“Sir. My lord. Sir?” The boy looked confused. Men like Stephen generally didn’t enter kitchens, and he was old enough to know it. “I—I need to talk to Lord MacAlasdair, sir, right away.”
“That’s me, lad,” said Stephen, as gently as he could manage. “What’s wrong?”
“I. It’s Mina. My sister. Miss Seymour, she would’ve been to you. My lord. She said she worked for you. She went out and she’s not come back, and Mum said as how she said she was coming up ’ere to talk with you.” The boy’s mouth worked silently for a second and then he swallowed, Adam’s apple bobbing on his skinny neck. “And they say there was gunshots earlier, m’lord, and screaming.”
When Stephen’s heart went still, experience took over, freezing his brain and his blood, constructing an icy wall of action behind which his rage and regret became distant. When he spoke to Mina’s pale-faced brother, it was with all the calm he’d ever used to lead men.
“Near you?”
“A street away, maybe. People couldn’t see well for the fog.”
“Is that all you know?”
The boy nodded.
Action beckoned. Stephen held back. “Why was she coming back here?”
“It was about Florrie, m’lord.” Mina’s brother gulped. “Um. Our other sister. She’s sick.”
“I know. And Mina said I could help?”
“She said you might.” Now he looked hopeful as well as frightened, and Stephen felt an intense desire to put his fist through a wall.
Ward had set this up neatly.
“I’ll try,” said Stephen. “See here—Bert, isn’t it?”
Even in his panic, the boy’s eyes widened a little. “Yes, m’lord.”
“Stay in here. There’s jam in the pantry. I’ll be back before very long, or I’ll send someone else for you.”
Colin met him outside. “I heard the disturbance,” he said, “and the wards seem to be fine all over the house, so I take it the problem’s physical?”
“Mina’s gone,” said Stephen. “Her brother’s here. From what he’s said, it sounds like Ward’s taken her. And that her sister’s illness wasn’t natural. A trap, likely as not.” He let his breath hiss out between his teeth. “I should have known.”
“Yes, you really should be more omniscient one of these days,” Colin said. “Now, if you could flog yourself a little later, you can get me a bowl of water and we can get to work.”
“Scrying? Don’t you need something of hers?”
“I’ve already got it.” Colin grinned. “You’re here, aren’t you?”
A few minutes of hasty activity produced the bowl in question and sent Polly to the kitchen for supervisory and jam-distribution purposes. Then Stephen stood, his hands clenched at his sides, and stared into the bowl as clear water gave way to blue mist, which in its turn parted to reveal grimy walls and huge metal vats: a factory of some sort, obviously, though Stephen didn’t know what it had made. At present, it was sheltering Ward and five of the hybrid manes, who stood in a ring around a female figure lashed to a pipe.
Mina.
Stephen growled and felt his lips draw back, baring his teeth in a threat as instinctual as it was ineffectual. His nails lengthened into claws, cutting into the still-unchanged flesh of his hands. He felt dim pain and didn’t care. Rage was much closer, and much more vivid.
No. Not yet.
As Stephen watched, Mina struggled, and while the desperate energy in her movements tore at his heart, it also reassured him. She still lived. She still had enough strength left to fight.
Unless he could get to her soon, though, that strength might not do her any good. Stephen didn’t know what Ward had planned, but several horrifying possibilities sprang to his mind—and he didn’t know that he could get there in time to stop any of them.
He didn’t know exactly where Ward’s den was. In human form, it would take him at least an hour to find it. When he got there, he’d have five of the hybrids to fight, which would be no small task even with Colin—and he couldn’t bring Colin.
“He doesn’t have one hostage,” Stephen said. “He has two.”
“You think he’d kill the Seymour child?”
