“Astounding.” Lady Maccon was impressed, both with the technology and Lord Akeldama’s ebullience.
He paused, recovering his equanimity, then continued with the explanation. “Only a receiving room tuned to the appropriate frequency will be able to pick up the message. Come with me.”
He led them into the receiving room section of the aethographor.
“Receivers, mounted on the roof directly above us, pick up the signals. A skilled operator is required to tune out ambient noise and amplify the signal. The message then displays there”—he gestured, hands waving about like flippers, at two pieces of glass with black particulate sandwiched between and a magnet mounted to a small hydraulic arm hovering above—“one letter at a time.”
“So someone must be in residence to read and record each letter?”
“And they must do so utterly silently,” added Madame Lefoux, examining the delicacy of the mounts.
“And they must be ready in an instant, for the message destroys itself as it goes,” Lord Akeldama added.
“Now I comprehend the reason for the noise-proof room and the attic location. This is clearly a most delicate device.” Lady Maccon wondered if she could operate such an apparatus. “You have, indeed, made an impressive acquisition.”
Lord Akeldama grinned.
Alexia gave him a sly look. “So what precisely is your compatibility protocol, Lord Akeldama?”
The vampire pretended offense, looking coquettishly up at the ceiling of the box. “Really, Alexia, what a thing to ask on your very first showing.”
Lady Maccon only smiled.
Lord Akeldama sidled over and slotted her a little slip of paper upon which was written a series of numbers. “I have reserved the eleven o’clock time slot especially for you, my dear, and will begin monitoring all frequencies at that time starting a week from today.” He bustled off and reappeared with a faceted crystalline valve. “And here is this, tuned to my frequency, just in case the apparatus you employ is less progressive than my own.”
Alexia tucked the little slip of paper and the crystalline valve into one of the hidden pockets of her new parasol. “Does any other private residence own one?” she wondered.
“Difficult to know,” replied Lord Akeldama. “The receiver must be mounted upon the roof, so one could conceivably hire a dirigible for air reconnaissance and float about looking for them, but I hardly think that an efficient approach. They are very dear, and there are few private individuals who could see to the expense. The Crown, of course, has two, but others? I only have the list of official compatibility protocols: that is a little under one hundred aethographors dotted about the empire.”
Reluctantly, Alexia realized that time was getting on, and if she intended to leave for Scotland, she had much to do in the space of one night. For one thing, she would have to send round to the queen to alert her to the fact that her muhjah would be missing meetings of the Shadow Council for the next few weeks.
She made her excuses to Lord Akeldama. Madame Lefoux did the same, so that the two ladies found themselves exiting his residence at the same time. They paused to take leave of one another on the stoop.
“Do you really propose to float to Scotland tomorrow?” inquired the Frenchwoman, buttoning her fine gray kid gloves.
“I think it best I go after my husband.”
“Should you travel alone?”
“Oh, I shall take Angelique.”
Madame Lefoux started slightly at the name. “A Frenchwoman? Who is that?”
“My maid, inherited from the Westminster Hive. She is a dab hand with the curling iron.”
“I am certain she is, if she was once under Countess Nadasdy,” replied the inventor with a kind of studied casualness.
Alexia felt there was some kind of double meaning to the comment.
Madame Lefoux did not give her the chance for further inquiry, as she nodded her good-bye, climbed into a waiting hackney, and was gone before Lady Maccon had time to say more than a polite good night.
Professor Randolph Lyall was impatient, but no one would ever guess it to look at him. Partly, of course, because currently he looked like a slightly seedy and very hairy dog, skulking about the bins in the alley next to Lord Akeldama’s town house.
How much time, he was wondering, could possibly be required to take tea with a vampire? A good deal, apparently, if Lord Akeldama and Lady Maccon were involved. Between the two of them, they could talk all four legs off a donkey. He had encountered them in full steam on only one memorable occasion and ever since had avoided the experience assiduously. Madame Lefoux had been a surprise addition to the party, although she probably was not adding much to the conversation. It was odd to see her out of her shop and paying a social call. He made a mental note: this was something his Alpha should know about. Not that he had orders to watch the inventor. But Madame Lefoux was a dangerous person to know.
He shifted about, nose to the wind. Some strange new scent on the air.
Then he noticed the vampires. Two of them, lurking in the shadows well away from Lord Akeldama’s house. Any closer and the effete vampire would sense their alien presence, larvae not of his line in his territory. So, what were they there for? What were they about?
Lyall lowered his tail between his legs and slunk a quick circle behind them, coming at them from downwind. Of course, vampires had nowhere near as fine a sense of smell as werewolves but they had better hearing.
He crept in close, trying to be as silent as possible.
Neither of the vampires were BUR agents, that was for certain. Unless Lyall missed his guess, these were Westminster’s get.
They did not appear to be doing anything but simply watching.
“Fangs!” said one of them finally. “How bloody long can it take to have tea? Especially if one of them ain’t drinking it?”
Professor Lyall wished he had brought his gun. Difficult to carry, though, in one’s mouth.
“Remember, he wants it done stealthy; we are simply checking. Don’t want to go at it with the werewolves over nothing. You know…”
Lyall, who did not know, wanted to very badly, but the vampire, most unhelpfully, did not continue.
“I think he’s paranoid.”
“Ours is not to question, but I believe the mistress agrees with you. Doesn’t stop her from humoring—”
The other vampire suddenly held up a hand, cutting his companion off.
Lady Maccon and Madame Lefoux emerged from Lord Akeldama’s town house and made their good-byes on the stoop. Madame Lefoux swung herself up into a cab, and Lady Maccon was left alone, looking thoughtful on the front steps.
The two vampires moved forward toward her. Lyall did not know what they intended, but he guessed it was probably not good. It certainly was not worth risking his Alpha’s wrath to find out. Quick as a flash, he slithered underneath one of the vampires, tripping him up, in the next movement lunging for the other, teeth snapping hard around anklebone. The first vampire, reacting rapidly, jumped so fast to one side as to be almost impossible to follow, at least for normal sight. Lyall, of course, was not normal.
He leaped, meeting the vampire halfway, lupine body slamming into the man’s side, throwing him off. The second vampire lunged toward him, grabbing for his tail.
The entire scuffle took place in almost complete silence, only the sound of snapping jaws marking the activity.
It gave Lady Maccon just enough time, although she did not know she needed it, to climb into the Woolsey carriage and set off down the street.
The two vampires both stilled as soon as the vehicle was out of sight.
“Well, that’s a sticky wicket,” said one.
“Werewolves,” said the other in disgust. He spat at Lyall, who paced, hackles raised, between them, forestalling any idea of pursuit. Lyall paused to sniff delicately at the wad of spit—eau de Westminster Hive.
“Really,” said the first to Lyall, “we weren’t going to harm one hair of that swarthy Italian head. We simply had a little test in mind. No one would have even known.”
The other elbowed him, hard. “Hush you, that’s Professor Lyall, that is. Lord Maccon’s Beta. The less he knows about anything, the better.”
With that, the two doffed their hats at the still growling, still bristling wolf in front of them and, turning, took off at a leisurely pace toward Bond Street.
Professor Lyall would have followed, but he decided on more precautionary measures and set a brisk trot to follow Alexia and ensure she arrived home safely.
Lady Maccon caught Professor Lyall when he came in, just before dawn. He looked exhausted, his already lean face pinched and drawn.
“Ah, Lady Maccon, you have waited up for me? How kind.”
She searched for the sarcasm in his words, but if it was there, it was cleverly disguised. He was good. Alexia often wondered if Professor Lyall had been an actor before metamorphosis and somehow managed to hold on to his creativity despite sacrificing most of his soul for immortality. He was so very skilled at doing, and being, what was expected.
He confirmed her suspicions. Whatever it was that had caused the wide-scale lack of supernatural was definitely heading north. BUR had determined that the hour of London’s return to supernatural normal correlated with the departure of the Kingair Pack toward Scotland. He was not surprised that Lady Maccon had arrived at the same conclusion.
He was, however, decidedly against the idea that she should go trailing after.
“Well, who else should go? I, at least, will remain entirely unaffected by the affliction.”
Professor Lyall glared at her. “No one should go after it. The earl is perfectly capable of handling the situation, even if he doesn’t yet know he has two problems to deal with. You seem to have failed to realize we all wandered around undamaged for centuries before you appeared in our lives.”
“Yes, but look what a mess you have made of things prior to my arrival.” Lady Maccon was not to be dissuaded from her chosen course of action. “Someone has to tell Conall that Kingair is to blame.”
“If none of them are changing, he’ll find out as soon as he arrives. His lordship would not like you following him.”
“His lordship can eat my fat—” Lady Maccon paused, thought the better of her crass words, and said, “—does not have to like it. Nor do you. The fact remains that this morning Floote will secure for me passage on the afternoon’s dirigible to Glasgow. His lordship can take it up with me when I arrive.”
Professor Lyall had no doubt that his poor Alpha would do just that and be similarly humbled. Still, he would not give in so easily. “You shall have to take Tunstell with you, at the very least. The lad has been pining to visit the north ever since his lordship left, and he will be able to keep an eye on you.”
Lady Maccon was truculent. “I do not need him. Have you seen my new parasol?”
Lyall had seen the purchase order and been suitably impressed, but he was no fool. “A woman, even a married woman, cannot float without proper escort. It is simply not done. You and I are both well aware of that fact.”
Lady Maccon frowned. He was right, bother it. She sighed and figured that at least Tunstell was a pushover.
“Oh, very well, if you insist,” she conceded with ill grace.
The intrepid Beta, older than most werewolves still living in the greater London environs—Lord Maccon and the dewan included—did the only thing he could under the circumstances. Pulled his cravat aside to expose his neck, gave a little bow, and took himself off to bed without another word, leaving Lady Maccon in possession of the field.
Her ladyship sent the hovering Floote to rouse poor Tunstell from his bed and give him the unexpected news that he would be departing for Scotland. The claviger, who had only just climbed into bed, having spent the better part of the night looking at ladies’ hats, wondered a tad about the sanity of his mistress.
Just after sunrise, having gotten very little sleep, Lady Maccon commenced packing. Or, it should be said more precisely that Lady Maccon commenced arguing with Angelique over what should be packed. She was interrupted by a visit from the only person on the planet capable of consistently routing her in verbal skirmishes.
Floote brought up the message.
“Good gracious, what on earth is she doing here? And at such an early hour!” Alexia put the calling card back down on the little silver tray; checked her appearance, which was only just passable for receiving; and wondered if she should take the time to change. Should one risk keeping a caller waiting or face criticism for being dressed in attire unbecoming to a lady of rank? She chose the latter, deciding to get the encounter over and done with as quickly as possible.
The woman waiting for her in the front parlor was a diminutive blond with a rosy complexion that owed more to artifice than nature, wearing a visiting dress of pink and white stripes that would better suit a lady half her age.
