Alchemist's Kiss (7 page)

Cora moved close to Icarus' back. He felt her trembling fingers curl into the back of his coat.

“We want freedom! We want science! We want steam!”

It became a chant, the air of menace growing as the men surged toward Icarus and Cora.

Icarus held up his hand, holding them all back with a simple shield spell. They beat on the barrier he had created.

“Icarus, don't hurt them.” Cora pleaded behind him.

“And what, Cora?” He looked over his shoulder at her, exasperated by her soft heart. “Allow them to come across the next unsuspecting wizard and have their way with him?”

She shook her head, her eyes wide and boring into him. “You're a powerful mage, Icarus. We don't have to resort to violence.”

He groaned in frustration but turned back to the mob with a sigh.

“Go home!' he called out, amplifying his voice so that it boomed over the roar of the crowd.

Some went silent and backed down, but, as he'd feared, the others grew more enraged.

“Parlor tricks!” the leader cried, trying to bolster the others. “Don't be afraid!”

“No.” Icarus kept his tone soothing. “I don't want to hurt you. Go home now.”

The crowd pounded against the barricade, ignoring him. He glanced at Cora. “What would you have me do now?”

“Cast a spell. Make them forget. But don't hurt them. Please.”

He sighed. “We're wasting time. Archimedes is out there waiting for us.”

“Icarus.”

The leader reached into his pocket and Icarus wanted to laugh. Guns wouldn't pierce the barrier, but what the man took from his pocket was not a gun. He held up a round spherical ball in the palm of his hand.

“Icarus, what is that?”

He didn't answer.

The crowd did quiet as the young man held the ball out triumphantly toward Icarus.

“You had no idea we had one, did you?”

“I can honestly say I did not.” Icarus answered dryly.

He felt Cora tug on his coat. “Icarus, I think we need to run.”

He ignored her. The young man held the ball out toward them. A bright purplish glow began to emanate from it. Icarus grimaced as he felt an awkward pain envelope him.

“Icarus, please!” Cora tugged hard on his hand. He shook as the purple light reached out, bypassing the barrier. Icarus could feel the aether screaming as the light moved through it.

He couldn't move, or stop her, as Cora stepped in front of him and held up The Hand.

The talisman gave off a bright white glow in the palm of her hand as he staggered against her. It grew so bright that the crowd began to cry out and shield their eyes. When the light of The Hand came into contact with the purple light of the strange orb the resulting shock wave threw Cora into Icarus. He managed to hold her up with sheer will.

The orb shattered, the shards raining down as the crowd ran in opposite directions. Icarus felt his magic begin to grow in strength again once the ball was destroyed.

He reached for Cora but she shrugged him off as she approached the leader of the mob who lay on the ground, covering his head as the others trampled over him to run away. She knelt down beside him and tapped his shoulder.

“Just kill me.” Icarus heard him wail.

Cora smothered a smile as Icarus leaned weakly on the wall, his legs shaking. Never had he felt the kind of disturbance in the aether that the orb had caused.

“That was supremely balmy idea.” She shook her head and tapped the man again. “Icarus could have killed you.”

“The Dielectric was supposed to have stripped his magic!”

“Dielectric?” Icarus moved to crouch next to the man. He cringed at the muddy boot prints covering the man's coat where the crowd had stomped on him to escape.

“They swore it would stop the magic. Even yours.”

“Not hers.” Icarus reached for the man and helped him to his feet. He pulled money from his pocket and pressed it into the man's hand. “Find an apothecary and get yourself healed.”

The man stared down at the money in his hand, probably more than he'd ever seen at one time, and then back to Icarus with wide eyes. “But...I tried to kill you.”

Icarus smiled. “Many have. You're not the first, and you won't be the last. But tell me, where did the Dielectric come from?”

“A man, a scientist, was selling them at Columbia Road.”

“Be off, then, young man. And the next time you wish to incite a riot, remember how those boot heels feel on your arse.”

The man scampered away as Icarus sighed and rolled his shoulders. He could still feel the alien emptiness that had invaded him when the purple light of the orb had touched his magic.

“Shall we continue?” he asked, offering Cora his arm. She took it but sniffed at him. “Angry at me again, Cora?”

“I warned you to run, and you ignored me. Someday you will learn to listen when I tell you something.”

“I admit that I let my machismo run wild.”

“The Dielectric is dangerous.”

He frowned as the smoke appeared before them again at the end of the alley.

“Indeed. That's an avenue of investigation we shall pursue once we've found Archimedes and have gotten my father out of London.”

She leaned into him and for a rare moment she was his soft, sweet Cora again. “We're trying to get out of this alive, Icarus.”

“Then we'd best find Archimedes quickly. He's always been the more level headed of us all.”

She laughed and he cherished the sound. Instead of moving away from him she moved closer, and he could swear he felt the heat of her clasp through his coat.

“Promise me we'll find him.”

He patted her hand and pointed to the smoke, which wavered in the direction of the steam mills. “I believe we are on his trail already.”

Icarus was used to fear. He'd often found that he worked best when his heart was racing and his mind was in the grips of deadly terror. He became calm, the world around him slowing just enough that he could out-think or out-maneuver whatever danger lay in his path. As Cora clung to his arm he began to understand that what he felt now was not fear, but dread. The smoke would indubitably lead them to Archimedes, but he'd begun to worry over what state the man might be in. He had no doubts his father, or the men that followed him, was behind the taking of their friend. His palm burned with the memory of just how terrible his father's wrath could be.

The stacks of the steam mills rose above them, casting moonlit shadows over the cobbles. The streets became narrower, the buildings closer together as they approached the center of the city. There were no flowers here, no joyful sound of children in their mother's arms. This was the darkest part of London, and these witless non-magics had chosen this tainted ground to build their silly factories.

Cora shivered hard, all the way to her fingertips. He reached for her, putting his arm around her shoulders and drawing her closer to his body heat. His coat was protected by magic, warming him and her in turn.

“You've never been here?”

She shook her head. Her perky velvet hat, trimmed with all the nonsensical oddities that women liked, brushed his nose.

“Why is it so cold?”

“Long ago, before the city of London even existed, a spell of great power was worked here. It left a magical residue that will never be erased.”

“A dark spell.” she guessed.

“It was not meant to be,” he squinted as the smoke darted around a corner and he quickened his pace to keep up with it, “In fact, it was supposed to be a protection spell.”

“It must have gone very, very wrong.”

He felt his lips twitch as amusement lit up his dark thoughts. His Cora was always so perceptive to the aether.

“It did. For hundreds of years people avoided this place. But as time grows long memories grow short.”

“Non-magics can't feel it?”

“Not the way we do. But it's no wonder this place has always been associated with poverty and grief.”

They turned the corner and Cora covered her mouth against the offensive smell of the refuse pile that occupied the space between the tall buildings. The smoke hovered over the pile, spinning like a top.

Icarus began to rush forward, but Cora grabbed his arm. “No. Wait.”

“He's here, Cora.”

Her eyes glistened with unshed tears. “It could be a trap, Icarus.”

Icarus brushed aside a tear and smiled ruefully. “What would I do without your clear head, Cora Jenkins?”

“Most likely die.” The words were weak and muffled, coming from the refuse pile.

Icarus raised his head sharply. Cora released his arm and he hurried forward, stumbling over the rubbish piled high around them. He slipped in something and went to a knee, but he saw the glint of gold in front of him. Uncaring of the muck he began to dig with his gloved hands, pushing and pulling the piles of garbage away from Archimedes.

He looked up when Cora joined him, uncaring of the way the rubbish clung to her heavy, full skirts. She dug into the pile with her immaculate white gloves, finally uncovering Archimedes' face.

A sob escaped her as the extent of his ordeal was revealed. Icarus mashed his lips together to hold back the curses that gathered on his tongue. Incredibly, Archimedes' least swollen eye was open and staring at them. He blinked and tried to smile past the damage to his face.

“Hello.”

Cora pushed more of the refuse back, exposing the horrors that had been done to his body. Icarus raised a hand and shoved the muck back with magic, splashing it over the walls in his anger. He reached for Archimedes' hand and took the broken fingers into his. “Hello, old friend.”

“I might live.”

Icarus nodded. “I'm afraid so.”

Cora touched his swollen nose and split lips gently with her fingertips. “Don't talk, Archie. We'll take you home and make you all right again.”

She looked him over with the frown that told Icarus she'd moved into her nursing mode. “Broken ribs. Fractured jaw.” She ran a hand over Archimedes' legs. “Nothing too damaging to the legs.”

“My back.”

Icarus helped roll him over, hissing at the sight of the raw red brand marks covering the flesh. They were already festering from their contact with the wet rubbish.

Tears rolled freely down Cora's cheeks as she bit her lip. “Oh, Archie.”

“Nothing home won't....help.” He slid blessedly into unconsciousness as Icarus held him.

“We're going to kill them all, Icarus. Every last one.”

He nodded at Cora's low threat. “Yes. We are.”

“I've done what I can.” The apothecary removed his spectacles and rubbed them on his shirt. “He will need all his considerable strength to recover.”

I looked up from my place by Archie's bed, his mangled golden hand still in mine. “He's not in pain?”

The man shook his head. He was neither young nor old, not fat and not precisely thin. He picked up his bag with a groan and a crack of his back. “No pain. Let him sleep as long as he will.” He pressed a packet into my hand. “Tea, three times daily with this root. In a week, ten days, he will move without cursing.”

“And the burns?”

I'd watched the apothecary smooth a dark black paste over the burns, easing the redness almost immediately. Archimedes had slipped into a more comfortable rest as soon as the cream had touched him.

“Aloe, dandelion and a few, more obscure, items.” He pointed to the bowl of black paste on the table. “Three times daily, after the tea. There will be scarring,” he looked at Archimedes with a frown, “but I don't think it will limit him in any way.”

“Thank you, Bastion.”

He took my hand and shook it neatly, two firm pumps. “My pleasure, Cora. Archimedes is a good man. I hope whomever treated him thusly will be punished.”

“Harshly.” I assured the man. I tucked Archie's hand under the blankets and escorted the apothecary to the door.

From the hallway he turned back to me. As with most powerful wizards I'd come across, his appearance belied his true strength. But I could feel how strongly he was connected to the aether, and his limpid blue eyes burned with anger. “Do not hesitate to call on us, Cora. Icarus has loyal friends. People he put his life on the line to help when he first returned to London.”

“He's going to need us all.” I smiled at the apothecary. “When the time comes he's going to need all the magic and all the loyalty we can give him.”

“Then I pity the man who crossed him.” Bastion's beard twitched with a smile. “Icarus Kane is not a man to be trifled with.”

I closed the door and leaned on it, my nose assaulted by the smell of the rubbish still covering me. In a flash Icarus had transported Archie back to the hotel and his own bed, but we'd had to make the long trek back on tired legs. I shivered and moved to stoke the fire, stopping as the laboratory door opened behind me.

“You're knackered.” He took the poker from my hand and turned the logs.

“I'm angry, Icarus. And dirty,” I felt tears prick my eyes, “and yes, I'm knackered.”

I turned away and slumped onto the settee, covering my face with my hands. I'd tossed my ruined gloves into the fire, but I knew my pretty day dress would have to follow. It, like the world I'd spent the last six years building, was now tainted. I couldn't help the streaming tears.

“Cora.”

I ignored his pleading, not giving a damn if he was uncomfortable with my tears. I was allowed to cry. Archimedes was the second most important man in the world to me. What had been done to him was unforgivable.

“Cora.” This time strong arms wrapped round my shoulders. I leaned into his chest and turned my face to his shirt.

“I'm horrible, Icarus.” I shook with my rage.

“You're wonderful.” he assured me.

I pulled back, looking up at his face. God had carved it himself, I was sure. Every line, every angle and every plane, was perfect. I shook my head. “I'm not. I'm a bad person, Icarus. I am!”

“Stop this, Cora.” Even the lines between his brows was perfect. “What's got you going?”

“All I could think, when I saw Archie in that refuse heap ...” I trailed off and looked away, afraid that if I finished the thought it would make him see me as awful too.

“What did you think, Cora?” He tipped my chin, lifting my eyes to his.

“I was glad it wasn't you.”

I buried my head in his neck, the tears coming faster and harder now. I clutched him to me and prayed I'd never have to let go. He held me close and stayed quiet until I was done. I hiccupped once and wiped my eyes.

“So you see, I'm a terrible person.”

“You're not.” He leaned forward, kissing my forehead. “You, Cora Mae Jenkins, are that which every woman should strive to be.”

“A glocky nemmo?”

He laughed out loud, the sound shaking through my bones where he still held me against him. “Where do you learn these words, Cora?”

“Jimmy, the chimney sweep's son, told me what it means.”

“You are not a half-witted woman. I promise.” He stared down at me with intense blue eyes and I wanted him to kiss me. I wanted it so much that I even told the aether swirling around us. He didn't move, so I pulled him to me, pressing my lips against his.

I've talked with Jimmy more than a few times. He was always a fresh font of information, including what it felt like to kiss a woman you wanted to lie with. Just as Jimmy had promised, Icarus increased the pressure on my lips, his hands holding me as close as we could get. I closed my eyes, lost in the sensation of his skin on mine. It was as close as we'd ever been in all the six years we'd traveled together. I felt his tongue sweep across my lips and it was natural to open to him, as I'd always done.

The taste of him was cinnamon and musk. I kissed him until I was lost in the feeling, my head spinning with the magic between us. It was a shock to feel him pull away. The air between us was colder without him; a slap to my face. It brought back some semblance of my sanity.

We were both breathing hard, and I covered my mouth with my hands, hoping to hold the feel of his lips on mine there forever.

He had a lost look on his face. It was some parts longing and some parts excitement like I'd only ever seen when he was working with magic.

“Cora---”

I covered his lips with one hand, still covering my own with the other. I shook my head and moved away from him, even though it physically hurt to do it.

“Good night, Icarus.”

“Good night, Cora. I believe I'll sit with Archimedes a while.”

In some ways I wanted him to fight with me. To demand I stay and say all the things that hung so delicately on the air between us, just as I'd confessed to Archie. Another part of me, the part that was still tumbling end over end without cease, wanted to run away as fast I could.

I settled for walking away at a moderate pace. I pulled the bell by the window and sent down the message that I needed a hot bath. I opened my door and turned back, but Icarus was already gone.

***

“She vexes you so.”

Icarus pulled his eyes from the fire and smiled at Archimedes. He'd retreated here to his friend's bedside so that he could resist the temptation to tear Cora's door from its hinges and join her in her bath.

“She does.” he admitted. He leaned forward and propped an elbow on his knee. He looked squarely at Archimedes, whose face was still swollen and mottled with bruises. “How much pain?”

“Some.” Archimedes' wince as he shifted belied his nonchalance. “Tell me why you won't simply tell Cora how you feel.”

Icarus maintained their stare by sheer will alone. “Tell me what happened.”

Archimedes narrowed his eyes and Icarus knew that he was on the short road toward stubborn.

“Like for like, then.” Icarus offered. “Answer my query and I'll answer yours.”

“A proper answer.' Archimedes demanded, moving up gingerly on his pillow. The seams between his living skin and the metal plate on his chest bulged with the movement.

“As you like.” Icarus leaned back, crossing his ankles and folding his hands over his middle. Archimedes was pale against the starched white poplin of his sheets, and a hank of dark hair over his forehead only served to heighten his lack of color. A twisting sensation in Icarus' gut had him shifting. He'd come so close to losing his friend forever. “You went to the apothecary for mandrake.”

“I did.”

Icarus saw the way Archimedes' hands tightened on the duvet.

“I purchased the mandrake and a box of chocolates, hoping to ease Cora's ill temper toward you.”

“She does like Belgian chocolate.” Icarus said with a grin.

Archimedes answering smile was brief. “She does. As I exited the shop I turned the corner toward the market square and a spell of immense power bound me. I fell, unable to move or to access my magic. I was lifted and placed inside a tanner's cart.”

“Did you see the wizard casting the binding spell?”

Archimedes shook his head. “No. The spell was so tight I must have gone unconscious from the pressure. When I awoke I found myself in a wares house of some sort, by the river.”

Icarus raised an eyebrow. “Did your attacker reveal himself then?”

“We were introduced.” Archimedes said dryly, and from the twist of his lips Icarus gathered the torture had then commenced. “Much later I awoke again to see Baiandelio had arrived.”

“A proper reunion, I take it.”

“Indeed.” Archimedes let his head fall back to the pillow. “He was much put out when your father denied him my death.”

“You saw Victor?” Icarus sat up, every sense sharpening.

“He's your father, that much is clear. Only darker, spoiled inside by blood magic.”

“He's not changed, then.” Icarus' gut churned harder, his fear for Archimedes mixing with the resurgence of his fear of his father.

“Victor demanded I be returned to you, as a show of good faith. He swore he's not in London to harm you.”

“Bollocks.” Icarus shook his head, his heart pounding and the palm of his hand on fire. “The man's done nothing but harm me.”

“He was adamant. The only reason I'm alive now is because Victor demanded it.”

“What could he possibly want in London, then, if not to heap more fatherly torture on his only son?”

Archimedes sat forward, his face growing paler with the effort. He reached for Icarus, and clasped his hand tight. “He left me with a message for you, Ic.”

Icarus moved, pushing Archimedes gently back to his pillow and sitting beside him on the bed. He kept the man's hand clasped in his. The metal was cold through his gloves, the gold warped and bent from his torture. He would need a new hand, Icarus thought.

“There's to be a war between magic and science, and London will be the epicenter. Victor is here to destroy the opposition to magic.”

“My father's never cared a whit about science. Why, now, would he take a stand against it?”

“He's going to destroy them all, Icarus. Women, children, and anyone who opposes magic. The blood he will spill.....”

Icarus felt his mouth go dry. A wizard as powerful as his father, with access to that much blood? He could destroy the world with the power he would gain.

“Orrin warned me.” Icarus looked at Archimedes. “There will be no escaping this war now.”

Archimedes' hand tightened over his. His eyes began to flutter as he struggled to stay awake. “You're not getting away that easily.” he warned, even as he yawned mightily. “You must answer my question, Icarus.”

“Ah, yes.” Icarus released his hand and pulled the blankets over him as he fought to stay awake. “Your question.” He paused and smiled when Archimedes growled low in his throat. “I hesitate to confess my feelings to Cora for many reasons.”

“A proper answer.”

Icarus' smile grew at Archimedes' sharp scold.

“The most pressing reason is this--- I can never have the life Cora deserves. I will always remain in the service of my magic and the people of London. I fear I cannot give her the devotion and stability she needs.”

“Lie.”

Icarus raised his eyebrow.

“The most pressing reason is that you believe you do not deserve happiness.”

Icarus smoothed the blanket over Archimedes and shook his head. “Perhaps that as well. Those who have fallen from grace cannot return to Heaven.”

“You were never an angel.” Archimedes' voice was slurred with exhausted humor. “But you're not a demon, Ic.”

Icarus stood, not realizing that he was rubbing the mark on his hand. He could hear the screams of his mother and sister as he was dragged from his bed to the fires of the forge. Feel the press of the red hot brand on his tender young skin and smell the burning of his flesh. The electric exhilaration of the magic as it greeted every particle of his being. Cries of the people his father murdered in pursuit of blood and power. He had their blood on his hands, too. He had much to atone for in this life, and surely he was not worthy of a woman like Cora.

“I feel my mother and my sister may disagree.” He turned down the lamp and moved to the door, but Archimedes' voice made him look back.

“Save London. Save science and magic. Then tell Cora you love her, Ic. Promise me.”

“If I live long enough to see the end of this war, old friend, I'll shout it to the rooftops.”

Archimedes laughed, and Icarus grinned as it became a long snore. He closed the door and leaned against it, staring across the shadowed parlor to the sliver of light that beckoned him from beneath Cora's door. He could go to her now and she would accept him in her bed and in her heart, just as he was. But what he was would never be good enough for a woman like Cora Mae Jenkins. The Devil's Hand sought her company, and the aether spoke to her. He would have to do something to redeem the mark on his soul in order to be worthy. He took two steps toward her door and stopped, moving instead toward the laboratory. His redemption, he feared, might come only with his death. He looked to his hands, covered in dark leather. This was his legacy. Never to touch with these hands, lest the rune strip the soul from the body and destroy it forever. He clenched his hands, the thought of Cora's hair spilling through his fingers enough to set his teeth on edge. The idea of her skin against his.... He could never touch her, not the way she needed– Not the way
he
craved.