The Slayer (31 page)

Read The Slayer Online

Authors: Theresa Meyers

Tags: #Fiction, #General, #Historical, #Fantasy, #Romance, #Paranormal

BOOK: The Slayer
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Alexa woke to find herself curled up in a heap on the cold, black marble floor. Every inch of her body ached, and she couldn't suppress a groan. Then she found her lungs burning as they starved for a breath of oxygen. A loud rushing filled her ears, and Alexa realized with horror that it was her own pulse she heard.
She was truly mortal again.
She leveraged herself up to a sitting position. As bad as she felt she had to look like hell. She looked at her reflection in the polished floor. Alexa drew back in surprise when instead of her own features she saw another woman's face, with honey blond hair upswept in a simple twist, her blue eyes so like Winn's it caused her chest to constrict with longing. Her clothes were homespun frontier clothing: a rough, brown calico skirt topped with an ivory button-up blouse and a worn, stained apron.
Alexa reached out to the image. She glanced at her hands to find they weren't her own. Instead of elegant fingers with long, neat nails, these were ruddy, rough, with traces of dirt ground into the cuticles. She pulled back her hands, ashamed of them.
“Who is she?” she murmured, only to find to her shock that her voice was no longer her own either, but the other woman's. Alexa grasped her throat gently with her hand. “What have you done to me?”
Rathe smiled, if the deep dark gash in his face revealing black gums and rows of sharp teeth could be called a smile. He steepled his fingers to the bottom of his mouth. “Patience, Lady Drossenburg. You'll find out soon enough.”
 
 
The spires of London and the face of Big Ben pierced through the dense, low-hanging fog. “Welcome to London,” Le Renaud said, an edge of distaste to her voice. The feathers on her broad hat drooped in the moisture-heavy fog and matched Winn's own deflated state.
All Winn saw was another big, dirty city. Too busy, too complicated. The crazy mix of anger, pain, and sorrow left no room for more sensory input, and it made his head, body, and heart ache.
While he knew what he had to do, he had no heart for it. Not anymore. A future bereft of Alexa was hardly a future at all.
Focus.
On the other side of him Octavia Turlock sighed. “I always love seeing that clock,” she said softly. Her accent was definitely British. She looked far different without her leather hood and goggles on. Pretty even. The top of her coppery curls barely reached his shoulder. She had a wide, expressive mouth and big, blue eyes and looked so much like his old friend Marley that it gave Winn a start every time he looked at her. But from what he understood, the Turlocks were a large family with connections to the Crown. Other than that, Marley never spoke of them. They'd parted ways when he'd left in disgrace.
Around Octavia's neck hung a simple chain with an oval gold locket. It didn't match her rough work pants, man's shirt, and leather apron and tool belt hanging heavy around her slim hips. She looked awfully young to be the engineer on any ship, let alone old enough to be consorting with a bunch of sky pirates.
“You sound like someone else I know,” Winn said absently. He began to wonder if there were more things Marley had never mentioned about his past.
She turned her curious big blue eyes upon him. “Who's that?”
“A good friend named Marley Turlock. You don't happen to know him, do you?”
Octavia gasped and blinked, her hand covering the surprised O of her mouth. “You know him?” Seagulls whirled and cried about the ship as they came closer to the water of the wide river bisecting the city.
Winn gave one nod.
“Where is he? How is he? What does he look like?” She shot off the questions in rapid fire, grasping his arm in her excitement.
Winn held up a hand. “Whoa now. One question at a time.” It was clear enough from her enthusiasm she knew Marley; the question was how. A cousin, perhaps, or a niece?
“You a relation of his?”
Octavia nodded. “I'm his daughter.”
That revelation took the starch right out of Winn's knees. He sucked in a breath. “His daughter?”
Octavia bit her lip. “I've never met him.”
A squirming discomfort took up residence in Winn's gut. “Does he know about you?”
Octavia stared out at Big Ben. “I don't know. My mum told me about him, but he left England before I was even born.” She fiddled with the locket on the chain at her neck, opening it. Inside were two miniature ambrotypes. One of them had a crack across the glass, making it hard to see the image.
“That's my mum,” Octavia said, pointing to the image of a flame-haired woman. “And that is my father.” Winn looked closer. The man in the image had a head full of dark hair, but there was no mistaking those huge, dark eyes and the stubborn tilt of the chin. It was a younger Marley.
“I'll be damned,” Winn breathed. He glanced down at Octavia's face. “You look an awful lot like your pa.” And then the thought hit him. She looked a lot like Balmora too. But then so did her mother. Dear God. Marley had fashioned the decoder automaton to look like his wife! No wonder he was so obsessed with it.
A broad smile lit up her face, and she bounced up to the balls of her feet. “Do you know where he lives?”
“Yes, ma'am. You get this ship fixed enough to fly to America, and I can take you right to him,” Winn said, then thought better of it. Maybe there was a reason Marley didn't want to see his daughter. Winn stiffened. Too damn bad. If she was his child, he had a duty by her.
Octavia's eyes glistened with welling tears. “Really? You could take me to him?”
Winn gave her a nod and a light pat on the shoulder. “It all depends on how fast you can fix this ship. Is there anything I can do to help?”
“No. We'll need thieves for that,” murmured the captain. She glanced at him, bracing her hands on the railing as she looked out across the city.
“Thieves?”
Octavia snickered. “There's hardly a legitimate market a pirate can go to, to obtain pieces for an exothermic chemical sodium engine.”
“For something like that you need the Forty Elephants,” the captain said as she stood up and glanced at the sails. “Turlock, make sure we're able to land in the Thames.”
Octavia bobbed her head. “Yes, Captain.” She darted off to the open hatch that led to the engine room.
“Forty Elephants?” Winn asked, bemused. He'd heard of elephants, but never actually seen one, except in pictures from the exotic lands of India.
“They're thieves. Best gang in London at picking up things you want pinched. All women,” Le Renaud said with a touch of pride.
“I take it you fashioned your crew after them.”
Le Renaud gave him a sly smile, her dimple flashing. “Now whatever gave you that idea, Mr. Jackson?”
“How long will the repairs take?”
“If we find everything we need quickly, and Octavia is fast, which you've now given her reason to be, we could be ready to leave by morning.”
Winn straightened. That gave him time to send a coded message to Marley by Morse code, perhaps find out how his brothers were faring, and perhaps drop off Marley's message to the queen. Then he could get himself good and drunk so he could get rid of the growing darkness inside that seemed to be swallowing him alive, leaving nothing but a gaping hole. Goddamn, he missed Alexa. His eyes burned, and his chest ached as if bruised.
The picture of her wide, frightened eyes, the memory of that last touch as she fell into oblivion, were going to haunt him for the rest of his life. But she was gone, and there was nothing he could do about it now. It was too late.
Winn's eyes narrowed as they neared the river. The muddy stench of it filled his nose. Those he loved ended up dead. It was a goddamn curse.
He gripped the railing, the truth he'd only now realized almost unbearable in its painful weight. He loved her. He loved Alexa, and it didn't matter if she was a vampire, or nobility, or ... dead.
The ship splashed down easily upon the water of the river, but Winn didn't care. Anger, red and seething hot, began to boil beneath the pain. Right then and there Winn made a vow to himself. He'd see that Rathe paid if it was the last thing he did. For his mother. For Alexa.
Chapter 25
The note Marley had asked him to deliver to Queen Victoria, what seemed like a lifetime ago, scraped against Winn's fingers as he shoved his hand in the pocket of his duster. Marley had packed it in oilcloth to protect it. There was a risk going to see the queen. Maybe Frobisher
hadn't
lied. Maybe the queen
did
want to close the Gates herself to cement the global reign of her empire.
Need, want
and
should
were three different things.
She'd
need
all three pieces of the Book to do the job.
Not gonna happen.
She
wanted
to do the job herself. But Her Royal Majesty was hardly capable of battling Darkin. No matter how large and powerful her army. Closing the Gates of Nyx was a job exclusively for the Chosen.
Should
he and his brothers capitulate, give the British queen the complete Book, and help her close the Gates? Hell no.
First, the Jacksons had been entrusted on their honor to accomplish this task, and complete it they would. No matter what.
Second, Americans were familiar with going up against monarchy. It was in his blood. Winn's lips twitched at the thought.
Time was running short. But dressed the way he was dressed, and being an American, he knew better than to march up to the front door and demand an audience with the British queen, not that he even had a clue where to find her.
Winn glanced at Captain Le Renaud gazing out over the rail of the ship as they negotiated their way around the other boats on the river. Her plumed hat hid her features, but her dark curls twisted and the large lapels of her faded military coat flapped in the breeze coming off the water. “What are the chances that your thieves might be able to sneak me in to see the queen and help me send off a message in Morse code?”
She turned and looked up at him, her eyes full of mischief and a touch of pride. “I think it could be arranged. They aren't the best pickpockets, blackmailers, and shoplifters in London without reason. What do you have in mind?”
Winchester withdrew the letter from his pocket. “To give her this.”
“Do you want an audience?”
Winn didn't know. Marley hadn't said, and Winn had been a little too busy to read the unopened letter. Things had been too dangerous to care what was scrawled there. While he didn't feel right invading his friend's privacy, now wasn't the time to worry about manners. Since Marley hadn't been privy to the events that had brought Winn here today, the letter might contain something that instead of helping them, could now harm them.
Before he blithely handed over the letter he had to know the contents.
He pried open the flap of the oilcloth and removed the heavy vellum and attempted to decipher Marley's horrible handwriting. Hell. Where had Marley learned to scribble? The words were illegible! Odd swoops and curls, and straight lines in the middle of what might be words, but could possibly be very small drawings of his inventions.
This missive could possibly change the course of the world, and Winn couldn't read the damned thing. He turned it every which way and muttered, “Damn it, Marley,” under his breath.
Le Renaud put out her grubby hand to take the missive and offered, “May I—?”
“I got it.” Winn didn't know what the hell was in the thing. As it was he was violating a trust by reading a letter from Marley to the queen of England. It wasn't for anyone else's eyes, although another pair of eyes trying to untangle the swirls and strokes would probably be useful.
On the banks of the river, London was a beehive of activity, and the place stunk to high heaven. Coal-fire smoke, rotting fish, and piss combined in a smell that made his country-boy's eyes sting.
He couldn't wait to get home.
After
he read this letter.
After
he delivered it to the queen.
After
he contacted Marley.
After
he closed the Gates of Nyx.
Then he'd go home to mourn the loss of his beautiful Alexa and the dream of building a normal life with her.
Le Renaud leaned against the wall of the aftcastle, putting her booted foot up against the wall. “Read then,” she told him.
Winn tilted the page. After a few minutes he concluded that the squiggles weren't some secret blueprint for a new engine design. They were all words.
Illegible
words, but words nonetheless. It was a start.
He made out the words
Balmora, delivery
and
exchange,
but that was about all. He tried half a dozen times to pick out more than a small handful of words, to no avail. Finally, because they couldn't stand there all day in the stinking river aboard a pirate airship, he refolded the missive and tucked it back in the envelope. He handed the note to the captain. “It's important. Put it right in the queen's hand. Then see this message is delivered to Marley Turlock. Here's the station you'll have it sent to.”
Le Renaud nodded. “I'll see to it.” She pushed off of the wall and with a fast stride crossed the deck, shouting orders. “Make ready the boats!”
“Aye, Captain.” Several of the crew began pulling ropes to lower a skiff down into the water beside the ship and flung the rope ladder over to meet it.
The twisting sensation in Winn's gut hadn't lessened. If anything, it had gotten worse. He grazed his fingers over Alexa's gun in his holster. Rathe would return for the Book. It was only a matter of time. Winn knew he needed more than firepower if he was going to fight him off. He needed a plan.
Winn headed for the hatch that led to the engine room. For his plan to work he needed someone with more ingenuity than he possessed. Someone with a mad genius for chemicals.
He navigated the narrow hall until he came upon a door with a porthole. One glance told him he'd found the right place. The engine took up the bulk of the room, but the other half contained an inventor's wide wooden workbench covered in bits and scraps of glass, copper wire, tubes, and assorted tools. It all looked very familiar. Marley would be right at home here. Winn pushed open the door.
Octavia fiddled with the metal patch she'd welded to the side of the enormous water tank that formed the bulk of the engine, her tongue between her teeth as she worked.
He cleared his throat, and she looked up. “Was there something else you needed before I go into London for parts, Mr. Jackson?”
“Can you booby-trap a book?”
She cocked her head and screwed up her face in thought. “It depends on what I have for supplies.”
Winn pulled Alexa's gun from his holster and held it out to Octavia. “Can you do something with this?”
Octavia's eyes sparkled with curiosity as she took it from him gingerly, turning it this way and that in her slender, dirty hands. “What kind of gun is this?”
“A cyanide shotgun. The contessa invented it. The shells contain cyanide salts.”
“Cyanide salts?”
He nodded.
She caressed it as she inspected every inch. He'd seen the same spark in Alexa's eyes when she'd seen Tempus, and it made his heart ache.
“What result were you hoping for?” she asked.
“It has to protect this.” He pulled the Book bound in oilcloth from his pack and set it down on the wide wooden workbench between them.
Octavia reverently placed Alexa's cyanide gun down on the workbench, then narrowed her eyes in concentration as she unlaced the binding and opened the oilcloth. “Liquid is out of the question; it would damage the pages.”
Winn let her mind work, glad she was talking out loud so he could follow along.
“We could sprinkle the pages with the salts. If there's enough moisture on the hands or in the air, it would cause the salts to be absorbed easily through the skin. Although ingestion is the best method—if you're trying to kill someone.” Octavia eyed him speculatively. “Who do you wish to prevent from getting his or her hands on this? And the end result of the booby trap?” When Winn remained silent, she asked shortly, “Do you want to deter someone from picking up the Book? Do you want to injure them? Do you want to kill them? It makes a difference in dosage, you know.”
“Any of the above. All of the above.” He wanted Rathe dead. Anything short of that yet causing him pain was good enough for Winn, too.
“What manner of person?”
He knew she meant male or female so she could adjust the potion for weight and body mass. “An archdemon.”
Octavia raised a brow. “Demons?” Her tone implied disbelief. Of course she would think it mad. She was a woman of science and mechanics, not a Hunter.
“They're around. Everywhere. Ask your father, when you get the chance.”
Octavia shrugged. “The crew has been talking about the strange creatures that came aboard ship and how the Lady Drossenburg was a vampire. Personally, it doesn't surprise me. I always knew there were things out there we couldn't explain with just science. Let me get my gloves.” She rummaged through a wooden trunk beneath the bench and pulled on stained leather gloves. “They'll protect my hands, but make it difficult for intricate work. Could you open the gun for me and pop out a cartridge?”
Winn knew better than to touch the salts within. Alexa had been able to handle the ammunition only because she was a vampire. Anything with living flesh, including an archdemon, would be susceptible to the cyanide; a demon more so to the salt, which would scald and blister his skin like fire, causing it to peel off of him, before it burned deeper.
Winn opened the ammunition chamber and withdrew one of the brass shells. The glass top showed it was filled with white pellets. He handed it to Octavia.
Excitement flared in her eyes. “Fascinating. Rat-shot converted to accommodate cyanide salts. Ingenious.”
She laid the cartridge on top of a flap of the oilcloth holding the Book and broke open the glass at the end with a fast tap of a wrench. “Stand back. And don't breathe, if you can help it. In fact it might be best if you stood outside the engine room.”
Winn didn't like leaving the Book where he couldn't reach it, but he retreated to the hallway and closed the door, then he watched through the porthole as Octavia pulled her leather goggled hood over her head.
She smashed the small white pellets into a fine powder, which she then picked up in pinches between her gloved fingers and sprinkled on the pages of the Book. Once she'd used it all she swept the brass end of the cartridge into a trash container and proceeded to fold the oilcloth around the Book.
She removed her goggled hood and gloves and grinned at Winchester, motioning him back into the engine room. “There. All done.”
A faint odor of bitter almond he hadn't smelled before lingered in the air. “Can I touch it?”
“The outer edge of the oilcloth, yes. The inside, no. Not without heavy-duty gloves. And whatever you do, don't lick your fingers after you've turned the pages.”
Winn didn't like that he'd had to make the pages untouchable, but what choice did he have? Rathe was bound to come for the Book sooner or later, and he had to have some advantage over him.
“Thank you. You're as clever as your father,” Winn said softly.
Octavia beamed at him, blushing to the roots of her hair. “If that's all, Mr. Jackson, I'm going to go get parts to fix the ship so we can be on our way as soon as the captain gives the word.”
Winn tipped his hat at her and let her pass, then carefully tucked the Book back into his pack. Now, no matter when Rathe came, he'd be ready.
The crew left in groups using a small skiff that ferried back and forth to the shore, leaving him alone on the anchored ship with one of the crossbows on his back. The evening air smelled of coal smoke and horses, wet cobblestones, and muddy river water that lapped gently against the hull.
From the deck Winn watched the brilliant white light of the arc lamps light up the Thames Embankment. He'd heard of them, but never seen one: tall, moonlit towers constructed of open-framed piping, stretching more than one hundred feet into the sky, causing pools of light nearly as bright as sunlight upon the streets below. Elsewhere in the city gaslights flickered on.
But all of it—the noise, the lights, the smells—made his battered soul long for the quiet of the open desert where a man could feel the stillness and solitude.
What he wouldn't have given to hold Alexa in his arms for a night. To have her sleep beside him soft and warm, her head cradled on his chest. To wake up with her kiss upon his lips and her fragrance on his pillow. But that was never going to happen. She was gone. And he'd never had the chance to tell her the truth.
He loved her.

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