A Scandal in Battersea (Elemental Masters #12)(98)

Alf left for the whorehouse a little before dark in the coach. Alex waited impatiently for him to return by the back door. They had both agreed to continue to take the utmost caution in making sure the neighbors saw nothing, and the very last thing they needed at this point was for some busybody to see a well-dressed girl half carried into the house. The house was utterly silent, except for the slow ticking of the eight-day clock. He was tempted to drink the brandy bottle dry, but nursed his drink, sipping it carefully, just enough to keep the edge off his anxiety.

It was moon-dark, so all he saw of the coach when it finally arrived was a dark shape against the snow. But when he made out a figure coming up the path to the door, he knew his long wait was finally over, and he flung it open immediately.

In the light streaming out of the door, Alf looked like—an ordinary servant bringing in a bundle. He heaved a tremendous sigh of relief. Alf had been cautious—tremendously cautious. There was a roll of what looked like carpet over his shoulder. Presumably the girl was inside it. He found himself giggling, as he recalled how Cleopatra had had herself smuggled in to Julius Caesar in the same fashion. Well, he was no Caesar, and he already knew the girl in the carpet was no Cleopatra either.

Alf thudded up the stairs into the kitchen, and Alexandre closed the door behind him and made sure the curtains were closed on the kitchen windows as Alf stopped next to the table.

Alf slowly slid his burden off his shoulder. “’Elp me ’old ’er hup, guv,” Alf said, and Alexandre steadied the roll upright while Alf unwound the carpet from its contents, catching the swaying girl by her shoulders and keeping her standing. Her eyes were half-closed, and she didn’t seem even remotely aware of her surroundings.

The girl revealed was scrupulously clean, scrubbed right down to her fingernails, which were neatly trimmed. Her hair was washed, her ears had been cleaned. That was a detail that he hadn’t considered, but he was very glad either Alf or the madame had. She was dressed “posh,” as Alf would say—wearing a brown wool gown that would not have looked out of place on a girl of his own social set, a cream silk waist, and good leather boots. Her hair had been pulled back into a severe knot at the base of her neck, and she smelled faintly of lavender.

As for her face . . . she was very, very plain. Horse-faced, he’d have said; her upper teeth protruded over her lower ones, her chin was receded, her nose was large and flat, and her eyes small. But there were plenty of girls in his social set and higher who were just as plain. She would not stand out as an oddity among the other six.

“She’s perfect,” he said aloud. “Worth every penny.”

Alf nodded with satisfaction. “Think yew c’n git ’er downstairs by yerself?”

She was quite light—judging by the thin wrist bones, she hadn’t been fed all that well in the workhouse. And again . . . that was not necessarily an anomaly. He knew girls who were even thinner. He lifted her, and felt a good corset under that dress. The Madame seemed to have covered every possible detail. She had certainly earned her guineas. “Easily. Can you get the boy by yourself?”

Alf snorted. “Jest a tap on th’ ’ead an’ ’e’ll be dreamin’. Leave th’ door open. Oi’ll be roight down.”

The feeling of relief he experienced as he carried the girl down the stairs was the most profound emotion he had ever felt in his life. He was almost giddy with it, as he laid the girl down beside the void in the floor, and stepped back.

Five minutes later, Alf joined him, and laid the boy down beside the girl. The boy looked to be another workhouse or hiring hall acquisition. Thin, poorly dressed, about thirteen. And probably he’d been guzzling beer and stuffing himself and dreaming of what he could steal from his “new employers.”

“Oi’ll jest leave ye to it,” Alf said, and went back up the stairs.

But he hadn’t gotten more than halfway up when the void suddenly erupted into a pillar, the pillar exploded with tentacles, and the tentacles seized the two victims and dragged them into the darkness. The pillar alone remained.

Alexandre let out his breath. “Now . . . we wait.”





18





ALF had always considered himself a practical man, and one of the things about being a practical man was constantly weighing loyalty against . . . circumstances. So far, he had never had circumstances outweigh loyalty, but this situation might change all that.

He sat in the kitchen, nursing brandies. He had fallen in with magicians quite by accident. One had plucked him out of the workhouse at the advanced age of eight, and at that moment, anything would have been better than the life of hard, unforgiving labor in the mills that he seemed to be destined for. He had learned the value of loyalty when his first master had generously rewarded it—and harshly punished disloyalty. A mere Elemental Magician, he had a benign relationship with his Elementals, if a criminal one. He was a professional gambler, and had a small flock of sylphs who thought it highly amusing to tilt dice in his favor,and whisper the cards in each of his opponents’ hands. He never used his own cards or dice, and thus, though he was often accused of cheating, nothing whatsoever could be proved. And the White Lodge either saw no reason to chastise him, or never knew about him—probably the latter.

His first master retired—and old as he was, was probably dead by now—and his second master hired him. This one . . . was one where the weighing of loyalty began. Another mere “magician,” he was . . . a grifter. He always had a scheme going, and thanks to his magic, he generally pulled them off. But he had had a terrible weakness. Not content with visiting whorehouses, as Alf had learned to do, he had to use his powers to convince others to have sex with him: male, female, it didn’t matter. It was one thing when he “seduced” victims of the working class. It was quite another when he decided to set his gaze higher. That was how he had gotten into trouble and how he had found himself on a small smuggling ship being taken across the channel—the trip arranged by Alf. Luckily almost none of the victims remembered Alf, or loyalty would definitely have been outweighed by circumstance.