Stoker & Bash: The Death Under the Dark Arches by Selina Kray

Author:Selina Kray
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Victorian, Romance, mystery, gay, historical
Publisher: Selina Kray
Published: 2020-10-25T23:00:00+00:00

Chapter 14

An arm for an arm

A Bash for a Beast

Make the exchange

And so will reign peace

Otherwise they’ll know

Naught but terror and pain

A game without end

And who will they blame?

The bearer of this missive

Is but a pawn in my plot

Do what you do best

And leave him to rot

But wait for my present

What or when, who can say?

If this gift doesn’t teach you

Others will pay

Hiero flung the note across the table to keep from tearing it to shreds. The blood-encrusted envelope—Dover’s blood, no doubt—emblazoned with a red-brown smear of a three glared up at him when he went to smash his head onto the glossy, seamless hardwood. He threw it as well.

On the small divan across the parlor, a doctor attended Dover, their murmuring voices rising in pitch and volume with every shift of the patient’s arm. Hiero could not glare at a man in pain, especially one suffering, as the note suggested, due to Hiero’s failings, so he directed his stare at the bovine DS Littlejohn, who worked his jaw as he watched over the proceedings.

Employing every one of his feline wiles to retrieve the note and envelope without Littlejohn taking notice, Hiero moved to the window instead of returning to his seat. The scene in the street below resembled a rowdy funeral. A procession of Black Marias waited to pull up to the exit to the Adelphi Arches, each to be filled with rioters escaping the underground blaze. Clouds of smoke hung around the tunnel mouth, stifled by the humidity and blending into the descending fog. Those bruise-fisted, black-coated constables not charged with herding prisoners clogged the street. Thrumming with the aftereffects of the battle, they cackled and whooped and tossed their helmets in the air as if they’d survived Waterloo.

Hiero turned his back on that hellscape, one thankfully not of his making, searching for a decent strip across which he could pace. Between the minuscule parlor and the two-person dining area, there was none to be had. The reception clerk had generously donated the room for Mr. Dover’s recovery and Kip and Callie’s refreshment in exchange for everyone’s discretion regarding the secret entrance to the Dark Arches in the cloakroom. Of course, the only room available was the least accommodating. How Kip and Callie were getting on in the adjoining bedchamber with water closet, Hiero hadn’t enough imagination to conjure. In a different mood, he might have passed the time guessing at the depth of Kip’s blush.

But the note tainted everything. After tucking it in an inner pocket, he felt it like a stone over his heart, crushing the last of his patience. The only thing that stopped him serving it up to a candle’s voracious flame was the chance it contained evidence. Evidence of something other than Hiero’s continued inability to put an end to the suffering of the members of his former company.

Method and reason could no longer shield him. He must embrace the madness.

With no warning, the door swung open. A snide protest died in Hiero’s

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