Disappeared. Gone.
Impossible.
He might have to accept that they were edging toward the shadows of the unnatural. Nicholas knew he would need to be on guard, and despite his shaky faith in a higher power, found himself thinking those words he’d heard Captain Hall say throughout his childhood: God defend us.
“How…? Are…?” Nicholas was not quite sure what he meant to ask.
The woman in black stormed back toward Sophia, who lifted a leather-bound volume off the floor and sent it flying toward the older woman’s head, coming within inches of striking her.
The sniffing intensified, until finally the woman held out an arm, silvery black lace dripping from the end of the sleeve. “Come here to me, beastie.”
Sophia took a rather large step back.
Before Nicholas could leap forward, the woman snatched Sophia by the arm and whirled her around, as if to swat her bottom. In one smooth movement, the woman pulled up the back of Sophia’s shirt and pulled something out that had been tucked into the belt around the girl’s waist.
For a moment Nicholas thought it might have been another trick of his eyes, because when her hand emerged it was holding a long, thin blade, but the end of it had been snapped off, leaving it a jagged claw. The base was adorned with a large ring, thin bands of silver weaving in and out of each other.
“Good God!” The words burst out of him as the woman held the pointed end up to her nose with one last, satisfied sniff. “You’ve been carrying that around this whole time?” he asked Sophia. “Where did you come across such a thing?”
Even as the words left his mouth, he knew. The body of the Linden guardian in Nassau, the one with the peculiarly small wound through his ear. She had reached the body first, and had somehow taken up the blade in the darkness of night. Without him ever noticing.
And she had held on to it for…what purpose, exactly? His guts clenched, picturing her expression of joy as she drove it through him while he slept.
Sophia refused to look in his direction. “How did you know I had it?”
The question was directed to the other woman—the true Belladonna, Nicholas suspected.
“The blood smells like the rotting intestines of a goat,” the woman growled at her. “This will be payment enough for entry.”
Holding it up to the candlelight, she studied something on the ring that Nicholas couldn’t quite make out—it might have been the etching of a sun. Her breath made the veil over her mouth flutter.
“Payment?” Nicholas heard the disbelief in his voice.
“Yes, beastie. Payment. This is a place of business. Or did you expect me to offer you refreshments and the moon?”
“Is information part of the deal?” Sophia asked, eyeing her with her usual look of mistrust.
“It depends, of course, on what it is you wish to purchase,” the Belladonna said. “I have been known to barter. From time to time. Boy, lock up the shop.”
“Yes, madam,” the boy said, brave enough to give her a petulant look for interrupting his reading again, but not brave enough to ignore the order.
“Children,” the Belladonna huffed as she led Nicholas and Sophia to the door behind the counter. “The only thing they’re good for is eating.”
Sophia barked out a surprised laugh, but Nicholas wasn’t quite convinced she was joking, given the casual way the woman had begun to twirl the blade with a shocking disregard for her fingers.
“She can follow me,” the Belladonna said, gesturing to Sophia as she began down the dark stairs, “and to hell with you, you humorless sop. Oh—you’ll want to hold your breath as you take the last few steps. If you faint, you roll down at your own peril.”
“I beg your pardon?” Nicholas caught a hint of something vaguely putrid and found himself doing as asked.
The lower level seemed to be two flights down, lit only by the faint orange haze crawling up the steps from fires below. Nicholas had a vague memory of something Julian had told him—that there was a kind of underground city in parts of Prague where they’d been forced to build the streets and buildings up to avoid flooding. The overall impression he had was of climbing through a dark vein to reach the city’s pale bones.
The light was coming from a fire in the corner of what looked to be some sort of workshop. The first small section they moved through contained mostly plants and herbs left to dry, as well as what looked to Nicholas like an area for blowing glass. They continued down the narrow, rough stone artery that connected that room to the next. At the very center of the room was a sort of circular stove, each layer stacked upon the next like the tiers of a dingy stone cake. Glass bottles ringed it like ornaments, many with long, hollow stems for pouring the liquids inside into another, simpler bottle below. As she passed by it, the Belladonna stooped to fan the small fire burning inside its base. Once past it, they were confronted with the sight of what looked to be a bell-shaped oven with small openings, as well as barrels, and mice scampering around them.
“Are you an alchemist?” Sophia asked, understanding the odd sight.
“Well spotted,” the Belladonna deadpanned. “I dabble. You might consider the use of my youth elixir, beastie. You look old beyond your age.”
Nicholas grabbed Sophia’s shoulder before she could make good on the murder in her expression.
One last jaunt down another hall brought them to their destination: an even smaller, darker room. Its only occupant, save for them, was a painting that stood taller than himself, and wide enough to cover the entirety of the wall. Nicholas’s eye was caught first by the glowing moon depicted in the dark, cloudy sky, and next, by the waves washing up onto a deserted, unknown shore.
“Now,” the Belladonna said, “do not touch anything, do not look into any of the mirrors, do not sit on my chairs, and most of all, know that thieves will be dealt with in the manner of ancient justice.”
Sophia gave a sarcastic salute, but Nicholas put a hand on the knife at his side.
With no further instructions or warnings, the Belladonna turned and stepped inside the painting.
IT WAS A PASSAGE, OF COURSE—an oddly quiet creature of a passage that sat just in front of the painted sky. The air shimmered and distorted the peaceful image as the Belladonna passed through it, and the usual drumming sounded off.
Both Nicholas and Sophia turned to look at one another expectantly.
“Oh, no, we’re here for you and your beautiful beloved, not me,” she said. “You test the waters!”
“I only wished to ask if you knew where it led,” Nicholas said brusquely. “I always intended to go first.”
She made a strangled sound of frustration, throwing her hands up. “And subject me to a lifetime of shame and guilt because that witch turns you into a pig and roasts you, before I can get through the passage to save your hide?” Sophia sniffed. “You’d like that, wouldn’t you, with all of your miserable, obnoxious honor.”
“I would have to say most men wouldn’t enjoy being transfigured into a pig and eaten,” he said. “But if something were to happen, it might as well be to me. You have the better knowledge of where passages are located, and could continue on—”
Sophia rolled her eye and stuck out her hand. Nicholas stared at it, until Sophia let out a huff and grabbed his wrist, dragging them forward. The whole experience was so bewildering that Nicholas hardly took notice of the passage’s usual stormy assault against his senses.
They were launched out of the passage at a run, their steps slowed only by the presence of a heavy Oriental rug and the ragged growl of a large white wolf, curled around the base of an imposing structure of iron that looked like it would better serve as a drawbridge than a desk.
Nicholas backed up as far as he could without brushing the passage, eyes skimming the space around them.
The room was small and without windows, but here and there were drapes slung down over the walls, and rows of glass bookshelves and cases, as red and rich as tides of blood. More alarming, however, wa
s the lack of a door—at least a visible one. There was no indication of where or when they were. No telling sights or sounds. Beyond the dust and smell of age, the only scent he could detect was that same earthy one as before, heightened greatly.
Nicholas sent a wondering look up at the rows of dried herbs and flowers hanging low over their heads, pushing the bundles out of his way to better see the Belladonna. Before she sat behind her desk, she retrieved a jar of foul, bitter-smelling liquid from her shelf and dropped the dagger into it. The mixture bubbled over like a hellbroth.
Sophia took a step closer to the nearest case, where a heavy sword was displayed. The long, heavy blade was chipped and dull along its killing edge, but the gold hilt was pristine, embellished by two golden chimeras. While he marveled, Sophia’s first instinct, naturally, was to lift the glass and make as though to take it out.
“If you touch that sword, I will use it to slice off your fingers, roast them, and feed them to Selene,” the Belladonna informed her, not looking up from the glass she had dropped the blade into. Beside her on the floor, the wolf looked up from the bone it had been gnawing and gave a snort of confirmation. Nicholas looked away quickly, attempting to not identify it as a human femur.
“What sword is that?” Sophia asked, still eyeing it.
“Arthur’s Caliburn,” the Belladonna said.
“Excalibur?” Nicholas couldn’t stop his brows from rising. A legendary sword—one that didn’t exist. So far as he knew.
“How has someone not bought this off you?” Sophia asked. “Ironwood would probably love to use it to behead his most hated enemies. His murders could use a little poetry.”
The Belladonna’s veil rustled and crimped, as if she’d smiled at the word Ironwood.
She knows who we are, Nicholas thought with a growing sense of unease.
“One of my scavengers fished it out of a filthy lake for me,” the Belladonna said. “However, I’ve never been able to prove the provenance of the object to your Grand Master’s standards, and so it remains. Until it one day needs to be found. No, beastie, take that thought of stealing it from your mind—” Sophia’s hand immediately lowered. “I’d hate for you to join my cadre of thieves.”
Without lifting her eyes from Sophia, the Belladonna pointed to a large, drooping net hanging from the ceiling. It was filled with human skulls, all boiled and polished as smoothly as pearls from the sea. At the sight of it, Sophia scowled and moved on to examine the next case, which contained a line of eight bejeweled and gold-trimmed eggs of various sizes.
“Imperial Fabergé eggs, lately of Russia,” the Belladonna said, pulling a grape from a nearby plate of them and popping it into her mouth. “I’m willing to bargain, if they’re of interest. It’s become damned difficult to auction them with the instability of that period.”
Instability. Nicholas seized upon the word, storing the information away. Where there was instability, there were likely changes to the timeline.
“Maybe I should have let you go first,” Sophia muttered to Nicholas, greedily eyeing a bowl of pristine apples that seemed oddly out of place. “I could be eating a fresh pork dinner right now.”
“That does sound rather appealing, I must say,” the Belladonna said, tossing a grape to the wolf, who snapped it out of the air. The animal gave a curious sniff in Sophia’s direction, but lowered its head and resumed its watch over them. “There’s King John’s treasure in the corner over there, next to Cromwell’s head, and a panel of the Bayeux Tapestry, if you’ve yet to finish wasting my time.”
At her interested hum, Nicholas grabbed the scruff of Sophia’s shirt, cutting off her path. “We’ve business here, mind you.”
“Oliver Cromwell’s head, though,” Sophia said pitifully, as if this might convince him.
He stepped forward, winding through the rows of shelves that separated them from the desk. Sophia followed reluctantly, shaking off Nicholas’s grip. To his complete and utter lack of surprise, there were no chairs for them to sit in. They presented themselves to the Belladonna like a mustering militia.
“Now,” the woman said. “Tell me what it is Ironwood seeks, and I shall tell you my fee.”
Sophia made a noise of disgust. “We’re not here on the old man’s business.”
The woman settled back in her chair. “Are you not Sophia Elizabeth Ironwood, born in July of 1904, lovingly”—the word was impaled with sarcasm—“pulled from St. Mary’s Orphanage in 1910 after you were caught pickpocketing for the third time—”
Sophia put her hands on her hips and said, “Well, they didn’t catch me the other hundreds of times. Three is hardly a bad score.”
Nicholas couldn’t be sure why the other woman had said it, other than to awe them with her knowledge, or disarm Sophia.
Rescued, orphanage, pickpocketing.
Christ. Julian had vaguely mentioned to him in passing that Sophia had not had a lady’s upbringing until Ironwood brought her into the family. But this…it went beyond humble origins. And as he himself knew, when you were forced to learn survival as a child, the instinct became etched into your soul.
The Belladonna smirked and her attention fell over him so heavily that Nicholas felt as though he’d gained another shadow.
“Everyone present knows of my origins; it’s not necessary to reiterate them to prove some mysterious point. We’ve come because we wish for information,” Nicholas said finally.
“Is that so?”
“We’re looking for what the last common year is,” Sophia explained. “To find someone orphaned by the shift, which I’m sure you are well aware of.”
The Belladonna leaned forward, resting her arms against the desk. A quill fluttered in its cup, and two grapes escaped their plate to find freedom on the floor. She stroked the veil covering her mouth, the way a man would stroke a beard. “Indeed? That is certainly within my knowledge. Who is this person you seek?”
“It’s Hen—” Sophia began, but Nicholas gave a curt shake of the head. He would rather not have the woman turn her eye onto Etta; the darkness of this place, the way it seemed alive with its own curiosity, made him want to protect her from this stranger’s interest for as long as possible.
The older woman turned her gaze back toward Nicholas. The small silver bells sewn into her mass of hair tinkled.
“Well,” the Belladonna continued, “your desperation reeks worse than your intriguing stench. You are clearly without earthly possessions, and neither of you was close enough to Ironwood to have new, useful secrets to trade. So perhaps our business has concluded before it began.”
Sophia took a furious step forward, reaching for whatever sharp weapon she had strapped to her belt. The wolf jumped to its feet, baring its teeth as the girl came toward her, but Sophia growled back, glaring at the animal until its lips relaxed and its ears rose to their usual position.
Nicholas’s heart began to beat back against the thoughts of no running through his mind. They had not traveled through centuries of swamps and storms to arrive at a denial. This search could be simple; they wouldn’t have to chase down every passage in every century for a lead on Etta’s whereabouts.
“Is there nothing else you want in exchange from us?”
In the silence, an idea seemed to shape itself from candlelight and shadow. Nicholas noted the moment it struck the Belladonna, how her hands laced together and her veil shifted, as if masking a smile.
“Many of my auctions are for items that are priceless. They defy valuation. As you may know, I select winning bids based on what they can offer me. A secret, or a favor they’re willing to do. Here, we can negotiate—in exchange for the information you seek, I’ll ask for a favor,” the Belladonna said, her chair creaking as she leaned back. “It will be of my choosing, to be completed sometime in the future.”
“I won’t do anything…”—Nicholas struggled to find the right words—“…scandalous. Immoral.”
One eyebrow rose. “Goodness. What an imagination you have. By favor, I me
an a task. Perhaps to find and retrieve something for me. Carry a message. Assist in my own travel. And so on.”
That…did not sound entirely intolerable to him.
“So he has to serve you?” Sophia demanded. “No questions asked?”
“For a time, only insofar as it pertains to the task,” the Belladonna said, flicking her long nails at the girl.
“Slavery,” he said, the dull burn inside of his chest growing. Intolerable. He should have guessed this underhanded “business” of hers would strive to bind the wings of his soul.
“Nothing so foul,” the Belladonna said, her voice sharp with offense. “It’s indentured servitude, and only a day or two’s worth. Your task pays off your debt to me. Once our business is concluded, that bond will be broken.”
Sophia grabbed his collar, yanking him down to her height and startling him out of his tangle of thoughts. “Forget this. We’ll try the Jacarandas instead, like we planned.”
And risk them not knowing? Risk running in circles long enough for this starting point to disappear? They’d failed to master time on this search, and now it was threatening to best them. Etta was hurt and alone, and the thought of taking a moment longer to debate this was intolerable. If anything, it was Sophia’s infernal pride speaking for her again, her entitlement. Nicholas hadn’t expected the answers to be handed to them. This was a business deal, and he had to believe that Rose Linden wouldn’t send him into the jaws of a literal and figurative wolf. The woman’s methods were patently ridiculous, but she was still his ally.
“Everyone has a master, whether you realize this or not,” the Belladonna said. “Luckily, I am a benevolent one. Mostly.”
How very bitter that truth was when swallowed. Some were bound by loyalty and vows, others by an obsession with wealth, and others were owned by other men through no fault of their own.
There was something else that Hall used to say—that life itself was uncertainty, and the only remedy to its madness was to act boldly. This was a risk, yes, but it was tied to a tantalizing reward. At least this was presented as a choice; at least he was retaining some measure of free will. Nicholas could tolerate this debt, so long as he felt the information he would be receiving was proportional to the work.