Incarnation Read Online Free

down my guard. Surrounded by the hot, coppery fragrance of pulsing blood, the warmth of living flesh, the beating of collective hearts, the effort needed to restrain myself was almost more than I could muster. Hunger gnawed at me. Had a rat appeared just then, I would have swallowed my revulsion and drained it in an instant. But London rats are wilier than the country prey that had sustained me thus far, wilier even in some regard than the humans with which they must contend. Nothing stirred in the alley.
    I drew back into the shadows, but kept my gaze on the Lyceum Theatre across the street. Its columned façade gave the appearance of an ancient Greek temple. The play advertised on placards out in front was one I had seen with my family the previous year during our visit to Paris. That seemed a lifetime ago—the life I had known having effectively ended on the windswept moors near Whitby when I fell under the spell of the seductive being who had so transformed me.
    Thinking of him, I was startled by the arrival of the black-uniformed Watchers gliding along on their upright Teslaways, their faces invisible behind the visors of their helmets. A few years before, such vehicles would have been restricted to the pages of novels by H. G. Wells, Jules Verne, and the like. But the luring to England of the brilliant scientist and inventor Nikola Tesla had brought about a technological revolution,the implications of which were only just beginning to be felt. At the same time, fear of anarchists and others deemed “subversives” had prompted broad new laws that gave the authorities unparalleled powers over ordinary citizens. Not everyone was entirely happy with the results. My father, for instance, had worried that civil liberties were being undermined by the government’s ever-expanding ability to observe and control its citizens.
    As the guardians of the public safety took up position outside the theatre, the ushers threw open the doors and light poured into the street. First out were the upper-class patrons of the private boxes and the dress circle, the gentlemen in their evening dress or military uniforms and the ladies in their gowns and jewels. When they had been taken up into their carriages, the decent professional men and their wives who occupied the stalls were let out through one door, while the rowdy students, tradesmen, and foreigners from the balconies were made to wait before exiting through another.
    All along the Strand, theatregoers were departing. Hundreds thronged the road under the gaze of the Watchers, calling farewell to friends, hailing cabs, exclaiming over the evening’s entertainment or complaining of it. All was ordered and proper until a tall, somber-looking man suddenly cried out in alarm and slapped a hand to the pocket that moments before had held his wallet. A Watcher took note, spied the fleet-footed thief, and promptly pursued him. Weaving his scooter in and out of the crowd, he quickly overtook the miscreant, rendering him insensible with an electrical cudgel.
    Other Watchers arrived on the scene and the boy was tossed into the back of a police van. His case would be heard in one of the summary judgment courts set up to deal withmatters of civil disorder. Within hours, he would be tried, sentenced, and committed to serve his term without the possibility of appeal.
    The streets of London were safer than they had ever been, but the prisons were fuller. There was talk that more such institutions needed to be built quickly.
    The brief flare of excitement faded away as the streets cleared. In my mind, I went over my plan once again. I would approach the Lyceum Theatre, enter through the back, and seek out the author of the deceitful version of my life. I would not kill him; on that I was determined. But I would compel him to tell me why he used me as he had.
    A clutch of young men hovered at the stage door, praising the attributes of the female lead, a certain Belgian actress who was linked