A Sinister Revenge


 
 
 
 ALSO BY DEANNA RAYBOURN
 
 Killers of a Certain Age
 
 Veronica Speedwell Mystery Series
 
 A Curious Beginning
 A Perilous Undertaking
 A Treacherous Curse
 A Dangerous Collaboration
 A Murderous Relation
 An Unexpected Peril
 An Impossible Impostor
 
 Lady Julia Grey Novels
 
 Silent in the Grave
 Silent in the Sanctuary
 Silent on the Moor
 Dark Road to Darjeeling
 The Dark Enquiry
 
 Lady Julia Grey Novellas
 
 Silent Night
 Midsummer Night
 Twelfth Night
 Bonfire Night
 
 Other Works
 
 For a complete list of Deanna’s titles, please visit deannaraybourn.com
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 BERKLEY
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 Copyright © 2023 by Raybourn Creative LLC.
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 Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
 Names: Raybourn, Deanna, author.
 Title: A sinister revenge / Deanna Raybourn.
 Description: First Edition. | New York: Berkley, 2023. | Series: A Veronica Speedwell mystery
 Identifiers: LCCN 2022031842 (print) | LCCN 2022031843 (ebook) | ISBN 9780593545928 (hardcover) | ISBN 9780593545942 (ebook)
 Subjects: LCGFT: Novels.
 Classification: LCC PS3618.A983 S565 2023 (print) | LCC PS3618.A983 (ebook) | DDC 813/.6—dc23/eng/20220708
 LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2022031842
 LC ebook record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2022031843
 Cover design and illustration by Leo Nickolls
 Book design by Kristin del Rosario, adapted for ebook by Kelly Brennan
 This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.
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 For Michelle Vega, with heartfelt thanks for joining me on this adventure. Excelsior!
 
 
 
 
 CHAPTER
 
 1
 Bavaria, September 1889
 You must not go into the forest at night,” the innkeeper warned, his voice trembling with fear. “Something dangerous walks there in the darkness.”
 He carried on in this vein for some time as I applied myself to a stein of Weissbier and a plate of crisp, excellent sausages. My friend and travelling companion, the Viscount Templeton-Vane, listened politely as the fellow grew more vehement.
 “The creature that walks by night, it is part wolf, part man. It has but one eye, the other a gaping hole of deepest black. It keeps to the shadows, and if you dare to come near, it snarls like a bear,” he went on, his eyes round in his chubby, shiny face. He was a character straight from a storybook, plump and bearded, an imp of a fellow, with lines of good humour etched upon his face. But there was no mirth to be found upon his visage as he told his tale, only fear, brightening his eyes and causing his mouth to tremble ever so slightly.
 Behind him, a lurking barmaid whose ample charms were scarcely contained by the lacing of her dirndl threw her apron over her head and fled through the door to the kitchens.
 The viscount—Tiberius to his friends—quirked up one expressive brow. “My good man, calm yourself. Surely this is some piece of local lore meant to frighten the feeble. We English are made of sterner stuff.”
 “But it is true,” the fellow insisted, colour pinkening the cheeks above the white fringe of his beard. He glanced around and lowered his voice. “I have seen it, a hulking shadow, moving in the silence of the firs. And when I stepped in its direction, it reared back and it growled with the fiendish fury of a hound of Hell.”
 Tiberius, usually a man of cool logic, looked startled. “Growled, you say?”
 “Like a wolf,” the man confirmed.
 I sighed. It was time to put an end to this. “My good man,” I said politely to the innkeeper, “whilst I must concede that your use of alliteration is impressive, I think we can dismiss the notion of a hybrid monster roaming these mountains.”
 He gave me a look of profound injury and slunk away, muttering.
 Tiberius met my gaze. “Can we? I realise the local folk are a superstitious lot, but how exactly would you explain the existence of such a creature?”
 I ticked off the qualities as I said them. “A tall, unsociable creature that keeps to the shadows, shuns the society of respectable people, and growls its displeasure? Tell me, who does that seem to describe?”
 Tiberius’ mouth went slack, then curved into a smile. “You mean—”
 “Yes, Tiberius. I think we have, at long last, found your brother.”
 
 • • •
 The Honourable Revelstoke Templeton-Vane—Stoker, familiarly—had not been lost so much as slightly misplaced. For some months Stoker and I had enjoyed an intimate relationship that had proven thoroughly fulfilling, indeed enrapturing, in all the particulars. We were work colleagues, engaged in the endlessly fascinating task of preparing museum exhibits for our employer, Lord Rosemorran. We were also neighbours, each of us inhabiting a small folly on his lordship’s Marylebone estate.
 And we were occasional partners in detection, as falling over corpses had become something of a habit. In short, our lives were so fully entwined it was difficult to say where one left off and the other began. We enjoyed it all—from the scientific work to the investigation of crime, to the exuberant physicality of our more private endeavours. (Stoker is singularly suited to the amatory arts through a combination of bodily charms, robust stamina, and an enchanting thoroughness that might have startled a less experienced or enthusiastic partner