Hartwell Square

The Duke of Draymoor received him in the Orrery Room at nine o'clock that night, and he did not rise.

It was a peculiarly effective discourtesy. Alaric, Grand Master of the Meridian Society, sat in a high-backed chair of black walnut at the center of a vast circular chamber, under a ceiling painted with the constellations in leaf-gold, and let his visitor cross forty feet of marble toward him in silence. Around the walls turned the Society's treasures: armillary spheres, Dutch globes, a mechanical sun on a brass arm, a whole orrery of the known planets that ticked and whirred softly in the half-dark, each ivory moon sweeping its tiny orbit. It was a room designed to make a man feel like a speck upon a clockwork universe. Garrick, who had once designed similar rooms himself in his head, found it irritating that it worked.

"Wynmore," said the Duke. "You are late."

"The tide, Your Grace."

"Is it?" Alaric smiled. "Sit. A glass of Madeira? It is the 'sixty-two. I have been saving it for the occasion."

Garrick sat.

He was a handsome old man, the Duke of Draymoor, in the manner of a well-kept portrait: tall and spare, with long white hair tied at the nape, a fine hawk nose, and eyes of a pale, clear, unnerving blue. He wore plain black, and his hands, resting upon the arms of the chair, were sheathed in white kid gloves that he never seemed to remove. His voice was soft. It had always been soft. In the three years Garrick had known him, he had not once heard it raised, and he had learned to feel, in that gentleness, the same unease he felt on a deck when the wind dropped to nothing.

"I have your report," Alaric said. "Brandt delivered it with the specimen this afternoon. Excellent work. Extremely thorough." He picked up a sheaf of papers from the table beside him and tapped them straight. "Though I confess I am struck by the gaps. You mention a 'volcanic vapor.' A 'perceptual anomaly' among the crew. A storm in the Bay, and the loss of a foremast. You do not mention how the Aurelith behaved."

"It behaved erratically."

"So I gather. The instruments are quite ruined." The pale blue eyes lifted. "I have taken the liberty of having it moved to the vault. I thought you would approve."

"I would have preferred to be consulted."

"You are being consulted now."

A faint, polite pause.

Garrick folded his hands. He held himself very still. He had been in rooms with more dangerous men, in the course of the Matter. He had negotiated with a Portuguese slaver at gunpoint and bargained with a Moorish pirate over a cup of mint tea. But there was a particular quality to the Duke's courtesy that made him want, absurdly, to check his pockets.

"I should like to see my sister," he said evenly, "and I should like to see the Society's plans for the device."

"Naturally."

"This evening, if possible."

"It is not." Alaric set down the papers. "The engineers need three months, perhaps four. The condenser must be built to the specifications of the sample. We have an excellent glassblower from Murano, and a French metallurgist. I have assured them that you will make yourself available for consultation."

"And in the meantime? Odette is dying, Your Grace. The physician gave her until the winter."

"Then we shall work quickly."

"I do not want her to wait for the winter."

"Nor do I." The gentle voice did not change. "I am very fond of your sister, Garrick. I have been since the afternoon at Richmond when she showed me her chart of the Southern sky. She had colored in the Magellanic Clouds with a pot of blue watercolor. Eleven years old, and she corrected my Latin." A smile touched his mouth. "She is a rare child. I should not like to see her lost."

It was said sincerely. That was the horror of it. Garrick looked at the old man's calm, benevolent face and felt, not for the first time, the faint cold touch of doubt.

He means it, he thought. He means every word. And yet.

"There is the matter of custody," said the Duke.

"I beg your pardon?"

"The Aurelith." Alaric drew a folded document from the inside of his coat and laid it on the table between them. It was a single sheet of heavy vellum, sealed with the Society's device in violet wax. "I should like you to put your name to this."

Garrick did not reach for it.

"It is a formality. A transfer of custody to the Society for the duration of the research. It states, among other things, that the specimen remains the property of the Society, that all findings are to be reported to the Grand Master alone, and that Lord Wynmore waives any claim of ownership or discovery." The voice was a lullaby. "You will see that there is a counter-clause. In consideration whereof, the Society undertakes to employ the said specimen, in the first instance, for the preservation of the life of the Lady Odette Wynmore. It is in my own hand."

Garrick read the document through twice.

It was exactly as the Duke had said. The Society's undertaking was there, sealed, signed, and witnessed. It was the letter he'd wanted for eighteen months.

It was also a rope.

"If I sign," he said slowly, "I surrender every right to the stone."

"You surrender nothing you ever possessed, my dear fellow. You are a Viscount and a navigator. You are no more the owner of a heavenly body than I am the owner of the moon." The Duke's tone was patient, almost affectionate. "The Society has funded your voyage. It has furnished your ship, your crew, your powder. It has protected your name, Garrick. You will understand me when I say that there are certain acquisitions made on the African coast that would not bear the scrutiny of a House committee. I have taken pains that they should never be examined."

The meaning, delicate as spun sugar, sat in the air between them.

I know what you did on that mountain.

I know, and I have not told, and I need not.

Garrick felt his jaw tighten, and willed it loose. He had expected the threat; it would have been a poor sort of Duke who had not made one. But he had expected it less quickly. Less gracefully. And he had expected, God help him, to feel more anger and less shame.

It was necessary, he told himself. It was the price. Odette.

"I should like a day," he said, "to consider."

"By all means. A day." The Duke smiled. "Though I shall tell you frankly that the longer you consider, the less I shall be able to shield you from the questions of the Consistory. You are aware that Magister Crale has been making inquiries."

"About what?"

"About everything. The Consistory of the Lantern has, as you know, rather uncomfortable views on the investigation of what they term 'unnatural phenomena.' If they learn that the Society has such a specimen in its possession..." Alaric spread one white-gloved hand. "It would be a pity if the work were interrupted. I am the only barrier between the Aurelith and Crale's bonfires."

"I understand."

"I knew you would." The Duke sat back. "One more thing, since you mention a sister."

Garrick stilled.

"I saw your carriage as it passed this morning. I was at the upper window. I could not help noticing that you had a passenger." Alaric's voice was bland. "A young woman. Dark. In gray wool."

Time slowed.

Garrick was aware of the orrery ticking behind him: the soft click of brass gears, the tiny ivory worlds swinging round their sun. He was aware of his own heartbeat in his ears, and of the old man's pale eyes resting on him, mild and interested, like a cat's.

"My ward," he said. "Miss Merrow. Her father was a business associate. He died at Lisbon. I have undertaken her guardianship."

"How very charitable."

"It is a duty."

"Of course. Of course." The Duke lifted the Madeira, studied it against the lamp, and drank. "I should like to meet her. In due course. When she has settled."

"She is quite unsuited to society."

"I find that the unsuited are often the most instructive."

He knows, thought Garrick, with perfect clarity. Not what she is. But that she is something. The Duke's spies were everywhere in London. A footman at the docks, a clerk in the customs house, a woman at a window. There was no room in the city without an ear in it.

He rose.

"I will send my answer on the morrow, Your Grace."

"I look forward to it." Alaric did not stand. "Do give my love to Odette."

…

The night was cold and clear when he stepped out into the square, and the fog had lifted, so that the stars shone as hard as nails over the black chimney pots. He stood a moment on the steps of Meridian Hall, drawing in air that did not taste of the Duke's study, and discovered that his hands were not quite steady.

Wait, he told himself.

He had a plan. It was a poor plan, and incomplete, and he had not allowed himself to examine it since Corvane, for fear he would see its edges. But it existed, a small hard knot at the bottom of his mind. Sign nothing. Say nothing. Learn the vault. Find the device. See the engineers. Watch the Duke. When the moment comes...

He did not finish the thought. He never did. That was the discipline of the Matter: to keep the pieces separate, in locked compartments, and to open none of them before their time.

He climbed into the carriage and gave Hatch's address, and rode in silence through the sleeping streets, and did not once look at the glass window of the Hall.

…

Wynmore House stood on the north side of Hartwell Square, a tall, handsome, cold-faced town house in honey-colored stone, with six steps and a fanlight and iron railings. Every window was lit.

Ixara had been in it since noon.

Garrick had delivered her at the door in the care of Mrs. Hatch, who had received her with a face like a closed Bible and a curtsey of such exact and glacial correctness that he had known, even then, she was going to say something later. He had gone directly to the Society. He had not seen Ixara since. It was now eleven at night, and as he came up the steps, he found himself, absurdly, bracing.

The door was opened by Tobias, the footman, who took his hat and cane and said, in a sepulchral murmur, "Miss Odette is awake, my lord. She was told you were expected. She has not gone to bed."

"It is past eleven."

"She would not, my lord."

"Of course not." He pressed his fingers to his eyes. "And Miss Merrow?"

"In the morning room, my lord. With Mrs. Hatch."

With Mrs. Hatch. It was said with studied neutrality, and Garrick, who knew his servants, understood it precisely. He handed Tobias his greatcoat. He took a breath. He crossed the black-and-white hall, passed under the sweeping stairs, and opened the morning-room door.

…

It was a small, warm, over-furnished room full of chintz, and it was occupied by three women.

Mrs. Hatch sat bolt upright in the wing chair by the fire, in her habitual gown of iron-gray bombazine, with her keys at her waist and her knitting forgotten in her lap. She was sixty-one. She had been in service with the Wynmores since before Garrick was born, and she had the shrewd, creased, unillusioned face of a woman who had buried two husbands and a master and intended to bury a few more. She was looking, with unblinking attention, at the young woman who sat opposite her on the sofa.

The young woman was Ixara.

They had put her in a gown of dove-gray silk, and it was too long in the skirt and too tight in the bodice, and she wore it as though it were armor. Someone had loosened the braids and bound them up in a plain knot at the nape. Her face, in the lamplight, was grave and composed and utterly still, her hands folded in her lap, her back straight as a drawn bowstring. She had been sitting like that, he guessed, for hours.

And across the hearthrug, on a low stool, with a shawl round her shoulders and a book open on her knees, sat his sister.

"Garrick!"

She was on her feet before he could speak, and across the carpet, and in his arms.

He caught her. She weighed nothing. He had known she would weigh nothing, he had prepared for it on the voyage, but the sensation of her, light as an armful of dry sticks, slight and warm and quivering, went through him like a blade. He held on. He pressed his face to the top of her head, to the pale, fine hair that smelled of lavender and camphor and the faint sweet staleness of a sickroom. Her heart beat, light and quick, against his ribs. He thought: I am here. I am here. I have come.

"You are thin," said Odette severely, into his waistcoat.

"I am a navigator. We are meant to be lean."

"You look like a heron." She drew back, and he saw her face: a small, sharp, intelligent face, with a pointed chin and enormous gray eyes, much too big for it. Her cheeks were flushed with two spots of color, bright as paint. Her lips were pale. "You didn't write after Madeira."

"There was a storm."

"There is always a storm." But her eyes were shining. She took his face in her hands, as she had done when she was five and he was twenty-one, and examined it with enormous seriousness. "Oh, Garrick. You have not been sleeping."

"I have been sleeping very well."

"Liar."

"Odette—"

She coughed.

It came on suddenly: a dry, shallow catch, and then another, and then the whole frail frame shook with it. She bent double, pressing a handkerchief to her mouth. He had his arm round her at once. Hatch had risen; Tobias was at the door; but he waved them back, steadied her, and walked her slowly to the sofa, murmuring nonsense, as he'd done a hundred times. When the fit passed, she lay against his shoulder with her eyes closed and her breath whistling.

She folded the handkerchief quickly, in her fist, so he would not see.

He saw.

"I'm perfectly all right," whispered Odette.

"Of course you are."

"I'm being introduced to your friend."

"So you are." He looked up. His voice, he was glad to find, was steady. "Miss Merrow. This is my sister, Lady Odette Wynmore. Odette, this is Miss Calla Merrow, my ward."

Ixara had risen.

She stood with her hands at her sides and looked at the girl on the sofa. And Garrick, who had spent two months learning to read that guarded, shadowed, unreadable face, saw something pass across it that he had never seen there before. It was gone in a moment. But he thought he had never witnessed anything so naked.

It was grief.

Not pity. Not the polite sympathy of a stranger. It was the old, deep, bone-weary sorrow of someone who has stood at a grave. It lasted half a breath. Then she bent her head, and curtsied, a little stiffly, a little wrongly, as a woman does who has been taught the movement an hour ago, and said, "I am glad to know you, Lady Odette."

"Oh, please," said Odette. "Just Odette."

"Odette."

"Calla." The girl tried it, tilted her head. "It's a pretty name. It's a lily, isn't it? A white one. But you're not at all white."

"Odette!"

"What? It's true." She looked at Ixara with candid delight. "It's wonderful. I think you're the most interesting person who has ever come into this house. Do you know any card tricks?"

Mrs. Hatch said, in a voice like frozen iron, "My lady."

"I only asked."

Ixara's mouth trembled. It was, Garrick realized, trying not to smile. It trembled and pulled at the corners, until at last, helplessly, it broke open, and the whole grave face lit.

"A few," said Ixara.

"I knew it!"

"Odette," said Garrick, "it is past your bedtime."

"It's past everyone's bedtime. That's what makes it fun." But she was leaning against him, and he felt the first weariness come into her, a slow drag, like the tide going out. "Will you stay? Miss Merrow? You're not going away?"

"I will stay."

"Promise?"

"I promise," said Ixara, quietly. "Cross my heart."

She did not know the phrase, he realized. She had picked it up from a book, or from the sailors. She laid her hand flat against her breast, as if the gesture were a sacred oath.

Odette smiled, and sighed. Then, with her eyes already closed and her voice thick with sleep, she murmured to nobody in particular, in a whisper that was meant to be private and carried across the whole room: "You know, he has never brought anyone home before."

Garrick felt his ears go hot. Across the sofa, Ixara looked at the carpet.

…

He carried her up himself.

The stairs were steep and the girl was light, and halfway up, as he passed the landing, he heard a footstep behind him, brisk and heavy and precise. He knew it. He had known it since he was four years old. He did not turn.

"My lord."

"Mrs. Hatch."

"A word. When you've settled her."

"Now, if you like."

"After," said Mrs. Hatch.

It was said quite civilly. But when he reached the top of the stairs, with his burden asleep on his shoulder, and glanced down at the hall below, he saw that the housekeeper had not gone back to the morning room. She was standing at the foot of the stairs, with the keys clasped at her waist and her hard, creased face tilted up. She was not looking at him.

She was looking past him, to the shadowed door of the morning room, where Ixara stood quite alone in the lamplight with her arms wrapped tightly round herself.

She looked a good deal longer than was polite.

And then, very slowly, Mrs. Hatch lifted one hand to the great iron key at her waist and closed her fingers round it, in a gesture older than any church.