Grace clutched a shawl around her shoulders. “Mind? I applaud it. Would you please come in and close the door. I abhor the cold.”
Simon nodded to Malcolm, who stood by the coach, and shut the door behind them. Grace slowly raised her hand a few inches toward several simple wooden chairs against the far wall. “There are no great comforts here, but we’ll be brief. Tea? Something stronger?”
“No, thank you.” Simon remained standing near the door with Kate. “We’re eager to get to it. So I assume the government is aware of the dangerous situation in London?”
From Grace North’s demeanor, she could have been meeting with the Kensington Garden Improvement League, until she leveled a shockingly hard stare at Simon. “The dangerous situation in London is entirely created by you, Mr. Archer.”
“I beg your pardon?”
“The difficulty with amateurs is that they don’t appreciate the full ramifications of a situation. They don’t have all the information to make a rational decision, and so they form a course of action, derived from self-interest only, like a child. Because they have no broader frame of reference from which to judge.”
“I fear you’ve lost me, ma’am.”
“I refer to you, Mr. Archer. And you, Miss Anstruther. You are the danger, and I brought you here to see that it ceases.” Grace shifted slightly in her seat. A sheen of perspiration showed on her forehead. “Rowan Barnes is fighting to save Britain. If he does not succeed, the consequences will be apocalyptic. I am asking you, if you love this realm, to allow him to do his good work.”
“Ma’am,” Simon said, “you have been cruelly deluded. Rowan Barnes may be many things, but patriot is not among them. He has murdered two women. And he will attempt the murder of two more if he isn’t stopped.”
“There have been no murders, Mr. Archer. Those two women willingly sacrificed themselves for the good of Britain. If Barnes does not complete the ritual, millions will die. Do you understand? Those women understood that. Millions of innocent men, women, and children. Weigh those against four lives. Any reasonable person would know which choice to make.”
Simon stared at her in complete confusion. He was beginning to sense a hint of the Red Orchid acolyte in her. She had the scent of one of Barnes’s people. Frightening. Barnes had access to the wife of the most powerful man in the government.
“I disagree,” Simon said firmly.
“That’s because you don’t understand. I know what you are, Mr. Archer. I know you are a magician, so let me explain in terms that will persuade you. Many years ago, a great magician, perhaps the greatest of all time, named Byron Pendragon, put a spell in place to protect Britain from a terrible threat he feared would one day occur. He was right, but unfortunately he was killed by that terrible threat. Britain needs Pendragon’s magic to save it. Rowan Barnes will do that, and he is the only one who can.”
Simon’s lips were a thin line. “So Barnes is using blood magic to pervert Pendragon’s intentions. He is slaughtering innocents to break the lock on the spell.”
“What we are witnessing,” Grace North said, “is the end of a tragedy set in motion centuries ago. There is, loose in the world, a madman named Gaios. No doubt you’ve heard the name, and perhaps thought it a myth. He is very real and he is one of the most powerful magicians in the history of mankind. He is an earth elemental and, in his long time on earth, he has killed millions. Most recently, he caused the eruption of Tambora in the East Indies in 1815, of which you no doubt read. Thousands dead. The volcanic debris thrown into the air blocked the sun even here. There was no summer that year. That is how obscenely powerful his magic can be. That is how low his regard for human life is. We believe he has already set foot in Britain, and he is bringing the end of the world. Only the sacrifice of four women can stop him.”
“How could you possibly know any of that?” Simon asked brusquely. “Are these more of Barnes’s fantasies? Are you in line to be one of his innocent sacrifices?”
“I know far more than you can possibly understand, Mr. Archer,” she said with a snide edge in her voice. “The rulers of this land have long had relations with many great magicians, including Byron Pendragon, and I am privy to stores of hidden information about this secret history.”