His Lordship Possessed (Page 20)

“My name’s Jasper, not sir, and you’re about as sorry as the cat what got caught with the canary feathers.” He retreated back to his chair by the banked fire and swaddled himself again with his blanket. “Give me ten in silver. No, twenty.”

I had enough coin in the reticule to pay him a hundred times that, but dutifully counted out twenty and handed him the stack.

He checked each piece with his teeth before they disappeared under the blanket along with most of his face. “All right,” he said, his voice muffled. “Which stone is it you want to charm?”

Since there were no other chairs in the flat, I went to stand by the mantel. “Dreamstone.”

His head poked up. “You climb up into my flat to ask me about a faeriestale? Have you gone off?”

“So you have heard of it.” As he scowled at me I lifted my hands. “Please, sir—Mr. Jasper,” I corrected myself. “I have to know what happens when it’s charmed.”

“Can’t be charmed since there’s no such stone.”

“Then how could you know of it? You must have heard something from someone,” I wheedled.

“Years ago some miners told tales about it. Said it were found in some pisshole in Cornwall. They only wanted to scare folk.” Jasper saw my expression and sighed. “Way the story went, some mage had been digging up half of Cornwall looking for it. Only it were the miners what found it first. The mage brought down a tunnel on their heads, stole it from them, used it to put them to sleep, and left them to die. Only one came out alive, and his people said the mage had used the stone on him.”

The story was too similar to Hedger’s for me to doubt it. “So charmed dreamstone makes people go to sleep?”

“Their minds, aye. Their bodies stay awake and do whatever the mage what bespelled them wills. That’s why they are also called the possession stones.” He made a rude gesture. “Only there weren’t no mage, no miners, and sure as Satan no bloody dreamstone.”

I glanced at the wardlings he’d nailed to the walls. “If a stone like it were real, Mr. Jasper, would it have to be carried or worn by the person it controls?”

“Why would it, once it was ’spelled? Stones give off power like the sun gives heat. All people’d have to do is stand close enough to be caught in the radiance.” He glared. “Don’t you know nothing about magic, gel?”

“Until a few days ago, I didn’t believe in it.” I tried to smile, but if what I suspected was true, in a few hours all of Rumsen would belong to the Reapers. “Is there any defense against a stone that could do that?”

“ ’Course there isn’t. Why would there be ? It don’t exist.”

“The mage in the miners’ story,” I coaxed, “how was he defeated?”

“Like all the evildoers, by being killed in a body what was outside after dawn.” He chuffed out a breath. “Nothing made of darkness can stand the light of day.”

Did that mean my grandfather was evil? Dredmore, now, he could be crowned Prince of Darkness and no one would even question it, least of all me. But as annoying as Harry had been since he’d come into my life, he’d never behaved in any particularly evil manner.

Except to Hedger, who hated him. And Dredmore, who despised him. And my mother, who had made me promise to wear for the rest of my life the pendant she’d made to keep me from seeing him . . .

Confused and angry now, I strode over to the wall of wardlings.

“What are you—hey, you quit that.” He got up and tried to stop me from removing one of his talismans. “Is that why you really crawled in here? To steal my only protection from me? I’m calling for a beater.”

“You’d best shout loudly, then. They’re all up on the Hill.” I brushed his hands away and wrenched the wardling from the wall, throwing it as hard as I could to the floor. Silver-white light exploded across the room as it shattered into three pieces.

While the light faded and the old charm maker squawked, I picked up one of the pieces and examined it. The outside of the wardling, which appeared to be silver, had cracked like cheap porcelain. Beneath the faux metal coating lay a dirty, speckled gray stone disk.

“Gimme that.” The old man brought over his candle, and as soon as the light from the flame touched the stone the speckles glinted with all the colors of the rainbow.

The flashing colors made me feel lightheaded. “What was the light?”

“Dispelled its power, you did,” he muttered, snatching the piece from me and turning it this way and that. “Shattering charmed stone always do.”

“So this is dreamstone.” What was it doing inside the wardling?

“These wardlings were struck from pure silver, they said,” the old man griped. “Charged me double for ’em.”

“Evidently they lied.” I picked up the other pieces. “Where did you buy them?”

“There’s a cargo house down by the dock that deals in stone and metals.” He brought the broken wardling over to the lit candle and studied it again. “Quarry masters have been bringing ’em in by the shipload for months. Can’t keep ’em stocked. Demand was so high they had to start importing ’em from Talia.” He looked up at me. “That’s all being sold now: Talian-made wardlings.”

Walsh had said something about the Talians forging them, but I’d assumed he meant forged as in hammering them out of metal. I was dealing with another counterfeiting operation, like the one that had robbed Rina’s poor old gent Wiggins of his bacco boxes, only on a much grander scale. “But everyone still believes they’re from the queensland.”

His shoulders hunched. “We knew, but silver’s silver. Don’t matter if it’s English or Talian.”

Unless someone was planning to invade a country. “If every wardling in the city has dreamstone inside it then why haven’t the stones affected the people?”

“Because it’s always been thought stuff and nonsense. Stones always work their charms, unless . . .” He fell silent, dropping the broken piece and shuffling back from it. “No. Couldn’t be. They’d never put so many unspelled stones in one place. Who’d be mad enough to do that?”

I went after him and grabbed his arms to keep him from crumpling to the floor. “Why aren’t they working, Mr. Jasper?” When he didn’t speak, I shook him. “Tell me.”

“A stone don’t work its charm if it’s raw. Never been spelled,” he added, his eyes wide and his voice going hoarse. “Raw stone soaks up power a hundred times quicker, too. Longer it’s left unspelled, the more power it takes.”

“From what?”

“Anything what lives: people, animals, plants. That’s why all stone’s spelled for the first time in the quarries, before it’s shipped. To keep us safe.” His face screwed up and he clutched at his chest. “I can’t take any more of this,” he wheezed. “My heart’s no good.”

“Calm down.” I helped him over to his chair and tucked his blanket round him. “If the stones in the wardlings were never spelled, then they’ve been absorbing power for months.”

He closed his eyes. “Aye. Go away.”

“One more question, Mr. Jasper, and I will.” I bent down so I could see his face. “What happens if a mage tries to spell all these raw dreamstones now?”

He opened one eye to give me a hopeless look. “He’s only got to spell one, gel. Raw stones stay connected to each other, like they are under the ground before they’re mined. That and all the power they’ve soaked up will cause the spell to spread on its own. There’ll be nowhere to hide from them then.”

I didn’t want to leave him like this, but I had to find Zarath before he cast the spell. “I’ll ask one of your neighbors to take you to the hospital.”

“Don’t bother. I’m the only one what has a carri.” He sounded more peevish than worried. “I’d rather spend my last hours here, in my place.”

I felt horrible. “Is your heart really that weak?”

“Not my heart, gel. The stones.” He made a fretful sound. “With that kind of power, as soon as the spell’s worked, we’ll all go into the dreams. Every man, woman, and child in the city. No one will ever wake up from them. Not ever again.”

It seemed I was going back to the docks sooner than I’d planned. I persuaded the charm maker to let me borrow his transport, which he stored in the merchant’s carrihouse on the corner. Mr. Jasper gave me his keyfob, which he said the doorman would demand to see before letting me in.

“I’ll return it as soon as I can,” I promised.

“ ’ Twon’t matter to me if you do,” he muttered, staring into the hearth’s embers. “We’re finished, all of us.”

I wasn’t giving up, so I hurried down to the corner and presented the keyfob to the lad working the door.

He looked me over, his cheeks pinking as he did. “You’re not Mr. Jasper.”

“How astute of you to notice,” I praised him. “I’m Mr. Jasper’s daughter, Constance Payne.”

He frowned. “You’re Old Jasper’s kid? But he weren’t never married.”

“Much to my mother’s everlasting sorrow, my father abandoned her after one night of love.” I sighed. “After enduring decades of needling guilt, he came to regret his cruelty and searched high and low for me until we were reunited. Now here I am, to run his every errand and make golden his final years. For which tonight I need his carri. Where is it?”

“In the back. Stall thirteen.” Reluctantly he handed back the keyfob. “You shouldn’t be out driving by yourself, miss. There’s a bad lot of furriners running about hurting people and setting fires. Burnt the Hill, they did.”

“Thank you for the concern, but I’ll manage.” I walked back to stalls, found the one numbered thirteen, and surveyed Mr. Jasper’s transport. Of course it was as old and cantankerous-looking as its owner, but as soon as I punched the ignition and cranked the motor it wheezed and chugged to life. As I wasn’t used to driving, I took my time easing it out of the stall, then drove to the front, where the doorman opened the gate. Since it had no glasshield I had to squint against the smoke pouring out of the old coal burner into my face.