Heart of Iron by Bec McMaster Read Free Book Online

breathless. As his vision faded back to normal, he realized they were all staring at him in various states of wariness.
    “I’m fine,” he muttered.
    Blade knelt back on his heels. “Good. Don’t think I could take you on just yet.”
    Lena sat up, her face pale. The coffee-dark color of her hair was the same precise shade of her sister’s, but her brown eyes were warmer, more almond shaped. Smiling eyes, meant to tempt and tease.
    They weren’t smiling now.
    Lena’s lips curved, but it didn’t light up her face the way it could. “Goodness,” she said in a falsely bright tone. “How much blood did you take, Honor?”
    “I had no idea you had a fear of needles,” Honoria said, glancing at the tiny vial.
    “Thought I could handle it.” It had been a long time since he’d fainted.
    “The exhibition?” Blade asked.
    Where he’d found Will as a boy. Chained up on stage in London’s East End and forced to exhibit his monstrous strength and healing capabilities to the gasping crowd. The showman, Tom Sturrett, cut him with iron blades. Despite the presence of the loupe virus, the poor conditions and lack of food meant he didn’t always heal as quickly as they wanted. Then Mrs. Sturrett would stitch him up with her coarse needle.
    It wasn’t long before just the sight of it was enough to make the blood rush out of his head.
    Lena clasped her gloved hands in her lap, tendrils of soft brown hair escaping from her chignon. She must have been in a rush, for her hat was still cocked jauntily across her brow, a scarlet feather trailing over one cheek. His gaze lingered on the feather.
    “The exhibition? What exhibition?” she asked.
    Blade met his gaze. “When—”
    “Nothin’,” he snapped.
    They all looked at him again and Will cursed his bluntness. Nothing would fire Lena’s imagination more than a brusque denial. He could already see the curiosity forming in her eyes. She’d be after his secrets now like a ferret.
    Maybe it was best to give them the condensed version. “Used to be displayed in the penny gaff shops as a curio. Or up on stage in Covent Garden.” Pitching his voice louder, he mimicked Sturrett’s showman cry. “Come and see the ferocious Beast! Witness London’s last remaining verwulfen in chains!” He could almost smell the cheap shag tobacco the audience smoked and the reek of stale, unwashed bodies. “After the singin’ and flash dancin’ I were the main event. They’d drag me out in a cage and the audience’d throw rotten food at me. Or sometimes they’d dress me in wolf furs and have some of the actors play at blue bloods. It’d usually end when they attacked me with swords.”
    Lena’s eyes went round. “They didn’t really stab you?”
    “With iron.” His voice was hard. “Heals right quick. Unless it’s silver-alloy.”
    “A similarity you share with Blade,” Honoria mused.
    “Honestly, Honoria. How can you think about the disease after hearing something so dreadful!” Lena snapped at her sister. Then looked back at him. “I thought you were fifteen when Blade brought you home?”
    “I were. Or nearabouts. Didn’t keep much track o’ time, in the cage.”
    Lena’s eyes softened with distress.
    Will hadn’t expected her to defend him or sympathize. Most of the crowd had been costermongers and the like, but sometimes one of the Echelon paid Sturrett to display him in their grand homes in Mayfair. The ladies wore fine silks and toyed with the extravagant diamonds and pearls around their necks—fancy women dressed like Lena—but at least they didn’t throw nothing at him. Instead they’d eye him with their hot little eyes, whispering and smirking behind their fans.
    The gentlemen hadn’t liked that at all. Will hadn’t the heart to tell them he shared their sentiments. It wouldn’t have mattered anyway. Nobody listened to him when he was in the cage. He’d become little more than an animal to them. In the end, he’d stopped speaking, growling and