Well, that certainly told Alexia where Madame Lefoux’s priorities lay.
“Who is Angelique working for? The vampires?”
Madame Lefoux, having talked herself out, nodded.
Lady Maccon swore, using words her husband would have been proud of.
Tunstell was shocked. He blushed.
“I suspected she was a spy, of course, but I did not think she would become an active agent. She did such lovely things with my hair.”
Madame Lefoux tilted her head as though she could understand perfectly.
“What is she after? Why has she been doing this?”
The Frenchwoman shook her head. With her top hat off and her cravat untied, she looked almost feminine, most unlike herself. Softer. Alexia was not certain she liked it. “I can only suggest—the same thing you are after, muhjah. The humanization weapon.”
Lady Maccon swore again. “And, of course, Angelique was standing just there. Right behind me in the hallway when I figured out what it was.”
Madame Lefoux’s eyes widened.
But it was Tunstell who said, voice full of awe, “You figured it out?”
“Of course I did. Where have you been?” Lady Maccon immediately headed toward the door. “Tunstell, my orders stand.”
“But, mistress, you need—”
“They stand!”
“I do not think she wants to kill anyone but me,” Madame Lefoux called after her. “I really do not. Please, my lady, do not do anything… terminal.”
Lady Maccon whirled back at the door and bared her teeth, looking for all the world like a bit of a werewolf herself.
“She shot my husband, madame,” she said.
Outside, where the Kingair Pack should have still stood, was only silence. Silence and a whole mess of plaid-skirted, large, sleeping bodies—quite the grand collapse.
Lady Maccon closed her eyes and took a long, annoyed breath. Really, must she do everything herself?
Gripping her parasol firmly, she armed the numbing spike, her finger hovering over the dart-ejection button, and charged up the stairs toward the mummy room. Unless she missed her guess, Angelique would try to get the creature out and on the road, probably by carriage, and back to her masters.
She missed her guess. The moment she opened the door to the room, it became patently clear the mummy was still in residence and Angelique was not.
Lady Maccon frowned. “What?”
She tapped the tip of her parasol on the floor in annoyance. Of course! A vampire spy’s priority would be the transfer of information. It was the thing vampires valued most. Alexia changed her grip on the parasol and hurtled up too many staircases for her corset-clad self, arriving, panting, at the aethographic transmitter room.
Without even bothering to see if it was in use, she aimed her parasol and pulled down on the appropriate lotus leaf in the handle, activating the magnetic disruptor emitter. For just one moment everything stopped.
Then Alexia rushed forward and into the transmitting room of the apparatus.
Angelique was already standing up from the station. The little arms of the spark emitters were stopped midmessage. The French maid looked directly at Lady Maccon and, without pause, dashed toward her.
Alexia deflected the charge, but the girl’s intention obviously had not been to attack, for she simply shoved Alexia to one side and leaped from the room. Lady Maccon fell back against a tangle of gadgetry on one wall of the chamber, lost her balance, and hit the floor hard, landing on her side.
She floundered among skirts, bustle, and petticoats, trying to regain her footing. As soon as she had, she raced to the transmitter cradle and grabbed out the metal scroll. Only three-quarters had burned through. Was it enough? Had her blast stopped the transmission, or did the vampires now have access to possibly the most dangerous information both about and to preternaturals?
With no time to check, Lady Maccon thrust the slate to one side, whirled about, and dashed after Angelique, convinced that now the young woman would be after the mummy.
This time she was correct.
“Angelique, stop!”
Alexia saw her from the landing above, struggling with the corpse of the long-dead preternatural, half carrying, half dragging the gruesome thing down the first set of stairs toward the front door of the castle.
“Alexia? What is going on?” Ivy Hisselpenny emerged from her room, cheeks blotchy and tearstained.
Lady Maccon took aim with her parasol, through the mahogany railing of the banister, and fired a numbing dart at her maid.
The French girl twisted, holding the mummy up as a shield. The dart hit and hung half inside of wrinkled brown skin thousands of years old. Alexia pounded down the next set of stairs.
Angelique pulled the mummy across her back so that it could protect her as she ran, but her progress was hampered by the awkwardness of having to carry the creature.
Lady Maccon paused on the staircase and took aim once more.
Miss Hisselpenny appeared in Alexia’s line of view, standing on the landing above the first staircase, looking down at Angelique, entirely blocking Alexia’s chance at a second shot.
“Ivy, move!”
“Goodness, Alexia, what is your maid up to? Is she wearing a mummy?”
“Yes, it is the latest Paris fashion, didn’t you know?” replied Lady Maccon before, quite rudely, shoving her friend out of the way.
Miss Hisselpenny squeaked in outrage.
Alexia took aim and shot again. This time the dart missed entirely. She swore. She would have to get in some target practice if she were to continue this line of work. The parasol carried only a two-dart armament, so she increased her speed and went for the old-fashioned option.
“Really, Alexia, language. You sound like a fishmonger’s wife!” said Miss Hisselpenny. “What is going on? Did your parasol just emit something? How untoward of it. I must be seeing things. It must be my deep love for Mr. Tunstell clouding my vision.”
Lady Maccon entirely ignored her dear friend. The power of the mummy to repel her notwithstanding, she charged down the staircase, parasol at the ready. “Stay out of the way, Ivy,” she ordered.
Angelique stumbled over the fallen form of one of the pack members.
“Just you stop right there,” yelled Lady Maccon in her best muhjah voice.
French maid and mummy were almost at the door when Lady Maccon pounced, prodding Angelique viciously with the tip of the parasol.
Angelique froze, turning her head toward her former mistress. Her big violet eyes were wide.
Lady Maccon gave her a tight little smile. “Now, then, my dear, one lump or two?” Before the girl could answer her, she hauled her arm back and bashed Angelique as hard as she could over the head.
The maid and the mummy both fell.
“Apparently, just one is sufficient.”
At the top of the stairs, Miss Hisselpenny gave a little cry of alarm and then clapped her hand to her mouth. “Alexia,” she hissed, “how could you possibly behave so forcefully? With a parasol! To your own maid. It simply is not the thing to discipline one’s staff so barbarically! I mean to say, your hair always looked perfectly well done to me.”
Lady Maccon ignored her and kicked the mummy out of the way.
Ivy gasped again. “What are you doing? That is an ancient artifact. You love those old things!”
Lady Maccon could have done without the commentary. She had no time for historical scruples. The blasted mummy was causing too many problems and, if left intact, would become a logistical nightmare. There was no way it could be allowed to exist. Hang the scientific consequences.
She checked Angelique’s breathing. The spy was still alive.
The best thing to do, Lady Maccon decided, was eliminate the mummy. Everything else could be dealt with subsequently.
Resisting the intense pushing sensation that urged her to get as far away from the awful thing as possible, Alexia dragged the mummy out onto the massive stone blocks that formed the front stoop of the castle. No sense in putting anyone else in danger.