‘Blackmail? Lord Silver?’ Lord Guantes blinked. ‘You astonish me.’
The singing onstage cut off as someone made a dramatic entrance, but all Irene’s attention was on the Fae in front of her. ‘It astonishes you that I could be an expert blackmailer?’
‘Not at all. It astonishes me that Lord Silver could have done anything for which he might be blackmailed. I don’t suppose you’d care to share it with me?’
‘Absolutely not. It’s far too useful.’
‘Hmm.’ Lord Guantes turned his attention away from Irene, looking back at the stage. ‘I would say “a likely story”, but clearly you are going to stick to it. Very well. Would you like to ask me any questions?’
‘Well, yes,’ Irene admitted. ‘But I’m surprised that you’d be willing to answer them.’ If all he wanted was to dispose of her, then why sit and chat, and why allow her to regain her voice? It was hardly a sensible way to treat a dangerous enemy.
He smiled. ‘Miss Winters, I could say that I am in such a position of overwhelming superiority that giving you answers is nothing to me. But I feel like starting our association with honesty.’ He glanced at her for a moment, and Irene felt her inferiority washing over her like a wave, taking in her shabby dress, her borrowed tokens, her weakness. She knew it was his power bearing down on her, and that helped her to push it away, but even so it left her feeling small and grubby. ‘I intend to recruit you - a tame Librarian would be quite a coup - and you will be far more useful as an informed operative.’
She was painfully conscious of the minutes until midnight ticking away, but she’d take any opportunity to gather information. ‘As I understood it from Lady Guantes, you intend to start a war.’
Lord Guantes waved a hand casually. ‘Either we start a war, in which case we benefit. Or the dragon’s family sacrifices him, and then I am owed a favour by whoever purchases him, in which case we benefit again. I have nothing to lose.’
‘I’m surprised you’re so certain of victory,’ Irene said.
‘Of course.’ Lord Guantes’ tone practically patted her on the head. The word patronizing could have been invented to describe its nuances. ‘However, Miss Winters, I have access to substantially more information than you do.’
‘More than the Library?’ Irene tried.
‘More than a very junior member of the Library.’
She had to admit that he might have a point there. ‘So why did you target Kai in particular?’
‘Because my information showed he was of sufficient rank to serve as a cause for war, and he was in a vulnerable location. I wouldn’t have tried to kidnap him from his own father’s sphere. Dear me, no. Should he survive this, and one day be returned to his father’s care, I don’t think he will be allowed to wander so freely again.’ He reached over to a small table and picked up a glass of brandy, taking a sip from it in a way that closed the question.
On the stage Scarpia was confronting Tosca. But it was only the first act - onstage and in the box. And she had to make Lord Guantes think she was weakening. ‘Why do you dislike Lord Silver?’ she asked.
He raised an eyebrow. ‘I hadn’t thought you liked him.’
‘I don’t. I’m quite happy to blackmail him. But I was wondering what your reasons were.’
He chuckled, deep in his throat. Again there was that note of patronization to it, as though she’d said something charming in its innocence. ‘My dear Miss Winters, I was born to rank, myself.’ Again that airy gesture of his gloved hand. ‘And, as befits my status, I have a purpose, Miss Winters. A duty. An obligation …’
‘To start a war?’ Irene suggested, before she could stop herself.
‘Quite.’ He favoured her with a thin-lipped smile. ‘As opposed to Lord Silver, who is a simple dilettante, placed in a position quite outside his capabilities and ignoring it, once there. He offends my sense of the proper use of power.’
Scarpia’s voice rang through the opera house in a grand crescendo, and Lord Guantes’ eyes glinted like flint as the light caught them.
‘And now, Miss Winters,’ he said, ‘we come to the question of you.’
CHAPTER NINETEEN
‘But I believe it’s about to be the interval,’ Lord Guantes said, glancing at the stage and releasing her from the weight of his gaze. ‘Can I trust you to sit quietly and refrain from making a disturbance, Miss Winters?’
Irene considered the possible chain of events. I scream and claim assault. He calls in the guard. My identity is revealed. I get arrested and marched away to prison. ‘Yes, of course,’ she said. She tried to make it sound casual, as if she was in control.
It didn’t work. She could tell from the way Lord Guantes relaxed, as the chorus onstage went into a dramatic Te Deum. He knows he’s got nothing to fear from me. And he seemed genuinely interested in recruiting her. But why? Kai was far more important than she was.
She looked out over the audience as the curtains closed. The lights around the auditorium flared brighter as the gas was turned full on, and people broke into a low roar of conversation. A flood of those in the lower seats drifted outside, but most of the men and women who could afford boxes stayed where they were.
‘Perhaps you would like to go and fetch a drink?’ she suggested politely.
‘I couldn’t possibly leave you here on your own, Miss Winters,’ Lord Guantes answered. ‘Who knows what trouble you might get into?’
Irene folded her hands in her lap, feeling the gun through the folds of her skirt. Her motor control was back: she could use the gun if she had to. But with his power beating down upon her, she’d rather play the waiting game as he tried to recruit her, and look for an advantage. Any advantage at all.
Lord Guantes smiled slightly, as if he’d sensed a lack of resistance. ‘Quite,’ he said. ‘I knew that you’d be reasonable. Now I imagine you’re wondering what your options are.’
He would probably have enjoyed delivering that line even more if she’d been tied down, Irene decided. It was all about the power. ‘I had wondered,’ she murmured.
‘Well, you must understand that you are a slightly notorious young woman.’
Irene wasn’t sure whether to be pleased or annoyed at the slightly. She settled for, ‘It’s so difficult to know when one has overstepped. I didn’t think I’d caused Lord Silver any real inconvenience.’
‘Oh, it’s not Silver that I’m talking about.’ Lord Guantes picked up his glass of brandy and sipped again, drawing out the moment. ‘That would be Alberich.’
The name Irene least wanted to hear. She had never asked to be a person of interest to one of the Library’s worst nightmares. She didn’t want to be connected with someone who skinned people alive. And she’d barely escaped with her life herself, during their last encounter. ‘Ah,’ she said, keeping her voice even, and grateful again for her mask. Perhaps making an outcry and getting arrested would be the better option. She could make a break for it in the confusion.
‘Indeed.’ He was watching her, his eyes alert for the least sign of weakness. ‘A most convenient gentleman, for those who want to take advantage of his unique capabilities. Very - what is that word? Useful. Yes, useful. Astonishing, what he’s made of himself, and they say that he’s still developing. He may have his own schemes, but he is always the utter professional when it comes to cooperation with others …’
‘And he’s the one who told you where you could find a dragon, wasn’t he?’ Irene said. It made too much sense. Alberich would have recognized Kai’s nature after their last encounter, and he was definitely the sort to hold a grudge.
‘Exactly,’ Lord Guantes agreed. ‘Which is why I’m in his debt. Handing you over would settle the matter quite nicely.’
The spike of fear nearly turned Irene’s stomach. Her very worst nightmare coming true … Wait. This is too obvious. Cold common sense dragged her back from panic to critical analysis. He’s deliberately waving this at me to persuade me to choose a lesser evil. If he wants me in his service this badly
, then why?
‘It would, wouldn’t it,’ she agreed, and caught a glint of annoyance in Lord Guantes’ eyes. He’d been expecting that to have more of an effect. Come on, boast to me. Tell me something useful. ‘The local nobility must be very annoyed that all their boxes are taken tonight,’ she remarked. ‘And all these people here from different worlds, but nobody seems to notice.’
‘This is our Venice, Miss Winters.’ Lord Guantes steepled his fingers as he looked out over the crowd with an air of ownership. ‘The world is what we say it is here, and it begins and ends with Venice. There is no land beyond it to interfere. The Ten command, and the people obey them as their masters. Even the very ground beneath our feet obeys their will. Everything is precisely as Venice ought to be. Napoleon will never come to this Venice; it will never be conquered, never be lessened, never be anything else. The Ten wish everyone to see their chosen visitors merely as foreigners, and so therefore they do.’ He paused. ‘Their chosen visitors, that is. I do not think you received an invitation, Miss Winters.’
‘I consider the kidnapping of one of my friends to be an unspoken invitation,’ Irene retorted flatly. ‘Which makes you my official host, Lord Guantes.’
He chuckled. ‘Not bad, but rather lacking in legal support. I don’t think you could argue that in front of the Ten.’
‘Is that what we’ll be doing?’
‘Only if you push me that far, Miss Winters, and only if absolutely necessary. You know how this sort of thing goes. An anonymous denunciation. Your public exposure. Your arrest. Your … questioning.’ He didn’t give the word the same inflection Silver might have done, to make something unwholesome and lascivious out of it. He merely let it roll out, heavy with the weight of darkness and dungeons and hopelessness. ‘By the time you were standing in front of the Ten, I promise you that you would already have confessed everything.’
‘I’m surprised you haven’t turned me over already,’ she said, as casually as she could. She was aware that she was walking on a razor’s edge, trying to find out what he wanted without pushing him too far.
The lights in the house were dimming again, and the audience noise fell to a hush as the curtains reopened.
Lord Guantes waited until the action had begun again, before continuing. ‘Of course, there are other options.’
‘Yes?’ Irene said, trying to throttle back the eagerness in her voice.
‘But your options are now very limited, Miss Winters. Limited to who I decide will be your new master or mistress, for you are my prisoner now.’ His pause was to allow her to agree to that, but she said nothing. He went on regardless. ‘The Ten would be glad to have you, I’m sure. You could be traded for later advantage. They have no wish to actively start a feud with your organization, so it would probably be a question of wringing you dry for information, then keeping you a prisoner until they had some use for you.’
Which tells me more about how you see things than about how they see things. Irene gave a rigid inclination of her head, waiting for him to continue.
‘Then again, I might gain advantage by presenting you to one of my allies, or to secure a potential ally.’ His pause there could have been designed for her to acknowledge the subtleties of high politics, as expressed by the trade in souls. ‘Some of the powerful of my kind would be glad to have you as a personal enemy in their story, or a student.’
‘A student?’ Irene said, surprised.
‘Eventually. After sufficient training. Or … a toy.’ His tone conveyed sadness at the need to actually mention such unpleasantness, but suggested that he could easily catalogue each possible indignity, torture or worse - or even perform them, should it become necessary.
Irene swallowed. Her mouth was dry. From a clinical point of view, she knew he was only - only? - attempting to frighten her. But the actual experience was indeed frightening, as she felt the compulsion to obey him, and she had to fight with everything she had not to succumb to that power.
Was Lord Guantes already controlling her? Was that why she was sitting so passively, convincing herself she was doing it to discover his secrets? She ran mentally through a couple of plans. Collapse the entire opera box. Shoot him. Threaten him with the gun. Smash his chair and set fire to his brandy. Jump over the edge into the audience. She thought she could do any of them … if she decided to. If she chose to make the effort.
‘Or I could offer you to Alberich.’ Lord Guantes’ hand reached across to clamp down on her wrist, pinning it to the arm of the chair.
Irene jerked against his grip, but his hand ground down, hard enough to hurt, and he turned in his chair to watch her. There was pleasure in his eyes, in the way that he looked at her, but it wasn’t a sadistic amusement at her pain. It was simply enjoyment of his power over her. How very like Silver. I should tell him that, if I ever really want to insult him. ‘Ah no, Miss Winters. That is not an option. You do not leave this box until we have decided your fate, one way or another. Tell me, are you so very afraid of him?’
‘Of Alberich?’ Sheer disbelief coloured her voice. ‘Why shouldn’t I be?’
‘Come now.’ He was playing with her. The voices onstage were all male, interlacing in threat and defiance, promising imprisonment and death. ‘What is there to dislike so much?’
‘I’m sure you know the sort of thing he does,’ Irene snapped.
‘I’d like to hear it from your own mouth.’ His eyes caught hers, and this time she couldn’t look away, even if she wanted to. They compelled her. It was his will against hers, and even her Library brand wasn’t enough to save her now.
She barely recognized her own voice as she began to speak. ‘He skins people—’
The sound of her voice broke that moment of control, and she jerked herself back against the chair, her body shaking. Her back ached as if she had been beaten. This was far worse than Silver’s attempt to get under her defences. Lord Guantes had done it.
She’d lost time somewhere. Tosca was onstage and singing now, her voice arcing through the opera house in smooth, effortless sweeps of sound, like a silver pendulum counting away the seconds.
‘Charming,’ Lord Guantes said slowly. ‘Quite charming.’ His hand stayed on her wrist, his glove smooth and unwrinkled, as though he wasn’t applying any pressure at all. ‘I begin to see why Lord Silver likes you so much. You really are quite stimulating, Miss Winters. You are exactly what I want.’
‘But what do you want?’ Irene whispered. Her voice shook, just as it should if he’d managed to cow her. She’d had people try to break her will before now, but none of them had actually succeeded, and she didn’t want to think about the implications.
‘You as my servant, in public, this very night.’ His smile was the essence of smugness. ‘We’ll already have proven we can strike against the dragons. Having a Librarian in my service too will demonstrate that they will not be a significant threat in this conflict. Wouldn’t you agree?’
Irene’s heart sank. He was right. Parading her as a trophy might push some of the Fae swing-votes towards war. And it was all her own fault for coming here and running her head into the noose …
No, that was what he wanted her to think. She thought of the pendant around her neck. She had done the right thing - the only thing she could have done - in coming here.
It was time to make her move. ‘Brandy, boil!’
The glass of brandy and the bottle both shattered in a gush of steam. Brandy was a volatile fluid, and the bottle went up in a gratifyingly dramatic display. The violence of it took Lord Guantes by surprise, and his attention shifted from Irene as his eyes flicked over to the shattered glass.
Irene slipped the gun from her skirt with her free hand, raising it to point at him. ‘Your move,’ she said.
His attention swung to her again, and this time there was no holding back. His eyes were a thousand tons of weight pressing down on her, cold and heavy as lead, and ice seemed to close around her limbs and heart. His hand bit into her wrist and she gasped in pain.
The burn of the Library brand on her back and the weight of the pendant around her throat were once more distant things, far away from the present oppression of his gaze.
Play along, pretend he’s won, part of her mind suggested. Just put the gun down …
She considered that statement. The most important bit seemed to be put the gun down, and that was the last thing she was going to do. She couldn’t stop fighting now. If she did, she’d lose. But it was taking all her strength and, the moment she lost her focus, her will would break.
She could feel herself losing, inch by inch. The gun was cold and remote in her hand, and she could scarcely feel her grip on it.
Do something.
She couldn’t.
‘Answer me,’ he said.
She struggled with the Language for Break, shatter, fall, but she could feel her mouth begin to move in a yes.
‘I believe the lady declines your invitation,’ Vale said from the darkness behind her.
CHAPTER TWENTY
Lord Guantes turned to look at Vale, cutting his connection to Irene. She breathed in great sobbing gasps of air. There was just enough space in her head for her to think, and the thoughts went: Keep that gun pointed at him.
‘Peregrine Vale, I believe. This box is locked,’ Lord Guantes said. ‘How did you—?’
‘I didn’t,’ Vale broke in. ‘I arrived before the performance and simply waited behind those curtains. I found your conversation most interesting.’
‘I see.’ Lord Guantes’ tone was still composed, but Irene detected a sense of simmering anger and uncertainty. He seemed unsure which of the two of them to target, in terms of directing his will and therefore his powers. She wondered suddenly if he couldn’t control two of them at once.
‘And how did you reach Venice?’ Lord Guantes demanded. ‘Must I constantly be interrupted when I am busy?’
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