Ivy: Daughter of Alice

by J. A. Armitage

I looked down at my hands.

  When I looked up at him again, his smile had vanished completely. He sighed.

  “I’m sorry for yelling at you,” he said. “I’m only worried for your safety.”

  I shook my head, holding up a hand to stop him. “Mr. Cappello wouldn’t hurt me. He’s a good man—”

  “Vampire,” Chesh corrected.

  I pursed my lips. “He tries to help people. Did you know there are hundreds of people starving in the tunnels underneath this city?”

  Chesh raised an eyebrow, shaking his head. “Even if that’s true—which I doubt—”

  “I’ve seen them!”

  “He’s a vampire,” he continued. “He drinks human blood. If you’re right about the blood banks, then where is he getting his blood from?”

  I started to shake my head again. “You don’t know—”

  Chesh stood abruptly, skirting the tables around us to walk up to the counter and take a copy of The Daily Hart. He sat down at the table again, pushing the plates aside to spread the newspaper on the tabletop. “People are going missing,” Chesh said. “Haven’t you been following this?”

  I shook my head, truthfully. There had been so many other puzzles jostling for my attention that I hadn’t kept up with the news as much as I usually did.

  “Look—another one today.” He jabbed a finger at a small article about a man who had gone missing the day before. The print blurred together as I stared at the words. After a pause, Chesh read it out to me.

  “Mr. Gavin Littleburn went missing from his place of work yesterday afternoon. A proprietor of Littleburn and Co Mechanical Inventions, the reports of Mr. Littleburn’s absence comes after several people were reported missing the day before, and several others last week. There do not appear to be any links between those reported missing—who were taken from districts all across Melfall—and President Rowntree has downplayed the facts, reportedly discouraging reporters at The Daily Hart from causing unwarranted fear among the people of The Forge. Investigations continue.”

  “You don’t really think Mr. Cappello had anything to do with this, do you?” I looked up at Chesh. “There’s no proof…”

  “Vampires are predators. They feed on human blood. If vampires aren’t getting blood from the blood banks, they’re getting it from somewhere. I’d put my money on the fact that the sudden spate of missing persons reports is linked to the vampires not being able to get blood by legitimate means.”

  I shook my head again. “He wouldn’t…”

  “You’re an intelligent woman, Ivy,” Chesh banged his hand on the table. Several people at neighboring tables turned to stare at us. He jabbed a finger at the picture in the newspaper. “Don’t tell me your head has been so turned by this man that you can no longer think for yourself, or even see the evidence in front of your eyes.”

  I stood, swaying on my feet. I was too tired to think, to argue. “I want to go home,” I said, then marched out, leaving Chesh calling after me.

  2

  27th August

  Uninvited, Chesh dumped a stack of copies of The Daily Hart on the side table in the sitting room, interrupting my solitude without apology. I looked up from where I was reading, curling up in a large leather armchair, although my eyes had been sliding over the black print without seeing it. Instead, the memory of Raven’s face had been interrupting my thoughts all morning.

  All morning, I’d burned alternately with desire and, then, with shame as I remembered Chesh’s accusation. I couldn’t rid myself of the small voice whispering doubts in the back of my mind—that Raven had sought me out, had wanted to know about Alice’s whereabouts, had lured me to him, and fooled me with stories. Now I wondered—was he really attracted to me? Or was he the villain that Chesh warned me about? Had he put me under some sort of spell to get closer to Alice? No, I was being silly. Raven might be a vampire, but he wasn’t a magician.

  Chesh glared at me as he put a finger on the stack of papers.

  “The Ivy I know wouldn’t have missed this,” he said.

  “There have been lots of other things going on,” I said and crossed my arms across my chest. “The Pinnacle clock, the Hearts—”

  “Yes, and for weeks, people have been going missing every day. It started happening just before the Pinnacle clock started working again. Look,” Chesh flipped over the first newspaper in the stack. “Mr. Allen Langstaff, master horologist, went missing on 10 August.” Chesh passed the article to me, then turned over another. “Miss Gabrielle Larkin, draftswoman, went missing on 11 August.”

  I found myself staring down at a sketch of a woman’s face. The pile of papers rustled, and Chesh continued, tossing the papers into the air as he read through the names and titles of the missing people. The sheets of paper were floating to the floor like snow, covering the plush rug under the armchair where I sat.

  “Mr. Mark Maycock, welder, Mr. Joel Wallace, rigger, Mr. Bartholomew Chickering, mechanical engineer, all missing since 13 August, Mrs. Grace Fischer, machinist, Mr. Samuel Cadwell, blacksmith, both missing since 15 August, Mr. Daniel Dorchester, mold maker, missing since 16 August, Miss Emmeline Beard, technical engineer, Mr. James Rexword, mechanic, Miss Emma May Whitten, mathematician, Mr. Byron Day-Forsythe, mechanical inventor, all went missing on 20 August. Mr. Lucius Perch, civil engineer. Miss Peggy Barclay, automotive engineer...”

  My eyes widened as I listened to the list of missing persons. I prided myself on being aware of what was happening in the city, and on being able to advise Alice. How had I missed this?

  I stood, going to stand at Chesh’s shoulder. He flicked over another page, this time The Daily Hart edition of the 23 August. “Mrs. Iris Barclay, electrical engineer,” I murmured.

  “Mr. Clement Hellyar, robotics expert,” Chesh said, flicking over the page to the next edition.

  “Mr. Tom Griffin, founder,” I added.

  “Mr. Gavin Littleburn, inventor, missing as of yesterday,” Chesh finished.

  We both looked at the papers spread out all over the floor. “That’s a lot of people,” I murmured, frowning as I tried to make sense of it. “Do they suggest a pattern?”

  Chesh shook his head.

  “Common elements?” I asked, peering at the latest article in front of me.

  “No,” Chesh replied. “They’re from all over the city. They’re not friends, nor colleagues, nor acquaintances. Some went missing from their place of work, or on the way to work, or on their way home, or on their way to the shops, or while running errands.” He crossed his arms over his chest. “You know the only thing they have in common,” he said, giving me a hard stare.

  I didn’t pick up on the hard edge to his voice as I stared at all of the faces looking up at me. There seemed to be something about the group that linked them, but I couldn’t quite see it. “What?” I asked.

  “You know,” Chesh repeated. “Think about it.”

  “If you know the answer, there’s no need to keep it to yourself,” I replied.

  “They’ve all got blood running through their veins.”

  I froze, closing my eyes. Raven’s face appeared in my memory, soft under the firelight, smiling at me. I put my fingers to my lips, remembering the feel of his kiss. I was shaking my head when Chesh’s hands were on my shoulders shaking me. “There’s nothing else. Nothing else. They’re alive. They’re people. They’re food. That’s what they have in common.”

  “You don’t know that,” I retorted. “You’re guessing.”

  Chesh groaned. “Even if you think you’ve stumbled across the one vampire in Melfall who is starving his natural instincts to feed—which I doubt,”

  I remembered the look on his face when Raven told the story about his mother feeding on his siblings. “I know he wouldn’t do—”

  “Even if that’s so, you don’t think the rest of them are starving themselves, do you?”

  “I’ve been looking into where the blood donated to the blood banks is going,” I said. “I think the Tweedles h
ave something to do with it.”

  “The Tweedles make mischief,” Chesh said. “They don’t kill people.”

  “There’s no evidence that these people are dead,” I said, though my conviction was hollow. “Have the families been blackmailed? Have there been any demands?”

  “None, but if they’re not dead, where are they hiding?” Chesh said, but he didn’t wait for a reply. “Do you know how many people went missing in July?”

  I shook my head.

  “None,” Chesh said. “Do you know how many people went missing in June?”

  I stared at him.

  “Or May? April?” Chesh raised an eyebrow. “None. Only two people have gone missing this year. One turned up a few weeks later after mistaking a hallucination-inducing pleasure drug for an anti-aging tonic. He regained his senses somewhere in a small village in the countryside. The other was stabbed in a disagreement over a woman after a number of strong drinks. The murderer hid the body, then confessed to authorities several weeks later.”

  “What about last year?”

  Chesh shrugged a shoulder. “You don’t find this suspicious?” He gave me a disbelieving look. “Ivy…”

  I held up a hand. “Yes, I think it seems out of the ordinary. I just don’t…” I don’t think Raven is involved.

  Chesh rolled his eyes. He gestured towards the missing persons articles with one hand. “Any other ideas?”

  I took a deep breath and turned my attention to the scattered papers. They were a mess of sketched faces and text against the background of the shag rug. I bent down to gather them in a pile. “Let’s look at this properly,” I said and led Chesh across the hall and into the President’s Library.

  It looked as though nobody else had been in this room since the last time I’d been here, and I cleared away the newspapers about the Red Queen’s reign, and spread the articles out methodically in date order of when the people went missing. As I put down each article, I took a good look at the face, read the article over again, and considered the elements—their age, their place of residence, their place of work, trying to find possible links between them.

  “There are no children among them,” I noted, once I’d spread the papers all over the table. “Nor very old people. These people are all working age.”

  “There’s still a wide variation in age,” Chesh replied. “Some have barely finished their studies, while others have decades of experience.”

  I shrugged, not taking my eyes off the articles spread around the table, as though the solution to this puzzle might leap off the pages.

  “Did they have any interaction with the Hearts?” I asked.

  Chesh frowned. “None of the articles mention the Hearts.”

  “Yet, the timing is similar.” I walked slowly around the large table, looking at the papers from a different angle, as though it might give me more insight into the problem.

  I pointed to a face I recognized. Mr. Byron Day-Forsythe. “Do you know him?”

  Chesh nodded. “He’s a talented inventor—officially one of our competitors, but we studied together, you know.” Chesh pointed to another face. “I also know Mr. Littleburn. He’s a friend of my father’s. He owns a shop selling the gadgets he’s invented across the other side of the city. They’re both members of the Inventor Guild.” Chesh peered at the articles with renewed interest. “In fact, Byron was an apprentice in the Inventor Guild.”

  I cast him a quick look, then ran my eye over the other professions listed. “Do you think that might be a common factor? Guild membership?”

  “Not of one particular guild,” Chesh said, but he made a wry face as he conceded. “They might all be members of the United Guilds.”

  The first hint of a smile touched my lips as a bubble of enthusiasm grew inside of me. “They all belong to professions related to building or inventing things,” I said. “Welder, rigger, different kinds of engineers, machinist, mold maker, mechanic, draftsperson…”

  There was a moment of silence. I could hear the ticking of the Pinnacle clock in the distance.

  “Perhaps we should check the United Guild—they keep all the memberships of the guilds, right?” I suggested. “I’m sure the grandmasters will provide the membership rolls if Mother asks them. We can check these names against them, to see if a pattern emerges.”

  Chesh tapped his finger over the sketch of Byron’s face. An expression of indecision passed over his face.

  “What?”

  Chesh looked up at me. “I’m not discounting the probability that vampires are involved in this…but I have another friend who is apprenticing in the Inventor Guild. Maybe we should pay him a visit? He might be able to tell us something about this that we don’t know.”

  “Why are Mr. Day-Forsythe and Mr. Pankhurst members of the Inventor Guild, and you aren’t?” I asked Chesh as we took the steps up to the residence of Mr. Oscar Pankhurst, an apprentice in the Inventors Guild. He lived in a three-story townhouse with large windows decorated with stained glass. The door was set above street level, only accessible by a set of steps bound by an ornate wrought iron railing.

  Chesh removed his hat as he lifted a hand to grasp the heavy knocker, shaped in the beaked head of a flamingo pecking at the heavy wooden door. He paused, looking down at his feet.

  I frowned. “Your father is a member of the Inventor Guild, and you’re his apprentice. Doesn’t that give you automatic membership?”

  Chesh blushed, dropping his eyes away from me, clearing his throat, but he didn’t immediately answer. “Yes,” he whispered.

  “So, why aren’t you a member?” I asked. “Don’t you want to be part of the Guild?”

  “I do,” Chesh responded, meeting my eyes again. His eyes were suddenly alight with passion. “I just don’t want to get in because of who my father is. I want to be a member because I have a talent for it. I want to prove myself.”

  “What do you have to do to prove yourself?”

  “If your father is not a member of the Inventor Guild, there is a process by which one has to be recommended by a guild member. Then, one has to present an original invention to a panel of the masters. They vote as to whether the invention, as presented, pushes the boundaries of knowledge and technological creation. It’s not enough to be able to build things—that might get a person into the Mechanic Guild, or the Metallurgy Guild, but an invention has to be impressively original and useful to obtain admittance to the Inventor Guild.”

  “You are a good inventor with a flair for new ideas. I’m sure one of the gadgets you’ve been working on would satisfy their requirements.”

  Chesh looked down at his feet. “Not good enough. Not yet. I’m not leaving it to chance. I won’t take a half-baked invention to the masters. I won’t shame my father by presenting something to them that isn’t good enough. One only has one chance.”

  I nodded my head. “Did Byron have family connections within the Guild? Or did he present to the panel?”

  Chesh raised an eyebrow. “He didn’t say, and I never asked.”

  “Does Oscar?” I asked.

  Chesh sighed. “No, Oscar’s father isn’t in the Inventor Guild. Mr. Pankhurst Sr. is a respected administrator within the First Forge Bank. He heads the division that administers the aesthetic stipend. Oscar was supposed to follow in his father’s footsteps and take a career in the bank. Instead, he became an inventor. His father hasn’t cut him off, but he’s threatened it. I think he’s hoping Oscar will come to his senses and return to the family business. Oscar’s a genius, though. We studied together. He’s a good friend. He’s been a good sounding board about…many things…over the years I’ve known him. I trust him—he’ll tell us if there’s something going on that we should know about.”

  Then, without giving me the chance to ask any more questions, he lifted the knocker to bang it against the door.

  We didn’t wait long before a butler appeared at the door. He wore a smart suit in black and a white bow tie with his hair slicked back—typical of a
butler in a wealthy, fashionable family. He looked down over his long nose with eyebrows raised as he waited for us to state our business.

  Chesh introduced me, then asked to see Mr. Pankhurst.

  The lines of the butler’s mouth drooped as he delivered the news. “I’m afraid Mr. Pankhurst Jr. hasn’t been seen since yesterday, sir. His parents have just reported his absence to the authorities. They are most anxious for any knowledge of his whereabouts. You don’t happen to know where he might be, do you?”

  Chesh paced with his fists clenched. His bright golden curls stood on end, and the back of his shirt was untucked, his vest undone, and he’d thrown his jacket over the back of a chair in a most un-Chesh-like manner.

  After we politely asked for our condolences to be passed along to Mr. and Mrs. Pankhurst, we had returned to Chesh’s home. Like the workshop, Chesh’s house was full of inventions. At the door, an automatic butler had seized my hat and coat. A series of pulleys had lit a lamp as we pushed on a door to enter the sitting room. Everywhere I looked, I saw gears, pulleys, and moving cogs.

  Chesh hadn’t said a word since we’d left the Pankhurst residence, but the energy emanating from him was like heat from an oven.

  “It’s alright to be worried,” I said to him as I watched him stride back and forth across the room. “We’ll figure it out.”

  Chesh spun around. “There’s nothing to figure out. You don’t want to see the most obvious solution. It’s not members of the guilds kidnapping each other—they wouldn’t do that. It’s the vampires killing for blood. Why can’t you see what’s right in front of your eyes?”

  I stepped back, physically recoiling from the force of Chesh’s outburst. “You don’t have any proof of that,” I said. I tried to keep my voice calm, but even I could hear the hard edge in it.

  Chesh threw up his hands. “Is it because of your new boyfriend? What kind of magic does he possess that he’s preventing you from seeing what’s right in front of your face?”