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  Shadow Phoenix

  Episode I: Answering the Call

  MJ Moores

  Shadow Phoenix Volume 1, Episode 1: Answering the Call

  Copyright © Melissa J. Moores, 2019

  Published by Infinite Pathways Press 2019

  P.O. Box 4, Caledon Village, ON Canada L7K 3L3

  eISBN 978-1-988044-13-2

  All rights reserved. Except for use in any review, the reproduction or utilisation of this work in whole or in part in any form by any electronic, mechanical or other means, now known or hereafter invented, including xerography, photocopying and recording, or in any information storage or retrieval system, is forbidden without the written permission of the publisher.

  All characters in this book have no existence outside the imagination of the author and have no relation whatsoever to anyone bearing the same name or names. They are not even distantly inspired by any individual known or unknown to the author, and all incidents are pure invention.

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  TABLE of CONTENTS

  Title Page

  Copyright

  Blurb

  Author’s Note

  Chapter 1 ~ Arse over Tea Kettle

  Chapter 2 ~ A Mother’s Curse

  Chapter 3 ~ Trodden Toes

  Chapter 4 ~ Mistaken Identity

  Chapter 5 ~ Abracadabra

  Chapter 6 ~ Night in the City

  Chapter 7 ~ Just Cause

  Books

  Shadow Phoenix Volume 1

  Episode I

  Answering the Call

  A young maid is catapulted into an inventor’s explosive world the night his experiment goes awry. Torn between the life she should have, and the one she ended up with, Louisa finally sees a way past her curse—as long as her mouth and her choices don’t get her fired first.

  A New Steampunk Serial

  This is the first installment of eight short-story-length episodes that link together to form a complete novel or volume. As Charles Dickens once wrote in batches of chapters for the local paper, this story will be revealed similarly via electronic episodes.

  Each “short read” is intended to have both a general conclusion to the immediate story line, and a through-story that links each one to a larger, over-arching, plot.

  It is my hope that readers who prefer shorter pieces, or who only have a limited time to read, will feel satisfied with each separate episode while looking forward to the next installment.

  Happy reading.

  Sincerely,

  MJ Moores

  SHADOW PHOENIX

  Vol. 1

  EPISODE I

  Answering the Call

  Arse over Tea Kettle

  L ouisa danced an awkward jig with the heavy wooden ladder, avoiding the topiary to either side of the sitting room doors, and stopped just short of the center of the room. She snarled at the dappled yet unconventional electric glass-drop chandelier. It clinked as she set the ladder in the exact right place. The tender skin at the base of her index finger caught in the bracing.

  “Odds bodkins!” she cursed, a tad louder than intended. Louisa sucked on her pinched flesh and looked to either door. One more slip like that and she’d be tossed out onto the street—no reference to boot. She couldn’t afford to let that happen again, regardless of how she felt about the job.

  Louisa shook out her hand, nabbed the feather duster tucked into the waistband at the back of her apron, and climbed the twelve-foot ladder all the way to the top. At least the gas lamps lowered for ease of lighting and cleaning. The electrical wires attached to the useless crank box on the wall remained fixed, forcing her to climb. The nuances of the experimental technology left a lot to be desired.

  Reaching as tall as her willowy frame allowed, up even onto her tip-toes, she leaned forward and counterbalanced by raising her left foot just so. That ought to do it. Louisa delicately dusted the lighting fixture, her mind flitting back to the last performance of Swan Lake she’d seen, and imagined herself a ballerina held high.

  Crystal chandeliers were a luxury. As well-known as her master was, everyone knew his grant money went into his experiments, not his decorating. But even a young gentleman such as he had a certain level of opulence naturally equated with his position. Collectibles, such as that eccentric, glass lighting fixture, became intriguing talking points for interviews and at fundraisers.

  A loud crash shook the ceiling. Muffled curses challenged the stillness of the room below. Tinkling glass swayed. Louisa held her breath and her body still. She dared not risk breaking anything.

  “Help! I say, I need help!” Master Bennett called from above.

  Louisa released her breath and kept dusting. Her thoughts drifted from her time cleaning gold-leaf filigree-encrusted balconies to the workshop above and a young master determined to invent something profound.

  What is he doing up there? Always banging about. Harnessing thunder for goodness’ sake? He’d doubled his time on the project in the last month since news of the continuing drought had spread.

  Another thud and several hard stomps rattled the lighting fixture, causing her to pull away again. If she had to keep stopping like this, she’d not be home before nightfall.

  I was hoping to leave early tonight. She sighed, knowing her route back harbored more than the usual riffraff these days. Louisa straightened, lowering her foot onto the rung, duster still raised, as she listened for the familiar patter of Missus Courtright’s footsteps.

  They never came.

  “Help now! Help, I say!” Master Bennett’s cry filled with an agitation Louisa had never heard before. She glanced at each door from her perch.

  Surely Henry or Isabel will race up and offer the required assistance? It wasn’t her job. Her job was to finish dusting and go home.

  As Louisa resumed her task, her ears twitched.

  Coughing?

  Her gut clenched.

  Something isn’t right. Where is everyone? The glass teardrops shivered from the dull pounding above, which was followed by a muted “Help, please …”

  Louisa’s heart jumped into her throat.

  Something was terribly wrong.

  She gathered up her skirts, crouched as she had so many times in the catwalks above the stage, and leaped from the ladder, landing on both feet. She tucked her duster in the back of her apron and ran for the stairs. An acrid woodiness coated Louisa’s nose and throat like a magician’s flash powder. She tried to swallow but couldn’t.

  Dark billowing smoke hugged the upper risers as Louisa ungracefully hiked her skirts again and leaped two steps at a time. She swung around the upper banister, pulling her wild curls like a scarf over her mouth and nose, and plunged into the thick gray cloud filling the upper hall. An orange flare licked the wooden floorboards just inside the master’s workshop.

  “Master Bennett! Master Bennett, where are you?” she cried, fruitlessly waving smoke from her face. She groped for the hall table, then reached for the silver pitcher she knew sat waiting. After knocking two glasses over, Louisa’s knuckles bumped smooth metal. She grabbed the container, its comforting weight pulling at her arm. Louisa dashed into the smoke-laden room, splashed water on several small fires, and dumped what remained across the flaming mass on the far side of the room—the master’s worktable.

  But, where is he? Where is everyone?

  “Master Bennett? Master Bennett?” She coughed and crouched low, duck-walking around the smoldering table. It needed another dousing, but not yet. “Master Bennett, say something!”

  A strained cough, left, toward the fireplace, drew her. Louisa waved her arms before her but only received grazed knuckles for her efforts.

  The pounding came from almost directly above me. She turned to whe
re she hoped the middle of the room was and searched again.

  Flesh met cloth. She grabbed at it—a leg!

  “Master Bennett, are you okay? Answer me.”

  She followed his leg, traced up his body along to his head and shoulders, and gave him a nudge. No response.

  “Bloody hell,” she cursed and pushed him onto his back. She took as deep a breath as she dared, grabbed both his arms, and dragged him from the room. At the top of the stairway, Louisa maneuvered him to her shoulder. As she strained to lift, he coughed and nearly sent her flying.

  “Hold tight, sir.” She scanned the lower floor for the other staff—still no one.

  His hot, staccato breath quick-stepped across her neck. He found his feet and tightened his grip around her.

  “Good. Now, down we go,” she said.

  Louisa leaned into the banister and led him to the lounge. She laid him across the settee, his feet dangling over the end. He coughed again but this time it sounded different. She shifted to slip out of his embrace, but he pulled her closer, strong even now.

  Her chest tightened.

  “My papers … save my papers,” he rasped and broke into another fit of coughing.

  “Yes, sir.”

  He released her, as did the vice on her heart. Louisa dashed toward the kitchen. Where is everyone?

  “Hello! Fire! We need help!” She scrambled for a bucket. When she found one, Louisa jammed it under the pump just outside the back door. Try as she might, no water came.

  The drought.

  Louisa raced back into the kitchen and over to the stove. Henry filled the soup pot each night with water from the river. She tipped it forward. Barely a pitcher’s worth splashed into her bucket. She grabbed a long rag and pounded up the stairs, the bucket cracking against her knees.

  Oh, what is going on? Why is this happening?

  In the workshop, Louisa lightly splashed every surface still glowing and then slapped with the cloth to smother what embers remained. She dropped the cloth and bucket and raced over to the window. Her hip smashed against the corner of the massive desk, spinning her off course. Knees bent, Louisa pushed up with her shoulder against the counterweight of the sash until the hidden supports swung down.

  A gust of cool evening air helped her breathe. She leaned against the window sash on soot-smeared arms to quell her shakes. The dull roar of a passing zeppelin heralded the last docking of the night. Her gaze lingered over the lamplighter’s trail. Another deep breath coated her nose and throat with an oily sweetness. She shuddered, gripped the wooden frame under her forearms, and forced herself to open the other window. Louisa’s fingers refused to work properly. Her hold slipped and she almost smashed the pane. Luckily, it only crushed her fingers.

  “Ack!” she yelled, her voice bouncing back to her from the townhouse not more than an arm’s length away. Using her good hand, she struggled to force the window up, sighing when the supports fell into place.

  Thank goodness. Louisa wrapped her sore appendage within the folds of her apron and returned downstairs to the master.

  He sat, breathing heavily, arms on knees. A lingering envelope of smoke enfolded them both. The charred air hung heavy. He tried to stand. A bout of coughing forced him back down. Louisa reached for the absent pitcher of water, shaking her hands, as she tried to make sense of what had nearly happened. She couldn’t get her thoughts to focus on anything but Bennett. Louisa’s duty demanded his well-being come first, and in the other servants’ absence, it became her burden.

  She spied the liquor cabinet. He only drank with certain high-end company, but he’d need something stiff after this fiasco. Louisa latched onto the idea and it steadied her nerves. The master’s experiments had never gone this far awry before. She had never been on duty to watch over him either. Why she was the only servant in the house niggled at the back of her mind.

  She poured the scotch without measuring, more than usual, but clearly necessary. Just as Bennett tried to stand again, she kneeled before him and placed the crystal tumbler in his hands.

  Louisa curled her fingers, even the ones that complained, around his hands surrounding the glass. She had to be certain he wouldn’t drop it. She’d never been so forward before—with anyone, let alone her employer. She wasn’t her mother and wouldn’t let that kind of issue arise again. Yet, until the tremble disappeared, it didn’t seem right to leave him.

  “How … how bad is it?” he asked, voice hoarse.

  “Take a sip, sir, please.” She raised their hands and slowly removed hers as his lips touched the glass. “The smoke damage is, perhaps, worse than usual and will require a fair amount of attention. And the small fires—”

  He shook his head and swallowed. “No, my papers. How bad is it? Have I—have I destroyed everything?” A note of fear mingled with the barest thread of hope.

  She didn’t want to look him in the eyes even though Courtright demanded it of all the servants. Bennett’s piercing blue gaze claimed the truth from her. She wanted so much to say the right thing. Her chest constricted. Would he fire her for hesitating? Not coming sooner?

  “They’re wet. That’s about all I can say at this moment. If you used ink …” Her voice trailed off, then she forced herself to finish the thought. "But if you used charcoal or graphite, I’m sure most of it is still there. The little water we had—”

  “I have to see.” He stood.

  She rose with him, her heart flipping in time to her stomach. If she’d ruined his papers—if he’d burned his notes …

  “Give the room a chance to clear first. Then, Henry can …”

  He shook his head.

  “Isabel, then?”

  He raised his eyes to look at her. Past the pain and worry lay something she didn’t recognize. No one had ever looked at her that way before.

  “I can’t thank you enough for staying.” His hoarse voice lingered in the air between them.

  “What do you mean?” She frowned, the moment lost, and brushed a dark curling tendril of hair from her forehead over to her ear.

  “Why, I let everyone go home early. To avoid trouble. What with the increase in attacks this month, especially after dark—” He must have read the shock on her face. “You didn’t know?”

  “No, no one told me.” Was there a reason no one had said boo to her about it? Had Courtright mentioned it but Louisa, not paying attention, missed it?

  “Thank heavens for that. Things could have been far worse without you here … It’s Louise, isn’t it?”

  “Louisa.”

  He nodded, took a healthy gulp of his drink, and indicated the direction of the stairs with a raise of his chin. “I’ll go see how bad it is. I’m so close …” He shook his head and walked from the room, still carrying his scotch.

  Louisa followed. He hadn’t fired her … yet. Maybe she could salvage the situation if—

  He stopped short of the workshop door and wavered. Bennett rested his hand on the wall to steady himself.

  “Sir? Perhaps it’s better to wait until Henry—”

  “No. I won’t be able to sleep. I must know.” He turned to face her; the barest shadow of doubt and stubble darkened his youthful face. It was easy to forget the master was only just out of university, trying to prove himself as he hobnobbed with the Society of Engineers.

  The magnitude of what might lie beyond the door finally struck her. If he’d written his notes in ink, if he’d burned key pages in the explosion, he’d be forced to start all over again. This wasn’t about her losing everything—she hadn’t much. It was about him.

  Louisa knew how that felt.

  “Shall I go first?” she asked.

  He looked up. “Together?”

  She smiled and curtsied. Her gaze traveled the length of her attire and realized she, too, was covered in smoke residue, water, and soot.

  He laughed. “We make quite the pair, don’t we?” He held out his arm to her as he might for a lady of renown.

  Louisa startled, not sure how t
o respond, at the same time not wanting to offend. Is this how it started with Mother? Could she decline the offer without offending? She tentatively laid her fingers upon his arm, and they strode into the room, her stomach in knots.

  Master Bennett halted just inside. The heavy aroma of damp wood accosted her. Clumps of wet and singed papers intermingled with dry notes that fluttered about the room in the breeze. It turned her stomach. Likely, it did worse to him. She slipped from his arm, a surge of inner strength forcing her back straight as she circled the room, and took stock of everything: water, paper, charred surfaces, desk, workbench, tool wall, and supply racks.

  A large black blast marred the worktable, now surrounded by broken glass and various ingredients.

  “Is that safe, sir?” She pointed to the mess on the floor.

  “N—no.” He took half a step toward the workbench, then looked back at his desk and the papers.

  “You take care of your experiment. I’ll go through your papers. It doesn’t appear they’re too badly singed.” They couldn’t risk another explosion. She couldn’t risk thinking of the late hour or being the only servant left in the house.

  “Right. Yes, of course.”

  As they worked steadily through the rest of the evening, Bennett grew calm from his cleaning and tidying duties. In fact, his meticulous attention to detail was likely a combination of making sure everything remained safe and sound and avoiding the inevitable.

  Regardless of her own plight, Louisa made piles: dry paper, damp paper, drenched paper, damaged, and so on. Giving in to curiosity, she read what she could of Bennett’s research. She didn’t understand the equations, but his words were clear enough around the engineering jargon.

  Soon, her piles divided and subdivided into like categories, depending on their content and how badly some smudged or ran, for Bennett had done most of his rough notes in graphite and his correspondence in ink.