The Great Game (Royal Sorceress)

by Nuttall, Christopher

  Besides, Lady Mary didn’t handle her own money, apart from her dowry. She was the youngest daughter of her family and hadn’t inherited much when her father had passed away... Howell would surely have considered her a bad investment risk, far more so than Sir Travis. Unless... he’d expected Lady Mary’s husband to pay? But a husband wasn’t legally obliged to pay his wife’s debts unless he’d backed them...

  “Nothing about this makes sense,” Gwen said, out loud.

  She briefly considered asking her father, then dismissed the thought. If her mother was scared... how would her father react? Instead, she walked over to the door and stepped out into the corridor. Unsurprisingly, there was no sign of Lady Mary.

  Gwen hesitated, wondering if she should just go – but her mother would be mortally offended if she didn’t stay for dinner. And it had been months since she’d spent any time with her parents... shaking her head, she turned and made her way up the stairs to her room. Lady Mary, as was tradition, had left it strictly alone. Even the maids had refused to go inside and dust. But then, they’d been scared of Gwen...

  It struck her, as she stepped inside, just how small the room seemed. Her bedroom at Cavendish Hall was much larger – and, she realised slowly, was designed for an adult. She looked around, remembering the dolls she’d played with as a young girl – and how she’d accidentally burned one to ashes when she’d been experimenting with her magic. The stuffed donkey she’d been given one birthday still sat on her bed. She couldn’t help reaching for the toy and cuddling him to her chest. And to think that she’d almost forgotten him!

  Most of the wardrobe had been cleared out – she’d had her dresses transferred to Cavendish Hall or simply given away when she’d become the Royal Sorceress – but the secret compartment at the bottom of the wardrobe was still untouched. She couldn’t help smiling as she sensed the magic she’d used to hide it; a clumsy job, by her current standards, but very unusual for a child. Another magician would probably find it with ease; the maids, on the other hand, would have completely missed it.

  Inside, the books were still there. One copy of Edmund: A Butler’s Tale; a fast-flowing book, crammed with sizzling gypsies. She’d hidden it for David after Lady Mary had caught him with its sequel, reading the book whenever she’d had a spare moment until she’d completed it. It had been a fun read, even though she’d had to look up some of the words in her dictionary. Lady Mary would have been horrified to know that Gwen had read it.

  She put the book to one side and picked up the next one, a copy of a play her father had been asked to finance, years ago. The Bloody Murder of the Foul Prince Romero and His Enormously Bosomed Wife, the playwrights had called it, claiming that it was a philosophical work. Their covering letter had explained that the violence of the murder and the vastness of the bosom were justified artistically. Lord Rudolf had thrown the manuscript in the wastepaper bucket without bothering to read it; Gwen had filched it before the maids could throw it out. The dialogue, which seemed to be nothing more than a list of horrible things the actors intended to do to the Prince, had made her giggle.

  Maybe I should see if they ever performed it, she thought, as she pulled out the next two books. One of them had been a gift from an uncle who didn’t like Lady Mary and had no compunctions about saying so. Gwen had enjoyed reading the copy of Letters From America; Being The True Story Of The Battle Of New York, but it hadn’t been very helpful in developing her magic. The writer had hedged so much in his work that it was difficult to draw the line between what was real and what had been added to confuse readers. After a moment, she put it on the bed, silently promising herself that she would reread it when she had a moment. The Luke and Saul mentioned in the book had to be Master Thomas’s old friends. No one knew what had happened to them.

  The other book was a guide to the natural world, a thinly-veiled tome about the human body. She’d badgered David for weeks before he’d agreed to buy it for her, back when her body had started to change. Not that it had been much help – the male writer spoke in riddles or outright concealed certain subjects – but it had been interesting. Gwen had decided that she wanted to become a doctor for a few days before going back to her magic after reading the book, if only because the writer had been stupid. His book was written for women – and it was clearly inaccurate in places.

  Maybe I could find a Healer and patronise her so that she can write a book, she thought. But Healers didn’t really know much about what they did. Their powers were largely governed by instinct. Or maybe one of the Trouser Brigade would be happy to study medicine. I could certainly hire a private tutor if the universities wouldn’t allow them to study there.

  There was a tap at the door. “Lady Gwen,” an unfamiliar maid said, “Lady Mary would like to know if you would like to stay overnight.”

  Gwen looked at her old bed, then shook her head firmly. It just wouldn’t have felt right. Besides, she had a feeling that dinner was going to be awkward...

  “No, thank you,” she said, feeling a pang of guilt – again – at the flash of fear in the maid’s eyes. Had she really been such a monster as a little girl? “I will take a carriage back to Cavendish Hall.”

  Chapter Nineteen

  As Gwen had expected, dinner was a fraught affair; her mother seemed oddly nervous, while her father was happy to chat about the latest developments in airship construction – but not about anything else. Certainly, he’d passed most of the family’s involvement in political affairs over to David, yet he should still have maintained an interest. Maybe he just didn’t want to talk about it in front of his wife.

  Afterwards, she took a carriage back to Cavendish Hall and fell asleep, only to be woken early the following morning by Martha. Lord Mycroft had sent a request for an immediate report on her encounter with the French Talker, so urgently that Gwen realised that Simone had passed completely unnoticed until she’d come too close to Gwen. Maybe the Talkers who generated mental hisses to cover diplomats might have shielded them, preventing her from reading their minds... or perhaps not. Gwen called for coffee, wrote out a brief report and then went down to breakfast. There was little else she could do about the French girl.

  There was a letter beside her plate on the High Table. Gwen scowled down at it, noted the masculine hand that had scratched out her name, and then opened it. There was a formal invitation to the Ambassador’s Ball and two dance cards – one of which had already had all of the dances marked off. Gwen couldn’t help a smile as she studied it, then put the cards and invitation into her purse. Traditionally, a man would only ask a woman to dance one dance – unless he was very serious...

  What, Gwen asked herself, if he is serious?

  She liked Sir Charles, but it had only been three days since they’d met. Certainly, she’d spent more time with him than the average girl her age would spend with a potential suitor – and without a chaperone at that – and he’d treated her more like an equal than any other man she’d met, apart from Jack. Even Master Thomas hadn’t treated her as an equal... and she hadn’t been his equal. She had been an ignorant young women when she’d been offered the chance to study under him.

  In some ways, it would be a good match, she decided. Sir Charles was a hero in his own right, but not someone high-ranking enough for her marriage to cause political problems – or require the consent of the King. And, as he wasn’t a magician, he wasn’t under her command; she wouldn’t have to worry about jealousy or accusations of favouritism. There was the question Lady Mary had raised about his family, but she could look into that...

  And she was wasting time, she told herself angrily, as the servant put her plate in front of her. She should be concentrating on finding Sir Travis’s killer and bringing him to justice, then she could worry about Sir Charles’s intentions... and if he would make a suitable husband. Crossly, she ate her breakfast and then called for her carriage. Her note to Lady Elizabeth hadn’t given a precise time, but Gwen had promised to be as early as possible.

 
She ran into Sir James as she left the dining hall. “Everything went well yesterday,” he assured her, without the smirk that she knew Lord Brockton would have given her if he’d had to make that report. “There’s a full outline on your desk.”

  “Thank you,” Gwen said. “How did the training go?”

  “We should have two new teams ready by the end of the month,” Sir James assured her. “If the French try to cross the English Channel, they won’t manage to land before being sunk.”

  “Let us hope so,” Gwen said. The Royal Navy was the most powerful navy in the world – but the French Army was vastly stronger than the British Army, at least without considering magic. If the French managed to land on British soil, the defenders might be in some trouble, even if firearms ownership had skyrocketed since the Swing. “The French have their own magicians now.”

  “I don’t see how they figured it out,” Sir James said, once she’d told him about Simone. “They should still be trying to brew potions and turn people into frogs.”

  “Professor Cavendish figured it out,” Gwen said, hoping that it would misdirect him a little. The truth – that Jack had taught the French a great deal during his exile – was known to only a handful of people, just like the truth about the undead plague in London. If both secrets came out, the British public would have problems deciding which one of the guilty men to hate more. “And the French aren’t stupid.”

  “They should have listened to the Pope,” Sir James growled. Like most scions of older families – his ancestors had served Queen Elizabeth - he was a proud Protestant. “He wanted them to burn witches and crack the skulls of warlocks.”

  “There’s too much advantage to be had from magic,” Gwen reminded him. Master Thomas had been quick to abandon the prejudice against female magicians when it had suited his purposes. “And besides, these days the Pope does what King Louis tells him.”

  She nodded to him, then headed down towards the main entrance, where she ran into Norton. “There are some legal letters for you,” he said, as he offered her a leather folder. “All from Sir Travis’s family, I’m afraid. They need your personal attention.”

  Gwen scowled at him. “I thought I appointed you as my representative...”

  “You did, but these letters are not entirely connected to my job,” Norton explained. “You may have to reply personally.”

  “I’ll read them as I drive to Bracknell Hall,” Gwen said, taking the folder. “Let me know if there’s anything else I can do.”

  She walked out of the entrance before he could reply and climbed into the waiting carriage. “Bracknell Hall,” she ordered the driver, as she opened the folder. “And don’t spare the horses.”

  The first letter was nothing more than a demand that she confirm – in writing – that Norton was actually her appointed representative. Gwen recognised it as a delaying tactic, although she had no idea why they were actually bothering. It wasn’t as if Norton was enquiring into their financial affairs. She scribbled a quick reply, then an additional note to Norton asking him to look into why the family was trying to waste time. It hadn’t taken her too long to realise that something that seemed pointless to her might not be so pointless to someone else.

  “Idiots,” she muttered, as she opened the next two letters. Both of them demanded that she move at once to distributing Sir Travis’s property, particularly the house. The police were still investigating the building... but they seemed to expect them to leave at Gwen’s command. “Don’t they have any idea how long this could take?”

  She wrote out a brief, but formal reply, informing them that she could not begin distributing the estate until there was a full accounting of both Sir Travis’s property and the reason for his death. After a moment’s thought, she added a note to the effect that Norton was her designated representative and all other communications were to go through him. Finally, she opened the fourth letter. Its tone was very different.

  That I, a respectable married woman, should be expected to answer imprudent questions about the contents of my jewellery box is beyond the pale. To pry into matters long over is pointless, particularly when the jewels in question were promised to me by my Aunt. Should your representative continue his imprudence, you will be hearing from my lawyer.

  She must have taken the jewels that were left to Polly, Gwen realised, after reading the letter a second time. Norton, true to his word, had made enquires when it had become clear that the jewels were nowhere to be found in Mortimer Hall. The threat of legal action would have stopped a normal investigator stone dead, particularly as the legitimate owner of the jewels was of no account. But Gwen was far from normal. She wrote out another note to Norton, sealed the fourth letter inside, and put it back in the folder, just as the carriage rattled to a halt.

  “Bracknell Hall, Milady,” the coachman said.

  “Thank you,” Gwen said, as she dropped down to the pavement. “Please wait here for me.”

  Bracknell Hall was huge, large enough to hold several families comfortably. Gwen strode up the immense marble steps, knocked on the door and waited. It opened a moment later and a butler – an elderly gentlemen who seemed unwilling to do anything, but look dour – ushered her into the building. Gwen gave him her hat and coat, then allowed the butler to show her into the drawing room. Lady Elizabeth Bracknell entered the room two minutes later.

  She looked to be a perfect aristocratic daughter, so perfect that Gwen would have hated Lady Elizabeth on sight if it hadn’t been clear that she’d been crying. Lady Mary would probably have approved of the way the girl held herself, but Gwen could see tears in her eyes and half-hidden streaks running down her face. She was a beauty – long brown hair framed a heart-shaped face – even though she was wearing a plain dress that matched her hair. But if she was in mourning, shouldn’t she have worn black?

  No one knows about the marriage contract, Gwen reminded herself. Too many people would have asked who she was mourning – and why.

  “Thank you for coming,” Lady Elizabeth said. Even her voice – soft and warm – was perfect. “You really are the Royal Sorceress?”

  Gwen looked at her, then held up her hand and summoned flames to dance over her palm, warming the air. Lady Elizabeth let out a strange sigh, staring at the flames almost as if she were mesmerised. Gwen clenched her fist, long enough to suppress the magic, then forced herself to relax.

  “I killed him,” Lady Elizabeth said. Her voice might have been perfectly composed, but it was easy to hear the grief – and guilt – behind it. “He died because of me.”

  Gwen stared at her. She had had some training in how to fight physically, rather than using magic, but she was the Royal Sorceress. Very few girls were taught how to fight – even how to use the shotguns and hunting rifles used on every noble estate – in the confident expectation that their menfolk would protect them. And Lady Elizabeth didn’t look strong enough to inflict the blow that had killed Sir Travis. How could she have inflicted such damage?

  “You killed him?” She asked, reaching out with her senses. The girl certainly seemed sincere, but that didn’t mean that she was telling the literal truth. “An experienced man like Sir Travis and you killed him?”

  “I didn’t kill him myself,” Lady Elizabeth said. “I...”

  There was a crash as the door burst open. “Elizabeth,” a harsh voice demanded. “What are you telling our guest?”

  “Mother,” Lady Elizabeth stammered. “I...”

  Gwen rose to her feet. Lady Bracknell looked formidable, certainly far more stubborn than Gwen’s mother, but Gwen had faced worse. Besides, she had been invited. “I was called to speak with Lady Elizabeth...”

  “You were not invited into our home,” Lady Bracknell thundered. “You may dress up as a man, but that doesn’t give you liberty to act like one.”

  She swung round and glared at her daughter before Gwen could reply. “And you should know better than to send out invitations without asking our permission!”

  That w
as a contradiction, Gwen noted, but there was no point in telling her. Who would have thought – Gwen certainly hadn’t – that there was a mother worse than Lady Mary in London? But Lady Mary hadn’t really been that bad... she felt a moment of sympathy for Lady Elizabeth, who’d had a harpy dictating her every waking moment. It was a miracle she hadn’t turned out any worse.

  “That smelly little lesbian is not welcome in our house,” Lady Bracknell continued, one hand raised to strike her daughter. “And...”

  “Shut your mouth,” Gwen ordered, drawing on all of her Charm. Lady Bracknell’s mouth snapped shut with an audible crack. The Charm was far from subtle, but it would take a very strong mind to escape its grasp. “Go to your bedroom, sit down on the bed and stay there until your daughter comes to tell you that you can leave. And I suggest that you treat her better in future.”

  Lady Bracknell stared at Gwen with unconcealed hatred, mixed with shock, but she obeyed.

  Gwen watched her go, then turned back to Lady Elizabeth. The young woman looked absolutely terrified and it was hard to blame her. Even if she hadn’t been scared of the magic Gwen had demonstrated, her mother would not be happy when the Charm wore off. And it would, Gwen knew. Nothing lasted forever.

  “Now,” Gwen said, quietly. She kept the Charm out of her voice this time. Even if Lady Elizabeth didn’t sense it, the Charm might not work right on someone who was clearly distraught. “Why don’t you tell me what happened?”

  Lady Elizabeth started to tear up again. Gwen sighed inwardly, removed a handkerchief from her purse and passed it to the girl, allowing her to dab at her eyes. Maybe using so much Charm so blatantly had been a mistake. But Lady Bracknell had deserved to be slapped down hard.

  You could have held her upside down until she fainted, a quiet voice in the back of her head pointed out. Or you could have put her to sleep, or...