17

Cathy waited for Carter on the lower floor of the bookshop, conveying her apologies and embarrassment with one glance at Jane. His footsteps clumped across the floor above them, did a circuit of the room with the fireplace and then made their way back. When he came down the stairs, Cathy hoped he didn’t have something on him that would detect the Charm to open the Way to the Nether reading room.

“Everything seems in order,” he said. “I’ll sit here whilst you browse, if that doesn’t get in your way?”

“That’s fine,” Cathy said. “We’ll be upstairs, that’s where… the best books are.”

“And the comfy chairs,” Jane added. “Shall we go up?”

“It’s so kind of you to open after hours for me,” Cathy said to her as they went upstairs, purely for Carter’s benefit. As long as he didn’t come up too – which she doubted – everything would be fine.

They went to the stained-glass door at the far end of the shop and Jane got the key ready. “If he starts coming up the stairs I’ll tell him you’re in the reading booth.” She opened the door to reveal a little cubby with another comfy chair in it. “Then I’ll come through and warn you, all right?”

“Thanks,” Cathy said as the door was closed and the key inserted. “I’m sorry to be a bother. It’s such a pain in the arse, all of this bodyguard bobbins, but it’s the only solution I could think of.”

“It’s no trouble,” Jane said and then unlocked the door. “Everyone else is already here. Enjoy!”

Cathy stepped across the shimmering threshold and into the secret reading room. This time it was full of people; she counted ten men and women, all evidently from the Great Families. A young woman who looked very much like Charlotte stood up.

“Your Grace!” she said and the conversation died, along with Cathy’s confidence.

Cathy reminded herself this wasn’t like a normal salon. “I’m Cathy,” she said. “Miss Rainer was my Governess and… and I think she used to organise this, am I right?”

Everyone nodded but they were still staring at her. She could feel the skin on her neck burning, and in moments the sensation reached her cheeks. “Um… I don’t want to screw this up, just because I’m the Duchess. I knew Miss Rainer before I became Duchess, it shouldn’t get in the way.”

“Of course not!” the woman said. “We’re so sorry, we knew a new person was coming but we had no idea it was you! I understand you’ve met my mother, Charlotte? I’m Emmeline and this is my brother, Benedict.”

Emmeline made the introductions and Cathy rapidly forgot all the names. Only two others were Londinium residents; the others came from all over Albion. A woman said she was from Aquae Sulis but Cathy didn’t recognise her.

“This is so exciting!” Emmeline said, leading her to one of the chairs. “We haven’t had a new member in four years! How is Miss Rainer? Where is she teaching now? Why hasn’t she been in touch with us?”

“We feared something had happened to her,” Benedict said. He was handsome but still boyish. Cathy suspected he hadn’t yet been packed off on his Grand Tour.

Everyone was looking at her. “She’s not… herself any more,” Cathy replied. “My parents discovered she was teaching me something worthwhile and complained to the Agency. I managed to track her down and… well, it’s not good.” There was a collective sense of grief. All of their lives had been touched by Miss Rainer. “But I promise I’m going to find a way to restore her.”

“She’s not the first,” Emmeline said, glancing at her brother.

“We need to stay positive though,” Benedict said and others agreed. “It’s what she would want.”

“I couldn’t agree more,” Cathy said as she sat down. “So. What have I missed?”

“Emmeline recited a very moving poem,” said the woman from Aquae Sulis. “And Benedict has brought something to share, haven’t you?”

“I’ve written an essay,” he said, patting a leather wallet resting on his lap. “And Alicia, didn’t you say you had some thoughts about the Suffragettes you wanted to discuss?”

Alicia, a lady from Jorvic, nodded. Cathy looked at the others but they just seemed to be waiting for something. “And then what happens?”

Emmeline frowned. “And then we have tea and decide what next month’s theme should be.”

“Hang on… is this just a discussion group?”

“Yes,” Benedict replied. “Were you expecting something else?”

“I didn’t know what to expect, I just found an old invite. I thought there would be planning, you know, working out what to do about Society. Taking action!”

Emmeline sank in her seat and Benedict took a sudden interest in his shoes.

“I mean, why else are you meeting?” Cathy pressed. “Surely you’re trying to work out how to change things for the better?”

“There used to be more of us,” Benedict said. “Men and women who were like you. Who wanted to be more… active and vocal about our cause in Society.”

Cathy wondered if they’d split and she’d found her way to the cowardly half of the group. “Where do they meet?”

“No, you don’t understand,” Emmeline said. “They were removed from Society and replaced by less troublesome spouses, or cursed in such a way as to make it impossible for them to cause any scandal. Like our mother.”

“Charlotte was such a pioneer,” Alicia said. “When she spoke, we felt like we could do anything!”

“But she took it too far,” Benedict said. “She was too passionate and she humiliated Father. If she wasn’t Lady Violet’s favourite she would have been replaced like all the others.”

Cathy thought back to her visit, how lovely Charlotte was. She could imagine the Fae adoring her beauty and the trouble that would bring. “Which family was she born into?”

“She was from Mundanus,” Emmeline said. “She was spotted by our father on the way home from a Suffragette rally. He had no idea what she’d been doing.”

“He stole her,” Benedict said, the anger straining his voice.

“But that’s a breach of the Treaty,” Cathy said.

“It happens all the time,” Alicia said. “Didn’t you know?”

She didn’t. Cathy sat back, appalled at how naive she was. From ignoring where the servants came from and how they could be treated, to discovering that mundane women could be kidnapped from Mundanus without anyone caring or doing anything about it, made her feel sick. What else was she ignorant of?

She considered telling Max about what had happened to Charlotte, but if she’d been taken in the early nineteenth century her family would be dead. Would she want a life in which she had the freedom she’d been fighting for without knowing a soul? And modern life was so different, it could be too much of a shock. It explained why she’d changed Miss Rainer’s fortunes; Charlotte had brought radical ideas into Nether Society with her and Rainer had been spreading them ever since.

“What happened to the others? You said they were replaced.” She’d heard of that at least, but she wasn’t exactly sure what it meant.

“They’re sent away and never come back,” Emmeline whispered. “No one knows where they’re taken nor what happens to them.”

“We don’t even know if they’re still alive,” Benedict added.

Cathy worried a button on her glove, the sombre mood of the room being the last thing she’d expected. “I don’t suppose one of them was Clarissa Arvensis-Ranunculus?” She was one of Miss Rainer’s students, one whose file ended abruptly with the cryptic code she’d asked Max to decipher in her last letter to him.

“Yes!” Emmeline said. “Do you know what happened to her?”

“No, she was just someone I hoped to meet.” She ran through the other names she could remember and the assembled confirmed that all had been replaced. None of them had been Londinium families, at least none of any note, so Max was the best bet in tracking them down. “I’ll look into it,” she said.

“Shall I read my essay now?” Benedict asked.

“No, wait,” Cathy held up a hand. “I know I’ve just got here but I’m sorry, I’m not taking the risk to sneak out just to listen to an essay.” When Benedict’s young face displayed his sadness she said, “I’m sure it’s really interesting, but I can read essays at home.”

“We can’t,” Emmeline said pointedly.

“But what I mean is that if we’re all taking the risk being here, let’s put it to better use. Let’s work out what we can do to find others like us. And we need a way to communicate securely with each other. We need to plan who we need to talk to and get on side, what we can say to them and who we think might be sympathetic.”

The group wouldn’t meet her eyes. No one said anything. Alicia took a breath but only to cough delicately into a handkerchief.

“I’m sorry, your Grace,” Emmeline finally said. “It’s too dangerous. We take comfort in each other and this keeps us from madness, but we aren’t the kind of people you’re looking for. They stood up for our rights and look what happened.”

“What do you think the Suffragettes endured?” Cathy stood up, unable to keep calm in the face of such cowardice.

“The Suffragettes didn’t have to contend with Charms and the Fae,” Benedict said.

“No, they had to contend with the police and prison officers who force-fed them and people jeering at them on the street and their own families turning against them. What kind of feminists do you think you are if all you’re prepared to do is just hide away in a bloody bookshop and talk?”

“Living ones,” Emmeline said, now standing too. “I’m sorry we haven’t met your expectations, and I’m sorry we’re not as brave – and reckless – as my mother, but we’ve lost people and seen with our own eyes what horrors can be committed.”

“So have I!” she shouted and immediately regretted it. Cathy held up her hands, ashamed of herself. “I’m sorry. I thought that if there were other people who had the same values we could actually achieve something.”

“Having the same values does not mean we believe the same action should be taken,” Benedict said. “If this group isn’t what you want then, respectfully, your Grace, perhaps you need to look elsewhere.”

She scanned the faces. All were nervous and tense. They were probably afraid she was going to force them into doing something by virtue of her status or that she’d do something that would lead others to them who would cart them off too. They were frightened and she didn’t have the right to tell them how to protest, any more than she had the right to be angry with them for not being what she’d hoped.

“I think I do,” she said. “I’m sorry I… sorry to disrupt your evening. I won’t bother you again.”

“Oh, your Grace, you’d be most welcome to discuss and debate with us,” Alicia said nervously. “Just… nothing more.”

Cathy managed a sad smile. “It’s not enough for me,” she said and left them to it.

Jane was waiting on the other side of the Way. “That was quick.”

“It wasn’t what I was hoping for,” Cathy said. “Thank you for being so accommodating though.”

She went down the stairs slowly, heavy with disappointment. Carter stood as she approached the door. “Did they not have any books to your taste, your Grace?”

“No,” she said. “I need to find what I’m looking for elsewhere.”

 

Will looked at the house through the raindrops rolling down the taxi’s window. Why did it always rain when he had business in Mundanus? It looked unassuming enough, a terraced townhouse in Pimlico with iron railings outside and a neat row of clipped hedges in a window box. There were steps down to the basement level and steps up to the black front door.

He couldn’t have found it without Tom, who may not have had the political connections but did have a talent for investigation. Tom’s instincts about the stables had been correct and he’d followed each of the leads diligently, writing it all up and delivering the evidence to him in a dossier that read more like an academic paper. The house he looked at now was at the root of the criminal network.

“This the one then?” the driver asked.

“Yes.” Will paid him and got out, opened the umbrella and directed it against the wind.

There was a light on in the living-room window and he could see an alcove full of books and a potted plant. The walls were white with a bold piece of modern art dominating the space above the fireplace. He couldn’t see much more but it was already evident that the woman living there was wealthy.

He had several Charms ready to use, should the woman elect to fight him instead of accepting her fate. He wondered whether to use the Clear Sight Charm he’d purchased only an hour before, but didn’t want to suffer the ill effects afterwards. He took a deep breath, adjusted the way the Glamoured sword rested against his thigh, and crossed the road.

The door knocker was a traditional lion’s head holding a thick circle in its jaws. It made a satisfying clunk against the door. He heard footsteps in the hall and the door was opened by a woman in her thirties. She was slender with long black hair and wore a suit. There was a smile on her face which faded when she saw him.

“Not who you were expecting,” he said.

“No. And you are?”

“The Duke of Londinium.”

She paled as she looked him up and down. “Come in.”

He looked at the threshold carefully before stepping through. It appeared to be clean and very mundane. The hallway had a polished oak floor and a cat sat on a console table, watching him with large amber eyes. Its fur was the same colour as the Nether’s mists. The sight of it reassured him he would just be walking into the house as opposed to an unknown location in the Nether, so he went in. She closed the door behind him after a quick glance out onto the street.

“What do you want?”

“You haven’t even shown me into your living room yet, Dr Tate. We may be in Mundanus but surely we don’t need to behave like savages. I know you were brought up well at least.”

He could see she was terrified. It made him more certain the conversation would go his way but didn’t make him feel good. He’d had his fill of destroying lives. No, he corrected himself, it may not come to that.

“I would offer you a drink but I doubt you’d accept it,” she said as he followed her into the living room.

“That’s right. And I’d rather you didn’t either. I’m sure you understand why.”

“So you know all about me.” She sat in a leather chair near the window. “Or so you want me to believe.”

He sat on the sofa. It was a nice room, tastefully decorated. “I know you have a lucrative business underpinned by crime. I know you used to live in the Nether until your father decided it was more important to bed the wife of a friend than protect his family. I know you somehow managed to escape the Collectors and have been missing for over ten years, presumed dead.”

He watched her throat move as she swallowed. “I can only assume, seeing as you’re paying a personal visit, that you don’t plan to turn me over to the Agency.”

Will nodded. “The ones you paid to rob the people of Londinium are in their custody now.”

“All four teams?” she asked.

“All five,” he replied. “Nice try.”

She licked her lips. “Sure you don’t want a drink?”

“They stole jewellery for you. You sold on the plain pieces and kept the Charmed ones to extract the magic trapped inside them whilst you obtained the other ingredients needed to make new products. These ingredients include a vast range of human emotions, from despair to love. I understand you take your time and cultivate your… patients until they’re ready to be emotionally harvested.”

“So you do know everything,” she sighed. “But you don’t want to turn me in. Which means you either want to kill me or use me. Which is it going to be?”

The door creaked as the cat pushed it open further and rubbed against her legs. She picked it up and put it on her lap.

“What’s she called?”

“He is called Henry. And I’d rather you just get on with it.”

“I’m not going to kill you,” Will said. “What do you think I am, some sort of gangster?”

“You’re an Iris, right?” At his nod she smiled. “You’re a gangster. Perhaps Daddy hasn’t told you yet.”

He stiffened, then laughed. “It takes more than that to upset me. I’m not going to kill you because I admire your work. The operation is really quite remarkable. It’s also mine, now.”

She tickled the cat behind her ears and purring soon filled the room. “But you’ve destroyed one of the most critical parts of my supply chain.”

“I’m merely replacing it with my own. I will supply all the Charmed artefacts you require. And I know exactly what you’ve stolen and when, so I know what kind of demand there will be. I won’t have to rob innocent people to satisfy your quota.”

“Innocent?” After a moment’s thought she added, “The pieces need to be first generation – Charmed by the Fae themselves – can you handle that?”

“Yes. That won’t be a problem.” He was planning to request pieces as part of his tithe and any shortfall could be made up by Lord Iris, he was certain of it.

“And your cut will be…?”

“Modest. You can continue to live your illegal life in the manner to which you have become accustomed.”

Tate looked at the cat and smiled as it looked back up at her. “And what about our two customers? I’m not sure they’ll be very happy about this. It does muddy things somewhat.”

He’d been fascinated to discover the criminal operation supplied the Agency and the Emporium of Things in Between and Besides directly. “Oh, there’s no need for you to worry about them.” Will smiled. “It’s not as if there are alternative suppliers for them to go to. And the Shopkeeper’s no fool. He’ll understand that to accept this new arrangement is to survive.”

“Hmm.” Tate looked unconvinced. “The Shopkeeper. Not the man best known for liking change.”