She stepped closer and then gasped and turned Mary’s face away. The body on the floor had no face. Or rather what had been a face was now a mass of blood and melted tissue. Silence squeezed her eyes shut. She knew who it was even before she felt Michael’s arms close around her and Mary.
“It’s Fionnula, I’m afraid,” he said into her hair. “I’m sorry, love. She’s dead.”
MICK FELT THE tremor that went through Silence’s body. He closed his eyes a moment and simply held her. The baby was bawling in his ear and he didn’t give a damn. She was alive. They both were alive and unhurt. They weren’t lying on the floor like Fionnula, her face a horrific mess. He grit his teeth at the thought and knew suddenly: this was fear. This terrible, cold hand clenching at his inner organs. This wild urge to scream at the awful thoughts running through his head.
What if—?
What if he’d delayed ten minutes longer at the opera? What if they’d thought to post an ambush by the front door? What if he’d been cut down as he’d entered? What if, at this very moment, Silence was in his hands?
Mick wanted to laugh. Doubts, worries, and fear of his mortality—those were all problems that other men had to deal with. He’d never bothered with them himself. Why should he? If he died, well, then he died. He’d led a good life—a fighting life. He’d leave no regrets behind.
But that was before. Now he had Silence to protect and worry over—and Jaysus a baby, as well. If he fell who would take his place to guard them? Who was as ruthless as he?
He looked up and his eyes met Harry’s.
Harry nodded soberly at Bert, standing in the doorway panting. “Bert says the Vicar’s men ’ave been run out o’ the ’ouse.”
“Good,” Mick said.
“What did that man d-do to her?” Silence asked, her face was still turned into his chest.
“Vitriol,” he said starkly. He didn’t have to look at Fionnula’s corpse again to see the effects.
He remembered the results of a vitriol attack well enough.
The caustic liquid was used in the production of gin and was in common enough supply in St. Giles. Vitriol burned any surface it touched except glass, and that included flesh and bone.
“Dear God,” Silence murmured. “I’d heard what vitriol could do, but this… it killed her?”
He stroked her hair. “It was quick,” he lied.
In fact Fionnula had probably suffocated as the terrible liquid ate into her nose and the tissues of her mouth and throat. Her death would’ve been agonizing.
“Poor, poor Fionnula,” Silence said. The baby had quieted into an exhausted slump against her shoulder. “Do you think Mary saw it?”
“Nah, she didn’t. Fionnula must’ve saved the babe,” Harry said somberly. He gently spread a handkerchief over the girl’s ruined face. “The baby was already under the bed wi’ Lad when I got ’ere.” He nodded to the connecting door to Michael’s room. “I came through there. Saw the Vicar’s man standing over ’er, jus’ lookin’. Then ’e turned tail and ran.”
“And why weren’t ye here afore the Vicar’s men to stop them from enterin’?” Mick asked coldly.
Harry flushed. “There were a fire in the kitchen. We went down to ’elp put it out afore it spread to the rest o’ the ’ouse.”
“A diversion,” Mick grunted.
“Aye,” Bert said. “A diversion right enough, Mick.”
Harry nodded. “The ’ole ’ouse was roused to carry the buckets. Weren’t until we ’eard a scream from above that we realized we was under attack. By that time they’d made the upper floors and ’twas ’ell to fight our way through.” He averted his eyes from Fionnula’s pathetic body as if he couldn’t stand the sight. “She were already dead by the time we made it ’ere.”
“How did the fire start?” Mick asked.
But at that moment Bran shoved past Bert in the doorway. Bran’s face was blackened, his hair straggling about his shoulders. He saw the still form on the floor and froze.
“No.”
Harry turned. “Aw, Bran—”
“No!” Bran batted aside the hand that Harry would’ve set on his arm. “No, no, no!”
He sank to his knees beside Fionnula and carefully lifted the handkerchief from her face. For a long moment he simply stared at the horror and then he abruptly jerked aside and vomited.
“She were a brave lass,” Bert said thickly, his eyes reddening. “Must’ve jus’ ’ad time to shove the babe under the bed afore they were in the rooms.”
Bran had his hands over his face and was simply rocking as if too stunned to move away from his position beside Fionnula. His reaction was stronger than Mick would’ve expected—he’d never thought the boy as in love with Fionnula as she’d been with him. Perhaps it was the shock of her terrible death.
Or perhaps Mick simply didn’t understand love.
Mick felt Silence shudder within his arms as she stifled a sob.
He stroked her hair. “A brave lass indeed. We’ll give her a proper burial, Bran, never ye fear.”
“Damn you!” Bran looked up, his face white and clear of tears. His eyes seemed to burn in the parchment of his face. “The Vicar had her killed because of your damned war, because of your damned pride! You whoreson! You should’ve killed him years ago, simply taken over his business and been done with him. But you’re too high in the instep for gin.” He spat, the glob of phlegm hitting the floor with a loud splat. “Damn you, her death is on your soul.”
Mick watched Bran throughout this tirade, not bothering to defend himself, though he did put his body between the grief-stricken boy and Silence. He glanced at Harry and nodded.
“Come on now.” Harry reached down and took Bran’s arm. “Times like these’s good for gettin’ roarin’ drunk.”
“Damn you!” Bran tried to wrench his arm from Harry’s grasp, but his heart didn’t seem to be in it anymore. The big man drew him up easily and hustled him to the door.
Mick glanced at Bert. “See that the room’s cleaned and Fionnula’s taken to the cellars until we can bury her.”
Bert nodded, his hangdog face heavy with sorrow.
Mick turned and left the room with Mary and Silence. He wanted them away from the scent of death and tragedy.
His own room hadn’t been touched. For a moment Mick narrowed his eyes, considering. The palace was a large and deliberately labyrinthine building. Finding a specific room was hard for those not initiated into its secrets. Yet the Vicar’s men had found Silence’s room very rapidly and without error, it seemed. How—?
“Why did they kill her with vitriol?” Silence whispered.
Mick looked down, his thoughts scattered. “Because o’ me.”
Her face was turned up toward his, pale and weary. She’d been fond of Fionnula. She’d be in mourning, too, along with Bran.
Her brows drew together in dazed puzzlement. “Because of you?”
He nodded. This was not the time or place, but he was all out of deceits and whiles. “A long time ago I attacked a man with vitriol. Threw it in his face.”
She recoiled. Well, and why wouldn’t she? It was a horrific act, the action of an animal. Naturally she’d be appalled.
“Why?”
He felt his own eyebrows arch in faint surprise. To question why an animal would act in an animalistic manner seemed absurd, but he humored her anyway.
“Because I wanted to kill him and the vitriol was at hand.”
She stared at him and blinked it seemed with an effort. “I’m very tired,” she said carefully, “but I know there must be more to the story than that…” She trailed off and shook her head as if too weary to go on. “I can’t ask the right questions tonight, but tell me this: Why should your attack so long ago lead to Fionnula’s death tonight?”