by A. C. Cobble
Suddenly, she turned, holding up a shining golden object. “What is this?”
“We used it at the equinox,” explained Gallen. “It… it’s an ankh.”
“It’s covered in golden paint,” muttered Sam. “To be effective, it would need to be pure gold.”
“I-I thought it was just some item Robertson had come up with,” stammered Gallen. “It… We never tried to do real, ah, real sorcery with it. We used it in a ceremony at the equinox. It’s just some iron, I think. Painted iron. Robertson claimed to have bought it in a market in the United Territories. Said it was from a merchant out of Archtan Atoll, but no one believed him.”
“The gem is real enough,” mused Sam, holding the ankh up and turning it so a blood-red ruby caught the lamplight. “It’s an accurate model of a true ankh, and the gem alone would sell for quite a bit. From Archtan Atoll, you said?”
Oliver glanced at Gallen. “The United Territories do not trade with Archtan Atoll. That’s a Company colony, and the harbor is restricted.”
Gallen shrugged.
“Duke,” said Sam. “We know the countess came from Archtan Atoll, but we do not know of any reason why she would be in Harwick or how she got here. The assassin that killed McCready had piercings typical of that place, and now this artifact is purported to be from Archtan Atoll as well?”
“It could be coincidence,” he said. He shrugged at her look. “Maybe it is not, but three points do not make a pattern.”
“No, not a pattern, but a line perhaps,” she said and then turned back to her inspection of the shelves.
He roved around the rest of the room, his fingers trailing over the objects in Merchant Robertson’s study, looking for… something. He stopped in front of the fireplace and knelt, peering at the charred wood and ash that hadn’t been swept off the bricks in weeks. Smiling, he noticed something and reached out to push a small scrap of char-fringed paper loose.
“What does it say?” asked Sam from behind him.
“I don’t know,” he said, “it’s the corner of a glae worm transmission. There is a unique multi-layered paper the operators copy the messages onto. One sheet is torn away and handed to the recipient, and the other is stored in the station for a time. It’s a relic of when my great grandfather first learned of the glae worms and had the filament inside of them extracted and stretched to form the transmission wires. He was worried the technology could be used against him and he thought keeping duplicates would minimize the threat, as if a band of potential rebels would be unwilling to bribe a station operator. Regardless, it appears Merchant Robertson had some message in the last two weeks that he felt was worth destroying. A record of it should be at the station.”
“I’ll get the carriage,” murmured Senior Inspector Gallen.
“Not much to it, is there?” complained Oliver.
“Enough, I think,” remarked Sam.
“Enough?” challenged the duke, shaking his head. “How do you figure? We know Robertson received the message, but we don’t know who sent it. I don’t even know why he burnt the thing. It’s total nonsense.”
“It’s code, a confirmation of receipt of what he sent,” speculated Sam.
“That is even more confusing,” grumbled Oliver. “None of this makes any kind of sense to me.”
He slapped the message down on the table, startling the filament operator, who appeared to be wishing he was anywhere but there.
He ignored the man and began to stalk back and forth across the tiny room. In the corner, Senior Inspector Gallen huddled, eyes closed, and Sam collected the paper the operator had handed them. She read it aloud:
“The Mouth is in the dark. The castle is empty. A box is prepared to hide the blessing. Your sacrifice and blood will pay for your rebirth. You shall rise and I with you.”
“The Mouth could refer to the Mouth of Set as Robertson was a member. Set is a powerful spirit in the underworld,” murmured Sam. “A prince, you might say, a bit above a duke…”
Oliver didn’t rise to take her bait. Instead, he turned from her and saw the senior inspector’s face rise in interest. He scowled at the man, guessing Gallen had no idea the name of his silly society referred to an actual spirit.
Continuing, Sam added, “The castle is empty. This was sent… two weeks ago? Approximately the same time Miss Robertson went missing. The box and blessing… I am not sure what those mean, but the sacrifice and blood undoubtedly refer to the ritual.”
“The countess died during the ritual,” remarked Oliver.
“You must die to be reborn,” retorted Sam.
“That’s rather grim, isn’t it?” asked the duke. “Cutting off one’s face to gain new powers?”
“No one said sorcerers are a cheerful bunch,” responded Sam. She continued to study the slip of paper, lost in thought. “There was a box in the apothecary’s quarters, was there not?”
“An empty one,” he responded.
“A blessing… A blessing could refer to a favor granted from the underworld,” murmured Sam. “The Church would call it a taint. A powerful enough spirit is rumored to be able to touch the world of the living unbound. Perhaps the spirit of Set granted some gift or touched something in Countess Dalyrimple’s possession?”
“And she and Robertson were attempting to hide it?”
“Unsuccessfully, maybe,” speculated Sam. “Why was she in Harwick? She could have been avoiding another sorcerer, trying to hide… something. She was too late or the ritual didn’t work, and they killed her and Robertson?”
“It appeared Robertson was killed by his own man,” reminded Oliver.
“But why?” asked Sam. “That man had been exposed to sorcery. Duke, he was a crewman on a whaling vessel, I doubt he was a secret sorcerer. That means someone else was in town, someone else aimed him at us… or at the inspector.”
Oliver grunted. “I don’t have a better theory.”
“It is just that, a theory,” admitted Sam.
“The other end was in Southundon?” the duke asked the filament operator.
Silently, the man nodded.
Oliver closed his eyes and reopened them. “We need those manifests from the Company. I’m confident we’ll find Countess Dalyrimple arrived on an airship to Southundon then perhaps traveled here in a public rail coach or even on one of Robertson’s whaling ships. I don’t think the other members of the Mouth of Set know anything, which means the trail goes cold here.”
In the corner, Senior Inspector Gallen let out a slow sigh. Duke eyed the man and shook his head, turning back to Sam.
“The trail here is cold,” she agreed. “I don’t expect we’ll find out much more in Southundon, though. Both the Crown and Company are well aware of her murder, now. If anyone in the ministry, the peerage, or the Company knew of her arrival, they would have commented on it. I believe if anything, we’ll find she merely passed through in secrecy on her way to Harwick.”
“If not Southundon, it goes back to Archtan Atoll,” agreed Oliver, grim-faced. “If she was involved in… in these types of things, the evidence of it would be there.” He sighed and stood. “We’ve accomplished what we set out to do in Harwick. We have an idea of what happened to the countess. We have enough to inform her husband the particulars, and we have a line of inquiry for the inspectors to pursue.”
“Shall I-I…” stammered Senior Inspector Gallen.
“I did not mean you,” snapped Oliver, glaring at the man. “You should do nothing except preserve the evidence and ensure the members of your society stay in place. I’m going to request an inspector from Eastundon tie up the loose ends here. That means talking to you and your friends. Gallen, whether you have a job, whether you see the light of the sun again, will depend heavily on the assistance you give that inspector. If you obfuscate, if you steer them astray, I will personally become involved again. I trust I do not need to detail what that will mean for you?”
“I understand,” mumbled the senior inspector, his face crestfallen.
/> “Sam, I’ll send a wire to my brother. Then, let’s collect our bags and catch the evening rail.”
The Director I
“You saw a copy of the transmission that arrived on the glae worm filament this morning?”
“Of course,” muttered Bishop Yates, crossing and then recrossing his legs.
Director Randolph Raffles tamped down the snuff in his pipe, pushing the dark leaves with his thumb. He collected a match from the smoking table and brushed it against the striker. He took his time drawing on the carved ivory pipe, pulling in the flame, igniting the leaves, inhaling the smoke, and exhaling a fragrant gray cloud.
Through the haze he watched Bishop Yates shift nervously. The man sipped at his sherry, not meeting the director’s gaze, not answering any of the obvious questions that were to come. The white ring of hair that surrounded the man’s bald head stuck out like he hadn’t brushed it since the night before. His robe, strained with the task of containing his prodigious belly in the best of times, looked rumpled from where Raffles guessed the man had been nervously clutching it.
A slender man attired in the tight gray livery and crimson red neckerchief of the Oak & Ivy appeared at his elbow.
“Sirs?”
“Another round of sherry, I think,” remarked Director Raffles. “Yates, will you be joining me for the evening meal tonight, or do you have somewhere to be?”
The bishop glared at him but didn’t respond.
“Dinner service for one, then. Perhaps in half a turn of the clock when I finish my pipe.”
“Very well, sir,” said the attendant before moving away to fetch their sherry.
“You know I’m not comfortable meeting in such a public setting, Director,” chastised Bishop Yates.
“There could be nothing more suspicious than me appearing at the Church so late in the evening,” reminded Raffles. “And you can’t be seen around Company House without raising the ire of your subordinate priests. What do you suggest, Yates? We hide somewhere in the shadows? Everyone knows you enjoy a sherry or two, and I’m at the Oak & Ivy several times a week. This is the most natural place we could meet. This early in the evening, we have the place practically to ourselves.” He waved around the sparsely populated smoking room.
The walls were adorned with luxurious polished-oak paneling on the bottom half and dark green paint on the top. Spaced at even intervals, half a dozen uniformed attendants waited to rush to the arm of a gentleman the moment they saw need. A line of heavily leaded windows let in the only light so early in the evening. All of the other over-stuffed leather chairs clustered in groups throughout the room were empty. Only a booth in the far corner was occupied with a pair of merchants huddled close, boxing in a shipowner. They had no interest in he and the bishop. From the way the merchants were pressing the unfortunate shipowner, he’d be half surprised if they’d even noticed the bishop come in.
Before taking another puff on his pipe, he advised, “Hide in plain sight, my man.”
Bishop Yates grunted and tossed back the rest of his sherry. The portly churchman glanced behind his shoulder, looking for the attendant.
“What did you think of Senior Inspector Gallen’s report?” wondered Director Raffles. “Sorcery here in Enhover? It’s sure to stir the interest of senior Church officials, don’t you think?”
“I will handle it,” muttered Yates.
“Will you?” questioned Raffles. “Who was the girl that Gallen mentioned? I thought you sent an older man to accompany the duke.”
“The Church has the apparatus to address matters like this, you know that as well as I,” snapped Yates. “The girl is part of our organization, an apprentice to one of our knives. I had asked her mentor, a man named Thotham, to accompany Duke Wellesley. For his own reasons, he sent the girl instead. It’s better this way, I believe.”
“How so?” inquired Raffles, nodding at the attendant as he dropped off two more crystal glasses of sherry. After the uniformed man departed, he added, “Is it usual for your subordinates to ignore your instructions?”
“The knives don’t report directly to me,” muttered Yates. “Trust me. This is better. The girl’s knowledge of these matters is limited and she has no direct experience. Had she and Oliver been quicker, they could have found someone to question. As is, no one living shares any connection to… to anything else. But now that we have proof of sorcery from his own apprentice, I will ask Thotham to go to Harwick and destroy the rest of the nest. He won’t refuse this time because it’s exactly what his council would demand of him and he knows it. Within a few days, every member of the Mouth of Set in Harwick will be dead.”
“And if this Thotham is as good as you say, do you think the trail will end there?” questioned the director. “It was stupid, Bishop, letting these offshoots share a name with your society here in Westundon. It ties right back to you.”
“The trail will end in Harwick,” declared the bishop. He snatched up the new glass of sherry and before Raffles could comment, he added, “I’ve made certain. That fool Gallen doesn’t realize it, but he’s making sure all signs suggest there was no involvement from outside of the village. He doesn’t realize who he is working for, and when Thotham kills him, there will be no thread to follow.”
Director Raffles nodded and took another draw on his pipe, looking over the room. In another quarter hour, the trading floors would close, the mercantile houses would shut their doors for the day, and half the plush, wing-backed chairs would be filled with wigged and suited gentlemen smoking pipes, having quiet discussions, and attempting to yank on the strings that made the empire dance.
Raffles had been one of them, once, those eager old men trying to carve out their hunk of wealth and power. He’d moved past it, though. As a director for the Company, his income trebled that of his closest competitor. His ties to the Crown were both extensive and personal. He’d achieved what the other members of Oak & Ivy still strived for, and he’d be damned if the spirit-forsaken bishop was going to ruin it for him.
“Handle your people, Bishop Yates,” instructed Raffles. “Handle them better than you have so far.”
Yates snorted and rolled his eyes. “You’re one to speak, Director.”
“What is that supposed to mean?” demanded Raffles.
“Duke Oliver Wellesley,” responded Yates. “He’s one of yours, yes? A dedicated employee of the Company?”
“And a dedicated member of the Church, too,” answered Raffles sardonically. “On the Company’s charter, I’m his senior, but you know as well as I do that’s not the way it works. I don’t control the man any more than you and your cardinal, or any more than his brother or his father, for that matter. He does what he wants to do, as he’s done since he was fourteen winters.”
The two men eyed each other before finally, Yates declared, “I can control my people, Randolph, but Duke Wellesley is a problem.”
“The boy has a mind of his own,” agreed Director Raffles, scratching at his mutton chop beard. “If he grows interested in this investigation, there’s not much we can do to stop him from pursuing it. He’ll delay or cancel the expedition to the Westlands and follow whatever lead he thinks he has uncovered. I’m afraid any intervention would only make him more curious.”
“What if we use that?” suggested Bishop Yates. “Governor Dalyrimple deserves a personal response to this tragedy, don’t you think? We could ask Oliver to deliver the news.”
“He’s set to depart for the Westlands in a week,” reminded Raffles. “A mysterious murder may catch his interest, but I don’t think he’ll have much enthusiasm for diverting to the tropics and informing a man his wife died.”
“Unless the thread of investigation leads that way,” suggested Yates. “If we find he’s interested in pursuing the matter, we can make his interests and ours align. We can leave some clues for him to follow. We need to get the duke out of Enhover long enough that Thotham can clean up matters in Harwick. It’s best if Oliver doesn’t hear what will happen th
ere.”
“What if he finds something in Archtan Atoll?” wondered Raffles. “Don’t you think it best to just let Oliver continue to the Westlands? He’ll be out of the way there as well.”
“Finds what?” questioned Bishop Yates. “Do you know something I do not about what the governor and his wife have been up to there?”
“Company business, that is all I know,” remarked Director Raffles. He fixed the bishop with his stare. “I did not even know the countess was in Enhover.”
Bishop Yates grimaced.
“Why was she here, Gabriel?”
Yates sipped his sherry, not meeting the director’s gaze.
“Don’t take me for a fool,” he growled. “You knew she was meeting with your minions in the Mouth of Set. You arranged her death. What was she doing?”
“She arrived with an artifact,” admitted the bishop, “one that she brought from Archtan Atoll. It was blessed by…” The bishop leaned forward and lowered his voice. “Ca-Mi-He.”
Raffles blinked at him, stunned.
“I’ve secured the object, but I don’t know how she obtained it,” admitted the bishop. “My presumption was that nothing was discussed within your organization.”
“No, of course not,” muttered Raffles, struggling to comprehend what the churchman was telling him. “I’ve heard nothing.”
“The governor will be suspicious of any representative from the Church that arrives in his colony,” suggested Yates. “We could send a new factor as a spy, but there’s no one in the Company who outranks him and could do what is necessary, except…”
“Except Oliver,” muttered Director Raffles. He glared at the Bishop. “You should have told me.”
The bishop shrugged. “You know now.”
“We are supposed to be partners in this,” complained the director.
“We are partners, Randolph,” responded the bishop. “I am fully committed to the partnership, but like you, that does not mean I no longer pursue interests on the side. Be honest, if one of my flock approached your organization with an item like this, what would you do? Run and tell me immediately, or look into it? I admit perhaps it was a mistake to not bring you in earlier, but I am now. If you want a share of this, then help me.”