The Wolf Witch Read online

  “Is that even possible?”

  “We don’t know, but there have been whispers for the past few years.”

  At the note of hopelessness in his voice, Emmeline brightened her features and changed the subject as she had done when her mother got that look. “You have three children, don’t you? What are they like? I have never had siblings before.”

  “Well, there’s Theo, who is my oldest. He is the most civilized of my children and the most responsible, as the eldest often are. He doesn’t shift much anymore as he has health problems, but he’s very dedicated to supporting the local families.”

  Without meeting his gaze, she took a few crumbs from his hand and tossed them to the birds. “How old is he?”

  “Twenty-four. My youngest, Eudora, is twenty.” A smile quirked his lips despite the sadness in his eyes. “She’s… Well, she’s different. Wild in every way her brother is calm. I guess that’s what happens when there’s no mother to care for a woman.”

  “And she was raised by wolves.”

  Silas chuckled. “Perhaps. Then, there’s Wesley. He’s twenty-three. Like I said, he got himself involved with the Pinkertons and fancies himself a detective.”

  “Why don’t you like him being a Pinkerton?”

  “No parent likes their child risking their life for people they don’t know. In the past three years, he has been shot at, punched, drugged, and plenty of things I’m sure he hasn’t told me. It takes him away from us for long periods. It puts a strain on the family, but he always comes back. Then, he spends half his time running around the countryside making mischief like a pup.” The smile on Bisclavret’s face faded as he puffed out a breath, tracing the loose arabesques with his eyes. Biting his lip, he shook his head and whispered, “I just know he shifted and got caught. My job is to protect my people, and I don’t know what I’ll do if they’ve killed him.”

  Raising her gaze to the buildings flanking the park, Emmeline’s heart quickened. There was one place he might be. One place she never wanted to return to.

  “If he was arrested, I think I may know where they’ve taken your son.”

  Chapter Six

  Cannibals and Conspiracies

  Emmeline and Silas Bisclavret sat side-by-side in front of Judith Elliot’s desk. For what felt like an eternity, they waited. Emmeline had hoped they could storm into Interceptor’s Headquarters, demand to see Wesley, and get out before she could start overthinking. That ship had quickly sailed.

  The office hadn’t changed in the months since the summer solstice, and something about that made Emmeline want to sweep everything off Miss Elliot’s desk and stomp it into the carpet. That day everything changed. Her world—her future—had turned upside down in the space of a few hours, yet no one there seemed to care. They had locked up the villain responsible and her co-conspirator was dead, and the monster they had tried to summon remained safely in the void. What else was there for them to think about?

  Tears burned the back of Emmeline’s eyes against her will. By now, she could have been married to Lord Hale. In that life, she would have lived in a comfortable home, the lady of the house and a lady to all. Soon, they would start a family, and Cecil would love and cherish her until death. Emmeline swiped at the moisture on her cheek with the back of her hand. At least one of those dreams had come true even if the rest of her dreams had been ground to dust. Raising her gaze to the desk, she found her father watching her, his head cocked and his eyes quietly searching her features.

  “Would you like to talk about it?” Silas asked, his voice rumbling from deep in his chest.

  “Not particularly.” Catching the edge in her voice, she straightened and said, “I lost someone very dear to me, and instead of letting me mourn, they dragged me here to be interrogated. I still haven’t forgiven them.”

  Silas nodded slowly. His slowness was something Emmeline had noticed and all at once understood and hated. He spoke as if each word had been drawn and stretched from his throat, the cadence of his accent melding the sounds into something unfamiliar. He moved deliberately and with purpose, keeping his steps to a languid stroll that gave him an air of confidence that parted crowds and attracted stares. Caught in his orbit, Emmeline desperately tried to spin out like a comet only to be dragged back to his pace. It was why she sat quietly in her chair rather than pacing the room or ransacking Miss Elliot’s desk as she would have done if she were alone. His hand crept in from the side of her vision, slow enough that she could easily pull hers away before he patted her gloved hand and gave it a gentle squeeze.

  “I’m sorry you have had so much loss,” Silas whispered.

  “Me too.” At the sound of footsteps echoing down the hall, Emmeline steeled her features and kept her voice level as she said, “When she comes, don’t lie to her. She has the ability to rip the truth from you and she can tell when you’re being false. Let me deal with her.”

  Before her father could respond, the door swung open to reveal Judith Elliot’s statuesque features and perfectly curled golden hair. Resisting the urge to pat her wayward mane, Emmeline sat taller to counter the practioner’s military bearing. Judith stiffened upon meeting Emmeline’s gaze, but she quickly caught herself as Silas and Emmeline rose to their feet. Her attention flickered between them, accompanied by the nudge of her energy against their minds. Emmeline gritted her teeth.

  “Miss Jardine, to what do I owe this visit? I heard you urgently needed to speak to me.”

  “I do. Father, this is Miss Elliot. Miss Elliot, I would like to introduce you to—”

  “I know who he is. Silas Bisclavret, head of the Southern Louisiana Pack. Better known as the Rougarou.” Judith eyed him wearily and folded her hands behind her back when he gave a little bow. “If this is an official visit from Les Meutes, you are required to give us notice of your visit.”

  “Consider this my notice.”

  Emmeline added, matching the other woman’s clipped tones, “We’re here because I believe you are holding my brother against his will. We would like to know why.”

  “Your brother? I was under the impression—”

  “Your impression was wrong.” Emmeline’s smile bordered on a grimace at the knock of Judith’s power trying to wriggle into her mind. “His name is Wesley Bisclavret. He’s a werewolf and a Pinkerton. I doubt you get many werewolves. If he is being held due to a simple prejudice—”

  “Mr. Bisclavret is being held on suspicion of murder and for shifting on English soil. I’d hardly consider that a witch hunt, Miss Jardine.”

  “Murder? Of whom? We aren’t the wolves of the Old World. Our methods don’t cause depravity, and my son isn’t—”

  “He’s a werewolf, Mr. Bisclavret,” Judith snapped, her American accent far sharper than Silas’s. “The fact that he shifted was cause enough to have him executed, but we have stayed the Crown’s hand in order to complete our investigation. Les Meutes has no jurisdiction here.”

  “Who is he accused of killing?”

  Emmeline froze at the low warning growl in her father’s voice. Beneath his neat suit and gold cuff links, Emmeline could practically see the faint outline of a wolf overlaying his form. Her mind sensed a predator in her midst, but at least she wasn’t prey this time. Judith’s eyes remained fully focused on Silas Bisclavret as if in challenge. Emmeline wasn’t sure if she was brave or incredibly stupid.

  “One of our own. A well-respected antiquarian and a restorer of extranormal objects. We found your son beside his body in wolf form. Mr. Lockwood had been eviscerated.”

  “We aren’t cannibals.”

  “Miss Elliot,” Emmeline cut in before she could begin again, “have you used your ability on Wesley to determine if he’s telling the truth? That would remove all doubt.”

  Judith frowned. “My ability only works on human minds.”

  “Then, we would like to see him. We want proof that he is still alive and so we can discuss how to prepare for a trial. If you will not allow that, we will summon Les Meutes.�
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  Emmeline conjured her best commanding look while her father glanced at her in unease. For an instant Judith’s gaze flinched toward the sheathed naginata hanging on a peg behind her door. Slowly she turned to the owl-eyed girl, and in Emmeline’s mind she heard her voice clear as her own. Be careful where you tread. I’m not your enemy.

  “Let me be clear with both of you. I’m a lawyer by trade, and while American and British laws are quite different, I want you to make peace with the idea that your son may not get a trial. He isn’t considered human under British law.”

  “I want to see him. Give an old man that.”

  “Let me speak to my superiors and see what I can do.”

  When Judith shut the door behind her, Emmeline half expected her to lock them in. She deflated as best she could without her father seeing. More loss. Feeling Silas’s eyes upon her, Emmeline turned to find him studying her with a small, affectionate smile. She thought he might scold her for the way she behaved; her aunt would have.

  “That was something. How do you know about Les Meutes?”

  “I don’t. The way you spoke of it, I assumed they were important. Really, I just threw back what the Interceptors would do in this situation if one of their own was captured.”

  “Not bad,” he said, seeming genuinely impressed.

  A bubble of pride swelled in Emmeline’s breast before she remembered her half-brother still remained tangled in this mess. Her half-brother who apparently was also half monster. It was hard to imagine her father as anything but a loud American in a suit.

  “I’m sorry about Wesley. I’m not certain what else to do to help him.”

  “You’ve already done plenty, Emmeline. But I have faith that Wesley will be safe.” Fishing into his pocket, he pulled out a wooden rosary. “Would you like to pray with me?”

  Emmeline stared at the alien object, slightly taken aback by its miniature tortured Christ and rough carvings of the Virgin and Child. “I probably don’t know those prayers. Are most werewolves Papists?”

  A tired laugh escaped his lips. “Yes, one more reason for England to distrust us.”

  Closing his eyes, Silas looped the rosary around his hands as his mouth moved in silent prayer. Emmeline envied the easy way he fell into prayer. Her mother had stressed thanking the gods and divine creatures for their aid, but Emmeline never felt she did it properly. Her mind was too loud, too turbulent for meditation or communing with the beyond without a focus. Sitting beside him, she called upon her mother for aid. She had only just gained a family, and it was already being taken away.

  ***

  It had taken over an hour for Miss Elliot to get approval from her superiors to take Emmeline and her father to see Wesley. In that time, her father had prayed while she sat in painful silence watching the beads slip over his fingers like tears. After a while, he grew restless and told her about the bayou he patrolled and the house that had been built after the first had been torched during the War Between the States. She longed to see the balconies with their lacy iron work and the cypress trees standing like sentinels in the swamps. It had a magical quality to it that London lacked.

  As they followed Judith deeper into the bowels of the headquarters, she clung to the images of Louisiana. With every ancient iron-barred door and hexed threshold that made Emmeline’s skin itch, her hope eroded a fraction. Somewhere in this building Lady Rose might still be locked up, if they hadn’t executed her for trying to summon a creature from the other side. Emmeline might still be in there if she hadn’t been able to prove that she had tried to stop the ritual. Passing a group of Interceptors chatting near what appeared to be a gymnasium, she felt their eyes upon her. How many recognized her from that day? Shame rekindled within her, but she couldn’t leave yet, even though every fiber of her being told her to leave with what shreds of dignity she had left. Beside her, Silas walked with his back straight and his eyes ahead, a comforting wall against those around her.

  Descending what felt like the tenth staircase she’d crossed, Emmeline shivered as she passed a row of knob-less doors. The air there felt thicker, as if she were passing through an invisible web of magic. Her temples ached as they did after a reading that lasted too long and the place behind her heart where fire bloomed felt empty. Silas must have felt it too for he rolled his shoulders as if working out an ache and sweat formed at his brow. At the end of the hall stood a single door. Ruins and sigils scarred the entire surface, glowing dully with blue, red, and green light. Growing closer, she could hear whispers, but as soon as she thought she could make out their meaning, the words fled from her grasp. Judith stood solemnly before the door.

  “You have fifteen minutes. And don’t do anything foolish,” she added, giving Emmeline a pointed look.

  With a string of words in a language Emmeline couldn’t identify and the press of her hand, Judith opened the door. Emmeline had expected to hear the pleading cries or heckling of the prisoners. Instead, there was silence. Silas stepped inside first, offering Emmeline his hand as she stepped over the warded threshold. The air hummed unpleasantly, making it hard to string together a full thought. In the center of the room sat a large cage. It stood seven feet in each direction with a cot against one set of bars and a chamber pot with a water pitcher in the other. Sigils lined the walls and wrapped around the bars and floor like the scrawl of a madman. At first the cage looked empty, but as she drew closer, she noticed a man leaning against the side of the bed with his knees curled up under his chin.

  He sat so still that for a moment, she thought he was asleep. At the sound of her hesitant steps, his eyes darted in their direction but his head remained still. The front of his shirt had been torn at the neck and hung open to reveal a sliver of olive, sun-kissed skin beneath that looked sallow in the room’s scant light. His feet were bare and lined with dirt, and while the beginnings of a beard obscured the lower half of his face, she could see the resemblance to their father in his jaw, the curve of his hazel eyes, and the curl of his hair. From his mother, he had received a more rounded nose and a full bottom lip that only heightened his petulant frown. That she recognized from her own mirror.

  Silas sucked in his breath, his feet moving of their own accord until he stood at the edge of the sigils. He reached over the faintly glowing symbols and grimaced as he wrapped his hands around the bars. Emmeline had seen that same frayed look on her mother’s face when Immanuel Winter had hauled her out of the Thames.

  “Wesley,” Silas called, his voice wavering.

  Wesley picked up his head, but it wasn’t until their father repeated his name that he turned toward them. His eyes alighted as he scrambled to his feet. While he appeared to have been fed, his eyes had become glassy and his face gaunt. Wesley carefully gripped the bars a few inches below his father’s hands and stared into his face as if he still wasn’t certain he was real.

  “Pa? Pa, is that really you?”

  Silas crushed Wesley to the bars, holding him to his chest and cupping his head and back. Drawing him back a fraction, Silas kissed his son’s forehead and rested his cheek against it. Emmeline bit back the nudge of anger at the back of her throat and averted her gaze. There was no reason to be angry, but she missed the familiar touch and protective fear of a parent. Silas Bisclavret might be her father, but Wesley was his son.

  “Pa, how did you get here?” Wesley peeled out of his father’s grasp and staggered back without releasing the bars. “How did you find me? They didn’t let me send a letter or a telegraph.”

  “Alfonse Dupre contacted me when you didn’t send your scheduled message.” He brushed the dirt from his son’s face and held his arm despite the tension in his features from standing on the sigils. “I knew something was wrong, so I got on the first dirigible to London.”

  “But what about Theo and Dora? Who’s keeping—?”

  “I’m sure your brother and sister have it in hand. What do you think they’ve been doing since you left, sha?”

  Wesley winced and withdrew from t
he bars. Rubbing his eyes and temples, he walked in a circle in front of the bed before dropping onto it. “How did you even find me here?”

  “Remember, how I told you, you had a sister in England?” Motioning for Emmeline to come closer, he continued, “I found her, and she realized where you may have been taken. This is Emmeline.”

  Her half-brother’s mouth hung open as his eyes ran up and down her form, lingering at her face. Feeling exposed under the feral edge of his gaze, she crossed her arms and frowned at him.

  “Are you certain it’s her?”

  “Yes.” Silas released the bars and backed out of the sigil. Reaching for his head, he let his hand drop and stared at his son. “Wesley, how did you end up here? I’m having a hard time believing what they told me.”

  “Believe it. Don’t believe it. It won’t change anything.”

  “Wesley,” he growled. “They want to execute you. Do you realize how serious this is?”

  Leaping to his feet, Wesley kicked over the table with the basin. The sound of the falling metal ricocheted off the chamber’s stone walls make Emmeline flinch.

  “Of course I know! I’ve been the one in the damn cell, Pa, waiting for the other shoe to drop.”

  Silas’s voice came faint and strained. “Did you do it?”

  “No! How could you even ask that? Yeah, Pa, I shifted, but I didn’t kill anybody. I’ve been tracking a murderer. He’s killed four people in as many weeks, but no one seems to care,” he said with a pointed glance toward Judith’s shadow in the doorway. “The thing, it’s not one of ours, but it’s similar. I followed the scent to a house. The man was long dead when I got there.” Looking around his father, he met Emmeline’s eyes. “If you don’t believe me, this is what I was wearing when I found the body. Do I look bloody enough to have eaten somebody?”

  Their father licked his lips and shook his head, pacing between them. His eyes gleamed in the low light as he turned to Wesley with a pained rictus. “Was it worth it? Where are the Pinkertons or Les Meutes now? I told you something like this would happen, didn’t I?”