“I do hope she grows out of this dislike for soap suds.”
Lord Akeldama gave Lord Maccon a significant sort of once-over where he lurked behind his wife in the hallway. “My darling chamomile bud, we can but hope.”
Lord Maccon took mild offense and sniffed at himself subtly.
“Conall and I have been summoned to visit Woolsey. You will manage without us for the remainder of the night?”
“I believe we may, just possibly, survive, my little periwinkle.”
Lady Maccon smiled and was about to head upstairs to change her gown when someone pulled the bell rope. Being already in the hallway and hoping to keep Prudence from waking, Lord Maccon dashed to answer the door despite the fact that this was most unbecoming for a werewolf of his station, and it was someone else’s house.
“Oh, really, Conall. Do try not to behave like a footman,” remonstrated his wife.
Ignoring her, Lord Maccon opened the door with a flourish and a tiny bow—as behooved a footman.
Lady Maccon cast her hands up in exasperation.
Fortunately it was only Professor Lyall on the stoop. If any man was used to Lord Maccon’s disregard for all laws of propriety and precedence, it was his Beta. “Oh, good, my lord. I was hoping to catch you here.”
“Randolph.”
“Dolly darling!” said Lord Akeldama.
Professor Lyall didn’t even twitch an eyelid at the appalling moniker.
“You had a visitor, my lord,” said the Beta to his Alpha, looking refined.
Alexia was confident enough in her assessment of Lyall’s character to spot a certain tension. He displayed quick efficiency under most circumstances. Such forced calm as this indicated a need for caution.
Her husband knew this, too. Or perhaps he smelled something. He loosened his stance, prepared to fight. “BUR or pack business?”
“Pack.”
“Oh, must I? Is it terribly important? We are required out of town.”
Alexia interrupted. “I alone am required. You, as I understand it, my love, were simply coming along out of curiosity.”
Conall frowned. His wife knew perfectly well that the real reason he wished to accompany her was for security. He hated sending her into a hive alone. Alexia waggled her reticule at him. As yet, there was no new parasol in her life, but she still carried Ethel, and the sundowner gun was good enough when pointed at a vampire queen.
“I’m afraid this is important,” said a new voice from behind Professor Lyall, in the street.
Professor Lyall’s lip curled slightly. “I thought I told you to wait.”
“Dinna forget, I’m Alpha. You canna order me around like you do everyone else.”
Alexia thought that a tad unfair. Professor Lyall was many things, but he was not at all tyrannical. That was more Conall’s style. It might be better said that Professor Lyall arranged everyone and everything around him just so. Alexia didn’t mind in the least; she was rather fond of a nice arrangement.
A woman moved out of the gloom of the front garden and into the light cast by the bright gas chandeliers of Lord Akeldama’s hallway. Professor Lyall, polite man that he was, shifted to one side to allow their unexpected visitor to take center stage.
Sidheag Maccon, the Lady of Kingair, looked much the same as she had almost three years earlier, when Alexia had seen her last. Immortality had given her skin a certain pallor, but her face was still grim and lined about the eyes and mouth, and she still wore her graying hair back in one heavy plait, like a schoolgirl. She wore a threadbare velvet cloak that would do nothing to ward off the evening’s chill. Alexia noted the woman’s bare feet. Clearly, the cloak was not for cold but for modesty.
“Evening, Gramps,” said Lady Kingair to Lord Maccon, and then, “Grams,” to Alexia. Considering she looked older than both, it was an odd kind of greeting to anyone unfamiliar with the Maccon’s familial relationships.
“Great-Great-Great-Granddaughter,” responded Lord Maccon tersely. “To what do we owe this honor?”
“We have a problem.”
“Oh, do we?”
“Yes. May I come in?”
Lord Maccon shifted, making an open-hand gesture back at Lord Akeldama, this being the vampire’s house. Vampires were odd about inviting people in. Lord Akeldama had once muttered something about imbalance in the tether ratio after Lady Maccon entertained Mrs. Ivy Tunstell overly long in his drawing room. He seemed to have adjusted tolerably well to Prudence and her parents living under his roof, but after the Ivy tea incident, Alexia always made certain to entertain her guests next door, in her own parlor.
Lord Akeldama peeked over Lady Maccon’s shoulder, standing on tiptoe. “I don’t believe we have been introduced, young lady.” His tone of voice said much on the subject of any woman darkening his doorstep with plaited hair, a Scottish accent, and an old velvet cloak.
Alexia pivoted slightly and, after a quick consideration, decided Lady Kingair was just lady enough to warrant the precedence, and said, “Lady Kingair, may I introduce our host, Lord Akeldama? Lord Akeldama, this is Sidheag Maccon, Alpha of the Kingair Pack.”
Everyone waited a breath.
“I thought as much.” Lord Akeldama gave a little bow. “Enchanted.”
The female werewolf nodded.
The two immortals evaluated each other. Alexia wondered if either saw beyond the outrageousness of the other’s appearance. Lord Akeldama’s eyes gleamed and Lady Kingair sniffed at the air.
Finally Lord Akeldama said, “Perhaps you had best come in.”
Alexia felt a surge of triumph at the achievement of such civilized discourse under such trying social circumstances. Introductions had been made!
However, her pleasure was interrupted by a high-treble query from behind them. “Dama?”“Ah, I see somebody is awake. Good evening, my puggle darling.” Lord Akeldama turned away from his new acquaintance to look fondly down the corridor.
Prudence’s little head poked out from the drawing room. Tizzy stood behind her, looking apologetic. “I am sorry, my lord. She heard your voices.”
“Not to worry, my ducky darling. I know how she gets.”
Prudence seemed to take that as an invitation and padded down the hallway on her little stubby legs. “Mama! Dada!”
Lady Kingair, momentarily forgotten, was intrigued. “This must be my new great-great-great-aunt?”
Alexia’s forehead creased. “Is that correct? Shouldn’t it be great-great-great-great-half sister?” She looked at her husband for support. “Immortality makes for some pretty peculiar genealogy, I must say.” No wonder the vampires refuse to metamorphose those with children. Very tidy of them. Vampires preferred to have everything in the universe neat. In that, Alexia sympathized with their struggles.
Lord Maccon frowned. “No, I believe it must be something more along the lines of—”
He never finished his sentence. Prudence, seeing that there was a stranger among her favorite people, and assuming that all who came into her presence would instantly adore her, charged Lady Kingair.
“Oh, no, wait!” said Tizzy.
Too late, Alexia dove to pick up her daughter.
Prudence dodged through the legs of the adults and latched on to Lady Kingair’s leg, which was quite naked under the velvet cloak. In the space of a heartbeat, the infant changed into a small wolf cub, muslin dress ripped to tatters in the process. The cub, far faster than a toddler, went barreling off down the street, tail waving madly.
“So that’s what flayer means,” said Sidheag, pursing her lips and arching her eyebrows. Her unnatural pallor was gone and the lines in her face were more pronounced—mortality had returned.
Without even a pause, Lord Maccon stripped smoothly out of his full evening dress in a manner that suggested he had been practicing of late. Alexia blushed.
“Well, welcome to London Town, indeed!” exclaimed Lord Akeldama, whipping out a large feather fan and fluttering it vigorously in front of his face.
“Oh, Conall, really, in full view!” was Alexia’s response, but her husband was already changing midstride from human to wolf. It was done with a good deal of finesse. Even if it was done right there for all the world to see. Sometimes being married to a werewolf was almost too much for a lady of breeding. Alexia contemplated divesting Lord Akeldama of his fan—her face was quite hot, and he no longer possessed the ability to blush. As if reading her mind, he angled about so that he could fan them both.
“That is a lovely fan,” said Alexia under her breath.
“Isn’t it marvelous? From a little shop I discovered off Bond Street. Shall I order one for you as well?”
“In teal?”
“Of course, my blushing pumpkin.”
“I do apologize for my husband’s behavior.”
“Werewolves will happen, my pickled gherkin. One has to merely keep a stiff upper lip.”
“My dear Lord A, you keep stiff whatever you wish—you always do.”
“Doesn’t it hurt her?” Lady Kingair asked rather wistfully as Alexia exited the vampire’s house down the front stoop to stand next to her, watching as the massive wolf chased the tiny cub.
“Not that we can tell.”
“And how long will this last?” Sidheag made a gesture up and down her own body, indicating her altered state.
“Until sunrise. Unless I intervene.”
Sidheag held a naked arm out at Lady Maccon hopefully.
“Oh, no, not you. The preternatural touch has no effect on you anymore. You’re mortal. No, I have to touch my daughter. Then immortality, sort of, well, reverberates back to you. Difficult to explain. I wish we understood more.”
Professor Lyall stood off to one side, a tiny smile on his face, watching the chaos in the street.
Prudence tried to hide behind a pile of delivery crates stacked on one side of the road. Lord Maccon went after her, knocking the crates to the ground with a tremendous clatter. The wolf cub went for the steam-powered monowheel propped against the stone wall of the Colindrikal-Bumbcruncher’s front yard. Mr. Colindrikal-Bumbcruncher was particularly fond of his monowheel. He had it specially commissioned from Germany at prodigious expense.
Prudence took refuge behind the spokes of the center area. Lord Maccon was having none of it. He wiggled one mighty paw through to get at her. The spokes bent slightly, Lord Maccon got stuck, and Prudence dodged out, pelting once more down the street. Her tail wagged even more enthusiastically at the delightful game.
Lord Maccon extracted himself from the monowheel, shaking loose and causing the beautiful contraption to crash over with an ominous crunch. Lady Maccon made a mental note to send a card of apology around to their neighbors as soon as possible. The unfortunate Colindrikal-Bumbcrunchers had suffered great travails over the past two years. The town house had been in Mr. Colindrikal-Bumbcruncher’s family for generations. Its proximity to a rove vampire was well known and tolerated, if not exactly accepted. Just as all the best castles had poltergeists, so all the best neighborhoods had vampires. But the addition of werewolves to their quiet corner of London was outside of enough. Mrs. Colindrikal-Bumbcruncher had recently snubbed Lady Maccon in the park, and frankly, Alexia couldn’t fault her for it.
She squinted at the Colindrikal-Bumbcruncher house, trying to see if an inquisitive face at a window might have observed Conall’s transformation in Lord Akeldama’s hallway. That would require an even more profound apology, and a gift. Fruitcake, perhaps. Then again, perhaps the sight of Lord Maccon’s backside might warrant less of an apology, depending on Mrs. Colindrikal-Bumbcruncher’s preferences. Lady Maccon was distracted from this line of thinking by Professor Lyall’s shout of amazement.
“Great ghosts, would you look at that?”
Alexia could not recall Professor Lyall ever raising his voice. She whirled about and looked.
Prudence had reached a good distance away, near to the end of the street, where an orange-tinted lamp cast a weak glow on the corner. There she had turned abruptly back into a squalling, naked infant. It was very embarrassing for all concerned. Particularly, if her screams of outrage were to be believed, Prudence.
“Well, my goodness,” said Alexia. “That’s never happened before.”
Professor Lyall became quite professorial. “Has she ever gotten that far away from one of her victims before?”
Lady Maccon was slightly offended. “Must we use that word? Victim?”
Professor Lyall gave her an expressive look.
She acquiesced. “Quite right, it is unfortunately apt. Not that I know of.” She turned to look at Lord Akeldama. “My lord?”
“My darling sweet pea, had I known that if we simply let her run a little distance she would work herself out, I would have let her gallivant about at will.”