Excerpt: A Matter at New Year’s

December 31, 1823

Lights whirled around me, or perhaps that was the brandy. 

I reveled in a pool of laughter and warmth, light and false bravado that kept out the cold darkness of New Year’s Eve. 

In other words, I danced at a New Year’s ball in the heart of Mayfair, held by a countess for the cowards of the haut ton, who refused to face the night alone.

These included me, of course. I’d been invited on the strength of my connection to my brother, Frederick Archer, gentleman of an ancient noble family, who’d gained in stature since I’d helped him recover his honor not long ago. 

The heir he’d recently placed in his nursery—cutting me out of inheriting the Archer riches—had raised his standing as well. Freddy was here too, but I avoided him by taking to the floor as much as I could.

My partner in this energetic country dance was a young lady with golden hair and a pointed face. She was the daughter of one of Freddy’s cronies, a man who’d deigned to allow a younger son without much means to lead his daughter out to the set. 

They lady was pretty, but she was an unmarried miss, so there would be no dalliance. Also, I had no intention of calling at her home tomorrow with a posy and a proposal, so I was careful not to be overly attentive.

Truth to tell, I had no business dancing with her at all, but it was New Year’s, and I suppose she was being generous.

Laughter sounded as we circled, the hundreds of candles the countess could waste her money on keeping the darkness at bay. The occasional drip of hot wax stung my face, but that was a small price to pay for this well of safety.

The windows that lined both ends of the room showed the gaping maw of night that waited for us outside—New Year’s Eve was particularly cold, dark, and prone to danger. London tried to tame it with gaslights on the streets, but those could only do so much and rendered the shadows between them darker still.

Inside, lights glittered, merriment flowed, and the dance came to an end. I bowed to the young lady, who curtsied enchantingly in return.

I’d put my hand forward to ask her to dance once more, or else lead her to a chair, whichever she wished, when the clock struck midnight. 

“Welcome the New Year!” our host boomed. 

A glass of champagne found its way into my hand and into those of the dispersing dancers. We raised them, crying the New Year’s toast. The orchestra began another lively song, and gentlemen kissed the ladies.

My young lady was expropriated by another gent, and I lost my chance at a kiss. I laughed as though I did not care and gulped down my champagne, pretending it was all in good fun. 

The golden-haired angel disappeared, and I was left to converse with my brother’s colleagues, who were as thick-witted as he.

With no chance for more dancing, especially not the waltz that had begun, I could either nod my head at Freddy’s idiotic friends or quit the place. I drained my glass, handed it to a discreet footman, and chose retreat.

I ought to have stayed. 

Darkness crouched before me as I exited the house, and I was not comfortable with it. At the end of my walk from Grosvenor Square to my club in Gower Street would be my empty room and lonely bed. Not the most auspicious way to begin the new year.

With the warmth of the ballroom and the fizz of champagne wrapped around me, I dared the frigid cold, telling myself I could keep to the lighted streets. A carriage was out of the question—Freddy would be highly displeased if I absconded with his, and I didn’t have the extra funds for a hackney.

All would have been well, I told myself forever after, if only the lamps hadn’t been out on a stretch of Portland Street. I viewed the welling blackness on that route and on impulse ducked down Queen Anne Street East, which would take me into Bloomsbury, where my club for former regimental officers lay.

Queen Anne Street had no lights either, I realized belatedly. A glow shone at the end of it, and I made for that as fast as I could. 

Not until I’d nearly reached the light did I see that what I’d glimpsed was not a gas lamp at the end of the narrow lane or the light from a warm house. The glow came from a lantern held aloft by a man, illuminating him and his two companions. 

The three lingered in a tiny passageway that led off Queen Anne Street, doing I knew not what, and I did not want to know. They were not ruffians—their suits could have come from the finest Bond Street tailors. But the scent that overlaid the normal odors of cologne, smoke, and brandy, was unearthly and terrifying.

They were not night-slayers, thank the good Lord. I’d have been dead in an instant if so. Night-slayers were also quite rare—not that this would be any comfort to me if I’d encountered one—and they never congregated with others.

I knew what these men were, though, and I considered them even more frightening than night-slayers. Night-slayers killed to satisfy hunger. These men would hunt for the sport of it. Possibly they’d destroy their prey in the end, when that prey was begging for mercy or death, or possibly they’d leave me to die slowly and in great pain.

They were were-beasts. Animals—wolves usually—who could appear as civilized gentlemen while they hunted the night.

I’d stumbled upon a gathering of them.

Of course, they saw me. I was in deep shadow, while they held the lantern, but they didn’t need the light. They’d scent a petrified, half-drunk army lieutenant a long way off his patch without any trouble at all.

I started to run. 

I heard my own footfalls echoing on the pavement, the opening to the next street tantalizingly distant. I’d have to navigate through a few more lanes before I reached Tottenham Court Road, where I would find a hackney, expense be damned.

“Stop him.” 

The rumbling command came from behind me, the voice gravelly and strong. I sprinted on, but I was no match for the speed of weres.

In two steps, they surrounded me, three large men in pristine coats and cravats, material stretched across arms and shoulders that would look misshapen under clothes not as well-tailored.

“Please,” I wheezed, my words slurring with the alcohol I’d consumed. Though I’d eschewed gin for a while now, I still found brandy and champagne agreeable, more fool I. “I never saw you.”

One of them reached for me, a rangy man with a sharp face and feral eyes that would bring me nightmares. I brought up my fists and defended myself as he attacked, not about to roll into a ball and let them do what they willed.

I’d battled Frenchmen on the Peninsula and at Waterloo, soldiers who’d have cheerfully bayonetted me and left me for dead if I’d let them. But they’d been men, like me, who’d folded over when I elbowed them in the gut, bled when I struck them in the face.

Against this were, I might have been punching a wall. Another of them began to laugh, the note of a wolf’s howl in his voice, glee at making the kill. 

They didn’t need knives or other weapons to subdue me. The one I fought brought up a hand that had turned to a beast’s paw, splitting his gloves. Razor-like claws came for me, and I knew I’d be dead in a few slashes.

I braced myself for bright pain to blossom in my abdomen, or for hot blood to spray from my throat.

Instead, I saw the man abruptly recede, as though grappling hooks had fixed into his fashionable coat and jerked him away from me. The other two gaped in as much amazement, and their leader shouted.

There was fear in that shout. In the next instant, the rangy man crashed into the wall behind him, and I felt very strong fingers under my arm.

“Run,” a woman’s voice advised me.

I hesitated a step, shock stilling me, and she pushed me off. 

“Run, idiotic man.”

I recognized the truth in her statement. She was giving me a reprieve, and I needed to take it.

I sprinted away, heading through the warren of streets toward Tottenham Court Road. I heard the scuffle behind me but knew I’d be half-witted to turn around to see what occurred.

The wide boulevard of the refreshingly normal Tottenham Court Road embraced me. Light not only from street lamps but in house windows and on hackney coaches warmed me, and I slowed my pace, trying to catch my breath. The ordinariness of the road returned my confidence somewhat, and I walked the remainder of the short way to Gower Street and the refuge of my club.

The remnants of a New Year’s celebration continued in the common room down the hall from the foyer, where I shed my coat. I joined the festivities to finish calming my nerves, sipped more brandy, and congratulated myself on my narrow escape.

I’d never seen weres in the flesh before. Heard of them, yes, listened to stories of braggadocios claiming they’d hunted them. 

I now knew those stories were false. The men who’d told them would never have stood a moment before even one of the three I’d encountered. 

It was said that weres couldn’t be killed with ordinary weapons. There was rumor that silver could take them down, but no one had verified this idea. I suppose if the theory were true, someone would be alive to relate that it had worked. However, if the three I’d seen tonight lived in London, they’d find it highly impractical to stay if they couldn’t touch silver.

Why had they been lurking on a dark street in Marylebone dressed in the first stare of fashion? As far as I knew, there’s never been sightings in this part of the metropolis. Weres tended to hunt the back streets of the East End and South London, where darkness and easy escape to nearby fields helped conceal them.

The logical part of my brain worked on the question of their presence while the other part, the one that had managed my survival through many chaotic battles, continued to be chillingly aware that I’d nearly died tonight.

Once I’d had enough brandy to restore some false courage, I bade the company good night. Almay, my closest friend, slurred a Happy New Year at me, and I returned the wish before I sought the stairs to my chamber.

Once there, I reposed in the chair before my meager fire for a while, in case Almay decided to step up to gossip with me before I fell asleep. He didn’t. 

I was still in the chair a long while later, my candle having guttered out, when I came awake, aware I was no longer alone.

She sat on the other side of the fireplace from me, where Almay often did, dying light flickering on her fine-boned face.

“Happy New Year, Robert Archer,” she said in her contralto voice.

I swallowed nervously. “And to you.” I had never learned her name, and I did not ask it now. 

“Tell me.” Her gaze was calm, as though she wasn’t the deadliest person in this entire house full of hardened, well-trained soldiers. “What have you done to make a trio of were-beasts so interested in you?”

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