The Clockwork Wolf by Lynn Viehl

lamplight Lucien Dredmore looked like a much younger version of himself, a handsome boy. For a moment I was so enchanted I lifted my hand to touch his face.
    Deep, throbbing pain raced up my arm into my shoulder and skidded down my back. I felt as if I’d been dashed across a brick wall, and groaned as I tried to sit up and made it worse.
    â€œBe still now.” His hand came over my face, his fingers spreading out as his warmth sank into my skin. “Your spirit was battered out of your body. It will take a few moments to enmesh yourself.”
    â€œJust shut up and kill me,” I begged. I’d have bitten his hand but I thought my teeth might fall out, my jaw was aching so. “The women and the kids on the tram?”
    â€œHysterical, but safe.” He stroked my forehead, and everywhere he touched the pain diminished. “You are not to think about it.”
    â€œI don’t want to.” The horror of what I had seen bloomed back in my mind, however, and I had to tell him. “They were like animals, Lucien. Wolves with the bodies of men. But it wasn’t natural. Someone made them. They made animech beasts out of those men.”
    He hushed me and pulled me close, and only then did I realize he lay beside me on the bed, our limbs entwined and nearly every part of us touching somewhere. Even his hair had tangled with mine, falling against my cheek like black and brown silk.
    I drew back, looking at him. “You’re in bed with me. That can’t be right.” I turned my head to see a room very much like the one in which I visited Docket. “Hospital?”
    He nodded. “When they couldn’t rouse you the beaters brought you here.” He moved his hand over my shoulder and along my arm. “I nearly lost you twice in one night. You should be locked up for your own good.”
    I should have pushed him off the bed for that, but the effort required was beyond me. “Why was I floating off like that?”
    â€œYou’re spirit-born, Charmian. In times of great duress part of you will always seek out your other kind and their realm.” He lifted his head. “Your friend the inspector will be rejoining us in a minute. Is there anything I should know before he does?”
    â€œI didn’t kill the Wolfmen. They killed each other.” I shuddered as I added, “One of them was named Akins. Until this morning, he was Lady Bestly’s footman.”
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    Dredmore departed with a promise—one that sounded like a threat—to return, ignoring Doyle entirely as hestalked from my hospital room. The chief inspector came to sit at my bedside, looking more troubled than annoyed.
    â€œYou have interesting friends, Miss Kittredge.” His fair hair glinted as he turned to regard me directly. “How are you feeling?”
    â€œKnocked about, but I’ll live.” Carefully I moved onto my side so I could face him. “Your men in the alley, they were very kind to look after me.”
    â€œThey say you deserve a medal or two.” Instead of taking out his notebook or spouting something official, he reached for my hand. “Do you feel well enough to tell me what happened, Kit?”
    I didn’t, but I did. Describing what I had seen sounded ridiculous, even to my own ears, but I gave him nearly every detail, leaving out only two facts: what I’d seen just before I’d fainted, and the fact that the second Wolfman had been the footman sacked earlier that day by my new client.
    To his credit, Doyle didn’t laugh at me, although when I spoke of the physical transformations I’d witnessed his expression grew doubtful.
    â€œI know it sounds like something out of a bad dream,” I said once I’d finished. “I can’t tell you how they did it, or God knows why, but their bodies changed shape. I could hear their bones cracking. And they were so fast, and so terribly