Lady Maccon witnessed very little of the battle after that. She leaned against Rumpet and tried to watch, but contractions kept distracting her, and the fighting below was nothing more to her unfocused mind than a puddinglike mass of clavigers, wolves, and steam from penny-farthings and an octomaton. Occasionally, a spurt of fire jetted into the air or a glittering waterfall of silver net was cast upward.

Eventually she gave up. “Rumpet, help me to the bottom of the stair.” The butler did so, and Alexia sank gratefully down onto the steps of the grand staircase. “Now, please go down and ensure that the vampires are locked in. The last thing we need is them on the loose.”

“At once, my lady.”

Rumpet disappeared and returned later, grim-faced.

“That bad?”

“They are complaining about the accommodations and demanding feather pillows, my lady.”

“Of course they are.” Alexia doubled over in pain as another contraction ripped through her. Dimly, she saw Lord Akeldama’s dirigible float in to a graceful landing in the front courtyard of Woolsey. Boots and the airship company leaped agilely out of the basket and lashed the craft to a hitching post.

The first set of clavigers returned at that point, dragging a netted wolf with the aid of a penny-farthing wagon. It took four of them to get him up the steps and into the castle, even with the silver net burning him into submission. It wasn’t Biffy, but it looked to be one of the other youngsters, Rafe.

Alexia’s attention was refocused into moaning as her pains became, if possible, worse. She looked for Rumpet, but he was busy supervising the unloading, seeing to it that the young wolf was dragged down into the dungeon and locked away. Alexia spared a moment to hope that all the vampires had gone into one of the cells together, or things were about to get very complicated, indeed.

“Conall!” she yelled through the pain, even knowing he was in wolf form and that he would be the hardest to catch and the last to return home. “Where is he?” She was irrationally convinced that he should be with her right that very moment.

At which juncture, a wide, cool cloth was placed across her brow and a soft reliable voice said exactly the right thing. “Here, madam, drink this.”

A cup was pressed against her lips and Alexia sipped. Strong, milky, and restorative, exactly how she liked it best. Tea.

She opened her eyes, previously screwed closed in anguish, to see the fine lined face of an elderly gentleman, nondescript and familiar. “Floote.”

“Good evening, madam.”

“Where did you come from?”

Floote gestured behind him where the dirigible was still visible through the open front door. Tizzy and Boots hovered in the doorway, looking at Alexia in horror and with an air that suggested they would rather be anywhere else but there.

“I caught a lift, madam.”

“Eep!” squeaked Tizzy as he was pushed aside by another group of clavigers dragging another netted wolf home. Hemming, thought Alexia. Had to be. Only Hemming whined like that. They muscled their captive through the hallway and toward the dungeon stairs without need of an order from the panting and writhing Lady Maccon.