The Red Plague Affair

Chapter Twenty-Seven A Finer End

She had never entered the room given over to Valentinelli’s use before, and saw no reason to now. Mikal hovered at her shoulder as she held the charming steady, her skirts pulled back from the threshold, and Horace and Marcus lowered the assassin into the ice bath. There was a choked cry and Ludovico’s wracked body twisted; Alice the blonde chambermaid and her brunette shadow Eunice worked their homely magic upon the monkish, narrow bed and its linens. Their collars were bright, and they cast darting glances at her; when the footmen heaved Valentinelli free of the slurry of ice and water she made a gesture, a drying charm sparked and fizzed, and he was heaved gracelessly into the waiting bed.

“Mum.” Finch’s discreet cough. He peered around motionless Mikal. “Messenger from the Collegia. Awaiting your reply.”

As soon as she loosed her hold, the assassin began to thrash. She gestured again, and Mikal moved forward, stepping into the room.

An iron rack atop a bureau of dark wood, festooned with cooled and hardened wax, held half-burned candles, their wicks dead and spent. There was a small tau corpse upon it, made of pewter with sad paste gleams for eyes and side-wound.

Does he pray?

The same chest she had seen in his other small rooms stood, closed and secretive, at the foot of his bed. He had chosen this room very near Clare’s suite, despite its small size, and she had oft wondered what lay behind its door.

Mikal settled at the bedside, yellow irises gleaming in the dimness. He would keep the assassin contained, and make certain he did not strike an onlooker in his delirium.

The gaslamps hissed, and the servants looked to her for direction.

Oh, Ludo. Not like this. You deserve a finer end. There was a dry rock in her throat. She turned her attention to Finch. “From the Collegia?”

“Yes, mum.” He did not quite bow, but he did hunch, and she remembered the hungry, sore-ridden wreck he had been long ago, before she had taken him into her service. How Severine had turned up her nose at the distasteful sight, and what had Emma said?

He has performed signal service already, Madame Noyon. Pray do not argue. That had been during the Glastonsauce affair: a newly crowned Queen in dire need of defence against a cabal of creaking ministers and competing interests, not the least of which was her mother’s determination to keep Victrix dependent and weak. The affair had taught Victrix to almost-trust the sharp-eyed young sorceress who had entered the game uninvited and turned it to the monarch’s advantage.

She gathered her skirts. The jet earrings shivered, tapping her cheeks; she took stock of her remaining resources. There was plenty of ætheric force in her jewellery, and the visit to Rudyard’s bolt-hole had not drained her overmuch.

The trouble was, there was nothing she could do. Except fend off Britannia’s ill-humour, and see what the Collegia was about.

Mikal? He took Shield training, they had plenty of time to notice his… distressing talents. They did not. How shall I defend him against a Council of Adepts, one no doubt top-heavy with enemies? Who is likely to be there? What can I muster against them?

And would she surrender her Shield to the Collegia, as the Law might require?

Of course not. Her gaze found Mikal’s. He swayed slightly on his chair, a supple movement. I am Prime. I do not give up what is mine.

No matter how often she asked herself the question, the answer was unvarying.

Was it more than that? She had undertaken to keep Clare close instead of sending him to Victrix, and undertaken to keep the disagreeable Doctor as well. And there was the matter of a tussie-mussie left for her, and a bloodstain upon a filthy Saffron Hill floor. A promise, and a demand.

From whom? Does it matter?

Finch waited with no sign of impatience or irritation. It was a rare man who knew the value of patience, and who was not bothered by silence.

He was such a man, and had behaved with admirable aplomb in the most dire of circumstances. The indenture collar was in no way sufficient reward, but it had been all Emma could offer him. The safety of her service, and the promise that whatever lay in his past would not pursue him past her doors.

For Finch, it was enough.

“Very well,” she said, as if the butler had pressed her. “Show the messenger into the study.”

“Yes, mum.” He glided away, perhaps relieved.

“Prima?” Mikal, the single word a question. Did he fear the Law? Perhaps not. It was, she admitted, far more likely he feared some manner of duplicity. A missive from the Collegia could bode no good.

“All is well.” She was conscious, at once, of the lie. It stung her blocked throat, and Valentinelli moved uneasily, murmuring curses in his native tongue. His eyelids fluttered, and his hands leapt up, fighting a shadow-opponent.

Today, his fingernails were clean. An odd sensation passed through her – a hot bolt of something very much like jealousy. She had never known him to scrape the filth of living away while in her occasional service. And yet, he and Clare were wonderfully suited to each other, and she did not have to worry overmuch for either of them when they were about chasing whatever prey the Crown set them at.

Perhaps it is time for worry, Emma. Don’t you think so?

The chambermaids fluttered a little. The two footmen were still watching her for directions. How few people it took to crowd a room.

“Be about your duties,” she continued, in a far more normal manner. “Except you, Horace – stay with Mikal, and be ready should he require something for Ludo’s comfort. Thank you.” She turned and swept away, trying not to hear Valentinelli’s moaning.

She was braced for any manner of unpleasantness when she opened the door to her study and sallied inside, breathing in the smell of leather, paper, old books and the richness of the applewood fire laid in the grate, a charm whisking the smoke up the flue but leaving the delicious scent.

Anything, that is, except the youngling from the Hall of Mending, his hands wringing together much as Severine Noyon’s sometimes did, his charm-smoothed cheeks pale and his tongue twisting as he gabbled out his news.

Thomas the Mender, Thomas Coldfaith, her Thomas…

… was plagued. And he wished to see her, at once. The message was clear.

He did not expect to live.