Soap hunched forward a little more. He seemed to be shivering.
“Soap! Are you unwell?” Vieve lurched forward. Sophronia had almost forgotten she was there. How embarrassing.
Soap’s teeth were beginning to extend. “I’m sorry. I’m so sorry. But I think you both should run.” His hair was becoming very shaggy, as though it wanted to creep out of the tight curls and descend all over his body as fur. His ears looked like they were stretching slightly, and his eyes were turning from brown to gold.
Sophronia couldn’t help but back away.
Vieve, with casual grace, reached over one shoulder, pulled a blunderbuss from a strap on her back, pointed it at Soap, and shot.
“Wait, Vieve, what are you…?” Sophronia trailed off, for no massive silver bullet emerged. Instead the gun emitted a large mesh net, with weighted edges like a fisherman’s, that flew out into a wide arc, completely surrounding Soap.
“Ouch, that stings.” Soap looked like a disgruntled bride.
“Good.” Vieve was unsympathetic. “Now get ahold of yourself.”
“Yes, Captain.” Soap came over all meek.
Everything about him seemed to shiver and tighten, pulling in on itself. His hair went back to the tight black coils Sophronia was so fond of petting. His ears returned to their roundness, his eyes to their liquid brown.
“How do you feel?” Sophronia moved back to stand near, wanting to touch him through the net.
“Ashamed. Trapped.”
“Controlled, I hope.” Sophronia hid her worry.
“I think you should kiss him.” Vieve’s small face was grave.
“Thank you for the advice. It shall be recorded for posterity that you once encouraged public courtship.” Sophronia pretended outrage.
Vieve was offended. “No, silly. Wolves respond well to touch. His instinct for protection and preservation should kick in through concentrated affectionate exposure. This might limit his capacity for shift under constraints of emotional surety.”
Sophronia looked at Soap through the mesh veil. “I think she’s speaking English, but I’m not convinced.”
Soap laughed. “She thinks if we kiss it will control my desire to shift, convince my wolf side to see you as family, not food.”
Sophronia considered. “And what do you think?”
“Can’t hurt to try.”
“Opportunist.” Sophronia bent forward and kissed him, mostly because she wanted to. The cool metal of the mesh between their skin seemed to burn Soap, yet his lips were eager under the barrier.
Sophronia drew back.
“Also, you two need to make up.” Vieve began coiling in the net, moving toward them as she did so, but ostentatiously looking away from the region of their mouths.
“Is it working?” Sophronia asked.
Soap closed his eyes, as though running an inventory of his internal organs. “Feels like.”
Vieve looked to Sophronia. “Ready?”
Sophronia nodded.
Vieve whipped away the silver net and Sophronia stepped into Soap’s arms. She pressed her lips to his again—for medicinal purposes only, of course. They embraced, perhaps with more urgency than passion, but it was firm and good.
When they parted, the anger was gone—from both of them.
“See?” Vieve was unbearably smug.
Meanwhile, the massive dirigible had drifted farther, and there were shouting heads peeking out of the hatch of engineering.
Sophronia went red as a beet. They had been observed!
She grabbed Soap by the hand. “Come on.”
With Vieve following, they dashed after the airship. It probably looked ridiculous, the three small figures madly chasing a low-flying dirigible. Luckily, there wasn’t much breeze that evening, a rare thing indeed on the moor, so they caught up to it easily.
“Can you lift me up?” Sophronia asked Soap.
“I could as a wolf, but it’s too dangerous to shift now.” He shook his head regretfully. He whistled up three sharp toots and gave a birdlike caw and the sooties dropped down their old rope ladder.
“You coming too, old man?” Handle stuck his head out the hatch.
Soap smiled sadly. “Not anymore. I can’t float, even if I wanted to.”
“Gone on to bigger and fuzzier things, I hear.”
“So they tell me.”
“Don’t you forget us when you get all over covered in high-and-mighty werewolf-type business, you hear?” ordered one of the other sooties.
“Never,” replied Soap. “Ready?”
“Yes.”
Before she could protest, Soap kissed her fiercely one last time and then tossed her upward.
Sophronia caught the end of the rope ladder and hoisted herself up, climbing easily, even with her massive skirts. Below, there came another pop as Vieve shot out her net. Once more it draped over Soap, like a veil in a Greek tragedy.
He didn’t seem to be inclined to shift, but it was a sensible precaution.
“Come along,” Sophronia heard Vieve say. “Let’s get you to that bathhouse. This is getting ridiculous, you realize? What am I supposed to do with you tomorrow night? You’ll be a full-on wolf whether you like it or not. Net or no. How do I hide a wolf in a bathhouse?” Sophronia was through the hatch at that point.
Vieve’s lecture faded away.
Sophronia could only hope the dewan guessed Soap’s location and came after. She was immensely grateful to Vieve—the small inventor had saved her and those she loved yet again.
The sooties were impressed by her dress. Sophronia put her humiliation aside to advocate for speedy travel to Professor Braithwope’s quarters—with their assistance. They were only too pleased to help. Handle returned her abandoned hurlie.
Sophronia was up and over the vampire’s balcony, brushing down her gown and patting her curls, less than an hour after she left. She’d made excellent time.
Dimity didn’t see it that way. She was playing backgammon with Professor Braithwope and sipping a small glass of some illicit beverage. “Where have you been?”
“Sorry, I was needed groundside. Is that sherry?”
“You were fraternizing,” accused Dimity.
Sophronia was amazed at her powers of deduction. “How can you tell?”
Dimity looked smug. “Slightly bruised lips, spots of color on the cheeks, hair mussed. Who was it? Has Lord Mersey won himself back into your good graces?” Dimity was being purposefully obtuse. She wanted to squeeze a confession out of Sophronia.
“Hardly.”
“Oh, no, you haven’t found yourself another inappropriate sootie, have you?”
“No, it’s the same one, as you very well know.”
Dimity rolled her eyes. “Sophronia, I mean this quite kindly, but there is no possible future there. Quite apart from anything else, he has eternity and you do not. One way or another, you’re going to break that boy’s heart.”
“I know, and I told him as much.”
“Wars have been fought for less, whot.” They had almost forgotten that Professor Braithwope was there.
Dimity waved a hand at the vampire. “Thank you. Exactly my point, Professor. You talk some sense into her.”
The vampire leaned forward over the backgammon board, a serious expression on his pale face. His mustache drooped. “Whatever you do, do not pickle gherkins. Onions, yes. Gherkins, never.”