They all looked across at the row of houses that lined the Parade. Most of them were still shuttered, but enough had their windows exposed to the bright June morning to give credence to Lady Margaret’s alarm.
‘I doubt that one or two steps will bring us undone,’ his lordship told her, ‘but your caution is exemplary.’
Helen let go of her skirts and turned towards the sea to hide her pique, her eyes fixed upon a three-masted war-sloop no doubt making its way to Plymouth before joining the newly declared war with the United States. Perhaps it could aim its cannons at Lady Margaret and her exemplary caution instead, Helen thought, then immediately felt churlish. The woman was irritating, but she and her brother had been valued members of the Dark Days Club for over five years, whereas Helen had only just joined the secret order that protected mankind from the Deceivers. And although Lady Margaret and her brother were not Reclaimers like herself and Lord Carlston — rare warriors born to fight the hidden creatures — it could not be denied that they were also placing themselves in great danger. Not to mention the fact that they had been kind enough to take her in after she had been expelled from her Uncle Pennworth’s house.
‘You must weigh and consider every action now,’ Lady Margaret added, her severe tone drawing Helen around to face her again. ‘One slip and you will —’
‘I am aware of it.’ Helen smiled through clenched teeth. ‘But I am obliged to you for the reminder.’
Lady Margaret regarded her warily, clearly recognising the strain in her voice. They had been confined together over the past four weeks in a rented townhouse in German Place, not without some sharp words from both sides. The unhappy incarceration had been ordered by Lord Carlston as it was imperative to the Dark Days Club that Helen start her Reclaimer training in earnest. It was a time-consuming project, and his lordship had insisted that they establish a reason why such a well-connected young lady staying in Brighton would be absent from many of the town’s social delights. Convalescence was the most believable excuse, and so Helen had stayed indoors alongside Lady Margaret and feigned poor health. She had also braved a visit from the proprietor of Awsiter’s Baths with his foul elixir of seawater and milk, and engaged the services of Martha Gunn, a sturdy old woman who dipped young ladies in the sea for their health — both clear indicators to society that she had come to the seaside resort for her constitution and not for the busy Season.
When she had asked his lordship why they had not gone to a quieter town instead — to her mind, a perfectly reasonable question — he had merely given her an endless shark-eyed stare. One of his more maddening traits. At least her convalescence story was now established to his satisfaction, and this morning he was permitting them to unobtrusively walk into town to sign the subscription book at Donaldson’s Circulating Library: the very hub of fashionable Brighton life and, according to Lord Carlston, its centre of illicit information.
Helen felt her gaze drawn to him again. He was back to watching the progress of the man walking up the hill. The clean lines of his profile were set and unyielding and he reminded her of one of the Roman centurion statues she had seen in Bullock’s Museum. Forever waiting for the enemy. Yet she could not forget that beyond those noble features she had seen a deep darkness within his soul. At first, she had thought it was the black mark of his wife’s murder — a crime that he had never denied — but now she knew it was a slow poisoning from the Deceivers’ foul energy. Every time he reclaimed a Deceiver’s offspring back to humanity, the blight he ripped from its soul took root within his own. Helen knew that every Reclaimer had to eventually retire from saving souls else it would send them mad. Yet Mr Hammond had said his lordship refused to stop.
‘I believe we are about to receive a visit from the Home Office,’ Lord Carlston said dryly, his attention still fixed upon the approaching figure. Helen looked back at the stooped man: his intention was now clearly aimed at the four of them.
Mr Hammond tilted back the brim of his beaver hat. ‘By Jove, is that —?’
‘Ignatious Pike,’ Carlston said. ‘I recognised him when he started up the hill. Hard to mistake that deplorable Whitehall style.’
Helen saw a fleeting frown tighten Mr Hammond’s face, and knew he felt as exasperated as she did. If his lordship had known it was the government man all along, why had he not offered the information? He kept his own counsel too much. It was even more maddening than his shark-eyed stare.
‘What is he doing here?’ Lady Margaret asked.
‘I would hazard a guess that the new Home Secretary has finally been informed about the Dark Days Club,’ Carlston said.
It was near two months since the Prime Minister, Lord Perceval, had been assassinated in the House of Commons. After much mayhem, His Royal Highness the Prince Regent had finally ratified a new government on the 8th of June, and along with it a new Home Secretary, Lord Sidmouth, who would, amongst other duties, oversee the clandestine Dark Days Club.
‘Well, at least we do not have Ryder over us any more,’ Mr Hammond said.
Carlston nodded his agreement. ‘They could not keep him, not after he covered up Benchley’s involvement in the Ratcliffe murders.’
Just the mention of Lord Carlston’s old Reclaimer mentor sent a crawling sensation across Helen’s nape. It was Samuel Benchley who had forced her mother to absorb the Deceiver darkness within him and it had all but killed Lady Catherine’s soul. He had planned to do the same to Helen, but her mother had bequeathed her a Colligat — an alchemical way to strip herself of her Reclaimer heritage — hidden in the miniature portrait alongside the Reclaimer lens. Benchley had attacked Helen in her uncle’s house, bent on stealing the miniature and its power, but had been killed by the Deceiver posing as a footman in the household.
Even in the bright sunlight and warmth of the Brighton morning, Helen shuddered at the memory of Benchley’s bulging eyes and popping veins as he died at the Deceiver’s hands. The creature would have attacked her as well, but Lord Carlston had intervened and absorbed all of its lethal whip-energy. The Deceiver had then grabbed for the Colligat, and Helen had been forced to make a terrible choice: leap for the Colligat herself and protect her only way to a normal life; or absorb half of the whip-energy raging through Lord Carlston and save his life but lose the Colligat.