The Dark Matters Quartet

by Claire Robyns

  “And perhaps beyond reach of my demon glass,” Lily gasped.

  Kelan nodded. “Containing demons to the Isle of Britain is crucial.”

  “There’s one more thing,” Armand said. He pulled a large, black ledger from the leather folder. “I don’t know if it means anything, but the name jumped out at me.” He placed the ledger on the table and flipped through the pages. “This is Winterberry’s appointment book and I was curious when I came across Devon Thorn, Duke of Harchings. Their first meeting was July, 1852, and throughout the next year there’s fifteen more appointments recorded until…” He stopped paging to point a finger at an entry “…April, this year.”

  “Harchings is the Secretary for Alternative and New Threats. The man has been harping on about a dirigible fleet since he was instated.” Kelan scrubbed his jaw. “The dates line up as well, if Harchings was the one who’d commissioned the warship as a prototype for his fleet. I finally managed to persuade the Queen to take a firm stand against his Dirigible Fleet Act and the proposal was formally dissolved in May. That would have terminated the project, thank God. Without knowing it, Harchings was playing right into Agares’ hands.”

  “Or the two aren’t connected at all,” said Greyston. “We could be back to the demon agenda having nothing to do with dirigibles.”

  “Fair enough,” Kelan agreed. “We need to interview Harchings as soon as possible, find out if he sanctioned this warship design and ascertain if he’d been under any influence from Timothkin, or that other demon, Saloese.”

  “You only have until tomorrow if you wish to speak with Devon,” Lily said. “He leaves London on Tuesday to take Evelyn down to Surrey until the end of the weekend. Oh, and by the by, Evelyn desperately wanted me to join them at Harchings Castle and I said I would.”

  “Harchings won’t give up answers easily.” Greyston stated, followed by a slow grin. “Torture may be required, in which case I volunteer for the job.”

  A suggestion Kelan didn’t dismiss outright. Harchings’ office was new, run independently from the War Office—where Kelan had inside contacts—and steeped in covert operations. Harchings must be aware Kelan had influenced both the Queen and Lord Palmer against his Dirigible Fleet Act. On top of that, the duke had found Kelan harbouring his wife, Evelyn, up in Scotland while he’d believed her dead.

  Circumstances were not conducive to the amiable exchange of information between peers.

  “No one’s torturing Devon,” Lily declared. “However…” She looked at Kelan. “I suppose if Evelyn and I put our heads together, we could get you that information.”

  “The poor man would welcome torture over you meddling in his marriage,” Greyston said. “Again.”

  Lily groaned. She nibbled at her lower lip for an age, then shook her head. “Evelyn is our best chance and I…this is more important…” She titled her chin up at Kelan, her mind set, if not happily so. “What must be done, must be done.”

  All at once, Kelan saw a little of himself in her. Lily adapted to whatever her life next demanded of her. Her strength was so quiet, one almost missed it entirely. Almost missed how remarkably admirable the woman was, even while she thwarted him.

  He thought on all the changes she’d overcome as normal collapsed from her world, of how she met each challenge, each new turn, with a startling combination of pragmatic acceptance and righteous fire. She’d given up everything she knew, the whirl of social engagements, her comfortable life and her reputation. If the occasion called, she’d give up her life for those she cared about.

  She’d married him, practically a stranger. A man who’d take what he needed, and not flinch at enjoying the ride. He’d make damn sure she enjoyed it too, but at what cost?

  He wasn’t offering love.

  He wasn’t offering her a future.

  Greyston spoke again, his gaze on Lily. “I’ll go with you to Surrey. If Harchings does provide some answers, you may need guidance on how to interpret his information to probe deeper.”

  Lily’s lips curved into a smile as she turned to him. “Last I recall, you were assiduously avoiding Devon.”

  “Not if the reward is extracting his secrets.” Greyston shrugged. “Besides, I’ve just heard the Red Hawk has returned to Cragloden and I’m—”

  “Where have they been?”

  “Earning their keep and their reputation.” Greyston winked, but he sounded a little off-beat.

  “You miss them.” Lily’s smile faded. “You miss the Red Hawk.”

  “I’m sending word tonight for them to rendezvous with me in France. So, I have a few days to spare and I can ride for Calais direct from Harchings Castle.”

  “France?” Lily said in dismay.

  “Since they’re banned from British Aether, that’s the closest they can get to me,” Greyston reminded her.

  “Of course.”

  A moment passed with them looking into each other’s eyes, and then Greyston said softly, “I’m not sailing off into the sunset, Lily. I told you, I’m in this fight with you until the end.”

  Kelan stood back, saying nothing, watching, thinking… And after the end, after the end of this demon war, after the end of him and Lily, she deserved more. The kind of more she truly wanted. The kind of more a man like Greyston could offer.

  He didn’t know if Greyston was Lily’s future, but he did know that bedding her would sever any possibility.

  There was a time when none of that would have bothered his conscience or changed his mind.

  Looking at her now, Kelan knew—with some pause for regret that was too ingrained in him to deny or avoid—that when it came to Lily, that time had passed.

  SEVEN

  Two nights. And Lily was still waiting for later, for Kelan to conclude the business of their marriage.

  Or, at least, to try.

  She didn’t care how many cravings he’d awoken in her, she’d not be tamed by his hand. By any hand at all!

  But he hadn’t tried. In fact, he seemed to have set aside his general grievances with her altogether. She’d been treated to nothing but the unaffected politeness he’d previously reserved for her…and everyone else.

  I’ve been relegated.

  The realisation added to the edgy dissatisfaction that hounded her.

  She absently selected another formal evening gown and carried it over to the bed. The wilful wife had suddenly become a mere hindrance, a small annoyance, in the backdrop of Armand’s revelations. She should be happy Kelan had turned his attention to more pressing matters.

  Well, she was.

  These other feelings were the problem. The discordant blend of fear and excitement. She felt as if she’d taken a wrong step off a cliff and every nerve ending was poised in anticipation. Perhaps it was a flaw of human nature, a single kernel of self-destruction that tempted one to fly even when the only possible outcome was plummeting to the ground.

  And maybe that’s what this jittery, disgruntlement was.

  She did not want to be jerked back to safety by an invisible hand. She wanted the choice to be hers, even if there really wasn’t any choice.

  “Would you not prefer the red and gold silk?” Ana glanced up from across the bed, where she was folding a champagne silk gown into tissue paper, one eye on Lily and the other on the cream gown Lily brought over. “When you came downstairs the night of the ball, I noted the particular look Kelan gave you was consistent with admiration.”

  “Kelan won’t be coming with us,” Lily reminded her. “And by the by, I’m not sure I want to encourage any particular looks from him.”

  She wasn’t sure she didn’t want to, either.

  This was all so, so confusing.

  As if… As if this inner struggle wasn’t merely between two halves of her consciousness, but between herself and a complete stranger. Her hand went to the silver locket at her throat. The locket holding a tiny vial of Kelan’s blood because her own wasn’t quite human enough to banish demons.

  Lily tossed her head back in
dismay. She wasn’t only living a life based on her mother’s decisions, she was a living, evolving by-product.

  “Actually, what we’ve already packed should be sufficient.” Lily scooped the cream gown into her arms and returned it to the wardrobe. “I don’t suppose Evelyn will be entertaining much.”

  She stood there a moment, digesting the enormity. She’d embraced her demon blood and awoken something foreign and hungry that seeped into the fissures. Every time she reached into that darkness, searching, she cracked a little more. Could she even trust her feelings, her wants and desire, anymore? How much was her and how much was the demon blood?

  “I honestly wish I knew what my mother was thinking,” she muttered.

  “Have you read her journal?”

  Lily turned to Ana with a blank stare.

  “People use journals to document their life and feelings,” Ana said.

  “I know what a journal it, but my mother never kept one.”

  “Lady Amelia used to write in it every evening.” Ana had packed the last gown and was closing the trunk.

  Lily watched as she fastened the leather strap on the outside, wondering if this was another consequence of Ana’s scrambled memory sap. If not, if Ana remembered correctly… Frustration tempered her excitement.

  “I never saw my mother writing a journal,” she said doubtfully.

  “You wouldn’t have.” Ana straightened and looked at Lily. “I didn’t see Lady Amelia writing in her journal either, not after you were born.”

  “Why would my mother have stopped when I was born?” Surely her arrival would have given her mother a host of new experiences to record?

  “I don’t know that she stopped, only that I didn’t see,” Ana said. “Lady Amelia never took me into her confidences.”

  Lily walked back to the bed in somewhat of a daze. The parts of her mother’s story that most interested her came before her birth, anyway, but were these journals lost to her? “I helped Aunt Beatrice pack up mother’s room years ago and we never came across any journals.”

  “When we first arrived from France,” Ana said, “Lady Amelia instructed some of her trunks to be stored in the loft.”

  “We never cleared out the loft.” Lily’s mind whirled at the possibility, small as it may be.

  How had her mother become involved with Duncan McAllister and his demon experiments? Why had she become involved?

  The truth about my father. Was he the recluse scientist Pierre d'Bulier, as she’d grown up believing, or another man she’d never met? He could still be alive!

  Lily sucked in steady, slow breaths.

  There might also be no answers.

  There might not even be any journals after all this time.

  Besides, she was leaving for Surrey within the hour and wouldn’t be able to search the loft until she returned. If she didn’t push this down right now, she’d drive herself insane.

  When Andrew came to collect her trunk, Ana left with him to supervise the loading.

  Lily used the private moment for one last peek into the demon glass before they departed. She sat on the bed, closed her eyes, and turned all her senses inward until the world around fell away. She reached deeper, into the grainy stillness that hung in the recesses of her mind like a grey, untouched artist’s canvas.

  That was as far as she could go.

  Usually the grey would swirl into a tempest storm, gather momentum, sweep her through that grainy tunnel and spit her out into the demon’s presence.

  For almost a week now, that storm had been quiet.

  She’d quickly learnt she could stay in this state for hours, searching, although it was more like waiting in front of a locked door. The rotting, acidic nausea only accosted her once she’d crossed through the tunnel. Some type of severe allergy to everything—the demons, the evil, the unnatural dimension—on the other side.

  Why couldn’t she sense Agares?

  Was there something more she should be doing?

  Lily tried to step forward, to push through the canvas. Nothing happened. She could pull back at will, but she couldn’t press… Wait, what was that? She hadn’t moved, but something was happening. The canvas was blurring, the grainy texture swirling into a smoky fog, whipping at the edges into a funnel that swirled around her, faster and faster, sweeping her along…

  Above, the sky broiled with thunderous clouds, lashing rain down to the earth. Lily wasn’t getting wet, didn’t feel the cold. The demon glass separated her from the scene, hid her from the demons.

  Where were they? Close. The acidic rot was already starting to line the inside of her stomach.

  Where was she?

  Through the sheets of rain, she made out the craggy wall of a mountainside. Sheer, almost vertical, rising higher than her eye could see, disappearing into the black cloud. She looked behind her. A little further off, another crevice-bitten rock, this one with a gentle slope and… Was that the blue haze of a mountain range in the distance?

  A disturbance swung her head around. The bleary images of two men on horseback emerged—below her—their path slicing the rain at a slow trot.

  Lily didn’t have much control over her movements, other than staying with the demon, but as she concentrated on the men, she floated lower. The track of flat ground, really just a crack between the mountains, was wide enough for the men to ride side-by-side.

  Which one was the demon? The demon would be the one smudged around the edge, not quite tethered to this world, but in this rain everything seemed smeared.

  The retching stench thickened, cramping her stomach as she drifted with the riders.

  They were both dressed in the same dark colours, long trench coats, hats pulled low. There wasn’t much to differentiate one from the other beneath the coats and hats, but the one on the left seemed less bulky, his face longer and thinner. They were clean-shaven and, from what she could tell, not much older than her twenty-two years.

  A wave of dry sickness roiled through her.

  These two weren’t making fast progress, their tedious travel marked with jagged outcrops and slippery shelves that forced the men into single file at times, dismounting altogether at others. No need to linger until the demon rash burned her insides raw. If she could just determine which one was the demon, which one the innocent, which one blurred more than the other…

  She yanked back from the scene, from the demon glass, spiralling through the tunnel to the other side.

  Lily opened her eyes, heart pounding. She hadn’t been able to separate the demon from the human because there was no human.

  Two demons!

  Agares and a lesser demon? Demons had no gender. There was no reason to assume Agares wouldn’t take on the form of a man when its Eliza Winterberry body had been destroyed.

  Lily gave her stomach a minute to rebound, then she hurried out the room. Kelan had left for Westminster early this morning, but she found Greyston and Armand in the library, their heads bent over the dirigible blueprint.

  She closed the door softly behind her, taking care not to disturb them. Greyston’s hair fell carelessly over his face, his jaw squared in concentration. Her finger went to her lips. She’d didn’t regret that kiss. She’d needed to know. And afterward, when Greyston had stood back, desire still melting in his eyes, and informed her that nothing had changed, that it couldn’t happen again…

  Well, she’d needed that as well. However Kelan made her feel, she did not have to act on it. She, too, could stand back, tell herself it didn’t have to happen again, nothing had to change.

  But she did acknowledge that kiss had been impetuous and selfish, and she was immensely grateful Greyston seemed to have put the entire episode out of his mind. She didn’t deserve it, but their friendship was intact.

  Greyston’s eyes lifted as she approached, warming on her.

  “I’ve just seen two demons,” Lily said.

  Armand’s head snapped up. “Two?”

  “Agares?” queried Greyston.

  �
�It must be.” She told them every detail, which, unfortunately, didn’t take long. “I don’t know where they are, or where they’ve come from. There was no sign of them when I looked into the demon glass after breakfast.”

  “The terrain you described seems more likely to be Scotland,” Armand said.

  Greyston snorted. “England isn’t all idyllic, rolling hillocks.”

  Armand crossed to one wall of leather-bound books and came back with an Atlas. He opened the book over the blueprint. The page he was after folded out into a large, topographical map of England.

  “The only truly, treacherous mountain ranges are far north, bordering Scotland.” His finger drifted along the dense clusters of circular altitude lines, all concentrated right at the top of the page. “The Pennines, the Grampian Mountains, the Cheviot Hills…” He took his finger away and folded his arms. “Once we get further into Scotland, the possibilities are endless.”

  “So,” Lily said, “we have absolutely no notion of where they may be.”

  “North,” Armand say, “which does narrow it down, although that’s not to say they’re not travelling south.”

  “We do know they’re not anywhere near civilisation,” Greyston pointed out. “Once they near a town, or city, we’ll be able to identify their whereabouts.”

  “The threat isn’t immediate.” Armand agreed. “It doesn’t warrant me hauling Lord Perth out of the Queen’s meeting chamber.”

  “I can’t leave London now,” Lily realised. “Evelyn will be devastated.”

  Greyston’s lips quirked. “Disappointed, at the most.”

  “When last did you speak to her?” Lily raised a brow at him. Evelyn had never leaned toward moderate emotion. Of late, her emotions had been emphatically pronounced and unpredictable. “She will feel I’ve deserted her.” She gave Greyston a thoughtful look. “Evelyn adores you. She was delighted when I mentioned you’d be joining us.”

  “No.” Greyston shook his head. “I’m not coddling Evelyn while you play with demons.”

  “You know Kelan won’t allow me near any of the demons,” Lily said. “And we don’t know where the demons are or where they’re headed. You’d only be wasting time here, waiting for something to happen.”