The Timeseer's Gambit (The Faraday Files Book 2) (55 page)

Chris brought the tea trolley in to Sister Patricia.

He’d never been to this room, one of the many locked doors hidden back in the bowels of Olivia’s sanctum. It happened to be a tiny parlour, small and cozy, with an actual window―small and high and being pelted by rain, but the little natural illumination it provided was welcome. In one of the comfortable chairs, the Maiden sat, her shoulders tense and pulled almost up to her ears. She glanced up as she heard Chris enter, and she actually bared her teeth at him.

“You!” she exclaimed, and she swung her gaze away. “I knew it! I knew something was strange about this office! This has nothing to do with Miss Banks’s paper. It’s you―you and your Deathsniffer. What do you want from me?” She snapped her eyes back to Chris and there was desperation there. “I
didn’t
kill Timothy!” she insisted. “He was a―” She closed her eyes tightly, but then clenched her fists, opened them, and continued. “He was not a pleasant person,” she said. “I didn’t relish marrying him! But he was a life, a human life! I could never―I
would
never―!”

“I know,” Olivia said, sweeping in after him. “I’m perfectly certain that you didn’t kill your Youth, Miss Montgomery. Nor did you kill Virginia Landon, or Georgiana Edison, or Lachlan Huxley, or Jason Billingsly.”

Sister Patricia’s eyes widened. “Oh, Maerwald protect me,” she whispered, and made the sign of the Three and Three. Not a curse, but a prayer. “Jason, too?”

“You seem devastated.” Olivia hummed.

“A fellow priest―one I
knew
―is dead! Of course I’m―”

“But Jason was, forgive my tongue, a grade-A
pillock
,” Olivia said sweetly. Chris started to prepare the tea. “We all saw with our own eyes how he tormented poor foul-mouthed Sister Margaret at our little get-together.”

“It doesn’t…” Sister Patricia looked away. “It doesn’t matter,” she said softly. “No one deserves… no one.” She lapsed into silence, and offered nothing else.

“How do you take your tea, Sister Patricia?” Chris asked, very politely, hoping to disrupt her self-imposed silence. Olivia sent him a thankful glance.

The Maiden looked up. “Ah,” she said. “One milk, two sugar. Thank you.”

“You weren’t surprised when we met,” Olivia said, her voice uncharacteristically soft, drawing the proper Maiden out of her shell. “On the day Lachlan died, some were shocked to see a Deathsniffer present. But you didn’t flinch.”

Sister Patricia nodded. “I…” She glanced away. “I was shocked that Lachlan was
dead
, certainly. But that it was a murder? No… no, it was just a… natural conclusion. I had no idea how the spirits were unbound―I still don’t! But I’d realized after Sister Georgiana passed, what was happening. It was too much of a coincidence to be an accident―
or
a curse from Father Calhoun.”

“Because of the fact that
all
four of the departed were either part of your little group, or paired with someone who was.”

Chris gasped. That was―yes. Yes, that made
sense
. The lot of them met; they talked about their secrets. Hadn’t Sister Margaret just spoken of how she’d love to see Brother Jason fall to the “Father’s Wrath” when he’d met them at the memorial?

“She started with me,” Sister Patricia continued. “Because she wanted to protect me most. We’re
family
, even if you don’t understand it. She’s my grandmother in every way that matters. I don’t blame her. I…”

Olivia’s mouth twitched. “Eugenia,” she said.

Chris slid the cup of tea he’d prepared onto the table beside Patricia. She glanced up at him and blinked, nodding in thanks. Her hands were knotted into the fabric of her habit. “Eugenia’s followed our group from the moment we all came together. She knows
everything
that happens in her churches,” she murmured. “And they
are
hers. I realized that only weeks after I became her granddaughter. My mother―my holy mother, that is―she told me to my face that Grandmother Eugenia was changing the way the church was run. That ever since she’d been made a Maiden under her, when Eugenia was still a Mother, she’d done
everything
she could to bring the churches closer together, to make things… easier for us.” She took a deep breath. “I can’t imagine living this life without having friends.”

“What she’s done is actually quite wonderful,” Olivia admitted. She reached out to lay a hand on Sister Patricia’s knee. She really did know how to be sensitive when it struck her. When she wanted something. “She’s made things better for all of you. None of you have had an easy time of it.”

Sister Patricia took a deep breath. “But she’s gone too far,” she said. “I think I knew the night Timothy died. We stood outside the church while they took his body away, and Grandmother Eugenia was just…”

“Mnn,” Olivia said.

Sister Patricia took a drink of her tea. “After Alex came to the church, I think she saw how good we were for one another. How many perfectly wonderful Maidens and Youths were just waiting in the wings while so many awful ones were guaranteed places in the church.” Sister Patricia hiccupped, and her shoulders shook just once. “I… I can’t imagine her being tried for murder. She was only trying to help us! But…” She sobbed again, and then swallowed and squared her shoulders. “But if you want me to testify, I… I will.”

Olivia smiled. She sat back in her chair. She sighed. “I do want you to testify, Miss Montgomery,” she said, and Patricia nodded. “But,” Olivia continued, “I’d really prefer the
truth
to that packet of lies.”

Sister Patricia’s head snapped up. Her eyes were wide, shocked, and she locked eyes with Olivia for just a moment before she looked away. “I―” she stammered. “I―I don’t know what―”

“Oh, none of that,” Olivia said sweetly. “What you’re doing is coming from a nice
place
, Patty! That’s what Sister Margaret calls you, isn’t it? Patty? You’re all such good friends, and I truly believe that. The only friends in the world you have. Friends that you can’t
bear
to lose.”

Sister Patricia’s shoulders hunched. “M-miss Faraday,” she whispered. “P-please, I―”

“You hate the thought of losing your Crone, too,” Olivia continued blithely, and Chris weaved madly despite having no idea what was going on. “But it’s just simple math, isn’t it? Eugenia is a very, very old woman. Spry as she is, she only has a few years left. You’ll be saying goodbye soon anyhow, and if she were to be arrested
today
, her Elder would be forced into retirement… and you’d become Mother and wed your dear Alexander. It’s not such a bad situation.”

Sister Patricia’s fingers tightened around the teacup.

“But if you told me who
really
killed all those people… well, you’d be losing a dear friend. A friend who cared about you enough to
kill
for your happiness. A friend who brought you Alex. You may not be able to look her in the eye, which is why you’re avoiding your summons to those little meetings, but you’ll be damned if you see her hang for five murders!”

“
Please
,” Sister Patricia begged, but Olivia continued.

“The fact of the matter is, this killer
only
hurts people who are hurting someone else. It’s not
about
being a good Maiden or a bad Youth, is it? Georgiana was learning! Jason did a fine job! No. It’s about being a good
partner.
Virginia refused to try and make things work with Tibault, burying herself in misery. Georgiana tormented Calum because he was the only target she had for being categorized ‘wrong.’ Jason dismissed, mocked, and belittled Margaret. And Timothy was only interested in what he could take from the Church, including you.”

“Miss Faraday,
please.
Don’t put her through this. She’s been through so much!”

“But we’re missing one person, aren’t we? The source of the
Father’s Wrath
only knew who to remove because of the words exchanged between the lot of you. And everyone agrees―Brother Lachlan was a
saint
. Which means that there is only
one
person who could have had reason to unleash that undine on him. Someone who knew that he wasn’t what he seemed, but couldn’t say a word because he was a part of the group.”

Patricia’s shoulders shook silently.

“His own Maiden,” Olivia said triumphantly. “Sister Elisabeth Kingsley.”

“I won’t hurt her,” Sister Patricia whispered. “I don’t know―I don’t know what Lachlan did to her, but what she did, she did for
us
. I
won’t
help hurt her.”

“That’s fine, dear,” Olivia said, patting the Maiden’s knee gently. “But Christopher has been transcribing every word you’ve spoken, and
he’ll
surely testify to what you’ve said here. Now. Drink your tea, won’t you? You don’t want it to get cold.”

ut she’s
grieved
for him.” Chris couldn’t understand. No matter how he tried to wrap his head around it, he just couldn’t understand. He’d seen the pain in her eyes. He’d felt it pulling at him like the moon pulls the sea. How could it be feigned?

“Of course she has,” Olivia said. Beside her, Miss Banks picked at her skirts, clearly wishing she were somewhere else. “Whatever he did to deserve this… he did it unexpectedly. He wasn’t on her list. If he had been, she would have killed him in his room, like all the others. He would have been dead asleep, not covered in defensive wounds. Jason was meant to be next. But something happened.” She sighed. “She killed her intended. She’s racked by guilt as much as she is by grief.”

“She killed
all
of them?” It just couldn’t connect in his mind, no matter how hard he tried to force it. Quiet, broken, crying Sister Elisa, a serial killer? “Even Georgiana? That’s…”

“That’s monstrous,
especially
because she did it as a favour for friends,” Olivia finished smoothly. She sighed and took a sip of her tea. “It’s a little bit mad, you might say. And isn’t that how you would describe Miss Kingsley, Em?” She turned to Emilia, who shook her head and sighed.

“I can’t believe you’ve dragged me into this, Olivia,” she murmured. “I don’t like it and I want no part of it. I never should even have agreed to bring Sister Patricia here, the poor thing. These people are
traumatized
. They’ve had their minds torn apart and rifled through by the government that’s supposed to protect them.”

“And it was only a matter of time before this happened, before one of them snapped, but it
is
happening
.
” Olivia looked at Emilia and then, shaking her head, put on an exaggerated pout. “Is that what you
want
, Emilia? Priests killing one another? Chaos in the churches? Your disruptor being used to wreak havoc in the holiest of―”

“What I
want
is to be far away from the entire macabre business,” Miss Banks snapped. Her black eyes glittered like obsidian and she folded her lips and glanced away. “Just―mirror Maris, won’t you? Order the arrest and let it be done with.”

Chris’s mind kept skipping over the knowledge that Sister Elisa could have killed her own Youth like the needle skipping on “Fly With Me” that night on Black Canning Street. It felt like a million years ago. How could it be possible?