Cold Stone & Ivy Book 2: The Crown Prince (The Empire of Steam)
Page 36
“I do understand, Miss Savage, but that’s not going to happen. Not for me.”
Her heart was racing in her chest and she wondered if there had been a time when it had stopped. She could almost remember but it was a dream.
“I am still incomplete, you see? I need the last locket but I don’t know where she is. Her sisters will help me. They will lead me where I need to go.”
“No. You will stop this nonsense and come home with me.”
“There is no stopping what has begun,” he said. “It is an act of God.”
“No,” she said. “God is not doing this. The lockets are.”
“Yes, the lockets. There is one more.”
“The lockets are destroying you.”
“No,” he said. “They are making me.”
He turned his face to look at her and her heart did stop this time.
His eyes, once brown as chocolate, oft blue as the sky or green as an emerald, then white, red, silver and finally black, were the lockets. Ghostlight and Arclight, spinning and flashing behind his lashes. Clockwork eyes of metal and glass and otherworldly elements and angels.
“I will find Lostlight and then I will be who I was created to be.”
“And who is that?” she asked in a voice very small and thin.
“Death.”
He twisted his hand into the mane, swung his leg and suddenly, he was up and onto the great ashen back. The horse pranced and the earth died with every hoof fall.
He looked down at her and smiled.
“Sophie was right. I am the Crown Prince of Death. I will find Lostlight, then go north to Lonsdale. I will find Arvin Frankow and I will kill him. God will judge the living and the dead and the world will come to an end.”
“You are not Death,” she said and she rushed to the horse, laid her hands on his boot. Tears spilt from her own lashes now. “No, you’re not. You are Sebastien de Lacey and I love you. Do you hear me? I love you and I don’t want you to leave.”
He reached down to touch her face, ran his cold fingers along her chin.
“And I love you, Miss Savage, if it is possible for me to love. I suppose then it is only fitting that Death would love Life. We are a set, you and I, matching yet opposite, star-crossed forever.”
“Romeo and Juliet,” she said. Her throat was tight. She could barely speak. “You said you would be the death of me.”
“I already was.”
He drew his hand away and the world was colder without him.
“Good bye, Miss Savage. Perhaps I will see you at the gates of the dead.”
“I shall live at Seventh,” she whispered. “And haunt you forever.”
The horse reared on its hind legs and the earth thundered one last time as it came down. The bone army shrank back, the human crowd did likewise and with a toss of its head, the pale horse pranced slowly, majestically, towards the Swiss Gate. The bone army moved to follow and the crowd fled before them, some wailing, others mute, all horrified at the things they had witnessed. Together, crowd, army and horse were gone in a heartbeat.
Ivy sank to her knees, finished.
It was the morning of the funeral of the Crown Prince who had lived, and the birth of the Crown Prince who had died. Nothing would ever be the same again.
Christien approached, his shadow blocking the early morning sun.
“What are we going to do?” she whispered.
“Simple,” he said and he looked down at her. “We stop him.”
He offered her his clockwork hand and she stared at it for a long moment, feeling the breath entering and exiting her body. Breathing, she thought to herself. Bloody marvelous thing. She would never take it for granted again.
She took his hand, allowed him to pull her to her feet and for the first time in days, the sun rose over the city of Vienna.
***
The Orient Express rattled along the track heading east towards Paris, the city of lights. There was a celebration in the dining compartment as unlimited champagne had been ordered, compliments of Emperor of the Known World, his wife the Empress of Avalon and their son, Crown Prince Maximilian. The renowned Star of Morocco had been returned to the imperial vaults and there was only one name on everyone’s lips – Penny Dreadful, Girl Criminologist.
“Bully for you, Penny!” guffawed her father, Chief Inspector Charles Dreadful. “It’s a regular Coop de Grace, it is. A regular Coop de Grace!”
“Coup de grâce, Father,” said Penny with the appropriate pronunciation and she lifted the flute of champagne to her lips. “But I couldn’t have done it without help.”
“Here’s to Julian Terrence Hull!” her father boomed. “We’ll make a criminologist out of that boy soon enough!”
“Here! Here!” echoed the boys in blue.
Standing in the corner, Julian smiled at her, his clockwork arm whirring as he lifted his flute. Odd, thought Penny, how often he smiled without his eyes.
She turned back to her father.
“And what about that rogue, Alexander Dunn?”
“What about him, Penny?”
“Well, technically he didn’t steal the Star of Morocco. He shouldn’t be tried for a crime he didn’t commit.”
“Balderdash, Penny. He stole what he thought was the Star of Morocco, which is just as bad. If it hadn’t been for you, Crown Prince Maximilian would never have been able to return it to his father. As it stands, all of Europe is basking in a fresh glow of world peace.”
“World peace,” she repeated and stared into her glass.
“Besides, there are so many crimes that rogue has committed, that he’ll surely swing for something once we get him back to good ol’ Londontown!”
A woman moved through the dining compartment toward them. Penny followed her with her eyes.
“Surely,” said Penny. “And you’re certain that Prison Compartment 3 in the rear of the train is secure?”
“Oh most secure, Penny. This is the Orient Express, after all. It would take an act of God to break him out of there.”
“An act of God,” said Penny and she smiled to herself.
The woman was dressed as a French maid, with a white powder wig, striped leggings and tiny spectacles that were as dark as coal. She was gazing absentmindedly out the window and bumped into Penny, causing her to spill her champagne.
“Oh mon Dieu,” said the woman, obviously French. “I am so terribly sorry, mademoiselle. I am not good on trains.”
“Not to worry,” said Penny. “It was entirely my fault.”
“I seem to have dropped my room key.”
“Oh look,” said Penny and she held up her flute. “Your key has somehow miraculously found it’s way into my champagne glass!”
“Oh, what a happy accident!”
Both she and the woman laughed merrily.
“Do take it with my apologies,” said Penny, pulling the skeleton key from the flute. “And enjoy the rest of the trip. We will be in Paris soon.”
“Yes,” said the woman. “J’adore Paris. I am expecting to be reunited with my brother soon.”
“I expect you will, then,” said Penny. “Give him my warmest regards.”
“I will, most certainly. Adieu.”
And the woman carried on to disappear into the next coach.
“Ah those French dames,” said her father. “Such a bloom of innocence and purity about them!”
“Indeed,” said Penny. “Il n'est rien de réel que le rêve et l'amour.”
“What’s that, Penny?”
“Nothing is real but dreams and love.”
And she raised her glass as a silent toast to dreams and international jewel thieves and the girl criminologists who loved them.
The End of Penny Dreadful and the Villain of Vienna
Epilogue
It was dark in the town of Over Milling, the crescent moon shedding little light along the cobbled streets. There were no gaslamps save for the four dotting the corners of the town square, and only two of those were b
urning. Towering over the square, a lone Sentinel stood. It was an old giant, one of the original fleet that had been sent out as a part of Prince Albert’s Great Exhibition of 1851. In the summer, he was surrounded by flowers and covered in ivy, a grand hitching post for horses and dogs alike. Come winter, he was home to a resident barn owl and friend to a few snowmen that joined him in the square. He was a fearsome sight nonetheless, standing guard over the town as a symbol of imperial majesty and might.
For thirty-seven years he stood, never having moved from the square. For thirty-seven years, he watched and guarded, and upheld the symbol in a silent, passive but very British manner.
Now, a telegraph signal caused sparks to flicker inside its metal skull and the tarnished eyes to beam and glow. With an indignant hoot, the owl lifted from its perch on the iron shoulder as gears that had not moved in thirty-seven years groaned, remembering their purpose. The bellows roared as mechanisms that had grown rusty sprang to life and gaslight could be seen along all the welded seams. The iron body shuddered as cables sprang taut, pulling gears in the great torso and one leg strained against the hard-packed snow.
From a neighbouring building, a dog barked as the ancient Sentinel broke free of the ice, its iron foot crushing the first of the snowmen beside it. The town square thundered as the second foot completely obliterated all traces of snowmen. Even with the dog barking, the residents of Over Milling would not realize until morning that the Sentinel had moved or that the symbol of majesty and might had left their town square.
It wasn’t until noon that it would be found on the road to Lasingstoke Hall.
To be continued in
Cold Stone & Ivy Book 3:
The Seventh House
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Other Books by H. Leighton Dickson
Tails of the Upper Kingdom
To Journey in the Year of the Tiger
To Walk in the Way of Lions
Songs in the Year of the Cat
Swallowtail & Sword
Empire of Steam
Cold Stone & Ivy Book 1: The Ghost Club
Cold Stone & Ivy Book 2: The Crown Prince
Dragon of Ash & Stars
Coming Soon:
Snow in the Year of the Dragon
Cold Stone & Ivy Book 3: The Seventh House
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
H. Leighton Dickson grew up in the wilds of the Canadian Shield, where her neighbours were wolves, moose, deer and lynx. She studied Zoology at the University of Guelph and worked in the Edinburgh Zoological Gardens in Scotland, where she was chased by lions, wrestled deaf tigers and fed antibiotics to Polar Bears by baby bottle! She has been writing since she was thirteen and pencilled her way through university with the help of DC Comics. She has three dogs, three cats, three kids, one horse and one husband. She has managed to keep all of them alive so far.
An award-winning indie author, Heather has seven scifi/fantasy novels on Amazon. She also writes for Bayview Magazine and is a photoshop wizard when it comes to book covers.
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