“These days, even the tiniest of cuts take forever to heal. And one is so verra weak without that supernatural strength. I used to be able to lift the back end of a carriage; now, carrying in Miss Hisselpenny’s hatboxes gave me heart palpitations.”
Alexia snorted. “You should see the hats inside.”
“I’d forgotten how to shave,” continued the first with a little laugh.
Felicity gasped and Ivy blushed. Bringing up a gentleman’s toilette at the table—imagine being so indiscreet!
“Cubs,” barked Lady Kingair, “that is by far enough of that.”
“Aye, my lady,” bobbed the three gentlemen, who were all two or three times her age. They had probably seen her grow up.
The table fell silent.
“So, are you all aging?” Lady Maccon wanted to know. She was blunt, but then, that was part of her charm. The earl looked to his great-great-great-granddaughter. It must drive Sidheag batty that she could not order Alexia, a guest, to be silent.
No one answered Lady Maccon. But the pack’s collective worried expression spoke volumes. They were back to being entirely human, or as human as creatures who had once partially died could get. Mortal was perhaps a better word for it. It meant they could finish dying now, just like any other daylight mundane. Of course, Lord Maccon was in the same situation.
Lady Maccon chewed a small bite of hare. “I commend you for not panicking. But I am curious—why not ask for medical assistance while in London? Or perhaps seek out BUR to make inquiries? You did come through London with the rest of the regiments.”
The pack looked to Lord Maccon to rescue them from his wife. Lord Maccon’s expression said it all: they were at her mercy, and he was enjoying witnessing the carnage. Still, she needn’t have asked. She was perfectly well aware of the fact that most supernatural creatures mistrusted modern doctors, and this pack would hardly seek out the London BUR offices with Lord Maccon in charge. Of course, they would want to get out of London as quickly as possible, retreat to the safety of their home den, hiding their shame with tails between their legs—proverbially, of course, as this was no longer literally possible. No tails to be seen.
Much to the pack’s relief, the next course arrived, veal and ham pie with a side of beet and cauliflower mash. Lady Maccon waved her fork about expressively and asked, “So, how did it happen? Did you eat some polluted curry or something while you were over in India?”
“You must excuse my wife,” said Lord Maccon with a grin. “She is a bit of a gesticulator, all that Italian blood.”
Awkward silence persisted.
“Are you all ill? My husband thinks you have a plague. Will you be infecting him in addition to yourselves?” Lady Maccon turned to look pointedly at the earl sitting next to her. “I am not entirely sure how I would feel about that.”
“Thank you for your concern, wife.”
The Gamma (what had her husband called him? Oh yes, Lachlan) said jokingly, “Come off it, Conall. You canna expect sympathy from a curse-breaker, even if you did wed her.”
“I heard of this phenomenon,” piped up Madame Lefoux, turning her attention to their conversation. “It did not extend to my neighborhood, so I did not experience it firsthand; nevertheless, I am convinced there must be a logical scientific explanation.”
“Scientists!” muttered Dubh. Two of his fellow pack members nodded in agreement.
“Why do you people keep calling Alexia a curse-breaker?” wondered Ivy.
“Precisely. Isn’t she simply a curse?” said Felicity unhelpfully.
“Sister, you say the sweetest things,” replied Lady Maccon.
Felicity gave her a dour look.
The pack Gamma seized this as an opportunity to change the subject. “Speaking of which, I was under the impression that Lady Maccon’s former name was Tarabotti. But you are a Miss Loontwill.”
“Oh”—Felicity smiled charmingly—“we have different fathers.”
“Ah, I see.” The Gamma frowned. “Oh, I see. That Tarabotti.”
He looked at Alexia with newfound interest. “I should never have thought he would marry.”
The Beta also looked at Lady Maccon curiously. “Indeed, and to produce offspring. Civic duty, I suppose.”
“You knew my father?” Lady Maccon was suddenly intrigued, and, it must be admitted, distracted from her course of inquiry.
The two werewolves exchanged a look. “Not personally. We knew of him, of course. Quite the traveler.”
Felicity said with a sniff, “Mama always said she could never remember why she leg-shackled herself to an Italian. She claimed it was a marriage of convenience, although I understand he was very good-looking. It did not last, of course. He died, just after Alexia was born. Such a terribly embarrassing thing to do, simply to up and die like that. Goes to show, Italians cannot be trusted. Mama was well rid of him. She married Papa shortly thereafter.”
Lady Maccon turned to look hard at her husband. “Did you know my father too?” she asked him in a low voice to keep things private.
“Not as such.”
“At some point, husband of mine, we must have a discussion, you and I, about the proper methods of fully transferring information. I am tired of feeling consistently behind the times.”
“Except that, wife, I have two centuries on you. I can hardly tell you everything I have learned and about everyone I have met during all those years.”
“Do not trouble me with such weak excuses,” she hissed.
While they were arguing, the suppertime conversation moved on without them. Madame Lefoux began explaining that she felt the aethographic transmitter’s crystalline valve resonator’s magnetic conduction might be out of alignment. Compounded, of course, by the implausibility ratio of transference during inclement weather.
No one, except the bespectacled claviger, was able to follow a word of her explanation, but everyone was nodding sagely as though they did. Even Ivy, who had the look of a slightly panicked dormouse on her round face, pretended interest.
Tunstell solicitously passed Miss Hisselpenny the plate of potato fritters, but Ivy ignored him.
“Oh, thank you, Mr. Tunstell,” said Felicity, reaching across to take one as though he had offered them to her.
Ivy huffed.
Tunstell, apparently frustrated by Miss Hisselpenny’s continued rejection, turned in Miss Loontwill’s direction, and began chatting with her about the recent influx of automated eyelash-curling implements imported from Portugal.
Ivy was more annoyed by this and turned away from the redhead to join in the werewolves’ discussion on a possible hunting outing the next morning. Not that Miss Hisselpenny knew a whit about guns or hunting, but dearth of knowledge on a subject had never yet kept Ivy from waxing poetical upon it.
“I believe there is considerable range in the bang of most guns,” she said sagely.
“Uh…” The gentlemen about her drifted in confusion.
Ah, Ivy, thought Alexia happily, spreading a verbal fog wherever she goes.
“Since we can go out during the day, we might as well take advantage and get a little dawn shooting in for old times’ sake,” said Dubh finally, ignoring Miss Hisselpenny’s comment.
“Is Dubh his given name or surname?” Alexia asked her husband.
“Good question,” he replied. “Hundred and fifty years I have had to put up with that blighter and he never told me the which way of it. I dinna know much about his past before Kingair. Came in as a loner, back in the early seventeen hundreds. Bit of a troublemaker.”
“Ah, and you wouldn’t know anything about secrecy or troublemaking, would you, husband?”
“Touché, wife.”
The dinner drew to a close, and eventually the ladies left the gentlemen to their drinks.
Lady Maccon had never much supported the vampire-derived tradition of after-dinner gender segregation. After all, what had begun as an honor to the hive queen’s superiority and need for privacy now felt like a belittling of the feminine ability to imbibe quality alcohol. Still, Alexia recognized the opportunity for what it was and made an effort to fraternize with Lady Kingair.
“You are fully human, yet you seem to act as female Alpha. How is that?” she asked, settling herself on the dusty settee and sipping a small sherry.
“They lack leadership, and I’m the only one left.” The Scotswoman was blunt to the point of rudeness.
“Do you enjoy leading?” Alexia was genuinely curious.
“It’d work a mite better if I were a werewolf proper.”
Lady Maccon was surprised. “Would you really be willing to try? It’s such a grave risk for the gentler sex.”
“Aye. But yon husband of yers didna care for my wishes.” Left unsaid was the fact that Conall’s was the only opinion that mattered. Only an Alpha capable of Anubis Form could breed more werewolves. Alexia had never witnessed a metamorphosis, but she had read the scientific papers on the subject. Something about soul reclamation needing both forms at once.
“He thinks you would die in the attempt. And it would be at his hand. Well, at his teeth.”
The woman sipped her own sherry and nodded. Suddenly she looked every bit of her forty years and then some.
“And I the last of his mortal line,” said Sidheag Maccon.
“Oh.” Alexia nodded. “I see. And he would have to give you the full bite. It is a heavy burden you ask of him, to end his last mortal holding. Is that why he left the pack?”
“You think I drove him out with my asking? You dinna ken the truth of it?”
“Obviously not.”
“Then it isna my place to be telling you. You married the blighter; you should be asking him.”
“You think I have not tried?”
“Cagey old cuss, my gramps, that’s for pure certain. Tell me something, Lady Maccon, why did you cleave to him? ’Cause he’s seated right proper in an earldom? ’Cause he heads up BUR and they watchdog your kind? What could one such as you gain from such a union?”
It was clear what the Lady of Kingair thought. She saw Alexia as nothing more than some kind of pariah who had married Lord Maccon out of either social or pecuniary avarice.
“You know,” replied Lady Maccon, not playing into her trap, “I ask myself that question daily.”
“It ain’t natural, a blending like that.”
Alexia looked over to ensure that the other ladies were out of earshot. Madame Lefoux and Ivy were engaged in complaining about long-distance travel in the mild manner of those who had thoroughly enjoyed the experience. Felicity stood on the far side of the room, looking out into the rainy night.
“Of course it is not natural. How could it be natural when neither of us are?” Lady Maccon sniffed.
“I canna make you out, curse-breaker,” replied Sidheag.
“It is really very simple. I am just like you, only without a soul.”
Lady Kingair leaned forward. Those familiar tawny eyes of hers were set in an equally familiar frown. “I was raised by the pack, child. ’Twas always intended I become Alpha female and lead them, whether he changed me or not. You merely married into the role.”
“And in that you have the advantage over me. But then again, instead of adapting, I am simply retraining my pack to accept my ways.”
A half-smile appeared on Sidheag’s dour face. “I wager Major Channing is cracked over your presence.”
Alexia laughed.
Just when Lady Maccon felt like she might be gaining ground with Lady Kingair, an enormous crash reverberated against the wall nearest the dining chamber.
The ladies all exchanged startled looks. Madame Lefoux and Lady Maccon immediately leaped to their feet and went swiftly back toward the supper room. Lady Kingair was but a few steps behind, and all three burst through to find Lord Maccon and the Kingair Beta, Dubh, grappling fiercely on top of the massive table, rolling about among the remnants of what once had been a most excellent brandy and plate of sticky meringues. The other members of the pack, the Kingair clavigers in residence, and Tunstell had arranged themselves well out of the way and seemed to be viewing the fisticuffs in the manner of sportsmen at the races.
Tunstell was running a commentary. “Oh, nice uppercut from Lord Maccon there, and, oh, did Dubh kick? Bad form, terribly bad form.”
Alexia paused, regarding the two large Scotsman rolling about among the sticky powder of crushed meringue.
“Lachlan, report!” barked Lady Kingair over the racket. “What’s going on?”
The Gamma, who Alexia had thought of as rather sympathetic up until that point, shrugged. “It needs getting out right to the open, mistress. You know how we like to settle things.”
The woman shook her head, gray-streaked plait flying back and forth. “We settle things by teeth and claw, na fist and flesh. This isna our way. This isna pack protocol!”