The Lothair sliced through the swells of the Atlantic, her three square-rigged sails bellying out with a steady wind. An iron-hulled merchant clipper, she carried a cargo of tea and whiskey – the staples of life in the British colonies – and one passenger named Anne Lawrence.
The Lothair had departed from Liverpool two weeks before. Save for a brief squall or two, the weather had been surprisingly fair and the crew joked that the mysterious woman with the black parasol brought them luck, which was true, though not in the way they thought.
Anne knew how to speak to the wind and water, to coax them to obey her will, and she had need for haste. So she’d worked a bit of magic — discreetly, of course. She knew all too well the superstitious panic that would erupt if anyone noticed. Even in this relatively enlightened era, mortals feared anything that smacked of the supernatural. Magic was the Devil’s domain.
Still, something about her made them keep a respectful distance, even the captain, who looked relieved when she politely declined his invitations to dine in his cabin. Anne was quick to smile, yet there was a seriousness about her that made her seem older than she appeared. Even those who fancied themselves ladies’ men found themselves stammering like schoolboys whenever her gaze turned their way.
Anne had auburn hair and freckles and ears that stuck out. She favored funereal black dresses that accentuated her pale skin. It was not a matter of ravishing beauty, rather of an elusive quality that bordered on witchiness — and that was much closer to the truth.
Now she sat on a coil of thick mooring rope, a wide-brimmed hat on her head and a book open in her lap. It was called In a Glass Darkly and featured five short tales of occult horror, presented as true accounts drawn from the posthumous case files of one Dr. Martin Hesselius. Anne’s fondness for sensational stories stemmed from her time at a ruined castle on the coast of Normandy, when she had little to do but read the books her captor gave her. He was an ardent fan of Edgar Allen Poe and Horace Walpole and other pioneers of gothic literature. At first she’d regarded the novels with condescending disdain, but the tales of supernatural afflictions and doomed love proved addicting.
In a Glass Darkly had evil dwarves and vengeful spirits, premature burials and beautiful, abused countesses — in short, all one could hope for — but Anne’s attention kept wandering from the page. As the Lothair drew closer to its destination, anxious thoughts filled her head.
She’d spent her life tracking things that didn’t want to be found. Things that lived in the shadows, beyond the edges of the firelight. But Gabriel D’Ange did want to be found.
She hoped.
Her keen eyes detected the dark smudge on the horizon a few moments before the sailor, up in the crow’s nest.
“Land ho!" he cried.
Anne rose to stand at the port rail as the crew scrambled to shorten the sails and await the arrival of a pilot vessel to guide them safely through to port. The shallow waters surrounding the island of Bermuda were a graveyard of wrecks. French, Spanish, Dutch, Portuguese and English ships had all met violent ends on the reefs and the captain of the Lothair was taking no chances.
Several pilot gigs raced toward them under sail. Listening to the bantering of the crew, Anne gathered that it was a highly competitive business and the first to reach the Lothair would earn the fee. The small boats had been lurking offshore and it was only a matter of minutes before the swiftest gig reached them. It was long and narrow, crewed by six oarsmen, a coxswain and a pilot, all of them dark-skinned Bermudians, freemen descended from the Africans who had been brought as slaves by the British.
An agreement was struck, the losers tacked away, and the Lothair set a course in the wake of the pilot boat. The crew seemed to have great respect for the gigs, which often came to the rescue of distressed ships caught up on the reefs at great risk to themselves. But the seas were calm today, and Anne watched the water turn from cobalt to a crystalline emerald color as they neared the shoreline. A few fishing vessels dotted Saint George’s Port, but it was dominated by the great steamers of the British Navy, which had an extensive dockyard there.
Anne had packed only one valise and she carried it ashore herself. After Bermuda, the Lothair would sail on for Canada. Customs officials waited on the dock to inspect the captain’s papers. They asked a few cursory questions, but Anne said she was a British citizen visiting as a tourist and they waved her through.
Not so long before, a woman traveling alone would be an extreme oddity. In her journeys around the world, Anne had often dressed as a man to avoid unwanted scrutiny. But times were changing. More women were starting to venture out on their own and Bermuda was a popular destination, though mostly for Americans.
The captain recommended the Globe Hotel, which had a colorful history. Beginning as Government House in 1699, it became a private residence and then a hotbed of Confederate agents during the War Between the States. Anne asked for directions and strolled through the town, sheltering from the midday sun under her black parasol. Bright flowers bloomed along the narrow lanes of houses. She was glad to have solid ground under her feet after so long at sea. She didn’t mind the pitching of the ship, but the confinement had started to chafe.
The hotel was modest but clean and airy. Anne secured a room with a veranda on the second floor. She opened her valise and took out a cedarwood box. A very old cross nestled in the velvet lining. She idly traced the rose carved at its center, recalling the last conversation she’d had with her brother Alec in London.
He’d been stretched out on a couch in the conservatory at Park Place, drinking a cup of tea and reading A Study in Scarlet, which had been sent to him by a young occult investigator in New York named Harrison Fearing Pell. She sounded interesting and Anne hoped to meet her one day, but at the moment, all she’d wanted to know was where Alec kept the cross he’d stolen from Gabriel D’Ange.
He’d raised an eyebrow when she asked. “Why?”
“Because I wish to return it to its rightful owner.”
Alec said nothing for a long moment. He laid the book down, his voice flat. “You know where he is.”
“I might.”
“You should stay away from him.”
“I’m not asking for your advice. I’m asking for the cross.”
Alec refilled his cup from the teapot, but set it down untouched. “You never told me what happened in Normandy.”
“Because it’s none of your business.”
“I’m your brother—”
“Then tell me all the things you share with Vivienne. Tell me how you truly feel about her. Since we have no secrets from each other.”
Alec was silent.
“No? Well, I won’t press you. But you can do the same for me.”
“You love him, don’t you?” The words were heavy. “After everything, you still do.”
“Where is it, Alec?”
He stared at her, unhappy. “Cyrus Ashdown has it.”
Anne had taken the next train to Greenhithe and walked from the station to Ingress Abbey. Cyrus had been delighted to see her, less so when she demanded the cross. But he knew better than to refuse. She’d booked passage on the Lothair the following day.
And now here she was, hoping she hadn’t made a terrible mistake.
A maid came and filled the slipper tub with lukewarm water. Anne took her first real bath in almost two weeks, soaking for a long spell with her eyes half-closed, listening to the drone of bees on the terrace. The full heat of summer had yet to arrive, but the sun was strong in these climes. She should have packed something light and sensible for the tropics. Instead, she’d thoughtlessly crammed two high-necked gowns into a case and hurried off for the docks to catch the first ship she could find. Both garments were jet black; the color of mourning and blood in moonlight.
Perhaps not inappropriate, all things considered.
When her toes started to prune, Anne left the tub. She sat on the bed and took out the letter from Gabriel. The creases were fraying from being folded and unfolded many times.
La vie est un sommeil, l’amour en est le rêve.
Life is a long sleep and love is its dream.
It didn’t sound angry.
Anne went down to the front desk and asked for directions to the postmaster’s office. It was a two-story white building located at 11 Water Street, a few short blocks away. The man behind the counter greeted her with a friendly smile.
“Good afternoon, Miss.” His accent was crisply British. “Posting a letter?”
Anne smiled back. “Good afternoon. Actually, I’m looking for my cousin. He came in a few weeks ago. Dark blonde hair, held back with a black ribbon. He was raised in Paris and has a French accent.” She lowered her voice. “His mother is quite ill and it’s urgent he return home to see her. But I’m not sure where he is staying.”
The clerk nodded in sympathy. “Yes, I do remember him. But I’m afraid he hasn’t returned.” He saw her face fall. “You could ask down by the packet ships. Perhaps someone has seen him.”
Anne thanked him and made her way back to the docks. She told the same story to the customs agent and the sailors unloading cargo, but all shook their heads and wished her luck. A few American tourists were wandering about, although the high season for visitors was winter. Anne didn’t bother with them. She doubted Gabriel would stay in a hotel. More likely he’d be holed up somewhere remote. She remembered his exact words on the night he’d asked her to come away with him.
I know a place, oceans away. The greenest water you ever saw….
I know a place.
He’d been here before.
Bermuda wasn’t large. If she walked from one end to the other, making inquiries along the way, surely she would turn up some sign of him. The black ribbon and French accent were distinctive. The alternative, that Gabriel had already left, was not something she wished to contemplate.
Anne spent the rest of the day strolling through the town, chatting up the locals in the shops and taverns. The tale grew in the telling. Gabriel’s mother was stricken with consumption and her dying wish was to see her only child one last time. Anne herself was an orphan, alone in the world, and Gabriel was like a brother. A devoted son, he had an adventurous streak that led him to the colonies to seek his fortune. She half came to believe it, brushing away tears when she came to the part about his mother clutching the only picture she had of Gabriel as she begged Anne to bring him home before it was too late.
By the time she was done, she felt assured that if Gabriel set foot in Saint George’s, he would be surrounded by a dozen people urging him to find his cousin Anne without delay. Yet the next day passed with no word, and she decided it was time to expand her search. The causeway to the main island had been badly damaged in a hurricane the previous summer and remained impassable. Anne checked out of the hotel and, carrying her valise and black parasol, set off for King’s Wharf where she caught a ferry to Hamilton.
The colony’s capital was busier than Saint George’s and Anne didn’t linger. She knew in her heart Gabriel would be elsewhere. Hamilton sat more or less in the center of the island, which was long and narrow and shaped like a fishhook. The only question was whether she should turn east or west. Anne flipped a coin and chose west.
There was only one main road running from end to end. If Gabriel was up in the hills, he would need to buy food and other supplies in one of the villages. For the next three days, Anne wandered from parish to parish, asking after him to anyone she met.
It quickly became clear why the island had once been a pirate’s haven. The coastline was riddled with secret coves and crescent beaches without a single footprint. Away from the larger towns and forts, Bermuda was a sleepy place. She passed children playing cricket on grassy pitches where goats and chickens wandered free, and bright green fields of onions tended by women in white dresses and broad straw hats.
Slavery had been abolished decades before, but as in other parts of the world, a rigid caste system remained. In listening to overheard conversations, Anne gathered that anyone not deemed entirely white European was referred to as “colored” – a catch-all classification that ignored the vast diversity among the people. They were a mélange of African, Portuguese, West Indian and Native American, with the blood of Irish and Scots indentured servants thrown into the mix. Most had a lilting accent that was unmistakably British but with the distinct flavor of the island.
Anne bought food when it was offered and met a kind reception from the people she encountered, if no news of Gabriel. At night, she found deserted stretches of sand and curled up with her valise, lulled into sleep by the tree frogs whistling up an eerie symphony in the darkness.
She’d had the same dream almost every night since leaving London. In the dream, she walked along a road beneath tall trees, their branches twining together to form a dark tunnel overhead. She was searching for someone – or running from them. That part was never clear. Only that she had to keep going or something terrible would happen. It was one of those quasi-nightmares that was more monotonous than terrifying; the kind that goes on and on with nothing happening, just a creeping sense of dread.
When night fell on the third day, she followed her usual routine, leaving the road and wandering down to the shore. She sat cross-legged on the warm sand and watched the sun dip below the horizon. A few fishing boats drifted among the reefs, but they set their sails for home as the daylight faded. Her small form was very still, with the relaxed watchfulness of her kind. Anne could sit this way for hours, her senses tuned to the endless ripples in the Nexus, the magical plane where all things were one and the elements that comprised them burned brightly.
The stars came out. The waves quieted. Anne sensed furtive movement from the corner of her eye. At first she thought it might be a stray cat, but then she realized it was walking upright on spindly, bowed legs. It had a shock of reddish hair and a scowling, wizened face. Some species of sprite no doubt. Mortals never noticed them, and this one was bold.
Anne smothered a yawn. It crept closer. Most likely it wanted her parasol. Sprites were awful thieves. She gazed out at the water, waiting until it got within arm’s reach. Then she turned her head and looked straight into its cunning yellow eyes.
“Boo,” she said softly.
The sprite shrieked like a boiling kettle and scampered away, her peals of laughter chasing it into the undergrowth. It was wicked to scare the nasty little thing, but she couldn’t help herself. She’d been robbed blind by sprites too many times to feel much pity.
Anne lay back with her head resting on the valise and watched the stars wheel overhead. She’d seen selkies and golems and bogles, but she’d never found another daēva, not in all her years of searching. Back in the days of Alexander the Great, there had been many of her kind in the world. After they were freed from bondage to the Persian king, the Immortals and Water Dogs had vanished. All except for Anne and her brother, Alec, and one other named Cassandane.
It was a bitter disappointment, but she’d taken solace in her work for the Society for Psychical Research in London, following up on sightings of legendary creatures. Most were harmless, others less so. It was on one of those assignments that she had crossed paths with Gabriel D’Ange.
He was a necromancer. An Antimagus. A killer a thousand times over. The mere whisper of his name inspired fear among those who knew his reputation. Yet she had come to know a softer side. A man with a rigid sense of honor, but also kindness and decency. In truth, she’d fallen madly, hopelessly in love with him, as improbable as it seemed.
Then he’d done something rotten and she’d done something worse, and they’d parted on very bad terms.
Gabriel had a fiery temper and nursed grudges with greater devotion than any person Anne had ever met, but perhaps if she gave him the cross back — the one her brother stole three hundred years before, the one that started the whole mess -- he might be willing to forgive. Either way, she had to try.
Anne’s solitary existence had suited her once, but now the world was not just a lonely place without Gabriel.
It was insufferably boring.
She passed the night unmolested by sprites or anything else. In the morning, she walked to the next village and made inquiries. No one had seen a man who fit her description. So Anne forged ahead, striding along the side of the road with her black parasol raised against the heat of the midday sun. She spoke to fishermen and farmers, mothers and children.
At last, she found herself at a tavern in Sandy’s Parish at the far end of the island.
It was a small, rough place, hardly more than a shack. She approached the barkeep, a slender dark-skinned man in his late forties, and ordered a mug of ale.
“I’m looking for my cousin,” she said. “Dark blonde hair, medium build.” Anne smiled. “He wears it unfashionably long, tied with a black ribbon.”
The barkeep gave her a bland smile. “I’m sorry, miss. Haven’t seen him.”
“He speaks with a French accent.”
He thought for a moment, his brow furrowing. “No, I don’t think so, miss. I’d remember that.”
Anne sighed. “Thank you anyway.”
He leaned forward and lowered his voice, his eyes flickering towards the group of white sailors who sat at a long table. “That lot is deep in their cups, miss. You might want to try elsewhere.”
Anne’s feet hurt and it was a long journey back to Hamilton. “I’ll just have my ale first.”
“As you please.”
The barkeep placed the mug of tepid ale before her. He ran a rag over the counter and signaled to a boy who was rinsing glasses in a bucket. “Joseph, run along to Aunt Ida’s house. She wanted you for feeding the pigs and you know how she gets when she thinks you’re shirking.”
The boy held his eye for a moment, then bobbed his head and scampered off.
Anne took a seat at a corner table where she could watch the harbor. The village of Somerset sat at the far western tip of the island. If Gabriel wasn’t here, that meant she’d chosen the wrong direction. Anne wondered if she could catch a boat back to the capital. She didn’t mind walking, but she doubted Gabriel would stay in Bermuda long — if he hadn’t already left.
She’d pried the whole story from her brother of what had happened at the Picatrix Club in London two days before she drove Gabriel away. A senior member of Gabriel’s Order of the Rose, a man named Constantin, had betrayed him in the vilest fashion, stabbing Gabriel in the back with a rare sword that should have killed him. Anne still didn’t understand why it didn’t, but revenge would be Gabriel’s first priority.
According to Alec, Constantin was now in the service of a necromancer named Jorin Bekker. They were trying to revive the high council known as the Duzakh, which had torn itself apart in a bloody civil war two hundred years before. Constantin had Bekker’s protection and Alec said he was one of the wealthiest men in Europe, with nearly limitless resources. It all sounded like another disaster in the making.
She looked up to find one of the sailors staring at her. She ignored him, determined to finish her ale before leaving. She felt weary and frustrated. Perhaps it had been a mistake to come here. Alec was right. She was chasing a ghost better left alone.
But she couldn’t. Not after that letter….
From the corner of her eye, she saw the sailor rise and approach her table. He was a big man, with a red face and a squashed nose that had clearly weathered more than one brawl.
“Buy you a drink?” The words slurred at the edges.
“That’s kind of you to offer, but no thank you,” she said firmly. “I’m meeting my fiancé.”
“I don’ see a ring.” He paused, swaying above her. “Why don’ we have a chat while you wait for this phantom to appear?”
Laughter erupted from his friends, who were watching the exchange as if a wager rested on the outcome. Anne sighed and rose to her feet. She was reaching for her valise when a hand gripped her arm.
“Where you goin’?”
“Back to my room.” She frowned. “Let go of me.”
His grip didn’t slacken. “But you jus’ got here.”
Anne glanced at the barkeep, who was drying a glass with a rag. He looked worried.
“This is a civil establishment, sir—” he began politely.
“Don’t get above yourself,” the sailor growled, shooting him a hostile look. “I don’t take orders from colored.”
Anne gave the barkeep a slight shake of her head. She wouldn’t get him in trouble with a mob of drunken white men. He watched the scene with a wary expression.
“Are none of you willing to assist a lady?” she asked the other sailors.
Flat stares greeted this remark. Anne hadn’t really expected help, but she always gave them a fair chance.
“No knights in shining armor here, love,” someone remarked.
Anne nodded. “That’s a shame. As it happens, there are no ladies either.”
The sailor grunted as she deftly pried a finger back, breaking his grip, and ground the bones of his huge, calloused hand together. He yelped in pain. Then his face went dark with rage.
“You little bitch—”
He reached for her again and Anne’s parasol met the juncture between his legs with a dull smack. The blow came so fast, he didn’t even have time to register surprise. He hit the floorboards with a crash, writhing soundlessly.
Anne’s cool gaze swept across the astonished faces of his friends. “Good day, gentlemen,” she said briskly. “Try to behave yourselves.”
The barkeep’s lips twitched in a barely suppressed smile as she picked up her valise and turned for the door.
A man leaned against the frame.
Her breath caught as she met Gabriel’s brown eyes.
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