Arcane Entanglement (The Mage and His Brute #1)

Chapter 10

“Dammit all to Hell, Evander! Why didn’t you tell me about the bloody vial?!” Rufus snarled.

He raked his hair with a hand where he paced the floor before the fireplace, the flames in the hearth casting an orange glow on the sharp angles of his face and his untidy locks.

“I completely forgot about it,” Evander admitted guiltily.

He hissed when Hargrove dabbed some ointment on his knuckles. The manservant ignored his sound of protest and carried on tending to him where they sat at his desk, in the formal study of the townhouse in Mayfair.

It was gone three in the morning.

One of the night duty sergeants at the Met had sent a message to Rufus’s home about the incident near Hyde Park Corner after the Brute was taken into custody. Despite the lateness of the hour, the inspector met up with Evander and Ginny as they were leaving police headquarters and insisted on escorting them to the townhouse.

“Honestly, Mrs. S, it is but a scratch,” Ginny protested. “You should see to Evander’s wounds.”

Evander’s housekeeper tsk-tsked. She was perched next to Ginny on a mahogany, button-back sofa upholstered in gold and green damask. “I will get to Master Evander in a moment. A lady must take care of her face, Lady Hartley.” Faint green light shimmered around Mrs. Sinclair’s fingertips as she healed the shallow cut on Ginny’s cheek.

“We all know she ain’t a lady,” Rufus muttered distractedly.

Ginny narrowed her eyes. “You asking for an ass-whooping, Grayson?”

Hargrove snorted. Mrs. Sinclair’s expression grew pinched.

“Sorry, Mrs. S,” Ginny mumbled. She shot a glare at Rufus from under her lashes.

Rufus smirked.

Evander swallowed a sigh. He’d wondered if the pair might develop amorous feelings towards one another when he’d first introduced them. Alas, Rufus saw Ginny as nothing more than an irritating younger sister he needed to keep in line, while Ginny considered Rufus a maddening older brother in serious need of removing the stick permanently wedged up his arse.

Ginny frowned at Evander as Mrs. Sinclair finished her ministration.

“Look, I know you got us out of a pickle tonight, but what you did was reckless. Those mages saw you use all your elemental powers.”

Mrs. Sinclair froze. “He never did,” she mumbled hoarsely.

“Bloody hellfire, my Lord!” Hargrove cursed.

“You mean there are dark mages running around London right now who know what you are?!” Rufus said, horrified.

Evander met their accusing stares with a contrite expression. “It couldn’t be helped.”

Less than ten people in the world knew of his status as an Archmage. Considering Archmages were considered de facto property of the state because of their dangerous powers, it wasn’t something he was keen to make public.

Mrs. Sinclair’s gaze held a healthy dose of concern mixed with incrimination.

Evander suspected she was thinking of one person in particular who would be most vexed that he’d accidentally revealed his true nature. The person he ultimately answered to and who’d kept him in a gilded cage for the last six years.

Ginny sighed. “So, what’s this about a vial?”

Evander removed the enchanted cane strapped to his forearm and twisted the top end, exposing a hollow metal compartment. It was short and narrow, just the right size to take a rolled-up note or a miniature magical device.

The crystal vial fell out into his palm when he tipped the stick, the blue liquid inside it shining faintly.

Hargrove whistled softly under his breath. “Now, that’s a thing of beauty. You can tell the Charm Weaver who made this put a lot of work into it.”

Evander and Rufus stared at the manservant.

“What makes you think this is the work of a Charm Weaver?” Evander said, puzzled. “They are normally metal crafters.”

“That goes to show how much you know about Charm Weavers, my Lord,” Hargrove scoffed. “The best artisans can work with any material.” The manservant closed the medicine box and ignored Mrs. Sinclair’s disapproving look as she took the seat he’d vacated.

Rufus came over to the desk and carefully picked up the object Evander had recovered from the alley.

“You found this near the dead man?”

He held it between two fingers and examined it against the light.

“Yes.” Healing magic warmed Evander’s hands as Mrs. Sinclair began treating his scrapes. “I think it was on the body of the victim when he fell. And I believe the mage who attacked us in the alley sent those men to retrieve it tonight.”

It had been a moment’s distraction that had made Evander slip the evidence he’d collected from the East End inside the cane before he’d left the townhouse to go pick up Ginny. The act had turned out to be providence of the most dangerous kind. One Evander hoped would lead them to the killer.

“Do you know what it is?” Rufus asked curiously.

“No. But I hope Mr. Brown and his associates will be able to decipher the substance it contains and its function.” Evander hesitated. “Whatever it is, there’s some kind of magic tracer on it. They knew I had it on me.”

Ginny lowered her brows where she’d joined them at the desk to study the vial Rufus held. “That strange magic you sensed in the gardens at Ashbrooke House.” She glanced at Evander. “You think that was them sniffing this out?”

Evander dipped his head. Ginny was sharper than many of the Met inspectors he knew.

“What happened at Ashbrooke House?” Rufus asked guardedly.

They gave him a shortened version of the events at the ball.

“You danced with the season’s belle?” Rufus said incredulously.

Even Hargrove stared at Evander like he’d grown a second head.

“Just because I’m not interested in matrimony doesn’t mean I can’t enjoy a dance once in a while,” Evander said, barely masking his irritation.

“Pardon the crudeness my Lord, but everyone in this room knows you prefer bollocks to tits,” Hargrove said bluntly.

Mrs. Sinclair dropped the cup she’d been gathering from the tea table. It hit the Persian rug and bounced.

Evander groaned.

Ginny bit her lip hard, shoulders quaking.

“I mean, not that we even know what kind of bollocks you like, since you never bring them home,” Hargrove prattled on, oblivious to the unhealthy shade of red rising in Mrs. Sinclair’s face. The manservant rubbed his chin thoughtfully as he observed Evander. “You should visit that club soon, my Lord. You could do with blowing off some steam.”

“That’s what I said!” Ginny exclaimed in a vindicated tone.

“Jesus,” Rufus muttered under his breath.

“ That’s it! ” Mrs. Sinclair roared. She pointed imperiously at the door. “Mr. Hargrove, out! Inspector Grayson, please be so kind as to take Lady Hartley home. Master Evander, to bed with you.”

Rufus and Ginny protested as she shooed them towards the exit, Hargrove wearing a martyred expression ahead of them.

“Mrs. Sinclair,” Evander called out as the housekeeper prepared to step out of the room.

She paused on the threshold and turned. “Yes, my Lord?”

“How are Samuel and Graham?”

Her expression softened at his concerned tone. “They are not any worse for the wear, my Lord. Young Samuel was all fired up after witnessing Lady Hartley in…action,” she said diplomatically. “I gave him a toddy and sent him to bed.”

Relief loosened Evander’s shoulders. “Good. Please grant them the day off. I shall get a hansom cab in the morning.”

Mrs. Sinclair dipped her head. “As you wish, my Lord.”

It wasn’t until Evander was slipping under the plush, goose-down comforter of his four-poster mahogany bed that the Brute the Met had arrested came to his mind.

The man had appeared utterly terrified and befuddled when he’d emerged from the melting ice block he’d been encased in. The blood had drained from his face upon realising his whereabouts and seeing the officers surrounding him, truncheons at the ready in case he made an attempt to escape. No one had been more shocked than Evander when he’d fallen to his knees instead and begged them not to kill him.

Evander frowned at the underside of the green velvet canopy.

He was like a different creature altogether from when he attacked us.

Brutes were a rare breed among the magicless. Gifted with Herculean builds and extraordinary strength, they were renowned for their remarkable resilience, their immunity to pain, and their resistance to all but the strongest magic. Though the first mention of a Brute was made in historical records in the late 1600s, their origins were still unclear to this day. Only one thing was certain about them. They were exclusively men.

After Evander learned of the War of Subjugation and the Brutes who played a crucial role against the zealot mages howling for the blood of innocents, he’d thought their existence a miracle borne of nature.

Like he’d said to his brother John before the latter’s untimely death, it was as if the world had decided to lend a helping hand to the powerless thralls by granting them monstrous beings who could defend them.

Brutes considered mages their archenemy. Which made the situation Evander had found himself in tonight the more puzzling.

His last thought before sleep claimed him was the mysterious message Ophelia Miller had imparted to him before he’d left Ashbrooke House. One that seemed even more prophetic now than it had appeared at the time.