The Chemickal Marriage

colours of paint were connected to the different colours of glass. The Comte had not realized the alchemical potential at the time, but – in the body of Robert Vandaariff – he must have done so since.
    ‘Are you just going to stand there?’
    She turned with a start. In the dying light she had not seen the figure slumped in the corner: a thin man in a white jacket and dark trousers. He had been beaten and his face swelled with bruises. Even as he spoke, his body did not move, as if to do so lay beyond him.
    ‘Who are you?’
    ‘Michel Gorine. Late of the Old Palace, now Her Majesty’s guest.’
    ‘I am Miss Temple. I’m not anyone’s guest at all.’
    ‘Forgive my not rising.’ He raised his hands, bound about the wrists with knotted rope. ‘Would you mind trying to untie me? My teeth will not do – our hosts knocked a few loose and I am loath to risk my smile.’
    Miss Temple did not move. ‘Is this the Old Palace, where we are now?’
    ‘The Old Palace is a brothel. We are in a shed outside Bathings.’
    ‘What is Bathings?’
    ‘What everyone calls the Royal Thermæ. I wish you would untie my hands.’
    Miss Temple pulled at the door, then kicked it again, without heat. She looked at the man in the corner. ‘I suppose you told him everything?’
    ‘I beg your pardon?’
    ‘If you had not talked they would still be at you. Now they must be confirming what you said, in case you tried to lie. Did you lie?’
    ‘About what?’
    ‘I would be happy to know. The fellow I met was named Schoepfil. Stout and weaselly.’
    Gorine shifted to a sitting position. ‘Why would anyone interrogate
you
?’
    ‘What did, or didn’t, you lie about, Mr Gorine, and to whom?’
    Gorine carefully touched his split lip. ‘An iron rooster named Bronque.’
    Miss Temple nodded. ‘I
thought
he was wicked.’
    ‘He has a wicked fist.’
    ‘Why should he care about a brothel?’
    ‘Who
are
you?’
    ‘No one at all. I don’t suppose you saw a beautiful woman with black hair and a dark dress?’ Gorine shook his head. ‘I can’t think they killed her – how could they have killed her but not me? No, the real question is whether sheis a prisoner or their ally. She’s very good at getting people to do things. Did you see the dead girl?’
    ‘What dead girl?’
    ‘Francesca Trapping. A poor pale thing with red hair.’
    Gorine shook his head carefully. ‘How did she die?’
    ‘That is the mystery. Those beasts have cut her to pieces to find out.’
    ‘Good Lord,’ cried Gorine. ‘Why?’
    ‘Because there is very little time – for anyone.’ She crossed to Gorine. ‘If you touch me I will do my best to hurt you, and my best is
keen
.’
    ‘I recline forewarned.’
    She tugged at the knots to no great success. ‘You’ve bled into the rope.’
    ‘My apologies.’
    Miss Temple lifted his hands to her mouth, taking a knot in her teeth and tugging until the first strand grudgingly pulled loose. She spat it out and made quick work of the rest, until the sticky rope lay uncoiled on the floor. She snatched up some straw to wipe her hands. Gorine studied the raw bands around his wrists. ‘You should wash that with salt and hot water,’ said Miss Temple. ‘It will hurt, but otherwise your hands will puff like a brace of adders.’
    ‘I’ll have my manservant boil some up directly,’ muttered Gorine, but then he looked up at Miss Temple and caught her smile. He shook his head. ‘You’re an odd creature.’
    ‘I suggest we escape, but I do not know where to go. My friends have vanished, if they are even alive.’
    ‘My friends as well.’
    ‘You have friends?’
    ‘A shock, I know,’ Gorine replied. ‘A man named Mahmoud. A woman named Madelaine Kraft.’
    ‘I do not know them.’
    ‘Why should you, unless you have traffic with our business?’
    ‘Which I do
not
.’ But then Miss Temple sighed at an unwelcome thought. ‘Unless you were acquainted with a woman named Angelique.’
    Gorine leant forward. ‘How in hell do you know of
her
?’
    ‘Part of the same exceedingly long story. She died at Harschmort House.’
    ‘By whose hand?’
    Though she herself had fired the bullet, Miss Temple scarcely considered her answer a lie. ‘The Comte d’Orkancz. He did terrible things to her body, with
machines
.’ Before Gorine could give vent to his anger – anger that, she knew, would be fuelled to excess by the shame of his own imprisonment – she changed the topic. ‘The fact is, I know all