Of Silk and Steam (28 page)

The enormous clanking creature that enveloped Leo was less difficult to control than he’d expected, though he’d needed most of the half-hour walk through the streets to work out what everything did.

Charlie, of course, had taken to the Cyclops as if he’d built them himself. The lad was amusing himself by running at walls, then performing backflips.

Ahead of him, Mina’s arm went up—or at least, the metal fist of the automaton. “They’re fighting,” she yelled. “Kincaid, take the east. We’ll hit them from the south. Grind them up against the walls!”

Half of the mechs clanked after Kincaid, leaving Leo and Mina with the band of Blade’s men and about a hundred mechs suited up. Leo strode forward, his own legs working within the Cyclops. Pneumatic pistons hissed beneath him as the creature clattered over the cobbles. His thighs strained with effort.

“Morioch’s ahead,” Mina said to him, her dark eyes visible behind the thin eye slit of the automaton.

“He’s mine,” Leo returned, grimly anticipating the look on the duke’s face when Leo came crashing out of an alleyway.

“Don’t get yourself killed,” Mina said.

Recognizing her nervousness for what it was, he forced a smile. “Isn’t that my line?”

A roll of the eyes. “I was waiting for it.”

The straps of the leather harness bit into his shoulders as he shrugged. It was so damned close in here, the weight of the metal seeming to loom against his skin. Heat bloomed along his spine where the boilers sat. “I make a habit of not irritating women who could set me on fire. Besides, logic dictates you’re more competent in this thing than I am.”

A long considering look. “Watch my back then.” A concession he’d earned by not trying to keep her out of the fighting.

“Always,” he replied and then worked the lever that set his Cyclops into motion.

Fire spewed over houses outside the walls as Leo strode forth with his contingent. Spitfires were going insane, marching on their own metaljackets as Blade’s rookery lads protected the base of the wall. A golden carriage stood in the midst of a dozen metaljackets, with Morioch on top of it shouting for order. Several handlers furiously worked their controls.

Leo’s eyes narrowed on the duke. Advancing through the tide of metaljackets, he smashed several of them out of his way with his enormous metal fists. The Cyclops was hard work; he jerked on the controls and gritted his teeth as metaljackets swarmed him. An enormous steel boot came up into his field of vision, kicking one of the clinging metaljackets in the head. A flash of Charlie’s eyes caught his through the eye slit, and Leo could tell the lad was grinning.

The wave of Cyclops joining the fight crushed the Echelon’s metaljackets. Flame spewed across the square, though both sides were careful not to overuse it. Greek fire burned like the fires of hell once it hit anything and was notoriously uncontrollable.

Morioch was screaming, his gaunt face wide with horror as he looked at the tide of Cyclops. Leo waved on the men behind him as he set his shoulder into the side of the carriage and tried to push it over.

It rocked from side to side as they joined him. Morioch danced on top of it, trying to keep his balance. The entire thing tipped on edge…and went down with a resounding crash. Morioch tumbled through the fallen carcasses of his metaljackets.

Stomping forward, Leo grabbed him by the throat. He hauled the duke up until his feet dangled, then pressed the button that kept his helmet sealed. It opened with a hiss, steam curling the hair at his temples. “Surprise,” he told the duke.

“Barrons!” Morioch gritted his teeth and kicked at him. “You treacherous snake!” A knife appeared in his hand and Leo smashed it away with his metal fist. The duke screamed in pain. “What have you done?” he howled, wild eyes looking at the carnage surrounding them.

“Not me, Your Grace.”

Mina clanked up beside him, releasing her own helm. Morioch’s eyes widened when he saw her.

“Me,” she said. “Are you going to kill him?”

“No.” Blade strode out of the clinging pall of smoke, the pair of razors in his hands. “I am. Put ’im down. I’ll give ’im a fightin’ chance, at least.”

“Is that wise?” Mina asked.

“I ain’t a murderer,” Blade shot back. His eyes focused on Morioch as Leo dropped him. “Now, what was that you were sayin’ ’bout me wife?”

* * *

Soot and ash stained the air, the houses lit by the glare of fire. Most of the handlers had been killed or captured. Metaljackets stood in silent rows or littered the square.

They’d won, though they couldn’t have done it alone. One Cyclops was worth four of the metaljackets, it was true, but at this stage they’d been vastly outnumbered and untrained. Only Lena’s frequency-altering device working in conjunction with the Cyclops had won them the day.

Leo kept his helm open, breathing in the hot, smoky air. Better than being trapped inside his helmet, his own breath blowing back into his face. “Roughly eight hundred metaljackets,” he announced, returning from his count. “Which means a good number of the Echelon’s forces.”

The little group huddled on the top of Morioch’s splayed carriage made up the war council; Blade, Rip, Will, Lena, Kincaid, and the duchess.

“They’ll still have the ceremonial automatons,” Mina replied, staring at the map someone had brought from the rookeries. She stabbed a finger into the heart of it. “And the walls guarding the Ivory Tower are immense. Nobody’s ever brought them down. They’re impenetrable, and no doubt any hidden access routes were blocked after our escape.”

Blade scowled. “So we ’it the gates? Smash ’em to pieces?”

“Spoken like a true brute.” Mina looked up at him, her eyes alight. “A good way to lose half your men. There are cannons mounted on the wall. You wouldn’t make it within a hundred feet.” She tipped her head toward the rookery walls. “And this time, we’ll be in Morioch’s position.”

“Then what do you propose?” Lena asked.

“We need more men—more of the Cyclops in action,” she replied. “We’ve called on the extent of Kincaid’s enclaves, but there are three other secret factories storing Cyclops.”

“Funny thing, luv,” Blade replied. “All the men we got to pilot them is right ’ere.”

Leo released the breastplate of the Cyclops and undid the harness. Hot air washed over his skin, but at least it was clean. A breeze of some description. “Mina’s contacted Sir Gideon Scott. We can only assume he’s spreading the word among the humanist forces in the city and outfitting humanists at the Ironmonger enclaves.”

“A mob.” Kincaid scratched at his roughened jaw. “Send them in first and let the Coldrush Guards on the walls focus on them.”

“No,” Mina snapped. “I won’t countenance useless deaths. Here.” She pointed to a spot on the map. “What we need is here.”

“The Nighthawks Guild.” Leo hauled himself on top of the carriage and peered at the map. “A whole army of blue bloods.”

She shot him a grateful look. “Our plan of attack is to march on the Ivory Tower—Blade can lead that force, keep their attention. Take Kincaid and his mechs with you. Then another group attacks the Coldrush Guards pinning the Nighthawks down, and then the Nighthawks go to the Moorgate and Cripplegate enclaves—they’re the closest to the guild. They arm themselves with the Cyclops there and assault the Ivory Tower from the south.”

“Will can lead that force,” Leo murmured.

Will scowled. “If you think I’m—”

“We
need
you to do it,” Blade repeated firmly. “I know you wanna stay at me side, but this is war, lad. We need someone we can trust and that the Nighthawks would recognize and obey. Get ’em to the enclaves where the second and third lot o’ Cyclops are, and suit up. I’ll meet you at the Tower.”

Will wavered. He’d been Blade’s second-in-command until he received his promotion to verwulfen ambassador. Leo could see the sense in Blade’s words, but Will would be fighting the protective instincts of a verwulfen—everything that told him to protect his master.

“I’m going too,” Lena said.

That refocused Will’s attention. “Like hell you are. This is war, Lena. You need to be at your sister’s side.”

“How do you plan to work the Cyclops?” she asked with a sweet little smile. “Rosalind showed me how they work when she was trying to recruit me to create them. You don’t have time to figure that out. Does he, Duchess?”

“Time is of the essence,” Mina replied.

“
And
I know how to work this,” Lena added, lifting her frequency-altering device. “There will be more metaljackets.”

“Still no word on ’ow we’re gettin’ past the wall,” Kincaid said.

Leo smiled. “Leave that to Mina and me.”

Mina arched a brow at him.

“Care to take that trip to Paris?” he asked, reaching out a hand to help her to her feet.

She understood immediately. “I assume we’ll be making a brief stopover.”

“Courtesy of the good Mr. Galloway.”

* * *

“What about me?” Charlie demanded, when the leaders were giving out the orders.

“Us,” Lark corrected, though she looked decidedly less enthusiastic than Charlie.

Leo paused at Blade’s side, checking over his weapons. Blade stilled, shooting the lad a hard look. At his questioning glance, Leo shrugged. He didn’t want the boy in the melee any more than Blade did, but Mina’s words made him wonder what the right course was.

“You’re stayin’ ’ere,” Blade said.

“I’m not a boy,” Charlie shot back. “Not anymore.”

Blade grabbed him by the neck of his shirt and wrenched him onto his toes. “I’m ’bout to lead most of me men on the Tower. It’s war, Charlie. I might not come back. Me nor Rip, nor Will… And your sister’s lyin’ in ’er bed with me daughter, unable to move if anyone takes this chance to attack. You’re stayin’ ’ere, and if she gets ’urt, I’ll thrash you to a bleedin’ pulp. You understand me? That’s your duty.”

Charlie’s mouth worked sullenly. “I’m a blue blood.”

Lark grabbed his arm. “We’ll stay,” she promised. “We’ll keep an eye on ’em.”

Blade nodded and let Charlie go. “Don’t disappoint me.”

“Good luck,” Lark called.

Lord Matheson’s manor was closer than Galloway’s, in the end.

Leo strode across the deck of the pleasure dirigible, leaning on the rail and eyeing the glittering sprawl of London below. They’d roused Bennett Whitcomb, the pilot, out of his bed at the air dock, and he was white-faced and nauseous behind the wheel. A dozen of Blade’s best men and a few of the mechs strolled the deck, staying relatively silent. Weaponry gleamed at their sides.

Mina’s glorious red hair whipped behind her in the wind at the prow. She gathered fistfuls of it, knotting it into a loose chignon at the base of her skull. Leo stepped up behind her, plucking the pins from her hand. “Here,” he murmured. “Allow me.”

Her brandy-brown eyes glanced up at him when he finished. “Thank you.”

“You’re welcome.”

Fire burned out of control in some parts of the city, and the cry of the mob was fierce as they passed over the Theater District. Covent Garden thronged with howling humanists, and he could just make out the tramping gallop of the Trojan cavalry through the narrow streets. People were screaming. His fingers dug into the rail.

“It will be over soon,” Mina murmured, resting her hand over his. “We cannot avoid the loss of life, not entirely, but we can make that loss worth it.”

A subtle shift of his hand and their fingers laced together. Mina looked down, then squeezed his fingers. Together in this. No matter what happened, he knew they would fight back to back if necessary.

Moonlight gleamed on the Ivory Tower in front of them. “Here we are,” he said, steeling his nerves. “Are you ready?”

“Are you?”

Leo slid a hand around the base of her neck and drew her face up to his. The crush of her body against his chest was brief, his lips tingling as he kissed her. Then he forced himself to let go.

“Take the gates!” he roared at the men behind him. They’d all been briefed on the layout and the resistance to expect. “Then we take the Tower!”

“Aye!” a handful of bellows echoed through the air.

Grabbing one of the grappling guns that Kincaid had supplied at the enclaves, Leo climbed onto the rail of the dirigible. Sinking the hooks into the rail, he leaned over the edge as the airship sailed over the high walls surrounding the Tower. Mina echoed him, her expression tight and focused. Leo counted under his breath, listening to the startled cries of the Coldrush Guards below as they realized what was happening.

“Here we are,” he said, looking at her. They were near the gatehouse.

Bullets whizzed past. Leo instinctively leaned closer to her, dangling backward out over the airship with his heels on the rail and the grappling hook holding him there.

“Three, two…one!”

Both of them sailed backward, dropping down into the melee at the gates.

* * *

Blade’s forces spilled through the narrow gates as they opened, a Cyclops smashing a fist into one of the Coldrush Guards as Leo dragged Mina toward the stables. Blade’s men and the Nighthawks were a distraction; he and Mina needed to get to the queen.

Rosalind and Lady Peregrine hurried at their heels, along with a force of Nighthawks that were pouring through the south gates. Once inside the Ivory Tower, they’d separate—the Nighthawks to the dungeons to rescue their leaders, and Mina and Leo up toward the throne room.

Fighting their way through the guards, they spilled out into the inner halls of the Ivory Tower.

“This is too easy.” Leo frowned.
Nothing
good
ever
came
of
anything
easy.

“I concur,” Rosalind replied. She looked up through the hollow core of the Tower to the top, where the throne room and the atrium lay. “Where are the rest of the guards?”

“Up there,” Mina murmured, “surrounding the key to the Echelon’s power.”

The
queen.

“Good luck then.” Rosalind ruthlessly primed the pistol she was carrying. “I’ll go rescue my husband and see what we can do to follow you.”

She and Perry vanished, leading the Nighthawks.

“Let’s hope they’re still alive,” Mina murmured.

Lynch was a friend, and Garrett too. Leo frowned and led her upward, thighs burning as they ran up the stairs. There was an elevation chamber located at the bottom, but he didn’t trust it. Locked inside the brass chamber, they’d be at anyone’s mercy.

Reaching the fifth-highest floor, he held out a hand to slow her. If they were going to start encountering guards, here was where they’d find them.

Climbing the stairs on cat-silent feet, he felt her hand slip into his and squeeze it tight. Nervous. For her queen, no doubt. Leo squeezed back. The sounds of fighting broke out below them, hurried shouts and the clash of swords.

And he could hear footsteps coming from above…

A dark figure glided around the corner of the spiral staircase, striding with lethal grace. Light gleamed on the man’s pale skin and white hair, and his hand slid down to the hilt of his sword as he stopped in the middle of the staircase.

They both froze.

Caine.
The sudden flare of rage blackened Leo’s vision, the world springing into stark relief as the darker side of his nature rose. A thousand twisted, conflicting emotions. Guilt, fury, rejection, need…

“What the hell did you do here?” Caine waved a hand, indicating the Tower and the madness outside. “Does this mess belong to you?”

Leo took another step, his body angled between the duke and Mina. “Stand aside.” His hand went to the hilt of his sword.

Caine’s eyes narrowed, locking on the way Leo protected Mina. “Fraternizing with the enemy? I thought I taught you better than that.”

“The only enemy I see is the one who turned his back on me,” Leo spat, stepping closer. “The duchess has proven more loyal than you ever did.”

“What the hell did you expect me to do?” Caine snarled. “I swore an oath to uphold my prince’s right of power. He said you weren’t to be harmed. If I’d had time, I could have argued against the exile…or worked to see you reinstated—”

“He wanted me dead all along,” Leo shot back. “And you just sat there.”

They stared at each other.

Caine was breathing hard. “No,” he said. “I didn’t know the consequences. I didn’t…expect it.”

“You?” Another step forward, fingers curling tight around the hilt of his sword. “The great master of the game? Looks like you were outplayed then, by your own prince.” Turning, Leo gestured to Mina, too aware of time passing. The sounds of fighting were growing closer, ringing up the hollow center of the Tower. The Nighthawks, no doubt. “Get out of our way.”

Caine’s expression tightened. Here were grounds that he understood. “No. I won’t let you do this. This is madness! If you take another step, then you
are
committing treason—”

“You’re several months too late for that.”

The shock on Caine’s face… Leo had no time for this. “Go,” he said to Mina. “Go and protect your queen.”

“We could take him together.” A hand strayed to the sword at her side.

“No, we couldn’t,” Leo replied softly, and he saw on her face the shock as she realized what he was saying.

He was the only one who knew the extent of Caine’s reflexes now. In times past, vampires had slaughtered hundreds before they’d been taken down. Caine had all of their reflexes, their speed, but tempered by cunning and the possession of his senses. He’d be virtually unbeatable, and time was working against them.

Mina couldn’t move, her eyes wide and haunted. “Leo?”

“Go,” he said, in a softer, knowing voice. “Protect your queen.”

“No.” She knew exactly what he was saying; he could see it. “No, I’m not going. I’m not—”

“We made these choices. This is war, Mina. I can give you the chance to get to her. Isn’t that what you want?” Her hands shook, where they never had before. Leo’s voice softened. “I don’t regret it. I don’t regret a thing. Remember that.”

Caine shook his cape back over his shoulder. “Don’t be a fool, boy. You’re not strong enough to defeat me. Nobody is, not anymore. Don’t make me kill you.”

* * *

“
Kill
you…
” The words echoed in Mina’s ears.

Leo tugged her hand to his lips. Their eyes met, his mouth breathing the sweetest of caresses over her knuckles. This…this was the cost of everything she’d set into play. It was too much of a price. She wanted him forever, damn the consequences. “No,” she said.

“I finally caught you,” he whispered, letting out a harsh laugh as he pulled back. “You’re finally starting to see why I could never let you go. I love you, Mina. I love you for everything that you are and that you could be, but I need you to go now and finish what we’ve both started. Do me proud. Kill that bastard and get the queen out of there.”

Everything screamed at her to stay and fight at his side. But as much as she wanted to stay, innocents would die for this—the queen would die—if she didn’t finish what she had set in place. The indignity…that she couldn’t even tell him how much he meant to her, because at the moment, she couldn’t even speak.

Fighting spilled out into the staircase below them, Nighthawks swarming into view as they dueled with the Coldrush Guards. If she wanted any chance at this, she had to go now, before anyone else got to the queen and forced the prince consort into a position he couldn’t win from.

“Be strong,” Leo said, stepping back and letting go of her hand. “I’ll wait for the Nighthawks as much as I can. You know I’ll wait for them. And I’ll come for you.”

If
he
could.

One last look at Caine, then a scream echoed from above. A woman. Mina’s blood ran cold as her head jerked up.

Steel screamed as Leo drew his blade. “Go, Mina.” He stepped in front of her. “Come, Caine. Let us see how well you’ve taught me.”

The moment he attacked, Mina darted forward, slipping past the deadly duke and ducking beneath his sword as he lashed out at her too. Then Leo pushed hard, whipping his blade across Caine’s cheek.

“Run!” Leo yelled at her, taking a countering blow across his forearm that he could have dodged. Distracting Caine for her.

No time now for all the things she should have said. Mina started running, lungs burning from the exertion of it.

I
love
you
, her aching heart whispered.

* * *

“Bloody hell, boy. This is foolishness! I don’t wish to hurt you!” The sword lashed at Leo’s face, whip quick, but Caine pulled away from the blow.

Leo parried. Steel screeched on steel and he was driven back. “Then stand aside.”

“You’ll destroy everything that we have worked for!”

“I’ll create something that you never dreamed of,” Leo corrected and lunged.

“With that bitch?”

Leo managed to rake the tip of his blade across Caine’s face. “You will speak courteously of my duchess, or not at all.”

Caine spat blood, his pale blue eyes reddened with fury. “You bloody fool. She’s the one, isn’t she? The one you think you’ll marry? Do you honestly believe you can trust her? She’ll betray you.”

Fury fired in Leo’s blood. “No, she won’t.” He drove forward under Caine’s arm, smashing his shoulder into his father’s ribs. They both went down and Leo rolled, swiftly coming to his feet but staggering on two different levels of stairs. He didn’t dare look down. “This is about my mother, isn’t it? You think she betrayed you.”

He’d never once referred to his mother. That was one lesson he’d learned as a little boy. Caine had beaten him the one time he’d dared ask about her.

The words worked now too. Caine’s eyes blazed and he whipped the tip of his sword across Leo’s face. Blood splashed against the gleaming white walls and fire flared along Leo’s cheek, his lip stinging as the craving virus set to work repairing it.

“Don’t you even speak her name!” A roar of fury and Caine drove back Leo, who stumbled down the stairs, trying to keep his feet under the onslaught.

“I damned well will if I want to,” Leo spat back, darting to the left and cutting low across Caine’s thigh. “She was my bloody mother, damn you.” Lunging forward, he trapped Caine’s sword between them, shoving him back against the wall. Caine’s head cracked on the marble and Leo tried to slide his sword against the bastard’s throat, but his hand was trapped too. Somehow he pinned Caine there, his fist curling in the bastard’s collar. “
My
mother. And you never let me mention her name. Why? Because you weren’t man enough for her? Because she found another man to replace you?”

“You little cur.” Caine shoved him back with a strength Leo couldn’t match.

He caught himself, fingertips touching the steps as his father lunged. He blocked the expected blow, but again just barely. Caine didn’t bother with finesse, smashing blow upon blow down on Leo’s upraised sword. Blood rained from Leo’s arms and hands.

Then Caine turned away, kicking at a Nighthawk who ran up the stairs. The man flew back through the air, tumbling head over heels down the marble staircase and crashing into his fellows far below.

Caine turned, baring his teeth. “You will not speak of your mother like that! She was a good woman! The best.”

Leo paused.

“Do you think that I didn’t know? Who do you think encouraged her to lie with him? You were the child that I engineered. You were mine. I made you. I sculpted you. Mine! My son. Not his!”

“What the hell are you saying?”

“I couldn’t give her children.” Caine’s nostrils flared. “A childhood bout of mumps. I knew it and I still married her, knowing how much she wanted them. She was so furious with me, and then I saw the way Todd looked at her. It was an arrangement, nothing more.”

The blood drained out of Leo’s face. “
Why?
” he whispered.

“To make her happy,” Caine said, his sword lowering. For the first time in his life, he looked uncertain. “Marguerite was my weakness, and I killed her with your birth.” His voice roughened. “I killed my Marguerite.”

“Then all of this was punishment?” Leo demanded. “Every beating you ever gave me, every time you—”