by April White
I screamed then, a primal sound that drew every bit of strength in my body to my arms as I swung the pipe at the crack in the column. The bishop finally saw me above him as I swung again.
And then the walls came crashing down.
The column above the bishop gave way and the ceiling it supported rained down on the two of them in a storm of brick, mortar and rocks. The pipe I straddled was wrenched from its moorings and swung away from the collapsing roof, taking me with it. I was flung clear and landed in a tangle of limbs. The sound was horrific, like the earth itself was groaning in pain as the cellar under the men’s wing collapsed on my father and the monster that had killed him.
The room was instantly filled with a blindingly thick coat of white dust. We had to get outside. We had to get fresh air to breathe and help for my mother and Archer.
I found my mother’s unconscious body first and I dragged her to Archer and Ringo. The dust was so thick I could barely see or breathe, and the ground was already covered in a layer like baker’s flour. I pulled my mother into my lap and grabbed for Archer. That left one free arm. I don’t know what possessed me except the excruciating need to get free of that collapsing cellar.
So I started to draw. First one spiral, then the others. “Ringo, hold on to me!” I could barely croak the words out but he must have heard me because I felt him clutch at my waist. I hoped our grips on Archer and my mother were strong enough, because my arm was starting to tingle and the humming had begun in the air around us. The only thought in my head was to get outside where there were trees and air and shelter from things that go bump in the night. And my mind flashed to the map of portals that Jeeves and hidden in my bag oh so long ago. There was a portal in Epping Wood, and didn’t that sound nice and peaceful away from the horror of tonight?
And suddenly we were traveling. Pulling. Stretching. The sounds of thrumming making the bile rise in my throat. And just as suddenly it all stopped.
I looked up to see the barest light shining through the window of a tiny house. A house I recognized from a painting I’d seen on a wall at Elian Manor. And then the light came toward us and a gravel voice spoke.
“And there ye finally are. The People have been waiting.”
Epping Place
It’s possible I passed out then, because what followed occurred in flashes. I wouldn’t let go of my mother or Archer and they had to pry my arms from them. My mother was carried away from me and I thought her eyes focused on mine for just a moment. Ringo went with her.
The woman with the gravel voice was small, like Sanda, and she bustled in a way that no one could oppose. She directed two young men with her to carry Archer into the cottage and I stumbled along behind them, barely conscious of getting there.
But inside the cottage, I snapped back to myself as the Sanda-like woman had Archer put into a room at the back of the tiny house, which a small iron bed dominated. When the wound at his throat was uncovered it still pumped bright red blood. The woman spoke to one of the young men in a low tone.
“Get me fresh marsh woundwort, some shepard’s purse if ye can still find it, and I’ve some puffball fungus in me wee box that I’ll be needing. And any spider webs ye find on the way would be good too.”
“Yes, Missus.” The guy was gone in an instant.
Then the Missus looked me up and down in the most efficient glance I’ve ever been on the receiving end of. Her eyes narrowed for the barest moment.
“Can ye make a poultice, lass?” I nodded, barely registering the fact that she saw me for a girl. “Good. Put the kettle on the fire and get the water good and hot. When my lad comes back with the woundwort, mix in a little of the puffball fungus and make a paste. I’ll need it for yer lad here.”
My lad. Those two words resonated with me like I’d never imagined they could. Archer was my lad and I’d been careless with him. I’d taken him for granted and now I might have lost him.
Like I’d lost my dad.
The image of his eyes seeking mine was burned into my head. He had saved me and Archer and had lost his life in the process. My heart felt like it had been torn to shreds, with pieces I’d only just discovered gone missing forever. I took a last lingering glance at Archer, but was bustled out of the room by the Missus.
“The faster the water boils, the faster we can draw out that what ails him.”
“But…” I tried to protest that there wasn’t a cure, but she looked me straight in the eye.
“Old one was it that bit him? We’ll do what we can.” And if there was anything at all that could draw the porphyria out of Archer’s blood, I suddenly knew the Missus was the woman to find it.
I left the room and went back into the front living space of the cottage. A young kid was just coming in with two cast iron pots of water hanging from a stick on his shoulders. He heaved them down and I grabbed one. “Tongs are there, rack’s in the fire.” The kid who brought the water was already busy washing something at the sink.
“Thanks.”
He made a noncommittal grunt and kept working. I found the tongs and hung the ridiculously heavy iron pot on the rack, as deep in the fire as I could reach. Then I went looking for my mother.
I found her in a corner off the main room that must have been the Missus’ bedroom. Ringo was by her side and he looked up at me with hollow eyes.
“Archer?”
“I don’t know.” My voice was flat. I truly didn’t know if he lived or died in that little back room, and the only thing I could do was trust his care to the Missus.
I went to my mother’s side and looked carefully at her face. The soft English face I was so used to had become hard lines and crevices. I picked up her hand and it was ice cold and limp, and if I hadn’t seen the outline of a pulse at her jawline, I would have thought she was a corpse.
“They’ve drained her.” Ringo’s voice sounded as flat as mine did. He was battered and exhausted, and yet here he was, still helping me, still standing.
The Missus had just entered the room when he spoke. She looked at me through narrowed eyes again. I felt like she was sizing me up to see what I was made of.
“She needs blood and it’ll not come from ye. Descendants don’t trade blood.” As shocking as it was that the Missus knew that, I couldn’t keep the indignation from my voice.
“I’m her daughter!”
“And yer da was Shifter. Yer blood’ll kill her.”
I stared at the Missus in horror. How could she possibly know… everything?
The Missus crossed her arms in front of her. “I can give her teas and such to help her keep the blood she’s got, but I can’t make it for her.”
“Aren’t there doctors who can do transfusions or something?”
Again with the narrowed eyes. “I wouldn’t trust a doctor with something as precious as a life. No. You’ll have to take her back.”
“Back… to my time?”
If she knew this much, I was betting I wasn’t going to shock her with that statement. I was right. “She’s told me what it’s like then, in yer time. They can save what I can’t.”
I started to feel frantic. I couldn’t leave, not with Archer on the edge of dying. The Missus must have seen my widening eyes for what they meant. “I can take care of yer lad for ye. It’ll be hard for a bit and he’ll not be whole, none can change that, but he’ll live.”
Her boy came back into the cottage with the herbs and plants the Missus had requested and he came to the doorway of the bedroom. “I’ve got what ye need, Missus.”
“Thank ye lad, leave ‘em for the lass. She knows aught what to do.” The boy gave me a quick, shy look, then bobbed his head and ducked out of the room. The Missus went right behind him, leaving me and Ringo alone with my mother.
He had heard everything and he looked worried. “You’ll have to go back then?”
My eyes were trapped by my mother’s motionless body. She looked so frail and small, and suddenly I felt what it must be like to take care of a parent when they
get old. The tables were turned and I was the one to make the decision for her welfare. “I have no choice, do I? If she dies now everything will have been for nothing.”
The words threatened to unlock the place I had shoved the searing pain I felt when I looked at my father’s dying eyes, and the despair that wracked my body as I pressed the tainted blood back inside Archer’s body.
I shoved the pain back and a sudden wave of hatred washed over me. I hoped the bishop had been crushed into oblivion by those falling bricks. I hoped his soul was rotting somewhere worse than hell, because no image I’d ever seen of the place was horrible enough for him. I shuddered and then repressed that too until there was no feeling left in me.
I suddenly felt myself bustle like the Missus.
“Will you stay with her for a while longer? I need to make a poultice for the Missus and see what else I can do for Archer before I take my mother… back.” I almost choked on the word, but got myself under control. Ringo seemed to be wrestling with his own demons though.
“We were in the tunnel when they jumped us, Saira. We never even saw them coming.”
Abruptly, I sat down. Like my legs gave way and wouldn’t support me anymore. “What happened?”
Ringo hesitated a moment, as if the memory pained him. “I’d gone to get Archer. He had already taken the last pill himself and was up and pacing his room. When I told him where you were, he came right away. He was so worried about you.”
Those five words were like an icepick in my heart and hurt so much I gasped. Ringo looked me in the eyes to drive the point home. “The whole way down to the tunnel he cursed himself for not being enough for you. Not strong enough or skilled enough.” How could he even think that? “He was almost relieved when they jumped us.”
That shocked me. “Why?”
“Because maybe you wouldn’t have to be there when he was turned.”
Thud. The hollowness in me was unbearable.
“First it was just a beating. The bishop made a big show of being so disappointed in Archer, but he was like a kid at Christmas every time the Ripper landed a punch on either of us.”
“And we fought. Both of us did. But there was something about the man that was meaner and tougher and didn’t back down with any amount of pain. And worse, he was boasting about how much fun he’d have carving us all up like he’d done to the Nosy Parker next door. And after us, what he’d do your mother, since the bishop had taken all her Clocker blood.”
Every word that Ringo spoke made me hurt for them even more. Archer had suspected Jack the Ripper had Family connections, but a Monger killer working for a Vampire mastermind had never occurred to any of us.
“Did he ever say why he’d killed the other women?”
Ringo shuddered. “He said something about blood. I think he asked the bishop if there was any value to our blood or could he butcher at will like he’d done to Mary.”
“What did the bishop say?” I was practically whispering.
“He said there was a little Seer blood in Archer, but not enough to keep him alive. Useless, just like the part-Clocker girls he’d tried first. It was the pure-bloods he wanted.”
I couldn’t trust myself to speak. So I nodded.
Ringo suddenly remembered something and reached into his pocket. He pulled out the little cloth bag of coins I paid Mary for my mother’s necklace. “I got this off the Ripper. He must’ve taken it from Mary’s place.” Ringo held it out for me but I shook my head.
“You keep it. Buy Charlie a meal. Maybe get my dress altered to fit her.” The thought of that actually hurt, but I swallowed the pain as insignificant and selfish.
He nodded and dropped it back in his pocket. “So that was your father? The Lion?”
“His name was Will Shaw. He was a Shifter.”
“So you’re a Clocker and Shifter mix?”
“I am.”
He looked at me with exhausted admiration. “Fantastic!” Even though Ringo might be the only one in my world to think so, I’d take it.
“I have to go make the poultice. Can you stay?”
“As long as you like.”
I gave him a kiss on the cheek and a tired smile. “Thank you, Ringo. You’re a true gentleman.” I headed for the door, but turned back for just a moment. “What’s your real name?”
He smiled wryly. “Jonathan Starkey.”
“I like Ringo better.”
“Me too.”
The poultice was simple to make and I was happy to have busywork to do while the Missus bustled and her lads rushed off to do her bidding.
When it had cooled enough to be used, I brought the poultice to the small room in back where the Missus was cleaning and dressing Archer’s other wounds. The one at his throat had a clean bandage for pressure, but seemed to otherwise have been left alone.
“May I?” I indicated the bandage and the Missus nodded curtly. Archer was still unconscious and I wasn’t entirely sure he hadn’t slipped into a coma. His skin was pale and in the candlelight it seemed to be taking on the smooth waxy look I’d seen on the bishop’s face.
I lifted the bandage and my stomach lurched at the sight of the jagged bite mark in the soft flesh where Archer’s neck and collarbone met.
“Pack it with the poultice, and don’t be shy with it. As much as can be drawn out will make the transition easier.”
I didn’t ask what she meant because I was too busy pushing the green mess I’d made into the wound. His hand twitched, and he grimaced once, so I guessed it probably hurt like hell. But he didn’t wake up. Not once.
When I’d finished I replaced the bandage and wound a soft white strip of gauze loosely around his neck to keep it in place.
I gazed down at Archer’s sleeping face and every part of me ached with the tears I was fighting back.
I loved him. And I’d never told him.
And now I had to go.
I think what hurt the most was knowing he’d wake up and feel I’d abandoned him. I got what I came for and went home without another thought for Archer. Which couldn’t be further from the truth.
I turned to find the Missus watching me. “Claire used to watch yer da like that when he slept.”
“You knew them then?”
She seemed to permit herself the smallest of smiles. “I helped raise yer ma and her sister Emily. I’d bring her here with me on me day off sometimes. It’s where she met him you know. Out in the woods.”
“He died tonight.”
The Missus nodded grimly. “I heard it told.” She looked me straight in the eye. “He loved ye both with all the fierceness a man can love. And now, ye do right by them and take her home to heal. The Other’s hurt her something bad.” The way she said ‘the Other,’ I knew somehow she was talking about the bishop. “And I don’t trust he won’t be back someday.”
The bishop was a Vampire who technically hadn’t been drained of all his blood before the ceiling came down on him, so I supposed it was possible. I needed to ward this cottage. I had to make it a place where nothing bad could get to Archer and no one could hurt him anymore.
I felt my body generate a kind of heat then, like something that got lit from inside. And then I felt it leave the surface of my skin almost like the heat of a sunburn.
“Well aren’t ye fancy.”
The Missus was looking at me with something like approval and it was like she’d given me a gift. I smiled quickly. “Maybe it’ll help keep the bad ones out.”
“As long as my family can come in, I’ll take it.”
The Missus saw me look back toward Archer and she busied herself with something at the other side of the small room. I went to the bed and held Archer’s hand. It was cold, ice cold. I tried to generate some warding heat to give him but none came, so I could only give him the warmth of my skin.
“I’m so sorry,” I whispered to him. “I didn’t mean to hurt you.”
I realized I’d seen Archer sleeping like this before - in my time, when I found his secret room
under St. Brigid’s School. That man felt like a worldly, sophisticated stranger to me now that I knew this one so well.
And just as I’d done then, I leaned forward and kissed him softly on the lips. But this time, his lips were warm and I could feel the slightest breath coming from them. And then the barest hint of a smile, just turning up at the corners. I could have totally imagined it, but the smile gave me hope and melted a little of the ice that had formed around my soul.
“There’s a spiral in the woods not far from here. Claire used it to come from the manor. The lads can help ye with her and guard ye while ye go.”
I nodded silently, my eyes locked on Archer’s face. Finally, I tore them away and followed the Missus to the door. “You’ll care for him?”
She nodded. “The change’ll take three days. The longer he stays down, the easier it’ll be for us all.”
I had a sudden thought and flung my leather satchel around to rummage through it. “I have chloroform in here. Could that help?”
The Missus looked thoughtful. She took the cloth-wrapped package from my hand carefully and nodded. “It could get him through the worst of the pain.”
I dumped some things out of my bag on the small table next to the bed. There were linen bandages, a flashlight and batteries, and Archer’s shirt. I pocketed the batteries for Ringo. “Use whatever’s useful and hide or destroy the rest.”
The Missus nodded. “Thank ye, lass. Yer ma’s brought me bits and bobs from yer time as well. It’s always welcome.” The idea that my mother had been visiting the Missus was one I stored away for later. There was so much I needed to ask her, but she had to live first if that was ever going to happen.
I stood to go, and the Missus brushed a lock of hair off Archer’s forehead with tenderness I hadn’t seen coming.
“When yer lad comes out of it I’ve enough learning of the Old Ones to guide him some. We’ll see he’s looked after.”