The Great Game (Royal Sorceress) (44 page)

“Travis was my friend,” Sir Charles said, coldly. “Gwen, I care deeply for you...”

“Do you?” Gwen asked, sharply. “I think you muscled your way into the investigation to monitor our progress.”

“You’re a remarkable girl,” Sir Charles said. “I allowed myself to fall for you.”

“I don’t believe you,” Gwen said, remembering some of the whispers the junior magicians had shared. They’d all talked about reaching a point after which they couldn’t stop – and yet Sir Charles had stopped when she’d told him to stop, without even
trying
to argue. “You didn’t have to mention the Golden Turk – and if you were so concerned with Sir Travis’s reputation, you would never have
mentioned
the Golden Turk.”

She held his eyes, forcing him to look away. “And you talked about gambling incessantly with him in India,” she added. “I believed you, yet there isn’t a mention of gambling in his journal, not even with you. You were claiming to defend your friend, but instead you were creating an impression that he was addicted to gambling, even to the point of using his powers to cheat. It was quite believable. Men like you and he gamble with your own lives regularly. Why not gambling for money too?

“I went through the account books. There are plenty of debts listed, but a number were entered for days when Sir Travis was out of the country. I have
proof
that he
couldn’t
have run up those debts. And Hiram Pasha, who backed the debts, was killed, apparently on the same night Sir Travis died. How very convenient! All the Charm in the world wouldn’t suffice to interrogate a dead man.”

“You’re wrong,” Sir Charles said. “Gwen...”

“Prove it,” Gwen insisted. “Where were you the night Sir Travis died?”

He had no answer.

Gwen felt magic shimmering within her, demanding release. She wanted to hurt him, to kill him, both for what he’d done to his friend and for making her look a fool. Or worse.

“You killed him,” she said, coldly. “You committed high treason.
Why
?”

Sir Charles seemed to relax, suddenly. “Why not?”

Gwen blinked in surprise. “
Why not?
”

He smiled. For the first time since entering the room, it seemed real.

“You know about my family, I believe,” Sir Charles said, as calmly as if he were ordering dinner. “I didn’t, you see. There was no clue that I wasn’t their middle child until I discovered that I’d been adopted. And I only found out through accident.”

Gwen couldn’t help feeling a flicker of sympathy. She’d been marginalised because of her sex and magic; what must it have been like to know yourself one moment and see it all torn away the next? Jack had had similar motives for turning against the Establishment.

“They treated me as their son, right up until my elder brother died,” Sir Charles added. “And then they turned on me. I had an engagement; it was suddenly broken. I had a ticket to the innermost levels of society; it was destroyed. My friends... suddenly wanted nothing more to do with me. And Rachel was so disgusted that she
spat
at me.”

“Rachel Wolsey,” Gwen said, remembering her mother’s views on the girl. She hadn’t just fallen from grace, she’d done something Polite Society found even more shocking; she’d
gloried
in her fall. If rumour were to be believed, Rachel Wolsey had slept with every dissolute young man in London. “And
she
spat at you?”

“I was a commoner,” Sir Charles reminded her. “She didn’t like the thought of opening herself for a commoner.”

Gwen shuddered. “And so...?”

“My family – my
adopted
family – paid for me to go to India and bought me a commission,” Sir Charles reminded her. “I served there for years, earning plaudits... and yet my family tried to deny me a knighthood. Lucky for me that they didn’t manage to convince the Viceroy, after what I’d done. Snobbish prick he might be, but he knew the value of rewarding courage and determination. I was a knight and a famous adventurer. But it wasn’t enough.”

“And so you decided to betray your country,” Gwen said, flatly. “Why did you kill your friend?”

Sir Charles laughed at her. “What made you think he was my friend?”

Gwen stared back at him. “His journal...”

“Sir Travis, the poor aristocrat whose very name opened doors all my wealth could not force, clung to me,” Sir Charles said. “I was never truly aware of my talent until after I met him – and after that, I could never escape him. He was a constant reminder of the mockery my life had become. I did much of the work on our missions; he reaped more of the rewards. Just because he was born on the right side of the blankets!”

He slapped his hands together. “Tell me,
Lady
Gwen, what would have happened to you if you hadn’t been born to the aristocracy? You would have been killed – or worse.”

Gwen shivered. Lord Blackburn’s uncle had seriously urged, back before the Swing had raged over London, that Gwen should be sent to the farms. There, she would have spent the rest of her days drugged out of her mind, giving birth to child after child. If she’d been born to a lower-class household, there would never have been a chance to apprentice under Master Thomas. She would just have vanished into the farms.

“I was lucky,” she said, quietly.

“Our entire system is badly flawed,” Sir Charles said. “If competence and birth went together, maybe it would work – but they don’t go together. For every Duke of India or Lord Amherst, there are ten idiots who think that the world will bow before them, simply because of their high birth. None of them can control themselves and yet they rule our world.”

Gwen found it hard to argue. The Committee, at least, was reasonably competent; the same couldn’t be said for the lesser nobility, who preferred to enjoy themselves rather than actually work hard to maintain their fortunes. And she had never really understood just how little some aristocratic women knew until she’d discovered why she’d been offered instruction on basic accounting. The women rarely knew the value of money, let alone how to bargain...

She shook her head. “Do you believe that your treachery will change things?”

“It might,” Sir Charles said. “The public already has a greater stake in government after the Swing. What will happen if the myth of aristocratic power is called into question?”

Gwen couldn’t help herself. She snorted.

“Do you really believe,” she asked, “that what you’re doing is in Britain’s best interests?”

Sir Charles shrugged. “Of course not,” he said. “But really, when has Britain cared about
my
best interests?”

He pulled up his jacket to reveal a scar. “I was slashed by a knife-wielding assassin while protecting the Viceroy,” he said. “My back was lashed hundreds of times while I was in Bukhara, where the Emir believed us to be plotting his overthrow. I even came within bare seconds of being trampled to death by a wild elephant. Time and time again, I risked life and limb to serve the interests of my country. But my country’s leaders were so petty that they tried to block me receiving my rightful reward. How many others were knighted for much less?”

“I wouldn’t know,” Gwen admitted.

“Of course you wouldn’t,” Sir Charles pointed out, coldly. “All you would know is that someone was knighted. You wouldn’t know how many others had been barred from a knighthood because of an accident of birth, or because they weren’t considered gentlemen, or... do you know how many aristocrats were promoted into positions where they could get people killed, just because of their birth? I shudder to think what Colonel Robertson would have received if he’d survived the Sikh War. He would probably have been rewarded for walking right into an ambush and seeing two-thirds of his men shot away before someone had the common sense to order a retreat.”

He looked up at her. “And tell me,” he added, “what would happen to you if they discovered another
male
Master Magician?”

Gwen grimaced. It wasn’t hard to imagine at all.

“You would be sacked,” Sir Charles said. “What do you
really
owe to the Establishment?”

His eyes bored into hers. “You were treated as a witch when you were a child,” he reminded her. “And now, even though you have proved yourself more than enough, they still sneer at you. There are even whispers that you offered yourself to Lord Mycroft to be confirmed in your position. The moment they find a replacement, they will kick you out of Cavendish Hall and exile you to India, where all the
embarrassments
go. What do you really owe them?”

Gwen hesitated. He had a point.

“Come with me,” Sir Charles added. “You could blaze your own path...”

“My mother kept me,” Gwen said, quietly. It was hard to be angry at her mother now, even after what they’d said to one another. Gwen had come far too close to making the same mistake. “I could have been given up for adoption, but she kept me, no matter the damage to her reputation.”

“You were isolated,” Sir Charles reminded her. “How many friends did you have growing up?”

“I thought that you were a friend,” Gwen said, unable to keep the bitterness from her voice. “But my mother didn’t abandon me, even though it would have been easy. Why should I abandon her?”

“The Establishment will drop you the moment it feels it can,” Sir Charles said, insistently. “I
care
about you, Gwen; they do not. They cannot. Join me.”

Gwen looked up at him. She knew that he was right; her experience told her that aristocracy was sometimes a poor way of choosing leaders. Jack had brought London to its knees and, as far as anyone knew, there was no aristocratic blood in him. Lord Brockton was unable to see beyond his own self-interest; Lord Blackburn had been even worse, before he’d fled to Turkey. And yet...

She’d sworn an oath to the King.

“I can’t,” she said, quietly. “I gave them my word...”

“They will not reward you as you deserve,” Sir Charles reminded her. “How much have you done for them already? No matter what you do, they will always hate and fear you; eventually, they will seek to replace you. One day, your life as the Royal Sorceress will be over.”

“You might be right,” Gwen said, making up her mind. “But you still killed Sir Travis.”

She stared at him, daring him to deny her. “I read his journal. He didn’t know how you felt about him – and he clung to you because you didn’t upset his talent. I think he cared deeply for you, in his own fashion. And you betrayed him by cracking his skull.

“You’re right,” she added, before he could say a word. “There are plenty of aristocrats who do not deserve to live. But Sir Travis wasn’t one of them. And even if he was, it wouldn’t make your actions
right
. You’re just seeking to punish everyone for the crimes of a few.”

She gritted her teeth at a memory. Six months ago, Lord Blackburn had encouraged Lord Liverpool, the Prime Minister at the time, to send troops into London’s poorer districts, stirring up a hornet’s nest. The day before, only a handful of them had supported Jack; the day afterwards, they were all rebels and the Swing had begun. Lord Blackburn had played right into Jack’s hands.

“I can’t let you get away with it,” she said, lifting a hand. “Please, come peacefully...”

Sir Charles moved forward, catching her hand in a vice-like grip. “So they can hang me from the nearest tree?” He asked. “Why should I do that?”

Gwen winced at the pain. “Let go of me,” she ordered. For the first time in far too long, she felt real fear. Few people had managed to hurt her outside training sessions with combat magicians. “Now.”

“Make me,” Sir Charles said.

Gwen reached for her magic...

... And it refused to respond.

Chapter Thirty-Seven

H
er panic must have shown in her eyes, because Sir Charles began to laugh.

“It was
very
difficult to fine-tune the talent,” he said, as he pushed her back against the wall. “Staying invisible to Travis was one thing, but other magicians... ah,
that
was a bit harder. I knew that all magicians are under standing orders to report any strange magical experiences to their superiors and a single mistake would have been far too revealing.”

Gwen couldn’t help a gasp of pain as his grip tightened. Her magic seemed to be curled up inside her, unable to respond to her commands or reach outside her body. Whatever he was doing was powerful enough to hold her helpless.

“You could have gone to Master Thomas,” she said. “
He
would have helped you.”

“Or would he have killed me out of hand?” Sir Charles asked. “A talent like mine... think how useful it would be to the enemies of the country. Or even just the enemies of
Master Thomas
. The old man had hundreds of enemies who pissed on his grave after he died. He wouldn’t want a talent like mine to become public.”

Gwen felt the wall against her back and knew that she was running out of time. “You had to have had help,” she said, as another piece of the puzzle clicked together in her mind. “I think you went to work for the French.
They
helped you to control your powers.”

Talleyrand had visited Sir Travis... and he’d been the last one to see him alive. It was clear, now, what had happened. Talleyrand had given the signal to Sir Charles and his hired Mover and the murders had begun. Sir Travis had been murdered and his papers had been stolen, then Hiram Pasha had been murdered and the papers planted in his house. And then the Mover had been killed, just to seal off the loose ends.

She brought her knee up, trying to strike between his legs as Irene had taught her. But he twisted to one side, then shoved her to the floor, still keeping his grip on her arm. Gwen gasped in pain as her back slammed against the hard wooden flooring, feeling her head spinning from the force of the impact. Whatever undiscovered talent had allowed her to heal herself, without ever realising that she was doing so, must also have been blocked by his power. And he was far stronger than her, physically.

“Do you know everything I did while I was in India?” Sir Charles hissed. “There were hundreds of details I left out of my dispatches.”