The Golden Spider (The Elemental Web Chronicles Book 1) by Anne Renwick Page A

voice sound normal while the rest of him throbbed.
    “A bit,” she admitted. “Mostly from worry. Has Black had any luck locating my sister?”
    Thornton shook his head, grateful for a topic serious enough to distract his unruly mind. “Not yet. Nobody will admit to Nicu Sindel’s whereabouts, and not a single gypsy has seen Luca Sindel or his gadji bride.”
    Her face fell. “Not surprising.”
    “No. Black did report, however, that the gypsies camped on Putney Heath seem unusually agitated. It seems a man has gone missing. One whose return was anticipated for reasons the gypsies decline to disclose.”
    Lady Amanda frowned. “That does not bode well.”
    “Not at all.”
    It had been over a week since the last gypsy murder. Given past patterns, Thornton feared another death was imminent. It was agony to sit helplessly in his laboratory, banned from fieldwork due to his damned injury.
    He looked at the partially assembled mechanism before them. Not entirely helpless. Once complete, there was a chance‌—‌a very slim one‌—‌that the neurachnid could be programmed to repair his own leg. What would it be like to experience movement via gold threads and rare earth metals? Not that he cared, so long as he regained full function of his leg, of his foot.
    He tucked a loupe into one eye and picked up a screwdriver. Work was one way to dispel the sense of dependence upon others, and an excellent way to avoid staring at Lady Amanda’s form. “What inspired the idea of this neurachnid?” he asked.
    “My brother,” she said, pulling her goggles back over her eyes and lifting her own tools once more. “We were at a house party some five years past. Ned accompanied Emily and me, but only because said party was at Nellie Atwater’s manor.”
    “I see.” Lady Nell was a beauty, and lust was a powerful motivation.
    Her hand stilled. “We teased Ned awfully, insisting he could never steal a kiss for her mother kept her under close watch during the day, lock and key at night, and the trellis outside her bedroom window was covered with thorns of the sharpest variety.” She paused. “Ned took that as a dare.”
    Thornton remembered twenty-five. An indestructible age. Though, at the time, he’d yet to do anything requiring nerve repair. He waited, guessing at the ending before it was spoken aloud.
    “The wood was rotten. He fell, landing on a stone planter below.”
    The wrong angle and just enough force and a man’s life was altered forever.
    “I’m sorry,” he said, pausing at his task. Guilt too was a powerful motivator. In the years that followed, Lady Amanda had designed and built the neurachnid, while Lady Emily toiled to concoct a drug that met the needs of the procedure. “I gather that Lady Emily, despite finding love among the Romani, continues to assist with your project?”
    She nodded. “By letter. Though, as I said, I haven’t heard from her in some time. Nor did I expect to. The last batch of nerve agent should have lasted months, provided the largest test subject was of the murine variety.”
    Mice would require significantly less of the drug during the procedure. To calm a grown man’s nerves long enough to perform the surgery would require much, much more nerve toxin.
    “There’s still hope,” she said. “Ned’s injury is not as severe as most imagine. The fall damaged the L4 and L5 nerve roots.” Her lashes fell. A slight blush tinged her cheeks. “However, the father of his would-be fiancée has expressed concern.”
    So Ned’s spinal cord was not severed. Fatherhood was still possible. But the nerve roots emerging from beneath the fourth and fifth lumbar vertebrae provided a large portion of motor input to the legs. He understood, but the ton at large would not. “I see.” He paused, then discarded delicacy in favor of bluntness. “I gather there are no bastard children to prove otherwise?”
    Her cheeks flamed and she kept her eyes firmly on the work before her as she shook