The sound of lowing bells jerked her away from her sleep. She curled her hands and found her fingers grasping at warm flesh. She tilted her head and found him watching her. Then he gently nudged her to the side and got out of the bed to peek out of the window. The lamp on the table with their cold dinner was still on; the light a golden glow that shone on his skin in shadowed bronze. The bells of the Cathedral continued to toll. She counted them—eleven.
Zan flung the covers off and felt the cool air slide over her naked skin. She walked over to him to peer out the crack the curtains permitted. There was a ledge, just outside the window, and then there was a short, brief space before the roof of the next building which only had one level. From there, it would be possible to find an outside stair to get to the ground. She felt his hands on her shoulders sliding downward and pulling her toward him until they met, skin to skin. He brushed her hair away from her face.
“I suppose I can’t convince you to stay here.”
“No,” she replied. “I am going.”
He briefly pressed his mouth against hers, leaving her lips tingling. “If we are both going no matter what, then who is following who?”
“No one is following anyone. We both have reason to see what he is up to. My uncle’s work. Your captain. The plotting against the Queen.”
“And one could wonder if there isn’t something that he isn’t involved in,” Caradon said in mock humor.
Somewhat awkwardly, she leaned over to brush her lips against the edge of his jaw which was slightly rough with stubble. She could feel energy pulsing beneath his skin, calling to her, drawing her out. She felt his hands flex on her waist, the prickle of his claws. The bronze-gold glow of the room slowly began to fade into gray and the rest of her senses heightened. She buried her nose into his neck, but somehow, the perspective was off—her nose was growing into a different shape and she felt fur on her cheek. She found herself crouched beneath the window instead of standing by it—and he was softly yipping in her ear, bringing her back to alertness.
It was so easy, changing, she thought as he raised himself up the window sill and pushed it open with a paw. I was hardly even aware that it was happening. It’s frightening.
He glanced back at her. It is easy if you don’t try so hard to control it. The less you worry about it, the change will happen when you need it and wait when you don’t.
She followed him up the ledge. I was very young when my parents passed away so my father had no chance to teach me how and why I had these urges to burst out of my civilized shell. My uncle taught me to control this animal nature because it just wasn’t done.
No offense, but Elliot Waterstone was not of our kind. He had no comprehension on what it is like to be a shifter.
The ledge ended at the corner of the building and they easily leaped over the few feet that separated the inn from the store next to it. The roof of the store was flat, except for a single chimney. On the other side of the roof was yet another building—this one three stories tall. A stair crisscrossed the side in a jagged pattern. From the store’s roof, they jumped onto the stair and proceeded to the ground. The night was complete and the small street of Maudlin narrowed into further darkness towards the old city.
At the intersection between Maudlin and South Bishop, the street was clear. Their two attackers, from earlier, were gone, as well as the Captain’s body. She sniffed the air and noted that the paths of the ruffians and the corpse had diverged. Someone had discovered the Captain’s body shortly after the two men had woken up and left and had taken the dead man west toward the morgue and the crematorium. The two attackers had taken the opposite route and had headed down South Bishop on a northerly route.
They followed the scent until the next intersection where the two men had turned into a small alleyway heading west. For a moment, Zan stood on the curb, peering into the night. The dilapidated buildings around them were either abandoned or dark because everyone was asleep. The rotting smell from the center of the city made her nose itch, but the unusually stiff wind that had sprung up earlier in the evening and was still blowing took the harshest sting out of the odor. Caradon looked down South Bishop, his ears twitching.
He glanced at her and she flicked her tail, almost imperceptibly. Together, they proceeded down the street until South Bishop began to curve westward and to change its name to North Bishop. The Cathedral loomed ahead—a hulking black thing along the street with several towers—one of which was the clock tower—and one spire that towered above the rest like a sharp spike piercing the heavens. Across from the Cathedral was a small field of headstones and then the Temple. The sky was cloudy and there was little moonlight so the headstones appeared little more than dark lumps surrounding the stark shadowed dome of the Temple. Even from their distance, they could see a line of robed people slowly making their way into the ancient building.
She darted into the cemetery, sprinting from one headstone to another. Nearing the entrance of the Temple, she could make out each individual in the procession. Each person was cowled—their faces covered—and carrying an object—be it a censer smoking with incense, brass staves studded with dark glass, or chains of black beads capped with the odd black cross encircled in silver. Caradon caught up with her a moment later and they watched the pagan worshippers moving in. As the last person took a step through the threshold, the two foxes followed behind and kept to the unwatched shadows that the pillars holding up the ancient Temple cast on the cold floor.
Which one do you suppose is Southmore? She asked. The incense is overpowering almost every other scent.
I don’t know, he replied. He could be any of those people. Or none. But do you really suppose he is a follower like them? Southmore strikes me more as a man who wishes to take charge. He is, after all, an emissary.
That’s right. He’d want to direct and choreograph the entire ceremony, not sit back and watch everything that’s going on. I want to get a closer look.
He gave a low, almost inaudible growl. You’ve seen all of this before. There will be incantations and a sacrifice. If we stay here, nearer to the entrance, there’s a chance we may be able to get back out before that thing throws up a barrier on the Temple.
Hm? I wonder if the barrier that had been on the Temple is similar to the one around Old Amanthus?
Who knows? But the one of the old city is the same as the one that had been here in one respect—they kept things in.
She started to slink closer to the gathering around the pedestal and the black bowl by keeping her back to the far wall.
Zan, where do you think you’re going? Come back here.
We’re not going to find out anything if we stay in one safe spot, she told him. Besides, don’t you remember that there is another exit to this place as well?
He sighed, exasperated in her mind and abandoned his post in favor of coming along with her. They padded around the perimeter of the main hall. None of the worshippers gave any indication that they saw two small fox shadows passing their peripheral vision.
As they passed the main hall, her ears pricked up at an unusual scrapping sound. She followed the noise until she came to the entrance to the small room that they had found in their last visit to the Temple. She peeked around the edge and saw that there were three robed figures already in the room. They were holding torches and looking toward the hole in the floor that went down to the passageway that connected the room to the wine cellar in the Cathedral.
The figures were not wearing their hoods. When one turned to another to speak, she saw that it was Southmore. He appeared impatient as he asked the other man what the time was. The man took out a pocket watch from beneath his robe. It was half-past eleven.
The scraping sound came again and then two men emerged from the stairway leading down the hole carrying a contraption. Zan stifled a surprised yip. It was her uncle’s last invention—one of the machines that had supposedly been placed in the Museum. But there was something odd about it—someone had definitely altered it. She could see a tiny hairline crack at the base of the electricity generator where someone had cut it open and possibly fiddled with the interior before sealing it back up with glue.
“Well, it is certainly time you got it here,” Southmore told the dark hole.
A moment later, a portly man—Pendergrast, Zan recognized with another shock—ascended the stairs and stepped into the room wiping his brow. Like Southmore and the rest of the men, he was dressed in the robe uniform of the pagan worshippers. “If you had been more efficient at obtaining the information or even securing the help from Miss Hu, I wouldn’t be in such a hurry!”
Southmore sneered—an ugly expression on a face that she had usually seen a congenial or sympathetic smile—“You assured me you were an expert in the field, yet you had to resort to your associates to obtain the necessary information.”
“Well, lucky for you my associates were fortunate in obtaining the information at all.”
The emissary waved a dismissive hand. “Never mind. What’s done is done. Time is growing short.”
Isn’t he one of the inventors at the Academy? Asked Caradon.
Yes. But I don’t understand—how did he get the information to modify my uncle’s prototype? She paused, thoughts slowly coalescing. It was the day at the gentlemen’s tailor when I was talking to my friends about this entire situation. Lord What’s-His-Name must have overheard me telling Del and Sabina that I had found my uncle’s notes.
Lord who?
Hyssop, she clarified. He’s some count’s son from the Continent. He’s Greta Del Rassa’s beau—and she is friends with Pendergrast. The news must have gotten to him through that direction and then they had sent someone to take the notes that day.
Oh. But if that’s true, what is Southmore doing with your uncle’s machine in this Temple?
I don’t know.
“Take it out,” directed the emissary.
Zan and Caradon made themselves smaller along the shadows of the wall as the two men carrying the machine lugged it out of the small room and toward the main hall of the Temple. Soon after them followed Pendergrast and the two other men that had been with Southmore. The emissary did not follow. Perhaps he was doing the final preparations for something else.
She peeked around the corner, but did not have a chance to see anything. Something tightened around her throat and she gagged. Caradon!
He pounced forward, growling, but halfway across the entrance to the small room, he stumbled as a loop of rope fell over his head and pulled taunt. Southmore finally emerged from the room, grinning down at them. The two fox-shifters growled at him, but he merely tugged at the two rope-leashes, silencing them.
“I knew my personal demons would be hounding me again,” the emissary said as he dragged them off towards the main hall. “Well, I’ll get rid of you two soon enough. You should be honored I’ve decided that you’ll do nicely as dessert for an old god.”
