Clockwork Princess

Consul’s eyebrows went up. “Because your father would have been docile?” he said. “There were two bad ends, and I chose the best of them. I still had hopes of controlling her. But now …”
    “Sir,” Gideon cut in, in his best polite voice. “Why are you telling us this?”
    “Ah,” said the Consul, glancing out the rain-streaked window. “Here we are.” He rapped on the carriage window. “Richard! Stop the carriage at the Argent Rooms.”
    Gabriel flicked his eyes toward his brother, who shrugged in bafflement. The Argent Rooms were a notorious music hall and gentleman’s club in Piccadilly Circus. Ladies of ill repute frequented the place, and there were rumors that the business was owned by Downworlders, and that on some evenings the “magic shows” featured real magic.
    “I used to come here with your father,” said the Consul, once all three of them were on the pavement. Gideon and Gabriel were staring up through the drizzle at the rather tasteless Italianate theater front that had clearly been grafted onto the more modest buildings that had stood there before. It featured a triple loggia and some rather loud blue paint. “Once the police revoked the Alhambra’s license because the management had allowed the cancan to be danced upon their premises. But then, the Alhambra is run by mundanes. This is much more satisfactory. Shall we go in?”
    His tone left no room for disagreement. Gabriel followed the Consul through the arcaded entrance, where money changed hands and a ticket was purchased for each of them. Gabriel looked at his ticket with some puzzlement. It was in the form of an advertisement, promising the best entertainment in london !
    “Feats of strength,”
he read off to Gideon as they made their way down a long corridor.
“Trained animals, strongwomen, acrobats, circus acts, and comic singers.”
    Gideon was muttering under his breath.
    “And contortionists,” Gabriel added brightly. “It looks like there’s a woman here who can put her foot on top of her—”
    “By the Angel, this place is barely better than a penny gaff,” Gideon said. “Gabriel, don’t look at anything unless I tell you it’s all right.”
    Gabriel rolled his eyes as his brother took firm hold of his elbow and propelled him into what was clearly the grand salon—a massive room whose ceiling was painted with reproductions of the Italian Great Masters, including Botticelli’s
Birth of Venus
, now rather smoke-stained and the worse for wear. Gasoliers hung from gilded mounds of plaster, filling the room with a yellowish light.
    The walls were lined with velvet benches, on which dark figures huddled—gentlemen, surrounded by ladies whose dresses were too bright and whose laughter was too loud. Music poured from the stage at the front of the room. The Consul moved toward it, grinning. A woman in a top hat and tails was slinking up and down the stage, singing a song entitled “It’s Naughty, but It’s Nice.” As she turned, her eyes flashed out green beneath the light of the gasolier.
    Werewolf
, Gabriel thought.
    “Wait here for me a moment, boys,” said the Consul, and he disappeared into the crowd.
    “Lovely,” Gideon muttered, and pulled Gabriel closer toward him as a woman in a tight-bodiced satin dress swayed by them. She smelled of gin and something else beneath it, something dark and sweet, a bit like James Carstairs’s scent of burned sugar.
    “Who knew the Consul was such a ramper?” Gabriel said. “Couldn’t this have waited until after he took us to the Silent City?”
    “He’s not taking us to the Silent City.” Gideon’s mouth was tight.
    “He’s not?”
    “Don’t be a half-wit, Gabriel. Of course not. He wants something else from us. I don’t know what yet. He took us here to unsettle us—and he wouldn’t have done it if he weren’t fairly sure he has something over us that will prevent us from telling Charlotte or anyone else where we’ve been.”
    “Maybe he did used to come here with Father.”
    “Maybe, but that’s not why we’re here now,” Gideon said with finality. He tightened his grip on his brother’s arm as the Consul reappeared, carrying with him a small bottle of what looked like soda water but what Gabriel guessed likely had at least a tuppence worth of spirit in it.
    “What, nothing for us?” Gabriel inquired, and was met with a glare from his brother and a sour smile from the Consul. Gabriel realized he had no idea if the Consul himself