Chapter 1
Early spring, 1866
London
The damn fools were chanting.
He felt like an idiot, and Montgomery Fairfax wasn’t partial to playing the idiot.
The circle of men in their brown monks’ robes and cowls were muttering together as if they’d practiced this ritual for months, if not years. He could swear he heard beads clicking together as they shuffled into a circle.
Only two beeswax candles illuminated the drawing room. The candles, accompanied by various incense burners and a large brass statue of a naked female figure, sat on the mantel of a cold fireplace at the far end of the room. The incense was strong, a convergence of scents at once flowery and spicy, mixed with the warmth caused by too many people in too small a room.
He should never have listened to his solicitor.
“I’d recommend you take the mirror to the Mercaii, Your Lordship,” Edmund Kerr had said. “They can properlydetermine its provenance and origin.” Edmund had procured him an invitation to this gathering as well as providing him directions to the townhouse.
From that conversation, he had been given to believe the Society of the Mercaii was comprised of reasonably intelligent men whose purpose was to investigate, then dispel, anything abnormal or irrational.
Instead, he faced a group of chanting monks.
The robe he’d been given to wear was too short and the wool cowl made his face itch. He done what they’d asked, and pulled it close so he would remain anonymous. For that fact alone, he was grateful. At least no one of his recent acquaintance would learn of this idiotic exploit.
He knew enough Latin to recognize it was the language the men were chanting. Their voices were low, melodic, and not one of the so-called monks slipped in his recitation.
The circle parted, forming two half-moons. He clenched his hands, forced himself to relax even as he felt his heartbeat escalate.
He didn’t particularly like the unexpected.
A figure separated from the others, walked to the mantel, taking one of the candles. With great ceremony, he lit the candles the other men held in front of them. Because their hoods were drawn forward, he couldn’t see any of their faces, even after their candles had been lit.
The chanting grew louder; the flames flickered as a door opened in the opposite wall. A tall, black-robed figure entered, moving to the center of the group.
The man—the leader?—spoke Latin in a deep, rumbling voice. The monks answered him in one voice. The gathering had taken on the solemnity of a religious ceremony, but that wasn’t the only reason Montgomery was becoming increasingly uneasy.
According to instructions given him, he should have remained in the anteroom until officially summoned. He would have done so if the monks hadn’t passed him, chanting. His curiosity had made him follow, but now he wished he’d stayed in the other room, or even opted to leave.
The damn mirror could have remained a mystery for all he cared.
Another door opened, one he hadn’t noticed until that moment. A figure, clad in a blue robe, was supported by two monks and led through the circle to stand before the leader.
Mumbling something in Latin, the man in the black robe stepped forward and pulled the cowl from the supplicant’s head, revealing a woman with tumbling chestnut curls.
The crowd surged toward her, the atmosphere abruptly changing from a religious ceremony to one more predatory. A hungry and expectant pack of wild dogs ready to set upon a wounded deer.
He took a few steps to the right, to see the woman more clearly. Her face was pale, her profile nearly perfect. Pale pink lips were curved in a half smile; her eyes blinked slowly as if she had recently awakened.
She didn’t belong there but, then, neither did he.
Another brown-robed figure brought a bench into the circle. The woman was made to kneel upon it, and place her folded hands on the small ledge in front of her. A lit candle was placed between her hands, her fingers molded around it when she couldn’t hold it on her own.
From the way she was responding, he suspected she’d been drugged. Otherwise, she would have comprehended the danger implicit in the sudden eagerness of the men around him.
“Do you surrender your will to the Society?” the leader said, addressing the woman in clipped English.
She shook her head, then reconsidered when one of the men at her side bent to whisper something in her ear.
“Yes,” she said softly, almost too softly for him to hear.
