“Not to be helped,” Simon assured her. “Churches can be rebuilt. Lives cannot. We’re fortunate to be alive, but we did well against two very formidable foes. Without your gauntlets to match that woman’s mechanical terrors, I would be lying dead now. Well done, everyone.”
Penny puffed with satisfaction and cavalierly shouldered her stovepipe blunderbuss. However she pointed at Simon’s damaged hands. “They hurt you as much as they hurt her. I’m sorry, Simon.”
“Don’t be silly. They worked like a …” Simon winced in pain. “… a charm.”
“What were they after then,” Malcolm demanded to know, “if not the king?”
Simon’s gaze swept to the overturned Seat of King Edward and the greyish lump of heavy stone resting beneath it. The rock seemed unexceptional, a few feet across and maybe a foot high. “Something a bit more mythical, I think.”
Chapter 3
The Devil’s Loom was an old haunt of Simon’s. It was a down-and-out public house in the St. Giles Parish of London on the edge of the disreputable area of poverty and misery known as the Rookery. Simon kept a town house not far away to the west between Crown Road and Soho Square in a little-known alley called Gaunt Lane.
Simon and Kate sat with Malcolm and Penny in a back booth. The pub was hot with summer damp and crowded with late-night gatherers. Even here among the working class, the conversation was largely the disaster at the king’s coronation yesterday. The speculation about the event ranged from an attack by radicals to a battle between demons and angels. The general tone was one of support for King William, who was mostly popular with the common people.
A stout barmaid with dyed red hair shoved through the clutches of arguing drinkers and approached with three new ales and a whiskey. She spared an interested look at Malcolm and hardly contained a sour glance at Kate. Then she leaned close to Simon, noting the bandages that covered his hands.
“You don’t come around no more,” she said with playful sadness. “Haven’t seen you hardly half a dozen times since last autumn. And Nick not at all. Have you gone off from London?”
Simon closed his small notebook around a pencil and laid a hand on her red dry fingers. “I spend more time in the country now, Rebecca.”
The barmaid reared up reproachfully. “Oh, is that it? You’re a squire now.” She quickly glanced at Kate again. “And Nick? Is he with you?”
Simon tried to keep the smile on his face, but failed. “No. Nick has gone off.”
Now Rebecca had a truly regretful expression. “Oh dear. I’m sorry. You two were such lads.”
“Good times.” Simon raised the ale to her, signaling that he had to return to his companions. She patted his cheek, picked up several rounds of empty glasses, and went away.
“Seems you and Barker were popular with the locals here,” Malcolm observed.
“Simon and Nick were prodigious drinkers,” Kate said.
“We did our part.” Simon sat back with a sad smile.
Penny raised her glass and said with a baronial huff, “That’s all England can expect.”
Kate caught another embittered glance directed at her from the barmaid across the room. “Your friend, Rebecca, is still glaring at me.”
“Not surprising. She was very fond of me.”
“You must have been more attentive in those days.”
“What do you mean?”
“You virtually sent that woman away just now. She clearly has an interest and wanted a bit of fun from you. You gave her no lascivious repartee. No charming banter. Not even a hint of repressed desire. I keep hearing that you were something of a rake in your former life. But so far it’s all hearsay. I’ve never seen more than a glimpse of it.”
Simon stared at Kate with surprise. “Do you want to see it?”
“Perhaps. Every so often.” Kate grinned. “I’ve heard tales about that Simon Archer. He must’ve been quite interesting.”
“If you like that sort of man.” He laughed. “Battling with werewolves and demigods and fire elementals doesn’t usually call for that sort of skill.”
Kate gave him a wry glance, one eyebrow lifting. “We aren’t dealing with werewolves and elementals every day, are we?”
“Seems like it.”
Her fingers played over his as they rested on the table. “If you don’t make time, there won’t be time.”
Simon stared at Kate. He studied the small flecks of orange in the green of her eyes. The fire behind them made his body flare with a warmth that had little to do with the temperature in the pub or the alcohol he had consumed. The challenge in her expression didn’t waver.
It took a great deal of concentration not to give her the demonstration she wanted in a public place. Though it would serve her right. With a wry smile, he opened the notebook and fumbled with the pencil in his bandaged hands. Without looking away from Kate, he began to sketch a rather bawdy picture of her. Kate’s eyes finally glanced down and gasped with shock. She shoved his hand away and flipped a page to cover it before anyone else, especially Malcolm and Penny, could see it.
Kate raised an eyebrow. “How charmingly lewd.”