by Anne Renwick
“And the witch might transform,” Dr. Farquhar insisted, his focus sharpening. “You promised I could present such findings to the Royal Society.”
“Just so.” Mr. Glover rolled his eyes as he patted the madman on the shoulder. “Should that come to pass, we’ll rearrange all our plans.” He looked to Mr. Vanderburn.
“Grab the earl. Our night’s not over yet. Decisions, decisions. Do we toss him to the kraken in the Thames? No, I suppose we need him found. We’ll dump him on his doorstep, like a cat gifts a mouse. I’ve no doubt his wife will be glad of a corpse.”
A smear of blood streaked across the floor as Mr. Vanderburn dragged her uncle by the collar from the room. Dr. Farquhar unhooked the overhead lamp, snatched up his bag and followed, mumbling about transformative powers of particulate matter. All while Mr. Glover limped away clutching documents to his chest that would twist her future to suit his purposes. All of them ignored her strangled cries.
The iron door clanged shut behind them, plunging the room into darkness.
Chapter Twenty
Bound and gagged and left in the dark with parasites worming their way into her heart, Colleen’s muffled cries tore at Nick’s soul. He ached to offer her comfort, but all he could do was breathe. One inhalation after another while the increasing cold of the floor beneath his cheek, beneath the entirety of his body, seeped into his bones.
Time passed and Colleen’s unsteady breaths smoothed as she fell into a drugged sleep. From time to time, she woke and fought against her bindings, dragging in panicky gasps of air about the gag. But inevitably, the drug dragged her under once more, leaving him alone with his thoughts.
The hellish scene he’d been forced to witness from the floor played out over and over in his mind. Colleen signing a slip of paper that legally bound her to Glover. Another that handed over her family’s lands. A blind vein puncture. A vial of nematodes.
No electrical cardiac pacer existed. No specialized device that could monitor a heart, shocking it back to life when it stilled. Instead, threadlike nematodes—roundworms—would complete the task. But how? Would they burrow through the wall of her heart to lodge in the muscular tissue between the two ventricles? Were their primitive nerve cords capable of conducting an electrical impulse from the top of the heart to the bottom, from atria to ventricles and outwards?
Without evidence, it was impossible to know. Farquhar’s mad ramblings about transformations made it impossible to believe any words that fell from his lips. And no proof that this might work existed—not even observational notes that another scientist might examine. All had been destroyed by the fire. Maynard claimed he’d witnessed success, but there would be no questioning the earl. Though it was impossible to mourn the horrid man, his cold-blooded avarice would have been preferable to the emotionally driven ravings of a spurned suitor who only wanted her for her lands, a crazed scientist who thought to turn his fiancée into a cat, and a mercenary guard.
Nick blamed himself for their situation. Distracted by a disembodied heart and certain Colleen would be safe upon the rooftops while her uncle attended a dinner party, he’d both failed to anticipate Maynard as the villain or to anticipate his trap. Keen to infiltrate the shadow committee, Nick had neglected to consider all the angles, including the possibility that she would make both the perfect hostage and the perfect human test subject.
Was there any hope of diverting the outcome of this madness?
His mind ran down a mental list of anti-helminthics that might kill the worm, but any and all vermicidal drugs that sprung to mind were either powerless to act outside the digestive tract or likely to kill a person if injected directly into the bloodstream. Not that it mattered. He could not foresee a future in which he laid his hands upon any such drugs before the creature was lodged in her heart.
At last the effects of the TTX poison began to ebb. Sooner than he’d dared hope, a testament to the thick wool of his coat sleeve and the reflexive instinct to yank the darts from his wrist and arm before the entirety of the toxin had discharged.
He heard Colleen wake with a gasp.
“Steady your breaths,” he said with half-numb lips.
Her ragged inhalations steadied. Grew slower.
He filled his lungs again. “No more tears.” The rag the bastards had stuffed into her mouth and bound with a length of linen would only become a threat if it began to slide down her throat. “My fingers are tingling. A few minutes more and I’ll have you free.” With the toxin flushing from his system, his own breaths came more easily.
Light. With Colleen’s keen eyesight, the faintest of light would offer a measure of comfort. He flexed his wrist, his biceps, forcing his hand deep into his coat pocket to wrap tingling fingers about his decilamp. Click. A reddish light began to glow. He tossed the miniature light source a few feet from his face, casting a faint silhouette of her lithe form onto the far wall.
“I’ll be at your side soon.” Freeing her, wrapping his arms about her, took precedence above all else.
The room was empty, but for them, the carpet she’d arrived in, an old wooden chair, and the black shadow of pooled blood. When their captors had left, they’d carried away a body and every other loose item that might aid them.
“Look about, Colleen. Hunt for structural weaknesses.”
He doubted she’d find any, but she needed a focus and every rivet, every seam must be examined. All they needed was to find a single fault in construction that might be exploited.
He pushed onto his elbows, then shoved himself onto hands and knees, and crawled to her side. Every movement taxed his strength, but his fingers found the rough fibers of the ropes about her booted ankles. The bindings fell away. As yet more strength returned, he lifted onto his knees and freed those about her wrists.
Her hands flew away, yanking the gag from her mouth. She dragged in a deep breath, then dropped onto the rug beside him.
“How bad is it?” he asked.
“The gunshot or puncture wound?” Her cool hands pressed against his cheek and her golden eyes flashed as she searched his face. “And I would ask the same of you.”
“Both. And I’m fine. Or, rather, will be.” He dropped his gaze to her bare shoulder. To the bandage inexpertly applied to the puncture wound. The men who had done this to her would pay. He’d see them dead or behind bars—or die trying. “But—”
“There’s no retrieving them, is there?” She shuddered. “The worms?”
“No.” He wished he had a different answer. “And no way to kill it without horrible side effects that would put your very life at risk.”
“Perhaps it’s not as awful as it seems.” She shifted closer, leaning against his side as he wrapped an arm about her shoulder for both comfort and warmth. “The cat sìth are known for being difficult to kill. And there are legends of wild women with amber eyes like my own, known for living alone deep in the woods, women with lifespans that far exceed those that most humans are allotted. If this particular worm somehow resides within their hearts…”
“Nine lives.” Nick considered the implications. “A cat with nine lives, and witches who can transform into them. You think the legends might have originated in your woods?”
“They came from somewhere.” She shifted. “If there’s a truth buried in the myths, what are the odds this could be a cure for your sister?”
“Roundworms do possess a nerve cord, musculature. Though such worms are usually parasitic, they might be able to live within a human in a mutualistic fashion, somehow regulating nerve impulses.” He swallowed. “But it’s impossible to know.” Nick’s gut twisted. He hated to offer her false hope. “Not without testing it.”
“On a human,” she finished. “In this scenario, me.” Her face hardened. “Dr. Farquhar plans to stop my heart—much like he did to Sorcha, to all the cat sìth before her—to see if it will restart.”
He’d reached the same conclusions. “Making it imperative that we escape. Even if you were willing to risk your life
in such a trial, Colleen, I’d not allow it here in such primitive, unsanitary conditions beneath a pub.”
“But in a hospital?” She licked her lips, then put on a brave face. “With colleagues that you trust?”
“No.” He stilled. Did she think him capable of such an act? “There are no circumstances under which I would agree to test such a thing on an otherwise healthy, young woman.”
Maybe over time, if he could independently verify Farquhar’s findings and after much consideration of every possible risk such a procedure could involve, he might agree to allow a desperate, sick patient on the cusp of death—someone much like his sister—to insert the worms. But he’d never stop a human’s heart on purpose, merely to see if such a cure was possible.
She rubbed her chest. “It appears I may have no choice in the matter.”
“Unless we manage an escape.” He traced a finger down the side of her face. When would he force the words past his lips if not now? “I love you, Lady Colleen Stewart of Craigieburn, and will do everything possible to prevent such an occurrence.”
Her mouth fell open, but before she could answer, he kissed her. Was he that afraid of a rejection? Yes. Very much so. He needed to believe they would have a future. Together as man and wife.
Mindful of her bandaged arm, he teased her mouth until both of their hearts beat a rapid staccato. What he wouldn’t give for a warm fire and a soft pile of blankets. Alas, there was nothing but cold metal, a stained rug, and a damp woolen coat. Never mind the frigid air. Letting the fantasy fade, he released her. Though still somewhat weakened by the various drugs and toxins that lingered in their veins, it was time to fully assess the grim situation of their current reality.
“Come.” He stood and held out a hand, pulling Colleen to her feet.
“About the heart.” Pride and concern wrapped about each other and cast a shadow over her face. “I almost made it out the window before they caught me. I found the rosewood box in my uncle’s safe along with pages upon pages of signed contracts arranging to sell a ‘cure’ to a number of prominent gentlemen. Your agency would have a field day, except—”
“Glover tore them to shreds.” With the intent to renegotiate. No doubt at a higher price point.
She nodded. “My uncle is—was—Cornelius Pierpont.”
There it was. Confirmation. “He bought back his own,” for lack of a better word, “product?”
“Worms.” She swallowed. Hard. “I took the vial. Directly from that rosewood box. And left my own gift in return. Glover has no idea I left a human heart in my uncle’s safe.”
A laugh burst forth. “Clever woman.” Not at all planned, but it would neatly tie the death of Mrs. Farquhar to the man who was soon to be found upon his own doorstep. Assuming they managed to both find and crack open Maynard’s safe. The police would be utterly confounded, but at least no blame could be laid at the feet of his family.
Colleen read his mind. “I imagine when the police swarm my uncle’s home, they’ll find the incriminating blood stains inside his personal dirigible. Moreover, Dr. Farquhar will soon be a hunted man, and he’ll waste no time pointing a finger at my uncle, a man who is conveniently dead.” Shivering, she wrapped her arms across her chest and stomped her feet. “Was it so very cold when we first arrived?”
“No.” He shrugged his coat from his shoulders and wrapped it about hers. It all but engulfed her. “No objections,” he added, when her face told him she was about to do exactly that.
She snapped her mouth shut, then smiled. “Ever the gentleman. Thank you.” She pressed her hand against the metal-paneled wall. “There’s a faint vibration. And the walls are damp with condensation.”
He picked up the decilamp and began to scan the riveted seams of the metal panels. “With the flick of a switch, our captors have activated a Linde’s Ice Machine, a vapor-compression artificial refrigeration system, outside in the hallway.”
“A refrigeration unit beneath a pub.” Her nose wrinkled. “That explains why it smells like soured hops, jellied kraken, and boiled tripe.”
“It also explains why they left us alone and unbound.” He moved the beam of light along a row of rivets, testing each one in turn. Each and every one was distressingly sound. “Cold saltwater brine is circulating inside the metal panels of this wall through a network of pipes. I expect the temperature will continue to drop, eventually inducing mild hypothermia.”
“Making us sluggish and easily controlled.”
He nodded. “We need to escape—or disable the pipes—before they return. Our best hope is to find a weak point.”
“Where in London, exactly, are we?”
Wounded, drugged and carried through the dank streets inside a rolled carpet, she wouldn’t know. “In the labyrinth of storage rooms deep beneath The Three-Eyed Bat.” He waited, trailing the faint light across the walls. Was she familiar with its reputation? Her muttered curse informed him she was indeed.
“There.” Colleen grasped his wrist and angled the light to shine upon the far wall.
He had to cross the room to see what had caught her eye.
As moisture collected upon the walls, it ran in thin rivulets to form puddles upon the floor. But one particular stream had pooled and caught upon the rust-encrusted bolts of a perforated panel affixed to the wall.
He stepped closer. Holding out the palm of his hand, he detected the slightest air movement. “A ventilation shaft.” The panel was only fifteen by eight inches. Not an exit for him, but for Colleen? At the very least, they might snag the attention of someone above it in the pub or on the street… “Is anyone there?” he called.
Silence.
Down this alleyway it surprised him not at all.
Colleen took the light from his hand and peered through the tiny holes. “It’s an old coal chute.” She winced, then drew in a deep breath. “I can fit through this opening and climb up the chute, but exiting? Standard coal holes come in two varieties. Twelve or fourteen inches in width. I can’t fit through the smaller hole, but fourteen inches? That I can squeeze through.”
“And find help.” Street urchins managed such a maneuver on a regular basis when an unsuspecting homeowner failed to latch the metal plate after a coal delivery. But there was no chance that he, a grown man with wide shoulders, would be exiting from such a hole of any size. He hated the thought of her walking alone through London in the middle of the night, but said nothing. She’d done exactly that for years. “But only if we can remove this grating.” He yanked a boot from his foot. “Let’s have a try.”
“Impressive.” She smiled in the dim light as he pried off the heel of his boot to reveal a flat sheet of metal cut to serve as a number of tools.
He held it before the light, triumphant, pleased he had something to offer. Can opener, screwdriver, knife—but most importantly—wrench.
“Glover and Vanderburn were too obsessed with the obvious weapons and missed a few hidden tools,” he explained. “I’ve a wire cord sewn into my waistband. Unfortunately, I should have worn a different coat, one with more options. A lesson to take to heart. You’ve never thought to hide any weapons within the seams of your clothing?”
“Only punch cards.” She smiled. “A short-sighted mistake I intend to rectify.” She joined him before the panel, rubbing her hands together.
He fitted the tool to a bolt, twisting. It moved, the slightest of fractions, but it was enough.
Over the next few hours, they took turns as one of them worked at the panel, while the other shouted into the grating or banged on the iron door. But to no avail. Progress was measured by the fall of bolts upon the floor. A few loosened and fell away with relative ease, but those that had rusted presented a greater challenge.
Teeth began to chatter as the temperature within the vault dropped. Slowly but steadily, the cold seeped through their clothing, their skin and into their very bones. The light of the fading decilamp illuminated the frost of their breath and their hands that grew stiff and numb and streak
ed with blood as they pried at the sharp edges of the panel. By the time the last bolt clattered to the floor, both shivered uncontrollably.
Clang!
The panel dropped to the floor.
Chapter Twenty-One
They both jumped back as the iron grille hit the floor, though not as quickly or as far as they ought. Reflexes and strength were ebbing. The only blessing of the cold was that it dulled the pain in her arm, though a gunshot wound seemed a trivial fact in the face of a greater horror should they fail to escape.
Colleen rubbed her arms, mindful that she wore Nick’s coat, leaving him exposed to the chill radiating from the walls. His larger size could only keep him so warm for so long. Overcome by the cold, they were bound to be helpless to resist when Mr. Glover and Dr. Farquhar returned.
Fear and anxiety kept rearing their heads. Trapped, her mind repeated, over and over. As her parents had been when the wind blew their train carriage off the bridge, plunging it into the river below. Had they been killed instantly? Or had there been a frantic scramble to escape before the icy water rushed in? She’d never know.
But here, beneath The Three-Eyed Bat, she had the benefit of time.
And now, the possibility of escape. She dragged in a deep breath and squared her shoulders. Nick loved her. Her. A sentiment he’d demonstrated in both words and actions. And, though her heart insisted she felt the same, her mind resisted speaking the words in such a cold, dank space.
Directing the fading light of the decilamp inward, Nick stuck his head into the hole.
“Please,” Colleen whispered on a breath of fog and ice. “Tell me there’s an ‘off’ switch.”
“Sadly, no. I see shadows of pipes to either side, but even if we managed to break one of them, we’d likely only flood the floor and worsen our sorry state.” He stepped back and held out the decilamp. “As to the coal chute, I can make out the original brick wall of the cellars, but the light is too faint for my eyes as it disappears into the darkness above.”