Lord Akeldama looked him up and down. “My sweet young nak*d boy, you are hardly one to talk. Not that I mind, of course.”
Lord Maccon blushed so profoundly it extended all the way down his neck to his upper torso. Alexia thought it entirely adorable.
Without another word, the earl untied Lord Akeldama and, as gently as possible, slid his hands and feet off the wooden stakes. The vampire lay still and silent for a long time after he had finished.
Miss Tarabotti worried. His wounds should be healing themselves. But, instead, they remained large, gaping holes. There wasn't even any blood dripping from them.
“My dearest girl,” said the vampire finally, examining Lord Maccon with an exhausted but appreciative eye, “such a banquet. Never been one to favor werewolves myself, but he is very well equipped, now, is he not?”
Miss Tarabotti gave him an arch look.
“My goodies,” she warned.
“Humans,” chuckled the vampire, “so possessive.” He shifted weakly.
“You are not well,” commented Lord Maccon.
“Quite right, Lord Obvious.”
Miss Tarabotti looked at the vampire's wounds more closely, still careful not to touch him. She wanted desperately to hug her friend and offer some consolation, but any contact with her and he was certain to die. He was near enough to it already, and returning to human form would end him undoubtedly.
“You are dry,” she remarked.
“Yes,” agreed the vampire. “It all went into him.” He gestured with his chin toward where the new vampire lay under Mr. MacDougall's ministrations.
“I suppose you might take a donation from me?” suggested Lord Maccon dubiously. “Would that work? I mean to say, how fully human does preternatural touch make me?”
Lord Akeldama shook his head weakly. “Not enough for me to feed from you, I suspect. It might work, but it also might kill you.”
Lord Maccon unexpectedly jerked backward, pulling Alexia with him. Two hands were wrapped around his throat, squeezing tightly. The fingers on those hands had no fingernails.
The automaton had crawled all the way across the floor, slowly but surely, and was trying to fulfill the last order given to it: to kill Lord Maccon. This time, with the earl in human form, it stood a fairly good chance of succeeding.
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
Royal Interference
Lord Maccon sputtered and gasped for breath, trying to fight off the repulsive creature with only one hand. Miss Tarabotti beat at the automaton with her free arm. But nothing they did seemed capable of wresting the construct from around the earl's neck. Alexia was about to let go of Lord Maccon's hand and back away, knowing he could free himself in werewolf form, when Lord Akeldama stood shakily up from the platform on which he rested.
The vampire produced a still miraculously immaculate white lace handkerchief from a waistcoat pocket, stumbled over, and wiped the rest of the smudged word off the automaton's forehead.
The monstrosity let go of Lord Maccon and collapsed onto the floor.
The most remarkable thing then occurred. Its skin began melting away in slow rivulets, like warm honey. Slow black blood, mixed with some black particulate matter, leaked out and intermingled with the skin substance. Both slid off a mechanical skeletal structure. Soon, all that was left of the automaton was a metal frame wearing shabby clothing and lying in a gooey puddle of old blood, wax, and small black particles. Its internal organs appeared to be all gears and clockwork mechanisms.
Miss Tarabotti's attention was drawn away from the fascinating mess by Lord Maccon saying, “Oops, whoa there,” and reaching for Lord Akeldama with his free arm.
The vampire was toppling over as well, having utterly exhausted what few resources of energy he had left in administering the deadly handkerchief. Lord Maccon, attached to Alexia with one hand, managed only to slow his fall with the other but not catch him completely. The vampire crumpled to the floor in a sad little heap of plum-colored velvet.
Miss Tarabotti bent over him, still desperately careful not to touch him in any way. He was still, miraculously, alive.
“Why?” she stuttered, glancing over at the automaton, or what had been the automaton. “Why did that work?”
“You only wiped off the P.” asked Lord Maccon, looking thoughtfully at the puddle of homunculus simulacrum residue. Alexia nodded.
“So you turned VIXI—to be alive—into VIX, with difficulty. Thus, the automaton could still move, but only barely. In order to destroy it entirely, you needed to remove the word and the activation particulate completely, breaking the aetheromagnetic connection.”
“Well,” huffed Miss Tarabotti, “how was I supposed to know that? That was my first automaton.”
“And a very good job you made of it, too, my pearl, on such short acquaintance,” complimented Lord Akeldama tenderly from his prone position without opening his eyes. He had yet to succumb to the Grand Collapse, but he looked in imminent danger of doing so.
They heard a great clattering and a quantity of yelling from the hallway behind them.
“Arse over apex, what now?” wondered Lord Maccon, standing up and dragging Miss Tarabotti with him.
A conglomeration of impeccably well-dressed young men bustled into the room, carrying with them the trussed and bound form of Mr. Siemons. They let out a collective shriek upon seeing Lord Akeldama crumpled on the floor. Several rushed over and began billing and cooing about him in an excess of emotional concern.
“Lord Akeldama's drones,” Alexia explained to Lord Maccon.
“I would never have known,” he replied sarcastically.
“Where did they all come from?” wondered Miss Tarabotti.
One of the young men whom Alexia remembered from before—had it only been a few hours ago?— deduced the cure to his master's ailments quickly enough. He pushed the other dandies aside, pulled off his blue silk evening jacket, rolled up his shirtsleeve, and offered his arm to the destabilized vampire. Lord Akeldama's eyes blinked slowly open.
“Ah, my capable Biffy. Do not let me drink too long from you alone.”
Biffy leaned forward and kissed Lord Akeldama on the forehead, as though he were a small child. “Of course not, my lord.” Gently he put his wrist to the vampire's pale lips. Lord Akeldama bit down with a sigh of relief.
Biffy was both smart enough and strong enough to pull away halfway through the feeding. He summoned one of the other drones to take his place. Lord Akeldama, as thirsty as he was from his recent abuse, could easily damage a solo donor beyond repair. Luckily, none of his drones was foolish enough to try and stay the course. The second young man gave way to a third and then a fourth. At this point, Lord Akeldama's wounds began to close, and his skin went from frighteningly gray to its normal porcelain white.
“Explain yourselves, my darlings,” ordered Lord Akeldama as soon as he was able.
“Our little information-gathering excursion into high society's festivities yielded up far more fruit than we had hoped, and more quickly, my lord,” said Biffy. “When we returned home early to find you gone, we proceeded immediately to act upon the information most recently acquired—namely, that which bespoke suspicious activity and bright white lights late at night emanating from the recently opened scientific club, near the Duke of Snodgrove's town residence.”
“And a good thing we did too,” continued Biffy, wrapping a salmon-pink embroidered handkerchief about his own wrist and tying a knot with his teeth. “Not that I doubt your ability to handle the situation, sir,” he said respectfully to Lord Maccon, without the sarcasm the statement ought to have elicited considering the Alpha was still entirely nak*d. “I will say that the moving room contraption transport device gave us some stick. Figured it out in the end, though. We ought to get one of those installed at the town house, my lord.”
“I will think about it,” said Lord Akeldama.
“You did very well,” complimented Miss Tarabotti to the dandies. She believed in giving praise where it was due.
Biffy rolled down his sleeve and pulled his evening jacket back on over broad muscular shoulders. A lady was present, after all—even if her hair was most scandalously loose.
Lord Maccon said, “Someone must go to BUR and get a couple of agents over here to handle the formalities.” He looked about, taking stock: three dead scientists, one new vampire, a trussed-up Mr. Siemons, a blathering Mr. Mac-Dougall, the other mummylike body intended for Alexia's blood, and the remains of an automaton. The chamber was a veritable battlefield. He winced at the mounds of paperwork ahead of him. His own three kills alone would not be too much of a bother. He was chief sundowner, sanctioned killer for queen and country. But explaining the automaton would require eight forms that he could think of, and probably a few more that he could not.
He sighed. “Whoever we send will also need to tell BUR we need sweeps here posthaste to clean up the mess. Have them check to see if there is a local ghost tethered nearby. See if it can be recruited to check for hidden chambers. This is a logistical nightmare.”
Miss Tarabotti stroked his knuckles with her thumb sympathetically. Absentmindedly, Lord Maccon raised her hand to his lips and kissed the inside of her wrist.
Biffy signaled to one of the other drones. With a grin of eagerness, the man clapped his topper to his head and minced out of the room. Alexia wished she had that kind of energy. She was starting to feel the strain of the evening. Her muscles were sore, and all the little points of abuse—the rope burns about her ankles, the cut on her throat, the slice on her arm—had started to ache.
Lord Maccon said to Biffy, “We will need the potentate if we are to shut this operation down completely. Does your master have any drones with high enough rank to get into the Shadow Council without question? Or will I need to do that myself?”
Biffy gave the Alpha an appreciative but courteous once-over. “Looking like that, sir? Well, I am certain many a door might be opened to you, but not the potentate's.”
Lord Maccon, who seemed to be periodically forgetting he was nak*d, sighed at this. Alexia figured, delightedly, that this meant he did, in fact, tend to traipse around his private apartments in the altogether. Marriage was becoming more and more of an attractive prospect. Though, she suspected, such a practice might get distracting in the long term.
Biffy continued, unabashed, to rib the Alpha's appearance. “To the best of our knowledge, the potentate's inclinations lie elsewhere. Unless he is with the queen, of course, in which case you might get right inside.” He paused significantly. “We all know the queen likes a bit of Scottish now and again.” He waggled his eyebrows in a highly suggestive manner.
“You do not say?” gasped Miss Tarabotti, genuinely shocked for the first time that evening. “Those rumors about Mr. Brown, they were true?”
Biffy settled in. “Every word, my dear. You know what I heard just the other day? I heard—”
“Well?” interrupted Lord Maccon.
Biffy shook himself and pointed to one of the young men fussing solicitously over Lord Akeldama: a slight, effete blond, with an aristocratic nose, wearing top-to-toe butter-yellow brocade. “See the canary over there? That is Viscount Trizdale, believe it or not. Heya Tizzy, come over here. Got a bit of sport for you.”