Of Silk and Steam (12 page)

The Betrayal

“If an injury has to be done to a man it should be so severe that his vengeance need not be feared.”

—Niccolò Machiavelli

Mina unpinned her mechanical spider brooch, letting her fingers brush against the wall where she deposited it as she walked past. The device could record sound from up to thirty feet away, with almost an hour’s worth of tape spooled in its tiny body. All she had to do was activate the tracking beacon in her pocket, and she would be able to find it again.

Barrons stood at the top of the stairs that led to the Council chambers, speaking to the Duke of Malloryn. The two had formerly been close friends, though the relationship had become strained over the years, she’d noticed.

As Malloryn caught sight of her, Barrons turned, his dark gaze pinning her with an intensity she couldn’t miss. Malloryn gave her figure a lazy perusal but Barrons cut straight to her face, his eyebrow arching as if in question.

There was no way Barrons could see any sign of what had happened in her expression. She was flawless, her hair curled back artfully and her lips painted the vibrant red that only she dared wear. Still, the sensation left her slightly restless. Did he see some sign of what had occurred?

“Malloryn.” She tipped her head to the other duke.

“My dear Lady Aramina,” Malloryn murmured in that mocking drawl he always affected. He was rarely serious, at least in public, though the sharp cut of his eyes showed his true nature. In the privacy of his bedroom, he’d been an entirely different man, but that had been many years ago. He continued, “Two Council sessions called in two days. Something’s afoot.”

“Perhaps the Nighthawks have word of Goethe’s final hours,” she replied.

“Perhaps.” Barrons looked unconvinced, however.

“Someone tried to kill me this morning,” Malloryn continued. “I was just discussing the matter with Barrons.”

Both of them looked at Malloryn sharply. He shrugged. “They already know they tried to kill me. Why keep it secret?” He glanced at the Council chambers. “They’re right in there, after all. We all just pretend we don’t know.”

“You were not assaulted?” she murmured to Barrons.

“No.” His eyes asked the question his mouth didn’t.

She nodded, almost imperceptibly, feeling that sharp, stabbing ache in her chest again. Even Malloryn saw it, but then he saw a great deal. Too many underestimated the dashing young duke. Of all the members of the Council, she thought perhaps he was the most dangerous. Knowledge was power, after all, and Malloryn had a network in place to rival Balfour’s.

Malloryn leaned closer to Barrons and whispered, “Rather interesting that you weren’t targeted. Looks like someone is trying to remove half the Council.”

The doors chose that moment to open, two unflappable footmen holding them wide.

Malloryn flashed her a cool smile. “I think I’ll go see what Balfour’s up to.”

His departure left her alone in the hallway. The last time she’d been alone with him, he’d pinned her to the console of an airship and done wicked things to her. It seemed a lifetime ago. At the moment, she couldn’t even summon a smile.

“Are you all right?”

She wanted to confide in him, the thought bringing a rush of pain to her chest.
My
cat, he killed my cat… His men were in my house, in my room…
None of it would make sense to him though, and there were too many ears nearby.

Her hesitation spoke volumes. Somehow she managed a weak smile. “I survive. As always.”
That’s the one thing I am very good at doing.

“You took a blow, though,” he said quietly. “I can see it in your eyes.”

“I’m tired,” she said. “I didn’t sleep this morning.”

“Mina?” Just that.

Suddenly the urge was too great to deny. “They killed my cat. They left her in the middle of my bed.”

Not a word, nor a single change in his expression, but she felt as though the world faded around them, as if his gaze sharpened until he could see all the way through her. As if he reached out to touch her somehow, but his body never moved. “I’m sorry.” A quick glance into the room. “They’re trying to frighten you, Mina. A warning, that’s all this is.”

“I know.” Somehow she could breathe a little easier. “I’ve said too much.”

“Perhaps that’s the problem. We councilors never say enough to each other. Together—”

The sound of someone coughing cut off his words. This was not the place to be having this discussion. Barrons tipped his head to her in a nod and entered the chambers.

Yet she understood what he meant.
Together
we
could
be
a
threat
to
him.
The idea had never occurred to her before, and it slowed her strides as she followed him inside. The Council of Dukes rising up to overthrow the prince consort?

Half the time they were at each other’s throats. Ridiculous even to assume that they could wield their power to remove this cancerous boil on the nation’s backside. Or that they would.

Never
discount
any
possibility.
And if it meant that the prince consort was overthrown sooner, freeing the queen…

A dangerous supposition. All it would take to destroy everything she’d worked for would be one set of loose lips seeking to gain favor.

Wait
, she told herself.
And
see.

* * *

Council was called to order, Morioch taking the Chair’s seat. He flashed a smirk at Leo, who stilled. The cadaverous old bastard had always despised him, and the smile made Leo uneasy.

Beware
a
blue
blood’s smile, for it is full of teeth.
An old human saying he’d heard in the streets.

The doors swung wide, hitting the walls with a crash. Every head in the room turned at the entrance, and shocked gasps spilled through the room. The pair of Coldrush Guards at the door both jerked at their blades until the prince consort called for them to be sheathed.

“A guest,” the prince consort said as the man entered, the hood of his cloak fluttering back from his brow.

“What the hell is all this about?” the Duke of Caine snarled, waving a gold embossed letter in his hand.

That wasn’t what had drawn the gasps, however. The duke wore white, from head to toe, his silvery fine hair carefully pomaded back from his pale brow. There was no color in his face, his skin, his hair… Even his irises were no longer cerulean but an almost colorless, milky blue, like a calcium pool.

The Fade, in all its spectacular glory. The final, end stages of the craving virus, a sign that a man was turning irrevocably into a vampire.

Leo’s gut knotted tight.

A hundred years ago, a rash of vampires had torn apart half the city, slaughtering thousands. For that was another effect of the disease, the descent into irrational blood-lust.

By law, anyone approaching the Fade was to be executed once the percentage of craving virus in their blood reached the seventies.

“Blood and glory.” Morioch gasped. He staggered back. “Guards! Guards!”

“I wouldn’t.” Caine cast the guards a filthy look as he strode toward the table. He stared them all down, one eyebrow arched. “My craving virus levels are in the nineties, after all. I’m stronger and faster than any man in this room. None of you could stop me if I chose to tear out your throats.” The Duke of Lannister’s former chair squealed as Caine dragged it across the floor. He flicked the black shroud onto the floor and took his place.

Circumstance put him directly at the end of the table, facing the prince consort. Not a hint of expression explained what this was about.

“Father?” Leo murmured.

“Not now.”

The prince consort looked nonplussed for once. “How…how is this even possible?”

For Caine had not evolved as a vampire normally did, hunched and bent over, his eyes filming with blindness and his voice losing itself to a pitch few humans could even hear. Nor was he ruled by the insane blood-lusts from which they suffered, though his hungers were deep.

“It appears I have evolved,” Caine said. “I am reaching the end stages of my metamorphosis.”

“You’re a vampire!” Morioch couldn’t seem to control his revulsion.

“Indeed.” The faintest of smiles played over Caine’s hard mouth. “In the truest sense of the word. I am what blue bloods were always meant to become.”

Why the hell was he here? Most of the time Caine locked himself away in the depths of his house, trying to avoid the sunlight, as it hurt his eyes dreadfully and burned his pale, sensitive skin.

To have come out into the light… Leo’s gaze fell uneasily on the letter that Caine had flicked onto the table, then toward the three guards in the room, noticing their pistols and swords, while Leo had nothing more than his blood-letting pouch on him.

“Explain yourself,” Lynch demanded, his voice cold and hard. “And why we should not consider you a threat.”

Caine held out his hands, his fingernails translucent—and sharp. “I am a vampire,” he explained, “who has managed to retain all his senses. What else do you need to know?”

“He is fully in control,” Leo admitted. After all, he’d known for years, horrified at first, keeping an eye out for the moment when by law he should have been forced to call for an executioner. Caine had vanished for a period of three months, touring the Orient, or so he had said. When he returned, his state had evolved to the point it was clear any chance Leo had of executing him was minute.

Something had stopped him from trying. Caine was lucid in a way most blue bloods weren’t at that stage. His blood-lust was entirely manageable, his needs seen to by Madeline and bottles of blood bought from the draining factories. He slept a great deal of the time, and when he was awake, he seemed sometimes catatonic. Rather catlike in a way. Content to sit by the fire to warm his cold blood, with his lap rug over his knees. Oh, he still liked to play the game and listen to word of court, but his existence had become almost…meditative.

“How did this occur?” the prince consort asked flatly.

Caine flashed his sharpened teeth, revealing canines that had elongated into sharpened points. “The answers are in the Orient. That is all I will say of the matter.”

The Orient. Where the craving virus had originated, kept under the strict control of the White Court that ruled the Forbidden City until an intrepid explorer named Sir Nicodemus Banks had become infected with their precious virus and fled back to Europe, infecting half of the continent’s aristocrats along the way.

Every court, from Spain to England, had paid gold to receive what seemed like a boon—strength, faster reflexes, prime healing rates, a certain sense of indestructibility…even a taste of immortality, if you wished.

Only Italy had held firm, naming the creatures that evolved from the virus demons and monsters.

That position spread throughout the Church, the Spanish Inquisition burning the country’s blue bloods at the stake. The French had been equally as efficient, executing most of their aristocracy. Only the Russians and the English Echelon had held firm, crushing the human classes beneath their heel and creating an automaton army to protect themselves from the mob.

As for the Russians, who yoked their humans as serfs and paid little heed to the care the Echelon took not to kill when they drank their blood…life was cheap on the Russian steppes.

Silence reigned in the room. The prince consort let out his breath, his fingers splayed on the table. “This is…unanticipated.” His eyes cut to Leo. “And should have been reported.”

“I had no intention of making myself the target of some botched execution attempt.” Caine laced his hands over his middle.

The prince consort nodded and Leo tensed. Not the prince consort’s plan today, then. He had something else on his mind. Something important enough to dismiss what should have drawn more scrutiny.

“You seem hale and of sound mind,” the prince consort said. “In this respect, I see no choice but to absolve you of the crime of concealing such a state. All in favor?”

Neither the Duchess of Casavian nor Lynch raised their hands. The rest gave their hesitant approval. After all, if they said nay, then who intended to imprison Caine?

“I would, of course, like to know more about this.” The prince consort’s smile was tight.

Caine bowed his head in deference. It was not entirely without wariness. “We shall speak privately. Now what did you mean by sending me this letter?”

Leo couldn’t take his eyes off it.

“A grave tale, Your Grace.” The prince consort paced, his hands behind him. “One of lies, of treachery…of betrayal.”

“What the hell are you referring to?” Caine snapped.

“The cuckoo in your nest, Your Grace.”

The world went still. Leo froze, every muscle in his body locking tight, not quite daring to look at the prince consort. This couldn’t be happening. Instinct screamed at him to run but he couldn’t move. In all of his nightmares of this moment—and there had been many—he’d shouted down the accusation, fought it, anything other than simply sit here, but it felt as if this were another dream, slightly watered down at the edges.

All he could see was the duchess’s pale face as she stared at him with wide eyes.

You. You were the only one with that information…
The betrayal was another knife edge, though he’d handed it to her. He’d dared her to stab him in the back with it the second he turned…and she had. Of all the blows, that was one of the greatest. For he’d thought, for a moment, that something fragile and tentative existed between them.

Caine’s laughter broke the silence, a sharp, rusty sound. Then it cut off as if with a razor. “You
dare
try and call my son a bastard? Be very careful about what you’re claiming, my prince. I will not be mocked. Not even by you.”

A meaty slap sounded and something slid across the enormous table toward the duke. Finally Leo could move again, his head spinning as he looked at the file and the photographs that spewed out of it as it came to a halt on the polished mahogany. Photographs of Charlie.

Caine looked up. Their eyes met for just the briefest of moments. And Leo knew that Caine was going to cut him loose.