The Jackal's House

by Anna Butler

  Table of Contents

  Blurb

  Dedication

  Map

  Author’s Note

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 30

  Chapter 31

  Chapter 32

  Steampunk Glossary

  More from Anna Butler

  Readers love The Gilded Scarab by Anna Butler

  About the Author

  By Anna Butler

  Visit Dreamspinner Press

  Copyright

  The Jackal’s House

  By Anna Butler

  Sequel to The Gilded Scarab

  Lancaster’s Luck: Book II

  Something is stalking the Aegyptian night and endangering the archaeologists excavating the mysterious temple ruins in Abydos. But is it a vengeful ancient spirit or a very modern conspiracy….

  Rafe Lancaster’s relationship with Gallowglass First Heir, Ned Winter, flourishes over the summer of 1900, and when Rafe’s House encourages him to join Ned’s next archaeological expedition, he sees a chance for it to deepen further. Since all the Houses of the Britannic Imperium, Rafe’s included, view assassination as a convenient solution to most problems, he packs his aether pistol—just in case.

  Trouble finds them in Abydos. Rafe and Ned begin to wonder if they’re facing opposition to the Temple of Seti being disturbed. What begins as tricks and pranks escalates to attacks and death, while the figure of the Dog—the jackal-headed god, Anubis, ruler of death—casts a long shadow over the desert sands. Destruction follows in his wake as he returns to reclaim his place in Abydos. Can Rafe and Ned stand against both the god and House plots when the life of Ned’s son is on the line?

  For Elin, Claire, and Sally, who helped Rafe shine all the brighter.

  Author’s Note

  THE EAGLE-EYED among you will have realized that, for the purposes of this story, I moved the Temple of Seti at Abydos a little farther into the desert. In reality, it’s closer to the edge of the canal. This map, beautifully drawn by Margaret Warner, reflects the geography depicted in The Jackal’s House.

  Chapter 1

  GIVEN A choice between listening to the prattle of children or walking unarmed into a room full of murderous assassins… well, once I wouldn’t have wagered one shiny silver sixpence on which I’d prefer. Less uncertainty than a flutter on the nags at the Derby.

  These days, I’m not so sure. I wasn’t given a choice, to begin with. And where’s the fun in not knowing which horse to back?

  Here’s your sixpence.

  IT ISN’T quite cricket to wager with a gentleman to whom you haven’t been introduced.

  So… Rafe Lancaster, at your service. Ex-aeronaut in the Britannic Imperium’s Aero Corps, forced into a medical retirement when, flying over the African veldt in action against the Boer rebels, a crash left me with damaged eyesight. Present coffeehouse owner. Gentleman. Scion of a cadet branch of House Stravaigor, one of the Minor Houses in the Britannic Imperium’s government, and although every gentleman in the Imperium is a member of some House or other, my relationship with House Stravaigor is as loose as I can keep it. I may be a wastrel, a wanderer, an iconoclast, and a rootless stray, but I’m an honest one. That’s more than you can say for most Stravaigors.

  Honest enough to mention that I am also a confirmed bachelor, if you know what I mean. I expect that you do. With regard to this last item, friend to Ned Winter, who is the First Heir of Convocation House Gallowglass. In fact, I’d say Ned Winter is the most important thing there is about me.

  And that is all you need to know for the moment. More, I expect, will become apparent.

  NOW THAT we are acquainted, picture me minding my own business—that is, my coffeehouse near the Britannic Imperium Museum in Londinium’s Bloomsbury—on the morning of 2 August 1900, one of those few idyllic British summer days when the weather wasn’t recreating Noah’s flood. By ten, the tide of breakfast customers had abated, and I handed the reins to my two indispensable lieutenants, Hugh Peters and Alan Jenkins. I fortified myself with a cup of my best brew, polished my spectacles in readiness in the same manner I used to check my gun before combat, and retired to the office to wrestle the July accounts into submission. I am not a natural accountant. I sat at the datascreen of my analytical machine and chased a recalcitrant guinea up one line of the accounting sheet and down several others. To no avail. An hour later, I still hadn’t managed to lay the pesky little blighter by the heels. It was a blessed relief when Hugh poked his head around the edge of the office door and interrupted me.

  A blessed relief that lasted for all of a second. I knew that hard-lipped expression, where even Hugh’s nostrils thinned and flared. The hand he had on the doorknob was white-knuckled.

  Trouble.

  “You’d better come through, sir.”

  I was out of my chair before he could close his mouth again, riding the blood rush that always came at such moments, my heart pounding. I pulled open the desk drawer to reach for my pistol.

  “Not sure you’ll need that, sir, but some of your House guards are here. We’re to expect visitors.”

  Oh. Joy.

  A visitation. And by someone of rank in my House’s hierarchy, given the guards. The important people in a House went nowhere without the escort of men so well armed they could start their own war. This did not bode well. Although I was invited to major House events, I was not on good terms with most of the important members. Some positively disliked me, astonishing as that might seem.

  I slumped into my chair again. Scrubbing my face with the palms of my hands and kicking one foot gently against the desk leg did not help. “I’d rather welcome the Beast of the Apocalypse.”

  “I know, sir.”

  “Did they say who’s coming?”

  “No, sir. I didn’t get the impression it’s the Stravaigor himself, though.”

  The Stravaigor’s Heir was an unwelcome possibility. He was one of those important House members impervious to my charm. He also had a bone or two to pick with me, I fancied, regarding what he viewed as my lack of enthusiasm for House affairs.

  After a wistful glance at my aether pistol and a hearty slamming closed of the drawer—all the better to express my wild delight at the prospect—I went through to the main coffeehouse. A House guard awaited me. To be more accurate, a House assassin. He held a harquebus, the aether chamber obviously charged and ready, and wore his aether pistols as openly as he wore his dark gray House uniform.

  Across the left shoulder of his uniform jacket, underneath the twist of scarlet braid on the epaulet, sailed a small ship—three-masted, canvas bellying out with a strong wind behind it, the metallic thread of the embroidery glinting. His House badge. I couldn’t read the motto from more than six feet away, not with my bad eyes, but I knew what the tiny letters proclaimed: errant in aeternum. Forever wandering. A perfect motto for the rovers of House Stravaigor, the footloose, the chancers, the vagabonds, the gadabout adventurers.

  The guard bowed slightly. “Captain Lancaster.” />
  Memory stirred. “I saw you at the wedding of the Stravaigor’s eldest girl back in June, didn’t I? In a waiter’s uniform.”

  The man’s mouth almost twitched into a grin. “I wasn’t a very good waiter.”

  “I expect your guns got in the way.”

  His grin made it all the way through.

  Mercifully, the coffeehouse had been almost empty in the midmorning lull. Another guard was ushering out my last customers. He turned to stand at the glass front door, blocking the entrance, a hulking great brute possibly made by the same manufacturers who build the Britannic Imperial Aero Corps’ dreadnoughts. Alan stood behind the counter at the coffee urns, one hand bracing himself against the countertop as if for support. As I glanced at him, he inched his hand a little closer to the electric warning bell that connected us to the office of my tenants on the floor above. They were House Gallowglass guards, permanently stationed in the coffeehouse to watch over Ned whenever he visited, but who might be expected to lend their assistance to us in a pinch. I hoped to God it wouldn’t be necessary.

  “A visit from my House, Alan. I’m sure it’s nothing to worry about.”

  He didn’t look convinced, but he let his hand drop. I can’t say I was convinced either, especially since I had only managed to raise the funds to buy the coffeehouse from old Mr. Pearse—alias the Jongleur, head of a House at least as important as my own—by selling the Stravaigor all my dead mother’s jewels and taking out a House loan for the balance. I was still paying off the mortgage. Being in hock to the beggars put me at a crippling disadvantage.

  An autolandau drew up in the street outside, darkening the windows with its shadow and steaming up the glass with a great burst of hot, tarry vapor from its emissarium. At exactly the right moment, the man at the front of the coffeehouse stepped aside as a third guard flung open the door with such force the bell rang madly, dancing on its coiled spring. I slid my hand into my pocket for the comforting touch of the little hideaway gun I kept there.

  I had been right about my visitor. Two visitors, in fact. My elder brother, Peter, and the owner of those heavily armed assassins, John Rohan Lancaster, First Heir of House Stravaigor.

  Peter and John.

  Oh, what joy.

  I IGNORED Peter. Five years my senior, he was very like our dear departed papa, inheriting his florid cheeks, cold eyes, and grasping nature. I hadn’t liked my father either.

  I did, however, incline my head in John’s direction and greeted him with the civility the thought of my mortgage demanded. “First Heir.”

  John’s expression would have curdled milk so fresh it was still in the cow. “Rafe.” He looked around the coffeehouse. “Your shop. How quaint.”

  My mouth ached with the effort of keeping the smile charming. “Thank you. A most unexpected… pleasure to see you in it.”

  The pause had been just long enough. John’s mouth, never what I would term generous, thinned out to the point where his lips whitened and almost vanished. “A word, if you please.”

  The assassin-guard stepped forward then and saluted. “Best done in the office at the back, Mr. John. We’ll hold the door here.”

  Rats in traps had a better time of it, I fancied. No way out of talking to my beloved family members short of the guards being taken with a simultaneous apoplexy that would allow me to punch John on his overlarge nose without the risk of being roasted by an aether fléchette from their harquebuses. I took comfort from the fantasy as I led my unwelcome visitors behind the counter. Alan and Hugh frowned at me as we passed, brows furrowed and mouths downturned, but they stayed where they were.

  My office was a commodious room, with my desk and chair set before the barred window that gave onto the paved backyard. John didn’t wait for an invitation to take the only other seating, an old sofa ranged along the wall opposite the door, with a low table set before it. I could only hope he found the broken spring.

  I chose not to hide behind my desk. Instead I propelled my office chair out into the room, keeping it at right angles to John’s sofa. Stretching out my legs and crossing them at the ankle, I leaned against the high leather back, the very model of a young man socially and emotionally at ease. Jamming my hands into my trouser pockets gave me a casually indifferent air and kept them from betraying anything to the contrary. I had a half crown and some pennies in the left-hand pocket. The coins jingled easily as I let my fingers trace the milled edges.

  Peter joined John on the sofa. John had to shift a few degrees in his seat to face me at a more direct angle. Causing him even that minor inconvenience was very sweet. It was, in fact, the only genuine amusement to be gained.

  John eyed me up and down for a moment. “You know why I’m here. Your conscience, although I doubt you have such a thing, will tell you.”

  “You are quite mistaken, John. I am honored, of course, but I can’t begin to account for your visit.” This was not strictly true. Although I wasn’t certain why he’d waited over a month to remonstrate with me.

  Peter’s scowl was vitriolic in counterpoint to John’s cold, unwavering stare. “Do stop playing the fool! You know very well what you’ve done to offend John.”

  “I have no idea, Peter, but whatever it is, it was most unconsciously done.”

  Peter rolled his eyes. “Winter.”

  Of course it was Ned. Edward Fairfax Winter, the Gallowglass First Heir. Now there was a House luminary to make even an iconoclast like me pause. None shone brighter.

  Ned Winter.

  My Ned.

  Not that John needed an excuse for wanting my blood, but I had a strong suspicion I understood why my knowing Ned served as an incentive this time around.

  John raised a hand, and Peter’s irate stuttering cut off abruptly. “Let us be clear what’s at stake here, Rafe.” John’s bland tone set my teeth on edge, so much falsity seethed beneath it. “My father, I know, has told you of our… our delicate position when it comes to the Cartomancer.”

  Indeed. My House was on the outs with Convocation House Cartomancer, to which we’d been allied since the Restoration. The Stravaigor had told me the alliance was shakier than a blancmange in an earth tremor. With the very real possibility we’d be cast off, the strategic importance of access to other Houses was incalculable, especially one of the eight great Convocation Houses. The Stravaigor was doing his utmost to repair the damage but was seeking alliances outside of Cartomancer as insurance, in case he failed. He had to capitalize on every possible link to the other Houses.

  So I nodded. My shoulders were stiffening, rising instinctively to protect the back of my neck. I had to force them down, to continue to appear indifferent and relaxed.

  He nodded back, almost genial, but his eyes had the cold, flat hostility of a snake’s. “Then you will understand my concern. You bought this coffeehouse from the Jongleur. It is patronized by both the Scrivener and the Gallowglass First Heir. And you didn’t tell me.”

  John might have noticed for himself if he hadn’t been such an indolent dunderhead, too eager to get me under a financial obligation to the House to look at the details of why I sought a loan. That snake’s stare, though, was enough to make me keep my observations to myself until I could see just what John was after. Some recompense for the Stravaigor’s anger when he had found out about John’s negligence, possibly—and good Lord, the old man had been very angry, as I’d seen for myself at the wedding back in June when this had all come out. But John’s manner had a whiff of more than that.

  “The Jongleur….” John raised one shoulder fractionally. “Too much of a recluse to be of political use. But the Scrivener alone would be reason to be put out with your refusal to tell us you had the connection. That’s bad enough, Rafe. But to conceal your friendship with Ned Winter is unforgiveable.”

  I would lay any odds that he was quoting his father verbatim on the Jongleur and the Scrivener, but there was a tremor of something very personal underneath the snake’s hiss. Anger, most certainly. Resentment, particularl
y that I was aware of the Stravaigor’s ire over the matter. A deep-seated rancor born of years of antipathy between us. Although his expression remained cold and his eyes flat and dark, his right hand clenched and relaxed, clenched and relaxed.

  It behooved me to tread warily. Not only had I the unholy temerity to befriend Ned Winter, but I hadn’t begged for permission first, nor had I run to the House to ask them how I could best turn this friendship to their advantage. In not asking John’s sanction, I had, in his view, set him up to showcase his incompetence in front of his father. In short, it was my fault.

  It was, I assure you, merely a happy accident. Pure serendipity.

  “John, I regret that my friendship with Ned came as an unpleasant surprise—”

  “Unforgiveable,” he said, the repetition heavy and uncompromising. “You should have told me.”

  “What could I tell you? When we met in February to discuss the loan the Stravaigor offered me, I had no idea Mr. Pearse was the Jongleur or that the archaeologist he talked about was the Gallowglass First Heir. I didn’t withhold this knowledge from you. I didn’t have it in the first place.”

  “You knew later, and you didn’t say anything. You hid the fact you were acquainted with Ned Winter until you could rub our faces in it at my sister’s wedding. You concealed it for your own advantage—”

  “Edward Winter!” Peter obviously could contain himself no longer. “Gallowglass! You conniving, treacherous bastard, Rafe! How dare you sit there smirking at us? How dare you!” Spittle flew everywhere, and his face was scarlet. If I’d cared, I might have worried about apoplexy. “I am ashamed of you! Our poor father… thank the Lord he isn’t here to see this! How could you? How could you be so lost to every finer feeling, be so ungrateful! We owe the House everything. It’s our duty to support the Stravaigor and the First Heir in everything they do. You know the situation we face with our Convocation House. You know we must all do everything we can to protect ourselves. But do you care? No! You are no brother of mine.” He made a pushing gesture toward me with both hands. “No more. I cast you off.”