Immanuel ducked to the left as the man lunged toward him with the knife raised. Before the machete could make contact, a figure burst from the shadows. Judith raised the naginata high above her head, bringing the butt down on Alastair’s skull with a sharp crack. He stumbled back, a dark liquid oozing from his scalp that stunk of swamp water. Leveling his gaze to Judith, Lord Rose released a sharp laugh. Even with his eyes upon her, she stood firm, her knees bent and her grip firm on the naginata.
Without warning, he dove toward her. The clang of blades striking echoed through the courtyard. Using the length of the weapon, she kept him as far from her as possible, thwarting his blows with a twist of the pole. Immanuel watched Alastair’s undead form in horror. It moved with a quick, unnatural gate, as if the skeleton and muscles no longer worked in harmony. Judith drove him back toward the trees with a series of short slashes of her blade. Alastair took an unsteady step back before making a desperate dive. Judith spun and slid to her knees. The machete embedded in the pole as he forced her down. A groaning cry ripped through the air as she sank, her boots scraping into the mortar of the cobbles. Immanuel’s heart thundered in his throat. He ran toward them, swiping the back of Alastair’s neck with the electrified metal claws.
The man whipped toward him, and in that brief opening, Judith swung her naginata and cracked him in the temple. The side of his face sunk in a fist-sized dent, but he didn’t stop. He swung again, narrowly missing Judith by a breath. Sliding back, she sliced through his free arm. Vomit rose in Immanuel’s throat as the limb hit the ground and skidded away. Alastair didn’t seem to notice as his attention turned to Immanuel, his unnaturally cloudy eyes locking onto him. He raised his blade to hack into him, but a shriek broke through the night. Judith flew past. The curved metal of her naginata pierced through the revenant as she drove him back, the machete dropping from his hand. Alastair and the naginata’s blade slammed into the trunk of a tree. The force of the blow nearly knocked loose her grip, but she held firm, pushing forward until the blade was fully embedded into the bark.
“Winter, do it now! It won’t hold him long,” Judith cried, locking eyes with Alastair.
A deranged grin accompanied the suck of tissue and muck as he slid his senseless body up the blade, grasping the shaft for leverage. “He wouldn’t dare.”
Grabbing the dagger at her hip, she drove the blade deep into his chest and pinned him again. He thrashed, his blood-slicked hands slipping up the hilt.
Judith locked eyes with Immanuel, her face red with effort. “Winter, finish him!”
Immanuel shook his head, his body locked in place.
“You’re pathetic. Do you really think you can kill me?” Alastair said. The voice wasn’t the one Immanuel heard in his nightmares but the tone, the cut, was the same. Those horrid eyes pierced him, burning through him with their unwavering hatred as he worked the dagger loose. “I’ll come back again, and this time, I’ll make sure you die in the filth like the waste you are. You don’t have the gall to kill me, you little sod—”
Before he could get the word out, Immanuel lunged forward, sinking the triad of claws into Alastair’s neck. Electricity surged across his back and down his arm, sending the creature’s body dancing with convulsions. Bone slapped against metal as wet flesh tore. Alastair locked eyes with him, holding his gaze as what little light he had went out in his eyes. Judith stumbled back breathlessly as she watched Immanuel hold the trigger long after the life had left his body. Laying her hand on his arm, he released the gauntlet. Immanuel stepped back, staring at the corpse slumped against the tree as a sob escaped his lips. He covered his mouth, careful to keep the metal tines tipped with putrid flesh away from his face.
It was over. It was finally over.
Shrugging the machine from his shoulders, he laid it under the ring of lamp light. He twisted open the brass ribs and watched a shadow shimmer within the quartz jar. As he dislodged it from the needle, a face roared at the side before fizzling into motes of dust. Immanuel thrust it aside, the strength seeping from his limbs. The damp cobbles soaked through his trousers as he sank down and watched Judith yank the naginata from the tree and the putrid corpse before severing its head with a sharp slash. Bile rose in Immanuel’s throat at the stench emanating from the body. Before he could stop himself, he vomited, grasping the lamppost for support. Wiping his mouth with his handkerchief, he hung his head and closed his eyes. A moment ago, the man had been alive and trying to kill him but now— It all seemed so unreal. If Judith hadn’t been there, he would have thought it had all been a trick of his mind.
“It will take days to get the smell out,” she muttered under her breath as she stepped over the disarticulated arm and came to Immanuel’s side. She patted his shoulder before resting the naginata against the lamppost. “The others should be out soon to clean up our mess. How are you holding up?”
He rubbed his face and eyes. “I don’t know. I— I keep thinking. Why couldn’t I have figured out all of this before? If I had known I had this ability, that magic was real, maybe— maybe my life could have been different. Maybe I could have gotten out and not— and not—”
Immanuel swallowed down the cry in his throat, hot tears burning the backs of his eyes. Raising his head, Judith’s stern form disappeared into the clouded portion of his vision. Maybe that wouldn’t have happened if he had been able to save himself.
“This may be hard for you to hear, but sometimes the most horrible circumstances are what bring out our greatness.”
“How can you say that?”
“Because it happened to me.” Voices rose from the doorway. The thin beam of a torch cut through the evening murk as a pair of men emerged. “Come on, let’s go back to my office. I’ll have Cassandra make you a cup of coffee before you go home.”
“No, I really should go. Adam doesn’t know where I am.”
“It will only be a moment. I just want to make sure you have your head on straight before you leave. Grab the machine and jar, would you?”
Giving into the numbness, Immanuel gathered the pieces of the machine, careful to avoid the dismembered body only feet away. He couldn’t bear seeing the horrors of the man’s final moments. Climbing the steps behind Judith, he watched in silence as she handed off her weapon to the silent Caldwell, who waited inside the door. With his other hand, he took the soul-stealing device, but when he reached for the quartz jar, Immanuel held it tight to his chest and turned away. He wanted to be as far from Lord Rose as possible, yet he couldn’t turn him over, not yet. Judith whispered something to the strange man, and he strode down the hall without looking back. As they entered a set of well-lit corridors, men and women rushed past, heading down to the courtyard. They stared at Immanuel a little longer now, but he averted their gazes, not wanting to know what they saw when they looked at him. He wasn’t one of them, he wasn’t a member of their ranks. He was merely an outsider who possessed a power he couldn’t even control. A man consumed by fear beneath the surface.
At the top of the tower, Cassandra stood waiting for them. Her face was ashen against her dark hair, but when she saw them emerge from the narrow staircase unscathed, her features brightened.
“Cassie, would you please find a cup of something hot for Mr. Winter? Something to steady his nerves.”
She nodded and disappeared into one of the closed rooms. Sinking into the chair at the end of the desk, Immanuel finally relinquished his hold on the jar and sat it far from him. Lord Rose’s black soul darted from edge to edge as if looking for a means of escape, lingering at the side where Immanuel sat. Miss Elliott perched on the corner of her desk, regarding Immanuel with narrowed eyes until her face broke into a smile upon seeing Cassandra return with a tray. She poured each of them a cup of thick, dark coffee before joining her partner on the desk. Immanuel took the offered cup, holding it far enough from his nose that his stomach didn’t churn at the smell.
“What will they do with him? Will he be somewhere far from people so he can’t escape?�
�� Immanuel asked as he feigned taking a sip of scalding coffee.
“Have you heard of the legend of King Solomon and the djinn? No? Well, you use his method for troublesome creatures. Lord Rose’s jar will be sealed with lead, sequestered in a locked box, and put in a vault where he will never see the light of day again. You needn’t worry that he’ll escape. Even if his jar breaks, the lead will hold him in.”
“Are you feeling any better?” Cassandra asked, watching him take a sip with a wince.
“Much better, thank you.”
“Now that you’re a bit more steady, I must warn you that Lady Rose may come after you,” Judith began cautiously. “She no longer has her revenant to do her bidding and she still needs the vivalabe. You need to be careful. Unlike Alastair Rose, she has no feelings attached to you, which will make you that much easier to dispose of.”
Immanuel swallowed hard, the cup clinking against its saucer.
“You’ll need to be especially careful this coming week.”
“Why?”
“Oh, I never did get to the point before, did I? We aren’t completely certain what, but Lady Rose and the Eidolon Club are planning a powerful ritual, an evocation. A ritual of this scale can only occur on a day when our world and the spirit world line up. The next time that happens is the summer solstice.”
“The solstice is this Wednesday. Mein Gott.” Immanuel’s eyes widened as the realization wrung the air from his lungs. “So is the museum gala.”
Chapter Twenty-Five
Ruined Plans
Emmeline stared out the window, her head resting on the cool wood of the sill. Below, people passed along Wimpole Street unaware of ghosts or demons or the realm that lay just beyond their field of vision. Her head still pounded from the brew Claudia had given her, but that wasn’t what bothered her. After her argument with Cassandra, she had begrudgingly slept the night on the sofa with the spare nightgown carefully folded on the end table. At the first sound of Cassandra and Judith stirring, Emmeline gathered her purse and disappeared out the front door. On the walk home, she braced herself for the tirade her aunt would deservedly unleash on her, but when she opened the front door, Aunt Eliza barely glanced up from the newspaper.
“Aren’t you going to ask where I’ve been all night?” Emmeline asked from the doorway, her voice tighter than she had expected it to be.
“No, it’s time I let go. You were right. I must trust that you can make the right decision. Is there a reason for me to be worried?”
“No.” What had Eliza thought when she saw her come in with her hair a wild mess, her dress from the night before crinkled, and her eyes bloodshot? Anger and sadness welled in her throat as a knot of spite. She wouldn’t let anyone think the worst of her. “If you must know, I fell ill and spent the night at Cassandra’s. That’s all.”
Emmeline bolted up the stairs and slammed the door behind her as a cry worked from her throat. How could anyone care for her after what she had done? She lost her best friend and alienated her aunt, her only allies, within the same day. Up in her room, she lay staring at the ceiling, half dozing in hopes that the tears and anger would conjure a solution. Hours later, when, the sun had grown hot against her cheek and blazed through her closed lids, she blindly groped under her mattress for the grimoire. Remembering it was no longer there, she fell back onto the mattress. She wished she had understood what the Corpus Grimoire contained before her initiation. Maybe then she could have understood why what she did was supposedly wrong. Cassandra knew but hadn’t given a reason. Why?Why had she kept it from her? her mind screamed. Had Cassandra thought she was protecting her? From what? She buried her head in the pillow and closed her eyes, pulled into an escapist sleep. When she awoke in the evening, her neck had grown so stiff that she could barely move. Rising, she crossed the room and pulled the stool from her vanity in to the window. Her stomach growled and her hands shook, but she refused to leave her room. She couldn’t bear to face anyone, most of all her own reflection as she crossed the boards.
No one had visited her. No one had even questioned her or lectured her. No one cared enough to do so. Raising her eyes to the window, she watched a steamer roll down Wimpole Street, its passage only remarkable in its hesitation. A hired cab would barrel down the street and throw it in reverse if it missed its mark, but as the steamer neared the house, Emmeline could make out a vibrant coat of arms painted on the door. It seemed so familiar with its twisting dragon and crescent moon. Her heart thundered as cold sweat broke across her back. What was he doing here? Below, Lord Hale’s driver opened the door and he swept out of his steamer. His auburn hair rustled in the warm breeze as he looked up but didn’t see her. Emmeline forced open the window and stuck her head out as far as she could manage without falling.
“Lord Hale! Lord Hale, up here!” she cried, keeping her voice low but sharp.
He paused, looking up and down the street for the source of the voice before continuing toward the front door. Emmeline gritted her teeth. That man would ruin everything if he came to confess what had happened the night before to her aunt and uncle. She had salvaged whatever dignity she had left in Eliza Hawthorne’s eyes, and he was not going to undo her lies with a noble conscience. Quickly slipping into a clean gown, she brushed out her hair, not caring as her ringlets turned into an unruly poof. She had to get down there and weave a tale that knit their versions of the previous night together. Racing down both flights of stairs, she rounded the corner to find the front parlor empty. Glancing out the front window, she found the steamer still idling across the street, but Lord Hale was nowhere to be seen.
“If it’s Lord Hale you’re looking for, he’s up in the study with your uncle.”
Emmeline turned to see her aunt watching her from the steps, her face set in a cultivated coolness.
“I didn’t invite him,” Emmeline replied quietly. “Did he say what he wants to discuss with Uncle James?”
“No. All he said was it was important and that he had to speak to him as soon as possible. Should I be worried, Emmeline?”
“No! Why do you keep saying that?”
Eliza ignored her, slipping past her to don her cloak and gloves at the door. “I’m going to the bank to open an account for you. If you would like your independence, then you shall have it. Though I doubt it will be for long.”
Emmeline stared at her aunt with furrowed brows as Eliza stiffly excused herself and left. She stared at the door, unable to tell if she had destroyed what little remained of their relationship or if her aunt was learning to respect her, no matter how begrudgingly. Padding up the steps, Emmeline lingered outside the shut study door, but all she could make out were muffled voices and the occasional word. Her body ran cold as she retreated to the front parlor to wait for the verdict. Even if Cecil contradicted her, Uncle James probably wouldn’t even look at her, let alone punish her. It wouldn’t be until Aunt Eliza returned that she would learn of her fate. Emmeline’s stomach churned, pulling and deepening as if fear had carved a void within her. Curling up in the corner of the sofa, Emmeline snatched her half-finished embroidery from the sewing basket beside it and applied herself to stabbing the minute stitches into the linen. No matter how much she tried to shut out the faint repartee of voices upstairs, the knots refused to leave her stomach.
If only her mother was alive. Her mother would have loved her no matter what she did, no matter how much of a disappointment she turned out to be. She wouldn’t have treated her like unworkable clay. She would have sat her down the moment she saw a sign of distress and asked her what the matter was, and Emmeline would have told her everything. She would have told her mother about Cassandra and Lord Hale and the Eidolon Club and the book. Her mother would have known what to do and would have kept them both safe. But that was impossible now.
Emmeline snapped from her reverie, pawing at her moist cheeks as the study door squealed open. Boot-treads too slow and steady to be her uncle’s clopped down the steps, pausing at the parlor doorway. Without lo
oking, she knew who it was, and more than anything, she wanted to bolt from the room and escape Lord Hale’s lingering gaze. She didn’t want to see her uncle’s reaction written on his face, and she certainly didn’t want him to see what the initiation had done to her, how she had unraveled from the inside out. When she finally turned to face him, she was shocked to find Lord Hale grinning affectionately at her.
“Your uncle would like to speak with you.”
Drawing close to him so only he could hear, Emmeline asked, “Cecil, did you tell him about last night? What did you say? We need to make sure our stories make sense.”
“Last night? Why would I talk to him about that?” he replied with an ochre brow cocked in confusion. “No, I came to— I shouldn’t say anything until you have spoken with your uncle.”
Emmeline stared into the nobleman’s eyes. Behind their somber, cultivated exterior was a gleam of joy, which only worsened the pit in her stomach. Her mind raced to concoct an explanation for not returning until the next morning. At the top of the steps, she paused, putting on her widest, wettest eyes, which, under the circumstances, wasn’t hard to do. In his study, James Hawthorne sat at his desk, his ink-stained hands clicking across the keys of his typewriter. Emmeline crinkled her nose at the faint smell of formaldehyde and rot. She hated his office with its shelves of bloated specimens and bowler hat-wearing skeleton in the corner. If she looked closely any given day, she could spot gruesome postmortem photographs strewn between autopsy notes so detailed she could vividly picture every wound and body as if they were her own.
Without looking up from his notes, James said, “Come in, Emmeline, and close the door.”
Doing as she was bid, Emmeline shut the door behind her and sat in the hard chair at the other side of his desk, locking eyes with the mummified head on the shelf behind her uncle. On the desk were two glasses. The one closest to her had been drained while her uncle’s retained a thin layer of what looked like port.
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