“Have pity on the weakness of our faith.” Auberon spoke the words of the prayer in a resonant voice, refusing to back down from Virgil.
Virgil felt the wolf inside him leap, though the beast should have been well and truly asleep. His lips curled back over his teeth. “Do not do this.” It was close to a plea. Fear curled in Virgil’s belly. What if the opium no longer worked? What if his anger devoured him even so? God, no. No.
“And you, do not do this,” Auberon said. “Accept that this creature is you.” He kicked the lacquered opium tray over, spilling pipes and matches and the lamp, the flame of which smothered in its own oil. The flames of the other lamps in the room stuttered. “You were but a child, Virgil. Savaged and scarred, but still alive and now whole and miraculous. If this is not the doing of God, what can it be?”
Virgil said nothing. How many times had he asked that question? What did God want of him? Had He meant this? What God could? By all rights, he should have died in the wreck of his own flesh and broken bones, but he hadn’t. He hadn’t.
“How alike we are,” Auberon whispered. “Wretches who wish they were anything but that which looks back upon them in the mirror.”
Virgil bowed his head, digging his fingers hard into his hair, against his scalp. Wretches both, he thought. Not yet saved; still lost. “Have pity on those who are fearful,” he whispered, clinging to the words of his faith despite the sins that cluttered around him.
In the flickering light of the room, Auberon crossed himself. “Amen.”
CHAPTER THREE
“And then Naville told me in no uncertain terms that the Rinaldi Codex was a forgery! Can you imagine? Of all things. Claimed that I had brought an illicit document to the Fund and should be expelled!”
Eleanor watched Juliana shelve another stack of books, her own mouth pressed into a thin line. Had Juliana encountered difficulty because she was a woman or because she was a known associate of Renshaw Folley? The Egypt Exploration Fund had been welcoming enough to women in the beginning, but as they regulated policies on artifacts from Egypt, everything else bore greater scrutiny as well.
“What was his basis for that conclusion?”
Eleanor closed the book she had been staring at all morning, unable to concentrate. The night before had been largely sleepless as she found herself unable to put the day’s events behind her. The memories dredged up by Agent Mallory fed into her dreams, contorting them into nightmare landscapes of rippling portals of light that threatened to carry her away. Eleanor had seen neither portal of light nor Agent Mallory in the waking world, but felt that either might be lurking nearby.
The occasional screech from clockwork pterodactyls circling the gallery’s high ceiling didn’t help set her at ease.
Juliana turned from the bookshelves and brushed her hands together. “The seal on the frontispiece. He claimed one marking to be a stork, when everyone knows Rinaldi House favored herons. Anyone with two eyes could see it was a heron.” She laughed, strangely happy despite her obvious annoyance. “A stork! Preposterous.”
Eleanor’s mouth quirked in a grin, which faded as a throat was cleared nearby and a voice asked, “Excuse me, ladies?”
It was Mallory’s voice, and Eleanor scowled. His quick appearance gave credence to the idea that he had been lurking, and she cast a glare to a passing pterodactyl, wishing it had warned her as to his approach. Eleanor spied a smudge of dust on Mallory’s otherwise flawless black coat. She pictured him crawling around machinery displays all morning and found the idea oddly comforting.
Juliana took a surprised step backward at Mallory’s arrival, upsetting a stack of books on the floor. One arm flailed in an effort to steady herself as Eleanor and Mallory stepped toward her. Each grasped one of Juliana’s arms, balancing her as she came to rest atop the disheveled pile of books.
“You would think, with all the loud machinery in here, and—” she cast a hand toward the ceiling and the metal forms that glided below it “—flying beasts, I wouldn’t be quite so unsettled.” As Juliana spoke, one of the pterodactyls gave a monstrous cry. It sounded as though the entire gallery of iron and glass had broken apart above them. “Agent Mallory, you do have a way about you.”
Mallory pressed his free hand to his chest. “My mother says so, yes.” He nodded, rough-cut hair brushing his cheek.
Juliana’s face filled with color and Eleanor laughed, a sound nearly lost under the wail of another pterodactyl passing above them.
“Mothers are notoriously biased,” Eleanor said, giving Juliana’s arm a squeeze before releasing her. She noted Mallory wore no tie today, even though his shirt collar was fully buttoned. She didn’t ask, especially when Mallory’s fingers fluttered to his collar, as if he were already keenly aware of the curiosity.
“If you’re looking for Mister Folley,” Juliana said, “he’s not presently here—” she gestured to the booth they stood in with its cases, shelves, and table “—though he may well be somewhere in the hall.”
“I was actually looking for Miss Folley,” Mallory said and inclined his head toward Eleanor. He gestured to the bookcases around them, a library in miniature. “Would she be shelved under foolish or impudent?”
Juliana’s giggle sounded like something that might come from a twelve-year-old at the telling of a bawdy joke. Eleanor glared at her traitorous friend before she looked to Mallory.
“I would place her under absurd, myself,” Eleanor said and turned away from them both, moving into the depths of the booth and the trio of shelves there. Her father had thought that in addition to the machines, some Exposition attendees might like to see his ancient volumes. He had thus far been proven incorrect. Eleanor’s fingers trailed over languages (dead and living) and sciences (natural and seemingly not).
“Eleanor, come back.” Juliana’s voice was laced with her laughter still. “We meant no harm. This nice young man would like to speak with you.”
“Nice young man,” she muttered and rounded the shelf to find Virgil Mallory at its opposite end. She had known he would come back, had hoped he would even as she struggled with her father’s wants lying in direct opposition to her own.
“I really am quite nice,” Mallory said.
“So your mother says?”
She enjoyed the faint tipping of his mouth and the way it brightened his eyes. She was beginning to get the impression that he didn’t like his task any more than she did, for Eleanor could not remember tales of Mistral agents being this delicate in the wrangling of their prey.
“I don’t mean to complicate your life,” Mallory said with what sounded like a hint of apology as he stepped toward her. Something about the agent lent an edge to him today, something she couldn’t pinpoint. He came close enough that she could smell him again, though his scent was different today: there was no sweet scent of opium.
“I think your life is already rather too complicated,” she said in return. “The last thing you need is such a folly.”
His smile broadened. “You have researched the Lady’s ring, Miss Folley,” he said. His voice dropped and the smile faded. “You know what we’re up against with its theft. You must.”
Eleanor feared she did know. If she paired her research with Mallory’s, what would it show? How much closer would that place her to her mother? She took a gamble, to see how much he thought he knew.
“You think the thief means to open a portal to the past?” Eleanor asked, her voice as low as his, though they had only Juliana and passing mechanical beasts to overhear them.
She thought Mallory would laugh it off, as if she was making a joke at his expense, but he didn’t. His eyes held hers in a way that told her he might have been asking himself the same question. The idea that their notions about the theft might not be so dissimilar gave Eleanor hope.
“It sounds foolish when spoken aloud,” he said.
“It does,” she agreed, but the idea still chilled her. She fell into trivialities to keep the feelings of loss from overwhelming her all
over again. “There is no way to verify the ring’s theft. Being that the Egyptian Museum has always denied being in possession of the Lady’s arm, how could the Lady’s ring be stolen from them?”
Mallory nodded, conceding the point. “You have only my word and the photograph, Miss Folley.”
“And the half dozen or so men on the roof!” Juliana cried as she stepped behind the shelves and took refuge between Eleanor and Mallory.
Men on the roof? Eleanor swept her skirt aside as she emerged from the shelter of the bookcase. Mallory came around the opposite end, peering up with her. Beyond the gleaming wings of a pair of pterodactyls, black-clad people stood atop the iron-flanked windows that constituted the gallery’s roof. Each wore a short mantle, their faces effectively covered with metallic masks that had been shaped like birds’ heads: long pointed beaks, short hooked beaks, gleaming gem-colored eyes. Eleanor tried to put this in perspective of the Exposition, that it was a demonstration, but when the windows shattered, Eleanor knew it was not.
Glass rained into the Folley booth, and both Eleanor and Mallory lifted hands to shield their faces from the shower of debris. The metalwork wings of one pterodactyl seized up, the creation plunging to the gallery floor with a squawk.
“Oh, the wretches!” Juliana cried, appearing from the shelves behind Eleanor and Mallory. “The books! Renshaw’s machine!”
Ropes uncoiled into the gallery and the bird-faced people began to descend, drawing guns. Some of the pterodactyls were still flying, their controllers heedless of the intrusion; one intruder kicked one of the winged beasts to the floor, where it shattered. Eleanor pulled Juliana back from the table and tucked her once again into the space between the bookshelves.
“The books have survived floods and fires,” Eleanor said. She looked back to see a bird-headed interloper land atop one of the bookcases; Mallory had drawn his revolver and fired before the man could get further. The report of the gun was startling within the confines of the booth and, Eleanor hoped, lost to other exhibitors under the hum of machinery. The intruder’s body snapped around, feet caught snugly in his rope, hanging dead against her father’s ancient texts.
“A little blood won’t be their undoing.” Eleanor tried to reassure Juliana, but when Mallory joined them between the shelves and pressed a second revolver into Eleanor’s hand, all reassurances died in her mouth.
“It won’t be your undoing, either,” Mallory said, a growl edging his voice. “Four remain. You know how to use it.”
Eleanor shook her head, not in denial of his words but at what holding and using the gun would mean. This was the line, she thought; the line she would cross where everything would change. Her hand hadn’t known a gun’s weight in years; she had thought to never know it again. But Mallory’s revolver felt good in her palm, familiar, and that terrified her. “I don’t want to go back there—for his sake.”
“I know,” Mallory said, and she thought she heard the understanding in his voice, the regret.
Unlike Mallory, the three men advancing on them didn’t care what Eleanor wanted. They unsheathed their weapons, short thick-barreled rifles, and fired in rapid succession. The shells from one gun impacted the shelves, throwing a thick, wet substance across the books. The shell from another gun ignited the liquid. The fire was sudden and intense; a glowing fireball expanded through the Folley booth, flames touching every wetted surface. Eleanor jerked Juliana to the floor, watching as Mallory hit the ground, too. Instinct took over.
“Crawl away, Juliana—away!” But the woman did not move.
The masked men were shadows to Eleanor, a memory from her past. Like the people in the desert strangely illuminated amid the dust, they represented a danger to those she loved. These men flickered in and out of her vision thanks to the flames that sought to consume the chemical that had doused the books. They drew revolvers next.
Eleanor pressed Juliana behind her and lifted Mallory’s revolver. She fired without thinking twice. The first shot took a man in the chest, while the second flew wide and lodged into a passing pterodactyl. Eleanor adjusted her aim and caught another man in his neck, while Mallory hit the third. Each of the men toppled from their ropes to hit the floor with muffled thumps.
“Eleanor!”
Juliana’s cry drew Eleanor’s attention from the dead men. Looking into Juliana’s wide eyes was little better. Eleanor lowered the revolver and reached toward Juliana. But Juliana, friend and surrogate mother these long years, came to her feet and fled the booth, pushing aside the approaching security guards who tried to stop her.
Eleanor dimly registered that Mallory moved to intercept the guards, showing his Mistral credentials. He insisted his people were on their way, that the scene must remain intact for them, but allowed a pair through with fire extinguishers to subdue the flames. Eleanor moved, pressing Mallory’s revolver into his hands before she traced Juliana’s steps, and found her cowering in Professor Twine’s booth, closed into his Miracle Steam Bath contraption.
“Juliana.”
The woman turned away. Through the cut-glass panes of the domed device, steam that smelled like violets swirled, a strange contradiction to the scent of burning books a few booths down. Eleanor circled the device, trying to meet Juliana’s eyes, but the woman refused to look at her. Professor Twine watched this strange dance from his stool, arms crossed over his chest.
“I wouldn’t have let them hurt you,” Eleanor said.
“They didn’t want me, did they?” The words came choked between sobs, and at last the woman looked at Eleanor. Juliana’s face was flecked with blood, her dress splattered with chemicals and soot.
“No,” Eleanor said.
Juliana stepped to the edge of the glass, steam swirling with her movements. “I never wanted to know what you did all those years ago.”
“I never wanted you to know.” She withdrew a folded handkerchief from her skirt and offered it through the slits in the glass to Juliana. Juliana took it, then turned away, stepping deeper into the violet-scented steam as she wiped her face clean.
Eleanor left her, knowing she would need time and want to be alone. Eleanor attempted to accommodate her, eyes flitting to the glass ceiling of the gallery as she made her way back to the Folley booth. She saw no one up there, but that didn’t mean these were the last.
The Folley display had been roped off, but the guards recognized Eleanor and let her through. She found Mallory kneeling near the first of the bodies, edging his fingers under the bird mask to reveal the human face beneath.
Eleanor didn’t recognize the person and exhaled, realizing only then she had worried Christian’s face might peer back at them. If he was responsible for the museum theft, was he now trying to reclaim the ring she possessed? She crouched beside Mallory.
A muscle in Mallory’s jaw flexed, but he met Eleanor’s gaze as his fingers slipped from the mask’s edge. “I know these men.”
Eleanor touched Mallory’s arm at the crook of his elbow. He leaned into her briefly, but Eleanor found a sliver of solace there, in the heat and scent of him—not the sweetness, but the darker thing that stretched beneath the gunpowder. She leaned into him, unbalanced but supported, as Mistral agents began to arrive.
Eleanor’s eyes sought his, a small reflection of herself hovering in their brown depths. She suspected he had as many questions as she did, but they would have to wait. He looked past her, to the tall Negro man who was speaking with the guards in harsh tones. Mallory’s hand slid over Eleanor’s and he set her back on both feet before he moved away.
Mallory had sketched the scene in his notebook, but another man arrived to photograph the wreck of the booth. Once his work was done, the bodies were removed. Eleanor had never seen dead bodies removed with such efficiency, but the Galerie des Machines was a public venue, and the last thing Exposition officials wanted was to admit such an attack had befallen one of the exhibitors. Others were already looking at the Folley booth with great curiosity—what did Folley possess that would
trigger such interest? Eleanor wished they would look elsewhere.
The precise cleanup work of the Mistral agents both fascinated and chilled Eleanor. Not even during her time with Christian had she seen such a thing. Even with Christian, there was a respect for a life that had passed, even if it were the life of an enemy. The Mistral agents who worked to clear the scene within the Galerie were dispassionate, as mechanical as any invention in the hall, as they lifted the sheet-wrapped bodies onto stretchers and carried them carefully away.
Across the aisle, Mallory spoke in hushed but angry tones to the tall Negro, his hair in more disarray than usual. Gesturing with both hands, it appeared Mallory would prefer to punch something or someone than attempt a conversation. The Negro attempted an explanation and tried to rest a hand on Mallory’s shoulder, but Mallory threw it off.
“Ellie!”
Eleanor’s father pushed past the guards. A word from Mallory and the guards let him through. Eleanor watched her father take in the destruction, the broken glass, the burned spines of the books, the gooey control panel on the otherwise-intact Triple E.
“What the hell is this?” he asked in a whisper. He grabbed Eleanor’s hands and pulled her to the edge of the central table.
“I don’t know,” Eleanor said. It was utter truth. She couldn’t give credence to the idea Christian was involved or was trying to reclaim the ring she wore. He wouldn’t go to these lengths. And, she reminded herself, Mallory had said he’d known the men. Was this Mistral’s doing? She looked at Mallory, to see that he had allowed the Negro agent’s hand upon his shoulder, allowed himself to be led to a bench.
“If the ring has been taken, why an assault here, on us?” her father whispered.
Did he have a theory of his own, one that didn’t involve Christian and the ring she wore? Did the attack mean whoever took the ring knew of their initial discovery and involvement?
His face creased with his frown. “You are an authority on the ring,” he admitted with reluctance. “Perhaps whoever took it means to reach you next, to help them use it.”
Rings of Anubis: A Folley & Mallory Adventure Page 5