My arrival at the Hermiter warehouse was unannounced—at least it seemed so to my limited view. It was clear from the outset, however, that Dirty Tim had indeed alerted the criminals of my eventual arrival. Guards clustered around the entrances to the building, and hulking forms patrolled the alleys nearby. I caught sight of more than one Changling in their ranks, ranging from the commonplace elf and ogre to the more rarely seen golem or werewolf. There was even an ifrit present, likely a member of the Association gone rogue, a fact that would no doubt dismay Francis when I told him.
Fortunately for me, my previous experience with situations requiring somewhat unofficial methods of entry had taught me the value of the rooftops. Rather than deal with the guards and patrols that lurked below, I focused my efforts on the nearby buildings. A swift survey of the available perches revealed a route by which I could approach from the northeast, allowing me to work my way past chimneys, gearworks, and the occasional airship platform to a ledge that overlooked the building’s northern side. I also had a clear view of the eastern edge of the warehouse, which would give me my first glimpse of Lady Hermiter himself.
Unfortunately, she appeared determined to avoid allowing me any opportunity to intrude on her privacy. She arrived in impeccable style, conveyed by a sturdy horseless carriage with no apparent markings to identify it save for the symbol of a wing on the door. Before the carriage entered the gate, a stocky fellow and a tall, lanky man of no apparent Changes disembarked. They surveyed the scene with the skill and caution befitting professional bodyguards, and then they stepped aside to allow Ms. Hermiter’s conveyance to enter the enclosure.
The carriage immediately rumbled to a small outbuilding connected to the main warehouse. Any sight of the carriage disappeared thanks to the roof, a fact I could not rectify without completely changing my position. As the carriage vanished within the confines of her warehouse, I turned my attention back to my plan of attack. There I found a sudden boon waiting for me.
The measure of security a man might employ to safeguard his property can range considerably. One might expect guards, traps, and fences about the perimeter and particular attention given to the usual points of entry. Ms. Hermiter had shown herself to be most careful in that regard, and every gate and doorway was lined with layers of protection that would have forestalled even the most determined intruders.
Ms. Hermiter, for all her caution, had forgotten one particularly important fact—that the wonders of the Distillation had opened the sky to both explorer and rogue alike. While an airship might not have approached stealthily by air, that was not true of all inventions, and so my hopeful eyes marked out the fact that while her warehouse was patrolled by no less than thirty guards and her own person accompanied by at least two more, the roof seemed to be patrolled only by a single, perpetually bored-looking thug.
I smiled.
It took only a few moments for me to spy out the perfect launch site, and a short stint of creeping across the rooftops to reach it. A nearby building had been kind enough to enterprising investigators to include a tall tower. No person could have utilized it for surveillance—the perspective from the perch was at a poor angle, offering little but a bland view of the gearworks on the rooftop. There was more than enough height to allow me to avoid the spikes of the fence and reach my goal, and the view of the roof allowed me to utilize the exact time when the guard was distracted. The moment he had struck up a conversation with the sentries in the courtyard below, I made my move. With considerably more confidence than I had enjoyed before, I grasped the Icarus band and jumped.
The glide lasted just long enough for me to settle onto the rooftop, coming to a stumbling halt as its mechanisms ground to a stop. Most unhappily, the effort to bring me to that spot exhausted the charge of the Distillation within the band. I was stranded, left with no choice but to find an alternate way to escape the facility. Regardless of that fact, I believed the guards would provide no true obstacle to my talents. My only concern would be to find a way in before the distracted sentry could come back to his post.
There was but a single door on the right-hand side of the rooftop, and I found to my considerable pleasure that it was not even locked. I checked the position of the sentry, confirming his continued conversation with the men below, and then opened the door to slip inside.
I was immediately greeted by the jarring sound of an intruder alarm, standard equipment on most factories. My shock froze me in place, and I glanced up to find that rather than the normal fitting, where the alarm would have been triggered by the crude forcing of an inward-opening door, it had been set to give warning the moment the door opened outward. The guard must have been able to swing the door inward somehow, or perhaps depended on someone to retrieve him without setting off the alarm, and his conversation with the guards below meant that they would all know it had not been him who set the clamor in motion.
With an silent curse, I sprinted for the interior of the warehouse, hoping to find some hiding place before I was captured. Whether it would be the sentry behind me or his fellows rushing up from below, it would not have mattered. I was certain the only penalty that Lord Devonshire—or his minion, Ms. Hermiter, for that matter—would prescribe for trespass would be death, and I had no desire to depart the mortal coil yet.
My desperate search yielded nothing. The walkway onto which I had rushed yielded no spot where I might escape notice; it was bare of any obstructions, and the railings offered no hope of concealment either. It was a simple, straight metal path that stretched along the interior of the warehouse wall to reach the stairs to the roof, and behind me it ended in a ledge. There were no branching pathways along the top of the warehouse I could use to my advantage, and the shouts of the sentry were now mingling with yells of alarm from guards racing up ladders toward my position. I had only a few moments before I was discovered.
Then my eyes fell on a nest of straw barely visible in the top of a shipping crate below. I heard guards approaching; doubtless they would be there within only a few moments. Therefore I did something that even Patricia might have termed rash. Before my sense of self-preservation could stop me, I jumped.
I fell out into space, the contents of the dimly lit warehouse whirling before my eyes. Then I hit the straw and sank into it, nearly crying out as my leg struck something hard and cold beneath the packing material. Despite the ache spreading through my leg, I kept silent and listened to the pounding feet overhead.
For a few moments, the guards occupied themselves with a short, sharp argument. I listened to their exchanged accusations and grinned as they hurled epithets and blame at one another. My smile faded when I heard a distinctly female voice override the fighting. “What is going on here?”
Obviously, the supposed “Lady” Hermiter had arrived. Her question provoked a flurry of explanations, which the woman endured for a heartbeat before breaking in again. “All right, that’s enough! We obviously have an intruder. Seal off the exits, and makes sure whoever it is doesn’t sneak past you. Tershire, gather the rest of the crew downstairs, and we’ll start a sweep of the inside. Go!”
Their obedience was instantaneous. One group of guards moved up to the roof, while others clattered along the walkways toward the rest of the doors of the warehouse. I felt my stomach sink as I realized that escape had become that much more difficult, but I could not afford to wallow in despair at the moment. All the same, I resolved to avoid being taken in by Hermiter’s tricks the next time.
When I was sure they were no longer waiting on the walkway, I drew out my climbing tool and hurled the grapnel at the ledge. It caught, and moments later, my climbing tool reeled me back to the ledge, where I carefully pulled myself up and began my search. I had little time, and much to do.
At first my inspection of the building proved rather fruitless. The inside of the warehouse was like any other in London. A single room dominated most of the inner space provided by the structure, with smaller rooms nestled into the sides of the building for offices and other work. All across the interior were crates of various sizes and makes, each with a small label declaring their contents. My initial survey of these labels soon told me that Hermiter had brought this cargo from many different places in Europe and beyond, with some coming from as distant as the Far East or South America. Smuggler or no, she had clearly taken the time to make legitimate contacts with the trading companies that underpinned the Empire, and those relationships were bearing fruit in the breadth of her goods on display.
Yet not all her prosperity was the result of legitimate trade. I had no doubt that some of the crates were mislabeled, or contained things of which Her Majesty’s inspectors would not have approved. Ms. Hermiter had gained much of her wealth through her skills as a smuggler, yet for all her guile she had been a fairly minor player within the circles of London’s underworld. She had risen abruptly around seven months prior. It was not a coincidence that she had begun her associations with Lord Devonshire around that same time. There had to be all sorts of evidence within the shadowed interior of the warehouse to indicate the elusive connection, but I would have to find it fast.
Fortunately I managed to locate the spot before the guards discovered me. The door to Hermiter’s office was carefully labeled as such; obviously the thugs in charge of the place had been quite concerned that one of the less-intelligent employees would barge in and earn the entire contingent of criminals an unpleasant punishment.
It was just as clearly locked, with a plethora of traps in place, waiting for someone who attempted to circumvent the security. Hermiter must have trusted her guards even less than most criminals; even a paranoid man or woman would hesitate to use a flamethrower as an alarm. The deadly muzzle of that device was not alone, for I could pick out several other snares for unwary thieves. Despite their obvious lethality, I knew that several of them had to be connected to the deadliest threat of all—a set of alarm bells which would surely bring every thug and miscreant in the building to inflict unfortunate harm on my person.
I sighed and began to draw out my lockpicks, certain that I could still manage to win the day against such an array of traps—and stopped, considering the situation. Ms. Hermiter had obviously taken a personal hand in the security of the building; the trap laid for me on the roof had been evidence enough of her devious influence, for not every common thug could have thought of such a deception. Yet the traps here were obvious, clear to anyone who cared to look. They did not deceive or trick. It was almost a boastful challenge rather than a clever trick—which meant it was just as much a snare as the rooftop door had been.
Careful to avoid the lock and the traps, I edged forward to inspect the door itself. It seemed solid enough, and there were no tripwires waiting to trigger still more traps or alarms. The devices themselves seemed earnest enough; every one of them was functional and directed appropriately. Yet something about the lock itself seemed not quite right, and the doorknob seemed far too fresh. It was as if the metal surface had never been touched, while the plate just above it had been brushed clean by repeated contact. A theory sprang to mind, and I tapped the door with the toe of my boot to test it.
The door swung open without a sound, and I tossed Ms. Hermiter a mental salute for another clever attempt at deception. Then I stalked into the office to find the evidence I had come to collect, closing the door carefully behind me as I moved.
Ms. Hermiter’s office did not appear as I had expected. I had given little thought to the smuggler Lord Devonshire had somehow managed to seduce to his cause, but I did admit to myself that my image of her had not been flattering. Similarly, I had expected the center of her lair to be a dark place full of cobwebs and shadows, disorganized and on the edge of ruin.
To my surprise, I found myself in a rather neatly arranged place of business. A single plain desk had been placed along one wall, with a nicely matched set of comfortable chairs gathered before it. The desk itself was clean and well-organized, showing a desire for order that extended to the accoutrements in the rest of the room. Maps and charts lined the walls, nailed in place with neat precision. A small oven had been set on the far side of the room, obviously as a measure to provide warmth during the approaching winter months. Nothing seemed out of place, and the only object which seemed messy at all was a shipping crate that was partially unboxed on one side of the room.
I did not waste time gawking at the scene, however. I could still hear the guards making their rounds, and at some point they would come to check on the office. Time was short, and knowing that fact, I made my way directly to the desk, hoping to find some clue there.
To my dismay, the desk drawers seemed to hold as many traps and tricks as the door had, and I doubted that enough time remained for me to puzzle them out. The desk itself had been cleared of all pages, and I looked around in vain for a rubbish bin I could raid. Puzzled, I found no bin in sight. Surely a criminal such as this one would not want their papers being carried out of the office for disposal; such laxity would make it easy for a subordinate to hide away various bits of information for their own use. Then my eye fell on the oven in the corner, and realization dawned.
It took only a moment to open the furnace, and the evidence of burnt paper told me I had been right to guess that Hermiter burned her old papers rather than throwing them out. Despite the charred contents, I rummaged through the furnace for a moment to salvage some pieces the fire had not entirely consumed. It was a curious collection of hints. There was a mining report about the soil under Whitechapel—what interest could a smuggler have in such information? Another piece of paper had a crudely drawn map of some city streets—I could not tell which—with directions sketched across it. Yet another scrap seemed to be curiously like a diplomatic envelope, something the French might have used if the decorations were accurate, while another held some sort of financial estimation from an Italian mercenary band I had not heard of. I gathered these hints and clues together and tucked them into my coat pocket for later study.
I made a quick search of the rest of the room, taking particular notice of the maps along the walls. They seemed to be keeping a schedule of sorts, tracing a route through the thoroughfares of London. Still others were sketching distances between the docks and various landmarks. Unable to copy them quickly enough, I tried to fix the details in my mind.
Then I came to the shipping crate on the ground. I pushed aside the straw and discovered, to my surprise, that it contained the mechanical bulk of a drilling machine. It was an elegant design, with flowing script decorating its mechanisms and the seal of a Swiss engineer upon its controls. Its presence matched all too well with the mining report, and I nodded to myself as I once again concealed the device. Devonshire was digging a tunnel of some kind, but why? More importantly, where was the scheme unfolding?
A case of content theft: this narrative is not rightfully on Amazon; if you spot it, report the violation.
As I pondered how to discover the answer, my gaze fell upon Ms. Hermiter’s coat rack. Only a single overcoat had been placed on it, styled in a military fashion with the addition of long, flowing coattails. Dyed a rich, bright red, it had braid and trim that no simple thug would desire. I could almost imagine Patricia wearing it, though she would surely complain about how much of a target it would make her. It had to be the property of Ms. Hermiter herself.
I crossed to it in a rush, seeing the opportunity to employ Daniel’s most recent brainchild, which he had given to me during my last visit. It was a flat, brass-bound disk about the size of an overgrown pocketwatch. Intricate designs were worked into the metal and mechanisms whirred within it. Those mechanisms drove the series of needles aligned along its upper surface, all of which pointed unerringly toward a bag set into a depression at its top.
From that bag I removed a small, luminescent stone. The needles twitched as I did so, and one made a particularly violent motion as I moved the stone back and forth. It never failed to point directly toward the stone, though it seemed to have some trouble when the stone moved above the plane of the disc. Daniel had referred to the device as a Delphic Compass, though I questioned the prophetic nature of it. The four stones he had called Oracles, and he had promised me that no matter how far away the stones were from the compass, one of the needles would always be able to track them. If I could hide one among a person’s effects, I would be able to track them just as easily. It was an interesting concept and I did wonder how he had managed to twist the use of the Distillation to make it work, but I had no time for such imaginings now.
I slipped the Oracle into a pocket of Hermiter’s coat, careful to choose one that had no other objects in it, and would likely not be used for much of anything. When I was sure my little gift was well secreted, I pocketed the Delphic again and made for the door. If I wished anything to come from this visit to the lion’s den, I would need to escape without being seen.
Even as I started toward the nearest ladder with the intent of securing that objective, I heard a small army of guards and workers gathering in the warehouse below the walkway where I stood. A sharp female voice cut across their murmurs, strong enough to bring their complaints and mutters to a halt—Lady Hermiter once again. “Gentlemen! We have an intruder. I do not expect miracles from you—not when there are so few saints among you.” She paused for a rumble of humor to run through them. “But I do expect this trespasser to be found immediately. The man or woman who finds him will be paid a bounty of one hundred pounds. Now, get to work.”
It was clear that staying in the warehouse would prove a considerable risk to my future security and happiness. As the group of workers began to disperse, I started along the walkway toward the nearest ladder, escape in the forefront of my mind. Yet Ms. Hermiter was obviously not done.
“Hobbes, Farland, Daniels! Come with me. He might be heading for my office, and I want to catch him in the act if I can.”
I needed to move, and quickly. As appealing as a direct confrontation might have seemed, I would pose no threat to Hermiter alone. Even had the numbers not been rather decidedly against me, I still would have been reluctant to approach the crime lord until I knew more about Lord Devonshire’s plans. Hermiter was merely a pawn in his game; if I removed her from play, his foul machinations might still continue. They certainly had even after Rook had died, with catastrophic results for the Academy. I had been mistaken once where Devonshire was concerned, and I had promised myself that I would not be so again.
A desperate search yielded no obvious, unguarded exits. The doors were nearly all on the first floor, except for the one which I had used to enter the warehouse, and I could see thugs waiting at each of them. I considered forcing my way back to the roof, but then abandoned the idea; the Icarus would not have enough of a charge to bear me to safety even if I escaped through that door intact. The guards began to climb the ladders leading to my walkway, and I wondered if my luck had finally come to an end.
Then my gaze fell on the opening of a chute and I stopped. It was clearly meant to convey trash from the second floor to the first. An idea bloomed, one entirely worthy of Patricia’s approval, and I grimaced at her likely reaction to my predicament. Then I moved to the chute with a sigh; I was inside before the thugs reached the walkway.
Sometimes there is truly no respite for the wicked.
The beginning of my exodus from Hermiter’s warehouse was considerably less dramatic—and dignified—than my arrival. The chute deposited me in a small wheeled container of trash, one which was eventually rolled out of the warehouse by a grumbling worker. We passed several guards on the way, who muttered darkly about their continuing search. My journey ended in a trash pile, where half a hundred rotting crates and broken shipments were clustered together.
I waited while Hermiter’s guards continued their search inside and nightfall approached. My patience was rewarded soon enough. As I had hoped, the trash collection service came to remove the refuse and moved through the gate without much fanfare. The guards barely checked the collectors before allowing them to rumble past in their large, hulking horseless cart. With admirable lack of disgust or squeamishness, the trash collectors began to comb through the debris and sort it into the containers on their cart, nearly oblivious to all else.
I managed, without alerting them to my presence, to steal over to the cart and attach myself to the underside. My climbing tool was invaluable in this task. Though the journey was a rough one, with every cobblestone sending a jolt through my body, I was ferried out of the warehouse compound with nary a whisper. Victorious, I smiled as we left the gates and pulled out into the traffic of the street.
My good cheer was rather short lived. I managed, with a minimum of injury, to free myself from the refuse cart a mile from the warehouse. The trash collectors appeared to have taken no notice of their suddenly lightened load; their dull lives were likely too full of humbling toil to care much for such details. Various passersby did take notice of my sudden appearance, as well as the rather disheveled appearance I must have presented to the world. My clothing had suffered rather considerably during my extended journey. Both my coat and hat were torn in places, and my trousers were spattered with mud and littered with straw from the crates as well. Bruises and scrapes lay underneath those more superficial damages, and my body began to ache and complain at its ill use.
All the same, I straightened up and dusted myself off as best I could. I looked coldly at those who had stopped to stare at me, and they quickly turned their attention elsewhere. As soon as I had arranged myself and stepped to one side of another rumbling cart, I tried to get my bearings.
What I found was mildly discouraging. The cart had not taken me any closer to the tube station. It would take hours to return to my home, and I remembered the fierce promise Patricia had given me with rather painful clarity. If she had been anyone else, I might have believed her capable of misstating the time she would arrive at my door, but with Patricia it was guaranteed that she would be there very close to first light. If I meant to have any sleep at all before she came, I would need to head straight home.
Determined to reach that ever-so-precious goal, I began my long, unfortunate trek through Whitechapel toward the tube station. I tried not to notice as the streets began to empty; even in calmer times, Whitechapel had never been considered a safe place at night. Now, with the Dollmaker lurking in the dark, none would want to brave the twilight if they could help it. The denizens of the borough vanished into their homes—or at least to the places where they intended to stay for the hours until dawn. It was with some envy that I watched them disappear as light faded from the sky.
The chill of the autumn air bit deep at me as I made my way down the cobblestones and broken roads. Still smarting from my rough ride and my efforts at the warehouse, I shivered and drew the tattered remnants of my coat around me. The lengthening shadows had taken on a looming, lurid cast as they stretched out across the roads before me. I wondered briefly if Patricia was out there, hunting the murderer without me. It was not an image I entertained gladly, and I strove to drive it from my mind.
By the time I neared my goal, the sun had completely set beyond the horizon, and the night was darkening all around me. There was no longer any evidence of people, not beyond the occasional lantern-lit window glowing in the gloom. Even the taverns seemed to be bleak and empty, a fact I blamed squarely on the threat of the Dollmaker. What else besides the danger of a shadowy murderer could keep the men of Whitechapel from their drinks?
I snorted to myself at the thought and would have continued on my way had I not caught sight of something in one of the alleys. It was the flutter of a skirt, quite possibly the last thing I would have expected in Whitechapel, but the motion was undeniable. For a moment I stood uncertain of what to do; after all, with Whitechapel being what it was, the woman wearing that skirt would not have been considered fine company by any means. Quite possibly she was a drunk who had wandered out beyond her intended curfew, or perhaps was a rather brave lady of ill repute who was determined to search out a client for her trade. Either possibility did little to endear to me the idea of escorting her home and out of danger. Worse, it was doubtful the lady would appreciate my interference no matter what my intentions were.
At the same time, I knew I could not leave the foolish woman so exposed. It was practically an offering to the Dollmaker. Resigned to my course, I approached the mouth of the alley and called out to her. “You there! Are you all right?”
Either due to inattention or drunkenness, the woman did not seem to hear me. Instead, she staggered farther into the gloom of the alley. I started in a hesitant pursuit, hoping the Dollmaker did not already lie in wait for a victim there. Her unsteady gait grew more rapid as I followed, and I called out in a blend of frustration and bafflement. “Please, if you would come this way, I might be able to help you. This place is not safe at this time of night. You need to find some place to stay.” Heedless of my warning, the woman continued her flight, and I was forced to lengthen my own stride to keep up with her. “Madam, please! I mean only to help you!”
Regardless of whether or not she heard me, the woman scurried back into the deepest shadows of the alleyway, where the looming buildings around us mired the passage in darkness so deep she seemed almost to vanish from sight. I would have dashed headlong into that obscure space if a sound ahead of me had not brought me up short. It was a familiar sound, if only half heard, and I had to think for a moment before I recognized it. It was the thin, sharp sound of a knife being drawn. Instinct brought my headlong charge to a halt.
I hesitated, still peering into the gloom ahead. The sound of the woman’s footsteps had faded completely away, though I thought it impossible that she could have gained so much ground on me. Perhaps she had stopped, but I could not say why she would do so. There was a click, as if a gun was being readied to fire, and it began to dawn on me that my course of action, while quite chivalrous, might not have been the wisest of choices this night. Uncertain, I placed a hand on my pistol. “Whoever you are, there is no need for that sort of thing. I was only attempting to help a lady who passed by here.”
A sharp peal of laughter burst from the darkness, and I stepped back from the well of shadows that had hidden the woman from me. I still saw nothing, but the cold chuckles raised the hairs along the back of my neck. When the laughter died, another new voice spoke, full-throated and feminine, with the soft hiss of Spanish thick on the tongue. “I’m afraid, kind sir, I do not need your help. I imagine that you would agree, Mr. Kingsley?”
Recognition froze my throat for a heartbeat. I knew that voice, though I had not heard it in some time. The last place I would have expected to hear it would be in the depths of Whitechapel, and the worst thing that I could have imagined would be to hear it now, in the darkness of a sheltered alleyway. “Ms. Aleman. How kind of you to recognize me.”
A hint of amusement leaked into her voice. “You managed to impress yourself on my memory the last time we met, Mr. Kingsley.” I heard her step forward, skirts moving in the dark. “Do not presume that your impression was favorable. I hold very few kind feelings toward you, especially now.”
I held up a hand defensively, as if to ward off the words. My other hand itched to draw my pistol in self-defense. “Now, Ms. Aleman, it has been some time since our last encounter. I hope that you would not hold such ancient history against me.”
“It has not been so long as you suspect, Mr. Kingsley. One cannot be expected to have so short a memory. Just as you cannot possibly have remembered that whatever the name I was christened with, my name now is Crimson.” She stepped forward, the blade of her knife and the muzzle of her gun intruding into the light. “And might I warn you that if you should try anything with the weapon on your belt, you will quickly remember why that name suits me. I hope you would make a wiser choice.”
Her words stopped me immediately. I watched her weapons move, wary. “Ms. Aleman—or Crimson, if you insist upon that name—might I ask your purpose? Surely you have not returned to London for the sheer exercise of vengeance upon me. An accomplished woman such as yourself has far more important things to take care of than a mere investigator.”
“Indeed.” She fell silent for a moment. “I came to hunt the Dollmaker, Mr. Kingsley. You just happened to intrude on my plans and fall into my trap. Rather like the last time we met, if I recall.”
I made an attempt to keep my face calm as I realized what sort of trap I had been caught in. It was a clever ruse, designed to catch those who preyed on helpless, isolated women. Certainly it was the sort of trap that could catch the predator now hunting the streets of Whitechapel. The only downside I could find was that instead of the Dollmaker, Crimson had caught me—a fact which, considering our previous history, did nothing to lessen my danger. I cleared my throat. “I have nothing to do with the Dollmaker, Crimson.”
There was no response for a moment. Then a sigh. “I know, Mr. Kingsley. However you have inconvenienced me in the past, I know your nature well enough not to suspect that.” Her knife disappeared, followed by her pistol. “Nor am I so foolish as to waste time and opportunity taking revenge on you while more important matters need my attention.”
Relief filled me, banishing the chill of fear from my heart. I took a step back, arms open. “I am glad to hear that, Ms. Aleman. Perhaps we can meet later on other terms.”
“I did not say we were done, Mr. Kingsley.” The bite in her voice returned, and she stepped forward into the light.
She had not changed despite the years. Crimson wore a plain, black dress with no embroidery, perfectly suited for skulking in the shadows. Her eyes were dark, the pupils deep orbs that reflected the light with a cold gleam. Olive skin further hinted at an ancestry from the southern portions of Europe, whether Italy or Spain, though that fact was not what caught my attention.
Her smile, merciless and unpitying, revealed teeth sharper than any normal woman’s would have been. While I dared not put forth my hand to confirm it, her incisors and canines seemed especially long and sharp. The supple, unwavering grace of her movements and the hunger in her eyes as her gaze touched for a moment on my throat were clues enough to the specifics of her Change. Those hints were fortified and underlined by the slight tremble in her hands as she caressed the weapons at her waist.
Her Change was not unknown to me, of course. Few familiar with the Distillation, or the general course of the upheaval which had followed it, could have been ignorant of it. The history of that curse was once again the consequence of the lack of caution our forefathers had shown. During the early, heady days of experimentation with the Distillation, scientists had found that, like many other plants, opium poppies could be induced to grow at an accelerated rate.
Unfortunately for the populace of England and Europe in general, they did not realize that the drugs made from the plant picked up some part of whatever energy the crystal gave off. As a result, students, intellectuals, the infirm, and others who were using the drug soon began to feel unrestrained cravings for human blood. By the time the government understood the problem and banned the drug, many Changlings struggled with the affliction, and though the government’s ban on the substance had slowed the spread of the curse, it did little to solve the issues the addicts faced.
Of course, not every vampire struggled with their desire for blood. Some positively reveled in it, a fact that only alienated those afflicted with it even further in the eyes of their fellows. Crimson was not one of them, by my previous encounters with her—but for vampires, the line between barbarism and civilization was always very close, and I had no inclination to tempt her toward it this night.
She continued. “I have heard several reports of your activities today from the constables. Apparently, you have been quite busy stirring up trouble among the criminals here.” My stomach sank with dread, and Crimson smiled. “If I cannot find the Dollmaker, good sir, at the least I can deliver you to the law instead. Let us be about it.”