Eterna and Omega Read online

  Rose, ever adept at listening in, enjoyed Evelyn Northe-Stewart and Miss Knight as they compared notes on clairvoyance. Knight was exceedingly keen to learn further mesmerism techniques from Bishop.

  Andre and Blakely basically drank themselves complacent, with Louis hovering in rotation between his twin and Clara.

  Only Adira Wilson held herself apart; she mourned in her bunk, reading holy texts and keeping a silent fast while her husband lay cold in the cargo bay in a slim airtight metal coffin provided by the embassy. Reginald had converted to Islam for her—she had sacrificed so much to be with him, he would not ask for her faith in addition. Now she would bury him in accordance with their shared beliefs, in a plot of land watched over by the small cottage in the north of England they’d bought to retire to.

  Now and then Miss Knight or Rose would check on her and be sure she at least had some water.

  Conversations covered any moment the company had—good, bad, normal, or paranormal—that might bear relevance to tasks ahead, thickening a web of shared experience so the shadows could not slip through. Rose hoped Mr. Spire, reigning skeptic, would deign to see this kind of shielding as vital as any physical retaining wall. If nothing else, she would try to be the one thing he could believe in.

  * * *

  Spire, with Lords Black and Denbury in tow, met Eterna and Omega at King’s Cross, where the whole motley lot was assembled after having docked at Southampton and taken the train into the corporation of London.

  The teams stepped onto the main platform at the loud, luminous steam-filled hub, the morning oddly bright as rare sun cut distinct shafts through glass panes into the grand, smoky station. Spire was glad Miss Everhart’s eye was on him like a hawk the moment her boot made contact with stone and floorboard. They nodded at one another, and Spire’s ongoing irritation at being wedged impossibly between fact and phantasm eased at the sight of his compatriot.

  Introductions were made, with tipped hats, and gloves meeting gloves in firm or delicate shakes of hand. Once the obligatory pleasantries passed—only Lord Denbury lingered at Mrs. Northe-Stewart’s side to inquire eagerly after his wife and child—Spire separated everyone into designated groups with immediate goals.

  Spire’s intent was to get as many people on task as efficiently as possible. For his part, he wanted nothing to do with the Wards, though he was admittedly curious about Senator Bishop’s mesmerism. Spire was as dubious about mesmerism as a particular power as he was about Warding, but he felt that an enigmatic, persuasive personality could indeed have an effect on an audience and was worth some consideration.

  “Mr. Andre Dupris,” Spire said, “since you were aware of your brother’s work and then continued on with Mr. Stevens, you’ll please follow Lord Denbury here.” He gestured the two to stand side by side.

  The haunted young lord looked the tall Creole up and down, noting, Spire assumed, his aura.

  “He’s stable and loyal enough to bring to Dr. Zhavia,” Denbury said. “We’ll continue to produce as many Wards as possible, substituting English parameters for the ones you used in New York. I understand the man already has a mass assembled.” His youthful face had aged, and his tone made it clear that he was weary and desperate to be done with the business. Spire understood that well enough.

  Andre Dupris gestured to the air to his right. “My brother will come along to help, unless you specifically object to the presence of a ghost.”

  Denbury’s expression did not change, nor did he look at the spot where Louis supposedly floated. “They’ve saved my life many a time, ghosts,” the young lord said matter-of-factly. “He is most welcome.” Denbury led the living and dead brothers away to a carriage.

  Spire tried to keep a neutral expression during this distressingly casual conversation about specters, but he could see Everhart holding back a smile so perhaps he hadn’t been able to hide distaste.

  The Omega field team banded together to help Mrs. Wilson and the train officials unload the steel casket from the cargo car. Before joining them, Everhart said to Spire, “If you’re taking Bishop to Parliament, I’ll come assist you there. Utilize my office if you need; its passages would be of use to any of your guards or men.” She passed him a key.

  “Thank you, Miss Everhart, and welcome home,” Spire said with a small smile.

  She smiled back and strode off to help her associates so that Mrs. Wilson, clad in black from head scarf to boot, did not have to trouble herself with the many painful logistics of death.

  Only Lord Black stood apart, and now Spire waved him over to the Americans, privately surprised that the senator, his ward, and their best medium were so composed, courteous, fashionable and, if he had to bet on it, relatively sane. His bias against Americans as loud, inelegant, and generally troublesome evidently had run deeper than he’d thought.

  “Lord Black has brought his largest carriage,” Spire stated, “so we may strategize together en route to Parliament.”

  Black led the group out of the station to a four-horse carriage awaiting them at a side portico. Spire brought up the rear of the group and thus was last to enter and see that a man was already seated inside the cab. The medium, Mrs. Northe-Stewart, gasped in palpable recognition at the sight of him.

  The black-clad, black-haired man—streaked with premature gray—might have been handsome at one point, but he looked like hell made flesh at present. He held a pair of pistols, aimed at Black and Spire.

  “Gabriel Brinkman, what in God’s name are you doing?!” Northe-Stewart admonished.

  So here he was, Spire thought angrily, the mysterious man himself.

  “I am not sure I will last the night,” Brinkman growled. “So listen hard and quick. I am a brilliant man with nothing to lose, and there is nothing so dangerous.”

  “We are listening, Mr. Brinkman,” Lord Black said quietly.

  Spire examined how the man held his weapons, to see if there was a way of blocking or deflecting the aim. He’d just have to draw his own, hidden up his sleeve. But only at the right moment …

  “I have not done as either of you have ordered, Lord Black, Mr. Spire,” Brinkman stated. “For that I am truly sorry. I have, for the sake of the life of my beloved son, made deals with devils. My son’s life has been forsaken regardless, and soon I will forfeit my own, but not until I push hell itself back to its infernal depths.”

  Brinkman’s desperation was palpable.

  “Moriel took my boy,” the man continued. “He … was … the most precious thing to me in all the world, after his mother…” Brinkman trailed off, eyes watering. To Spire, making sense out of Brinkman fell into place. The agent continued, “None of you have children.”

  “I do,” Mrs. Northe-Stewart, growled. “My Natalie and Denbury, my grandchild, and for their sake—”

  “For their sake—” Brinkman overpowered her, his tone rising dangerously, “I expect you to stop the Society’s initiatives. I did my best as a double agent, trying to keep them guessing during their first assaults. My son was returned to me, but as a shell, a husk. His soul had been ripped apart from his body, replaced with something ungodly. I never did believe in God, but I most certainly believe in evil; it’s living in my boy. I have given up hope that he can ever be returned unto himself.” Almost to himself, Brinkman added, “I’ve searched everywhere for the canvas that might contain his soul and found nothing.”

  “We will do everything in our power to—” Lord Black began, only to be cut off by the wave of a pistol barrel.

  “Their rituals,” Brinkman said in a growl. “Never recreate them, you will only summon more demons. This is not child’s play. Stopping the possessed and the dread shadows requires knowledge of their preferences, rites, powers, and predilections. I do not have faith that the populace at large will be able to battle these forces—”

  “We don’t expect them to. That’s why we’re here, to help,” Clara said, her voice holding an edge for all this man had done to her team.

  Turning to Bis
hop, Brinkman said, “You’re going to convince Parliament the same way you did Congress, yes, Senator?”

  “I am,” Bishop said, impressing Spire with the confidence he exuded.

  “I’ve been long ‘assigned’ as a Society double agent,” Brinkman explained, “and my next orders are to spread Stevens’s chaos powder onto the floor of the House of Commons so that the members would all go berserk.”

  “I’ll gather my Metropolitan men to intercept,” Spire stated.

  “I doubt you can be prepared in time.” Brinkman smiled, a ghastly sight. “But a little terror on the Commons floor might work to your advantage.…”

  With that, in the next instant, the elusive man had opened the carriage as it rounded a slow turn, levied himself down in a nimble jump, and was off like a shot, Spire drawing the pistol from his sleeve and pointing it out the window, but Black closed the swinging door instead.

  Everyone sat in silence a moment before Mrs. Northe-Stewart offered a disturbingly matter-of-fact explanation.

  “Well, then, we’ve no time to waste. Lord Black, Mr. Spire, there will be three prongs of initiatives in play,” she began. “Some of which you have had experiences with already. If the experiments are similar, you will find first attacks upon souls, ripping them from bodies to serve as shells for demon inhabitation. Then reanimate bodies, powered by the dead whose body parts are collectively tied to the patchwork corpse. And last, via a powder that renders an entire change in a person from docile to violent, as Mr. Brinkman is describing, you will see this launched upon Parliament. The Master’s Society wishes to overturn the world order into his hands by devilry and chaos. There is good news that Mr. Stevens is repentant and under our employ and gave us a significant store of antidote for the violent toxin. We can dose the MPs.”

  Spire was focused upon what Brinkman had said about advantage. “Is the toxin lethal?”

  “Only if they harm themselves or others,” Miss Templeton replied. “So your men will need to safeguard those who can’t be helped.”

  “Brinkman may be right that these men will be more apt to listen to you, Senator, if the threat is real to them,” Black said, seeming loath to agree with their unhinged operative.

  The company was startled as the composed medium suddenly pounded her gloved fist on her satin-clad knee. “What good are these gifts with such blind and massive holes?” Northe-Stewart exclaimed. “I should have foreseen the scope of all this years ago! I know things.” Spire noted the pain across the whole of her stately body. Miss Templeton reached out to take her hand.

  Spire could not understand this medium’s gifts, but he did understand her agony. Every time he hadn’t solved a crime, caught a killer, overturned every stone, missed something that after the fact seemed obvious, he grieved and nearly tortured himself over it. No matter how many cases he had tried or won, it never felt enough. There was always something more he could have done.

  “These terrible matters put up walls,” Lord Black reassured. “I’ve been misled and lied to all along. We cannot blame ourselves,” he said gently. “At some point these devils seem to turn on ‘their own,’ and we can hope they do so quickly.”

  Spire turned to the nobleman. “Lord Black? If you want enough of my men to cover and attend to even a fraction of the hundreds of MPs who might be present, I need three hours and permission to say whatever I please to convince them. I was head skeptic of a team of skeptics. You can’t ask my men to join this cause out of belief; we’ll have to ask them to do their jobs as protectors of the peace and leave it at that.”

  “Three hours, Mr. Spire, you have them,” Black granted. “And yes, your judgment remains yours, thank you. Say whatever will get the job done.”

  Spire nodded and turned to the Eterna Commission. “Which of the American team feels confident in administering Stevens’s antidote?”

  “I can, and I will,” Clara Templeton volunteered. “I also advise, as we have enough of the treatment for your men, that they take it beforehand, as their keeping their cool is more important than anyone else, save ourselves. Senator Bishop will need to keep the subjects in thrall. Evelyn will need to read the room for threats and liars. I should be the tactician with the antidote, and Miss Everhart will help me.” Miss Templeton spoke with the kind of unflinching due process Spire admired, a quality that reminded him entirely of Miss Everhart. Those two must have got on well during the journey, like long-lost sisters. He hoped Everhart was doing all right assisting Mrs. Wilson; he looked forward to speaking with her.

  “Good. So we’ll assemble the masses and see what sorts out.” One by one, Lord Black took in the rest of his company, clapping his hands together in the tense cab. “Well? We’ve got to give Mr. Spire three hours. Let’s take your trunks to my home, my footmen will have the lot taken care of. We’ll take a moment of well-earned rest, then it is off to Parliament to rejoin Miss Everhart, await good Mr. Spire’s readiness, and see what kind of a scare those poor bastards are in for!”

  CHAPTER

  ELEVEN

  Clara was very taken by the understated grandeur of Lord Black’s fine Knightsbridge home, a neoclassical-style building with bright openness, simple lines and arches, wide spaces, an inordinate amount of verdant ivy in small ceramic pots, and white-paneled walls. She was glad to sit for a moment with a fresh cup of tea on a sumptuous divan in a large parlor where a set of French doors showcased a verdant rear garden.

  They were tended to by the most pleasant, and handsome, of butlers, a man who treated the lord of the manor with a fond fastidiousness that spoke of a closer bond than she’d have expected from an office traditionally groomed to be detached, quiet, and unseen. But Lord Black was a man of warmth and of equalizing. He made no one feel out of place or station.

  The guest room assigned her was white paneled, dressed in blue silk curtains trimmed with wispy lace, and bedclothes of the same, the upper walls lined with flocked wallpaper in floral patterns. She longed to lie down on the bed a moment and rest from the extensive travels, but she was afraid she’d sleep right through their next appointment, the most vital of all, as there really was no time to waste, especially considering the unpredictable Brinkman.…

  * * *

  As fond as Clara had been thus far of London’s sights seen from train, carriage, and street, she was most amazed by the beautiful Gothic Palace of Westminster, its extensive spires rising with breathtaking splendor alongside the Thames, a most glorious riverside sentry.

  The great vaulted Westminster Hall, which served as the base for the parliamentary expansion, led into modern, freshly built wings, though the Gothic sweep and pomp of its architecture made it classic and timeless. Designed by Prince Albert as a testament to his wife, the queen, it spoke of the grandeur of the Empire, and Clara found herself not nearly as fond of Capitol Hill in comparison. Perhaps it was the old soul in her that was so captivated by these halls instead.

  The House of Lords was all done in red, the House of Commons in green, and Clara noted how dressed down the Commons was compared to the Lords in its lobby and halls, corridors, rooms, and appointments.

  Black led them into the House of Commons, where the entourage was immediately accosted by various MPs in dark frock coats. Clara spotted the occasional decorative dandy-like cane, likely lords, a few peacocks among the gamut in bright colors or stripes, but most of the men seemed to prefer generally sober, functional attire.

  In response to queries as to why those assembled had been brought together, Lord Black only smiled.

  Just before a call brought the top of the first legislative session of the day to order, Harold Spire appeared at the top rear stairwell and offered a little salute to Lord Black. His men were ready, then. When they had parted, Bishop handed Spire a box of ample antidote for his men, and Clara hoped Spire believed them enough to have implemented it, along with her instruction that they mask their noses and mouths, as they could not be sure when and if Brinkman would strike.

  A rush of nerves flooded
Clara’s body; suddenly her corset was too tight beneath her shirtwaist, her bustle chafed against her back despite its being modified for a work habit, her skin prickled beneath her muslin layers, the room was too warm, and she was terrified that everything would go wrong.

  “Gentlemen of the Parliament,” Lord Black said once the roll was completed, standing and seizing the floor.

  There were a few calls of “Now what?” and “Don’t you lords ever get tired of bossing us around?” before a horde of police officers, Clara glad to see all in powder-shielding scarf masks, entered the House.

  “Do not be alarmed,” Black said, speaking loudly to be heard over the complaints and concerns of the lawmakers. “I have been advised by a commissioner of the Metropolitan Police that a drill is being run today, a—shall I say—Fawkes-ian preemptive measure, hence the masks to protect from imagined fire and smoke. Let them do their job as you do yours, thank you.”

  There was a hush and then a hubbub of voices as the parliamentarians considered this, watching Spire and Grange as they led sets of half-masked Metropolitan officers into the upper gallery benches.

  Lord Black continued from the Commons floor, Bishop by his side, glad that Lord Black invited a considerable contingent from the House of Lords to sit in for this special session. It seemed to Clara that Black had his own pull and mesmerism unto his colleagues. He was indeed an engaging, persuasive man. They were interesting complements to one another, these two contingents forced to become colleagues.

  “Gentlemen,” Black boomed over the hubbub, “if you value your lives and the fate of this country, you shall listen to this American.”

  At the word “American,” the air erupted with infamous hisses, boos, and general reactive shouts that emanated from parliamentarians no matter, it seemed, if the sentiment being expressed was favorable or hateful. It was hard to tell, Clara realized, what the British liked at all. Disdain, or the love of noise, seemed the default here.