Someone grabbed a chair for Mr. Willoughby from inside the room. His pale lip trembled, half-way between crying and retching, while he closed his eyes to concentrate. Even decades later, while his life extinguishes, he'll remember the smell. He'll remember the short trip from the stairs to the room's door. But, most important, he'll remember opening the door and finding Mrs. Bennett on the floor, eyes opened, and a blue tint on her skin. He'll never forgive himself, he knows that. After all, it was his idea to install those damn gas fixtures around the hotel.
"Mr. Willoughby, are you alright?" He heard a voice call for him.
He opened his eyes, to see a girl in front of him. No, not a girl, a young woman, judging by her hair. Her clothing, expensive, too expensive for a modest place like that. Covered in greyish-blue stains, but otherwise dressed for a palace. Wasn't the Queen's Ball today? He had seen the woman before, she had gone to see the woman, the dead woman, a couple times before.
"Yes, sorry. How can I help you?" He managed to say, standing up.
"What happened to Mrs. Bennett?"
He tried to explain as best he could remember. Another woman, older, joined the young one in her inquiry. That one he had never seen before, but he had seen her in magazines. The Marchioness or Baroness of...something. He never had a good mind to remember such things. Around the time he finished, he saw a couple of constables carrying Mrs. Bennett's body on a stretcher, covered in a sheet.
"Mrs. Bennet kept something for us. Would you mind if we take it?" He absolutely mind, but something in the voice of the young woman. He couldn't but smile.
"Of course miss. Just check the windows are open."
Alice thanked him and, followed by the Marchioness, walked into the room. Everywhere they looked, half-made restorations and sketches for future ones. On the desk, surrounded by silver polish and rags, a large round shield. Though pressed for time, she couldn't but admire the thing, and the beautifully horrid engraving of a woman's head with scaly skin and snakes entangled in her curly hair. Of course she admired it. It ran in the family to enjoy things like that. Old, mythological.
"Oh, we are doomed," the Marchioness blurted when her eyes met the ones on the shield. "She'll come looking for it."
"So, we better take it to her. Help me find a small wooden cup, I brought it here to restore."
They found it, under the bed, hidden inside a box underneath a floorboard. At least Mrs. Bennett was not careless with one of the most powerful artefacts in history. Still others around also had the tint of divine around them, which meant they could disappear with people coming and going, or even those who'll clean that mess.
"I see, with my little eye, around ten or so historical things we should bring back to wherever the gods are hiding."
"They are not hiding, they are lodging," Alice corrected her, using the insistent terminology her father used. "What do you propose?"
"Back in the old days, my nanny -the same one your father had, by the way- had this cute ability to make things larger on the inside. I learned to do that, but only works on pockets."
"Thank gods this century still has them. Watch out for the twentieth, though, it's going to be your nightmare."
"Don't tell me things like that with an empty stomach, I didn't eat at the ball,. I've been around since before the invention of pockets, but I don't think I can go without them again."
The Marchioness pulled a very small sachet from the inside of her decolletage, and started putting things inside. The sachet, mind you, not her clothing. First the shield, though it took some effort due to the stitching. Then a couple plates, a sugar bowl, delicate statuettes, and other unsorted trinkets. She tried- and failed- to pry the cup from Alice's hand.
"This comes with me."
"Alright then, the game's afoot. Where did you said they are...lodging?"
"Mr. Lestrange knows, he'll take us there."
Lestrange, to no one's surprise, waited for them on top of a less conspicuous carriage. At least one more subtle than the one he ferried them to the palace. A riddle for the ages if he procured it legally, or using his more subtle and godly ways. Alice had no issue with either, since then the purpose was the same.
Not many places could hold a meeting of the gods. Ever since more of them delighted in joining the humans on the modern activities, not even Olympus itself could harbour all of them. A few proposed solutions, temporal fixes while looking for a permanent one, and none of them in London -or even Britain, for what mattered. Rumours of building a hotel, one large enough so they could avoid each other, and the setting of a fixed reunion every so years, as not to strain already tense relations.
Since the situation -with the gods ageing- was dire, most of them agreed to a lock-down on a secret location. Around a hundred gods and primordial entities, hiding in plain sight, in the middle of the busiest city in the world. The carriage's wheels screeched to a halt, when they arrived.
Northumberland House, at Trafalgar Square. A colossus of a manor, too far gone from its own time. A symbol -as Olympus itself- of a bygone era. The Duke, who Alice sometimes referred to as Uncle Aggie, was a dear friend of her parents, and allowed use of the house for a small fee. Small in comparison to what would entail sending the bunch to a hotel and facing the damages.
After some remodelling done to the gardens years prior, the stones around the place created an echo chamber. Sound from the outside couldn't come in and disturb the peace, and, more important for Olympus, the yelling and fighting couldn't escape the property. Yelling which, as soon as Alice put a step on the pavement going to the house itself, became almost deafening. She couldn't help but wonder if the reactions she heard were coming from their traditional instability, or somehow caused by the absence of King William's Sword.
"I wouldn't go inside if I were you." The voice came from a woman with dark curly hair, reading a novel on a bench near the gate. "They're behaving like little unruly children. Come, sit with me."
Alice did, but the Marchioness didn't. She said her goodbyes, left the satchel with them, and left in a hurry. Though Isigny lodged nearby, at Elysian House, she had no intention of dealing with the Family. Muttering to herself about the stains and rips on her dress, she left. Not on Mr. Lestrange's carriage, but one which passed the street.
"I hope you have a better plan than to barge inside with the cup. Would be a very poor last judgement," the woman said, not lifting her eyes from her book. "I believe you know better."
"I hope so."
"If you know, for example, Hebe's room location, you could sneak inside and leave it there. I don't know how you would know it's passing the drawing room, up the service stairs to the second floor, and the third door on the right."
"A true mystery. The only way someone could do something like that, would be a distraction on other area of the house. Something god-threatening, but harmless."
"Like Kerberos, which is sleeping in the kitchens, considering he has an obsession with some tapestry around the house."
"Nice to see you again, gran."
"Same, dear. Now, run. Time is in the essence."
With that, the woman stopped talking. Alice walked away from the bench and to the other side of the gardens. The walk to the back of the house, to the short stairs to the kitchen, gave her some time to think. Planning with her grandmother, though an interesting experiment, always left her with the impression of something too easy. Her father talked about Odysseus, how he followed her grandmother's plans...and how that went for him.
No servants on the kitchen. That didn't surprise her, as the Duke travelled with his servants while loaning the house. Most of the place still prepared food, but through enchanted whisks, bowls, knives, and large iron ovens which turned themselves on and off. Sleeping in a large dog bed, on a corner next to one of the ovens, a small three-headed lapdog slept.
Kerberos, Hades' dog, followed him almost everywhere. Even with Olympus in crisis, he couldn't leave him behind. Because of the expansion in modern medicine, they improved security at Styx, and made Kerberos redundant. In the modern world, the fearless and bloodthirsty hound had turned into a pampered dog, whom Hades and Persephone loved like a son. The dog woke up when Alice approached, and turned his three heads towards her.
"Hi there," Alice said, offering her hand to the dog. "Have we met yet?"
The dog growled for a second, but the, proceeded to lick the hand, tail wagging in excitement.
"Good boy," she said,untying the leash he had to the bed. "Care for a walk?"
A playful bark, and off they went out the kitchen. Alice marvelled herself with how calm the dog behaved. Hades must've done a gruelling work turning the fierce guardian of the Underworld, into a joyful pet. Pet which followed her up the service staircase and into the secret passages of the mansion.
They found a large room with a decorated marble floor and expensive furniture cornered into the walls. The drawing room of Northumberland was one of the most expensive places in England, with richly waved tapestries and priceless sculptures and vases on precarious tables. No one there, since the purpose of a drawing room is a calm conversation between people who, at least, tolerate each other.
"Off you go," she said, motioning to the room, but Kerberos remained at her side, looking puzzled. "Go on, you can go now. Please?"
Nothing. Kerberos remained by her side, looking around. Alice wondered what could she do to command him to destroy. Maybe in the original Greek? But she knew nothing in that language. "Good girls learn embroidery, to sing, and the art of conversation", she remembered Isigny say, "not Latin, Greek, or Math."
She knew, though, how to enchant pebbles to move by themselves. Maybe she could do something like that there, with a delay. Blaming Kerberos seemed like a scummy thing to do, but she had no other ideas. Although, when she tried to leave, the dog followed her around, no matter what she said or did. Instead of incriminating him, then, she would leave a mystery for the gods to figure out.
Walked inside the service passage and, once she made her way to the top of the stairs, concentrated. She saw a vase, one of the very ornamented ones a merchant had brought from China, on top of a small table with flimsy legs. For a second, she saw it tumbling by itself. Clearly, as if she was in front of it. The vase tumbled, then fell from the edge, and she heard a loud crash coming from the drawing room.
While steps from everywhere on the house came to the room, she walked away from the noise. Up the stairs, through a hidden door, and into a hallway with many doors on each side. Though most gods preferred for the rooms to stay how they received them, a few fitted them to match their interests. The Olympians in the majority, belonged to the latter group, but most of them turned were part of the former.
Hebe, goddess of Youth and cup bearer of the gods, had a small room in the far corner to the left from where Alice exited the passage. A modest room, furnished in the style of half a century ago. A couple of suitcases on the corner, but every piece of clothing hanged from the wardrobe or neatly folded in the drawers. Everything in its place, measured to the inch, made almost impossible to simply drop the cup somewhere.
Looked around. Not even a space between the floorboards. Someone had bolted the dresser and wardrobe to the walls, so no space there either. In the end, she had an idea: under the bed.
She pulled the cup from the hidden pocket in her dress. Made sure the clay had fixed the gash. Mrs. Bennett would've done a better job polishing and staining it so it matched the wood, but she was unavailable to do so; on account of being dead. That had to do. Someone else could fix it later. The primary purpose of the cup, if it worked, should remain intact.
A pitcher of water on the dresser.
She couldn't wait for the clay to dry, though it appeared dry to the touch. With a bit more time, she could find fire to seal it to the water, but she heard steps coming from the hallway. Poured a couple of drops of water in the cup, which made them glow slightly, and drank it, before hiding under the bed.
She saw feet on low heels, walking around the room. They went to the dresser, then the wardrobe, then the bed, and then exited.
Alice sighted with relief, but was short-lasting. She felt a bolt on her back, a large cloud of smoke surrounded her, and, when dissipated, she saw it had transported it back to the drawing room.
"Ah, of course," she heard a voice say. "I wondered who could enter here."
When the cloud dissipated, she found herself surrounded by people. About thirty of them, all looking at her. She recognised most of them. Though different from each other, the gods had a certain quality which made them stand out in a crowd, but blend when they were the crowd.
In the middle of the group, she recognised her grandmother, great-grandfather, and uncle. All of them looking from annoyed to angry.
"Now, Alice," her great-grandfather spoke, his voice thundering on the room. "What have you done?"
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