Secrets In Savannah (Phantom Knights)

by Amalie Vantana

  His words held a double meaning, and it took every ounce of strength to keep myself from charging forward and strangling the life from his evil body. If I could make it that close to him. Harvey knew what had happened to Jack, for there was little that he did not know when it came to the Phantoms.

  “You know who have found me, you knew when you left me.”

  He smiled, and I wanted to slap it from his bearded face. “I have warned you before, but you never heed my words. Without my protection, you are helpless, prey to all the beasts that want to do you harm.”

  “We move away from the point, do not you think?”

  His eyes flashed his displeasure at my not following his tangent. One would think that he would have grown used to my not following his whims, but still he held out hope that he could bend me to his will. That would never happen.

  “What point is this that you speak of, Guinevere?”

  The back and forth between us was growing tedious, and my cape was beginning to chafe me. The cape was another one of Harvey’s rulings, one that I agreed to due to the air of mystery that it lent me. Now that the Phantoms knew who I was, the mystery was gone. At least the mystery of the white phantom, and while I played that part well, I was ready to be myself again.

  “What is the next step, General? Where do we go from here, for you cannot mean to remain so close to Washington?” General Harvey was now known to the Phantoms just as I was. He was no longer the mysterious secret leader of the Holy Order of Levitas. He relinquished that right when he had me capture Bess Martin, and he revealed his identity to her.

  There was a deep game afoot, and it chafed me that the general used me like a puppet on a string, but I needed him. He offered protection, and I was not naive, I knew that without his covering I would be dead. My life was full of secrets, secrets from the past that I tried not to think about, but was daily reminded of. My life was one large tangled web of lies and deceit.

  Jack never could understand why I kept going back to the general, but Jack could have led a normal life, if my past faults had not gotten him killed.

  Swallowing the lump in my throat and forcing Jack from my mind, I focused on the enemy before me.

  “I am afraid that it is not that simple. There have been some ... setbacks,” Harvey said.

  My heart did a little dance, and I felt a chill start to creep up my spine and arms. “Setbacks? What manner of setbacks?”

  Harvey looked away, and I became aware of who the others in the room were. They pulled off their hoods and four of the twelve heads of the Holy Order watched me. The twelve were never called upon unless something terrible had occurred.

  “What have you done?” I demanded, taking a step forward.

  Harvey’s eyes snapped back to mine as his jaw hardened. “You forget yourself.”

  “I do not! You forget yourself, and your role. Where is my sister?” My hands were clenched tight at my sides, my nails digging into my palms.

  It seemed like an eternity as I waited for Harvey to speak. He took his time, eyeing me dispassionately. He looked away again, and dread covered my body.

  “She was taken while we were in Charleston.”

  There could be only one meaning behind those words, and I felt the old fear creeping in. Chills covered my arms that were no longer warm under the cape. My body was shaking with panic.

  “Who?” I whispered, needing to hear him say it. Harvey shook his head, and that small gesture snapped my panic into wrath. “Liar!”

  The other people in the room either cringed or jumped, and it added a kind of wicked pleasure to my wrath. That I, a girl of eighteen, could frighten them.

  Harvey rose, trying to intimidate me into submission. He would try to get me to believe that he had nothing to do with my sister’s capture, but I knew the truth. If my sister was gone then he was fully to blame.

  “You will not speak to me in that tone, do I make myself understood?” The words were spoken calmly, but it belied the approaching storm. “Answer me,” he snapped and two of the others jumped in alarm, but not me, never me.

  Squaring my shoulders, I crossed my arms over my chest and cast him a scathing look. “I will speak to you as you deserve, and I will ask you again, who has my sister?”

  Harvey eyed me for a long moment, but I would not retreat. I held his gaze without flinching. Too long had I relied on the protection of others, and it had made me soft. I felt determination cover me. It was the same determination that made a ten year old girl, who had watched her father be brutally murdered, survive the fate that was destined for her.

  “I do not know. If I did, do you not think that I would extend every effort within my power to rescue her?”

  He was lying. I could see it, not in his eyes, not in what he was saying, but what he was not saying. He was trying to use tactics, first bellowing and then pity, but it would not work, not this time. He had one task, one simple task, and he could not even do that. No, General Harvey had outworn his usefulness. It was time that I regained control of my life, my fate.

  “I do not think it, but you now have the opportunity. Send for the twelve, and together we will rescue her.” My words shocked those seated around the room. Their eyes turned to me, but it was not fear that I saw. It was pity.

  Harvey was again in control and shook his head. “I am afraid that is out of the question. Sending for the twelve, as you know, can only be done in extremities. The message it means is war.”

  “This is war! Those who have taken my sister know that as much as you. We must pursue them. We must get to her before they have a chance to turn her over to Luther. For once he has her, it is only a matter of time before he finds Ma belle.”

  Harvey sat back on his throne and with a sinking stomach, I knew that I had lost. He meant to do nothing. “There is only one who can declare war and until I receive such word my hands are tied.” He entwined his fingers to make his point.

  Fear tried to sneak up on me, but I squashed it. Fear had held me bound for too long. It was what made me become the white phantom. It was what made me join Harvey and the Holy Order, and it was what had led to my sister being captured. Shaking off such thoughts, I took in my surroundings, searching for the easiest way out.

  “Then your services are no longer required,” I said once I located my path to freedom.

  Harvey jumped to his feet, his face draining of all color, making him look like a ghost of his former self.

  “For too long you have tried to rule, me, my sister, our futures, our fate, but no more,” I said as I took a step back toward the door.

  Harvey took a step back. He had always been able to threaten me to do his wishes, but the power had just traded hands, and he knew it. I turned and walked toward the double doors.

  “You know that I cannot allow you to walk out those doors. Not without paying a price,” Harvey said, halting me. As I turned, he snapped his fingers and his three guards that were in the room moved to block the door.

  There was one way out. I had to fight.

  All of Harvey’s guards were similar in stature, but their fighting styles were always different. Two of the guards smiled at me knowing what was expected, but one looked hesitant. There was my last target.

  As Harvey snapped his fingers again, and the guards stepped forward, my hand was feeling along my belt for my iron. When the first of the eager guards rushed me, I pulled out my iron and struck his nose. He stumbled back with groans and curses as the second eager guard ran at me. Sidestepping and dodging around his punches, I slammed the iron knob against his wrist. He hunched over, and my hand swung around the back of his neck. I dug my nails into his skin as my other hand with the iron struck his back. Releasing him, I dropped down and hit the iron against the back of his knee. As he fell, I rose and moved around him for the hesitant guard.

  His brows rose as I approached as if he thought I would not strike him because we had once been allies. He did not know me as well as he thought.

  I raised the iron as
I neared him and swung it toward his head. He grabbed my wrist and wrenched the iron from my hand, but he was not focusing where he should have. As his face centered on me, his cheek met the sharp end of my dagger.

  It had annoyed me for years that the guards undervalued and underestimated what I was capable of, but this day I was grateful for their ignorance. I smiled, for I had won, and he knew it. He could try to attack me, but I would shoot him with the little pistol attached to my dagger. He dropped my iron, and I raised my brows. He was a fool if he thought I would fall for that child’s trick. I pushed the tip of the dagger into his cheek, guiding him away from the door.

  The man whose nose I had hit was coming toward me if the sound of his growls and stomping boots were any indication. Twisting around the guard before me, I aimed my dagger over his shoulder and squeezed the small trigger on my pistol that was attached to the blade. The explosion made the people upon the thrones jump. As the guard clutched his shoulder, I glanced at Harvey. He was standing with his hands fisted on his hips and annoyance coating his face. Placing my dagger at the base of the final guard’s neck, I forced him to his knees. Swiping my iron from the floor, I moved to the door.

  “If you walk out that door, you forfeit all rights and are henceforth to be considered as a threat. Think carefully, Guinevere. Is that what you want? To lose my protection?”

  He was right of course. I slowly turned, and he smiled knowingly. His smile said it all; he had me on a string, and I would dance when he commanded.

  As a slow smile built upon my lips, I cut the string. I lowered my hood and unclasped the white cape from around my neck. I watched his emotions as he grasped what I was doing. With the flick of my wrist, I sent the white cape fluttering to the floor.

  “White was never my color anyway,” and with that I turned and walked out the door. The click of my heels against the stone steps encouraged me on, step by step, into the unknown, but a path that I choose, no longer chosen for me.

  òòò

  When I reached the house that Pierre was occupying in Washington, I ran inside, shouting. “Pierre, we must make haste away from the city. Harvey’s guards will be but minutes behind me.” There was no doubt in my mind that Harvey would send men after me. I knew too much.

  Entering the front parlor, Pierre was not alone. My body froze, my gaze focusing on the woman whose voice I had imitated for months.

  Hannah Lamont.

  “Guinevere!” Hannah ran toward me, and I was too stunned to react. She threw her arms around me, squeezing me against her, then she gave me an air kiss on each side of my cheeks. With her hands on my shoulders she held me back. “My dear, you looked two shades from ill. Have you missed me that much?” She laughed as she released me but pointed a finger at me. “Do not answer that.”

  Hannah Lamont had been my one nemesis in Philadelphia society while I had been pretending to be Richard’s ward. I genuinely did not like her.

  “What is she doing here, Pierre?” I demanded at once, ignoring Hannah completely.

  “Imagine my surprise when I learned that Pierre was not killed as I had been told, but resurrected by you. You must be a powerful sorceress to accomplish such a feat. Bringing the dead to life,” Hannah said, one thin brow angled up.

  “Pish! You mortals will believe anything,” I exclaimed, and Pierre coughed pointedly. Sighing, I relented. “Richard wanted the Levitas members to think him all powerful, so he staged Pierre’s death. As Pierre was working for me, he went along with it.”

  “What about you resurrecting him?” Hannah asked, still with that mobile brow arched.

  “Wherever do you get your information,” I scoffed. “Pierre and I staged that little scene for the Phantoms who were watching.”

  “She brings news,” Pierre interrupted as he stood facing me. Pierre knew me better than most. He could always tell when I was one moment away from hostility.

  Hannah waved an airy hand in my face. “Oh, just that George Crawford is the man who has taken your sister, and it is to Charleston that he has gone.”

  “How do you know this?” I had never trusted the woman, and I was not willing to begin.

  Her smile was arrogant and full of mystery. “That, my dear, you shall learn in time, but for now, you may wish to gather your things. Our carriage departs in an hour.” She walked out of the room.

  “She is not to be trusted, Pierre!” I began, furious over his lack of perception. Hannah Lamont was one of the last people that we could trust. Her appearance was the highest order of suspicious. Only one person could have sent her, to misdirect us from his trail.

  Hannah’s head suddenly popped back into the room around the wall, and I jerked into Pierre.

  “By the by,” Hannah said, smiling, “your Jack Martin survived.”

  CHAPTER 4

  JACK

  20 May, 1817

  Charleston, South Carolina

  On the morning of Bess and Sam’s masquerade ball, I was walking down the stairs when the sounds of a confrontation in the parlor came to my ears. My new brother was arguing with Leo by the sounds of it. When Bess’s voice joined the confrontation, I paused on the bottom step, for she had said Guinevere’s name.

  “You are not to tell him. He will do something to cause further injury, and that will distress my wife, which I will not allow,” Sam was saying.

  “With all due respect, you do not know Jack well if you believe he will injure himself,” Leo surprised me by saying.

  “He is not to know,” Bess said with finality. “Once she receives this, she will not wish to see him.”

  That was enough for me. Whatever Bess was planning, I would not allow.

  Walking into the parlor, three sets of eyes rose to greet me.

  “How are you feeling?” Sam asked as if he had not been conspiring against me.

  “Splendid, once you tell me why you were quarreling with Leo, and why Bess has resorted to her Phantom ways.”

  Bess was seated on the sofa with a selection of flowers on the table before her. She was arranging them into a bouquet, one that held a questionable message.

  “Charlotte tells me that you have promised her a dance this evening,” Sam said conversationally, though I knew what he was about.

  Bess had questioned me the day before about my feelings for Charlotte, Sam’s sister. What my mother and sister did not seem to grasp, or did not want to, was that I was betrothed to Guinevere.

  Charlotte was a dazzling young woman with enough vivacity for an entire court of women. She and I had become great friends during my recovery, but so had I with all of the members of the Charleston Phantoms. Char and I had spent hours together playing chess, talking, or me listening while she read to me. She was a lovely girl, but she was not Guinevere.

  “If my sister put you up to this, Sam,” I said as I cast a pointed look at Bess, “you may give her the tidings that I will marry Guinevere or no one at all.”

  “I am only going to say this once, Jack, and then I will remain well out of your affairs.” Sam received Bess’s frown with equanimity. “I have worked in proximity to Guinevere, and I have found that the woman is without conscience and heart.”

  “Not to me. You do not know her,” I told him, feeling more annoyance than anger. No blame rested at Sam’s feet. I could detect the work of a far more persistent force prodding him along.

  Sam sighed before smiling ruefully. “That is what I told her, but alas, she is relentless in her pursuits of your happiness.”

  My happiness as they called it would include my marrying someone I did not love so that I could live a life without danger. What they failed to grasp was that loving anyone was dangerous. What was life without risks?

  “You have received word of Guinevere?”

  Bess rose with the bouquet in hand. “She has returned.”

  Those words sprouted a new vigor within me.

  Bess held out the bouquet to me, but I did not reach for it. “While I appreciate the sentiment, flowers are not the bes
t way to win me over.”

  “Not for you, imp. You will send this to Guinevere with your compliments.”

  “I am not having that delivered to Guinevere.”

  “I, myself, do not understand the message,” Sam said as my sister and I scowled at one another.

  “Allow me to educate you,” I said as I snatched the bouquet from Bess. “The withered white rose is to relay that no impression has been made, though we all know that is untrue. The grass suggests uselessness; the dead leaves are to mean sadness. While the yellow carnation relays disappointment, the hyacinth represents constancy.” With a disdainful laugh, I dropped the bouquet onto the table.

  “What about the red rose?”

  “That would be crimson, and that would be for mourning. My darling sister has a taste for the dramatic.”

  Bess cast me a withering look.

  Sam smiled fondly. “That she does.”

  Bess picked up the bouquet, tucked a note into it, and handed it to Leo with the instructions to deliver it at once.

  “Do not deliver that atrocious excuse of a bouquet,” I warned.

  “He will deliver it if he wishes to attend my party this evening,” Bess countered artfully. “I know of a certain someone who will be especially disappointed if he is not present.”

  To my utter astonishment that remark sent Leo to the door, bouquet in hand.

  I started to pursue him, but Sam stepped in my way.

  “I suggest you allow him to go or my wife will make all of our lives uncomfortable.”

  “I marvel at your ability to marry such a shrew.” I threw the remark more at Bess than at Sam.

  Bess only smirked.

  The corner of Sam’s lips inched up. “She does have her redeeming qualities.” He moved out of the parlor, laughing as I tried to kick him.

  Bess was cleaning off the table when I turned to her.

  “In whom does Leo show interest?”

  Bess grinned conspiratorially. “Much has been happening while you have been laid up. Let me say that you are not the only one she came to see.” Bess gathered the flower scraps in her hands and left the parlor whistling.