Maelstrom (23 page)

Had I only waked alive thanks to Christine’s
presence?

The murmur of voices drew closer. “What do
we have here?” Tilton asked.

“I came home to find Dr. Osborne robbing my
house,” Bradley said, aping indignity. “He attacked me with a
knife. Fortunately, Miss—Dr. Putnam and my father arrived.”

“He’s the one who killed Tubbs,” Christine
said flatly. “And others.”

“We found another body this morning,
floating in the Cranch,” Tilton said. “Killed in a similar manner
to Mr. Tubbs and the fellow who washed up on the beach. The coroner
thinks he died last night. I’m sure Dr. Osborne here would like to
tell me all about what happened to him.”

Three men sacrificed in the sea, and at
least two on land. I recalled the dark stain on the altar on the
island. No doubt a sixth body lay at the bottom of the lake.

“And you have him nicely trussed up like a
Christmas goose,” Tilton said with satisfaction.

“More a Thanksgiving turkey,” Christine
muttered.

“Will there be any evidence I can take to a
judge?” Tilton asked as two officers seized me by the arms and
hauled me up. “That is, we’ll hold him on the robbery and attempted
murder of Dr. Whyborne, of course. But the other
accusations...”

“I’m sure we’ll find something,” Father said
smoothly.

One of the police cut the makeshift bonds
around my ankles. Christine had tied me up with the tasseled
curtain tiebacks Griffin and I had argued over when redecorating
last year. As the police dragged me from the room, I met
Christine’s eyes—surely she would recognize me, even if I was in
Bradley’s body.

She glared back at me, jaw clenched. “The
electric chair is too good for you,” she said. “I hope they drop
you in a hole and leave you there.”

I closed my eyes, unwilling to see Father,
or—worse—my own face smirking back at me.

The officers dragged me
none-too-gently to the police wagon waiting in the street. Oh
God—if they took me to jail, what would happen? What did Bradley
intend to do in
my
body? When Griffin returned...

From his remarks to me over the years,
Bradley would never fall into bed with Griffin. Which was a thin
comfort. What would he do instead? Break Griffin’s heart?

No—Bradley would never let him live. Griffin
would no doubt become the convenient victim of the cultists still
roaming loose. He’d be felled by a hand he believed to be mine, his
last thoughts of shock and betrayal.

I went wild, thrashing madly against my
restraints. “Oi!” exclaimed one of the policemen. “Settle down, or
we’ll have to get rough!”

But how could I settle? I tried to shout
against the gag, to tell them they had the wrong man. A sharp blow
across the back of my head sent me reeling, and within moments,
they’d flung me into the back of the wagon and slammed the
doors.

I lay on the sticky floor, gasping. The
smell of dried vomit and blood wafted up, left behind by previous
occupants. Nausea clawed at the back of my throat, and terror
seized me. With the gag in my mouth, I’d surely drown in my own
bile if I threw up now.

The police wagon lurched into motion,
bearing me away from my home. Away from Christine, and my father,
and my own body.

No. I couldn’t panic. Once we arrived at the
station, Tilton would have to remove the gag. I’d tell my side of
the story. Yes, it would sound utterly mad, but Tilton would surely
relay it to Father and Griffin, even if he didn’t believe it
himself.

Bradley could never carry out a convincing
impersonation for long. They’d see through his pretense, or
Christine would. And they’d reverse whatever Bradley had done, and
I’d be restored to my proper body, and everything would be all
right.

Except Bradley, for all his flaws, wasn’t a
fool. He had to realize how precarious his masquerade was. Which
meant he’d make sure I didn’t live long enough to raise
suspicion.

The rat familiar might be dead, but what
else might the Man in the Woods have given him? What else might he
do now that he had access to my sorcerous blood? How easily he’d
summoned fire—might he summon something far worse?

I’d never survive long enough to give my
statement to Tilton. If they put me in a cell, I was as good as
dead.

I thrashed against my bonds. My feet were
free, but my hands still firmly tied. I had to get loose somehow. I
cast about hopefully, but the interior of the police wagon was bare
of any edge I might use to saw through the tieback around my
wrists.

Sorcery was my only hope. But this body
Bradley had consigned me to had neither ketoi blood nor Endicott,
let alone an unholy combination of the two.

So? Blackbyrne hadn’t been an Endicott or a
ketoi. Neither had various members of the Brotherhood who’d learned
sorcery over the years. Yes, they’d had the Man in the Woods to
offer them a start, the power of their horrible familiars to draw
upon. But I had years of practice, of honing my will into a
tool.

I drew my bonds tight and hoped I didn’t end
up killing myself in the process. Taking as deep a breath as the
gag allowed, I closed my eyes. I couldn’t speak aloud the true name
of fire, but chants and circles and sigils were all just tools
anyway, meant to lead the mind along certain paths and focus the
will. I’d done without them before, and I would again.

I bent all of my concentration onto a single
point on the ropes holding me. I whispered the true name of fire in
the confines of my mind, over and over. It was the spell of a
novice; surely I could perform it, even now.

Nothing happened.

I tried again, and again. Rain began to drum
on the metal roof, further distracting me. My heart raced in my
chest, and I was acutely aware that we must be drawing near the
police station by now. But fear would only interfere with my
concentration and make things even harder, so I did my best to push
it aside. There was only this moment. Only the rope.

Only the fire.

The smell of scorching fibers reached me,
then grew stronger. Heat whispered against my wrists and the small
of my back. I pulled as hard as I could on my bonds.

They weren’t giving way.

I tugged harder, frantic now. The heat grew
painful, and I bit my lip. The fire would surely eat through the
rope before my suit coat caught, wouldn’t it? Except the stench of
burning wool had now joined the earlier smells. The skin on my
hands nearest the flame was beginning to hurt badly, scalded by the
heat, and I couldn’t take it for much longer.

The ropes gave way abruptly. I rolled onto
my back, smothering the flames. The skin on my thumbs and the back
of my hands was reddened and starting to blister, but I didn’t
care. I was free.

When I was sure my suit coat no longer
smoldered, I sat up. Everything felt wrong, each movement not quite
what I expected, a reminder that this body was alien to me.

The wagon slowed to a halt. I shifted into a
crouch, and hoped none of the police would look through the tiny
windows on the sides of the wagon.

The officer who swung open the door expected
to find me still securely bound. His eyes widened, and he opened
his mouth to cry out.

I hit him with all my strength. To my utter
shock, he staggered back, eyes rolling into his head, and collapsed
on the pavement.

Apparently, all those hours Bradley had put
in at the athletic club hadn’t been for naught.

My surprise almost lost me my opportunity.
There came an angry shout from the other policeman. I leapt from
the rear of the wagon and ran. The rain had begun in earnest now,
and I was soaked within minutes. The shriek of the police whistle
was drowned out by the crash of thunder. My shoulders itched,
expecting the impact of a bullet.

I dashed through the pelting rain, paying no
heed to where I was going, only seeking to put distance between the
police and myself. The legs I stretched weren’t as long as I was
used to, but what they lacked in initial speed, they made up for in
stamina. I ran until the muscles ached, until my lungs were afire,
and I could go no further.

I stumbled to a halt and leaned against the
side of a building, rain sluicing down my face. There was no sign
of any pursuit, and the storm had driven the inhabitants of the
run-down neighborhood inside. I slid to the ground and wrapped my
arms around my knees. I wanted to curl up and sleep, to awake and
discover this was some awful dream. I’d find Griffin in the bed
beside me, and he’d laugh when I told him I’d imagined Bradley, of
all people, had swapped bodies with me. Then he’d say he
appreciated my body far more than Bradley’s, and go on to prove
it.

Except it wasn’t a dream, and this was all
too real. I had to think. I’d escaped the police for the moment,
but they’d be on the lookout for me. Or, rather, for Bradley
Osborne. Tilton would no doubt inform Father and the man they
thought to be me.

Bradley would take no chances. He’d spin
some story to ensure the police would shoot me on sight.

He wanted my life, he’d said. It seemed
impossible—mad. My life was quiet breakfasts and long hours at the
museum. My life was ketoi and umbrae, and a host of cousins who
wanted to kill me. My life was narrow escapes and the vague dread
I’d end up in an unmarked grave or the belly of some monster. Who
would want that?

But maybe that wasn’t what Bradley saw when
he looked at me. What had he said, about wasting my potential? He
didn’t want my position at the museum—that would be the first to
go, as he had no knowledge of philology. No, he wanted to be the
Whyborne heir and all that implied.

The goal of the rituals hadn’t been about
swapping bodies with me, though. Some larger plot must be in place,
something Bradley was willing to commit murder to achieve. But
what? This Restoration Scarrow had mentioned?

Bradley owned the old Somerby estate. Might
there be some clue there?

I pushed myself up on aching legs. I
couldn’t go to my friends without risking my life. And I couldn’t
very well stay here and wait for the police to appear, so I could
die in a jail cell. The estate seemed as good a place as any to
go.

I started walking.

Whyborne

I stood at the edge of the Draakenwood,
staring out across the lawn of the Somerby Estate. The last light
of the sun struggled through the thick clouds, but full darkness
would fall soon. The storm hadn’t lessened its fury, and despite
the summer warmth, the cold rain had leached the heat from my body.
Shivers wracked me, seemingly echoed by the leaves of the
ill-favored wood at my back.

Was this where Bradley had met the Man in
the Woods? It seemed likely enough. How he had known about any of
this—the Fideles or Nyarlathotep, or any of it—I couldn’t guess,
and at the moment it didn’t seem particularly important.

Lightning flickered, reflecting in the
windows of the great manor house. A light showed from the first
floor—Bradley hadn’t left the place undefended, it seemed.

Where was he now? At Whyborne House? With
Christine and Iskander, Miss Parkhurst and Persephone, not to
mention my father? All of them thinking he was me, not knowing they
had a murderous viper in their midst.

What of Griffin? Had he returned from Boston
yet?

Bradley wouldn’t hesitate to kill him. Or,
more likely, have him killed.

Oh God, Griffin.

I took a deep breath. I couldn’t worry about
what might have already happened. I needed to concentrate on
preventing anything else from going wrong. I had to get into the
estate and find any clues Bradley might have left. Spell books.
Instructions on how to reverse the damned body swap. A detailed
outline of all his nefarious schemes.

The very presence of a guard suggested there
was something in there Bradley didn’t want anyone else to see. I
needed a weapon. Something—anything—that might offer me a chance.
Without access to magic, I felt utterly helpless.

Still, this body possessed a strength my own
never would. Perhaps it might be enough. I slipped back into the
woods. The canopy cut off the last of the sunlight, and I swore to
myself. A few moments of searching blindly, and I stumbled over a
heavy fallen branch that seemed only half-rotted.

It would have to do.

Clutching my makeshift cudgel, I crept
toward the house. Going through the front door would be the height
of folly, so I snuck around the back, away from the light in the
window. My hands shook as I tried the kitchen door.

Locked.

Not knowing what else to do, I went to the
nearest window and waited for the next roll of thunder. It wasn’t
as loud as I would have liked, but I hoped it would cover the sound
of breaking glass as I swung the branch into the window.

I reached inside and freed the window latch.
Trying to be as stealthy as possible, I shoved it open. Years of
neglect had left the wood warped, and the window groaned and
squealed against the frame.

I listened intently, but heard nothing from
within. Had my luck held?

I scrambled through the window and into the
kitchen. The air reeked of mildew and dust. The door leading to the
basement cellar stood open, and I fancied the fetid stench of the
Guardians still stained the air. Blackbyrne and Addison Somerby had
held Griffin there for hours, and I shuddered at the thought of how
it must have tormented him, even as I admired his bravery yet
again.

If Bradley did something to him...hurt
him...killed him...

I couldn’t let such thoughts distract me,
not now. All but holding my breath, I eased out into the hall.

Rain drummed against the windows, and water
dripped steadily somewhere nearby. Nothing else broke the
silence.

The light had been near the front of the
house. In the parlor? I tried to call up my old memories of the
place, when Leander and I had played here together. Before death
and madness, before magic and abominations, when the estate had
been a refuge from the cruelties of my father and brother.