Werehunter (anthology)

by Mercedes Lackey

“Thenkee, Karamjit,” Nan sighed. He patted her shoulder, then unfolded his long legs and rose from his chair with a slight bow to Maya. Then he left the kitchen, allowing Nan to finish her tea and run back up to the nursery, to give Sarah and Grey the welcome news that they would not be the only ones concerned with the protection of Mem’sab from the consequences of her own generous nature.

  Sahib took both Nan and Sarah aside just before bedtime, after Karamjit and Selim had been closeted with him for half an hour. “Can I ask you two to come to my study with me for a bit?” he asked quietly. He was often thought to be older than Mem’sab, by those who were deceived by the streaks of grey at each temple, the stiff way that he walked, and the odd expression in his eyes, which seemed to Nan to be the eyes of a man who had seen so much that nothing surprised him anymore. Nan had trusted him the moment that she set eyes on him, although she couldn’t have said why.

  “So long as Nadra don’t fuss,” Nan replied for both of them. Sahib smiled, his eyes crinkling at the corners.

  “I have already made it right with Nadra,” he pro­mised. “Karamjit, Selim, and Mem’sab are waiting for us.”

  Nan felt better immediately, for she really hadn’t wanted to go sneaking around behind Mem’sab’s back. From the look that Sarah gave her, Nan reckoned that she felt the same.

  “Thank you, sir,” Sarah said politely. “We will do just as you say.”

  Very few of the children had ever been inside the sacred precincts of Sahib’s office; the first thing that struck Nan was that it did not smell of tobacco, but of sandalwood and cinnamon. That surprised her; most of the men she knew smoked although their womenfolk disapproved of the habit, but evidently Sahib did not, not even in his own private space.

  There was a tiger-skin on the carpet in front of the fire, the glass eyes in its head glinting cruelly in a manner unnerving and lifelike. Nan shuddered, and thought of Shere Khan, with his taste for man-cub. Had this been another terrible killer of the jungle? Did tigers leave vengeful ghosts?

  Heavy, dark drapes of some indeterminate color shut out the cold night. Hanging on the walls, which had been papered with faded gold arabesque upon a ground of light brown, was a jumble of mementos from Sahib’s life in India: crossed spears, curious daggers and swords, embroidered tapestries of strange characters twined with exotic flowers and birds, carved plaques of some heavy, dark wood inlaid with brass, bizarre masks that resem­bled nothing less than brightly painted demons. On the desk and adorning the shelves between the books were statues of half- and fully-naked gods and goddesses, more bits of carving in wood, stone, and ivory. Book­shelves built floor-to-ceiling held more books than Nan had known existed. Sahib took his place behind his desk, while Mem’sab perched boldly on the edge of it. Selim and Karamjit stood beside the fire like a pair of guardian statues themselves, and Sahib gestured to the children to take their places on the over-stuffed chairs on either side of the fireplace. Nan waited tensely, wondering if Mem’sab was going to be angry because they went to others with their concerns. Although it had not fallen out so here, she was far more used to being in trouble over something she had done than in being encouraged for it, and the reflexes were still in place.

  “Karamjit tells me that you four share some concern over my planned excursion to the medium, Nan,” Mem’sab said, with a smile that told Nan she was not in trouble for her meddling, as she had feared. “They went first to Sahib, but as we never keep secrets from one another, he came to me. And I commend all four of you for your concern and caution, for after some discussion, I was forced to agree with it.”

  “And I would like to commend both of you, Nan, Sarah, for having the wisdom to go to an adult with your concerns,” added Sahib, with a kindly nod to both of them that Nan had not expected in the least. “That shows great good sense, and please, continue to do so in the future.”

  “I thought—I was afeared—” Nan began, then blurted out all that she’d held in check. “Mem’sab is ’bout the smartest, goodest lady there is, but she don’t know bad people! Me, I know! I seed ’em, an’ I figgered that they weren’t gonna lay down an’ lose their fat mark without a fight!”

  “And very wise you were to remind us of that,” Sahib said gravely. “I pointed out to Mem’sab that we have no way of knowing where this medium is from, and she is just as likely to be a criminal as a lady—more so, in fact. Just because she speaks, acts, and dresses like a lady, and seeks her clients from among the gentry, means nothing; she could easily have a crew of thugs as her accomplices.”

  “As you say, Sahib,” Karamjit said gravely. “For, as it is said, it is a short step from a deception to a lie, from a lie to a cheat, from a cheat to a theft, and from a theft to a murder.”

  Mem’sab blushed. “I will admit that I was very angry with you at first, but when my anger cooled, it was clear that your reasoning was sound. And after all, am I some Gothic heroine to go wide-eyed into the villains’ lair, never suspecting trouble? So, we are here to plan what we all shall do to free Katherine of her dangerous obsession.”

  “Me, I needta know what this see-ants is gonna be like, Mem’sab,” Nan put in, sitting on the edge of the chair tensely. “What sorta things happens?”

  “Generally, the participants are brought into a room that has a round table with chairs circling it.” Mem’sab spoke directly to Nan as if to an adult, which gave Nan a rather pleasant, if shivery, feeling. “The table often has objects upon it that the spirits will supposedly move; often a bell, a tambourine and a megaphone are among them, though why spirits would feel the need to play upon a tambourine when they never had that urge in life is quite beyond me!”

  She laughed, as did Sahib; the girls giggled nervously.

  “At any rate, the participants are asked to sit down and hold hands. Often the medium is tied to the chair; her hands are secured to the arms, and her feet to the legs.” Nan noticed that Mem’sab used the word “legs” rather than the mannerly “limbs,” and thought the better of her for that. “The lights are brought down, and the seance begins. Most often objects are moved, including the table, the tambourine is played, the bell is rung, all as a sign that the spirits have arrived. The spirits most often speak by means of raps on the table, but Katherine tells me that the spirit of her little boy spoke directly, through the floating megaphone. Sometimes a spirit will actually appear; in this case, it was just a glowing face of Katherine’s son.”

  Nan thought that over for a moment. “Be simple ’nuff t’ tilt the chair an’ get yer legs free by slippin the rope down over the chair-feet,” she observed, “An’ all ye hev t’ do is have chair-arms as isn’t glued t’ their pegs, an’ ye got yer arms free too. Be easy enough to make all kind uv things dance about when ye got arms free. Be easy ’nuff t’ make th’ table lift if’s light enough, an’ rap on it, too.”

  Sahib stared at her in astonishment. “I do believe that you are the most valuable addition to our household in a long time, young lady!” he said with delight that made Nan blush. “I would never have thought of any of that.”

  “I dunno how ye’d make summat glow, though,” Nan admitted.

  “Oh, I know that,” Sarah said casually. “There’s stuff that grows in rotten wood that makes a glow; some of the magic-men use it to frighten people at night. It grows in swamps, so it probably grows in England, too.”

  Karamjit grinned, his teeth very white in his dark face, and Selim nodded with pride. “What is it that the Black Robe’s Book says, Sahib? Out of the mouths of babes comes wisdom?”

  Mem’sab nodded. “I should have told you more, earlier,” she said ruefully. “Well, that’s mended in time. Now we all know what to look for.”

  Grey clicked her beak several times, then exclaimed, “Ouch!”

  “Grey is going to try to bite whatever comes near her,” Sarah explained.

  “I don’t want her venturing off your arm,” Mem’sab cautioned. “I won’t chance her getting hurt.” She turned to Sahib. “The chances are, the room
we will be in will have very heavy curtains to prevent light from entering or escaping, so if you and our warriors are outside, you won’t know what room we are in.”

  “Then I’d like one of you girls to exercise childish curiosity and go immediately to a window and look out,” Sahib told them. “At least one of us will be where we can see both the front and the back of the house. Then if there is trouble, one of you signal us and we’ll come to the rescue.”

  “Just like the shining knights you are, all three of you,” Mem’sab said warmly, laying her hand over the one Sahib had on the desk. “I think that is as much of a plan as we can lay, since we really don’t know what we will find in that house.”

  “It’s enough, I suspect,” Sahib replied. “It allows two of us to break into the house if necessary, while one goes for the police.” He stroked his chin thoughtfully with his free hand. “Or better yet, I’ll take a whistle; that will summon help in no time.” He glanced up at Mem’sab. “What time did you say the invitation speci­fied?”

  “Seven,” she replied promptly. “Well after dark, although Katherine tells me that her sessions are usually later, nearer midnight.”

  “The medium may anticipate some trouble from sleepy children,” Sahib speculated. “But that’s just a guess.” He stood up, still holding his wife’s hand, and she slid off her perch on the desk and turned to face them. “Ladies, gentlemen, I think we are as prepared as we can be for trouble. So let us get a good night’s sleep, and hope that we will not find any.”

  Then Sahib did a surprising thing; he came around his desk, limping stiffly, and bent over Nan and took her hand. “Perhaps only I of all of us can realize how brave you were to confide your worry to an adult you have only just come to trust, Nan,” he said, very softly, then grinned at her so impishly that she saw the little boy he must have been in the eyes of the mature man. “Ain’t no doubt ’uv thet, missy. Yer a cunnin’ moit, an’ ’ad more blows then pats, Oi reckon,” he continued in street cant, shocking the breath out of her. “I came up the same way you are now, dear, thanks to a very kind man with no son of his own. I want you to remember that to us here at this school, there is no such thing as a stupid question, nor will we dismiss any worry you have as trivial. Never fear to bring either to an adult.”

  He straightened up, as Mem’sab came to his side, nodding. “Now both of you try and get some sleep, for every warrior knows that sleep is more important than anything else before a battle.”

  Ha, Nan thought, as she and Sarah followed Karamjit out of the study. There’s gonna be trouble; I kin feel it, an’ so can he. He didn’ get that tiger by not havin’ a nose fer trouble. But—I reckon the trouble’s gonna have its hands full with him.

  The medium lived in a modest house just off one of the squares in the part of London that housed those clerks and the like with pretensions to a loftier address than their purses would allow, an area totally unfamiliar to Nan. The house itself had seen better days, though, as had most of the other homes on that dead-end street, and Nan suspected that it was rented. The houses had that peculiarly faded look that came when the owners of a house did not actually live there, and those who did had no reason to care for the property themselves, assuming that was the duty of the landlord.

  Mem’sab had chosen her gown carefully, after dis­carding a walking-suit, a mourning-gown and veil, and a peculiar draped garment she called a sari, a souvenir of her time in India. The first, she thought, made her look untrusting, sharp, and suspicious, the second would not be believed had the medium done any research on the backgrounds of these new sitters, and the third smacked of mockery. She chose instead one of the plain, simple gowns she preferred, in the mode called “Artistic Reform”; not particularly stylish, but Nan thought it was a good choice. For one thing, she could move in it; it was looser than the highest mode, and did not require tight corseting. If Mem’sab needed to run, kick, or dodge, she could.

  The girls followed her quietly, dressed in their starched pinafores and dark dresses, showing the best possible manners, with Grey tucked under Sarah’s coat to stay warm until they got within doors.

  It was quite dark as they mounted the steps to the house and rang the bell. It was answered by a sour-faced woman in a plain black dress, who ushered them into a sitting room and took their coats, with a startled glance at Grey as he popped her head out of the front of Sarah’s jacket. She said nothing, however, and neither did Grey as she climbed to Sarah’s shoulder.

  The woman returned a moment later, but not before Nan had heard the faint sounds of surreptitious steps on the floor above them. She knew it had not been the sour woman, for she had clearly heard those steps going off to a closet and returning. If the seance-room was on this floor, then, there was someone else above.

  The sitting-room had been decorated in a very odd style. The paintings on the wall were all either religious in nature, or extremely morbid, at least so far as Nan was concerned. There were pictures of women weeping over graves, of angels lifting away the soul of a dead child, of a woman throwing herself to her death over a cliff, of the spirits of three children hovering about a man and woman mourning over pictures held in their listless hands. There was even a picture of a girl crying over a dead bird lying in her hand.

  Crystal globes on stands decorated the tables, along with bouquets of funereal lilies whose heavy, sweet scent dominated the chill room. The tables were all draped in fringed cloths of a deep scarlet. The hard, severe furniture was either of wood or upholstered in prickly horsehair. The two lamps had been lit before they entered the room, but their light, hampered as it was by heavy brocade lamp shades, cast more shadows than illumination.

  They didn’t have to wait long in that uncomfortable room, for the sour servant departed for a moment, then returned, and conducted them into the next room.

  This, evidently, was only an antechamber to the room of mysteries; heavy draperies swathed all the walls, and there were straight-backed chairs set against them on all four walls. The lily-scent pervaded this room as well, mixed with another, that Nan recognized as the Hindu incense that Nadra often burned in her own devotions.

  There was a single picture in this room, on the wall opposite the door, with a candle placed on a small table beneath it so as to illuminate it properly. This was a portrait in oils of a plump woman swathed in pale draperies, her hands clasped melodramatically before her breast, her eyes cast upwards. Smoke, presumably that of incense, swirled around her, with the suggestion of faces in it. Nan was no judge of art, but Mem’sab walked up to it and examined it with a critical eye.

  “Neither good nor bad,” she said, measuringly. “I would say it is either the work of an unknown profes­sional or a talented amateur.”

  “A talented amateur,” said the lady that Mem’sab had called “Katherine,” as she too was ushered into the chamber. “My dear friend Lady Harrington painted it; it was she who introduced me to Madame Varonsky.” Mem’sab turned to meet her, and Katherine glided across the floor to take her hand in greeting. “It is said to be a very speaking likeness,” she continued. “I certainly find it so.”

  Nan studied the woman further, but saw nothing to change her original estimation. Katherine wore yet another mourning gown of expensive silk and mohair, embellished with jet beadwork and fringes that shivered with the slightest movement. A black hat with a full veil perched on her carefully coiffed curls, fair hair too dark to be called golden, but not precisely brown either. Her full lips trembled, even as they uttered words of polite conversation, her eyes threatened to fill at every moment, and Nan thought that her weak chin reflected an overly sentimental and vapid personality. It was an assessment that was confirmed by her conversation with Mem’sab, conversation that Nan ignored in favor of listening for other sounds. Over their heads, the floor creaked softly as someone moved to and fro, trying very hard to be quiet. There were also some odd scratching sounds that didn’t sound like mice, and once, a dull thud, as of something heavy being set down a little t
oo hard.

  Something was going on up there, and the person doing it didn’t want them to notice.

  At length the incense-smell grew stronger, and the drapery on the wall to the right of the portrait parted, revealing a door, which opened as if by itself.

  Taking that as their invitation, Katherine broke off her small talk to hurry eagerly into the sacred precincts; Mem’sab gestured to the girls to precede her, and followed on their heels. By previous arrangement, Nan and Sarah, rather than moving towards the circular table at which Madame Varonsky waited, went to the two walls likeliest to hold windows behind their heavy draperies before anyone could stop them.

  It was Nan’s luck to find a corner window overlooking the street, and she made sure that some light from the room within flashed to the watcher on the opposite side before she dropped the drapery.

  “Come away from the windows, children,” Mem’sab said in a voice that gently chided. Nan and Sarah immediately turned back to the room, and Nan assessed the foe.

  Madame Varonsky’s portraitist had flattered her; she was decidedly paler than she had been painted, with a complexion unpleasantly like wax. She wore similar draperies, garments which could have concealed anything. The smile on her thin lips did not reach her eyes, and she regarded the parrot on Sarah’s shoulder with distinct unease.