour Locke had gone mad.

  Eliza squeezed on through the sea of bodies. Hats, banners, and flailing arms blocked her view. Eyes flashed at her, cruel smiles glinting. Was that a scarlet hood, a spray of mahogany curls? Before she could focus, it was gone.

  At last, the podium came into view, ringed by brass Enforcers. She craned her neck, eyeing the tall tower that blocked out the sun.

  Two minutes to eleven.

  The heat, the smell, and the roiling noise washed over her, a dizzy cacophony of sensations, and the past unfolded before her eyes like a cinematograph in slow motion.

  The official party climbed the dais steps, flanked by their black-robed escorts. Bertie, Princess Victoria, the scowling Regent, Lord Beaconsfield with blue rosettes pinned to his coat.

  One minute.

  The murderer-king laughed, blond hair falling from beneath his hat. Victoria smiled at him, eyes flashing dark. The ground thrummed as the gigantic bells struck the Westminster Quarters. DING-DONG-DING-DONG! DONG-DING-DING-DONG!

  The minute hand clunked to vertical.

  ONE . . . TWO . . .

  A splash of scarlet, in the corner of Eliza’s eye. Lizzie’s cloaked figure wormed through the crowd, dark curls escaping from her hood.

  Eliza sprang. Jumped an Enforcer’s legs, dodged a man’s flailing elbows, grabbed the red-cloaked shoulders. “Lizzie, stop!”

  “Leave me be!” Lizzie’s eyes spat dark poison. “You can’t stop me. This is MINE, hear me?”

  THREE . . . FOUR . . .

  Eliza held on. “You don’t understand. You can’t kill the king. Everything goes wrong.”

  On the stage, Bertie laughed and waved, and Lord Beaconsfield stepped forwards to accept his cheers. “Watch me,” growled Lizzie. “I’ll wring the murdering bastard’s neck!” She struggled and snarled, spit flying. FIVE . . . SIX . . .

  But Eliza fought desperately, refusing to let go. “It doesn’t work. You kill the Philosopher instead and the sorcerers win!”

  “So much the better!” With a hideous skull-like grin, Lizzie slammed her forehead into Eliza’s face.

  Red pain blotted her vision. SEVEN . . . EIGHT . . . Groggily, she shook her eyes clear . . . and her blood curdled in despair. Lizzie was gone.

  The king was waving and hooting, jumping up and down. The black-robed sorcerers loomed, menacing. Victoria laughed—and the air beside her writhed and tore. NINE . . . TEN . . .

  Pop!

  La Bête squeezed from the crack, a streak of black horror. His withered arm dangled grotesquely, the relic of some awful spell.

  ELEVEN!

  La Bête grinned at Victoria, triumphant—and the sorcerer next to him hurled off his robes in a swirl of black.

  Not a sorcerer. Remy Lafayette.

  Remy’s lips moved, words snatched away by the din. La Bête’s face twisted into a frightful sneer, and his gauntleted arm flashed up. But Remy was quicker. And he grabbed the amulet around la Bête’s skinny neck and tore it free.

  Fire flashed, a deadly electric sizzle. La Bête screamed. Muscles rippled, clothing tearing under the strain of the change. His spine quivered and arched, his scrawny knees popped backwards with an ugly snap! Black fur sprouted, covering his rawboned form. His face elongated into a snout, furred ears flattened—and with a snarl of dripping fangs, the creature leapt for Remy’s throat.

  Crrack! Remy fired his pistol. Sky-blue lightning pierced the creature’s heart, stopping it in mid-flight. It somersaulted, and flopped to the dais. Dead.

  Remy dropped the amulet, and crushed it under his boot.

  Victoria screamed. Lord Beaconsfield seized his cane two-handed, and swung it hard. The diamond-studded unicorn slammed into Victoria’s skull, and she toppled,
out cold. Beaconsfield sniffed haughtily, and straightened his necktie.

  The crowd roared, like the Newgate mob on hanging day, thirsty for a bloody spectacle. But Eliza had never laid eyes on a more blessed sight.

  No skyships. No sorcerers’ army. No ruined aether.

  Just one abominable dead man.

  His voice abruptly restored, the Philosopher yelled sharply for Enforcers. Metal feet thundered, and a dozen glittering electric weapons descended to protect the king.

  Wildly, Eliza searched for Lizzie. There, an angry scarlet streak, oozing between Enforcers in the confusion, clambering onto the stage in a throng of fleeing dignitaries with the knife bright in her hand.

  “Stop!” Eliza dived, grabbing Lizzie’s skirts and dragging her to the ground.

  Lizzie screeched, a trapped wildcat. She kicked, sending Eliza flying, and leapt atop her, pinning her to the cobblestones. Bonk! Eliza’s skull cracked backwards, stars whirling. Lizzie had clipped her under the chin. A disorienting blow.

  Eliza choked, trying not to vomit. She couldn’t break free. She groped in her pocket for the stinger, the world reeling.

  “God rot you, girl,” snarled Lizzie, sour breath scorching Eliza’s face, that peculiar goaty odor of madness. “Why can’t you just DIE?”

  Steel flashed, and Lizzie stabbed the blade down.

  Eliza’s fingers folded around her stinger. She kicked as hard as she could, rolled, and thrust the weapon upwards.

  Zzzap! Electricity exploded. Lizzie jerked, eyes rolling, an ugly rictus of shock. And then she wilted, tumbling across Eliza’s chest. Her pupils dilated, staring into Eliza’s eyes, sightless but accusing.

  Lifeless. Just a drift of mahogany hair, trailing in the wind.

  A scream rose in Eliza’s throat.

  But all it met was blood.

  A strange chill spread down her neck, seeping outwards. Where had the sunshine gone? She felt so cold. She tried to breathe, but metal scraped on bone. She gurgled, coppery liquid choking her. Her eyes ached and blurred. Her legs wouldn’t move. A strange weight bore down, sapping her will. Heavy. So very heavy . . .