Blameless - By Gail Carriger Page 0,87

embankment. It was there, the faint odor of old blood and decay that meant vampire, mixed with almost alcoholic overtones that, like the subtle difference between fine wines, indicated lineage. And Lyall smelled an old lineage, with a film of pine resin to the wine, and no ties to the modern hives. It was a scent long since lost and no longer emitted except by this one man. Lyall could have guessed the identity of the vampire from that scent, even were he not already familiar with its owner—the potentate. Or, as the vampire was dead and no longer a denizen of the Shadow Council, Lyall supposed he must be remembered now under his old name, Sir Francis Walsingham.

“Queen Victoria,” he said to his Alpha, “is not going to be happy about this. Why the hell didn’t he send someone else to do his dirty work?”

Lord Maccon did not look up from his self-prescribed penance: bite, lick, bite, lick.

Together, the three drones hefted their dead master and made their way slowly up the stairs around the earl and Biffy’s still form. Even in their grief, they winced away from the sight of an Anubis feeding. As they passed, Professor Lyall noticed that Lord Maccon’s bullet had hit Walsingham directly in the heart—a lucky shot, indeed.

A vampire was dead. There weren’t enough of them around to forgive a transgression like that, even from BUR’s chief sundowner. The potentate was a rove, with no major hive connections, and for that Professor Lyall was grateful. But there would be blood payment due to the greater community regardless, and it was the potentate’s relationship with Buckingham Palace that was the real stickler. Even if, by his actions, this vampire had shown himself a traitor to his own kind, kidnapping another’s drone, his absence left a gap Queen Victoria would find hard to fill. He had served as advisor to the throne since Queen Elizabeth’s day. It was his knowledge of Roman strategy and supply management that drove the expansion of the British Empire. For someone like that to die because he had made a mistake, because Alexia Maccon, soulless, had become pregnant by a werewolf and he panicked, was a loss to every British citizen. Even the werewolves would mourn him, in their way.

Professor Lyall, who was cultured and not given to profanity, watched the drones cart the disanimated potentate away and said curtly, “What a bloody awful mess.”

After which he stood, silent and waiting, wary and alert, for five long hours while Lord Maccon, stubborn to the last, held Anubis Form and worked over the dying drone.

The earl’s stubbornness was rewarded when, just before dawn, before all his labor would be lost to the sun, Biffy’s eyes opened, as yellow as buttercups. He howled out his pain and confusion and fear as his form shifted, and he lay there, shuddering but whole, a lovely chocolate-brown wolf with oxblood-red stomach fur.

Lord Maccon changed out of Anubis Form and grinned hugely at his Beta. “And there’s another one for the howlers to sing about.”

“What is it with you, my lord? Can you only metamorphose the difficult cases?” Professor Lyall was impressed despite himself.

“Yes, well, he is your charge now.” Lord Maccon stood and stretched, his spine popping as it realigned. His tawny eyes turned with surprise toward the rapidly lightening sky.

“Best get him indoors right quick.”

Professor Lyall nodded and bent to pick up the newly made wolf. Biffy struggled halfheartedly before sagging weakly into the Beta’s strong arms. Metamorphosis took even the best of them like that.

Lyall made his way silently up the steps to the top of the embankment, thinking hard. They would have to find shelter nearby. A new pup couldn’t take direct sunlight without considerable damage, and poor Biffy had been through more than enough for one night. Just as he figured out a destination and headed purposefully north toward Charing Cross Station, he noticed his Alpha wasn’t following him.

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

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

Lyall would have rubbed his face with his hands, except his arms were full. “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 recall them

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