The Guild Chronicles Books 1-3

by J M Bannon

  “We have never stopped your deal making,” said Chilton.

  “No, you haven’t, but I have stopped myself. I know what conflict it would create and how you would perceive that it would tarnish your reputation. So, in deference to you, I have not been myself,” confided Strathmore.

  “How do you see us working through this,” asked Chilton. He knew that Strathmore had a deal he wanted.

  “There have been two developments that have facilitated my decision. Frankly, these two clients will absorb most of my time, and I wouldn’t be a good manager of your American affairs. To that point, I assure you I will not poach any of the staff from the firm and look to leave the New York operations intact. You can quickly put someone in over there to mind the store, and the organization will continue operations without upsetting customers.”

  “So, you won’t poach staff, but what about clients?” asked Chilton.

  “There will be three clients that will not be yours. Only one is currently on the books,” said Strathmore.

  Chilton gave him no reaction.

  “The Du Moya accounts will come with me. The guardian of the heir has given me agency on the Trust accounts.

  Chilton didn’t like that. The Du Moya’s were a long-time customer and Strathmore first exerted his independence within the partnership by moving account control to America. “You said there were three, what are the other two?”

  “I have landed the Corsini account. The Countess will be using me as her banker of choice. Her business will consume much of my time,” concluded Strathmore.

  “I’ll expect some fee for helping you secure that account,” demanded Chilton.

  “I’m sure we can come to some type of arrangement to offset my capital account,” said Strathmore.

  That was the hammer Strathmore would wield to strike a deal. He knew that the firm would need to liquidate positions to come up with hard currency or bullion to pay Strathmore out.

  “You said there were three, Mr. Strathmore,” guided Owens.

  “Yes, Poseidon won’t be a worry for you. I have come to an agreement with Sheppard and will handle the subscription and capitalization.”

  Chilton smiled. He couldn’t wait to hear this.

  “Oh, Randal I can’t believe you're going to get involved with Sheppard and his Indian,” said Owens.

  “This is where I will benefit you the most. I am prepared to get as much of my capital as you can as debt and equity associated with either the East India Company or the Hudson Bay Company rather than cash,” said Strathmore with a smile.

  “You’ll take the paper instead of cash?” queried Owens.

  “At sixty-five of face value,” offered Strathmore.

  “A thirty-five percent discount!? Are you mad?”

  “There needs to be a margin for me; that’s the offer. Of course, the other side of the coin is you pay me in bullion, and I force a prompt payment.”

  Chilton knew that would be the ultimatum. If they had to gather up that much bullion, it would strain other deals and operations, and if they slowed payment, Strathmore would spread the rumor throughout the City that Chilton couldn’t pay their debts to a named partner, bringing a chill to any deals they were working to consummate.

  “Randal stood picking up the portfolio that they were to review in this meeting. Tapping his finger on the cover, he said, “I’ll assume that these numbers are in order. I’ll leave it to you gentlemen now to discuss how you would like to buy me out and get the papers drafted. I think given my resignation I should leave you two to working through the firm’s business.” He walked out without a handshake or second look.

  Sir Lester sat looking at the resignation letter.

  “I’ll contact Davis and York and have them review the partnership contracts to see what options we have,” said Owens.

  “Mr. Owens, do we really want to make this hard on ourselves? Randal is up to something big with Sheppard, and I don’t really want a part in it.” said Sir Lester.

  Mr. Owens picked up his papers and stood, “Your father would sometimes say when we were in a prickly deal, ‘We are married now, so just lay back and enjoy it’ - crude, but apropos.”

  Sir Lester nodded, “I suggest we not only lay back, but we show some passion. Randal got where it is because he is driven. We should have always expected this to come about; for God’s sake he is American and thinks he’s special. I’d say we work out a deal and figure out how we can support his efforts with Sheppard. If Strathmore is willing to stake his debut on that deal, it has got legs to stand on, and we should be on the winning side.”

  26

  Tuesday the 6th of August, 1861

  1:30 P.M Haddon Hall, Bakewell, England

  The portal in the basement of Haddon Hall opened to the loud clap of static electricity releasing. Gerrard Du Moya stepped through wearing the Aether suit with the helmet under his arm. His curly black hair was wet, and he was glistening with sweat.

  Luca Giuliani stood near a control panel for one of his electro-chemical baths.

  Gerrard pulled the chain aside the gate shutting down the connection.

  “The Countess not joining us?” asked Giuliani in Italian.

  “She will be here soon,” replied Gerrard his Italian was far better than Giuliani’s English.

  “You look exhausted.”

  “I am. The number of trips has increased and where I end up is not always as pleasant as it is sitting here in Haddon Hall. I’ve come to discuss changes to this suit,” said Gerrard.

  “It was designed as discussed with the Countess,” replied Giuliani.

  “The Countess isn’t the one going out there. You’re a scientist do you think you’ve got the design perfected or could you improve the performance with the input of actual use?” Gerrard threw the helmet at Giuliani who almost fumbled the unexpected catch, “look!”

  Luca twisted the helmet around to see the faceplate of thick opal glass. Three scratches went across the glass damaging the electroplated tint and the underlying glass. “Oh my, what happened?”

  “Something wasn’t too welcoming when I came through. It was big; twice the size of me and its claws did that,” screamed Gerrard angrily.

  “How did you escape?”

  “Fortunately, it just threw me back through the portal like a rag doll, as fearsome as this creature was to me it seemed equally terrified of me.”

  “Given the forces required to do this kind of damage I would say you are quite lucky to be alive. I’ll fix this, but the real issue is you,” said Giuliani.

  Gerrard was in no mood for excuses, “what’s that supposed to mean?”

  “I can’t augment your physical stature and while the shell may not break the egg could still be scrambled if you follow my meaning.”

  “Oh, I do I feel a bit like a scrambled egg,” said Gerrard with a wry smile.

  Giuliani moved close to Gerrard and touched the young man’s head, “I can see a contusion. Certainly, you’ll bruise, but I worry more if there might be internal injuries.”

  “I feel fine. More to the point I need protection out there, when will these be ready?” said Gerrard as he pointed to the wall of mechanist men.

  “There has been a setback with Fletcher. The mechanics are completed, the new design is superior in all ways. The original mechanist man wouldn’t allow me to see the inner workings of the power source and the spirit chamber when he visited, so our work is incomplete,” replied Giuliani.

  “You let him go?” Gerrard shouted toward the ceiling.

  “We are not kidnappers.” Giuliani responded with a sigh.

  “It’s a fucking metal man with a spirit trapped in it, no one will care,” said Gerrard.

  “What it is isn’t important, that it will be missed and that he might tell others what we are doing here is,” replied Giuliani. “I have developed a power supply that works. I had hoped to get a look at the work in the first mechanist man, but he would not have it. We need to understand this spirit chamber.
”

  Gerrard’s rage grew he prepared to press into the Italians mind to see what happened and if he was telling the truth.

  “I wish to see our project be a success sir, but part of our advantage is our deception,” said Giuliani.

  Gerrard let his rage fade. Giuliani was right; impatience would cause him to fail, and there was too much at stake. All of this was to support his exploration of the aether, “I’m sorry, the work and the stress of these trips are taking a toll on me.”

  “What is it like?” asked Giuliani

  “The only way to explain it is this, the travel is not all that different from what you have experienced yourself through the gate, but rather than stepping from here back to the palazzo, you step into a dream. The problem is what you see is beyond what you can dream. Does that make sense?

  “A bit, I certainly hope to get the experience myself,” mused Giuliani.

  Gerrard wasn’t interested in hearing Giuliani’s aspirations. He needed the safety of numbers. A troop of mechanist men built of steel, not dreamy scientists looking to go on holiday, “I spoke with Dimetri, he is too busy to help. I have some ideas about Allard's work, but I will need your help and most of all I need to see how Fletcher has the spirit contained and able to activate the automaton.”

  “There is the problem. Fletcher doesn’t know,” said Giuliani.

  “What?”

  “He’s a mechanist, a brilliant one, his work is novel, to say the least. The problem is his success comes from collaboration, He made the structure, but the white witch is the one that built the chamber that this Azul resides. It’s an arcane innovation,” said the Italian.

  “I’ll need to meet with Fletcher and hear this from him. I will figure out how to contain the spirit. You will need to help me with a method to get the spirits into the machines.”

  * * *

  3:40 Haddon Hall, Bakewell, England

  Fletcher was standing outside of his workshop enjoying a cigarette. The gardens were in full bloom with a day that was warming up after a slow morning rain.

  He was about to take a walk into the garden and look for some inspiration as he was still sore from his falling out with Azul. On the one hand, he could see his side, the mechanist man was more to Azul than a bunch of parts to be improved, it was his body. The other hand it was Fletcher’s work, and he wanted to make more of it. He chuckled to himself thinking “the other hand,” looking at his artificial hand.

  He also felt like he had let down Giuliani who was eager to see the Mark III operate with the parts he had supplied. He flicked the butt of his cigarette to the gravel and began to walk into the garden when he noticed movement inside his shop. Through the tall windows, several figures were moving about, and he could hear the muffled voices. He went back in to see who was in his laboratory uninvited.

  “Countess, how good of you to visit,” greeted Fletcher. He wasn’t sure when or how she arrived at Haddon Hall. His patron was accompanied by a young man in his teens. Of some mixed race but well dressed and groomed. This was not some servant of the Countess, or if he were, he exuded arrogance. Professor Giuliani was also in attendance.

  “I shared with the Countess that Vizier Hassan was none too pleased with us when he visited,” said Giuliani.

  “I am to blame, I should have been more thoughtful and shared with him our need to work on his internals,” said Fletcher.

  “When will he be back?” asked the Countess.

  “Fletcher looked at his feet then looked back at them,” He hasn’t returned any of my wire-types. I think I may have stuffed this up a bit, but I have a plan to resolve it,” added Fletcher,

  “And that is?” asked the Countess.

  “I had planned to take Professor Giuliani and the Mark III down to London. There we can confer with Dr. von Traube and Miss Caldwell to be certain everything is ship shape. I know with that team together old Azul will be more comfortable and will let us move him into the new form. Problem is that I’ve been informed he has gone on a research trip and won’t be back to London until after the Gilchrist wedding in Prussia.”

  “So, you were just going to take my property and show it off to them?” asked the Countess.

  “I’m confused. I thought the purpose of this work was to advance the knowledge of automatons and improve Azul’s design,” replied Fletcher.

  “I too am confused, because I was told that you were the creator of this mechanist man,” replied the Countess.

  “I am!”

  “Whose invention powers the machine?” pressed the Countess peering into Fletcher’s eyes.

  “Lorelei — Dr. von Traube’s.”

  “And who developed the internals that house the spirit of Azul?”

  “Miss Caldwell and the actual transfer she had assistance from a friend,” said Fletcher.

  “So, you collaborated with them to build a living machine, but you see all you have made here is a very complex statue, Mr. Fletcher. It needs the Alchemist to give it power and the witch to induce the spark of life that animates the machination. You’re a fraud, Fletcher, you have no knowledge as to how to make this thing come to life!” The Countess’s words echoed through the hall.

  Fletcher certainly felt like a fraud.

  “Mechanist Fletcher might you have some recollection of how the witch made it possible for the spirit to dwell in a machine,” asked the young man.

  “She did most of that work on her own just giving me specifications, but I do know from our initial experiments that she was able to transmit signals that mimicked what happened inside that box we put in there. She said that was where he was living. When we tested the device before he was put inside she would use her theurgy room to project inside,” said Fletcher.

  “Does your arm work on a similar principle?” asked the young man.

  That made Fletcher think, “Oh yes, very similar. You see inside the arm is what we have named the Aetheral Neural Bridge. It converts my thoughts into movement. I just took the one from my old arm and put it in this one.”

  The young man looked to the Countess. Neither said a word then the Countess gave him a nod.

  “I didn’t catch your name,” said Fletcher

  “Gerrard is my name. May I touch you, sir? The arm, I mean,” asked Gerrard with a smile.

  Fletcher smiled back nervously, “I suppose —”

  Gerrard took Fletcher’s metal hand in his two hands moving the fingers and the wrist. Fletcher triggered it to give some resistance.

  “Oh, quite strong — Do you ever feel it is a bit too powerful?” Gerard asked, looking to the Countess.

  “In the beginning it was clumsy, but now it feels like a part of me,” said Fletcher.

  Gerard turned his back to Fletcher and walked towards the Countess. Fletcher thought his actions rather rude.

  “I know the ladies would be happy to help, knowing that their friend Azul will benefit from the upgrades,” said Fletcher.

  Fletcher was shocked when his metal hand went to his own throat and began choking himself. Fear washed over him as he felt the young man named Gerard in his head rummaging around looking through his thoughts and memories. It felt like he was drowning; his thoughts mixed with Gerrard’s. As much as he tried to make the arm release from around his own throat he had no control.

 

  27

  Friday the 9th of August, 1861

  1:00 A.M. The laboratories of Palazzo Corsini Rome, Italy

  In front of him were three gemulets made by occultists of different ages; all of similar construction. Eldritch elements enclosed into precious metals. He had gone to the theurgy chamber and entered these objects to explore their workings. He needed to become as adept in the workings of gemulets, as the white witch if he were to solve the issue of enlivening his mechanist bodyguard.

  As a true traveler of the aether, he understood its raw, savage power. The various planes o
f existence were enclosed in this force. The energy was the barriers between universes. It dawned on him then that a gemulet held a tiny sample of the aetheric energy and allowed one to manipulate and construct their own universe within. It was as if within the physical object the aether was clay to be molded by a proficient practitioner of the occult into whatever they could imagine. This led his mind toward more and more questions.

  If a metaphysicist could construct rooms or objects within the containment of a gemulet, could he do the same when he was in the aether? He would need to devise an experiment to test his ability to control the eldritch energies that filled the limbo between realities.

  When projecting into the gemulet, does the result put one into a micro world made of the aether with the object, or was that a tiny window into some controllable space in the aether? Could these objects be simplified versions of Dimetri’s projector? Was one just opening rifts into the aether and folding and controlling it? Was a gemulet a peephole that one’s spirit could sneak into the aether like a mouse through the floorboards?

  Gerrard saw the ingenuity of Rose’s work in the ethereal neural bridge. The work was a marriage of science and the occult. Seeing the device before him, he held an appreciation for the one they called the white witch. This device wasn’t a big leap for him. He still had vague memories of the village and his mother’s occult practices that had been augmented by Caiaphas showing him that the metaphysical was measurable and predictable once the underlying laws were understood. It was man who wove in the mythical into the metaphysical.

  The Metaphysicist Caldwell had taken the principles of astral projection practiced by occultists of various orders and turned the tables. Most were trying to project out of their body to go to other worlds or visit with spirits. If they became adept, they could astrally project their spirit with the use of a theurgy pool into a finite portion of the aether they isolated in a gemulet. None had traveled like Gerrard in physical form. This Rose had done the opposite and instead figured a way for the spiritual to action something in the physical world.