As the women climbed the stairs with Immanuel behind them, Adam could guess what drew men like Byron to them. Besides a blood and familial connection, the selkies exuded power. He could never be sure if Immanuel felt it the way he did, but there was a pulse ringing through his body when he watched them. Even without magic, their limbs were defined and strong while their hips and breasts were padded with ample curves. A sculptural balance of softness and strength. Adam quickly turned his gaze to the ground as they approached but not before catching smears of kohl around their eyes and the flashes of gold ringing their bodies. Adam listened for any sign of intruders or spies as they reached the road. His gun hung limp in his fingers, the cold metal heavy in his hand.
At the top of the steps, Greta came forward. In front of the silver-haired woman, Greta bowed her head low, whispering a greeting in a soft, guttural language Adam couldn’t understand. With a shake of fabric, the cape dropped out. The taller woman bent low enough that Greta could fasten the cape with a hat pin. She repeated her task with the other two women before the selkies turned toward Adam. Shockingly intelligent eyes swept over him, more probing than praising.
The silver tattooed woman stepped closer until their chests nearly touched. Adam slipped his gun into his pocket and bowed low as Immanuel had, keeping his eyes on the ground as the other women joined the Völva. Slowly rising, Adam met Immanuel’s gaze as the women walked past them toward the house.
At the door, Völva Hilde stopped, her cape billowing across her pale fur like a shadow as she laid a hand on the rough wood and mossy stone on the inn’s crooked face. Her mouth tightened. “Let’s get on with it. I would prefer not to dwell here long.”
Chapter Twenty-Two
Beholden
Adam stood near the door of Mr. Jacobs’ room, watching Immanuel explain all they had uncovered. For Völva Hilde, Isa, and Tara, Immanuel translated the symbols and shorthand carefully inscribed on each missing woman’s profile. The selkies nodded in acknowledgment, occasionally explaining or expanding upon something in English or to each other in their mother tongue. Immanuel patiently listened and answered their questions as best he could. Despite his initial pallor and anxiety, Immanuel moved through it all with a quiet competence Adam admired. A small smile crossed Adam’s lips. This was what his uncle had seen in Immanuel back at Oxford when he felt invisible, and it was what Adam saw in Immanuel every day behind closed doors. So few had the chance to see him at his best. With each nod and confirmation from the selkies, Adam felt a swell of pride grow behind his heart. If only Sir William could see him like this.
Footsteps shuffled behind him in the front room. Adam glanced over his shoulder to find Miss Larkin standing at the table, her face ashen and her hand fisted against her stomach. He wanted to ask her if she was all right, but he feared speaking would anger the selkies or unsettle Immanuel. When they had come into the house, Völva Hilde made it clear that Greta was to stay in the front room while they met to discuss Berte’s death. A flicker of anger crossed Miss Larkin’s features at the dismissal, but she bowed her head and took her place on the sofa. When they finally came into the study, Adam had insisted on leaving the door open for security reasons and so Miss Larkin could listen in if she so chose.
“Now, what I want to know from you is if Berte had any entanglements, specifically a human man named Will Jacobs,” Immanuel said, passing them Jacobs’ likeness. “Or did she perhaps have any other suitors on the island, like one of the sailors or Byron Durnure.”
“Durnure has a suitor, Jenny,” Isa said when Hilde glanced at her for an answer.
“But did Berte have a lover or a captor, perhaps?”
“Not a lover. She chose to forgo mating to become a priestess. We assumed she had been captured when she disappeared. There was nothing to be done, then.”
“Treacherous creatures,” Tara murmured, her words and gaze falling heavy on Adam.
“Could she have been lured to the shore by family?”
Isa furrowed her brow as she tugged her cloak around her middle before shrugging it off at the elbows. “We all have families, in one way or another. I think Berte had brothers, but I’m fairly certain they were seals.”
Adam’s gaze flickered toward the narrow gap in the curtains behind the selkies. In the dim light, he thought he had seen a figure, but as thunder rumbled overhead and a crack of lightning lit the glass, all he could see were the boulders lining the road.
“The thing is, we found a calling stone in Mr. Jacobs’ possession. Could they have been related through her mother? Perhaps from a different brood with a different father?”
Picking up the twine-strung calling stone, Immanuel carefully placed it in Völva Hilde’s outstretched palm. She blanched and her eyes narrowed as she looked from the green stone to Immanuel’s face.
“Where did you get this?” she demanded, her voice edged with a growl.
Immanuel swallowed hard, the moisture drying on his tongue. Opening his mouth, he measured his words carefully.
“We found it among Mr. Jacobs’ possessions. When we discovered his body, we found a pocket watch with a hollow back. That stone was hidden inside it,” Adam replied for him. “Do you recognize it?”
“It was my mother’s,” Hilde said in nearly a whisper.
“Your— your mother?” Immanuel stammered.
Panic rose in his breast at the look in the high priestess’s eyes. Looking to Adam, he found his lover observing them carefully. He gave Immanuel a reassuring nod and straightened.
“Völva Hilde, is there any way Mr. Jacobs could have been in contact with your mother?” Adam asked, his voice level.
She turned to him, rising with a flourish of her cloak. “My mother has been dead since before my transformation. She’s right here, among your many, many others.”
In two strides, she stood at the wall. With the sharp hook of her finger nail, she jabbed through a poster above her head. Even from his place by the door, Adam could see the notation beside the sketch of her face: Murdered. The likeness wasn’t very good, but he could see the curves of the dead woman’s nose and lips in Hilde’s.
“Then how did he get the stone?”
“That is what I should be asking you. Wasn’t he one of your cronies?”
“We never met him,” Adam stated coolly. “We never got the chance to because someone murdered him as well before we got here.”
“My brother and I were the only ones who knew that stone existed. Our mother left it for us. Your Jacobs must have stolen it.”
“Could you or your brother have simply lost it?” Immanuel asked quietly, shrinking under Völva Hilde’s penetrating gaze.
“No, he would never lose something so precious.”
Adam’s henna brows furrowed. “Who is your—”
“Völva!” Shoving an elbow into Adam’s ribs, Greta Larkin pushed into the room. “Völva Hilde, you need to see this.”
Cold dread settled over Immanuel’s form at the sight of his notes crushed in Greta’s fist. Isa and Tara closed ranks around Greta and Hilde as they huddled over the crumpled pages. Immanuel opened his mouth, but no words worked from his lips as the women conversed in harsh whispers in their guttural tongue. Isa’s hands trembled and her lips silently parted while Tara’s scowl deepened. What scared Immanuel most was Völva Hilde’s silence and how Adam had drew closer until he stood at his elbow. They exchanged a worried glance and waited. As Völva Hilde raised her eyes from the page to pin Immanuel where he stood, he blindly reached for Adam’s hand. They’re fingers intertwined, little fingers squeezing for a brief moment, before falling away.
“Explain yourself, witega,” the Völva spat, shoving the balled pages into Immanuel’s chest.
He tried to catch his notes, but they fell from his hands. The breath hitched in Immanuel’s throat as his damaged eye burned. The papers fluttered to the floor and he dared not reach for them.
“I said explain,” she growled, the force of her mind ramming his so hard his t
emples reverberated with pain.
“Those are the notes I made during Berte’s autopsy. They’re merely diagrams, drawings. I wanted to get a better understanding of selkie anatomy.” When the selkies didn’t move, he added, “I told you, her body arrived in London and the Interceptors wanted me to prove she was indeed a real selkie and not a well-made forgery. I told you that was the reason I came looking for you.”
“You did not say you desecrated our sister. You have violated her in death as that monster did in life.”
“No, I— I didn’t violate anything. It was done with the utmost reverence, I can assure you. You must understand that autopsies are very common where we’re from, especially when someone dies under mysterious circumstances.”
“But you are a death seer, witega. None of this was necessary. You knew how she died. You saw her death. You needn’t do more, but you did. You took away her dignity. You cut her into pieces and for what? You destroy to what? To learn? You learned nothing of value.”
Immanuel’s lungs convulsed. He gripped the papers tighter against the constriction of his ribs. His knees buckled, but Adam’s grip on his shoulder kept him in place.
“What should we do with him, Völva? Should we tell him the punishment for violating a priestess?” Tara asked, her eyes glinting dangerously. Her features grew more grey and round, her teeth slowly elongating as her body curved in until she resembled something horrifically human yet unmistakably animal.
Isa shook her head, her orange curls scattering. She looked between the selkies and the men. Her eyes were glazed with fear and hurt, but her mouth betrayed her anger.
“No,” Hilde declared, stepping away from Immanuel to the oil stained sigil on the window with a look of disgust. “He is already of the lowest breed. He is beneath our laws or punishments.”
Adam released Immanuel’s arm and darted from the room as the selkies made to leave, calling after them, “No matter what you think Immanuel did, he did it thinking he could help her.”
“He did it to help them,” Hilde spat.
“If he thought he was offending you, he never would have done it. Please, let him finish. We need your help to find who killed Berte and Mr. Jacobs. Someone on this island did it.”
She curled her lip, the torc gleaming beneath the cords of her neck. “Why do you care? You knew neither of them.”
“Because no one deserves to lose their life without having it avenged. If you help us, we can give you the killer and you can exact justice your way.”
“We already plan to. Enough of our sisters have been desecrated. Make no mistake, our justice will be swift. We will do what we should have done long ago.”
Völva Hilde moved as if to grab the door handle but instead caught Adam’s wrist. As her hand tightened on his, he flinched at the pressure of something prying at his senses. He resisted, closing his eyes and turning his head even as the spear drove deeper until his eyes burned. Pain burst across his brow like a pop of fireworks, but he gritted his teeth and swallowed it down with a grimace he hoped would pass as a smile. Her grip and gaze hardened the more he struggled against the prod of her powers.
“Why are you resisting? What have you to hide?” Völva Hilde demanded.
“I’m not hiding anything,” Adam rasped as he raised his eyes to hers only to find hers nearly black.
“Then, let me in.”
“Get out of my head.”
“Why should I?”
“As you said, Immanuel isn’t beholden to your laws,” he replied through gritted teeth. “That means I’m not beholden to your will, either. Why should I have to turn my mind over to you?”
Her claws dug into his arm until pricks of blood dotted his freckled flesh and pain flashed across Adam’s features. “I suggest you and the witega get off the island. I cannot promise my sisters will be merciful.”
With a thrust of her arm, she threw him back and opened the door. Adam stumbled, cracking his head against the heavy wooden doorjamb. The room spun around him, his mind reeling at the sudden absence of her invasive presence. As he hauled himself up with the heavy knob, the only thing he could make out through the driving rain was the flapping of cloaks and the crack of muscle and bone. Releasing a deflated breath, Adam kicked the door shut and threw the bolt. There was no sense in chasing them now.
Wincing, Adam rubbed the back of his head and turned to find Immanuel where he left him in the middle of Jacobs’ room. His heart sank at the sight of Immanuel’s ribs trembling as he stared at where the selkies had once been, pages fluttering in his outstretched fingers. His lips twitched and his eyes clenched, but he didn’t move. From the doorway, Adam watched, waiting for the impending implosion and wishing he knew what to say.
Adam quietly padded closer to Immanuel until they stood a hand’s breadth apart. Immanuel bit his lip, keeping his burning eyes on the floor as Adam carefully pulled each paper from his shaking hands. With each page, Immanuel’s breaths sharpened until they rattled his throat as a smothered wheeze. Bending down at his feet, Adam gingerly smoothed the last of his rumpled notes over his knee and set them aside. They had been bent and slightly torn, but they could be salvaged.
As Adam rose, Immanuel averted his gaze, his hands curled in loose fists over his heart. Adam wanted to beg him to look at him or at least breathe, but he felt it too. The cold dread that somehow the world was crumbling around them and it was all their fault.
“Immanuel,” Adam said softly. He reached out to touch him but hesitated at the way his companion trembled. “Please look at me.”
He shook his head. Forcing back the wave threatening to spill over him, he bit his lip and shut his eyes.
“Immanuel, you didn’t do anything wrong.”
Immanuel slowly raised his mismatched eyes to Adam’s face. Tears gathered at the edge of his lids. He searched Adam’s face as the first defiant tear broke from its mooring. Each word rasped out, punctuated by a sharp breath, “Yes, I did. I ruined everything.”
Before Adam could reply, a sob leapt from Immanuel’s throat. He covered his face with his hands as his voice collapsed into a string of convulsive breaths. He couldn’t breathe, he couldn’t think, all he could see was the look of disgust on Völva Hilde’s face as she turned from him. Drawing in a strangled breath, his throat spasmed. His ribs ached with each wet cough and his nose burned, yet he didn’t fight it. He deserved every second of pain after what he did. Sinking to the floor, he covered his face as if that could keep the pain or his troublesome powers in.
Somewhere outside of him, Adam unbuttoned the collar of his shirt and managed to slip off his jacket. His companion spoke softly, telling him kind lies that only made him hate himself more because Adam wholly believed them— believed in him. Immanuel shook his head as words were beyond him, but the more he fought, the closer Adam held him. One arm encircled his flailing ribs while the other came to rest over his ear, pinning him against his lover’s stalwart form. Adam gently stroked his cheek and brought his lips to Immanuel’s forehead. Tipping Immanuel’s head back, Adam met his gaze.
“Immanuel, you need to take a deep breath.”
He shook his head again. How could he tell him he didn’t want to? To breathe meant going on and he couldn’t do that. Not yet. He had ruined all they had done since they left London. More than anything, he wished he would never have to breathe again, and when darkness finally enveloped him, there would be no worry of how to fix it or how to explain to Judith and the Interceptors how he had failed so utterly.
“I can’t do this,” he wheezed, staring down at his shaking hands. “I’m not cut out for this.”
“Yes, you are. We… we just had a setback is all.”
“A setback! They left! They— they— they wanted to punish us for an autopsy.”
“Breathe,” Adam said simply.
When Immanuel looked pleadingly into his eyes, Adam drew in a slow breath and watched as Immanuel struggled to mimic him through a string of raw coughs. Pulling him upright beside him, A
dam wrapped his arm around his shoulder and let Immanuel’s meager weight fall against him once more. His bony shoulders shuddered with each labored breath, his spine poking dangerously against Adam’s side.
“We don’t need them to figure this out, you know. Even if we never find out who killed Berte or Jacobs, on Monday we’re going back to London. The Interceptors and Special Branch can sort it out.”
“But what if they—”
“There is no way they could have expected you to handle this on your own without any formal training. You aren’t even a full member yet.”
Immanuel bit his lip and sniffed. “But what if I make a mistake again?”
“I’m certain you will. As much as you would prefer not to believe it, you’re human.” He carefully brushed a stray hair from Immanuel’s forehead. “You know how often I make a mess of things, yet you still love me. I really don’t think you made a mistake this time. There was no way for you to know how they would react,” Adam replied, rubbing Immanuel’s arm as his breath finally slowed to rhythmic puffs.
“But did I violate her? Hilde was right. I did see Berte’s death. I didn’t have to autopsy her, but I did. I don’t even think I did it for the Interceptors or Sir William. I wanted to know how it all worked, how she could be so human and yet not. I needed to see where the lines blurred. Did I do the wrong thing?”
“It depends who you ask.” Adam stared up at the thick timbers crossing to distract his mind from the hollow figure lurking in his memory. “Think about it this way. When you die, you stop being you. You have no use for your body. It’s a shell as empty as one you would find on the shore, so no, I don’t think you violated her. But when someone dies, those who love them don’t see that body as a shell, at least not at first. They see the person they loved.” His hand hovered over Immanuel’s side. It’s only when they die piece by piece that you begin to see the edges of the shell. “Do you think her autopsy was a waste of time?”
Selkie Cove (The Ingenious Mechanical Devices Book 5) Page 25
