Thorne did not appear crestfallen. He merely smiled and tipped his hat to her. “Should you change your mind, I will find you.”
Chapter Seven
Talent insisted on walking Mary back home. Unnecessary, but the stubborn man would not be dissuaded. And so they traversed the lonely streets in a strained silence.
“You and Mr. Thorne appeared quite familiar with one another,” Mary said after a time.
“I don’t care to discuss Thorne.”
What a shock. Mary decided to refrain from speaking at all.
The sound of their footsteps echoed off the cobbles and the brick buildings leaning in on them. A vortex of yellow-green fog obscured their surroundings, and the hissing gas lamps did little more than brighten the fog and make it appear thicker. Talent’s gaze roamed and remained vigilant. Mary knew his eyesight was better than hers, but the fog was hindering him too, for he edged closer to her side and tensed as if preparing to spring into action.
“Something smells off,” he murmured.
“Could you be more specific, Mr. Talent? Everything smells off in London.”
He glanced at her, and the corner of his mouth twitched. “Don’t be daft, Mistress Chase.” Reminding her yet again that she ought to be calling him Master. “There are familiar foul scents, and there are odd ones.”
“Well then, let us say that my sense of smell is not as developed as yours. Fortunately.” He snorted wryly, and she went on. “What is it that you smell?”
His nose lifted slightly, and his mouth opened to the night. “Don’t precisely know. It smells a bit like oil. Not lamp oil, but the sort you scent down by the factories. Sharp, sulfuric.”
His description tickled the edges of her memory, but she couldn’t catch a hold of the proper recollection. They were silent. Both of them searching the night. Click, click went Mary’s heels. Her breath sounded over-loud in her ears. And then she realized. There were no other sounds. No city sounds, no scurrying of little rodent feet.
Convulsively, she clutched Talent’s arm. “Oil.” A discordant grating sounded in the night.
Talent stopped short. “What the bleeding hell?” Around them shadows darkened, becoming thicker, taking on shapes.
Mary backed up, and her shoulder met his. “It can’t be…” But she rather feared it might. “Shadow crawlers,” Mary whispered, her hand slipping underneath her cloak to her hip, where her weapons belt lay. She grabbed the small bullwhip.
“What?” Talent glanced wildly around. He could see the shadows, that was certain. He just didn’t know what they were.
The grinding of gears, a hiss of steam, and a clank, clank, clank rang out.
Bother. “Mechanical men.” She braced her feet as the shadows surrounded them. “They live in the shadows and draw power from them. I’ve never seen one, but have heard stories. They’re called Adam’s first experiment. A nightmare version of the GIM.”
“Hell.”
Precisely. And then they appeared. Two lurching, hulking men making their way down the street. Vile experiments, partially flesh, mostly metal. Red eyes gleamed in the dark as one of them advanced, a blackened thing oozing oil, with steam billowing from the open iron rib cage in which its black heart pumped. The other crawler was more gold than flesh and appeared vaguely familiar.
“Piss and shit,” Talent uttered with wide eyes.
“Be creative in your shifting, Master Talent!”
Mary leapt back as one lunged, and then let her whip fly. It snapped around the thing’s massive iron leg, and she pulled hard. Gods, but it was heavy. The crawler wobbled. A hard kick to its chest had it toppling. It crashed to the ground. But before she could free herself, it caught hold of the whip and tugged. Mary went flying into it, stopped only by a metal fist smashing into her face. White spots exploded before her eyes as her cheekbone cracked and blood poured into her mouth.
Dimly she heard a roar of fury and saw the blur of Talent launching into the golden crawler. His claws swiped, and sparks flew as he connected with raw metal. But then another hard tug dragged her roughly over the cobbles. The whip had become tangled about her wrist, and the crawler was hauling her back to him. Hands shaking from pain, she got her knife out, sliced through the whip, and fell back. A second later, fire burst hot and bright from the crawler’s mouth. Mary flung her arm up against the blistering heat, but something fell upon her, trapping her against a brick wall. Through a haze, Jack Talent’s eyes, gleaming in fury, stared down at her as flames roared behind him.
He hissed, and she saw them—thick, leathery wings of onyx arched over his head, forming a barrier between them and the crawler’s fire. Before she could say a word, the fire died, and he reared around, his fist smashing into a crawler’s jaw. It barely made an impact, and the crawler lunged forward, punching a hole through one of the strange wings that had sprouted from Talent’s back.