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.”They heard Miss Hisselpenny squealing in the hallway and then a chatter of other voices, Felicity perhaps, and Tunstell.Lord Maccon, still lounging poetically upon the bed, sniffed.“Very well, travel the length of England accompanied by Ivy and my sister, which is very possibly worse—and still your fault.”The earl rose, came over, and buttoned up the back of her dress.Alexia was only mildly disappointed.They were running late for dinner, and she was starving.“Why are you here, wife?” he asked bluntly.Lady Maccon leaned back, exasperated.They were getting nowhere with this conversation.“Conall, answer me this: have you been able to change since we arrived at Kingair?”Lord Maccon frowned.“I had not thought to try.”She gave him an aggrieved look via the mirror, and he let go of her and stepped back.She watched him, his busy hands stilled.Nothing happened.He shook his head and came back.“Not possible.It feels a little as though I am in contact with you and trying for my wolf form.Not difficult, or even elusive, simply unavailable.That part of me, the werewolf part, has vanished.”She turned to him.“I came because I am muhjah, and this changelessness is connected to the Kingair Pack.I saw you sneak away and talk to the Beta.None of this pack has been able to shift in months, have they? For how long exactly has this been going on? Since boarding the Spanker and traveling home? Or before? Where did they find the weapon? India? Egypt? Or is it a plague they have brought back? What happened to them overseas?”Lord Maccon looked at his wife in the looking glass, his big hands on her shoulders.“They willna tell me.I am no longer Alpha here.They owe me no explanation.”“But you are BUR’s chief sundowner.”“This is Scotland; BUR’s authority is weak here.Besides, these people were my pack for generations.I may have no wish to lead them anymore, but I do not want to kill any of them either.They know that.I simply want to know what is happening here.”“You and I both, my love,” replied his wife.“You don’t mind if I wish to question your brethren on the matter?”“I dinna see how you will make over any better than I.” Conall was doubtful.“They do not know you are muhjah, and you’d be wise to keep it that way.Queen Victoria isna so loved in this part of the world.”“I’ll be discreet.” Her husband’s eyebrows reached for the sky at that.“Very well, as discreet as possible for me.”“It canna hurt,” he said, and then thought better of it.This was Alexia, after all.“So long as you refrain from using that parasol.”His lady wife grinned maliciously.“I shall be direct, but not that direct.”“Why do I doubt you? Well, watch out for Dubh; he can be difficult.”“Not up to Professor Lyall’s caliber as a Beta, shall we say?”“Um, that’s not for me to say.Dubh was never my Beta, not even my Gamma.”That was interesting news.“But this Niall, the one who was killed in battle over seas, he wasn’t your Beta either?”“Na.Mine died,” he replied shortly, in a tone of voice that said he did not want to discuss the matter further.“Your turn.This dirigible fall, wife?”Alexia stood, finished with her ablutions.“Someone else is on the scent: a spy of some kind or some other agent, a member of the Hypocras Club, perhaps.While Madame Lefoux and I were strolling the observation deck, someone tried to push us over the side.I fell and Madame Lefoux fought off whomever it was.I managed to stay my fall and climbed to safety.It was nothing, really, except that I nearly lost the parasol.And I am no longer partial to dirigible travel.”“I should think not.Well, wife, try not to get yourself killed for at least a few days?”“Are you going to tell me the real reason you came back to Scotland? Do not think you have thrown me off the scent so easily.”“I never doubted you, my sweet demure little Alexia.”Lady Maccon gave him her best, most fierce, battle-ax expression, and they went down to dinner.CHAPTER NINEIn Which Meringues Are AnnihilatedLady Maccon wore a dinner gown of black with white pleated trim and white satin ribbon about the neck and sleeves.It would have cast her in a suitably subdued and dignified tone except that, due to the protracted argument with her husband, she had entirely forgotten to stuff her hair under a cap.Her dark tresses rioted about her head, only partially confined by the morning’s updo, a heaven of frizz and feathering.Lord Maccon adored it.He thought she looked like some exotic gypsy and wondered if she might be amenable to donning gold earrings and dancing topless about their room in a loose red skirt.Everyone else was outraged—imagine the wife of an earl appearing at dinner with frizzy hair.Even in Scotland such things were simply not done.The rest of the company was already at dinner when they arrived.Ivy had rejected the blue gown for a more excitable puce monstrosity, with multiple poufs of ruffles like so many taffeta puffballs, and a wide belt of bright crimson tied in an enormous bow above the bustle.Felicity had chosen an uncharacteristic white and pale green lace affair, which made her look deceptively demure.Conversation was already in flow.Madame Lefoux was in deep consult with one of the Kingair clavigers, a bespectacled young man with high-arched eyebrows that gave him a perpetual expression of equal parts panic and curiosity.They appeared to be ruminating on the malfunction of the aethographor and formulating plans to investigate it after the meal.Kingair’s Beta, Gamma, and four other pack members all looked glum and uninterested in the world about them, but spoke comfortably enough to Ivy and Felicity on the inanities of life, such as the appalling Scottish weather and the appalling Scottish food.Both of which the ladies made a show of liking more than was the case and the gentlemen a show of liking less.Lady Kingair was in a fine fettle, waxing sharp and grumpy at the head of the table.She paused in the act of waving austere hands at the footmen to glower at her distant grandfather and his new wife for their unpardonable tardiness.Lord Maccon hesitated upon entering the room, as though unsure of where to sit.The last time he’d been in residence he would have sat at the foot of the table, a spot now ostentatiously vacant [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]