The Iron Wyrm Affair

thought. “I am not quite myself at the moment, Miss Bannon. Pray do not question me too much; it may overtax my faculties and I shall become a brain-melted embarrassment.”

A fleeting, half-guilty smile greeted his sally. Mikal appeared, bearing a plate of provender. “Prima?”

“Hm?” She glanced up as Clare started gratefully on his toast.

“I have an idea.”

“Yes?”

“I think it would be most instructive to learn the recent movements of a dead Master Sorcerer.” The Shield straightened, folding his arms. “One who was running errands for Lord Sellwyth.”

Sellwyth? Yes, the dead Prime. Clare winced again. Even such a simple act of memory strained the meat inside his skull most alarmingly.

“Quite.” She took another sip of tea. She was still distressingly pale. “I wonder if anyone else has seen Mr Devon of late? Childe said a fortnight or so ago. The last time I saw him was at Tomlinson’s. Where he had bungled the traces rather neatly, it now appears.” She closed her eyes, gathering herself. When she reopened them, her gaze was very direct – and very, very cold. “Still, a corpse to mislead investigation is not difficult to procure, and the remains at Grace Street were so badly burnt … If Throckmorton is alive …”

Silence filled the room. Clare hoped she did not require his faculties to see her way through the tangle. He crunched on his toast, relishing the butter and the thick bread.

“I am very interested in Hugh Devon’s movements,” Miss Bannon continued. “However, following him is a waste of time, since he is dead. If Throckmorton is alive—”

“Cedric Grayson’s signature is on the papers you gave me, Miss Bannon. You must not be as familiar with his hand as I am.” Clare’s attention snagged on a memory, and a braying laugh surprised him. “The sherry was poisoned. How typical.”

“Sherry?”

That was why it reeked as it did. It was cheap, yes, but also adulterated. “When we visited the Chancellor. At the time I thought the sherry dreadfully cheap, but Cedric’s aesthetics are so bad —”

“Poison. I see. A slow-acting one, no doubt, meant to preserve some parts of you.”

“Preserve?”

“The other unregistered mentaths were missing their brains and spinal cords. I rather thought it had something to do with a mad Alterations sorcerer.”

“Oh.” Clare shuddered. No wonder she had reserved that information. It changed the entire complexion of the affair, but his faculties were too aching and strained to make use of the revelation.

“And the trap in Bedlam,” Miss Bannon continued daintily, “was meant to take care of me, possibly while I was occupied in ministering to you. Rather tidy. Which brings us to another interesting question.”

As long as you do not expect me to answer said query, dear God. “Which is?”

“Where is Lord Sellwyn? If Throckmorton is alive, I find it hard to believe he is truly deceased.”

Indeed. “Ah. Well. I cannot help you.”

“No need.” She sipped again, delicately, and he had the sudden fancy that there were very few places Lord Sellwyn would be able to hide once Miss Bannon took a serious interest in finding him. “Tell me, Mr Clare, how long will it take your faculties to recover?”

He cogitated upon this, carefully, wincing. “A few hours, and one of your most excellent dinners, should see me right as rain, Miss Bannon.”

“Very well. Concern yourself with restoring said faculties, sir, and I shall speak with you after dinner.” She opened her eyes and rose, waving at him abstractedly as he moved as if to rise as well. “No, no, do stay seated. You have done very well, Mr Clare. Very well indeed. After dinner, then.”

He found his mouth was dry. “Certainly. But Miss Bannon?”

She was already halfway to the door, her teacup handed to Mikal and her stride lengthening, skirts snapping. “Yes?”

“The next time you use me as bait, madam, have the goodness to inform me. I do not mind being dangled on a hook. As a matter of fact, I derive a certain enjoyment from it. But I would rather not endanger my friends.”

She paused. “You were not bait, Mr Clare. You were more of a dach’s-hund, meant to flush the prey.”

“Nevertheless.”

A single, queenly nod. Did she unknowingly copy that movement from Victrix? Yet another question that could wait until his head ceased its abominable pounding.

“Yes, Mr Clare. You have earned as much. My apologies.” And with that, she swept out through the door the new Shield held for her.

The door closed, leaving him with the assassin and Sigmund. Who crunched on something from his plate, licked his fingers, and belched contentedly.

“What a woman,” he said, dreamily. “Ein Eis Madchen. Archibald, mein Herr, I believe I am in love.”

The Neapolitan, upon hearing this, laughed fit to choke. Clare simply clasped the water-proofed ice cloth to his head and sighed.

Dinner, though superb, was a somewhat hurried affair.

Miss Bannon, appearing in black silk and even more fantastic jewellery, waited until the vegetable course. “I shall deal with Lord Sellwyth, Grayson, and Throckmorton. You, Mr Clare, shall deal with finding and – should it become necessary – destroying the larger logic engine.”

“Splendid.” He dabbed his lips with his napkin. Beside him, Valentinelli had dispensed with rudeness for once, and was partaking with exquisite manners. Across from him, Mikal and the new Shield – Eli – set to with a will. On the Neapolitan’s other side, Sigmund expressed his admiration for the excellence of the dinner in mumbled German. He seemed supremely unconcerned with any larger questions, such as what his landlady and his apprentice would think of his disappearance and the state of his workshop. He had already dashed off a note for them penny-post, and then put them from his capacious mind, which was already busy worrying at other problems. “How do you propose I do so? I have my ideas, of course –”

“– but you would like to know if I questioned a dead sorcerer’s shade, and can shed any light on the situation. I did, Mr Clare, and I can.”

Clare noted that the new Shield turned pale and stared at his plate, before shaking his head slightly and renewing his interest in his food. Interesting. It was a pleasure to deduce again, without the inside of his skull feeling as if acid had been poured through it. The equations had nearly cracked him, the small logic engine cramming force through his capabilities until his head was a swollen pumpkin ready to burst. He had not felt so skull-tender since his Examination.

The new Shield was a Liverpool boy, dark-haired and not very comfortable in his high-collared coat that almost matched Mikal’s. His boots were more impractical than Mikal’s – or for that matter, the sorceress’s – and Clare thought it likely Miss Bannon had not acquired his services as part of a well-laid plan. Another refugee, perhaps, to add to her household of cast-offs?

Or did Miss Bannon think the dangers of the situation finally required another Shield? Why not more than one, then?

The implications of that question were extraordinarily troubling. Just like the implications of the harvesting of other mentaths’ nervous organs.

He brought his attention back to the matter at hand. Sometimes, after a violent shock, a mentath’s mind wandered down logical byways, taking every route but the one most direct. “Please do.”

“My method of procuring the information—”

“Does not trouble me at all, Miss Bannon. I believe I am past being troubled, at least for the next fortnight. After that, we shall see.” His digestion, at least, was sound. It was a small mercy. “Nothing you could tell me would discommode me more than this afternoon’s adventure.”

Her pained half-smile told him she rather doubted it, but was too polite to say as much. “Very well. Mr