by A. W. Exley
“How did they cut it out?” Loki asked. “If it’s a foundation stone, doesn’t that imply there was a whole lot of wall above and around it?”
The count smiled but it didn’t reach his eyes. “I understand a band of very determined men chiselled this and two others out.”
“The thing is huge, Nate. We’re going to need a sled to drag it back to the Hellcat, and the weight will affect our time to return home.” Loki waved to two of the crew, who saluted and trotted back to the airship.
“Shall we have refreshments while the men labour, my lady?” The count gestured to the table under the pergola.
“Yes, please.” She hadn’t walked far and already her hips and knees ached. Amy said it was the ligaments in her body stretching, preparing her for the final event. Childbirth definitely took more planning and work than organising a boxing match between two peers.
“Loki and I need to calculate the weight of the stone.” Nate kissed her cheek and left with his men, leaving her in the count’s care.
The count poured lemonade that tasted of sunshine and revived Cara’s flagging senses.
Two women wearing loose-fitting cream blouses and cranberry-coloured full skirts appeared in a doorway, each carrying a platter of food that they deposited on the table. A murmured conversation in Spanish took place and Mancilla waved them away with a hand.
“It is called tapas and is traditionally served to guests and friends.” He slid a platter closer to Cara.
Before her was thinly sliced bread, pieces of meat, olives, pickles, and cheeses. For the first time in many months, her stomach grumbled. Cara took a piece of bread, and then layered meat and cheese on top. “I might need to convince our cook to prepare something similar.”
Crewmen returned with a sled to convey the stone to the Hellcat. Nate and Loki took measurements and did the calculations to estimate its weight. Cara was content to let the men work while she drank lemonade and picked her way through the tapas. Perhaps pregnancy wasn’t so bad after all.
She chatted with the count, asking about his hometown. That revealed his devout beliefs, which then led to a theological discussion.
“Curious that Lord Lyons won the bout when we are taught as children that good always triumphs over evil.” He stared at her over the rim of his glass with the sharp black gaze that revealed his intellect and cunning.
“Are you implying that you think my husband evil?” Cara glanced at the devilishly handsome man in question, clad all in black like the rest of the Hellcat crew. He wasn’t evil, but he certainly cloaked himself in shadows and dwelt in a world usually hidden from polite society.
The count placed his glass on the table and speared an olive with a small fork. “The Duke of Clarence is the supreme specimen of manhood. It was evident that he has remarkable prowess at boxing. Given a fair and equitable fight, I cannot comprehend how he was defeated.”
“So my husband is not just evil but also a cheat?” Cara pushed off the arms of the chair to her feet. The action caused the men around the stone to turn in her direction. “Thank you for your hospitality, but I’ll take my stone now and return to England.”
The men had huffed and sweated and loaded the enormous stone onto a sled to drag back to the airship.
“I wish you a pleasant flight home,” the count said. He nodded his head briefly as his previous civility was replaced by a colder tone.
A single bead of sweat ran down the side of his face and Cara watched its journey, fascinated. It wasn’t that hot in the shade cast by the building, but something was making the count sweat.
She walked to the stone and placed a hand on it. For such a large artifact, it had no effect on her. Even the smallest object emitted a faint tingle that tickled over her skin. There was only one reason why a supposed artifact wouldn’t register with her.
Cara patted the stone and then turned to lean against its solid weight as she addressed the count. “Odd that you make veiled accusations of cheating against my husband, and yet you are the one seeking to cheat us.”
Another droplet of sweat joined the first in the journey down the count’s face. “I don’t understand what you mean, Lady Lyons.”
“Don’t you?” Cara caressed the rough stone. It certainly looked ancient, and who was to say it didn’t come from an old structure? It would be easy to mistake one old stone for another, since they all looked the same and they didn’t exactly come with labels stating their point of origin.
“Where’s the real stone, count?” Nate caught Cara’s meaning and turned on their host.
They had to tread lightly, not quite sure of how the stone changed ownership. Cara only assumed that winning the bet had somehow transferred ownership to her.
The little man grew flustered, and his face turned red as though he had been out in the sun all day without his hat. He waved at the three-foot-high piece of rock. “Why, it is right here in front of you.”
“No, it’s not.” Nate crossed his arms over his chest at glared at the Spanish noble.
Cara cast around the space. If you had a foundation stone from the Great Wall and didn’t want someone to find it, what would you do with it? It had to be close by; Malachi said it needed to be near the heart of an estate.
She scanned the surroundings. The stone was huge, and she doubted it was hidden behind a potted plant. Nor was it under the table. Then her attention wandered to a stone slab being used as home for a range of brightly coloured potted plants. Geraniums spilled over the side and obscured the block from view with their flowers of red and vivid green leaves.
She walked closer and picked up a bloom, letting her fingers graze the stone. A familiar buzz vibrated through her fingertips. “I’m sure you are simply confused, count. An easy mistake to make. After all, one stone looks much like another. But here is the genuine foundation stone from the Great Wall.”
His mouth opened and closed. Caught in his own deception, he would lose face to admit he tried to cheat them. Instead, he took the out Cara offered. “Why yes, it must be. Silly me, we use both to hold the flowers, and I mistook which one to clear off.”
The men gave an audible groan. They had just hauled tons of useless stone onto the sled. Now they had to get it off and load the correct stone.
The count muttered about having other business to attend to and took his leave. Cara used the extra time to find Paniha on the beach. The two women waded in the water while the crew laboured to unload the wrong stone, lever on the correct one, and drag it out to the Hellcat and up into the cargo hold.
Two hours later, Cara stood on the bridge as Spain receded from view. “I can’t believe he tried to cheat us. Is there no honour among artifact collectors?”
“No. From what I have seen, they are a murderous pack of thieves.” Nate laughed softly from by her side.
Cara adjourned to the lounge and put her feet up. The journey passed quickly as Paniha told her stories of a magic-laden land at the bottom of the world and its fierce inhabitants. Before she knew it, they arrived in Lowestoft as evening fell.
“Now what?” Nate asked as he took Cara’s hand.
“We wait until morning. I’m too tired to think straight.” All she wanted to do was hug Rachel, have a quiet dinner, and spend several hours trying to get comfortable in bed.
After breakfast the next morning, they gathered in the yard and stared at the imposing stone on its sled.
“How do you make it work?” Jackson asked. He looked as unimpressed by the solid lump as if Cara had bought a three-legged horse.
Like most artifacts, what little written information she found wasn’t exactly explicit or instructional. “To begin, Malachi said it needs to be near the heart of the estate.”
Nate swept an arm around them. “Somewhere in this yard, then? It’s surrounded by the house, the barn, and the workshops, which form the heart of our operations.”
Cara pointed to a spot close to the barn. “Let’s position it by the barn door. If the count can use it as a potted-pla
nt stand, I’m sure we can use it as a mounting block.”
The men levered the stone from the sled while the dragons watched. Once it was in place, Cara approached and laid her hands on the rough stone. She wasn’t sure if she had to do the next bit or if the old goat Malachi had been teasing. He said she had to tell the stone that it was in position and that it needed to protect her home.
“You’re at my home and I need you to protect my family,” she whispered, feeling rather foolish asking a lump of rock to protect everything she held dear.
At first nothing happened. Then the stone began to vibrate under her palms. As the tremors increased, Cara stepped backwards. A boom sounded from the rock, as though somewhere deep in the earth a monster slammed an enormous door. The sound wave was visible as it rippled outward from the stone, becoming a snake that undulated under the grass and dirt as it raced towards the edges of the estate.
People gasped as the wave passed through them, and the dragons all reared up on their hind legs, ready to take flight. Then a loud crack, like the first blast of thunder during a storm, ripped through the air. The sky above them shimmered and, for a moment, turned to mirrored glass reflecting the buildings below and the people standing on the grass. The ripple dropped back to the ground like a curtain falling, and the sky returned to normal.
Nate glanced to Cara and arched one eyebrow. “I assume that means it’s working now?”
“It’s working. Although we’ll need one of your many enemies to try to cross onto our land to make completely sure.” Cara walked to Kirill and patted his side. At her touch, he dropped back down to all fours and tucked his wings to his sides.
The dragon called to Pavlin and Calypso, as though telling them everything was safe before he bent down to present his head to Cara for a rub.
“You’ll all be safe now, boy. Or so long as you stay on the estate.” She scratched his head and tried not to think of what would happen beyond the border of Nate’s estate. Bounty hunters could still lurk in the forests, in town, or out at sea waiting for their opportunity to strike.
Satisfied, Kirill approached the stone and sniffed at it. Then he gave it an experimental lick, which caused him to screw up his face and spit.
Cara laughed at his antics. “You’re not supposed to eat it, silly. Just leave it to do its job. It has created a perimeter that will stop anyone coming in to hurt you.”
Pavlin butted her head against Rachel. The girl scratched the dragon’s head as the other two took flight. A quiet, mournful cry came from Pavlin as she arched her head to watch them play.
“Soon, girl, Aunty Amy will take the stabilising rod off and you can test your wing,” Rachel said.
Kirill and Calypso flew in spirals around one another, or dared each other to plummet to the ground and pull up at the last moment.
Cara stood next to Paniha as they watched the two dragons circle above. “I worry about them as though there were my children. Sometimes I wish I could make them smaller so they would be easier to protect from all the men who would do them harm.”
Paniha clasped the jade dragon that hung around her neck. “We call our extended family whanau. It is not just the family by blood, but those by ties of strong friendship.”
“Whanau. I like that, and it is exactly what we have built here.” Cara rubbed her tummy. “Any time now, little one, and I promise you’ll be safe here.”
20
August
Two weeks later, Nan’s plans were about to be put into fruition. Nate was banished to another suite, and Cara, Rachel, and Amy all curled up in the big bed. For most of the night, Amy and Cara traded stories of their childhood. They spoke of the many times Cara escaped out her window and got into mischief, and Amy had to cover her tracks. Or quite frequently got blamed as an accomplice.
“You were horrible!” Amy laughed. “I don’t know why I was ever friends with you.”
“Because part of you longed to escape too,” Cara replied.
A wistful smile flitted over Amy’s face. “I tried so hard to be the dutiful daughter, and none of it mattered in the end. Then I did escape and discovered how marvellous freedom can be.”
They skipped the dark years, when Cara ran trying to escape her demons. Those long lonely years when she had tried to scrub another man’s crimes from her skin. Only her father’s death had brought her back to London and reignited the long dormant friendship with Amy.
“Were you sad that your father died?” Rachel asked.
Cara fell silent as she considered the serious question. She wanted to be honest with Rachel, even if it made her sound like a horrible person. “No. I wish I could say I was, but I was more relieved. He made a terrible decision, and I was the one who had to live with the consequences.”
“I hate my father for what he did to me, and I will never forgive him,” Rachel whispered, her attention on the mechanical arm. Silver fingers opened and closed and then formed a metal fist. “Don’t you hate your father for what he did to you?”
Cara drew a deep breath and held it. Then bit by bit, she let it go. Once, she had hated him. Then she saw a different side through the diaries he left behind, and she learned how to let go of the hurt in order to heal herself. Her father had been faced with a terrible choice, either give her to the Curator or sell her to Clayton. Perhaps he knew she could escape one, but not the other.
She hugged Rachel tight. “I hate the decisions he made.”
The young girl frowned. “Isn’t that the same thing?”
How to explain it to the child, when it had taken Cara nearly a decade to understand? “No. Sometimes good people wind up in terrible situations, and that pressure leads them to make horrible decisions. Your father and mine both made the wrong choice, and they will have to pay for that.”
Large eyes shimmered with unshed tears. “But we pay for it every day.”
Cara hated that she couldn’t wipe away Rachel’s pain. She had offered to restore the child’s arm with the phoenix feather, but her mind had been filled with the wonderful contraptions Nate could make for her. Cara wondered if the girl regretted her choice. Perhaps she should have insisted, but that would have left Faith in the realm of the dead, and Fraser would have joined her.
Cara smoothed the child’s frizzled curls and wished she could brush away her fears. “I have yet to discover an artifact that will turn back the hands of time and allow us to remedy horrid choices. Since we cannot alter what has been done, you have two choices. You can either dwell on it and let it consume you, or you take your remaining pieces and build something new.”
“Some days it hurts though, to think about it,” Rachel whispered in a small voice that seemed so lost in the world.
Cara pulled her close and kissed the top of her head. “I know. I can only tell you what I learned, which is that hate will destroy you more completely than any man’s poor decision. It takes bravery to take what was broken and make it into something else.”
“That’s enough of sad thoughts for tonight. We should be looking forward to all the excitement to come,” Amy said.
Cara smiled her thanks to her friend. “Quite right. Let’s talk about something happier. Where do you think we should take the baby on its first overseas holiday? Spain, Russia, or New Zealand?”
That led to a spirited discussion about which country would be the best place to start their international explorations, which lasted until Rachel quietly fell asleep on Cara mid-explanation.
The following day dawned with a clear blue sky and barely a hint of a breeze. Even the baby seemed to know it was an auspicious day and behaved, and Cara felt calmer and healthier than she had in many weeks.
The maid brought in a laden breakfast tray and set it on the table. Cara drank tea and nibbled buttered toast. Somehow butterflies managed to find a tiny bit of room inside her to flit their wings. Today was her wedding day, and despite her protests, excitement competed with the baby for space to unfurl within her.
“Silly, really. We were married
long ago. Then I moved into his house and conceived his child. The wedding ceremony seems rather redundant,” Cara said.
“Weddings are important. Back in London, my friends always talk about getting married and wearing a pretty dress.” Rachel chewed rich-smelling bacon while she smeared poached egg over a piece of toast.
“Not so much a pretty dress as a circus tent,” Cara muttered. Nate’s men were taking bets on when she would deliver. Her skin pulled tight over her belly and breasts. As Loki so rightly observed, she appeared to be smuggling an airship. Or at least the enormous air bladder of one.
“You look beautiful, radiant, and expectant,” Amy said as they dressed and she tweaked a fold of soft cream chiffon.
Cara let out a sigh. Deep within her, and almost completely squashed, was the tiny whisper of a childish dream to be a fairytale bride. What she saw in the mirror instead was a bridal whale. “If Jackson yells out there she blows as I walk down the aisle, I will shoot him.”
Amy looked delectable in a soft pink gown with a narrow bustle and short train. It had a simple square neck that revealed a hint of rounded bosom. The dress was almost austere in that it had no lace or adornment, but the simple cut added to its elegance. Her long, chocolate hair was gathered in a soft chignon, and a few wisps escaped around her face.
Her friend had come a long way from the garish fashion choices and hideous hats that she used to wear. Or perhaps she used them to hide who she truly was underneath. Amy had shed her former obnoxious style as the confident soon-to-be doctor emerged.
“Jackson doesn’t deserve you. You look stunning.” Cara hugged her friend and wiped a tear from her eye while no one was looking.
Amy took Cara’s hand. “Come on, let’s go surprise him and you can have your fun.”
They sent Rachel on ahead as lookout, to ensure the men had already left. When she gave the signal (a reedy whistle), they descended the stairs to find Nan and Nessy waiting with Rachel between them.