The Dashkova Memoirs 02 A Cauldron of Secrets by Thomas K. Carpenter

The Dashkova Memoirs 02 A Cauldron of Secrets by Thomas K. Carpenter

Author:Thomas K. Carpenter
Language: eng
Format: mobi
Tags: mystery, myth, steampunk, russian, god, historical fantasy, fae
Publisher: Black Moon Books
Published: 2015-05-09T22:00:00+00:00


Chapter Sixteen

The interior of my front room smelled like a vagrant's soiled clothes as I stepped through the door. I held the crook of my elbow over my nose as I pointed the pistol at the doorways, feeling that Voltaire would spring from the darkness the moment I let down my guard. The cellar door hung by one hinge, a tilted rectangle casting shadows from my lamp against the wall.

"Bonjour, Monsieur Voltaire," I called sweetly.

The whole lower level had been ransacked, drawers opened, cushions upturned. He'd been thorough in his destruction. My kitchen had seen similar treatment. What few spices I could afford had been spilled upon the scuffed wooden floor in overlapping blobs of light brown, white, and chunky black.

By the smell, he'd urinated in the corners a few times like a wild beast, which maybe he was by now. When I was sure he wasn't on the main level, I examined the second floor. Like the downstairs, every drawer and cabinet had been opened, contents strewn across the room like a hurricane had blown through.

The cellar floor sparkled like a moonlit lake. Glass had been broken into fine pieces and spread across the stone, stains of the alchemical materials marking their ending. Most of the items had been expensive and irreplaceable, at least on my current earnings. What a mess he'd made of my home, looking for more powder. Is that what I would turn into soon enough?

Content that I was safe for the moment, or at least that Voltaire wasn't lurking in the corner, I put away my pistol and returned upstairs to retrieve a proper dress. For now, I didn't think I'd be able live here, so I packed a traveling bag.

With a dress over my arm, I prepared to leave and found a letter right inside the door. The seal in the red wax was a gear at the center of a spoke-wheel.

"Djata," I whispered, and broke it open to read the letter. In it, he requested a favor in return for the cane he'd given, asking for my assistance at the Merry Meadow Dock house on the Schuylkill River, two nights hence.

I knew the place. There was a long boathouse near the bend in the river, and its roof had been painted a bright red. The poorer residents of Philadelphia went swimming in the oxbow lake that had formed behind the boathouse. Memories of laughing children throwing black, earthy mud balls at each other tugged the corners of my lips upward. I tucked the letter away and moved my things to the idling steam carriage.

Next to the wheel of my vehicle was the creature that had stalked me at Djata's place. Its golden scales reflected in the gas lights. Standing on hind legs, the beastie was as tall as my waist. I nearly dropped my dress onto the damp cobblestones in surprise.

Its black, pebble-like eyes regarded me with an alien confidence. On its jaw, a faint line ran across its cheek, as if it were hinged.



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