The Bartered Brides (Elemental Masters)

by Mercedes Lackey

  Sarah stared at her, very much surprised. “You knew I had your locket? I mean, you knew that I would be able to see you?”

  “I . . . I am not quite sure how. I just felt it,” the ghost replied. “Oh. I’m Caroline Wells. Call me Caro. You must be some sort of mediumistic person?”

  This was, without a doubt, one of the sanest and calmest spirits that Sarah had ever encountered in her entire life. And she could not account for how such a levelheaded soul had not passed on. “Yes, I am,” she answered simply. “I’m Sarah. Among other things, I look for objects in pawnshops that are . . . attached to spirits.”

  Before she could continue, Caro interrupted her. “Well, I don’t want to be sent on just yet. Please. This is why I clung to my locket. It’s not for any selfish wish, and heaven knows I never did anything to speak of, much less anything terrible. The thing is . . . I don’t want to be sent on if I can help you. I spent most of my life in beds in sanitariums and nursing establishments and other such places. I want to do something useful before I move on. Do you understand?”

  Sarah frowned a little; this was . . . a new development. And it made her a little uneasy, given what she knew about ghosts. Could this one be trying to pull some sort of deception on her? “I think it’s only fair to warn you that the longer you remain in this form, the more of yourself you are going to start losing. Old ghosts . . . are more than a little insane.”

  “Oh, I don’t mean to stay forever,” Caro said, with cheerful practicality. “Just a year or so. Until I’ve done something really useful and helpful. So I don’t meet Saint Peter with a sad little list of non-accomplishments.”

  For the first time Grey spoke up. “Yessssssss,” the parrot said, drawing out the “s” into a long hiss. “Good idea.”

  Sarah was startled. Again.

  Sarah turned to look at the bird, who bobbed her entire body enthusiastically. She turned back to the ghost. Grey has never been wrong before. She knew when someone was dangerous, even when I had fallen under her spell. But I should, in all good conscience, make sure of this spirit.

  “It won’t bother you if I don’t call on you for days at a time?” she asked, carefully.

  “It’s not as if I’m a djinni that has to live in a lamp,” Caro laughed. “I’ll be fine. There are a lot of things I can do ‘over here.’ ”

  “And if I take the locket with me, you can go with it,” Sarah mused. “To the theater—”

  The ghost literally brightened, and her expression changed to one of such pathetic eagerness that Sarah’s heart went out to her. “Oh, would you? I’ve never been to the theater! Or the ballet, or the opera or—”

  That cemented it. Sarah was reasonably sure this was no act. It was Sarah’s turn to laugh, as she rummaged in the bedside table drawer for a ribbon and strung the locket on it temporarily until she could find a good strong chain, tying it around her neck. “I’ll take it with me everywhere. If you’re going to help me, you certainly deserve some reward.”

  “Thank you, Sarah,” Caro replied. “I had the feeling you were a good person when you touched the locket. I’m glad I was right.” She tilted her head to the side, abruptly, as if she had heard a sudden noise. “I think there is someone coming to your flat.”

  “That would probably be Nan, my friend. We live together. We also have a young ward, but she’s at school.”

  “Then I’ll disappear, and you can introduce us later.” Caro wiggled her fingers. “Tata, my new friend. Thank you ever so!”

  And with that, she vanished, as abruptly as she had come. Just as Sarah heard Nan’s key in the door.

  * * *

  “Well, your afternoon was more fruitful than mine,” Nan said ruefully, having changed out of her masculine disguise and into a comfortable tea gown. “I discovered exactly nothing. Well, other than that there apparently are a few fellows on the prowl for pretty young men who are bold enough to walk about looking for them in daylight.”

  Sarah shook her head; Nan chuckled inwardly to think how shocked John Watson would have been to overhear this conversation. “Well, that seems to indicate that there are pretty young men willing to give them what they want that also walk about in daylight, doesn’t it?”

  “So it does. And I don’t know why that never occurred to me, but the first time one of them came sidling up and whispered in my ear it was a bit of a shock. Fortunately they were willing to take ‘No thenkee, guv’ for an answer. But tell me more about this ghost of yours.”

  “I suppose we probably ought to see if there is any recent record of someone by her name passing away of consumption,” Sarah said thoughtfully.

  “I suppose we could ask her directly when she died, and where, and where she was supposed to be buried,” Nan countered. “That would make verifying what she says much simpler. If she really is what she says she is, she won’t be reluctant to tell us.”

  She waited warily for Sarah’s reaction to her challenge. After all, Sarah had shown herself to be susceptible to falling under the control of another before this.

  But Sarah only nodded eagerly. “I was about to get to that myself, but that was when you arrived, and she told me to call her again once night fell.”

  Hmm. Seems promising. “Grey, what do you think?” she asked, turning her attention to the parrot on the back of Sarah’s chair.

  Grey bobbed her whole body, her feathers slightly fluffed with cheerful exuberance. “Good! Good!” she said enthusiastically.

  Nan did laugh out loud at her reaction. “Do you mean it’s a good idea, or that you think this ghost is good?” she asked.

  “Both!” said Grey.

  Nan didn’t really need the answer; she was satisfied that Grey had been convinced by this ghost. “Well, shall we do this after sundown, then?” she asked. And then something occurred to her. “Wait a moment. Doesn’t it seem to you as if she is offering to be your spirit guide?”

  Sarah blinked owlishly at her. “I always thought that ‘spirit guides’ were the hallmark of charlatans . . . but now that you mention it, that is exactly what it sounds like.”

  Nan shrugged. “The idea has to come from somewhere. Perhaps it came from a situation identical to this one.”

  Any response Sarah might have made was interrupted by the appearance of their landlady and her maid of all work with their dinner tray. Nan was starving after all the walking she’d done, and Mrs. Horace had outdone herself with a lovely soup and cold sandwiches.

  Once the last crumb was gone and the tray outside their door with the empty dishes on it, Nan locked the door to prevent interruptions and turned back to Sarah. Outside the windows, the sky held the clear blue of twilight.

  “So—” Nan began.

  And then there was a third, transparent figure in the room, standing on the hearthrug. The young woman turned toward Nan.

  “You’d be Sarah’s friend?” she said, though it came out as a whisper.

  Nan raised an eyebrow at her. “Nan. Nan Killian.” She glanced over at Neville.

  The raven was so perfectly relaxed in the presence of the ghost that he wasn’t even paying attention to her. Instead, he was giving his wing and tail feathers a vigorous grooming.

  “I hope you don’t mind answering some questions,” Nan continued.

  “I expected them.” She folded her hands at her waist, looking as relaxed as Neville. “Ask away—or, wait, I think I can anticipate them, if you’d like to sit down and take notes?”

  Sarah got a pen and paper from the writing desk, while Nan took a seat in one of the hearthside chairs. “You seem . . . very composed for someone who’s dead,” she said bluntly. Truth to be told, she was a little startled. The only other time she’d seen Sarah’s ghosts had been when Sarah had summoned them to help all of them with the operatic diva, Magdalena von Dietersdorf. And then, they had not spoken to her.

  “I had a very long time to get used to the idea I was going to die,” Caro told her, just as bluntly. “The fact that I lived as long as I did was mor
e of a surprise than the dying part. Honestly, to be this free to move about, to be able to breathe without pain, is glorious. I prefer this state. I feel better now than I ever remember feeling in my life.” She glanced over at Sarah, saw that she was ready, and nodded at her. “As I told Sarah, my name is Caroline Wells. I died last year, December 28th, and I was buried in the churchyard of St. Mary’s Church, Wimbledon.”

  Sarah wrote all that down. “Parents?” she asked politely, as if she was interviewing one of Sherlock’s clients.

  “Mother died giving birth to my brother, Stephen. Her name was Charlotte, and I am buried next to her. Father is Brandon Wells, and is a solicitor in London. Please don’t trouble him or my brother—” for the first time she lost her cheer. “My illness and demise were very hard on both of them. I do not wish to renew their grief.”

  “Oh, we won’t,” Sarah assured her. “How did your locket get into the pawnshop?”

  “Stolen by the gravedigger after the service. I didn’t mind, you see, because I was hoping I could get it into the hands of someone like you. So I haunted him until he sold it at a pittance to the pawnbroker, then haunted the pawnbroker so he hurried to do the same.” A mischievous smile creased her lips once again. “And then until you came I gave anyone else who touched it an extreme dislike for it if I felt they were the wrong person for me. I fancy the gravedigger will never rob another corpse again, and the pawnbroker has been cured of taking stolen grave goods.”

  Nan couldn’t help but laugh as she shook her head. “You are a terror, my dear,” she said.

  “I am making up for all the pranking I was never able to do when I was sick,” Caro admitted shamelessly. “But I promise, aside from throwing a fright into any boys in this neighborhood that terrorize their sisters, I shall be quite sedate. You’ll scarcely know I am here.”

  “Now, what fun would that be?” Sarah demanded, and Grey bobbed her head. “I trust your discretion, but I see no reason for you to have to conceal yourself if we’re alone here of an evening.”

  Nan was a little torn . . . after all, they had not yet verified the ghost’s story. But on the other hand, Neville was also nodding his approval, and if the birds approved, there really was no reason to object. And Caro seemed the sort of “person” who would be amusing to have around in the evenings.

  “I follow the locket of course, so if you want me to find something else to do, just put it in a silk handkerchief in a drawer, and I’ll amuse myself,” Caro continued.

  “Well, tonight I was going to read some of Mr. Kipling’s Indian stories aloud while Sarah does the mending for both of us,” Nan told her.

  “That would be heavenly,” Caro replied with a wistful sigh. “The nurses never had time to read to me, and it was a great trial to hold up a heavy book.”

  “Then you should definitely join us,” Sarah pronounced.

  And so she did. It was possibly one of the oddest evenings they had ever spent in this flat, with a silent, transparent wraith perched attentively in the corner of the settee that Suki usually occupied, with one of Suki’s dolls showing through her middle, as she had absentmindedly “sat” where the doll was. She was highly appreciative, and suggested that she take her leave just before Nan was about to beg off.

  “Now is the most active time for my sort,” Caro explained, “And I would like to look about your neighborhood and see if there are any other spirits, perhaps ones that might need your help.”

  “By all means,” Sarah agreed, and Caro stood up, made a saucy little sketch of a curtsey, and drifted out through the street-side wall, waving a cheerful goodnight as she did.

  “Well!” Nan closed the book and looked at Sarah, who was smiling. “I don’t think I’ve had such an entertaining evening since Robin shared our stolen bread and ham that one evening in the garden at the school.”

  “It makes me wonder if this is what John and Mary go through of an evening,” Sarah mused. “There are ever so many more Elementals about than there are walking spirits.”

  “Probably not. I get the impression from Mary that Elementals are supremely uninterested in what we humans do, for the most part,” Nan replied, as she put the book back in its place and turned down the gaslights. “Perhaps Beatrice?”

  Sarah shook her head. “I get the impression that Beatrice’s parlor is full of her young writer and artist friends in the evening. I actually envy her. If this flat wasn’t so comfortable and convenient to everything in London I’d be mightily tempted to ask you to move.”

  “You’d get quickly tired of a lot of artists lounging about, eating our food, drinking our wine, and burning holes in our furniture with their cigarettes,” Nan laughed. “I think I prefer ghosts!”

  “I think I do too,” Sarah confessed, setting the last stitch, and patting one of the two piles of mended clothing next to her. “These are yours. Don’t stay up too late.”

  She took her own clothing with her back to her room. As was her habit ever since Suki had been attacked, Nan settled back into her chair in the darkened sitting room with Neville on her lap, cautiously opened her mind, and passively allowed the uppermost thoughts of those around her to trickle into her mind.

  Mrs. Horace was preoccupied with her own bedtime preparations, thinking of how nice it was to have a bakery around the corner so that she didn’t have to make her own bread anymore. Mary Ann, the little maid of all work, was already asleep—Mrs. Horace was a thoughtful woman and made sure the girl went to bed right after the last of the washing-up was done, so when she rose at five to get the stove started, she’d had plenty of sleep the night before. In her little room in the garret, Mary Ann was dreaming of sitting in the middle of the kitchen eating all the bread and jam she could hold.

  The neighbors to either side were either asleep already, or engrossed in getting ready to do so. Across the street it was the same, as well as behind the house. There were a few late strollers in this fine evening air, and one lone policeman. There was no one lurking about in the shadows, hiding in the alley, or even flattened on a rooftop. All was well.

  She shielded her mind again with relief. Maybe I am being too cautious—but I would rather be overcautious and feel foolish than be cavalier about this and regret it later.

  “All right, my lad,” she said to the dozing raven in her lap. “It’s off to bed for us. No eyes for you to peck out tonight.”

  “Bugger,” said Neville sleepily, and laughed.

  * * *

  The next morning as the girls were enjoying their breakfast with the birds, they clearly heard the staccato hoofbeats of a horse in a hurry and the two wheels of a hansom stop in front of their house. All four of them—girls and birds—brought their heads up like hounds hearing a fox horn, and a moment later, they heard the bell ring, Mrs. Horace answering it, and footsteps on their stair.

  But of course, Nan had already detected the familiar flavor of John Watson’s mind, and had sprung up to answer the door before he could knock on it. “The hunt?” she asked, using one of Sherlock’s favorite phrases.

  “Not precisely ‘up,’ but Lestrade has begged me to come have a look at a corpse that’s got him all of a tither in the absence of Holmes.” Watson shook his head. “Poor Lestrade. He’s not nearly as much of a fool as I make him out to be in my stories, but he’s much repenting some of the hard things he’s said about Holmes at the moment, and I feel very sorry for him. He’s out of his depth again, and he knows it, and now there’s no Sherlock to fall back on.”

  “Just how awful is this corpse?” Sarah asked. “I’d like to know whether I’d be well advised not to finish my breakfast. The oatmeal will probably stay settled, but anything excessive and I have doubts about sausage and eggs.”

  “I’d advise you not to finish,” John said soberly, and Sarah immediately folded her napkin and set it aside, rising from her chair.

  Neville immediately jumped to the table and helped himself to their eggs. Nan thought about chiding him . . . but why waste perfectly good eggs?
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br />   “Eat some of the tomato too,” she chided him. He looked up at her and made a disgusted noise, but she stared him down. “It’s good for you,” she reminded him. “The Warden told me so. Pretend it’s an ear.”

  Reluctantly, he ate half a tomato slice. Roughly the size of the ear he’d sliced off.

  “And eat neatly while we’re gone!” Sarah ordered, tying on her hat. “It’s not fair to Mrs. Horace or Mary Anne to make them clean up your mess.”

  “Yes, Mama,” Grey said, and laughed at her.

  Sarah rolled her eyes, as Nan suppressed a smile. She had the feeling this was going to be the last amusing thing that happened today.

  * * *

  The young woman’s corpse had been in the water for quite some time. Both Nan and Sarah had tied neckerchiefs around their faces soaked in lavender oil. It helped, but not nearly as much as Nan would have liked. The stench was appalling—but it was one that both of them had endured as children. Sarah’s doctor parents had lived in a part of Africa where death was commonplace, and Nan in the worst parts of London. Neither were strangers to death and decay.

  The most notable thing about the body was the fact that it had no head.

  Strangely, that actually made the sight of it a little easier to bear. Without a head, it just became a thing, an abstract. At least, Nan felt that way. Odd, how much of personhood we assign to having a head.

  Inspector Lestrade stood behind them with a handkerchief of his own pressed up against his face. He generally looked distressed or worried when Nan and Sarah saw him, but today the upper part of his face was contorted in a way that suggested that he might go have a good cry when he was assured of privacy. Nan didn’t blame him. The poor child on the morgue table couldn’t have been more than fifteen, and for all his bluster and officiousness, Lestrade was human, after all.