Arsenic nodded. “Verra good then.”
“You go, I’ll come last.”
“Why?”
“Seems like the gentlemanly thing to do.”
“Ladies get to walk the plank first?”
“Isn’t it always ladies first?” Percy looked perplexed.
Arsenic decided they were running the risk of being rude, blathering on with hosts awaiting. She walked lightly across the plank to the house-meets-boat. Percy followed.
They were then treated to the sight of Lord Maccon, clearly in full possession of his werewolf abilities, simply lifting the massive plank, swinging it around, and sliding it along one side of the hull into a specially designed cradle. It was quite the display of supernatural strength.
His wife, one must presume, put her hand to his arm as soon as the wooden beam was settled. This must be for preternatural reasons, as they were not inside the plague zone, and her touch would keep him human and safe from Alpha’s curse. Clearly, they were temporarily in this location in order to meet up with Rue.
Rue ran at her parents. Well, waddled at them enthusiastically. She was absorbed into a three-way hug, one arm from each as they bent over her, both being considerably taller.
It was an egregiously open display of affection for British aristocrats – how Continental of them.
After a long moment of softly murmured greeting, they broke apart. Arsenic admitted to wiping a mote of sentiment from one eye, since Lord Maccon reminded her a bit of her own da, who was large and Scottish and a big advocate of hugs.
Rue backed away and Quesnel made his greeting, for the first time, as her husband. Despite the fact that he was an intellectual, middle-class tradesman with no peerage and foreign heritage, Lord and Lady Maccon welcomed him with evident approval.
“They support the match?” Arsenic whispered to Prim, seeking confirmation.
“They do indeed. Lord Maccon would let Rue do most anything, so long as it made her happy. Lady Maccon is great friends with Quesnel’s mother. I think, as well, they did not anticipate the possibility of grandchildren, so all around this is a welcome event.”
After Quesnel, the twins issued pleasantries with all the forwardness of domestic intimates and the stiff awkwardness endemic to their personalities. Primrose was painfully polite and well-mannered. Percy was his usual half-shy, half-arrogant self, unable or unwilling to interact easily with others, even old family friends. Arsenic felt a bubble of pride that she’d managed to crack his shell, if only a little.
Lord Maccon treated the twins with open affection, as if he wanted to give them hugs too, but was tolerably certain one or both might swoon if he tried.
Lady Maccon gave each Tunstell an exhaustive once-over and a supportive smile, much in the manner of an affectionate teacher.
Then it was Arsenic’s turn.
“Mother, Paw, may I present the latest addition to my crew, Dr Ruthven? She’s a pip, even Percy likes her. Arsenic, this is my mother, Lady Maccon, and my father, Lord Maccon, formerly of the London Pack.”
Lady Maccon offered up her free hand in the manner of Americans. Arsenic shook it, noting the firmness of the grip and the sureness of her stance. A vigorous woman, Lady Maccon. Her figure was well padded, her complexion robust if rather tan, and her black hair only just beginning to grey. Arsenic thought her likely in possession of a resilient constitution. She was the kind of female one could imagine taking up mountain climbing in her eighties, or retiring to a desert country and living in a boat-house, for that matter. In other words, a bold eccentric.
“It’s a pleasure to meet you, young lady. And to see my daughter is being sensible with her safety at last.”
“Mother! I did it for the crew. It was Quesnel who got shot recently, not me!”
“But you are the one unexpectedly inconvenienced. It’s just as well to have a physician aboard.”
Arsenic hastened to correct any misconceptions. “I’m a surgeon by training, Lady Maccon. I will do my best for your daughter and her crew, of course, but trauma is my specialty. I was with the military for years.”
Lord Maccon looked pleased. As a werewolf, he would have served himself. There was an innate camaraderie among those who’d been to war, regardless of which war. Even those like Arsenic, who’d merely been adjunct, were acknowledged as having shared experiences with soldiers.
“Delighted to hear it!” he boomed out. “I think injury is likely more frequent than childbirth, given my daughter’s proclivities.”
Lady Maccon looked between her daughter and Quesnel, who had a hand to Rue’s lower back in a manner that ought to look supportive but actually looked libidinous. “I don’t know, Conall. This may not be our only grandchild. Our son-in-law is French.”
Quesnel blushed quite red.
“Mother!” said Rue.
Arsenic could be diplomatic. “Let’s see how this one goes, shall we, before we consider the next?”
“Wise words. I like you, girl,” said Lord Maccon.
“Thank you, sir.”
“Come inside, you lot, do.” Lady Maccon had apparently decided they’d spent enough time dawdling on deck.
Indoors, the house-boat was designed not unlike a standard English country home. Lady Maccon led them to a parlour-meets-sitting-room-meets-conservatory, hand firmly holding her husband’s. The room was decorated with light rattan furniture, sumptuously thick rugs, and hanging plants. There were large windows opened wide to harness the breeze off the river and displaying a spectacular view.
Rue and Quesnel sat together in one settee, with Arsenic and Primrose in another, while their hosts and Percy opted for chairs.
The chairs were a little spindly. Arsenic feared for their survival under the Maccons’ bulk.
An Abyssinian cat wandered in at that juncture, big, orange, arrogant, and clearly master of the place.
“Mother, when did you get a cat?”
“Ossobuco found us. Years living with Lord Akeldama and I could only accept my fate.”
“Paw?”
Lord Maccon shrugged. “I spend little time as an actual werewolf anymore, no cat could object. Besides, cats are adaptable, even to living with larger predators.”
Percy said, “Footnote barely tolerates Tasherit. He will leave any room she walks into, whether she’s lioness or human.”
“Yes,” said Primrose, “but that’s two cats. Different thing entirely.”
Ossobuco made the rounds about the visitors, sniffing feet and expressing a general opinion of disinterest. He rolled a bit on Quesnel’s shoes, something appealed there, and then padded over to the window, where he jumped onto the sill, and sat in picturesque elegance licking a paw and keeping one eye to the river, and the other to the humans.
Lady Maccon turned her large nose upon Primrose. “That’s right! Dearest girl, I hear congratulations are in order.”
“What could you possibly mean, Aunt Alexia?” replied Prim, rather unguardedly, Arsenic suspected.
“I hear you have found yourself a lover.” Lady Maccon waggled her eyebrows.
“Mother! You can’t simply say those things out loud!” Rue was aghast.
Prim looked like she was halfway between hilarity and hysteria.
“Obviously I can, because I just did, Infant. It’s true, Prim dear, isn’t it?”
Primrose extracted a fan from her many-pocketed parasol, and in the manner of all elegant females, hid behind it, crimson faced.
Percy was trying not to smile.
Quesnel said, staunchly, “We all like Tasherit very much. Rue has made her first mate and she’s taken over ship’s defences and militia training.”
Lord Maccon’s yellow eyes narrowed. “Militia?”
Rue jumped to the defence. “Everyone will keep shooting at us. It’s not our fault. It’s where we get sent. Blame Mother or Dama for that.”
Lord Maccon glowered at his wife.
Lady Maccon looked complacent. “Prudence can take care of herself. Look how well s
he’s done. So far, no one important has died. I call that a win. And she’s managed to recruit a werelioness to defend them; a noted spy to interpret for them; a paranormal assassin to do whatever it is that he’s doing on board; and now a doctor. Rue is fine, dear. Perfectly fine.”
Lord Maccon looked like he would enjoy arguing any number of those statements but in the end chose Rodrigo as the scapegoat.
“Aye, daughter dear, what is Rodrigo Tarabotti doing, exactly, aboard your ship? Dinna he try to kill you?” Lord Maccon’s Scottish accent, Arsenic noted, was stronger than her own. But she’d worked to shed hers, scared of losing the respect of the medical community. Lord Maccon need not fret about such things.
“Well, yes, Paw, but that’s all in the past. Percy saved him with philosophy. He’s on our side now. There was a book club involved. It’s all perfectly in order.”
“And he married Anitra,” added Primrose, clearly thinking that should help.
“The assassin married the spy?”
“They’re sweet together. And they like it aboard the Custard. We’re family.” Rue was adamant about this.
Her parents didn’t seem wholly convinced. Arsenic understood their concern. However, after two weeks aboard Rue’s dirigible, she could also see that there was little need for it. Whatever Anitra and Rodrigo had once been, they were now part of Rue’s crew.
Anitra gave language lessons that anyone could attend. Half the decklings were learning Italian at the moment, with Rodrigo’s help, of course. They wanted to know what he said when he swore. And Rodrigo seemed willing and able to put his hand to anything, from helping the sooties in the boiler room to describing foreign ports, to telling tall tales to decklings on slow evenings.
The whole time, both Anitra and Rodrigo tended towards that slightly shocked air of unexpectedly having found a place to belong. They lived with people who enjoyed their society and wished to keep them. It was a sensation Arsenic occasionally enjoyed herself these days. To be wanted was an extraordinary gift.
The thing about The Spotted Custard was its general aura of welcome. So long as one was willing to tolerate the foibles of the staff and crew, the ship forgave you yours. No one minded Arsenic’s propensity for sportswear or the way she always looked to physical fitness and health, before seeing the personality of the actual human. No one cared that her mother killed people. The Spotted Custard was the kind of place where exceptions were made, because everyone was strange and exceptional.
Surely Lord and Lady Maccon could understand that? For lack of a better analogy, what their brash and rather impulsive daughter had done was build herself her own pack.
“Anitra used to work for Lord Akeldama, you know that?” Lord Maccon pressed his point. Divided loyalties bothered werewolves.
Rue shrugged. “Still does, I think, but we keep her busy. I don’t mind. He was bound to have someone in his silken pocket aboard my ship, keeping an eye on me. Better to know who it is than not know.”
Lord Maccon turned to his daughter’s new husband. “Lord Akeldama hired you and your mother to make the preservation tank for Floote, and Floote adopted Anitra as his granddaughter before he died. You aren’t perturbed by questionable allegiance?”
Quesnel shook his head.
Lord Maccon glared at his daughter.
Rue only shrugged. “I am less concerned by Formerly Floote and his machinations than you are. After all is said and done, he and his schemes were for the good of Grandfather Tarabotti, and now they are for the good of me and Rodrigo. We are the last of the Tarabotti line and we are together on my ship. I believe he always intended to see us united. He’s vested in our safety. I’m Lord Akeldama’s adopted daughter. I’ve been raised to question motive, including his and yours. But I’ve never doubted your love, none of you.”
Lady Maccon looked pleased. “Yes, we made sure of that. Children should know they are loved. But that doesn’t mean you should forget other lessons concerning caution.”
Rue actually paused to consider this. “I believe that now we all share the same goals, such as they are. We enjoy one another’s company, and we have, I hope, a purpose. So it will all work out in the end. Speaking of which, I hear you’ve a task for us?”
Lord Maccon waved a large hand dismissively. “We’ll get on to that in a moment, and I want to hear all about the wedding. But I’ve one question for you to consider, daughter mine. Did Lord Akeldama send Anitra to Floote or did Floote hunt out Anitra?”
“What does it matter except that they found each other? And that she found Rodrigo?”
Lord Maccon was going to press the point, but Lady Maccon squeezed his hand. “Enough for now, husband. Let her make her own choices.”
“Rodrigo sends his familial regards, incidentally, Mother,” said Rue.
“And I return them, of course. It’s difficult knowing that I’ll never meet my only nephew. Rodrigo is, so far as I can tell, my last living relative on my father’s side.”
“Speaking of relatives, your mother turned up at my wedding.”
Lady Maccon made a face. Lord Maccon practically growled.
Arsenic tried to exchange a significant glance with Percy, but he was staring at the cat.
“What did she do?” Lady Maccon was prepared to get upset.
Rue grinned. “That’s the fun bit. She fell into a fountain! Or more precisely, Aggie pushed her. Never been so happy to have that woman around. Did you know we were related on Grandmother’s side to Aggie? I didn’t.”
Lady Maccon frowned. “Your head greaser is a relative? What’s her surname?”
“Phinkerlington?”
“Ah, that’s Mother’s maiden name. She must be a second or third cousin.”
“Were you bad to them?”
“Not so as I’m aware.”
“Well, Aggie’s never liked me. I think it has to do, in part, with relations. I can understand simply not liking me on principle, but her animosity always seemed to be rooted in something more.”
Lady Maccon shrugged. “There was some scandal with Mother’s side. Serious scandal. She never talked about it. Lost two brothers, I think. Although I’m unclear exactly how they were lost – dead or disowned. She got stranded and married Alessandro Tarabotti, as an odd kind of rescue. He died, and she never recovered from the embarrassment of it all. So far as I can tell from her treatment of me, she regretted it. I thought the Phinkerlingtons cast her out, but perhaps it was something else. Perhaps it was the other way around, and that’s what has your greaser’s bloomers in a twist.”
“Families are awfully challenging,” said Rue with feeling.
Arsenic considered her own, with her mother’s covert activities and all her sisters and their agendas, and had to agree. Even her father had once worked for the War Office.
The tea tray was brought in by a bonnie-looking butler, who was immediately dismissed.
Arsenic wondered if Lady Maccon trusted her servants, or if it was simply her way.
“This is delicious!” Arsenic couldn’t help but say, sipping the golden-tinged scarlet brew, which was light with almost sweet notes. “It looks like Darjeeling, but it dinna taste like it.”
Lady Maccon smiled. “You have an interest in tea, Doctor?”
“Aye, a little.”
“Infant, I approve your new crewmate. This, Doctor, is my current favourite, Jaekseol from Choson.”
“Mother, never say you’ve thrown over Assam!”
“Infant, even I am allowed to broaden my tastes upon occasion.”
Rue looked at her mother suspiciously. “Is that where we’re going next then, Choson?”
“Ah, you see my scheming ways, Infant. Not Choson exactly, but close, Japan.”
Arsenic was excited. She’d never been to Japan. The others looked interested, surprised, and resigned according to their natures. Except Percy, who looked like none of those things, but just like Percy.
“That is, if you accept the mission.”
“You can always say
no.” That was Lord Maccon, glaring at his wife.
His daughter did no such thing. “Why are we headed to Japan?”
“There are rumours of a new kind of supernatural.”
“Like last time in Peru?” said Rue.
“Or the time before in Sudan?” said Primrose.
“Or the time before that in India?” added Quesnel.
Arsenic looked at them all. How many different kinds of supernaturals had they uncovered?
She’d heard, of course, of all the new shifters and bloodsuckers and so forth coming to light in the second age of exploration. Monkey shifters and werecats, of course, and wasn’t there some kind of fat-sucking vampire reported recently?
“Is it always you who find them?” she wondered.
Rue shrugged, no doubt a mannerism she’d picked up from her husband. “Seems to be our custom, these days, to unearth new types of supernatural creatures. Sometimes literally.”
“The Custard’s Protocol, if you will,” suggested Arsenic, with a grin.
“I like it!” said Rue.
“So what kind are we after this time? The immortal flesh-consuming kind or the changes-shape kind?”
“Is one worse than the other?” wondered Arsenic.
“You never know until you meet them,” said Primrose, darkly.
Percy was holding his tongue and looking smug. Arsenic recognized that expression – he knew something.
“Form-shifter this time, dear, or at least we think it’s a form-shifter. Lord Akeldama had a report but since then, silence. So we thought you’d like to go after it.”
“And he couldn’t tell me this himself? I just saw him!”
“You know I like to give the orders,” said Lady Maccon. “Besides, I wanted to ensure you visited us.”
“Oh, really.” Rue looked a little choked up. Quesnel put an arm about her shoulders.
“You’ll bring the grandchild to Egypt, after it arrives?”
“Of course I will, Mother.”
“Of course you will, Infant.”
The rest of the visit was mainly a retelling of the wedding, which was amusing in spirit if not content, as it exposed the opinions and biases of Arsenic’s crewmates. Their descriptions of the event were materially different from her own, in style if not substance.
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