Chapter Thirty-Three. A Tiny Problem

C HAPTER T HIRTY-THREE

A Tiny Problem

RUAN was gone the next morning—a realization which might have stung, if I hadn’t been debating how to extricate myself from the situation. It wasn’t as if anything happened last night. But whether we intended it or not, something had shifted between us and I feared that we would never go back to how we had been before. We were beyond friendship now. We were… well, I didn’t know what we were, which meant that he would want to discuss matters. Especially as he could no longer hear my thoughts. Dreadful man.

A ghost of a smile crossed my face as I recalled the scent of his skin as I fell asleep. Oh, good God, I was in deep water. I’d have to deal with this when I had more time. Much more time.

I threw my legs over the side of the bed, before noticing that he’d left a stack of fresh clothing and my locket on the chair by the recently stoked fire. A hastily scratched-out note sat on top.

Gone to deal with the body. R.

Not the most romantic of notes, and I was grateful for that. At least he wasn’t spouting off sentimental nonsense when we had a job to do. I quickly donned the emerald-green suit that he’d fetched from my room, and had started for the door when a loud knock came from the other side.

“Morvoren, let me in.”

Hecate.

Pinching the bridge of my nose, I tried not to think on precisely how bad it looked that I was alone in here, especially as my chemise and dressing gown were now in an incriminating heap by the fire.

Heat rose to my face. Ah, well… in for a penny… Bracing myself for her scorn, I opened the door.

But instead of sharp words Hecate stormed past me into the room. She wore a pale gray dress this morning, the shade of smoke from a dying fire. It was the closest thing to a color I’d ever seen her wear. “Where is he?” The bracelets on her wrist jingled as she shut the door behind her.

I rubbed my face hard, struggling to gather my wits. I’d not even washed my teeth or run a comb through my hair and was in no condition to carry on intelligent conversations with anyone—let alone her. I gestured to the closed curtains. “He’s gone to search the ruins.”

The witch’s expression shifted to one of alarm. “What do you mean by search them, child?”

Images of the dead woman’s body flashed in my mind and I squeezed my hands to keep the damned tremor from returning. “I found the missing medium… the woman you replaced… she was murdered.”

Hecate exhaled with a rush of cool air. “Then she is on the other side. I suspected as much.”

“Someone hid her body in the ruins. I found it after the séance and…”

Hecate held up a hand. “I do not need to know your reasons for being here, Morvoren. If what you say is true, then there is not much time at all.”

“I do not understand. There is a murdered woman in the ruins!”

Hecate stopped me. “Miss Demidov is missing, as is Lady Morton. No one has seen either of them since the séance last night. I have reason to believe the young medium is in danger.”

“That’s preposterous, I…” I suddenly recalled the conversation I’d overheard last night, and the words withered on my tongue. Distracted as I was by the thief and then by Ruan, I’d almost forgotten the very real fear in Genevieve’s voice. Mr. Owen had told me that the late Lord Morton had been a Eurydicean. Could Lady Morton be involved somehow? Oh God, I’d ignored her all along. I caught my lower lip between my teeth. “We must check Genevieve’s room, see if there’s any clue to where she went. The girl… Where is Lady Amelia?”

“Her mother sent her south to her grandfather’s estate after the séance. Something is wrong, Morvoren. Very wrong.”

I moved to my pile of discarded clothes, pulling the Webley revolver from the pocket of Mr. Owen’s dressing gown, and headed for my room to pick up the shoulder holster from my things.

If Hecate noticed the bathtub full of filthy water, she did not speak of it—and I was grateful for her discretion. I slipped the stained leather holster over my shoulder, tightening it to my chest and placed the gun inside. It was an uncomfortable apparatus at the best of times—pinching and restricting movement—but with the fresh wound in my shoulder, my every subtle motion screamed in pain.

“There is no time. We must hurry,” Hecate hissed at me.

We were certainly in accord on that one. Genevieve’s disappearance took on a more sinister tone after finding the body in the ruins and overhearing her conversation with Elijah. Perhaps he’d simply taken her to safety, but a nagging voice within me said that was not the case.

The two of us raced up the back stair to the family wing of the house. I’d snooped around enough that I was able to find Genevieve’s room in minutes, two doors down from Lucy’s.

As I nudged the door open with the toe of my shoe, my earlier fears coalesced. Genevieve was going to die—if she wasn’t dead already. Her hard-sided traveling case sat atop the dresser fastened and belted shut. The wardrobe doors were flung wide, contents missing precisely as Lucy’s room had been on the night she was killed.

I hastily unfastened her bag, desperate for some idea where she had been going. All of her belongings were stacked and neatly folded within the case. I gingerly pulled them out—one by one—setting each to the side as I had with Lucy’s things a handful of days earlier.

Hecate stood at the window, her gaze fixed on the ruins. Beside her was a cheap glass vase, holding a handful of dried dahlias, their paper-like petals illuminated in the early morning sun. Hastily drawn hexafoils adorned the windowsill.

I folded my arms uncomfortably across my chest, thanks to the revolver. “Do you have any idea what she was running from?”

The White Witch left the window, allowing the white lace curtains to fall behind her. “I do not. Keep looking.” She tilted her chin to the suitcase.

Right. Genevieve’s belongings and the glass plate negatives were all we had to go on, and I’d already exhausted the negatives. I ran my fingers over the fine leather. It was an exceptionally fine case. Too fine for an impoverished medium. “Who is she?”

“Now you speak in riddles, Morvoren.”

“She’s an Englishwoman, not Russian,” I murmured to myself as I continued rummaging through her things. “I heard her speaking with Elijah—”

Hecate furrowed her brow.

“Mr. Sharpe. He is not who he pretends, his true name is Elijah Keene. He’s from New York. I knew him… once… I overheard the two speaking last night, and I’d bet my soul she’s an Englishwoman.”

“Is anyone who they pretend to be?” Hecate asked me kindly. “Hiding one’s true self does not make them a killer.”

I had to give her that. Returning to Genevieve’s suitcase, I withdrew a little bottle of rose water and set it with her unmentionables. “Someone here is a murderer though.” I hefted out more underthings. Silken ones.

My hand hit something hard and wrapped in fabric. “What are you?…” I pulled out what might have been a book wrapped in a nightdress.

I gently unwrapped the parcel from its linen packaging. Hecate drew nearer, craning her neck to see what I’d found. The scent of death on the linen was unmistakable. I peeled back the fabric to find a tattered plaid cloth beneath, covered in dirt and decay.

More negatives.

My eyes met Hecate’s.

This had been with Abigail’s body. The same grave scent that flooded my senses in the ruins permeated the inner fabric. Only one question remained: did Genevieve put the medium in that grave herself, or had she simply found what had been hidden? I set aside the wooden-cased photograph on top, and focused upon the glass plate negatives wrapped in the soiled fabric. There were two dozen at least. Likely the remainder of the set that I’d found in Lucy’s room earlier. I lifted them one by one, inspecting each in the brilliant morning light.

Mariah’s photographs.

These had to be what we’d been looking for—what Mariah wanted us to find. But as I continued going through the images, I realized that they’d been irreparably damaged. Naked bodies with faces hastily scratched out and identities removed. I wasn’t quite certain how it was done but the effect was jarring all the same.

“What is wrong with them?” Hecate asked.

“Either someone found these before Genevieve did… or…”

Hecate interrupted me, pointing at the background of one of the plates. There was a man there, fully dressed and cutting a fine figure in his suit, wholly unaware of the photographer’s presence. He was the only person in the image whose face was fully visible. His body radiated anger, the image was blurred where his hand would have been—the likeness captured mid-motion.

“Isn’t that the one they call Captain?”

The man bore a striking resemblance to Andrew, though whoever he was—his nose had not been broken. This wasn’t Andrew Lennox at all. Not to mention the clothing was far too old-fashioned. I sucked in a sharp breath as the gravity of what I held in my hands sank in. Mariah had most certainly taken these photographs, and this man… whoever he was, could only be one of two people—Mr. Owen, or his brother Malachi—both of whom would have looked a great deal like Andrew as young men. This was bad.

Very bad.

Had Mr. Owen also lied about his involvement with Eurydice’s Fall? I tucked the glass negatives under my arm and reached for the wooden-cased photograph. “Dare I see what you are?”

Hecate clucked at me. It seemed that ancient witches did not talk to themselves.

Ignoring her disapproval, I released the latch and opened the case, revealing an image of two figures—a young girl of about ten, and an older woman who looked an awful lot like Genevieve except her hair was fair. Based on their clothing alone, I would have put the image around 1890, which made sense as Genevieve was easily a dozen years older than me. The woman held what looked to be an 1890s Kodak Number 3 camera, a fact I only knew as I’d managed to find one for Mr. Owen’s collection not long ago.

“What did you find, Morvoren?”

A mother’s tears… a daughter’s rage…

My stomach knotted. I knew well the depths of a daughter’s rage—of the lengths one would go to fix past slights.

Mariah’s body had never been found.

My head began to swim. What if Mariah hadn’t died all those years ago at all? What if she was still alive? Alive and angry. “We need Ruan… we need Ruan now.”

“What do you see?”

I could scarcely form the words, scarcely think them. I latched the wooden photograph case, slipping it into my pocket. “You said that Genevieve and Lucy were close…”

“Lucy was very protective of the girl, why?”

I thought back to the image in my pocket—of mother and daughter—afraid of what it would mean if my suppositions were true. Of course, Lucy would be protective of Mariah’s daughter, of her own niece.

Hecate’s expression fell as she sniffed the air in alarm. “Fire!”

Hecate and I bolted from the bedchamber, out into the corridor, down the back stair and toward the source of the flames. The smoke grew thicker, filling my lungs, and I fell to my knees, crawling toward the door that opened into the garden and the ruins beyond. The muscles of my chest hurt from the exertion, but I clutched the glass plates tight against me with Hecate trailing at my heels.

Shouts of Fire rang out from elsewhere in the castle.

My pulse pounded in my ears as I struggled to remember where the door was. I’d only seen it twice, but I was not about to die like this, not when I was this close to saving Mr. Owen.

With each labored breath, I grew increasingly unable to think of anything but clean air. Water. Life.

Ahead I spied the edges of the door, visible through the smoke. My eyes burnt. I blinked back the wetness there.

Just a little farther.

All I had to do was make it a few more feet. My lungs rebelled against the rapidly warming air around us. The flames must be close now.

A little farther, Ruby. Go a little farther. My mother’s voice echoed in my head. I was dying. I must be to hear her voice again. Coughing, and body weakening, I finally found the door, reaching up for the catch. Warm but not hot. A good sign. It meant the fire was behind us, not ahead. Cool air rushed in when I pushed it open and the pair of us scrambled out onto the cool grass.

Sooty and coughing we collapsed on our backs, watching as the black smoke billowed from the upper floors of Manhurst, orange flames licking up into the smoky clouds—a beautifully terrible sight.

“Morvoren…” Hecate rolled over onto her knees, panting for air, as she stared at the ruins behind me.

Gasping, I struggled to sit and spied two figures high up in the ruin and recognized them both at once. One was Ruan—making his way cautiously along the uneven rampart with his right arm in the white cloth sling. The other figure appeared to be Elijah. His fair hair shining like gold in the morning sun. His hands were up as he spoke to someone else—someone deeper in the shadows.

Elijah did not notice Ruan’s quiet approach.

I crept closer, hugging the glass plates to my chest. Elijah and the unknown man were arguing, I could hear the tone in Elijah’s voice, but couldn’t make out the words. The wind whipped around me, catching on my sooty skirt and plastering it to my legs.

Ruan edged closer to the two men. What was he thinking?

He paused and turned straight to me, holding my stare with such intensity I could have sworn I felt him graze my hand. The wind rose up, stronger than before—the air sharp and full of energy. Elijah’s coat flapped angrily around him as he stepped to one side, revealing the man in the shadows.

Inspector Burnett.

Ruan must have already sent word about the missing medium.

A short-lived relief rushed through my veins only to be quashed when Elijah lunged for the inspector. They were grappling over something twenty feet in the air.

This was decidedly not normal.

Ruan edged closer to the fray.

Get down, you foolish man.

The inspector slammed Elijah’s head into the stone wall, making a sickening thunk. Elijah stumbled, teetering near the edge. He reached out to steady himself, latching onto the inspector’s coat sleeve.

The two men tumbled forward, and I saw a flash of steel.

Good grief, Elijah had a gun!

The two men struggled, grunting and swearing—and there was absolutely nothing I could do but watch. The inspector knocked the pistol from Elijah and it tumbled from the ramparts, striking the ground near me as a shot rang out, ricocheting back up. All three men paused and Ruan dropped to his knees behind a broken piece of crenellation.

Elijah took this moment of surprise to draw a knife, slashing wildly at the inspector. Inspector Burnett dodged backward, a miscalculation, as the ragged stone beneath his foot gave way. I scrambled back from the edge to avoid the falling debris.

Elijah did not hesitate. Instead of waiting to be sure the inspector fell, he turned and ran across to the far side as the inspector pinwheeled, struggling to regain his footing. My breath caught in my chest, watching helplessly as the man finally lost his balance and fell to the ground in front of me with a sickening thump and the distinct sound of breaking glass.

I started after Elijah, when I noticed Ruan stumble and changed course.

I would have to catch Elijah later, and I had a sickening feeling I knew exactly where he was headed. If Genevieve was Mariah’s daughter as I now believed, then there was only one place in the world she’d go—and her accomplice would follow along behind.

A daughter’s rage.

The one person I knew who had caused Mariah’s tears. The same one who had been lured to Scotland under false pretenses. I hoped I was wrong, but if the daughter wanted vengeance… there was only one place she’d go.

To Rivenly and Mr. Owen.

Hecate hurried to the inspector’s lifeless body as I raced through the narrow wall to the turret stair after Ruan.

Foolish stubborn bull-headed reckless man.

With my right hand on the center column to keep my balance, I made it halfway up when Ruan met me on his way down.

Infuriating.

Insufferable.

Impulsive.

My internal litany of complaints against him continued, despite the bone-deep relief of seeing him alive.

“What were you thinking, you foolish man?” I started in, poking him hard in his chest. “You could have died. You could have—”

But the words died in my mouth as I took him in, his expression as stricken as my own. He reached down, running his thumb down my cheek, his finger coming away black with soot. He sighed, muttering to himself before pressing me hard against the wall and kissing me as if his very next breath relied upon it.

It took a remarkable amount of willpower to pull myself away from his embrace. I laid a shaky hand on his chest to steady my own galloping pulse. I missed the strange way he could ease my mind. The peculiar way he’d touch my brow, and that rush of cold that would ricochet through my body, easing each bit of tension and fear. I could have used a dose of that now for what we were up against.

My throat burnt from the smoke. “Ruan, we have a problem.”

He straightened, rubbing his hand over his face, leaving a smudge of my own soot on his skin. “Only one?”

“Several,” I admitted. “But at the moment the one most concerning me is that I have reason to believe that Mr. Owen’s wife might yet be alive and that she and Genevieve mean to kill him.”

His breath hitched and he paused, hanging on to the center column, the width of his shoulders taking up most of the narrow castle stair. “You what?”

“Well, it’s that or he’s been killing women one by one over the last oh… forty years… And I must admit I really don’t care for that option.” Either I’d placed my trust in a murderer, or I was about to lose the man I’d come to love as a father just as we’d truly begun to know one another.

In the few minutes that I’d been inside the ruins, chaos descended upon Manhurst. Most of the new castle was embroiled in flames, licking at the hazy sky overhead, all the old wood and varnishes and lacquers having fed the blaze into an uncontrollable inferno. The scent of burning timbers and fabrics coated my lungs. I couldn’t pause to think of what—who—might be left inside. Ruan placed his palm low at the center of my back—a quiet bolster to my flagging courage—as we approached the White Witch where she remained crouched over the inspector’s body.

“Did you find anything?” I stooped down on the stony ground beside her.

She rocked back onto her heels and wiped her sweaty brow, leaving a streak of pale flesh amidst the ash. “More glass.”

I pulled out my filthy handkerchief and gently lifted the inspector’s coat. Inside his jacket was a leather folio strapped across his body. It’d come open at some point, leaving fragments of broken negatives scattered on the ground around him. Gingerly I unhooked the case from the strap and withdrew it from his body. “Do you suppose he’s our thief?”

Ruan caught the inside of his cheek in his teeth and shook his head. “He must be. But why, what does he stand to gain?”

I pulled some of the large pieces from the folio, attempting to reassemble the old glass plates, but they were broken beyond repair.

“He must have found them here,” Ruan murmured. “He or the other one.”

“Elijah?”

He nodded. “I heard the pair of them arguing when I came out this morning to find the body. I wasn’t close enough to make out what the quarrel was.”

I sniffed the air tentatively. After the fire, I’d nearly forgotten that Ruan had come to the ruins to find the dead woman. “It doesn’t smell…”

Ruan winced as he shifted his weight. His shoulder aching from where he’d caught himself against the stones earlier. “I doubt you could tell over all the smoke, but you’re right. There is no body. I found the spot you described. The hole reeked of death, but it was empty.”

“The killer must know I found her.”

Ruan nodded. I tucked the Webley revolver back into the holster and stood, dusting my hands on my ruined skirt.

“Go. I will take care of things here. But you should leave before too many questions are asked about how this came to be.” The White Witch turned back to the dead man between us, yes, a wise idea.

I gave her a curt nod and squeezed my eyes shut, trying to make sense of what had happened over the shouts and the ferocious crackle of the fire. If Elijah and Genevieve were working together, that meant he would be headed to Rivenly as well, and I was not certain if I hoped or feared I was right.