by Morris, Tee
Before he hit the chairs of the first row, before the screams of ladies filled the air, Wellington did catch one word. Certainly not coming from his lips, or Eliza’s for that matter. “Mum!”
Douglas Sheppard was bounding for the stage. Strange bolts of blue and violet danced between the chandelier’s ceiling fixture and Kate’s own brass arm and jaw. She looked only startled by the sudden display of electricity rather than truly shocked. Douglas dove for his mother, knocking her free of the podium, and sliding with her to the far left edge of the stage, before tumbling off the edge in a tangle of arms and legs. Tendrils of energy clung to Kate but dissipated as she slid out of reach. They disappeared from view just when a brilliant white claw of energy reached through the highest windows of the meeting hall and struck the podium where Kate had been. The bolts angrily danced along and around the stage as if searching for a victim. Finding none, the lightning grew brighter and brighter.
Thunder roared through the tearoom. Wellington ducked and rolled away into the retreating wave of panic as the podium exploded.
A hand gripped his bicep and pulled him up to his feet. “Welly?”
The Archivist adjusted his spectacles, looking up to at his colleague. “Eliza? Are you hurt?”
Strangely, her evening dress appeared only slightly tousled, but her hair was not even out of place. “We must have been safely out of its range this time.”
He nodded, his eyes immediately turning to the stage. “As were most of the ladies.”
Eliza suddenly shoved him aside, her eyes boring into the crowd. “And there you are again!”
Wellington followed her gaze to a rather imposing woman of extraordinary height, accentuated either naturally or by the lights of the meeting hall, with sharp cheekbones, dark eyes, and golden hair just visible underneath her hat. Before he could enquire, his colleague shoved herself in the direction of the tall suffragist. A short scream from someone in Eliza’s way caught the woman’s attention, and on seeing she was being pursued, she too began to push and shove her way through the chaos. Eliza made a strange motion with her arm, and then she turned to Wellington and made the gesture again.
When she mouthed “Cut her off!” to him, Wellington finally understood and worked his way around the fray, now beginning to die down as most of the assembled had escaped into the night. He had reached the door at the same time Eliza did, her face now red with frustration.
“Damnation,” she swore. “She got away.”
“Who exactly got away?”
“I don’t know.” Eliza raised her hand, a warning for him not to say anything. “What I mean is, I don’t know who she is, but she was at Speakers’ Corner. I can’t quite put a finger on it now, but there’s something about her I recognise.”
“Please Eliza, sometimes you do make it difficult to follow your train of thought. Can you not elaborate?” He followed her back towards the stage.
“I recognise the other suffragists from previous rallies. They also have a carriage suited for such gatherings. They looked like they were supposed to be here.” Eliza pointed to the doorway where she had last seen this stranger. “She didn’t. Not at Speakers’ Corner. Not tonight. And I know her. I don’t know where.” With a final sigh of irritation, she turned back and strode hotly back towards the stage, “I don’t know how, but I know her.”
Douglas was helping up his mother, while the officers were being tended to by Protectors. Eliza and Wellington joined him at her side. “Mrs. Sheppard,” Wellington asked, “are you well?”
“As well as can be expected when one is tackled twice in one week,” she grumbled. “Good Lord, Douglas, when do you find time for rugby? Your tackle is terribly fierce!”
“I make time, Mum,” he said. “I have to stay fit for when I scale Lhotse next year, yes?”
They both chuckled at that. Eliza examined the other women, all of them still catching their collective breath. “I suppose we must add tonight to a growing list of disasters.”
“I beg to differ. We . . .” And Wellington paused, his eyes darting at Douglas. “We prevented Mrs. Sheppard’s abduction, and got a very good look at how this device works.” Now it was Eliza’s turn to pause. “Not only do we catch a whiff of electricity before an event, but there is a buildup in the air. Brush or come close to anything metal, and it can give you a bit of a shock. At first I thought it was a residual of the abduction, but now . . .”
“That’s what brought you back in here,” Eliza realised.
He looked back towards the door. “Partially.”
Her brow furrowed. “Something else then?”
Wellington wanted to tell her what he saw, or what he thought he saw. But, “No, nothing. A trick of light.”
They both looked around the hall. Moments ago, there were screams and pandemonium. Now, the silence—aside from the murmurs coming from the officers of the Movement—was just as deafening.
“Well then,” Eliza groaned, “I have endured my fill of peculiar occurrences for a day. I’m off home.”
Wellington watched her gather up her coat and scarf. Tonight was the first time that he could recall ever seeing Eliza looking exhausted.
The same instinct that urged him to study the building across the street urged him to look back at the Sheppards. Kate was gazing around the empty meeting hall with the air of a general reassessing her resources.
Douglas was watching his mother intently, until his eyes caught Wellington’s. The sombre look on his face softened, and he smiled. The man was almost as insufferable as his books made him out to be.
Wellington heartily wished he would go back to the Serengeti, posthaste.
Chapter Eight
In Which Our Dashing Archivist Upholds His Gentlemanly Upbringing and Our Beloved Colonial Pepperpot Entertains Unexpected Guests
“Stare if you wish, but on this I am firm,” Wellington insisted.
He swore for a moment that he saw Eliza blush. He was not certain whether it was in reaction to his words or his removing his coat, but Wellington would not be denied in this moment.
“Welly . . .” Eliza began.
“I will hear no arguments to the contrary, Miss Braun. I will be spending the night here.” Her eyebrow arched slightly, until he placed his coat on the back of a chair. “I will be staying on the couch, if you please. Tomorrow we will return to the Archives and search for clues—but after all these goings-on, you have made yourself quite the target, and have been seen talking to Mrs. Sheppard on many occasions.”
Eliza fixed her gaze hard on him. “This is me we are talking about, just to be clear.”
“Admittedly, yes, but even you, the South Pacific Angel of Wanton Destruction and Calamity has to sleep sometime.”
A hiss of pistons took Wellington’s attention away from Eliza. Alice seemed as if she wanted to interject, but Eliza stepped between them, her smile warm and pleasant.
That unsettled Wellington quite a bit.
“Now, Wellington . . .”
And she was calling him “Wellington” which made him, unexpectedly, a bit wobbly in the knees.
“. . . your gesture, while sweet and endearing, is really unnecessary. I think Alice and I can protect ourselves most admirably.”
She was being difficult, so he brought out the ultimate argument. “Remember,” he said in a quiet voice, “how you felt when Agent Thorne went missing. Surely you would not wish to put me through the same thing?”
Eliza’s mouth opened and shut a few times in an impotent search for further argument. Finally, she walked up to him and gave him a hard shove, sending him backwards into the plush couch. He now looked up at her; and with her hands on her hips, lips pursed, and eyebrow crooked as she considered him, she was quite the vision. As he was sitting down, he couldn’t tell if his knees were weak but he somehow knew they would be. At that moment he saw exactly why men all over the world couldn’t resist the compulsion to grant her with whatever she wanted.
“Stop trying to use logic on me,
Wellington Thornhill Books!” Her sapphire eyes trained on his own. “And using Harry is a bit below the belt.”
A cool sweat formed on the back of his neck. It wasn’t from fear, and that was more unnerving than if it had been.
“However, if you insist.” Eliza motioned to her maid. “Be a dear, Alice, and fetch Mr. Books a sidearm. Something fitting for a gentlemen.”
“Yes, miss.” Alice curtseyed and then walked over to a gorgeous music box. As Pachelbel’s Canon in D began to play, the maid pressed a hidden button, and produced an impressive firearm from within the still playing device. “The Bulldog, miss? Or may I suggest the Webley Mark I for the gentleman?”
“A standard,” Eliza acknowledged. “A fine pairing, Alice. Nicely done.”
Wellington shook his head, taking up his walking stick. “No need, Miss Braun. This will be adequate.”
She went to protest, but Wellington emphatically held up his hand.
Alice closed the music box and then pressed the fleur-de-lis in the same end table. A panel slid back to reveal a small shotgun. “Perhaps, Mr. Books, would prefer something with a bit more stopping power? It’s not as gentlemanly to be sure—but who wants to be a gentleman in a tight corner?”
“Good Lord!” Wellington stared at the compact weapon for a moment, and then motioned around himself. “I’m spending the night in a bloody armoury!”
Eliza clicked her tongue and finally spoke. “I would say that this problem you have with guns will be the death of you.” She looked him over and gnawed lightly on the inside of her cheek. “Now I worry if it will in fact be the death of me.” Eliza tapped her fingers against her bodice and shook her head. “Alice, fetch a few pillows and some blankets for Mr. Books as he will be joining us tonight.” She leaned down and pressed the tip of his nose, before adding, “Better you stay here anyway. I can’t defend you if you’re outside playing the gallant and not within eyesight.”
“Your faith in my abilities does inspire me as would Helen’s visage,” snipped Wellington.
“Helen had a thousand ships covering her backside, mate.” Eliza shrugged, motioning to him. “I have an Archivist who’s afraid of guns. You figure out who has the better deal.”
Alice returned with her arms full of pillows and linens. “And with that,” Wellington huffed, snatching a pillow and punching a bit of air and softness into it, “I bid you good night, Miss Braun. Sleep easy as I will serve as your first line of defence.”
Again, he noted Alice shooting a glance to Eliza. His partner did little to conceal the look of frustration as she turned and made for her own bedroom. She said good night before closing the door.
The couch had looked a good few inches longer when he made the offer to stand for her honour. He was sure it had shrunk in the intervening minutes. With a low sigh, Wellington pulled a pair of blankets up to his chin, and wriggled against the couch. It failed to get any more comfortable.
He reflected on when he had slept on foreign soil while serving at Her Majesty’s pleasure in the Transvaal War. This couch was void of rocks, dirt, insects, and any passing indigenous species, and yet he was actually more uncomfortable now than he had been then. He scanned the room for an ottoman of some kind to prop his feet up on even as the shadows began to lengthen and devour the room.
Eliza’s apartments now appeared as when he first saw them. Lights of London crept in through the windows, the late-night carriages and calls from the streets creating a constant murmur. His mind wandered to the Archives. Noise, Wellington thought as he struggled against the cushions, can serve as a lullaby in some instances. Granted, it never did as such in the Archives, but it should have, as the generators there always filled the crypt underneath the Ministry with a low, steady drone. Such noise could lull others to sleep, as he had seen on occasion with Eliza; but it was more of a comforting cadence to him, a reassurance that, yes, he was doing the right thing. From the Archives would he serve Her Majesty now, a destiny he felt far more comfortable with than the one his father had groomed him for.
The soft din from outside was not as comforting. He was “in the field” as Eliza would put it. Hardly familiar ground for Wellington.
More to the point, it had been half a decade since Wellington had known the kind of action that Eliza thirsted for. Sound had assigned her to him to blunt that edge. Now he squirmed on her couch, serving as her protector. Would I do this for any of the other female agents? he mused. Agent Ihita Pujari? Agent Kitty O’Toole? Both beautiful women, and based on their previous cases, perfectly competent. No, Eliza was probably right. She didn’t need protecting.
But Eliza was different. To him, at least.
Somewhere between the aural backdrop of London at night and his own random considerations, Wellington surrendered to the warm, friendly embrace of Morpheus. His dreams were as they usually were: vivid. However even in the beautiful field of flowers he found himself in, something ominous hung in the air. A repeating displacement thrummed in his ears, sounding as if it were a palpitation of his own heart. He couldn’t hear his own footfalls as he ran through the plain of brilliant flowers, and yet something or someone was coming closer with every thud within his skull. In the dream, in the centre of this wide, vast moor, Wellington stopped, his hands over his ears, his mouth open in a scream that made no sound, while high above him the quick claps of thunder grew louder. Louder . . .
And with a start, Wellington was back in the darkness of Eliza’s apartments.
“Bloody hell,” he whispered as he brought himself up to a sitting position.
He was shaking. How odd. He had to calm himself and remember old habits, as he couldn’t afford a sleep as deep as that; otherwise, Eliza would truly be better off without him there. He took a deep breath, trying to slow his heartbeat now resounding in his ears.
Wait a moment, Wellington thought, the grogginess of his odd dream now surrendering to his military and Ministry training. That’s not my heartbeat. That beating is coming from—
He felt the shower of glass and wood just before throwing himself to the floor, his walking stick now against his chest and tight in his grip. Another window shattered and from his vantage point, two pairs of feet paused and then started coming towards him. Wellington looked behind him to see three others closing on his position. He brought to mind the variety of furniture and fixtures decorating Eliza’s apartments. In this sitting room, the three entering in from alley side would have more ground and décor to work around. The other two would be better targets, particularly as they were city side and had the lights of London, few and far between as they might be, behind them.
Why, oh why, could this encounter not have been in Paris with all its grand illumination?
From the coffee table he grabbed a small but solid statuette. (Mercury, or was it Loki?) He pushed the distraction to the back of his mind as he stood and threw the small idol at one of the advancing shadows. As the statuette flew, preferably with Mercury’s speed, Wellington launched himself at the other shadow. His walking stick cut the air and impacted hard against what he was hoping was an arm or perhaps ribs.
The way the shadow reacted to his blow, his cane had connected with a shoulder. Who were these intruders? Pygmies?
He could hear footsteps behind him. Footsteps, and pistons firing rapidly in succession.
Wellington brought the cane around, lifting the diminutive intruder off his feet, and then thrust the cane forward, its silver tip catching the glint of the outside light before striking what he hoped was a head. A crunch of glass accompanied the cane’s impact into something solid.
“Alice,” Wellington shouted as he spun around. “Be—”
He could see the shadows stir and then abruptly stop when the maid stepped into sight; the shattered window frames painting dark, angry streaks across her body. She was still, but pistons continued to pop and hiss angrily while cogs and gears spun so fast they screamed a high-pitched whine that made Wellington grind his teeth. He wanted to believe what he was wi
tness to was a trick of shadow, but he—and no doubt, the intruders opposite of Alice—knew it was no illusion. It all flashed by in a moment: a moment for Alice’s left thigh to burst open, a moment of hesitation on the intruders’ part, the briefest moment for Alice’s right leg to step back; and in the same moment for the maid to pull from her open prosthetic the forearm-sized firearm. Alice’s first shot thundered through the apartments, lifting one of the assailants off the ground while sending the other two scattering into the darkness. Another shot exploded from the shotgun’s second barrel, but Wellington doubted if it hit anyone.
“Careful as mice,” Alice shouted back as she fell back into cover.
Wellington could hear in this brief lull Alice reloading shells and the remaining two intruders closing on them both. Quickly. How were they able to move as deftly as they could?
On hearing the grinding of glass against wood, he glanced at his own felled opponents. One of them was attempting to prop themselves up on one elbow, and that’s when he caught sight of pale skin through a shattered lens. Where his cane had connected, the goggles’ thick frame had cracked open, revealing a collection of wires, some hanging loose as if they were innards of an animal torn free after a lion’s attack.
“Starlight Goggles!” he shouted.
“Bugger all!” Alice replied.
He brought his cane around, but this time his opponent caught it. Wellington twisted the head of his walking stick, and the blade appeared with the lightest of rings. The attacker scrambled back, returning to two feet, standing with knees slightly bent, waiting for Wellington’s next attack.
“Never you mind, Mr. Books,” Alice called as she fired off a round, shattering what sounded like something made of marble. “I got a mind for these lurkers. You tend to yours, I’ll tend on mine!”
Wellington turned back around and cut the air with his sword and assumed a challenging stance.
The shadow’s arms dropped sharply, and from its forearms came a hard, loud ring as two blades locked into place.
