The Perilous Sea (The Elemental Trilogy #2)

The last, Foreign expulsion, was the very one that had sent Wintervale into a seizure. Titus turned it around in his fingers, shaking his head at the mayhem it had caused.

He stilled. He had chosen the remedy because he had thought it would precipitate and expel harmful substances from the body, but that was the province of a remedy by the name of foreign extraction. Foreign expulsion, on the other hand, was meant for getting rid of parasites and such.

Or was it?

He pulled out a thick volume of pharmacological reference and looked up the remedy.



Foreign expulsion. An older remedy, now no longer common. Good for the purging of parasites. Can also be used to expel swallowed objects and objects stuck in various bodily orifices. May aid in the divestiture of intangible tenure.



What in the world was intangible tenure?

He wanted to look it up. But a quick pulse from his pocket watch reminded him that that morning service was almost finished. Kashkari would bring Wintervale back to Mrs. Dawlish’s, and Titus was to give Wintervale the vertices of the quasi-vaulter to carry on his person, with a suitably dire report of the dangers rising all about them, without mentioning anything specific.

He made a mental note to look up intangible tenure later and left the laboratory.



“Things are moving so fast, we don’t know what will happen in the next hour. Or even in the next minute,” said Iolanthe, seated in the drawing room at Windsor Castle that Lady Wintervale had appropriated for her own use. “Likely we will have to take your son away from school—and likely soon—for his safety. I thought you might like to know that.”

Lady Wintervale looked out the window toward Eton, just across the Thames River. Her voice had a faraway quality to it. “You mean, after this, I might not see him for a while, perhaps ever?”

“It’s quite possible.”

Iolanthe waited for Lady Wintervale to exert her parental right, something along the lines that if they were taking Wintervale out of school, then he might as well be under the protection of his mother. But Lady Wintervale only continued to stare out of the window.

“Would you like to see him before he leaves? We can make sure no one traces his physical movements to you. And I daresay he would not speak of your whereabouts to anyone. He has become more circumspect of late—certainly he has managed to keep the fact that he is now a great elemental mage to himself.”

Lady Wintervale clenched her hand and again gave no reply.

Iolanthe was counting the hours until she and Titus had all the precautions in place, so she could have him vault her to Paris to see Master Haywood, who had to be anxious for her news. After that, there was no telling when they would meet again. Or if.

The distance Lady Wintervale insisted on keeping from her child made no sense at all.

“May I ask, ma’am, why you do not want to see your son?”

Lady Wintervale moved to a different window. Her jaw worked, but she remained silent. Against the deep vermilion drapes, she was pale as a wraith and almost as insubstantial.

Iolanthe’s bafflement turned into uneasiness—for now she could feel the fear radiating from Lady Wintervale.

“Please, my lady, I beg of you. If there is something that matters, do not hold it back. There are lives at stake here, many lives.”

“You think I do not know that?” Lady Wintervale snarled.

But nothing followed. After a fraught, interminable interval, Iolanthe had to accept that she would get nothing else out of Lady Wintervale. “Thank you for seeing me, ma’am. Long may Fortune walk with you.”

As she rose, Lady Wintervale said, “Wait.”

Iolanthe sat down again, tense with anticipation—and no small amount of dread.

Another minute passed before Lady Wintervale said, “I lost Lee on our last trip.”

Iolanthe blinked. “I don’t quite understand.”

“Among the Exiles communities, we have built our own network of translocators. But since spring, Atlantis had actively interfered with the working of those translocators. By early September, when Lee and I set out, all the translocators the Exiles in London had depended on for years were out of service.

“We had a choice between using carpets or taking a steamer across the English Channel. Lee cares for neither. But nowadays there are excellent remedies for seasickness, so he decided on the steamer. Once I had seen him settled in his bunk—the remedy allowed him to sleep through the crossing—I went above to take in some fresh air, as I enjoy ocean travel.