Graves looked serious. “Attractive, isn’t it? I can see you’re enamoured by it, Newbury. We’ll come to that.”
Newbury ran a hand through his hair. He felt a little faint. He pressed on regardless. Graves was so egomaniacal that he seemed eager to answer Newbury’s questions. Newbury decided to take advantage of the fact, gaining as much information as he could while he had the chance. He knew it might prove invaluable later, and he’d long ago learned how to manipulate the arrogance of men such as Graves. His sort, Newbury had found, were always willing to impress people with their assumed intelligence, always looking for the validation of others. “So how does the duplication process work? I understand it has something to do with Lucien Fabian?” There, Newbury thought, let’s see what he makes of that.
“Fabian?” Graves almost spat the name. “That pretentious upstart? Dear me, no. The duplication technology is the work of Dr. Warrander, our Chief Engineer. Fabian was a pupil of his, a long time ago. Warrander taught him everything he knows.”
Newbury suppressed his surprise. He had no reason to doubt Graves’s claim. He’d always wondered where Fabian had earned his stripes. As far as many people were concerned-Newbury included-Fabian had simply emerged fully formed, a medical man, an inventor, an engineer. He knew Fabian had been away at war and had experimented on wounded soldiers, finding ways to patch them up and send them back into battle, but that was about the sum of his knowledge of the man’s history. He wondered if Graves knew about the experiments with duplication that Fabian was conducting at the Grayling Institute with Amelia, and whether Fabian had also learned that from Warrander. Newbury suspected that was probably the case. It would be too much of a coincidence otherwise. Newbury waited to see if Graves would elaborate.
Graves smiled. “You’re wondering now why Fabian parted company with the Bastion Society. You’re a clever man, Newbury. You understand so much of what’s going on here.”
Newbury smiled, but ignored the pandering.
Graves shrugged at his lack of response. “Fabian had always wanted to push his work beyond the point where any of us felt comfortable. He never really accepted our beliefs, was more interested in the physical world than the spiritual one. When he went to the Queen and offered to find a way to preserve her life, he took a step too far. He was ejected from the society. By then he didn’t need us, or Warrander, anymore.” Graves folded his arms. “I must admit, Newbury, that we never even considered he might be successful. By then the Queen was already on her deathbed. Even Warrander believed he would fail.”
Inwardly, Newbury grinned. But Fabian didn’t fail. That must be what this whole business was all about. Fabian had found a way to extend the Queen’s existence, and Graves and his bizarre society considered that the greatest blasphemy of all. Fabian had offered the Queen longevity, binding her spirit to her decrepit body beyond the course of its natural life. To Graves, this was the ultimate anathema, the gravest of crimes. The result was that the Empire was being ruled by a woman whom Graves and his men believed should have died long before, an undead monarch whose very existence undermined their core beliefs.
So was it the Bastion Society that was planning to move against the Queen? Did they want her dead? Surely they didn’t have the means to storm the palace as Amelia had envisioned. Newbury needed to keep Graves talking until he found out. “I’m surprised you didn’t help Fabian to the grave, just like Sykes. It sounds as if he would have benefitted from the same sort of lesson.”
Graves clapped his hands together in satisfaction. “I knew you were one of us, Newbury! You’re quite right. We made an error of judgement allowing Fabian to go free. But we had other considerations at the time. He’d taken a position as the Queen’s personal physician. A role like that brings with it a certain level of protection, both physical and political.”
Newbury nodded. “You didn’t want to go up against the Queen.”
Graves frowned. “We didn’t have the means to go against the Queen. It wasn’t a matter of desire.”
So that was it, then. It had all been a matter of timing. They’d been preparing, and now they were almost ready to show their hand. “Surely you can’t want to depose the Empress? To murder a crippled old woman in her own palace?”
Graves laughed. “Oh, Newbury, such melodrama. She’d be dead anyway if it wasn’t for the machines keeping her alive. That’s no life. And she’s no innocent old woman, as well you know. I’m surprised to hear you rush to her defence. She’d hardly do the same for you.” Graves paused, leaning forward to look Newbury directly in the eye. “The Queen doubts you, Sir Maurice. I’m sure you’re already uncomfortably aware of that fact. She doubts your commitment and your integrity, to the extent that she deployed one of her best agents to spy on you, right under your very nose.”
Newbury clenched his jaw. The words hit home like a knife twisting in his gut. So even this indefatigable fool knew the truth about Veronica. He bit back his retort, holding his nerve but simmering with anger. He felt a bead of sweat forming under his hairline and shivered.
“Yes. Yes! I can see by the look on your face, Newbury, that you know I speak the truth. But it matters little. Soon enough the Queen will be gone and there will be a new monarch on the throne. One who is perhaps even less tolerant of your vices. Victoria’s era is ending, and with it, so will yours.” Graves reached up and removed his bowler hat, tossing it on the table and running a hand through his hair. “I’m going to offer you a choice, Newbury, and you should consider it very carefully. I know all about your work and your fascination with the occult. I know your habits and how you crave the Chinese weed. I know your methods and your personal affairs. I know everything there is to know about you.” He paused, giving his words time to sink in. “And still I do not doubt you like the Queen does. You are a remarkable man, Newbury. It doesn’t have to end there. When she falls, there is a place for you by my side, as one of us, as a member of the Bastion Society. Unlike the Queen, we understand you, Newbury. We can offer you salvation.” He smiled and held out his hand. “Will you join us?”
Newbury regarded Graves coolly. “I will not,” he said, leaning back in his chair.
Graves’s face fell. His extended hand curled into a fist, and he banged it angrily against the arm of his throne. “Then I fear, Sir Maurice, your time has come to its end. I will keep you alive only long enough to see the ruination of everything you hold dear. Victoria’s reign will crumble, and with it, you and Miss Hobbes. I’m only disappointed that you haven’t the intelligence to see what you’re dismissing so casually, Newbury. You would have shined among us. Your experiments could have flourished. You would have had access to secrets you can only begin to imagine, the undisclosed history of the world. But I can see now it was not to be.” He sighed. “Instead, your corpse will rot in the ground until your spirit is returned to the earth to make recompense for your inadequacies.” Graves snapped his fingers, and the two guards stepped forward. He addressed them haughtily. “Throw him in the cell with the girl,” he said, turning his cheek. “I do not wish to look upon him any longer.”
Newbury felt the guards’ hands grip his shoulders, and he stood, allowing himself to be led away. His captors led him out through a side door and along a dank passageway lit only by torches crackling in iron brackets affixed to the walls. As they walked, one guard before him, the other nudging him regularly from behind, the passageway sloped steadily down, slowly taking them beneath ground level. Other tunnels branched off at regular intervals, like rabbit warrens, and occasional wooden doors denoted access to hidden rooms. Here, the tunnel walls were undressed and roughly hewn, as though the whole network of catacombs and tunnels had been chiselled out of the bedrock after the house above had been built. Newbury assumed this was the work of the Bastion Society, using one of Warrander’s contraptions to carve out a secret haven beneath the city. He wondered how far down the tunnels went, and what else they were keeping down there.