Stranger (19 page)

“Go ahead and shoot him,” Catullus said to Gemma.

“Catullus!” a woman exclaimed, coming into the room. She was delicate and pretty, with honey-colored hair and a lively face, her clothes fashionable—in contrast to Gemma’s threadbare, somewhat grimy traveling dress. “I would be
extremely
vexed if your friend shot my husband.”

Gemma lowered her pistol, and Day let drop his hands. Clearly, neither of these newcomers were Heirs of Albion. The only threat Bennett Day presented was the fact that he annoyed Catullus.

“And this is London, Bennett’s wife,” Catullus said.

The stylish woman gave a refined curtsy, which Gemma returned. With a cultured voice, London said, “Always a pleasure to meet friends of Catullus, Miss Murphy.”

Gemma looked at Catullus. “Drunk, in a tea towel?” A flush darkened Catullus’s cheeks. “A very uninteresting story.”

“I’d like to hear it.”

Day said cheerfully, “We were in Prague and there were these, well, I suppose one wouldn’t call them
ladies
precisely—”

“Enough, Ben,” growled Catullus.

“Yes,” said Day’s wife. “I think we would
all
appreciate not hearing that tale.”

Day strode over to his wife and wrapped her in his arms, smiling down at her. “Merely practice, love. Preparing me for you.”

“Naturally.” Yet she allowed her husband to kiss her, boldly and thoroughly, in front of Gemma and Catullus.

Rather than watch Bennett effectively seduce his wife, Gemma busied herself by stashing her derringer in her pocket. She glanced up when Catullus drifted to her side.

“Thank you for coming to my aid,” he murmured.

His voice was velvet along her skin, and she felt her cheeks warm. “When I heard him call you a rotten bastard, and I saw him swing at you …”

Catullus grimaced. “Ben’s way of saying hello. He’s the Blades’ most expert cryptographer, but sometimes he has the behavior of a poorly socialized warthog.”

“I am a very
nicely
socialized warthog,” Day interjected.

Catullus ignored him. Still speaking softly to her, he asked, “Did you rest well?”

“Well enough, but,” she added quietly, “it would’ve been better if you’d taken me up on my offer.” She had to show him that her interest hadn’t ebbed, and appearance of his old friends hadn’t changed her feelings.

He looked pleased, then flushed again and cleared his throat. He plucked his spectacles from his face and carefully polished them—his habitual gesture when he found himself at a loss.

Then, as if pushing the words out, he rumbled, “That would … be nice.”

Nice wasn’t precisely how she wanted a future tryst described, but she knew that she flustered him, and so couldn’t take offense at what words he was able to cobble together. He was letting her know, in his way, that he wanted her just as much. She took the victory for what it was, and so guided the conversation back to more stable ground.

“Did you get any sleep?”

He took the offered distraction. “Astrid spelled me, until Bennett arrived.”

“How did your friends find us?” she asked.

“Lesperance. He flew to Southampton—”

“And caused quite a stir,” interrupted Day. “We don’t see many naked people showing up on our doorstep, and even less who can change into an animal.”

“None, I think,” added Mrs. Day. “Though I am fairly new to the Blades.”

“After we found him a pair of pants, Lesperance told us everything.” Day shook his head. “Watching King Arthur rise up from the great beyond? Must have been a hell of a sight.”

“Nearly cost me my head,” Catullus said, “but, yes, it was a sight.” He grinned. “Like something from the old tales.”

“I envy you, you bespectacled bastard.”

Catullus drew himself up, smoothing a hand down the front of his waistcoat. “As well you should.”

Gemma looked back and forth between the two men, marveling at the change Bennett Day’s arrival wrought in Catullus. She knew he and Astrid had a close relationship, but it was clear that Day and Catullus held that unique bond only men could share with one another. Part brother, part tormentor. A friendship crafted of many years, many adventures. She wanted, just then, to take Catullus away
and crawl into his mind, not only to hear the countless tales he surely had, but to know him as well as his friend did.

A strange jealousy, one she’d never experienced before. She had never felt the need to delve into a man’s innermost self. Even as close as she’d thought herself to Richard, she didn’t want to explore every part of him. But it was different with
this
man, as complex and intricate as a many-chambered nautilus. The going might be challenging, yet the rewards, she felt with utmost certainty, would be worth it.

If only the damned man wasn’t so reserved!

Day said, “The hawk fellow guided us back here. Said he had some kind of bond with Astrid and could find her anywhere.” His brilliant eyes gleamed with pleasure. “It’s good to see her truly back. And it’s clear that she and Lesperance are mad about each other.”

“Where
is
Astrid?” Gemma asked, glancing around.

Mrs. Day said, “As soon as we arrived, after greeting us, she and Lesperance … ah … sequestered themselves.” A dainty pink stained her cheeks, so very different from the violent red Gemma would turn whenever
she
blushed.

“Cat—” Day began.

“You know I hate that moniker,” Catullus groused.

“Cat,” Day said, “what happened in this village? Where is everyone, and why are there piles of torn clothes everywhere? That can’t
all
be Astrid and Lesperance’s doing.”

Catullus’s expression turned serious. “Boggarts. Overran the town.”

Day looked shocked. “What? That kind of fey activity hasn’t been seen in over a hundred years.”

“And there’s more.” Quickly, Catullus outlined everything that had happened since Lesperance had left their company, including the pixie rampage in Gloucester and the demon dogs’ pursuit. The more Catullus talked, the more Day’s ready good humor ebbed. “Did you observe nothing like this en route from Southampton?”

“No magical activity,” said Mrs. Day.

“Must be Arthur,” Gemma offered. “He seems to call the magic up wherever he goes.”

Soberly, Catullus said, “But I fear that the longer he is manifest, the more his power will grow. His influence will be felt farther afield, even places where he has not been.” Turning to Day, he concluded, “We have to go after him. Find a way to curtail his growing power. If your horses are rested, we can set out at once.”

Mrs. Day and her husband shared a concerned glance, sending apprehension glinting through Gemma.

“Leaving this place is going to be a problem,” said Day. His handsome face grim, he pulled his wife close. “The village is entirely surrounded by Heirs.”

A moment’s shocked silence, then Catullus demanded: “Tell me everything.”

Day gently disengaged from his wife and took down from a cupboard a jar of something dark and viscous. He went to the table in the middle of the kitchen and set to one side a coffeepot and mug. Opening the jar, he dabbed his finger into the sticky contents, then began to smear it across the table.

Gemma realized he was drawing a map of the village.

“This is where we are,” he said, indicating the house’s position just off the square. “The high street runs straight through the plaza, west to east. Two smaller lanes lead off the square.” He drew those, as well. “But they both terminate in dead ends. Which means that there’s only one way in and out of the village. The Heirs have positioned themselves about half a mile at either end of the road leading to town.” He made large
X’s,
denoting the location of the Heirs.

“Half a mile,” Gemma mused. “Enough distance for us to sneak past them.”

Yet Day shook his head. “They’ve enchanted a web that,
while it can’t hold us inside the village, it
will
alert them if we try to breach it.” He drew a large circle around the whole of the map. “Within a minute, they’d descend on us.”

“How did you get in?” asked Gemma.

“It’s a talent Bennett has.” Mrs. Day looked proudly at her husband. “He can find the gaps where seemingly none exist, and slip through them.”

“Then leading us past the Heirs and their web should be easy.”

“It’s only possible with two people.” Day shrugged. “Any more than that, and they’ll be all over us like cats on cream.” He stuck his finger in his mouth and sucked away the sticky substance covering it. “Mm, treacle. I could lick this up by the gallon.” Eyebrows raised, he glanced back and forth between the jar of treacle and his wife. “Perhaps you and I could …” A smile, devastating in its sensuality, played across his face.

“Later, my dear.” But Mrs. Day sounded distinctly breathless, her cheeks staining pink.

Even though Gemma had only just met the couple, she could easily imagine that they lead a very active life in the bedroom. Bennett Day all but glowed with sexual energy. And his wife had the radiance of a well-satisfied woman. Considering the way that Astrid and Lesperance could not bear to go longer than a day without ravishing one another, it was a marvel any of the Blades could get any work done.

She cast a sidelong glance at Catullus, who was bent over the impromptu map and studying it intently. Would he be the same way, once he took a lover? Thorough and inexhaustible? Or would he time the whole endeavor, striving for efficiency?

It seemed she would never find out. If they could only find a moment where they weren’t running for their lives. She felt him, through her careful give and take, edging closer, slowly breaking down the reserve that confined
him. Freeing himself, trusting them both, would take time, though.

Time they did not have. None of them might survive the next few hours.

“When do the Heirs plan on attacking?” Catullus asked Day. “Or do they mean to wait us out?”

“They move in at dawn.” Everyone looked up as Lesperance and Astrid, hand in hand, came into the room. Lesperance wore only a pair of trousers, and Astrid’s clothes looked decidedly rumpled. Neither of them seemed a bit embarrassed by their appearance. “I heard their plans as I flew overhead,” said Lesperance. “If we don’t attempt to leave the village by sunrise, then they’ll come for us. They’re all well armed: shotguns, rifles, and pistols.”

“How many men?” Catullus demanded.

“Eight on the eastern road, six on the west.”

“And six of us,” said Astrid. She hefted a rifle, which she must have taken from somewhere in the village. “We have firepower.”

“That won’t be enough,” Day said. “Aside from the enchanted web, we have to assume they have some other magic at their disposal. Which we don’t have.”

“There’s mine,” offered Lesperance.

Day nodded in acknowledgment. “And we’ll make use of your ability. But even a bear, hawk, or wolf can’t withstand dark magic.”

Tension descended over the room as everyone contemplated the circumstance. The Heirs hadn’t been seen for over a day, their threat never forgotten, but now they loomed close. A small iron clock near the stove showed that dawn was only an hour away.

Gemma glanced around the kitchen, at each Blade of the Rose. They each seemed veterans of this kind of dire situation, and wore their years of adventuring like invisible armor. If anyone could figure out a solution, a means for them all to escape to safety, these men and women were the
ideal candidates. Yet Catullus’s words to her on the ship came back vividly. Blades knew full well that their lives were precarious things, lost in a moment. Success was never a guarantee.

Catullus braced his hands on the edges of the table, his wide shoulders straining the fabric of his clothing as he stared down at the map. His brain, Gemma knew, sped more rapidly than a steam engine, and it fascinated her to simply watch him think. An inundation of ideas and hypotheses that he both produced and organized.

After several silent moments, Catullus looked up.

Gemma found herself holding her breath as five pairs of intent eyes stared at Catullus, each of them instinctively turning to him for guidance.

“I have a plan,” he said.

In unison, everyone exhaled. Catullus was no divine being, but he, more than anyone in the whole world, might create a clockwork miracle.

In groups of two, they combed the village, going from house to house, ducking into shops, taking whatever might be useful to repel a siege. Catullus gave each group a list of things he would need. So they spread out through the empty little town in what had to be the strangest scavenger hunt ever undertaken.

Catullus would have enjoyed himself, if the circumstances weren’t so dire.

“Didn’t think anyone could top my family for oddness,” Gemma said as they made their way along the row of shops along the high street. “Those friends of yours would give them a run for their money, though. It’d be one hell of a poker night.”

“Sometimes I think the Blades go out of their way to recruit eccentrics.” He glanced up at the shingles, looking for
one in particular. Hopefully, the village wasn’t too small for what he had in mind. Ah, this was the place!

“My kind of people.” She grinned saucily at him, and, God, if he didn’t want to press her against the shop door and kiss them both dizzy. She was a freckle-faced temptation with a sharp mind and lush body.

She might not outlive the day if he didn’t focus on the task at hand. So he put thoughts of kisses and freckles and sumptuous breasts from his mind—a job more easily proposed than done.

He tried the door on the shop, but found it locked. “Miss Murphy, if you would do the honors.” He stepped aside and presented the door to her with a flourish.

With an eager nod, she stepped forward and opened the door. He understood how much she needed to be useful—it had to be difficult when faced with a collection of dyed-in-the-wool adventurers who had spent years facing precisely this kind of danger. Yet Gemma was more than willing to meet the challenge.

The door swung open, and they went inside. Catullus held up a lantern. What he saw made him smile.

The shelves were lined with marked glass jars.
Spt: Vini:. Meth:. Pulv: Sapo: Cast:. Tinct: Fer: Perch:. Liq: Senna:.
There were dozens more. And small tinted bottles with labels, advertising their wondrous properties. Most of these held nothing but colored glycerin, but there was quite a lot to work with.

A chemist’s shop. Paradise.

In two strides, he stood in front of the shelves, examining labels, plucking jars down, muttering to himself as he mulled chemical combinations.

Several minutes passed before he became aware of Gemma, leaning against a counter and watching him, her eyes sparkling. “You’re like a child set loose in a toy shop.”

“This is far better than any jackstraws or whirligig.”
He held up a jar full of a crystalline substance in liquid. Removing the stopper from the bottle, he held it out to her.

She took a tentative sniff, then wrinkled her nose. “Smells like a satanic egg.”

“Sulfur compound.” He replaced the stopper. “This will definitely be coming with us.”

“I take it you aren’t making perfume.”

“It won’t
smell
pleasant, but what I have in mind should have pleasant
results.
For us, anyway. Not for the Heirs.”

At his direction, he and Gemma collected several bottles and made their way back to the center of the village. Everyone awaited them, the fruits of their searches piled up on the ground. Hands on hips, Catullus surveyed the amassed goods.

A crate of iron scraps, taken from the blacksmith’s. An empty barrel. Obtained from someone’s carriage house, a metal canister of oil. Gunpowder.

“Will this do, Professor?” asked Bennett.

“It will,” Catullus said. “Very well, indeed.”

Heavy explosives were to be prepared by Catullus and Bennett. The task of creating blockades in the side lanes, using furniture and whatever could be gathered, fell to Astrid and Lesperance. They were also responsible for dragging heavy wooden horse troughs into position in the central square.

“And what about us?” Gemma asked, pointing at herself and London. “Don’t tell me to stand around and look pretty, or I’ll feed you your pocket watch.”

“Had my breakfast, thank you.” Catullus gingerly handed Gemma the canister of oil, but not before wiping the outside of it clean with a handkerchief. “And you’ll look pretty no matter what you do.” He flushed at his compliment, almost as much as she did to be its recipient.

She glanced down at the oil can now cradled in her arms.
“Typically, men give flowers.” Then she looked up, holding his gaze with her own. “But you’re definitely not typical.”

“And that pleases you?” His voice was low, meant for them alone.

“Oh, yes. Nearly everything about you pleases me.”

He smiled; then a furrow appeared between his brows.
“Nearly
everything?”

Before she could answer, Bennett said, “Sunrise is coming, and the Heirs right after.”

Gemma stepped back from Catullus and hefted the canister. “I’ll treasure this forever. Now, what am I supposed to do with it?”

He outlined his plan quickly, if still somewhat distracted by her earlier words. Once she and London received their instructions, they headed off toward the eastern entrance to the town. Catullus watched her go, noting her purposeful stride, but mesmerized by the movement of her succulent hips, the sway of her vivid hair down her back.

Turning around, he found Bennett grinning at him. Never a good sign.

“Let’s put this thing together.” Catullus strode toward the empty barrel. “Start handing me the sharpest pieces of iron scrap.”

Bennett handed him bits of jagged metal. “Lovely girl, your Miss Murphy.” He glanced in the direction which she and London had disappeared. “Fiery. Quick. And “—he double-checked to make sure he and Catullus were alone—” a hell of a figure. Don’t mistake me. I’m happily enslaved to my wife’s body.” His eyes glazed over as if revisiting in his mind London’s carnal charms, before he recollected himself. “But, dear God, temples have been built to honor breasts like Miss Murphy’s. They’re … the Platonic ideal of breasts. Except one wouldn’t feel very platonic toward them. I’d say they were the erotic ideal, if such a concept exists. In fact—”

“Shut it,” Catullus gritted. He arranged the iron pieces
within the barrel to keep himself from plowing his fist right into his friend’s blathering mouth.

“So you
are
besotted with her,” Bennett hooted. “About damned time. Here I was, thinking that cock of yours was only for show. Oh, and for occasionally poking that mercer’s widow in Southampton.”

Catullus straightened. “My cock is none of your sodding business. And you know about poking … I mean, my situation with Penelope?” He’d always been so careful about keeping his arrangement with her private.

Bennett looked affronted. “If I, the Blades’ cryptographer, can’t figure out who my best friend is plowing on a semi-regular basis, then I’d better turn in my Compass.”

“You were bloody spying on me,” Catullus growled.

Bennett just smiled, crossing his arms and leaning against the barrel. “Of course. But we’re not talking about the widow. We’re talking about that ripe peach of an American.”

“No,” said Catullus, getting back to work, “we’re not.” “She likes you.”

“I like her.”

“I mean, she really
likes
you. More than that wrinkled brain or that antique body of yours. The person that you are. She likes you.”

“So you keep saying,” Catullus grumbled, while a small explosion of pleasure went off in his chest to hear this. Not just a flirtation for her, or an interest born out of necessity—he was the only single man she’d encountered in a while. Bennett’s juvenile words were actually confirmation that Catullus’s deep feelings for Gemma were—amazingly—not one-sided. But Catullus staunchly would say no more on the subject. He wasn’t like Bennett, readily and easily discussing the most intimate of subjects. God knew how many times Catullus had been forced to listen to Bennett ramble on about this woman or that woman, one who could do the most
incredible
things while standing on her hands, and the
noises this other made that resembled an aroused parrot. Although, Catullus realized, Bennett offered no such private details about his wife. A sign of respect, he supposed.

So, rather than voice any of this, Catullus remained silent, carefully arranging the pieces of iron.

“She has freckles,” Bennett added. “I know how you like those.”

Still, Catullus said nothing, but cursed his friend’s excellent memory. Catullus had only mentioned his preference for freckled women
once
six years ago, after imbibing a little too much Trappist ale whilst in Ghent.

“Have you bedded her yet?”

Catullus sprang back up again, seething. “That is also
none of your goddamned business.”
“That would be ‘no.’”