Maelstrom (21 page)

“Not at all,” I said staunchly. She gave me
a skeptical look, and I winced. “Well, yes. But Iskander loves you
anyway. Just be here tomorrow night, grit your teeth through the
floral arranging, and compliment him on his hard work.”

“You’re right.” She rose to her feet. “It’s
only one more day. If we can make it through tomorrow, everything
will be perfectly fine.”

Griffin

I took the Curved Dash to Boston the next
morning. Given that Christine and Iskander’s wedding was less than
twenty-four hours away, I didn’t wish to find myself beholden to
train schedules, as I had no idea when I’d find myself free.

With any luck, Mr. Quinn’s visit would prove
to be on some museum business or other, completely unrelated to the
cult. He’d visit a bookshop or antiquities collector and be on the
return train to Widdershins within a few hours.

As the Curved Dash would draw too much
attention, I left it a good distance from the train station and
went on foot to wait for Mr. Quinn. I’d dressed the part of a
modest salesman, my suit just slightly out of style, and carried a
somewhat worn sample case. Inside the case were my ordinary
supplies: lock picks, binoculars, a spare hat and coat in case I
needed to change. My revolver I kept in my coat pocket, where I
could reach it quickly if the need arose.

I desperately hoped it wouldn’t. If I were
injured, Whyborne would never forgive me. If I were worse than
injured, he’d never forgive himself.

I arrived at the station shortly before the
morning train from Widdershins, where I loitered about and
pretended to study the schedules, keeping a close eye out for Mr.
Quinn as I did so. Soon enough, I spotted him in the crowd, looking
like a crow in the midst of a gaggle of chickens. He carried only a
small valise. Whatever business he had in Boston, he obviously
didn’t expect it to take long.

I followed him at a distance. He made his
way from the bustle of the city’s heart, and soon we were in yet
another residential neighborhood. The July sun made the cheerfully
painted houses look even brighter, and the laughter of children
echoed through the street. Women called neighborly greetings to one
another as they hung out their laundry, and brilliant flowers
bordered the walk.

Quinn looked horribly out of place. He
walked quickly, leapt out of the way of a gamboling puppy, and
scowled at a woman who wished him good day.

What possible business did he have in a
place like this? Had some family found a valuable tome in their
attic, or as part of an inheritance? Or had the cult’s corruption
infiltrated this seemingly wholesome neighborhood? God knew I’d
seen enough with the Pinkertons to realize the ugliest truths
sometimes lurked behind the most pleasant masks.

Still, this wasn’t Widdershins. Neighbors
might ignore a cult there, but here? Surely the sight of men in
robes, the mere glimpse of an unholy symbol, would be viewed as
cause to summon the police.

Quinn paused outside of a house, and I
slowed so as to remain unnoticed. He seemed to be steeling himself
for something. Straightening his shoulders and holding his chin up,
he marched to the front door and knocked. Within moments, it
opened, and he vanished within.

I strolled past, making note of the address.
I’d take it with me to the Pinkerton office here in Boston and give
it to my friend to look into who owned it. Perhaps he’d even have
found something on the old Somerby estate for me by now.

Not just yet, though. Quinn might have other
destinations in mind. Or I might be able to spot some clue as to
what might be going on inside.

I took my time, circling back as indirectly
as possible while still keeping the house in sight. A tall fence
separated it from the house on the left—the remnant of some
long-ago feud between neighbors, perhaps. Old rose bushes had
overtaken the rusting fence, forming a thick hedge adorned with
hundreds of bright pink flowers.

It seemed my only chance at drawing near
with any hope of concealment. I slipped into the gap between
houses, moving as cautiously as possible. The heady scent of roses
perfumed the air, and bees droned lazily from one bloom to the
next. I tried to peer between the thorny canes, but the bushes were
too thick to make out anything beyond indistinct patches of
color.

Then came a sound that froze my blood,
despite the warmth of the summer sun. Two people murmured a chant
in unison. I couldn’t make out the words, but the voices belonged
to children.

~ * ~

I had to act. Ival might never forgive me,
but if the cult were using children in its abominable rituals, I
couldn’t risk going to the police for help. By the time we
returned, they might be dead, slaughtered just as Tubbs and the
other sacrifices were.

The hedge ended at the back of the property.
I drew my revolver and offered up a prayer. Then, holding my gun
firmly, I stepped around the end and into the yard.

“Hold still!” I shouted. “Or I’ll...”

My words died away. Mr. Quinn sat at a table
on the patio behind the house. On either side of him were two
little girls, twins dressed in identical frilly dresses. Across
from him was a golden-haired doll, and on the table was a miniature
set of teacups and pot.

For a moment, we all stared at one another
in horror. Then Mr. Quinn rose to his feet, with all the dignity he
could muster, given the situation. “Mr. Flaherty. What an
unexpected pleasure.”

I lowered my revolver. The two girls stared
at me with silvery eyes very similar to Quinn’s own. Then one
asked, “Have you come to join our tea party?”

“Rose, Lily, why don’t you go see if your
mother has finished the cake yet,” Quinn suggested.

Naturally, at the suggestion of cake, both
children rushed into the house. Mr. Quinn crossed the lawn and
stood before me. “I must confess, I’d hoped no one in Widdershins
would ever learn about this,” he said. “I don’t wish to be rude,
but why are you here?”

My heart sank. Either I’d given myself away
to a maniac who happened to enjoy tea parties with dolls between
bouts of murder, or I’d been entirely mistaken as to Mr. Quinn’s
involvement in the cult. “I heard chanting,” I said, deciding to go
for the most immediate answer. “In children’s voices. I thought
they might be in trouble.”

“It’s more a poem than a chant,” Quinn
said.

“Listen up little fish, little fish,

Let’s make a wish, make a wish,

For a time not come but yet to be,

One for the land, and one for the sea.

“I’m certain you’ve heard of it,” he
finished dryly.

“You aren’t ketoi,” I said, then cursed
myself. No need for him to know of my shadowsight.

“The prophecy concerns Widdershins,” he
replied, a bit stiffly, I thought. “And all who live within it, on
the land and in the sea. There is no need to question my
loyalty.”

I was missing something, that much was
clear. “So why were you teaching those girls the poem?”

“They’re my nieces. My sister married a
Boston man, and moved...here.” Quinn surveyed the sunlit yard and
pink roses as though affronted by their very existence. “Her
husband doesn’t approve of Widdershins. But the children deserve to
know their true heritage. Today is their birthday, and as their
father is blissfully away, I came to visit them.”

“And play with dolls.”

“Very ordinary ones, I’m afraid.” His thin
lips pressed together in distaste. “When my sister and I were
little, we had the most lovely doll. It would whisper secrets to us
at night, once all the adults were asleep.”

The sunlight seemed to lose some of its
warmth. “I...see.”

“Sadly, the toys here know no secrets. They
are mere objects.” He sighed. “But I do what I can for the girls,
anyway.”

I was having less and less trouble imagining
why the girls’ father disapproved of Widdershins. “That’s very, er,
good of you.”

“Yes.” He turned his pale eyes on me. “So
why are you here, Mr. Flaherty? Did Dr. Whyborne send you?” The
thought appeared to improve his mood, and he offered me a somewhat
worrisome smile. “Am I needed?”

There seemed no point in dissembling any
further. “We thought someone at the museum was involved in a cult.
Your name kept appearing—on Mr. Lambert’s client list, in requests
for the map that was stolen from the hall of records, and of course
in association with the Wisborg Codex.”

Quinn drew himself up in obvious affront.
“You believe I would steal a book?” He made it sound as if I’d
accused him of dancing naked in public.

“It was an honest mistake,” I replied. “And
I saw a doodle of a swirl symbol among your things. The same symbol
that appears on the altars where men have been recently murdered.
And in the stolen codex.”

“Where did you...never mind.” Quinn’s
expression had gone icy. “It is not a swirl, Mr. Flaherty. It is a
vortex, turning widdershins.”

Of course. I felt a fool not to have seen
it. Still... “And why would you draw such a thing?”

“Because I know my place, sir.” Quinn peered
down his long nose at me. “I am loyal to Widdershins. I admit I
didn’t recognize him when he first stood before me, but I have done
all I could to make up for my mistake in the two years since.”

I frowned. “Wait. Do you mean the town? Or
Whyborne?”

“Really, Mr. Flaherty.” For a moment it
seemed he might laugh at my foolishness. “You speak as though
there’s a difference.”

Whyborne

I spent most of the day trying not to worry
about Griffin. He’d promised not to take any risks, and I believed
he truly meant that. The problem was, in a case such as this one,
risk tended to find us whether we wished it to or not.

I tried to lose myself in my translation of
the cuneiform fragments. I was beginning to think Jensen was in
fact on the right track with his suggestion that Gilgamesh and
Enkidu had a more intimate relationship. After all, the same verb
was used in their interaction as between Enkidu and the courtesan
Samhat.

“I pressed myself upon him
like a wife.”
Not the way I would have
phrased it, of course, but it seemed to me their relationship had
an erotic component. Perhaps even more than that.

Which thoughts sent me back to considering
my own husband, and returned me to worrying about him once
again.

I left the museum as soon as I reasonably
could. “Will I see you this evening, Dr. Whyborne?” Miss Parkhurst
asked. “The florist is supposed to deliver the flowers to your
father’s house tonight, and Persephone—that is, Miss
Whyborne—wished to see them. Since she can’t come to the wedding
itself.”

“I’m not certain.” A great deal depended on
what Griffin found in Boston, if anything. On the other hand,
perhaps I ought to go and make certain Christine and Iskander were
on good terms once again.

This wedding business was a terrible
headache. Griffin would have preferred a real ceremony in a church,
but I found myself more happy with our little exchange of vows by
the day.

I returned home, letting myself in the gate
and starting up the walk. Saul meowed plaintively at me from high
up in the branches of one of the trees shading the house from the
westering sun. I paused beneath him, patting my thigh in a gesture
for him to come down. “Are you hungry, old tom?”

Apparently, he’d already eaten his fill of
birds or mice for the day, because he remained on his perch and
made no move to join me on the ground. With a shrug, I opened the
front door and went inside.

A slight shift of the air was all the
warning I got. A heavy blanket descended over my head, knocking off
my hat and plunging me into darkness.

Terror spiked my blood, and I flung my
weight forward—right into a pair of hard arms that locked around
me. Wild thoughts flitted through my brain—was I being robbed?

If so, they’d chosen the wrong house. I
reached for the arcane fire of the maelstrom, my thoughts shaping
the spell that would call the wind howling in through the
windows.

Heavy iron closed around my wrist,
accompanied by the click of a key.

My arm instantly went numb. Agony flared in
my scars, as though they’d opened anew. I stumbled, off balance and
dizzy as my sense of the maelstrom vanished.

The witch hunter’s manacles.

I tried to struggle, but one of the men
buried a fist in my gut. I doubled over, fighting to draw air into
my lungs, even as the heavy blanket pressed against my face,
smothering me.

My captors dragged me in the direction of
the parlor. My lungs lost their paralysis, and I gasped in what air
I could against the muffling blanket. These men had to belong to
the cult, and my gut shriveled at the thought of what they surely
meant to do. Would Griffin return to find my corpse on the floor,
my throat slit and my heart missing?

Griffin. Had he been caught in Boston? Had
Quinn set this trap because he knew we’d found him out?

“Hold him,” ordered a voice that seemed
strangely familiar. Rough hands wrapped around my left wrist,
yanking my arm in front of me. With my magic bound, I only thrashed
helplessly while they tore off my cuff and shoved back my
sleeves.

The blade of a knife sliced my forearm,
drawing a shocked yelp from me. Hot blood ran across my skin, and a
hand wrapped around the wound, sending another jolt of pain through
me.

Then the hand was gone. “Let him see this,”
said the voice. “I want him to know.”

The blanket was torn aside. I gulped in the
relatively cool air, squinting at the sudden return of light. As
I’d surmised, I stood in the parlor. The desk had been pulled back,
the cabinet broken open, and the rug tossed aside. A complicated
series of sigils and circles covered the floorboards, drawn in what
looked to be colored chalk. And in the center, perched on its brass
stand, stood the Lapidem.