Blameless

“Now where are you going, my lord?” he hol ered after Lord Maccon’s rapidly retreating back.



The earl yel ed over his shoulder without breaking stride. “I have a boat to catch and a wife to find. You can carry on from here.”



Lyal would have rubbed his face with his hands, except his arms were ful . “Oh, yes, certainly, feel free to depart. And me with a drone changed into a werewolf and a dead potentate. I am certain I have had Alphas leave me with worse messes to tidy up, but I cannot recal them at the moment.”



“I am sure you wil do very well .”



“Wonderful, my lord. Thank you for your confidence.”



“Toodles.” And with that, Lord Maccon wiggled his fingers in the air in the most insulting way and disappeared around the side of a building. Presumably, he was heading for a busier part of London where he might stand a better chance of hailing a hackney posthaste for Dover.



Professor Lyal decided not to remind him that he was completely naked.



CHAPTER THIRTEEN



Picnicking with Templars



Alexia took a moment before breakfast to drag Floote into a secluded corner.



“We must get a message to the queen on this relic business. Or at least to BUR. I cannot believe you knew about it and never told anyone. Then again, I suppose, you never tel anyone anything, do you, Floote? Even me. Stil , I know now and so should the British government. Imagine using preternatural body parts as weapons. Just think what they could do if they knew how to mummify.”



“You are no longer muhjah, madam. The supernatural security of the empire is not your concern.”



Alexia shrugged. “What can I say? I cannot help myself. I meddle.”



“Yes, madam. And on a grand scale.”



“Wel , my mama always said, one should do what one is best at on as large a scale as possible. Of course, she was referring to shopping at the time, but I have always felt it was the only sensible sentence she ever uttered in her life.”



“Madam?”



“We have managed to keep the mummy business mum, even from Madame Lefoux.



The point being, we cannot let anyone know that mummies are useful as a weapon.



There would be a terrible run on Egypt. If the Templars are using dead preternatural body parts and they figure out the mummification process, I am in real trouble. Right now it is only natural decomposition, and the fact that they have to preserve tissue in formaldehyde, that keeps preternatural-as-weapon limited to special use.” Alexia wrinkled her nose. “This is a matter of supernatural security. Italy and the other conservative countries must be kept from excavating in Egypt at al costs. We cannot risk them figuring out the truth behind the God-Breaker Plague.”



“I see your reasoning, madam.”



“You wil need to develop a sudden malaise that prevents you from attending this picnic the preceptor is dragging me on. Get to the Florentine aethographic transmitter by sunset and send a message to Professor Lyal . He wil know what to do with the information.” Alexia rummaged about in the ruffle of her parasol until she located the secret pocket and extracted the crystal ine valve, which she handed to Floote.



“But, madam, the danger of you traveling about Italy without me.”



“Oh, fiddlesticks. Madame Lefoux has entirely refitted my parasol with the necessary armaments. I shal have the preceptor and a cadre of Templars with me, and they’re bound to protect me even if they cannot look at me. I even purchased this.” Alexia exhibited a clove of garlic dangling from a long ribbon about her neck. “I shal be perfectly fine.”



Floote did not look convinced.



“If it wil help al ay your fears, give me one of your guns and some of the spare bul ets you purchased yesterday.”



Floote did not seem at al mol ified. “Madam, you do not know how to shoot.”



“How difficult can it be?”



Floote ought to have known after a quarter century of association with Alexia that he could not hope to win any argument, especial y as a gentleman of few words and even less inclination to use them. With a faint sigh of disapproval, he accepted the responsibility of sending the transmission and left the room, without giving Alexia one of his guns.



Professor Lyal spent the last hour before dawn coping with the consequences of Biffy’s sudden change into a werewolf and the potentate’s sudden change into a corpse. He began by seeking out the closest safe house, where no one else would think to look for him and his new charge. And since Charing Cross Station was just south of Soho, he headed north toward the Tunstel s’ apartments, in al their pastel glory.



While midnight was considered quite an acceptable hour for cal ing among members of the supernatural set and among the younger, more dashing mortal crowd



—drivers of phaetons and the like—dawn was not. In fact, dawn might be considered the rudest time for anyone to cal upon anyone else, with the possible exception of groups of hardy fishermen in the backwaters of Portsmouth.



But Lyal felt he had no choice. As it was, he had to bang on the door a good five minutes or so before a bleary young maid opened it cautiously.



“Yes?”



Beyond the maid, Lyal saw a head stick out of a bedroom far down the hal —Mrs.



Tunstel in an outrageous sleeping cap that resembled nothing so much as a frothy lace-covered mushroom. “What has happened? Are we on fire? Has someone died?”



Professor Lyal , stil carrying Biffy in wolf form, muscled his way past the astonished maid and into the house. “You might put it like that, Mrs. Tunstel .”



“My goodness, Professor Lyal ! What do you have there?” The head disappeared.



“Tunny! Tunny! Wake up. Professor Lyal is here with a dead dog. Arise at once. Tunny!”



She came bustling down the hal way wrapped in a voluminous robe of eye-searing pink satin. “Oh, the poor lamb, bring him in here.”



“Please do forgive me for the presumption, Mrs. Tunstel , but yours was the nearest house.” He lay Biffy down on the smal lavender couch and quickly reached behind it to draw the curtains over the window, just as the sun’s first rays peeked above the horizon.



Biffy’s previously stil form stiffened and then began to shudder and convulse.



Throwing al decorum to the winds, Professor Lyal rushed at Ivy, got one arm firmly about her waist, and hustled her to the door. “Best you not be here for this, Mrs. Tunstel .



Send in your husband, would you, once he awakens?”



Ivy opened and closed her mouth a couple of times like an affronted poodle, and then whirled to do as he had bidden. There was a woman, Lyal thought, forced into efficiency through prolonged exposure to Alexia Tarabotti.



“Tunny!” she cal ed, trotting back down the hal way, and then with far greater sharpness, “Ormond Tunstel , wake up. Do!”



Professor Lyal closed the door and turned back to his charge. He reached into his waistcoat for one of his trusty handkerchiefs, only then remembering he was wearing no more than a greatcoat, retrieved from the shore, having dressed for change, not company. Wincing at his own temerity, he grabbed one of Ivy’s pastel throw pil ows and wedged a corner of it into the new werewolf’s mouth, giving Biffy something to bite down upon and also muffling his whimpering. Then Lyal bent low, bracing the shuddering form of the wolf with his own body, curling about him tenderly. It was partly Beta instinct, to protect a new member of the pack, but it was also sympathy. The first time was always the worst, not because it got any better, but because it was so unfamiliar an experience.



Tunstel let himself into the room.



“God’s teeth, Professor, what is going on?”



“Too much to explain ful y right now, I’m afraid. Can that wait until later? I’ve got a new pup on my hands and no Alpha to handle him. Do you have any raw meat in the house?”



“The wife ordered steak, delivered only yesterday.” Tunstel left without needing to be pressed further.



Lyal smiled. The redhead fel so easily back into his old role of claviger, doing what needed to be done for the werewolves around him.



Biffy’s chocolate fur was beginning to retreat up to the top of his head, showing skin now pale with immortality. His eyes were losing their yel ow hue in favor of blue. Clutching that writhing form, Lyal could feel as well as hear Biffy’s bones breaking and re-forming.



It was a long and agonizing shift. It would take the young man decades to master any level of competency. Rapidity and smoothness were markers of both dominance and age.



Lyal held Biffy the entire time. Held him while Tunstel returned with a large raw steak and fussed about with varying degrees of helpfulness. Held him until, eventually, he was left with an armful of nothing but naked Biffy, shivering and looking most forlorn.



“What? Where?” The young dandy pushed weakly against the Beta’s arms. His nose was twitching as though he needed to sneeze. “What is going on?”



Professor Lyal relaxed his embrace and sat back on his heels next to the couch.



Tunstel came over with a blanket and a concerned expression. Just before he covered the young man over, Lyal was pleased to notice that Biffy appeared to be entirely healed from the bul et wound, a true supernatural, indeed.



“Who are you?” Biffy focused fuzzily on Tunstel ’s bright red hair.



“I’m Tunstel . Used to be a claviger to Lord Maccon. Now I’m mostly just an actor.”



“He is our host and a friend. We wil be safe here for the day.” Professor Lyal kept his voice low and calm, tucking the blanket about the stil -shivering young man.



“Is there some reason we need to be? Safe, I mean.”



“How much do you remember?” Lyal swept a lock of brown hair back behind Biffy’s ear in a motherly fashion. Despite al his transformations, his nudity, and his beard, the young man stil looked every inch the dandy. He would make an odd addition to the gruff soldiering masculinity of the Woolsey Pack.



Biffy jerked and fear flooded into his eyes. “Extermination mandate! I found out that there is a… Oh, dear God, I was supposed to report in! I missed the appointment with my lord.” He made as if to try and rise.



Lyal held him back easily.



Biffy turned on him frantical y. “You don’t understand—he’l swarm if I don’t make it back. He knew I was going after the potentate. How could I have gotten caught? I’m such an imbecile. I know better than that. Why, he’l …” He trailed off. “How long was I down there?”



Lyal sighed. “He did swarm.”



“Oh, no.” Biffy’s face fel . “Al that work, al those agents pul ed out of covert placement. It’l take years to reintegrate them. He’s going to be so very disappointed in me.”



Lyal tried to distract him. “So, what do you remember?”



“I remember being trapped under the Thames and thinking I would never escape.”



Biffy brushed one hand over his face. “And that I real y needed a shave. Then I remember water flooding in and waking in the darkness to shouting and gunshots. And then I remember a lot of pain.”



“You were dying.” Lyal paused, searching for the right words. Here he was, hundreds of years old, and he could not explain to one boy why he had been changed against his wil .



“Was I? well , good thing that didn’t take. My lord would never forgive me if I up and died without asking permission first.” Biffy sniffed, suddenly distracted. “Something smel s amazing.”



Professor Lyal gestured to the plate of raw steak sitting nearby.



Biffy tilted his head to see, then looked back at Lyal in confusion. “But it’s not cooked. Why does it smel so good?”



Lyal cleared his throat. As a Beta, he’d never had to perform this particular task. It was the Alpha’s job to acclimatize the newly turned, the Alpha’s job to explain and be there and be strong and be, well , Alphaish for a new pup. But Lord Maccon was halfway to Dover by now, and Lyal was left to deal with this mess without him.



“You know that dying issue I just mentioned? well , it did take, in its way.”



At which juncture, Professor Lyal had to watch those beautiful blue eyes turn from dazed confusion to horrified realization. It was one of the saddest things he had ever seen in al his long life.



At a loss, Lyal handed Biffy the plate of raw steak.



Unable to control himself, the young dandy tore into the meat, gulping it down in elegant, but very rapid, bites.



For the sake of his dignity, both Professor Lyal and Tunstel pretended not to notice that Biffy was crying the entire time. Tears dribbled down his nose and onto the steak while he chewed, and swal owed, and chewed, and sobbed.



The preceptor’s picnic, as it turned out, was a little more elaborate than Alexia and Madame Lefoux had been led to believe. They trundled a sizable distance into the countryside, away from Florence in the direction of Borgo San Lorenzo, arriving eventually at an archaeological excavation. While the antiquated carriage attempted to park on a hil ock, their Templar host announced with much pride that they would be engaging in an Etruscan tomb picnic.