The Great Game (Royal Sorceress) (10 page)

“You did extremely well,” Sir James said, loudly. “You came very close to beating us.”

Gwen glanced at him in surprise, then realised that Lord Brockton had come close enough to listen to them without making it obvious. Praise from Sir James for her wouldn’t make Lord Brockton feel any better, but at least it would make him less sure of his allies on the Committee. Gwen looked back at Sir James and wondered if she could count him an ally – and, if so, for how long. He wouldn’t remain in London indefinitely.

Perhaps His Lordship should consider himself lucky
, she thought, ruefully.
Master Thomas would have killed him by now
.

She finished eating, said her goodbyes and walked back into Cavendish Hall, heading back to her suite. Martha had, thankfully, already laid out another suit; Gwen simply had to undress, wash herself quickly and then get dressed again. Her body was covered with bruises, as she had expected, but they would heal quickly. There was no point in asking Lucy to Heal them.

There was a frantic tapping at the door. “Come in,” Gwen called.

A maid, panting slightly, stepped into the room. “Your Ladyship,” she said, between gasps. “Lord Mycroft has arrived in his carriage. He requests that you accompany him.”

Gwen blinked in surprise. Lord Mycroft rarely changed his routine for anything or anyone, even the King. Whatever the matter was, it had to be urgent. War? Had France declared war?

“I’ll grab my coat,” she said. Thankfully, she was washed, dried and dressed. She didn’t want to ride in a stuffy carriage while she was still unclean. “Tell him I’ll be with him in two minutes.”

Chapter Eight

A
re we at war?”

Lord Mycroft regarded Gwen gravely as she climbed into the carriage and sat down facing him.

“Not yet, but we could be soon,” he said. He rang a bell and the carriage lurched into life, the coachman cracking the whip to make the horses move faster. “A situation has developed that requires your presence.”

Gwen studied him, thoughtfully. He looked...
mussed
, as if he’d been forced to leave the office on very short notice. Coming to think of it, she reminded herself, he rarely ever left the office. Whatever had happened had to be urgent – or disastrous.

Lord Mycroft leaned forward, resting his hands on top of his cane. The pose reminded Gwen so strongly of Master Thomas that she felt an odd sense of
déjà vu
for a long moment, before firmly reminding herself that Master Thomas was dead. She missed him, even with what had happened in his final hours. If she’d had more time to learn the ropes, and impress the Royal Committee, would she have had so many problems now?

“Tell me,” Lord Mycroft said. “Have you ever heard of Sir Travis Mortimer?”

Gwen hesitated, thinking hard. “Not that I recall,” she said, finally. He didn’t sound like one of the men that Lady Mary had tried to convince her would make a suitable husband – and he wasn’t one of the people she dealt with as Royal Sorcerer. It wasn’t really surprising; there were so many people knighted in the British Empire that she couldn’t hope to be familiar with them all.

“He
was
one of your people,” Lord Mycroft said, with a single raised eyebrow. “But, to be fair, he spent the Swing in India, so you might not have met him personally.”

Gwen flushed. She
didn’t
know every magician in the Royal Sorcerers Corps – and probably never would. The sorcerers that had been sent to India or America or South Africa were on very long-term deployments. Some of them might not even have heard that Master Thomas had died, to be replaced by a slip of a girl. Even with Talkers, it took months for news to reach everywhere in the Empire.

“He was a Sensitive,” Lord Mycroft added. “Quite an unusual fellow, really.”

Gwen nodded, tightly. Sensitives were uncommon – and they tended to be predominantly women, rather than men. Doctor Norwell had admitted, when pressed, that men
liked
having the big and noisy powers, but preferred not to talk about possessing the more
subtle
powers. Charm was less effective if the victim knew that he was being Charmed... and Sensitivity sounded disgracefully feminine.
Men
!

But, masculine or not, it could be a very useful talent.

“A powerful Sensitive,” she mused. “What happened to him?”

Lord Mycroft scowled. “Sir Travis was discovered dead this morning,” he said, grimly. “I was informed immediately, naturally, and came at once to Cavendish Hall. Your presence is required.”

Gwen winced. Losing a magician
hurt
, even if she hadn’t known him personally. Maybe Master Thomas had been able to accept losing his people calmly, but she felt as if she would never master
that
skill. She wasn’t even sure she
wanted
to.

“I see,” she said, thinking hard. “What killed him?”

“A blow to the back of the head, according to the report,” Lord Mycroft said. “Do you see why that is odd?”

“Yes,” Gwen said, slowly. “A Sensitive should not have died that way.”

When she pushed her limits, she was almost completely aware of her surroundings, right up to the point where the sudden influx of information threatened to overwhelm her mind. A Sensitive, with only one talent, would either go mad or learn to live with it – and if he succeeded, he’d have a formidable tool. It was impossible to lie to a Sensitive, or prevent one from reading you, no matter how much you tried. Even keeping one’s mouth shut didn’t hide the reaction that betrayed your innermost thoughts.

No Sensitive had a comfortable life. They rarely slept well – a single noise could awake them – and their marriages tended to end poorly. Gwen knew, from watching her own parents, that there were matters her mother and father never discussed openly, but that option would never be available to a Sensitive. Master Thomas had urged her to develop her Sensitivity, but never to rely on it. A Sensitive could be crippled by a sudden loud noise.

She looked over at Lord Mycroft and frowned. “Sir Travis was in
India
?”

“Indeed he was,” Lord Mycroft confirmed. “And yet he managed to keep from being overwhelmed by the exotic.”

“Impressive,” Gwen admitted. Maybe she would have liked Sir Travis, if they’d ever had a chance to meet. Or maybe he would have been as smug and full of himself as many of the senior magicians. “What do you want me to do?”

Lord Mycroft smiled. “I want you to investigate his death,” he said, calmly. “
That
is one of your roles as Royal Sorceress.”

Gwen blinked. “I am no detective,” she pointed out. “Surely your brother...”

“My brother has... other matters to concern himself with,” Lord Mycroft admitted. “But even if he were free, it would still be your responsibility. A magician is dead, seemingly murdered. We must know the truth before time runs out.”

Murdered
, Gwen thought. It didn’t seem likely. Sneaking up on a Sensitive was impossible, unless the magician was drugged and comatose. Sir Travis would have known if someone with murderous intentions approached him – or, for that matter, if someone had been Charmed into serving as an unwitting cat’s paw. How could a murderer have got close to him?

Maybe he was tricked, somehow
, she thought. If nothing else, they would have to solve the mystery to ensure it could never happen again. But she honestly didn’t know where to begin.

“Start with the crime scene,” Lord Mycroft advised. “And then see where it leads you.”

Investigating magical crimes
was
part of the Royal Sorcerer’s job, Master Thomas had told her, but he’d never given her any formal training. There just hadn’t been enough time... and there might not have
been
any formal training. Gwen had watched Lestrade at work long enough to know that he had a habit of chasing the blindingly obvious or finding himself unable to work out how to proceed. Scotland Yard just didn’t seem to have very many detectives.

But any one of them would be better prepared than Gwen.

“The police will be supporting you,” Lord Mycroft assured her. “But you
do
have to take the lead. It is
expected
of you.”

Gwen scowled. If she pushed someone else forward, even Mycroft’s brother, the Royal Committee would snicker and claim that she was shirking her responsibilities. And if she did try to find the killer, if there
was
a killer, they would claim that she was shirking her
other
responsibilities. Master Thomas hadn’t had to deal with so much backchat...

...
Or maybe he did
, she reminded herself. She’d never attended any formal meetings of the Royal Committee before he’d died, merely the emergency meetings before the Swing had gripped London and the government had had to flee the city.

“Send me a couple of clerks,” she said, resignedly. If she could shuffle the paperwork onto someone else – at least the task of filtering out the unimportant letters from the hundreds she received each day – it would make life a little easier. And perhaps she could pass some decision-making down to the senior magicians. She didn’t
have
to approve their training schedules, did she?

“They will be at Cavendish Hall later today,” Lord Mycroft assured her. “And don’t worry. They know how to be discreet.”

The carriage rattled to a stop. Gwen almost jumped as a hidden panel appeared behind her head, revealing the face of the coachman. “The police are blocking the road up to the building, sir,” he said, to Mycroft. “They insist that you have to walk.”

“Unsurprising,” Lord Mycroft said. He stood up, opened the door and clambered out with remarkable agility for a man his size. “You can wait with the other cabs until I come back.”

Gwen jumped down beside Mycroft and glanced around. Like most aristocratic houses in this part of London, Mortimer Hall was surrounded by a brick wall that served more to mark the owner’s territory than provide a barrier. Gwen could have scrambled over it without using magic; given that she could see apple trees rising up on the far side, she had a feeling that the young men in the district probably raided the garden regularly. Olivia had told her that it was a common rite of passage among the young men unfortunate enough to grow up in the Rookery. Raiding an aristocrat’s garden made them feel like they were fighting back, even though it was petty and pointless.

Lord Mycroft led the way down towards the gates, which were guarded by a line of burly policemen in blue uniforms. She winced as she saw a handful of reporters already there, shouting questions towards the policemen and a handful of men in black suits, who probably worked for Mycroft. Some reporters were decent people, she was prepared to admit, but others had a remarkable skill for twisting the truth into something unrecognisable, without ever actually telling a lie. The freedom of the press was yet another consequence of the Swing – there were over two
thousand
new newspapers founded in London in the last six months – but there were times when she thought that it had gone too far.

And they recognised her, of course.

“Lady Gwen,” one reporter shouted. “Do you have any comments?”

Gwen ignored them as best as she could, even though the questions were growing more and more absurd. Hardly anyone seemed to know that Sir Travis was a Sensitive – which did make a certain amount of sense – and half of the reporters seemed to have decided that a magician had killed him. It hadn’t been
that
long since Jack had terrorised the aristocracy, after all. A couple of rogue magicians could easily break into a house and kill the inhabitants...

She pushed the thought aside as Lord Mycroft led her through the gates. Mortimer Hall was smaller than Gwen’s own home, built in a dark gothic style that had been all the rage a hundred or so years ago. It seemed to have survived the Swing with very little damage, but she couldn’t help noticing that a number of windows were boarded up and the Garden had been allowed to slip out of control. The handful of statues – all angels weeping and covering their faces, as if they were trying not to see the evil of the world – sent a shiver running down her spine.

“I believe that Sir Travis’s mother died while he was in India,” Lord Mycroft said. “His father died when he was very young, leaving her to bring up their child on her own. She refused to move back with her family, even though there was no hint of scandal tainting the birth. Instead, she stayed here.”

Gwen nodded, sourly. Magical children
terrified
the non-magicians; God knew she’d terrified hundreds of servants into giving their notices and seeking employment elsewhere before Master Thomas had taken her to be his apprentice. A Sensitive wouldn’t accidentally burn down the house or go flying, but he’d still have too much insight and a complete lack of discretion. Gwen suspected that Sir Travis’s mother had decided, after one or two incidents, that it was safer to keep her child isolated.

She could have given him up for adoption instead
, she thought, realising that she would probably have liked her, if they’d ever met. But then,
Gwen’s
mother had never seriously considered giving her up, even after her social reputation began to suffer. Maybe she’d underestimated her mother all along.

The doorway was wide open, but guarded by two more policemen. “The Inspector is awaiting you in the study,” one of them assured Lord Mycroft. The other was staring at Gwen, as if he couldn’t quite grasp how she was wearing male clothing. “Do you require an escort?”

“I have been here before,” Lord Mycroft said. “But thank you for the offer.”

Gwen stared at his back as they walked inside. If Lord Mycroft had been here... Sir Travis had to have been
important
. Maybe it made sense to have the meeting away from Whitehall, where a Sensitive would find it hard to avoid being overwhelmed by his surroundings, but if that had been a problem, how would Sir Travis have been able to operate in India?

She couldn’t ask when there were so many policemen around, so she concentrated on looking around and studying the interior of the building. It was surprisingly bare; she could see places on the walls where portraits had hung, before they had been taken down and stored elsewhere. There were definitely signs that
someone
had been trying to keep the place tidy, but it was clear that they were losing the fight. Dust was everywhere, particularly in places few men would notice. Maybe, Gwen told herself, Lady Mary’s lessons on how to run a household hadn’t been wasted after all. It was clear that Sir Travis hadn’t been a married man.