by K. E. Mills
She let her teeth show, just a little. “He isn’t for sale.”
“Stupid girl!” Volker shouted. “You know what we can do!”
“I’ve a fair idea, yes,” said Bibbie, watching Dermit’s fingers slide into his pocket. “But here’s the thing, gentlemen. That Gladys Slack trick I showed you? I know a better one. Look!”
Her hands came up. Fisted. Then she spat the words no-one, not even Monk, knew that she knew.
Bern Dermit and Grune Volker dropped dead at her feet.
Oh, she thought, staring down at them. That was … easier than I expected.
There were feelings, somewhere. She didn’t have time to feel them now. After emptying her would-be slayers’ pockets, she returned to Gerald and the girls. Met Melissande’s shocked stare with a small, complicated smile.
“It turns out Great-uncle Throgmorton owned a lot of very naughty books.” And then she shrugged. “Besides. I’m a Markham. And a Thackeray. And they hurt Gerald. Now, would you mind handing me my reticule? Make sure you take the crystal ball out first.”
As Melissande, still stunned silent, did as she was asked, Reg chattered her beak. “Not that I’m sorry those buggers are dead, you understand,” she said. “But I feel bound to point out that they might have been useful.”
Bibbie shook her head. “No. They’d never have spoken willingly and besides, Dermit was about to use one of these filthy things. Thank you, Mel.” Grimacing, she tipped the hexes she’d collected into her reticule. “And we wouldn’t have survived.”
“So you saved our lives,” said Melissande. “And I’m sure we’re grateful. But Bibbie …”
The look on Melissande’s face told her what she was supposed to be feeling. Faint. Shocked. Remorseful. Guilty. But she was pretty sure she didn’t feel any of those things.
Mostly, it seemed, she felt pleased.
“Here,” she said to Reg, and held out the two other items she’d taken from Bern Dermit. “I’m thinking one of these vials is tincture of dirit—and the other one is what a smart man carries with him when he’s carrying tincture of dirit. You’d better tell me which is which. I wouldn’t like to make a mistake.”
Gerald had been battling the poison for so long that it took nearly twenty minutes for the antidote to take effect. When at last he stirred, and opened his eyes, Reg leapt onto his chest and burst into sobs.
Sitting on the cold pavement beside him, Bibbie smiled and touched his hand. Algernon Rowbotham disappeared. Rolling his head, Gerald looked at her. Smile fading, she looked back. They had so much to talk about. There was so much to say. But for now, right now, it was enough that they sit beside each other in silence on the cold damp cobbled pavement, while the bloody bird wept and scolded and Melissande, whose eyes weren’t dry, fretted aloud about how they’d get home.
“Don’t worry, Mel,” she said, and looked at the crystal ball cradled in her hand. “The ether really is starting to clear. Give it a few more minutes and I’ll be able to get a call through to Monk. Then he’ll call Sir Alec, and everything will be fine.”
Epilogue
“Bloody hell, Alec. Bloody, bloody hell! Do you have any notion of what you’ve done?”
Sir Alec finished signing his name, neatly placed his pen on the desk, set aside his monthly expense report and then looked up.
“By all means, Ralph, come in. Take a seat. But be so kind as to shut the door after you first.”
Shutting his office door was of paramount importance. It might be late—these kinds of conversations were always conducted in the dead of night—but Nettleworth was never entirely deserted.
Ralph slammed the door and started pacing. “I told you, Alec. Didn’t I tell you? Didn’t I say this damned mission would end in tears?”
Sitting back in his chair, Sir Alec swallowed a sigh. “Surely it’s to be expected. Weddings are, I’m told, emotional affairs.”
Ralph’s glare was hot enough to combust a forest. “I’m not talking about the bloody wedding! I could care less about the Splotze-Borovnik wedding! Damnit, Alec! What the devil are we to do with this—this—creature you’ve created? That bloody dirit should’ve killed him stone dead in heartbeats. And thanks to those grimoire incants and his rogue potentia, it didn’t! What have you to say about that? About any of it? The things he did—he’s unprecedented, Alec! And it’s all your fault!”
Creature. Resisting the urge to swear, Sir Alec kept his expression impassive. “Calm down, Ralph, before you burst a blood vessel.”
“Trust me, Alec, this is bloody calm!”
Ah. “Would you care for a drink?”
“No, Alec, what I’d care for is an explanation!” Ralph retorted. “What I’d care for is knowing how you intend to stuff this bloody genie back in its bottle!”
It would be far easier to answer Ralph’s ire if he weren’t, in his own way, feeling equally alarmed. “Ralph, you are borrowing trouble. There’s no need. Mister Jennings tells me—”
Ralph waved a furiously dismissive hand in passing. “To the devil with Jennings, Alec! He’s as clueless as the rest of us. Admit it. You don’t know what Gerald Dunwoody’s turned into and you’ve no more idea of how to control him than I have!”
“What I know, Ralph,” he said, very carefully, because his own temper was starting to stir, “is that Gerald Dunwoody saved the day for us. Again.”
“With a lot of help from my niece!” said Ralph, still glaring. “And that’s another thing, Alec. Emmerabiblia! D’you know she’s started dropping hints the size of carthorses about gels in the Department?”
Because he was more than a little irritated with Ralph, he smiled. “Indeed? Well, she certainly proved her mettle in Splotze.”
Ralph leapt to the desk and banged both his fists on it, hard. “Don’t you dare, Alec. I’m warning you. Don’t you bloody dare. I won’t have Bibbie dragged into our world. Not again. This Splotze business will never be repeated, do I make myself clear?”
He stared at Ralph’s fists until they were removed, then looked up at his sometime friend, sometime foe, and shrugged. Emmerabiblia Markham. What a surprise that young lady had turned out be. The various mission reports had proven to be … interesting … reading.
“Quite clear, Ralph. Only I expect, at the end of the day, it won’t be up to me. Or, dare I say it, you.”
“Perhaps not,” said Ralph, close to snarling. “But it won’t be up to her, either.”
He wasn’t sure about that, but neither was there any point in arguing. Young Bibbie was Ralph’s niece. Let her be Ralph’s problem, at least for the time being. He gestured at the chair on the other side of the desk.
“I understand. Now, please, Ralph, do sit down. There’s no reason that we can’t discuss this like sensible men.”
Ralph stepped back. The mingled despair and contempt in his eyes were a sharp reproof. “There’s nothing to discuss. Clearly you’re not interested in entertaining any suggestion that Gerald Dunwoody might now be more than even you can handle.”
He dropped his gaze to the desk. Dammit. He’d never seen Ralph so angry, at least not at him. The situation was untenable. Ralph Markham was an indispensible ally. If he let pride destroy their complicated relationship …
“I’m sorry,” he said, resting his clasped hands before him. “If I gave you the impression that I feel your concerns are trivial, Ralph, I apologise.”
Which neatly took the wind out of Ralph’s bellicose sails. He sat. “You did.”
“Then I was clumsy.”
“You were.”
“I am sorry.”
“Yes. So you’ve said.” Ralph drummed his fingers on the arm of the chair. “But let’s not get maudlin. What matters now is how we’re going to deal with your precious Mister Dunwoody.” A shiver. “Who makes my skin crawl, Alec. I’ll not pussyfoot around it. These changes in his potentia? They make my skin crawl.”
Jennings had said the same thing, in a slightly more technical manner. And as for his own skin …
Dunwoody’s more unsettling than ever. I can’t deny that. But unsettling isn’t evil. Gerald Dunwoody isn’t evil.
“Something’s got to be done, Alec,” Ralph said, more kindly. “I know you’re fond of the lad, but—”
Fond. A ridiculous word. “I agree,” he said briskly. “Mister Dunwoody’s situation cannot be left unaddressed. For any of our sakes. But I’m not prepared to let fear propel me into a decision I might later regret.”
Ralph was bristling. “Fear? Who said anything about fear?”
You did, my friend, and we both know it. “A poor choice of words,” he said smoothly. “My point is that we can’t unring a bell, Ralph. What we need is a little breathing space, so we can think the matter through calmly, and decide what to do next.”
Ralph snorted. “And I suppose you’ve got that all organised, have you?”
“Well …” He permitted himself a small smile. “As it happens, I do have an idea.”
“And am I going to like it?”
“I hope so. King Rupert of New Ottosland has expressed a desire to introduce a little modern thaumaturgy into his moribund kingdom. Nothing too extreme. A limited public portal network, a few labour-saving devices here and there. He wondered if I might be able to assist him. I thought perhaps Mister Dunwoody could prove helpful.”
“New Ottosland,” Ralph said slowly, considering. “That’s a nice long way away. And then there’s the Kallarapi desert. All that sand, and New Ottosland like a little island in the middle …”
“Precisely.”
“Out of sight, out of mind, that sort of thing.”
“Indeed.”
Now Ralph was smiling. “And in the meantime, Alec, while Dunwoody’s busy emptying scorpions out of his underwear, you and I—and possibly that ghastly nephew of mine—can come up with a way to get him under control. Permanently.”
Not at all. But he wasn’t about to spoil things with another argument. Not yet, anyway. “So, you agree?”
Ralph sighed. “Do I have a choice?”
“Always,” he said, lying without compunction. “But I really do feel this is the answer, at least for the time being. Now, Ralph, are you quite sure I can’t pour you a drink?”
Nine days after his return to Ottosland, Gerald found the events in Splotze were starting to take on a slightly unrealistic air. Even with the report writing, and the hours of poking, prodding, intrusive tests with Mister Jennings, and the scattering of conversations that had taken place here in Chatterly Crescent, a certain dreamlike feeling persisted.
Of course, that bizarre sense of I wonder if I didn’t imagine it all wasn’t helped by the sight of Sir Alec at the town house’s kitchen table, sharing an informal meal. He’d turned up at the front door, uninvited, just as Melissande was making mushroom gravy, despite unsolicited culinary advice from Reg, and Monk and Bibbie were laying the table. So of course he’d been asked to stay.
To their scarcely hidden alarm, Sir Alec agreed.
Now it was nearly half-past eight. Over the course of an hour and a half they’d eaten their way through an appetiser— onion soup, not crab puffs—then roast beef with all the trimmings, and finally an apple and blackberry pie with generous dollops of cream. Conversation had been desultory and mostly about the foibles of famous thaumaturgists, long dead. Nothing awkward or Department-related at all.
“So,” said Sir Alec, elbows negligently resting on the kitchen table. “The Splotze-Borovnik affair.”
Gerald exchanged glances with Monk. I knew it was too good to last. Then he looked back at Sir Alec. “Yes, sir? What about it?”
“In the end, it was a rather grubby crime, really,” Sir Alec said, sounding mildly offended. “A distasteful dog’s breakfast of passion, misplaced patriotism, and greed.”
That was one way of looking at it, certainly. A very simplified way. But given the enormous list of secrets, both classified and unclassifiable, that the six of them now kept, he had to wonder how long simple could last.
And what was the tally this time? Bibbie’s two dead bodies and his own grimoire-enhanced potentia and the restoration of his sight and Reg and Monk’s enterprising but completely illegal forays into espionage. And Dodsworth, of course. There were probably more, but he was tired and full of food. Those were enough to be going on with.
Perched on the back of her chair, Reg rattled her tail. “What I want to know, Mister Government Stooge, is did we ever uncover the truth about those bloody Lanruvians?”
Sir Alec nodded. “As a matter of fact, Reg, we did. Ambassador Dermit has proven himself to be a fascinating conversationalist.”
“And?” said Reg, when it seemed no-one else felt brave enough to prod. “What did our Steinish chatterbox have to say?”
Sighing, Sir Alec steepled his fingers. Though he was dressed in his customary nondescript grey suit, he had unbent far enough to loosen his tie. It made him look positively debauched.
“Let’s see if I can keep this straight,” he murmured. “Since between them, our players have turned this into something of a melodrama. Norbert of Harenstein encouraged the match between Ratafia and Ludwig in order to lull Hartwig and Erminium into a false sense of security regarding his friendship and the disposition of the Canal. His intent, however, was to bind Erminium to him, encouraging her to rely on his judgement above her own, so that he might in due course undermine the newly formed alliance between Splotze and Borovnik, and the marriage between Prince Ludwig and Princess Ratafia, thus ensuring that the Canal came under Steinish control, with Borovnik the paper partner.”
“Yes, yes,” said Reg. “The political quickstep. It’s all horribly familiar, I’ve seen it a hundred times before. But what about the bloody Lanruvians?”
“Yes,” said Melissande. “And Leopold Gertz?”
Sir Alec’s lips twitched, very faintly. “Former Secretary of State Gertz’s motives were, alas, driven by the personal. In some ways he, too, is a victim. Norbert of Harenstein learned of his history and ruthlessly manipulated it for his own ends.”
“What history?” said Bibbie, drawing patterns on the tablecloth with the tines of her fork. “I never thought Gertz was enough of a person to have a history. He was always just … that damp little man.”
Sir Alec’s gaze was cool and steady. “We are all of us persons, Miss Markham, however plain and damp and lacking in brilliance we might be.”
As Bibbie’s cheeks tinted pink at the reproof, Gerald reached for her other hand under the table and squeezed. His precious, precocious Emmerabiblia. They’d have to talk, and soon. What with one thing and another there’d been little time before now. And, if he was honest, a need for some distance. She’d felt it too. They’d both been hiding.
But that can’t go on. There are things we need to say. Things we can’t hide from, even though they’re hard to look at.
Under the table, Bibbie’s fingers closed around his.
Melissande rearranged her spoon on her empty plate. “What was Leopold’s history, Sir Alec?”
Sir Alec’s expression softened ever so slightly towards regret. “When he was a child, his father was killed in one of the Splotze-Borovnik Canal skirmishes, and apparently the loss disordered his wits. Seeded in him a hatred of Borovnik that bordered on madness. It seems he genuinely believed that in ruining the wedding and the treaty he was saving both Prince Ludwig and his beloved Splotze from a fateful mistake.”
Monk was frowning. “Fine, I can see where and why Gertz did his bit. But that rockslide at the Hanging Bridge—from what Gerald’s said, it could easily have killed Ludwig and Ratafia. How could Norbert’s plan have worked if they were dead?”
“Obviously it couldn’t,” Sir Alec said, his eyes faintly approving. “That was a miscalculation on the part of Dermit and Volker. Fortunately for Norbert of Harenstein, Mister Dunwoody was at hand.”
Gerald cleared his throat. “And Miss Markham.”
“Indeed.” Now Sir Alec’s expression was repressive. “B
ut the less said about that, the better.”
Right. Giving Bibbie a quick nudge under the table, he risked a sideways glance at Monk, whose shoulder twitched in the smallest of shrugs. They’d not done much private talking either, since his return from Splotze … and now there was more to say then ever. The grimoire magic. Bibbie. Where they all went from here.
But that can wait, too. Right now I need everything to wait.
“All right, all right,” said Reg, with an emphatic tail rattle. “So we’ve established Norbert’s a villain and poor little Leopold was simply misunderstood. Not that it excuses him poisoning my Gerald, but since the boy didn’t die I’ll let that pass. For now. But that still doesn’t explain—”
“The bloody Lanruvians,” said Sir Alec. “Indeed. An intriguing puzzle piece, they’ve proven to be. According to Ambassador Dermit, Norbert had reached a mutually beneficial agreement with our pale friends. In return for giving their cargo barges unrestricted and uninspected access to the Canal, once it was in Steinish hands, the Lanruvians would give him the wherewithal to take control of the region’s unreliable etheretics.”
“What?” said Bibbie, astonished. “But—is that even possible?”
“Maybe,” said Monk, after a look at Sir Alec. “That restricted equipment Aylebsury said they were trying to get their hands on? There’s a good chance it would’ve helped them make good on their side of the bargain.”
“Or at the very least advanced their cause far past the point where I, and Sir Ralph, and any number of other concerned parties would be comfortable,” said Sir Alec. He gave Bibbie a small nod. “So now it seems we are in debt to both of your brothers, Miss Markham.”
“So … what?” said Melissande, frowning. “After the near-disaster at the bridge they decided Harenstein couldn’t be trusted to succeed?”
Sir Alec sat back. “Certainly that’s one explanation. But I don’t begin to understand the machinations of the Lanruvian mind.”
“Speaking of the bridge,” said Reg, “has that manky bugger Dermit turned up yet? Or his knife-happy offsider?”