aven felt Gargantua’s huge hands about his shoulders, gripping him and hauling him upright like he was a carcass in a slaughterhouse.aven felt Gargantua’s huge hands about his shoulders, gripping him and hauling him upright like he was a carcass in a slaughterhouse.
‘Mr Raven,’ the Weasel said, a vicious delight dripping from his voice. ‘What a lovely surprise to run into you. Now, do you know what time it is?’
He theatrically produced Raven’s father’s pocket watch and dangled it from its chain.
‘Well past time you paid up – either in coin or in kind. I think I said an eye, didn’t I?’
The Weasel put the watch back in his pocket and took out the same blade that had ripped Raven’s face the last time they met.
Raven started at the sight of it, but Gargantua’s hands held him firm.
He felt sick with fear. He was barely able to think of anything other than the pain he would endure, but some part of him was thinking of the consequences beyond. Could he still have a career with one eye? It was a moot question, he realised. Being held here and mutilated meant his mission tonight was at an end. With Simpson dead, he would have no apprenticeship anyway. It was all about to be lost, for the price of trying to help Evie.
To add insult to imminent injury, he hadn’t even helped her. In fact, it was quite possible he had merely borrowed the means by which she purchased her own death.
Fear caused his mind to race, revisiting the events of the evening like he was experiencing them all simultaneously. Every sight, every smell, every sensation and emotion flashed before him, and amidst it all, something stuck.
Raven’s shoulders remained gripped, but his hands were free and he could bend his elbow.
‘No, I have it,’ he implored. ‘I have Mr Flint’s money upon me. Please, I beg you. I have just sold a treasured heirloom and I have it here in my pocket.’
Mindful of the broken glass, he dipped his fingers carefully and scooped up a quantity of the red powder. Then he closed his eyes and tossed it backwards into his captor’s face.
Gargantua let go immediately and spun away, bending over and howling as he put his hands to his eyes. Even as he did so, Raven was scooping another handful, which he cupped in his outraised palm and blew, sending a red cloud to engulf the Weasel’s eyes, nose and mouth.
The Weasel fell, his screams echoing about the walls, while behind him Gargantua remained bent, emitting a low moan and muttering about being blinded by hot coals.
Raven crouched over the Weasel and swiftly retrieved his stolen pocket watch. Would that time itself could be recovered so easily.
Raven resumed his running, powering down the grass of the Mound in darkness, his eyes fixed on the lights of Princes Street ahead. His heart was fluttering both from his fear and from his exertion, but he felt as though some analgesic draught was surging through him, dulling the pains in his legs and in his chest.
The draught had worn off by the time he was careering down Frederick Street, but by that time gravity was assisting his flight. He almost flattened a gentleman alighting from a carriage as he turned the last corner, the front door of No. 52 in sight ahead of him. He barely dared to consider what awaited him behind it.
Raven burst into the hall past a startled Jarvis, his thighs screaming from his efforts. His breath was so short he feared he would not have enough left to speak, but as he bowled through the door into the dining room, he discovered that it didn’t matter.
He was too late.
The room was in disarray. The lace tablecloth was hanging askew, a number of glass tumblers lay smashed upon the wooden floor and several of the dining-room chairs were on their sides. Amongst the detritus on the floor, beneath the mahogany table, were the lifeless bodies of three men: Simpson, Keith, and one he did not recognise. A fourth, James Duncan, was slumped face-down on the table, a single bottle open in front of him next to a folded cloth.
Raven cursed the man. In his blasted quest for a place in history, he had killed them all.