Prime Minister Giraud stood and touched a napkin to his lips. He was a small man with a long nose and receding hair, but he managed to project an air of utter stylishness. Aubrey decided his impeccable clothes played a good part in this, but he noted the man's steady gaze and neat, precise gestures. 'Young Fitzwilliam,' he said in good Albionish. 'Mine may be the only official congratulations you receive for your efforts in returning our most valuable treasure, but please accept them nonetheless.'
'I'm glad I could help,' Aubrey murmured. He was pleased that his father heard this, and only wished Caroline had as well.
'Gallia is restored now?' Sir Darius said.
The Prime Minister smiled wryly. 'This crisis is over, thanks to your extraordinary son, but we have others on the horizon.'
'As do we all,' Sir Darius said.
Aubrey felt a tap on his elbow. It was a uniformed embassy functionary. 'Mr Fitzwilliam, sir? The Ambassador would like to see you.'
Aubrey rolled his eyes. He apologised to his father and Prime Minister Giraud. 'Sir Percy probably wants to chastise me for some of the goings on over the last few weeks.'
'Would you like me to come?' Sir Darius asked.
'No. Thank you.'
Sir Darius nodded, a wry smile on his face. 'I forget myself sometimes. I'm sure you can handle Sir Percy.'
'Thank you, sir.' Aubrey felt a small measure of selfsatisfaction. Perhaps his successes were making an impression.
He crossed to where his mother and Caroline were still talking. He kissed his mother and made his excuses before following the functionary through the throng, which, if anything, had grown louder and more jolly. Aubrey found that he was humming along with the orchestra in a surprisingly tuneful manner. He caught George's eye and waved just before he edged through the doorway. George was still at Sophie's side and looked as if heavy machinery would be required to remove him.
The functionary took Aubrey up the grand staircase and along a wood-panelled corridor. Brass light fittings with muted glass shades clung to the walls. He stopped outside a door that was identical to a dozen others they had passed. 'Here, sir. Sir Percy said to enter as soon as you arrived.'
The functionary bowed and hurried back along the corridor, leaving Aubrey alone.
Music floated up from the ballroom, making Aubrey eager to get back to join the celebration. He chewed his lip and stared at the door, feeling uncomfortable standing there. It wasn't the prospect of fronting Sir Percy that unsettled him, it was something else, something skittering around the edge of his magical awareness. Bowing his head, he concentrated and grimaced when he found a tingling presence, diffuse and hard to isolate. It itched deep in his ears, where he couldn't scratch. For a moment, he was worried, then he shrugged. It would be odd not to find magic in a place such as this. Over the years, both high-level and low-level magic would have been performed in the service of Albion.
He rubbed his ears, but it didn't help the itching. He shook himself and sniffed – then his eyes widened. Even though the embassy was a potpourri of smells of leather, wood polish, perfume and cigar smoke, another, more pungent smell hovered in the air. When he realised what it was, he stepped back from the door and stared.
Flash powder. The distinctive, burnt metal smell of flash powder was coming from the room, reminding him of the horror of the Soul Stealer. He hesitated. He'd seen at least one photographer in the ballroom. Perhaps another had been in this part of the embassy?
He didn't want to contemplate the alternative.
He paused and his suspicions took the opportunity to break loose and jab him with sharp sticks. Why hadn't Sir Percy summoned him to his office? Why this obscure room toward the rear of the embassy?
He flexed his fingers, trying to decide what to do. Then a notion occurred to him and he smiled. He brought a simple light spell to mind and changed its intensity variable. He rehearsed it until it was on the tip of his tongue. Once pronounced, it would create a burst of light many times brighter than a photographer's flash powder. It would temporarily stun and blind. A useful weapon.
He grasped the door knob and pushed the door open.
When it swung back, he faced a room cluttered with crates and boxes. The end of the room was marked by lush, crimson floor-to-ceiling curtains. Half a dozen high-backed wooden chairs stood against the curtains. His magical senses alert, he took one step inside. A tiny creak and a swish made him turn, but he was too late. His skull rang like a bell the size of the world and everything went away.
WHEN AUBREY REGAINED CONSCIOUSNESS, HE WAS TIED TO A chair. I deserve it, he thought and he cursed himself for preparing magically, but ignoring the possibility of a simple blow to the back of the head.
He was still in the same room. In front of him were the curtains and the high-backed chairs. To either side were boxes of a number of sizes, two tin troughs and three or four large books. A trunk lay open, revealing bottles of reagents.
'I am glad you are awake.'
Aubrey had never expected to hear Farentino, the Soul Stealer, again. Incredulous, he jerked his head around but couldn't swivel far enough.
'Very clever,' he said, his heart hammering. 'Stand behind me and I can't see you. Keep talking and I'll be bound to panic. In a few minutes I'll break down and be putty in your hands.'
'Make your japes while you can. You will soon be free.'
'Free? Excellent. These ropes are chafing. I'm sure I'm getting a rash on my wrists.'
'Free from this earthly existence, this dull travail where we plod day after day until we dwindle, diminished, and are gone.'
'Ah. That sort of freedom.' Aubrey gave up on the ropes. Farentino may have had a depressing view of human existence, but he was a dab hand at knots. Aubrey's stomach flipped over and back again. He realised that his best chance lay in their being discovered, so drawing out the conversation was his best tactic. 'I don't think you should kill me.'
'You will not be killed.'
'Don't you want to know why you shouldn't kill me? If you'd been going to kill me, that is?'
'You will join the others who have been freed. Your soul will be separated from your body and will survive, untouched and unchanging, in an existence beyond the grubby mundanity of this so-called life.'
Aubrey stiffened at Farentino's mention of souls surviving apart from the body, but before he could respond, the photographer stepped into view. He glowered, bending, hands behind his back, so he could look his captive in the face.
Aubrey recognised the bristling black eyebrows, the full black beard, but most of all he remembered the fanatic's eyes. 'Not wanting to be too personal,' he said. 'But you're meant to be dead.'
The Soul Stealer wore a long black coat and a rounded black hat with a wide brim. 'I cannot die. Not before I complete my mission – a mission you seem keen to thwart.'
'Tell me about your mission.' Keep talking, Farentino. Someone will wonder where I am. And when you ramble on, do mention the soul and body thing again. Details this time.
'It is a duty, given to me.' Farentino stretched out a long arm and dragged a chair close. He sat on it and placed his hands on his knees. He stared at Aubrey.
'Given to you? By God?'
Farentino shook his head and his whole body swayed. 'I do not presume to know the mind of God.'
'But someone must have given this mission to you.'
'If the Almighty has deigned to communicate his will to me, who am I to refuse?'
Aubrey thought it wise not to point out the way Farentino had contradicted himself. He had a feeling that consistency wasn't the Soul Stealer's strong point. 'Indeed. After all, he spared you for your work. An ordinary person would have been killed by that plunge.'
'I was taken into the bosom of the waters and borne to safety.' Farentino looked away, distracted. 'I cannot die. I have a destiny to fulfil.'
He stood and walked to the curtains. With a grunt, he drew them back.
Lying on the floor in a haphazard jumble were a dozen bodies, men and
women. All of them were wearing evening finery. Propped up in one corner, Aubrey saw Sir Percy Derringford in his bright-red regimental uniform. All of them had the staring, vacant eyes of the dispossessed. Aubrey clenched his fists with horror and frustration.
Farentino walked among them, studying them with a chilling mixture of tenderness and detachment. 'I've realised that I must work more swiftly. Why labour with the masses when I can save the souls of the most important members of society? If I can liberate the leaders, then surely the rest will follow.' He nodded, as if reassuring himself that this had been a good idea.
Aubrey seethed and felt sick in the pit of this stomach. Gallia had been brought back from the precipice by the return of the Heart of Gold, but this madman's actions could throw everything into chaos again.
'How did you get into the embassy?' Aubrey asked.
Farentino started, as if he'd forgotten Aubrey were there. 'Sir Percy. I contacted him and offered a portrait session to mark the occasion of the ball. He even set me up in this room.'
Farentino went to one side, and was obscured from Aubrey's view by the bunching of the drapes. He came back with a large, ominous camera.
'Ah, Farentino,' Aubrey said. 'You've obviously done some fascinating work. I'd really like to discuss it with you.'
The Soul Stealer glanced at Aubrey but didn't reply. He placed the camera on the floor and then went back behind the drapes, returning this time with a heavy tripod.
'All your own devising, is it?' Aubrey said. 'Or did you have some help?'
Farentino busied himself with assembling the contraption. 'In the beginning, I had help from one of your countrymen. A great man.'
'An Albionite?'
'He said he was no longer welcome in Albion. He had great knowledge of magic.'
'Tall man, was he?' Dreadful suspicion prodded at Aubrey. 'Dark hair, eyes?'
Farentino straightened. 'Do you know him? He claimed he'd been Sorcerer Royal in your country, but I didn't believe him.'
Tremaine. Aubrey shook his head. Assisting someone like Farentino and then setting him loose was a typical Tremaine tactic, a backup to a major plan. Layer upon layer, Tremaine's scheming was like an onion.
Aubrey frowned. Combined with what von Stralick had revealed, this was important information. Tremaine was actively pursuing his aim of a continental war, with his usual strategy of working on many fronts at once. Aubrey had to get free and share this with the authorities. And to stop Farentino from turning me into a mindless husk, he thought. Mustn't forget that.
He strained, hoping he could stick out a leg and tip over the camera, damaging it somehow, but he was tied fast to the chair.
Farentino applied himself to seating the camera on the tripod. 'I have made some improvements on my methods,' he said. 'The flash powder.' He gestured to the box by his feet. 'I've enhanced it, magically. The process of capturing your soul will be less painful than formerly.'
'Less painful? Are you saying that as well as being an abomination, this process has been painful as well?'
Farentino didn't look up. He shrugged as he screwed a locking bracket into place. 'What is pain when an existence of unsullied purity is the result? It is a momentary thing to be passed through to achieve the greater good on the other side.'
'Farentino, I was wondering: did you ask all these people whether they wanted to have their souls taken away?'
Farentino straightened. He blinked, puzzled. 'Ask them? Why? How could they begin to understand what I was offering them? I am giving them a great gift, even though their lives are paltry and insignificant.'
Mad as a loon, Aubrey thought.
Farentino measured his flash powder onto his hod.
Aubrey took a desperate stab in the dark. 'It's death magic, isn't it, Farentino? That's what you've built into your photographic process.'
Farentino's hand jerked. Flash powder spilt onto the floor. 'Death magic?'
'You've done well, blending magic and chemical processes. How do you sever the golden cord that keeps body and soul together without the soul disappearing into the true death?'
'You know something of death magic?'
'Enough to know how dangerous it is. How did you protect your soul when you were messing about with it?'
'I . . .' As if in a dream, Farentino fumbled under his coat. He pulled out a small, glass photographic plate. 'My soul. It's here, safe. I trapped it there before I did anything. It hurt a little, but what is life but pain?'
Farentino stared at his soul plate, his expression one of desolation. 'I have little time left, which is why I must save as many souls as I can.'
This sounded more positive. 'You have little time left?'
Farentino held up the plate. 'My soul. It's fading. When it disappears from the plate, I am gone.'
An impractical process, and an imperfect one. Aubrey sighed. He'd hoped to learn something from Farentino's approach, something he could use to shore up his condition, but he now saw it was futile. It's a dead end, he thought. And I hope I live to share that pun with Bertie.
Farentino thrust the soul plate into a pocket. 'Enough. I will liberate your soul, then I will move on to the others in this place. One by one, I will capture the most important guests. Then, a group portrait of those remaining. It will be a triumph.'
Farentino stooped, took a measure of flash powder from the open box and shovelled it onto his metal shelf.
Aubrey saw his opportunity. Farentino hadn't closed the box of flash powder. Sloppy, he thought. It's attention to detail that trips us up in the end.
He called to mind the light spell he'd rehearsed. It was all he had at hand, and he called on his talent for improvisation. Light was a near cousin to heat. The light spell included a tamping element, limiting the heat produced, which was usually a desirable thing. Aubrey, however, inverted that variable, increasing the heat produced.
He snapped out the spell, casting its location at the box next to Farentino's feet.
Just as it flared, Aubrey tipped his chair backward, hoping that the seat would offer some protection. He heard the thump of an explosion and, even though he closed his eyes, the burst of white light went right through his lids. Heat scorched his exposed skin and he felt the tell-tale tingle of magic. He smelled the reek of flash powder and the sharper, more ominous smell of burning cloth and timber.
He opened his eyes to find the room full of dense white smoke. Small flames licked at wallpaper, while pieces of smoking drapery drifted through the air. He lay there, stunned. Flat on my back, tied to a chair, he thought, hacking each breath from a throat that felt as if it was packed full of soot. Not exactly a hero's death.
To his left, he heard a splintering noise.
'Aubrey!'
'George! Over here!'
George blundered through the smoke, squinting and flapping wildly. 'The room's on fire.' He applied himself to the ropes. 'I'll get you free.'
'Don't worry about that.' Aubrey coughed. 'Drag the whole damn chair out of here!'
The last thing Aubrey saw as George hauled the chair out of the burning room was, right where Farentino had been standing, a small pool of melted glass and brass right next to a pile of ash.
COMMOTION, UPROAR AND CONFUSION. DAZED AND SINGED, Aubrey was happy to sit back and choose which word described the situation that was going on around him. Someone had given him a glass of mineral water and he sipped at it, enjoying the soothing effect it had on his throat. From outside the door of the parlour, he could hear shouting, fire bells and running footsteps while the faint strains of the orchestra still drifted up from the ballroom. It was all very dramatic.
Sitting opposite him on a brown leather couch were his mother and Caroline, neither of whom seemed happy. George fussed about, moving from window to window and reporting the goings on.
The door opened and Sir Darius slipped in. He looked unperturbed. 'The fire is out,' he said. 'Little damage, really. The house staff were able to extinguish it before the fire brigade arrived.
'
'The ball?'
'It goes on. I think most of those present weren't even aware of the fire. And certainly not about the dispossessed ones lying about up there.' He made a face. 'Horrible.'
'We can restore their souls.' Aubrey sat up straight. 'We use the glass plates and the magically enhanced flash powder to reverse the process. Set off the flash powder, hold the plate between the flash and the dispossessed one and project their soul back to their body. With an enhanced reflector.' He gnawed a lip, remembering the fate of Monsieur Bernard. 'I'll need to sort through Farentino's notes, though, to perfect the process. I want to find the composition of the flash powder, and work out the spell he used to add to it.'
Sir Darius nodded. 'Good. We will speak to McKenzie about it later. But I fear there is another issue that may not be as easy to resolve.'
Aubrey raised an eyebrow at the prospect of an issue that was more problematic than that of restoring lost souls.
Aubrey was exhausted and grimy, but exhilaration was bubbling up inside him after defying the Soul Stealer. He wanted to get back to the ball and enjoy himself. He tried to catch Caroline's eye, but she avoided his gaze.
'Can this wait?' he asked. 'With respect, sir. We should rejoin the ball as soon as we can. Show the flag, so to speak.'
His mother bridled. 'No, this cannot wait. I regard this matter as very, very serious.'
Aubrey scanned the room for clues. His mother's anger was palpable. Her face was pale – furious pale – and her eyes were hard. Caroline also looked unhappy, the handkerchief in her hands seeming to take up most of her attention. No, he corrected himself. Wistful would be a better description than unhappy.
His father was grim. Only George looked as befuddled as Aubrey felt.
His exhilaration began to drain away.
Sir Darius cleared his throat. 'While you were engaged upstairs, Caroline spoke to your mother. She mentioned that she was unhappy at the way her place at the university was withdrawn.'
Aubrey's stomach tried to scurry away and find somewhere to hide. 'Ah. Yes.'
Lady Rose made a fist and bounced it on the armrest of the couch. 'I've lived with you too long, Aubrey, not to be able to sense your machinations. I immediately sought out the Chancellor of the university.'
Heart of Gold Page 38
