The Seven Deaths of Evelyn Hardcastle

‘This is forbidden, Josephine,’ says the Plague Doctor, shocked. ‘We do not take direct action. We do not give orders. We certainly don’t feed them information they aren’t supposed to know. You’re breaking every rule we’ve promised to uphold.’

‘You dare lecture me?’ says Silver Tear, scornfully. ‘All you’ve done is interfere.’

The Plague Doctor shakes his head vehemently.

‘I explained Mr Bishop’s purpose here, and encouraged him when he faltered. Unlike Daniel and Anna, he didn’t wake up with the rules burned into him. He was free to doubt, to veer from his purpose. I never gave him knowledge he hadn’t earned, as you have done with Daniel. I sought to bring balance, not offer advantage. I’m begging you, don’t do this. Let events follow their natural course. He’s so close to solving it.’

‘And because of that, so is Annabelle,’ she says, her voice hardening. ‘I’m sorry, I must choose between Aiden Bishop’s well-being and your own. Proceed, Mr Coleridge.’

‘No!’ yells the Plague Doctor, holding out a placating hand.

The thug with the shotgun points it at him. He’s nervous, his finger gripping the trigger a little too tightly. I don’t know if the Plague Doctor can be hurt by these weapons, but I can’t let him risk it. I need him alive.

‘Just leave,’ I say to him. ‘There’s nothing else you can do here.’

‘This is wrong,’ he protests.

‘Then make it right. My other hosts need you.’ I pause, meaningfully. ‘I don’t.’

I don’t know if it’s my intonation, or whether he’s simply watched this moment play out before, but, finally, grudgingly, he relents, staring at Josephine, before disappearing out of the graveyard.

‘Selfless, as always,’ says Daniel, walking towards me. ‘I want you to know that I’ve admired that quality, Aiden. The way you’ve fought to save the woman whose death would set you free. Your fondness for Anna, who would have undoubtedly betrayed you if I hadn’t done so first. In the end though, I’m afraid it’s all been for nothing. Only one of us can leave this house, and I have no interest in it being you.’

Crows are gathering in the branches above me. They arrive as if by invitation, gliding in on silent wings, their feathers slick with recent rain. There are dozens of them, pressed together like mourners at a funeral, watching me with a curiosity that makes my skin crawl.

‘Up until an hour ago, we had Anna in our custody. Somehow she’s managed to escape,’ continues Daniel. ‘Where would she go, Aiden? Tell me where she’s hiding and I’ll instruct my men to make your death quick. There’s only you and Gold left now. Two gunshots and you’ll wake up in Bell, knock on Blackheath’s door and start everything again without my getting in your way. You’re a clever fellow, I’m certain you’ll solve Evelyn’s murder in no time.’

His face is ghoulish in the lantern light, twisted by need.

‘How frightened are you, Daniel?’ I say slowly. ‘You’ve killed my future hosts, so I’m not a threat, but you have no idea where Anna is. It’s been eating away at you all day, hasn’t it? The fear that she’s going to solve this before you.’

It’s my smile that scares him, the faintest sense that I might not be quite so trapped as he first believed.

‘If you don’t give me what I want, I’ll start cutting,’ says Daniel, drawing a line across my cheek with his fingertip. ‘I’ll take you apart an inch at a time.’

‘I know, I’ve met myself after you’re done,’ I say, staring at him. ‘You break my mind so badly, I carry my madness into Gregory Gold. He slashes his own arms and babbles warnings at Edward Dance. It’s horrific. And my answer is still no.’

‘Tell me where she is,’ he says, raising his voice. ‘Coleridge has half the servants in this house on his payroll, and I have a pocketbook thick enough to buy the other half if necessary. I can surround the lake twice over. Don’t you see? I’ve already won. What’s the use of being stubborn now?’

‘Practice,’ I snarl. ‘I’m not going to tell you anything, Daniel. Every minute I frustrate you is another minute Anna has to reach the Plague Doctor with the answer. You’d need a hundred men to guard that lake on a pitch-black night like this, and I doubt even Silver Tear can help with that.’

‘You’ll suffer,’ he hisses.

‘One hour until 11 p.m.,’ I say. ‘Which one of us do you think can hold out the longer?’

Daniel hits me hard enough to rip the air from my lungs and knock me to my knees. When I look up, he’s looming over me, rubbing his grazed knuckles. Anger flickers at the edges of his face like a storm creeping across a cloudless sky. Gone is the suave gambler of earlier, replaced by a scrappy conman, his body twisted by red-hot anger.

‘I’m going to kill you slowly,’ he growls.

‘I’m not the one who dies here, Daniel,’ I say, letting loose a shrill whistle. Birds scatter from the trees, the underbrush rustling with movement. In the inky blackness of the forest, a lantern flares into life. It’s followed by another a few feet away, and then another.