Lady Maccon ground her teeth together. “Felicity! What have you done? Oh, gracious me, it was you who stole my journal on the dirigible to Scotland, wasn’t it?”
Felicity looked archly up at the ceiling.
“You leaked my pregnancy to the press intentionally, didn’t you?”
Felicity gave a delicate little shrug.
Alexia was quite disgusted with her sister. To be stupid was one thing; to be stupid and evil yielded up untidy consequences. “Why, you conniving bit of baggage! How could you? To your own flesh and blood!” She was also scandalized. “Do pull your dress up. What a neckline!” Alexia was so out of temper, in fact, she nearly forgot that they were all in danger from a rampaging two-story octopus. “And?”
Felicity pursed her lips and looked at the ceiling.
“Go on!”
“Oh, really, sister, there is no need to take that tone of voice with me. All Lord Ambrose wanted was a few reports on your activities and health now and again. Well, and the journal. Until this recent change of address—then we thought if I were to take up residence with you, well, you know?.?.?.?And I’ve been visiting with the countess only now and again, let her have a little nibble, relay some information. No harm done. She’s perfectly lovely, isn’t she? Quite the motherly sort.”
“Aside from the neck biting?” Sarcasm was, of course, the lowest form of discourse, but sometimes Alexia couldn’t resist such temptation as her sister offered. That was probably how Countess Nadasdy felt. Which explains those ugly shawls Felicity’s been wearing. She’s been hiding her neck.
They both turned to watch the countess as she conferred with two of her drones. She was moving lightning fast from one task to the next, preparing to defend her territory with both might and cunning and, if Alexia’s eyes were to be believed, a tin of what looked to be pickled herring. The vampire queen had the demeanor and appearance of some sort of small, quick hedge bird—a tit, perhaps. If a tit could kill you with a mere nod of its little feathered head.
“Felicity. What did you tell her about me?”
“Well, anything I could think of, of course. But really, Alexia, your activities are very dull. I fail to see why anyone should be interested in you or that child of yours.”
“You would.”
With her hive busy mustering up troops, the countess flitted back over, sat down, and looked as though she intended to return to tea.
Lady Maccon narrowed her eyes, marched the last few feet to the beautiful cream brocade settee, and placed a very firm and very bare hand on the vampire queen’s forearm. Alexia was a good deal stronger than a proper English lady ought to be, and the countess was suddenly ill equipped to shake off such a grip.
“No more tea.” Alexia was quite decided on this point.
The countess looked from her to her sister. “Remarkable, isn’t it? Sisterhood, I mean. One would never guess it to look at you.”
Alexia rolled her eyes, let go of the countess’s arm, and gave her a look of mild reproach. “My sister cannot possibly have been an effective spy.”
The vampire queen shrugged and reached for her tea—the ordinary kind. She sipped at the bone china cup delicately, taking no pleasure or sustenance from the beverage.
Waste of perfectly good tea, thought Alexia. She looked at Felicity. But, then, the countess probably thought Felicity was a waste of perfectly good blood.
Her sister assumed a dramatically relaxed pose atop the tea trolley, her face petulant.
Alexia reached for a treacle tartlet and popped it into her own mouth.
“You have been conducting some interesting investigations recently, Lady Maccon,” said the vampire queen slyly. “Something to do with your father’s past, if what your sister has relayed is true. And a ghost. I know you are adverse to my advice, but trust me, Lady Maccon, it would be best not to delve too deeply into Alessandro Tarabotti’s records.”
Alexia thought about Floote, who always seemed to know more about her father than he was willing to tell her. Or was allowed to tell her.
“Did you vampires somehow have my father classified? Do you have my butler under a gag order? And now you are corrupting my sister. Really, Countess Nadasdy, why go to such lengths?” Lady Maccon put her hand back onto the vampire queen’s arm, turning her mortal once more.
The countess flinched but did not pull away. “Really, Lady Maccon, must you? It’s a most unsettling sensation.”
At which juncture Lord Ambrose turned and saw what was occurring on the couch.
“Let go of her, you soul-sucking bitch!” He charged across the room.
Alexia let go and raised her parasol.
“Now, Ambrose, no harm done.” The countess sounded placid but her fangs were showing slightly.
Felicity was looking back and forth between the players around her with increasing befuddlement on her pretty face. Since Felicity often wore such a look whenever attempting to understand any conversation not directly concerning herself, Alexia saw no reason to explain. The last thing Felicity needed to know was that her older sister was anything more than a bother. That is, assuming Felicity still doesn’t know I’m preternatural. Right now it’s difficult to put anything past her.
Lord Ambrose looked as though he would very much like to strike Lady Maccon.
Still holding the parasol at the defensive, Alexia reached inside her reticule and withdrew Ethel. She then lowered the parasol to reveal the gun now pointed at the vampire.
“Back away a little, if you would, Lord Ambrose. You are making me feel most unwelcome.”
Lord Ambrose did as he was told with a snorted, “You are unwelcome.”
“Do I have to keep reminding everyone? I had an invitation!”
“Alexia, you have a gun!” exclaimed Felicity, horrified.
“Yes.” Lady Maccon relaxed back into the settee and allowed the gun to waver slightly over toward the countess. “I should warn you, Lord Ambrose, my aim is not very accurate.”
“And is that gun loaded with?.?.?.??” He did not finish the sentence. He did not need to.
“I should never, of course, admit to the fact that Ethel here is equipped with sundowner bullets. But a few may have accidentally made it from my husband’s stock into my own. Can’t imagine how.”
Lord Ambrose backed farther away.
Alexia looked with annoyance at her sister. “Get off the tea trolley, Felicity, do. What a place for a young lady to be sitting. Do you have any idea what kind of trouble you are in?”
Felicity sniffed. “You sound just like Mama.”
“Yes, well, you are beginning to act like Mama!”
Felicity gasped.
Lord Ambrose made a move forward, thinking Lady Maccon’s attention distracted.
Ethel swung once more toward the countess. Alexia’s hand was remarkably steady. “Ah, ah, ah.”
The vampire backed away again.
“Now,” said Alexia, “I do so hate to do this to you all. But really, our safest bet would be to get out of here. And quickly.”
The countess shook her head. “You may leave, of course, Lady Maccon, but—”
“No, no, both of us, I insist.”
“Foolish child,” said the Duke of Hematol, coming back into the room. “How can anyone know so little of vampire edict and sit the Shadow Council? Our queen cannot leave this house. It is not a matter of choice—it is a matter of physiology.”
“She could swarm.” Lady Maccon swung her gun once more toward the vampire queen.
Lord Ambrose hissed.
Lady Maccon said, “Go on, Countess, swarm. There’s a good vampire.”
The duke let out an annoyed sigh. “Save us all from the practicality of soul-suckers. She can’t swarm on command, woman. Queens don’t just up and swarm when told they have to. Swarming is a biological imperative. You might as well tell someone to spontaneously combust.”
Alexia looked at Lord Ambrose. “Really? Would that work on him?”
At which juncture the most tremendous crash reverberated through the house, and guests at the party below started screaming.
The octomaton had arrived.
Lady Maccon gestured with her gun in an arbitrary manner. “Now will you swarm?”
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
In Which Lady Maccon Mislays Her Parasol
The countess jumped to her feet. So, too, did Felicity. Lord Ambrose decided Lady Maccon was no longer the greatest threat in his world and turned toward the racket.
“Now would be an excellent time,” prodded Alexia.
The countess shook her head in exasperation. “Swarming is not something one chooses. I know this is difficult for you to understand, soul-sucker, but not everything is the result of conscious thought. Swarming is instinct. I have to know, deep down in my soul on a supernatural level, that my hive is no longer safe. Then I would have to source a new hive, never to return to this one. Now is not that time.”
The house fairly rattled on its foundations as another mighty crash rent the air.
“Are you convinced of that?” wondered Alexia.
Something was literally tearing its way through the building, as a child will rip paper twists to get at the sugar candy inside. Tasty vampire candy. Mmm.
Felicity started to scream.
“Where did you stash Quesnel, Countess Nadasdy?” Lady Maccon raised her voice to carry over the din.
The countess was distracted by the commotion. “What?”
“I was simply suggesting you might want to retrieve him. Have him with you, and soon.”
“Oh, yes, excellent plan. Hematol, would you fetch the boy?”
“Yes, my queen.” The duke, having only just appeared, looked reluctant to obey; no vampire wishes to leave the side of his queen when she is in danger. But a direct order was a direct order, so he bowed perfunctorily and scurried off.
Yet another crash sounded. The door burst open. Dr. Caedes, a number of the footman-drones, and several other hive vampires ran into the room. Mabel Dair was the last inside, slamming the door behind her. The actress’s beautiful gold gown was ripped, and her hair had fallen down about her face. She looked as though she were just about to perform Ophelia’s death scene to a packed audience.
“My queen, you would not believe the monster down there! It is horrible! It ripped right through the wall, the one with the Titian. And it broke the bust of Demeter.”
The countess was obligingly sympathetic to the trauma. “Come to me, my dear.”
Mabel Dair ran to her mistress, knelt at her feet, and buried her face in the vampire’s full skirts. Her hands were trembling where they gripped the fine taffeta material.
Alexia was tempted to clap. Spectacular performance!
The queen set one perfect white hand atop Miss Dair’s cascading blond curls and looked to her hive. “Dr. Caedes, report! What is the octomaton’s armament? Is it standard to the earlier model?”
“No, my queen, it seems to have been modified.”
“Fire?”
“Yes, but only one tentacle. And the customary wooden blades. But a third seems to be able to shoot stakes. And the fourth has bullets.”
“Go on. That’s only four.”
“It hasn’t yet used any of the others yet.”
“If this is Madame Lefoux we are dealing with, she’ll have armed every single tentacle with something deadly. That’s how she thinks.”
Alexia couldn’t help but agree. Genevieve was like that about her gadgets—the more uses the better.
The wall on the opposite side of the room shook. They heard a horrible, wrenching, tearing, crashing noise. It was the sound of metal and wood and brick colliding. The entire wall before them was ripped asunder. Once the dust settled, the domed head of the octomaton became visible, balanced atop its many tentacles. The creature scrabbled for purchase within the rubble of what had once been one of London’s most stylish residences. The silver light of the moon and the bright gas of the streetlamps lit up the gleaming metal hide of the mechanical creature. Alexia could just see the fleeing forms of the countess’s party guests in the street below.
Alexia raised her parasol and stood. She pointed the frilly accessory at the octomaton accusingly. “Genevieve, I do hope you didn’t kill anyone.”
But if Madame Lefoux was in there, guiding the creature, she did not acknowledge Lady Maccon. She had one intended target and one target only—Countess Nadasdy.
A gigantic tentacle wormed its way up into the room and hit out at the vampire queen, trying to crush her. Alexia preferred to lead with an airborne offensive, but Madame Lefoux was opting for hand-to-hand—or was that hand-to-tentacle?—combat. Possibly to protect as many innocents as she could.
The queen, supernatural in speed and cunning, simply dodged out of the way of the massive metal thing. But she was well and truly trapped, for there were no other doors out of that room, and half of her house was now destroyed.
