by H. G. Parry
“We still don’t intend to break the Concord,” Pitt said. “But—”
“Even with this army of the dead from France?” Thornton asked. “Austria and Prussia are pushing for it. Help yourself to a drink, by the way.”
“Thank you—No, not even with France’s army of the dead. Most of the Alliance want to use magic since Dunkirk, you’re right, but they won’t as long as we don’t. They don’t want to lose Britain’s support, financial and otherwise, and make an enemy of us in the process. And I have hopes that the army of the dead won’t grow very much bigger—the dark practices needed to bring it about are too barbaric. Even the scale of the executions at the moment… The general population in France won’t stand for them for long.”
“But hypothetically?” Wilberforce prompted, drawn in despite himself. “If we were to break the Concord? It’s good to see you, by the way.”
“And you—Is this how you always greet your guests? I haven’t even sat down yet.”
“Oh, you love it. You’d be so bored if we greeted you with ‘Good afternoon, how are you? Was your journey very smooth?’”
“I think I could stand to be a little bored.”
“Good afternoon, Pitt. How are you? Was your journey very smooth?”
“God, how boring. Hypothetically: we already conscript in the navy—or press-gang, to be more precise. It’s not pleasant, but we’ve done it for centuries. I don’t think we’d need to resort to those methods for the army, though. People are flocking to sign up for the king’s shilling as it is. If we increased the financial incentive for magicians, that along with the prospect of using their magic might entice them. We could afford it, at least as things stand now. But, as I said, I hope it won’t come to that.”
“It’s a dark path we’re on,” Granville Sharp said. He shook his head. “Freedom of magic leading to revolution and dark magic on the battlefield. Repression of magic leading us to further prejudice against magical Commoners. It’s difficult to know which way to turn.”
The conversation turned after that, but didn’t wane. Eliot’s little daughter, now a year old, was visiting her father with a nurse; he brought her in for Pitt and everyone else to admire. (Fortunately, she was an unusually pretty child.) Thornton wanted to talk about the prison bill being raised in the House next session. Somebody, inevitably, brought up abolition. The sun moved across the sky outside.
“Pitt’s my guest,” Wilberforce said at last. “And this is his first time here in months. He’s already seen this library; he designed the thing. I’m showing him the gardens. Pitt?”
“I’m very happy to see the gardens,” he replied promptly. “But I object to my library being called a thing.”
“Why is he your guest?” Eliot mock-protested, taking his daughter back from Pitt. “I’m the father of his niece. I should show him around the gardens.”
“But you have a letter to write to Macaulay. He’s written to us from the colony at Sierra Leone. I left it on your desk this morning.”
“You could write back to him yourself.”
“I could. But I’m showing Pitt the gardens. Besides, we have important secrets to discuss. It’s why he came out here in the first place.”
“Never mind, Eliot,” Pitt said consolingly. “I’ll see you again before I go. We can have tea here, in the thing.”
The sound of laughter and conversation followed them down the path as they left Battersea Rise behind them; by mutual agreement, they held off talking about the real reason for Pitt’s visit while there was still a probability of being overheard. In retrospect, Clapham probably wasn’t the safest place for a private conversation, when every house, tree, and patch of grass was regarded as communal property by its inhabitants. But it was where Wilberforce had been when Pitt had contacted him with the promise of news, and it was infinitely better than anywhere Pitt could provide in London. Here, at least any eavesdropping would be accidental and friendly; in Downing Street, half the cabinet would be twitching about the door for news.
“Well,” Wilberforce said. “What do you think of this place, now it’s finished?”
“It’s beautiful,” Pitt said, in the faintly wistful tone with which people always appreciate real beauty. The path wound away from the house, meandering about the yellowing tulip trees and autumnal flowers. The breeze made the grass stir and brought with it the earthy smell of dried leaves. “I’ve been stuck in London entirely too much lately. I almost wish I could join you all here.”
“You would hate it. We’d pester you all the time for your insights on everything from foreign policy to ancient Greek, steal your books, wake you at sunrise every morning, and make you go to church.”
“I’ve changed my mind. Dear God, what realm of torments have you concocted?”
“The latter two would be very good for you. The former would only benefit us, alas, but we’d make it up to you with beautiful gardens, reasonable food, excellent company, and fireside conversation.”
“That is indeed tempting, but I’m afraid I’ve now changed my mind once in the last few minutes. Changing it twice would look like indecision. The government would fall.”
They waited until they were out of earshot before they spoke again.
“You probably saw the reports in the papers that the first battalion of the dead has been used in action,” Pitt said. “Only fourteen of them were there, and yet they say they killed three hundred men apiece. Likely exaggeration—they were supported by an army of regular Commoner magicians who surely did their own share of killing—but many of our soldiers were certainly killed before they could be evacuated. Between the terror they inspire on our side, the hope they inspire on our enemy’s, and the fact that they can’t be killed, they form a formidable front.”
“We lost Dunkirk, didn’t we?” Wilberforce said, not sure why he made it a question. They had certainly lost Dunkirk. “They’re calling it a disaster.”
“I wouldn’t call it that,” Pitt said, to Wilberforce’s complete lack of surprise. If Britain were to sink into the sea, Pitt would regard it as an unfortunate but not irretrievable situation. “It’s certainly a severe check; I still hope it will be only a temporary one. If they send out many more undead, though, it’s looking more and more likely that we’ll have to break the Concord to have any hope of success. Spain will probably do so, if we don’t first. There’s a very good chance that this could bring widespread magic back to the battlefield for the first time since the fifteenth century.”
“And we now know, or suspect,” Wilberforce said, “that Robespierre sent an undead to Britain before the fall of the Bastille.”
“I think we can suspect more than that,” Pitt said. “I think we can safely say that he’s working with the same vampire that tempted Clarkson all those years ago. Whatever its plan is, it goes well beyond abolition.”
“It must,” Wilberforce said. “Robespierre’s always been a friend to abolition. There’s no reason he’d want to kill me. But do we really know that he’s in league with a vampire? I know armies of the dead are associated with the Vampire Wars; in that case, the vampire was usually the one to summon the shadows. But there’s no vampire at the guillotine—from what I’ve heard, there’s a series of shadowmancers, none suspected of being anything else. Could Robespierre not have found the knowledge on his own, somehow?”
“It would be extremely coincidental, given that we know there is a vampire in France with at least some of the traditional abilities, and the knowledge of how to create an undead has otherwise been lost for generations. Besides… someone summoned a shadow for him to create the undead that nearly killed you. He does indeed have a series of people working with him at the guillotine now: Camille Desmoulins and Antoine Saint-Just, usually. But 1788 was before Robespierre had moved to Paris; he was a poor lawyer in the provinces, living among nonmagical or braceleted Commoners. Desmoulins was miles away, and braceleted. Saint-Just was a child.”
“You think the vampire was there?”
“The undead had been killed twice, according to the Templars. I told you this at the time, but you were very ill—you might not remember. The second time was your stake through the heart. The first time, it had been half decapitated, and—”
“—and drained of blood,” Wilberforce finished. “I do remember, though I hadn’t thought of it in years. Is that necessary to create an undead?”
“Not at all,” Pitt said. “But if you happen to be a practicing blood magician trying not to attract attention in a provincial town, I imagine you take what you can.”
The gentle autumn sun suddenly felt very cold.
“But why?” Wilberforce asked. “What does it want?”
“I don’t know what it wanted with you, in ’88. I’m not even entirely sure what it wanted with Clarkson and Saint-Domingue—unless it was to provoke war between France and Britain, and there are far easier ways of doing that. But the war, the breaking of the Concord, and the army of the dead—that, I suspect, is a vampire doing what vampires have traditionally done: take control, and expand their territories.”
During the Vampire Wars, vampire families had been on the thrones of France and England. “He’s removed the royal family from France. The throne is vacant.”
“Exactly. Robespierre is the closest the Republic has to a leader at present. The vampire’s working through him. He’s using Robespierre to take power, and to create an army of the dead that can expand France’s territory back to what it used to be hundreds of years ago.”
“He’ll want Britain as well, then. All the vampire kings wanted both Britain and France. King George’s magic hasn’t revolted this time, has it?”
“No. I saw him only yesterday. He’s well—very disturbed over this, of course, but well. I suppose the vampire is less directly involved with these undead. Though it might be only a matter of time. Magic is unpredictable.”
A thought struck Wilberforce. “Is this happening because of you? I mean… do you think this vampire is challenging you, in particular?”
“I don’t know. Perhaps.” He sounded tired. “It doesn’t really matter, does it? Not from a practical point of view. Either way, we appear to be fighting the first vampire war in over three hundred years.”
“Dear God.” Wilberforce was quiet for a moment. “What can we do?”
Pitt caught himself firmly on the edge of despair. “As a matter of fact, I think we can do quite a lot. Far more than we had any hope of doing before. Robespierre’s revealed his hand now—or rather the enemy’s hand. If we’re careful, and clever, and very fortunate, we might be able to put a stop to this right now. Because if we’re correct, we finally have someone with a tangible connection to the enemy.”
“Robespierre.” Wilberforce began to get a vague inkling of where this was going. “In fact, if you’re right, and the vampire physically helped Robespierre create an undead in Arras all those years ago, then that would mean he’s actually seen the enemy vampire.”
“Exactly. And that makes him our greatest opportunity. It’s why I very much hope that we’re right.” He started to cough, suppressed it, and moved on. “Because if we are, he can help us find it.”
“The trouble is,” Wilberforce said, “he would never help us with anything, ever. Especially you. He thinks you’re the devil incarnate.”
“‘He never could abide carnation,’” Pitt quoted absently. It was a sure sign his mind was leaping ahead somewhere else entirely. “‘’Twas a color he never liked.’”
It sounded familiar, and Shakespearean. “Henry the Fourth?”
“Fifth.”
“Ah. The one where they conquer France.”
“And just like that, the solution falls into place. We conquer France. That should resolve everything.”
“And they say in the papers that you don’t have a military mind.”
It occurred to him too late that the joke might not be very tactful under the circumstances; if Pitt minded, though, he gave no sign. “They’re quite right. So we’d better consider an alternative, just in case. The problem is, even if it could be brought off, I’m not convinced that talking to Robespierre would be the best course.”
He broke off to cough again. This time, he didn’t shake it off quite so easily; it sounded painful enough that Wilberforce frowned. “Are you quite well?”
“Not quite,” he conceded, a little breathlessly. He cleared his throat. “But well enough, considering.”
“Considering what?”
“Considering that I don’t have time to be anything else.” He shook his head. “It’s nothing serious. As I said, I’ve been in London for far too long this summer, and I’ve been rather overworked—I wouldn’t be doing my job very well if I wasn’t. You’re the one we all worry about. Eliot told me you haven’t been very well yourself.”
“Well, no. But I was stabbed by an undead on the eve of the French Revolution. I have an ongoing excuse.” A thought came to him. “It isn’t anything similar in your case, is it? I mean—the elixir still works?”
“It still works. I’m just taking slightly more of it than usual.”
Wilberforce stopped to look at him. “Since when? Why didn’t you say something?”
“I said it still works. Truly, there isn’t anything more to be said.”
“There certainly is. Why should you need more? You’re not using your Inheritance, are you?”
“Not in the way you mean—of course not. But I’m using it to stay alive, unfortunately. Blood magic is how my heart pumps and my lungs draw breath. It takes a toll. Besides—I’m not sure I can explain this, but even legal magic doesn’t work the way you might assume. It doesn’t lie around and wait to be taken up, like a quill or a hairbrush. Magic wants to be used. In times like this—times when magic would be very useful—keeping it from manifesting is exhausting in itself.” He sighed at Wilberforce’s expression. “All of which is perfectly normal, and what every Commoner magician struggles with every day. Please don’t be concerned. I’m not.”
“I am. Of course I am. How much is slightly more? Half again? Double?”
“Something like that. It’s not an exact science.”
“It used to be, didn’t it?”
“A great many things used to be. I think this path is going to take us back to the house before we’re ready. Do you mind if we sit down?”
Wilberforce recognized the change in subject; he let it go, but it compounded his list of worrying things left unspoken. “Of course not.”
There was a rough wooden bench under an oak tree, half-submerged in a mess of grass and dandelions. Once they’d sat, Battersea Rise fell behind the surrounding trees; as a result, the grounds seemed quieter, and more peaceful. The cloudy sky overhead felt like the curve of a glass jar, muffling the sounds of birdsong and voices in the distance.
“The difficulty about Robespierre,” Pitt said, as though there had been no interruption, “is this: if we speak to him or show any sign of using him to find the enemy, the enemy will know. We’ll never find it that way.”
Wilberforce nodded. “I see. But we have supporters in Paris, don’t we? If ‘supporters’ is the right word. Informers. Spies.”
“Des intrigants?” Pitt said with a smile, and Wilberforce smiled too, remembering their brief imprisonment in a Rheims police station. “We have many—not as many as Robespierre thinks we have, unfortunately. I don’t think there are as many spies in all of Europe as Robespierre thinks are in Paris. We still have two daemon-stones in Paris, though we don’t expect to hear much more from one of them. At least for now their possessors are still at large. But there’s very little they can do with this on their own. Neither of them is close to Robespierre. And if they denounce him, then they’re likely to be executed themselves. At best, if they’re believed, Robespierre will be executed in their place.”
“That would at least end the necromancy.”
“But it would lose us all trace of the enemy. We’d be back where we started.”
“Far t
oo familiar a location.” The abolition movement, after all, seemed to spend the end of every parliamentary year back where they had started. “So there’s nobody who will be able to help us.”
“Well,” Pitt said—so carefully, Wilberforce suspected he wasn’t going to like what was about to be said. “There’s Camille Desmoulins.”
His suspicion had been correct. “Camille Desmoulins. The spark that ignited the Revolution. The writer of the most inflammatory material to come out of Paris. The shadowmancer who stood at the guillotine when the Terror took its first victims. The… Please interrupt if I leave something out.”
“He was all those things. Because of that, we’ve had people watching him very closely since the Bastille. He’s difficult to miss, it must be said. And recently, it seems, he’s begun to show signs of remorse—or so our informers say. One of them sat beside him when the Girondins were put on trial.”
“And is it a person whose information you trust? Because you do that too easily, you know.”
“What do I do?”
“Trust information that you want to be true. Believe things are going to work out because they have to. Fail to consider the possibility that you are being misled.”
“I do consider that possibility.”
“But you tend to reject it. I don’t mean to criticize; there are far worse faults than natural optimism.”
“But possibly not less dangerous ones, in a time of war.”
Wilberforce sighed. “Please don’t be offended.”
“I’m not offended,” Pitt assured him, probably not truthfully. “I didn’t mean to sound it. I take your point, and in fact, Dundas would agree with you. He doesn’t think Desmoulins could be of any use to us: he’s far too unpredictable, for one thing, and he’s a true believer, not a pragmatist like Danton. He was calling for a republic long before anyone else dared. And yet, in this case, that could work to our advantage. There’s a very good chance he could turn away from the Terror.”
“But not toward us, surely? England and France are mortal enemies.”