Benjamin Franklin, my friend and the irrepressible leader of the Transcendent Society, spied my advance immediately as I left the safety of the doorway. Our encounter the previous week, when I was only just recovered from the battle in the sky over Philadelphia’s forests, had left me little time to take in the changes from the last year.
When I said he'd taken a youthful appearance, I'd been under exaggerating by yards. The immortality powder Ben made for those of us in the Society had the secondary benefit of rejuvenating the flesh. Ben seemed only a mite past the blush of youth, his cheeks pink and his wavy brownish-blonde hair settling comfortably on the lapel of his dark blue coat.
The older Ben had achieved a portly elegance, like a wise king, while the younger version had a barrel chest like a wrestler or a swimmer. He was youthful in every way except for his eyes, which were gray, almost blue, like storm clouds over the ocean. They held the rod of authority, much like Empress Catherine had.
"My dear old Ben, I'm right heartily glad to see you," I called to him from the yard, as I made my way through the ivy-wrapped iron arbor. The window that I'd crashed through when I was escaping in the cauldron was boarded over. The skeleton of a scaffold had been set up across the front in preparation for repairs.
His lips, which normally had a humorous quip waiting on them, curled downward. "Temple, you mean. William Temple Franklin, Ben's grandson," he said, under his breath. I'd forgotten that before he left, he'd taken his grandson's name so his youthful appearance wasn't questioned. The real grandson was living in France with his mistress, Blanchette Caillot.
I grabbed the sides of my skirt and curtseyed. "Apologies, Temple. I forget myself. My heart sings that you've returned. It's been too long."
He glanced away from me, down the street, lifting his chin so that he could see that far, and then his eyes creased.
"If it sings, it sings the song of the raven, the harbinger of bad tidings," said Franklin, his voice carrying like a drum beaten.
"It's been a bad spell in Philadelphia," I said.
He seemed to be distracted, so I turned to find a woman of striking beauty and strange attire strolling up the street towards us. She had hair as dark and shiny as crow's feathers, bloodred lips, an embroidered crimson jacket that hinted at Prussian military styling, and a black scabbard hanging from her hip.
Her approach was a dance, each step gracefully forward in a meticulous line, as if she were a tightrope walker. She moved without hesitation or stumble despite the uneven cobblestones. As she moved, I heard a light rattling, like the tapping of many sticks.
"The day only grows worse," said Ben.
"Worse?" I asked, looking back to him but feeling drawn to watch the woman. "It's me, Kat, do you think I'm someone else? This behavior troubles me."
I'd seen him cross before, but never at me. He scowled in an unattractive manner that cast shadows across his face.
"I know who you are, Katerina Dashkova. You are a traitor to the Society. Voltaire told me what you did to Morwen Hightower. I sent her to help and you banished her from this existence, unleashing darker forces. Morwen Hightower was the only thing standing between us and chaos," he said.
My face twisted with pain. "It was a mistake. Not intentional. She attacked me, tried to swallow me whole. I only gave her one of her chocolates."
"Even before I left there were rumors of your hidden allegiance. I thought those rumors untrue, not wanting to believe that you would betray me and the Society so falsely. I see that trust misplaced. To think I would have let you continue in my confidence, believing you fully, if it weren't for Voltaire," he said.
"That monster tried to kill me more than once. Without the powder he was a beast," I said, hearing my voice crack and trying to hide my desperation. "But in the end, I stopped the Binghams from killing the President and his wife, as you desired."
"I cannot dare trust you. I should have remembered that you'd been a sister to your Empress Catherine, and maybe more. I learned things when I was away that put doubt in my mind like a seed, and I thought these doubts were false. But then I returned and learned the truth," said Ben, and then his voice rose, as if he were a judge pronouncing my fate, "I cannot trust you, banisher of Morwen Hightower, who was a friend to the light. Katerina Dashkova, you are no longer welcome here."
He pointed down the street. It felt like a lever had been pulled and my body had fallen through the hole on the gallows, to snap and dangle until the carrion birds feasted.
Ben's return was to have been an oasis from the events of the last few weeks. I'd avoided death multiple times from otherworldly beings only to find that which I’d hoped to attain a mirage.
I made my way down the street, each step away like a hammer blow to the chest. Before long, I was numb.
The only thing that made its way through my cocoon of shock occurred when I neared the woman who was clearly headed to the Franklin Estate. She winked and gave me a knowing smile.
The faint rattling that I’d heard earlier grew louder, the source of the noise clearer from up close. Hanging from the hem of her jacket were tiny bone fetishes, bound with gut string and tinkling like crystal.
"Sister," she said in an intimate way, as if she knew me. She smelled like the fields at harvest.
Suddenly I heard my heart in my ears, beating away like a stampede. When I looked up, the woman was already at the Franklin Estate, standing beneath the ivy wrapped arbor, speaking to Ben. I could not hear what either of them were saying.
Watching made me feel unwanted, so I kept moving down the street, still trying to process what Ben had said to me. He'd said I was a traitor to the Society. It was a death sentence, though a slow one. Without access to the powder, I had a finite life span.
But this didn't bother me as much as it should have. I was troubled most by how Ben had treated me. We'd been intimates before, laughing until our cups rattled, like children conspiring behind their parent's back. I'd come to the United States, seduced by Ben's vision of how to ensure the Enlightenment banished the dark of ignorance. To be cast out as an enemy was to be branded and then paraded through the streets naked and in stocks.
I glanced once more at Ben and his guest, still talking from opposite sides of the yard, before cutting down a side street. I stumbled as I went, stubbing my toe in absentmindedness. When a steam carriage sped past me, I barely bothered to get out of the way.
An airship floated overhead, not a military but a passenger one, and I found myself mesmerized by its passage. The sky was a layer of white clouds with gray bottoms, so the iron bands that ringed the massive leather bladder didn't reflect as it tacked into the wind.
Beneath the bladder, the gondola had numerous windows along its starboard side. It was small enough that the ship's origin had to be from this continent, probably New York, since that was Philadelphia's most frequent trading partner. The transcontinental airships had large gondolas for the long trip, and often a double bladder to keep the ship stable in the upper air currents.
The patient click of approaching horse hooves spurred me to move to the side of the street. I'd been standing in the dead center like a madwoman, an affliction I was going to have to get used to as the powder ran out again.
When the horses neighed as their reins were yanked, I realized the carriage was being stopped for me. As soon as I laid my eyes upon it, I knew the owner of the carriage, even though I still didn't know her name.
The horses at the yoke had black manes and bay roan coloring. They were strong, broad-chested beasts that would have looked as comfortable pulling a plow. Hunched on the driver's seat was a hulking man wearing fur lined leathers that would have been more appropriate in the arctic north. The reins were mere strings in his paws, and his beard swallowed his neck and face until only unyielding eyes stared out.
The driver was the least interesting thing about the horse-drawn carriage. The carriage itself was as pale as bone, with crimson struts that looked like veins. Trinkets, no bigger than the palm of my
hand, hung from the box top, quietly clicking against the wall. They were made of bone and grass and gut string; they were the symbols of harvest.
The smell of cut fields overwhelmed me as the door sash came down, revealing the darkness inside. I felt compelled to step forward so I could see inside.
The woman who had called me sister appeared out of the gloom. I was struck by how pale her skin was against her blood-red lips. She smiled and I felt a lightness bubble up inside.
When the door opened, a warm wind passed us, and I heard dead leaves rattling somewhere nearby. Autumn was coming to Philadelphia.
"Get in," she said.
Steeling myself against the unknown, I climbed into the strange carriage.
Chapter Three
It took a moment for my eyes to adjust to the darkness and then it seemed like I was seeing in bright light, even through the candles flickering in smoky glass boxes on either side of the interior seemed inadequate to the task.
"I am Rowan Blade," said the woman across from me.
A slight lurch announced the continuation of the journey. The shade had been pulled up on the door. The cushions were made of worn leather and the silk fabric above the elbow line was rust red.
"Katerina Dashkova," I said. "How do you know Temple?"
Her eyes flashed mischievously while her lips parted, only slightly, leaving a playful gap.
"You mean Ben Franklin," she said. "And we've known each other for years."
I felt a jealous tug on my heart.
As her lips closed, little creases around her lips and eyes formed. Rowan seemed in her mid-thirties, though something in her brown-gold eyes said she was older.
"Yes, Ben," I said quietly.
Rowan crossed one leg over the other.
"You're wearing soldier's boots," I said.
"I've worked on the battlefield," she said, that smile from before still lurking on her lips.
I frowned, not believing she was a soldier, though she had the scabbard of an officer. Its nationality was unknown to me.
"What do you do?" I asked, then listened for an accent.
"You'll learn that soon enough, I hope," she said. "But that's not why I invited you into my carriage."
The accent was foreign, but nothing I could pinpoint—not Russian, or French, and certainly not English. It hung on the end of her words, and gave each statement an enjoyable trill.
"Why did you invite me?" I asked, truly curious.
"I suspect we have similar goals," she said.
I rubbed the back of my hand. "Really? You don't know me at all, so I doubt that."
"Skepticism is a good survival trait in these times," said Rowan. "So I do not take offense to your intimation."
"What kind of times are these?" I asked.
"Dangerous ones," she said, her lips flattening. "I smell a war brewing. A calamitous war. A war that will turn the progress of this world into a stillborn."
My skin felt prickly. I hadn't expected her to say that. "Is that why you were talking to Ben?"
"Yes," she said, staring into her lap. The playfulness from before had turned sullen. I could see a great weight on her. She seemed aged by a decade in that glance.
"I could not convince him that the coming war should be avoided. He seemed not only to expect it, but to invite it," she said, melancholy shading her gaze.
"I doubt that," I said with a razor in my voice.
Rowan raised a contemptuous eyebrow. "Do you now? The Benjamin Franklin you just saw is not the one you know."
"I am not amused by your assumptions." I clasped my hands in my lap and stared across the space between us.
Rowan's face softened. "Apologies, Katerina. I mean no disrespect. You don't know where Ben has been, what journeys he's been on, and this ignorance of what's transpired taints your judgment. He is changed."
"If you know, then tell me so I might pass judgment myself rather than take the word of a stranger," I said.
She smiled, not overtly in a way meant to coerce, but in a way that made me feel she was showing her true self. Her smile only found half of her lips, the other half was unsure.
"I cannot explain. You do not have the experience to understand," she said.
I couldn't accept this. "So you were on this journey with Ben? Is that how you know?"
A hint of darkness fell into her eyes. "The journey? No. But our paths crossed at junctures."
"So you are opposed?" I asked.
"We are all opposed on something. Not even a man and wife agree upon everything, probably very little, except in the rarest of cases. In some realms, Ben and I agree, while in others we differ. Do you agree with everything he says or does?" she asked, the question barbed.
"No," I said, and fell into a heavy silence while the carriage pulled us through the streets of Philadelphia. My gaze found the silver rings on her fingers. None of the bands were adorned with jewels, though nearly all had been shaped into cyclopean designs.
"Madam Blade," I said. "Please release me from your carriage."
Rowan flashed her brown-gold eyes at me. They shimmered with a worrying intensity.
"I'll let you out soon enough. You need not fear me. We can be friends. As I said before, our paths align," said Rowan.
"I'd rather get out now," I said, casually placing my hand on my thigh where a dagger was hidden.
Her lips twitched in disappointment. "I don't think a knife will do you much good here. And I've spent enough time on the battlefield to know my way around a fight." She glanced at her scabbard.
"That long blade would be useless in here," I said, as warmth invaded my cheeks. "And I'm no stranger to a fight either."
When I looked back, Rowan had a pale knife in her hand and the point was resting against my side, right above the waistline of the gown. She'd moved so quickly and without making a noise, not even rattling the bone fetishes that hung from her jacket, that it put a burr in my throat.
"You were watching my eyes when you should have watched my hands," said Rowan. "The eyes lie."
"Which is its own form of truth telling," I said, and when I looked back down, the blade was gone.
"I didn't bring you here for a fight," said Rowan.
"Yet, I sense you desire to cross blades with me," I said.
Rowan smirked, a light in her eyes. "You judge me keenly. Only out of curiosity, though. I would not want to damage a potential ally."
"What if I'm not an ally?" I asked, keeping my hands clasped on my knee.
Rowan shrugged, as if that were too pointless an option to consider. "Let's make sure that doesn't happen." Then she shook her head and sighed heavily. "I've made a mess of this introduction. Here I'd hoped to persuade you, yet I've done nothing but set up your bristles."
"You've told me nothing except that you know Ben and that you seek to oppose him," I said. "If anything, that is the cause of my ill-ease."
"You defend him after he threw you out?" she asked. "I heard your exchange as I came up the street."
"What transpired between Ben and I was private," I said. The ache of that verbal blow still reverberated in my chest.
"I pray you give me a chance to explain, to show you what's at stake," said Rowan.
I leaned back against the cushion and considered the woman across from me. I couldn't quite place her. She had the arrogance of royalty, but the demeanor of the working. I sensed a military streak in her, yet she was not jaded by war. My gut told me to flee from her carriage, though I was intrigued by her proposal.
"Do you make a habit of making offers such as this?" I asked.
She blinked and shook her head, releasing a strand of jet black hair to fall into her eyes. She hooked it back to the side of her face with curled fingers.
"Not usually," she said, that smile returned to her lips. "Do you believe in prophecy?"
"Only as a tool of the deceitful to swindle their marks," I replied.
Rowan's expression flickered with annoyance. "I believe in prophecy," she sa
id forcefully. "And it seems you and I are destined to be great friends."
"How do you know it was me?" I asked.
She smiled. "I know."
"Prophecy is in the mind of the listener," I said, remembering the hedge-witches of Russia that sold worthless fortunes to the weak and unsuspecting minds of the peasants.
"A strong will may shape prophecy," said Rowan, lifting her chin. "It can depend on the source of the prophecy—the stronger the seer, the harder for the listener to shape events, but in this, I am their mistress."
"I think I'd rather get out," I said.
Rowan's face grew dark and my pulse quickened. She lunged forward, and for a moment, I was sure that pale blade was in her hand. But she grabbed the door handle and swung it open, letting in the rosy autumn sunlight.
"We have arrived," said Rowan.
Before she changed her mind, I stepped onto the street, fixing my gown. The door closed behind me. I stood half a block up from my house.
Rowan pulled the shade up and leaned into view. "Think about my offer. When you've come around, you'll find me on the northeastern side of town near the corner of Brown and Second. You'll know my shop when you see it."
Before I could answer, the hulking driver snapped the reins and the strange carriage surged forward, whisking Rowan Blade from view.
I was too busy rolling the exchange around in my head to notice the tall, ruggedly handsome man in a buckskin coat and a tricorn hat standing at my doorway, ready to knock. His face was as tanned as a man who spent as much of his time outdoors as could be, and the concern on his brow sent a shiver down my back.
"Good day to you, Warden Snyder," I said, realizing it was too late to run away. "What brings you to my humble door?"
I was expecting many a response, from condemnation to accusation to arrest, considering that the last time the Warden Simon Snyder had seen me, I'd flown away in a cauldron. But what he said defied my expectations of our encounter so much that it didn't even register until well after he'd said it.
Birds of Prophecy (The Dashkova Memoirs Book 3) Page 2
