The Dark Matters Quartet

by Claire Robyns

  Since he’d already eaten, he went directly to the laboratory. No doubt Greyston would enlighten Lily at the breakfast table on what he perceived to be yet another example of flawed McAllister mentality.

  “Prepare for the transfer,” he told Armand. “We’ll begin as soon as Lily and Greyston join us.”

  “We’re going ahead with it?” Armand frowned at him from across the workbench. “Restricting the extra-circulatory duration to half an hour won’t minimise the damage by much and it’ll be irreversible.”

  “You underestimate yourself, Armand.” He wandered over to where Ana lay, took her hand and looked into her eyes. “Don’t worry about Armand’s fussing, Ana. Nothing is irreversible. You’ll be fine and that’s a promise.”

  “I’m not worried.” She gave him a smile. “Do you know where Neco is?”

  “Neco has been enlisted for forestry duty,” Kelan informed her. “My estate manager thought it prudent to use his muscle while available. Should I have him sent for?”

  She blinked once, twice, then said, “His presence is not required for a successful outcome.”

  “We can wait,” Kelan decided, although Neco might argue them all under the table when he heard about the dismal results of Ana’s memory retention. I’m going soft in the head. “Would you like him to be here?”

  “He would find the procedure informative,” Ana said. “I have, however, been incapacitated for five days. I would rather not wait any more than necessary.”

  Considering everything about to happen would be undone just as quickly, Kelan nodded and released her hand.

  He helped Armand bring the pumping mass of memory sap through from the adjacent chamber and set it all up on the trolley beside Ana. Even though the tubules were coated in steel and supported in a sturdy wooden frame, they worked as if the entire structure were made of eggshells.

  The last piece of equipment needed was the replica Armand had built and they’d just installed it on the trolley when Lily and Greyston arrived.

  “It’s almost over,” Lily said, hurrying to Ana’s side. “It will be nice to have you back upstairs with me.”

  Greyston dragged a chair closer for her, then perched on the edge of the desk to watch.

  “Shall we?” Armand asked, holding up two ends of celluloid tubing.

  She nodded eagerly, sparing Kelan a fleeting, excited glance that led him to surmise Greyston hadn’t slandered him from here to Mull over breakfast and, secondly, her faith in Greyston’s ability to rewind any disaster was absolute.

  Once he’d connected the tubing, Armand flipped a lever to power up the small engine with a gentle hum that echoed off the walls. A silvery liquid gurgled from Ana, through the transparent connectors, and disappeared into the sealed box housing the complexities of the temporary circulatory mechanism.

  True to Armand’s word, less than ten minutes had passed before Ana was drained and re-filled with the foreign memory sap.

  For a moment, no one said a word. Kelan shook off his daze and stepped up to the base of the workbench on which the celludrone lay. Possibly no longer Ana.

  “What is your name?” he asked.

  “Ana,” she replied.

  “Her name and any pre-loaded information is still the same,” Armand said. “That resides apart from the memory sap that is unique to the advanced celludrone technology.”

  Lily popped up from her chair to lean over Ana. “Do you know who I am?”

  “No, m’am,” Ana said. “We have not been introduced.”

  “Oh, yes, of course.” Lily dropped back into her chair with a crestfallen expression.

  “It’s temporary,” Greyston reminded her, moving into place behind her chair and resting a comforting hand on her shoulder.

  Acutely aware of the time restriction, Kelan rattled off his first question. “Ana, what’s the last thing you remember?”

  “Darkness.”

  “The last thing you heard?”

  “Creaking in the walls,” she said. “From the heating. Water pipes creaking in the walls.”

  He met Armand’s gaze. “The optical and vocal translation devices must have malfunctioned before we found it.”

  Greyston spoke up. “Ana, who’s the last person you remember?”

  “Duncan McAllister.”

  “What was he doing?”

  A spring-loaded eyeball extended slightly to look at Greyston. “He turned the lamp down, said goodnight, and locked the door behind him on the way out.”

  “Like he did every night?” suggested Kelan.

  Her left eyeball looked at him. “Yes.”

  “Were you ever a celludrone? Have you been outside this laboratory?” Kelan fired his questions off in rapid succession. “Do you know what a demon is? Have you ever seen a demon? Did Duncan McAllister give you any specific instructions or leave you with a message to pass on?”

  “I’m not a celludrone and I don’t know what is outside this chamber,” she said. “A demon is an energy entity that has come through the rift from an unknown dimension. I have seen the demons Raimlas and Gorgon. They were imprisoned in there—” she pointed to the chamber where the rune to Bind and Keep was still engraved on the floor “—for nineteen months. Duncan gave me many instructions. You will have to be more specific.”

  A breathless noise escaped Lily’s lips. “Did you talk to them? To the demons?”

  “I do not talk.” An instant later, Ana amended that to, “I did not talk. I do talk now.”

  “Did you overhear the demons talking to each other?” asked Lily.

  “Yes.”

  Kelan’s heart raced at this discovery. “Did they know you were listening?”

  “Raimlas referred to me on many occasions as Duncan’s failed attempt to turn mercury into gold and Gorgon never showed any interest,” Ana said. “From that, I would conclude no, they did not know.”

  “Which means they would have spoken openly amongst themselves,” Armand said.

  “You were right,” Kelan told him. “Duncan did build this as a recording device, but not to record his work…at least, not only for that.” He turned his gaze back to Ana. “You were Duncan’s spy.”

  Greyston checked his watch. “Fifteen minutes.”

  Kelan needed days, weeks, months with this valuable source. With Greyston’s help, he could count on roughly thirty minutes in every day while the clock ticked down to the end of their world.

  Ana’s real memories were a luxury they could ill afford.

  “I have a question,” Lily said tentatively.

  He stood back, giving her the floor while he contemplated just how far he was prepared to go.

  Keep Ana a prisoner of this memory box until he had all the information he needed?

  Lily might even forgive him one day. She’d given up everything, the comfort of her home and friends, her standing in society. She was about to enter into a marriage of convenience for the sake of battling demons.

  He was inclined to believe she’d eventually accept why it was so important to give up Ana.

  “Were Raimlas and Gorgon banished?” Lily asked.

  That captured his attention. Had there even been any doubt?

  Ana nodded. “At the same time.”

  “As I understand it, their essence should have disappeared from our dimension,” Lily continued, leaning forward. “How, then, is it possible that some of Raimlas’s essence remained behind.” She gestured between herself and Greyston. “In our blood?”

  “You were part of Duncan’s experiment,” Ana stated. Neither curious nor, apparently, concerned at how many years must have passed since she was last coherent. “Demon essence has parasitic qualities. Once attached to a living organism, it is able to coexist in that environment as a separate entity from the portion that was banished.”

  “That’s why Duncan changed his mind about infusing the demon blood into celludrones,” Kelan realised. “How did he know it wouldn’t work?”

  “He told them, Raimlas and Gorgon
, what he was going to do and we waited to see what they’d say about that in private.”

  Lily shuddered. “Dear Lord, now I have a parasite living off me as well?”

  “What happens to this parasitic essence if the organism it’s attached to is no longer living?” Greyston sounded as if he were biting out the words.

  “If you die?”

  “So to speak.”

  “Duncan’s theory is that it will not be able to survive,” she said. “It will be instantly banished.”

  “Or find another host to suck dry,” he retorted. “That is the definition of a parasite, isn’t it? They feed and take shelter while contributing nothing to the survival of the host.”

  Lily turned an ashen grey.

  “Don’t confuse parasite with parasitic qualities,” Kelan said quietly. “I think we can all agree your demon blood provides a mutually beneficial arrangement.”

  Greyston opened his mouth, then clamped his lips without stating the obvious about who was being fed on and who was benefiting. His grasp on Lily’s shoulder tightened, pulling her back. “Time’s up. We need to go.”

  Kelan steeled himself, as if bracing for an impact.

  Dammit all.

  He’d walked most of his life without fear and this knotted his gut? He’d thought Greyston had put his mind at ease the other day, but clearly the rest of him was still undecided. He was about to lose half an hour of his life, of his thoughts and actions, decisions he’d taken, half an hour of…

  “Shall we?” Armand asked, holding up two ends of celluloid tubing.

  “Not yet.” Greyston pushed away from the desk. “Kelan, a word?”

  “We won’t be long,” he told Armand, stepping outside into the tunnel with Greyston. Lily was right behind, her face a ghostly white. “Are you ill?”

  “I’ve just learnt the demon essence in my blood is a parasite.” She looked at Greyston and blanched. “I can feel it squirming inside me, suckling at my veins.”

  “I’m sorry,” Greyston said. “I should have kept my mouth shut.”

  Kelan frowned at them. “What the hell happened at breakfast?”

  “Don’t mention breakfast,” groaned Lily.

  “It’s done,” Greyston told him. “Armand completed the transfer, we examined the memory sap and I’ve brought us back.”

  The hairs on his neck stood straight. “Are you sure?”

  “Are you going to ask me that every time?”

  “Probably!” Dammit all, he wasn’t accustomed to this feeling…as if he’d been skinned and his insides lay bared for all to see except himself.

  Not everyone, he reminded himself. Only Greyston. Somehow, that didn’t make it much better.

  “It’s the truth,” Lily said. “We’ll tell you all about it.”

  “We?” He gave Lily a sharp look.

  “Oh, yes, well…”

  “Lily is able to come back with me, but only if we’re in physical contact while I time-run,” Greyston inserted, shaking his head at them. “For all the secrets you two insist on sharing, you don’t speak much amongst yourselves, do you?”

  Right, so make that Greyston and Lily.

  “The point is,” Lily said, regaining some of her colour, “we’re finished with Ana, are we not?”

  “Depending on what we found out, we may need to repeat the process for further information,” Kelan said slowly, still processing the fact that Lily could sift time with Greyston.

  “Fine, but in the meantime, she doesn’t have to remain bedridden.”

  “Fair enough.” Kelan stuck his head inside the laboratory to instruct Armand. “We’re not going ahead with the transfer for now. It’s too risky. Close Ana’s chest so she can get up.”

  “Thank goodness.” Armand carefully replaced the pair of tubes on the trolley. “Lady Lily would never forgive me if I wiped Ana clean.”

  Kelan rather thought she might. She’d given up everything; was about to enter into a marriage of convenience. For the right reason, he was inclined to believe she’d accept the loss of Ana.

  But that wouldn’t make her mourn the celludrone any less, and he was pleased she hadn’t had to. Not today, anyhow.

  As they made their away along the tunnel and up the stairs to the main house, Greyston filled him in.

  Armand had suspected the memory sap had been some sort of recording device, and that did indeed appear to be the case. Excitement rippled down his spine at the confirmation that Duncan had set it up in his laboratory for a detailed recording of his work. That would be an excellent point of reference to turn to when and as required.

  “Not simply a recording of his work,” Lily exclaimed. “He specifically built the recording device to—”

  “—as a personal journal of sorts,” Greyston cut in. “Mad scientists, huh?”

  They’d reached the marble foyer of the guest wing and from where Kelan stood in the semi-circle they made, the hand Greyston placed on her arm appeared to be of a restraining nature.

  “A journal?” he queried, looking at Lily.

  She swallowed. “I suppose he liked talking while he worked.”

  Kelan had no idea if something was underfoot or if this whole time sifting business made him feel insecure to the point of neurosis.

  He was unhinged.

  There, he’d admitted it. He was losing his spine. That alone was enough to make him clamp down on his back teeth and let the suspicion pass.

  When Greyston got to Duncan’s parasite theory, Kelan gave a brutal laugh. “The bastard. That’s why he turned to humans instead of his original plan to infuse a celludrone army with demon blood.”

  Then he recalled what Lily had said about parasites squirming inside her and suckling at her veins. “Don’t confuse parasite with parasitic qualities,” he told her in a soothing voice. “The only thing inside you is an energy force that enables your demon glass. And that, as far as the rest of the world is concerned, is a blessing.”

  “I know,” she sighed, and a moment later turned it into a shaky laugh. “But, dear Lord, it certainly isn’t what any lady wishes to hear directly after breakfast.”

  ELEVEN

  Father McIntyre would be arriving before sunset and Lily felt little more than a dogmatic numbness about the entire affair. That might be due to her peeking through the demon glass every other hour to monitor the situation in London (who knew what a mundane existence a demon could lead when it put its mind to it) and the constant nausea that ensued. It might also be somewhat due to Greyston’s overwhelming protestations. She’d tossed and turned the night away in a fretful state of anxiety, barged into his room this morning to ambivalent results, and now this emotional decay came as a relief.

  A marriage of convenience.

  A practical arrangement.

  A temporary rearrangement of her personal situation.

  She scowled at the book she was purportedly reading. Goodness, not too long ago she’d resigned herself to a far more permanent solution for a far less worthy cause. She couldn’t imagine what all the fuss had been about last night.

  This marriage was a stumbling block she had to hurdle on her way to London; that was all. Her heart hammered inside her chest whenever she thought about her aunt, about Evelyn, Pragella, Halver, Devon…everyone she knew and cared about so close to an enormous danger and completely unaware.

  She didn’t need fussy nerves and emotion. What she needed was to approach this decision from her usual pragmatic perspective.

  She slammed the book shut and drummed a finger to her lower lip.

  A marriage of convenience. Greyston was certainly the more convenient choice. They’d spent a fair amount of time in each other’s company and once he’d stopped aggravating her, he was a pleasant companion. He’d certainly be easier to navigate around in this particular marriage that would be, by its very nature, a stiff, awkward place. Kelan…? Humph.

  A practical arrangement. Well, they’d become publicly acquainted while she was in London and if she wer
e to return suddenly attached to a man, Greyston just made more sense. Especially considering the last time she might have been spotted in London, it would have been her leaving the city in his—Oh!

  Oh dear, that cannot be good.

  She stood abruptly and took deep breaths. How on earth had that pertinent detail slipped her mind? All their minds?

  She brushed down her skirts and set her shoulders back.

  Temporary.

  A temporary rearrangement.

  Goodness, we’ll barely know we’re married.

  Before leaving the room, she took a moment to accept the inevitable. The stab of disappointment took her by surprise and proved harder to dismiss. It seemed, no matter how dire the state of the world, a lady’s nuptials, real or otherwise, couldn’t be relegated to the bottom rung completely.

  Greyston’s many protests hadn’t truly convinced her of his indifference, not entirely. Truth be told, she had no idea what to think or feel and so she hadn’t. Her so-called numbness had been a delay tactic, an assumption that any relationship between her and Greyston would resolve naturally during the course of their marriage, however long or short.

  Suddenly she was feeling again; she was thinking again, wondering if Greyston would share her regret. Or if he truly was as thoroughly opposed as he claimed, and she was the one stubbornly hanging onto a broken bough.

  “Well, there’s that, too,” she told herself stoically.

  On enquiring, a passing footman informed her of Kelan and Greyston’s whereabouts. By the time she reached the library, she’d changed her mind a dozen times. The problem was, she could change her mind a hundred times and that didn’t change the outcome.

  Her back flattened against the wall before she realised what she was doing. An inch to her right, the door to the library stood slightly ajar. It must have been the tone of the male voices that had alerted her.

  A blade of steel edged Kelan’s voice. “You’re a fool.”

  Greyston’s reply was a harsh, brittle drawl. “Have you not yet figured out that your insults don’t work on me?”