The Mime Order (22 page)

****

Even a revolutionary breakfast—whatever that might be—had to be eaten in Chateline’s. The others met us in our private booth. As always, I sat at Jaxon’s right side, where a mollisher belonged. He ordered a spendthrift breakfast: everything on the menu, from salted sprats on scrambled eggs to honeyed corn muffins, glossy sausages, and kedgeree with hard-boiled eggs. The food was delivered on tiered stands and trays covered by silver cloches.

“What’s this in aid of, Binder?” The owner poured me a cup of fresh coffee. Chat was a soft-spoken ex-boxer who’d served Jaxon for years until he’d lost a hand to an angry rival. Broken capillaries spread out from his nostrils into his cheeks. “Giving Hector a farewell toast?”

“In a fashion, my friend.”

Chat retreated to the bar. Opposite me, Eliza helped herself to a dish, smiling her uncertainty. “In a fashion?”

“You’ll see. Or rather, you’ll
hear
. When I tell you,” Jaxon purred. “Right. How was the meeting?”

“Oh, quite uneventful. I almost forgot how insufferable they all are. Nonetheless, Paige’s reputation is safe, so the meeting served its purpose.”
I’ll bet it did
, I thought. “Devilled kidney, Danica, my dear?”

He offered her a hot plate. She gave it a surly look before taking it.

“This is the first time we’ve seen you in days.” Zeke slid a plate of muffins toward her. “What are you living on up there?”

Danica
was out of her depth outside the den. Wild red hair tumbled from its bun, her freckled cheeks were spattered with oil and fresh soldering burns mottled both her hands. “Oxygen,” she said. “Nitrogen. I could go on.”

“What are you
working
on, then, brains?” Nadine popped a fried mushroom into her mouth.

“Danica is designing a jamming device,” Jaxon intervened. “The same technology that created Senshield, beautifully enrobed in a convenient, hand-held form.”

“I took the basic design from Scion,” she said. “They’re working on a portable version of Senshield.”

My fingers tapped the tablecloth. Opposite me, Nick frowned. “Why would they need that?”

“To get rid of the NVD. You don’t think they want to use unnatural police for ever, do you?”

Nick looked shocked, and no wonder. If Senshield could be carried by amaurotic Vigiles, they wouldn’t need sighted eyes on the streets. The voyants who had turned on their own kind, who had hunted their fellow unnaturals, would no longer serve a purpose in Scion.

“Excellent news for us,” Jaxon remarked. “We’ll have amaurotics bumbling about with cumbersome bits of equipment instead of sighted clairvoyant soldiers on the streets. Do eat, my lovely,” he added to me. “We have much to do over the coming weeks. You’ll need your appetite and your wits about you.”

I took a bite of bread.

“You look a lot better, Paige.” Now they’d made up, Eliza was back to being a true yes-Jaxon. “We’ve got a ton of rainbow ruses to sort out. I could use a hand tomorrow if you’re up for it.”

“I wouldn’t concern yourself with rainbow ruses for now.” Our mime-lord took a delicate sniff of lemon Floxy, as he always did to cleanse his palate. “We have far more important matters to consider,
O
my lovely. Matters that, for the first time, may take our thoughts beyond the limits of I-4.” He paused, presumably for dramatic effect. “Would you like to hear them?”

Zeke caught my eye and pulled a face. “Yes, Jaxon.”

“Good. Gather round, then.”

We all leaned closer. Jaxon looked at each of us in turn, his whole aspect aflame with energy.

“As you know, I have been devoted to I-4 for close to twenty years. Together, we have kept it prosperous in the face of Scion’s tyranny. You six are my magnum opus. And despite your occasional—well, regular—blunders, I have nothing but the greatest admiration for your skills and dedication.” His voice dropped a note. “But we can do no more with I-4 and her people. We are the best of all the dominant gangs in the citadel: the best at trading, the best at combat, the best at
excellence
. For this reason, I have decided to apply for the position of Underlord.”

I closed my eyes. No surprise there.

“I knew it.” Eliza’s face broke into a grin. “Oh, Jax, this is really off the cot, but just
imagine
it. We—we could really be—”

“The governing gang of the Scion Citadel of London.” Jaxon took one of her hands, chuckling. “Yes, my faithful medium. Yes, we could.” She looked as if she might weep with joy.

“We’d be calling the shots.” A smirking Nadine traced the edge of her glass. “We could tell Didion to blow up the Juditheon.”

“Or give all its spirits to us.” At her side, Eliza was basking in Jaxon’s good mood. “We could do
anything
.”

“Just the seven of us. The lords of London. It will be exquisite.” Jaxon lit a cigar. “Don’t you think, Paige?”

Behind that smile was danger. I mustered what I hoped was a convincing grin. The sort of smile a mollisher should give her mime-lord on the receipt of such good news. “Absolutely,” I said.

“You have faith that I can win, I trust.”

“
Of course.”

Jaxon had the most money, ego, and ambition out of all the mime-lords in London. Given how ruthless he could be, and how skilled he was in both binding and spirit combat, he had a high chance of winning. A
very
high chance. Nick looked as apprehensive as I felt.

“Good.” Jaxon picked up his coffee. “I shall be leaving some homework in your room. Reading material, so you can learn the noble customs of the scrimmage.”

Brilliant. While Scion and the Rephaim plotted their next move, I’d be doing my homework. Like a good little mollisher.

“Paige,” Jaxon said, almost as an afterthought, “fetch another rack of toast sandwiches, will you, darling?”

It had been years since I’d been the tea girl. Maybe I hadn’t shown enough enthusiasm. The gang watched me as I walked over to the bar and waited for Chat to emerge from the kitchen, drumming my fingers on the bar. In the corner, I could just hear two other voyants talking.

“. . . argument with I-4.” A man’s voice. “I heard there was some quarrel with the French girl at the market.”

“She’s not French,” a woman muttered. “That’s the Silent Bell, his whisperer. She’s a free-worlder, they say. So is the brother.”

I tapped the service bell, my nerves looping themselves into tight knots. Chat came out of the kitchen in his apron, his cheeks red from the heat of the ovens. “Yes, love?”

“Some more toast sandwiches, please.”

“Coming up.”

While I waited, I strained to hear the conversation again. “. . . saw her with Cutmouth, you know. She was wearing a mask, but it was her, I’m sure of it. The Pale Dreamer.”

“She’s back in London?”

“Aye, and she was there when Hector died,” a gruff voice said. “I
know
the glym jack that went with her to the Acre. Grover. A good man, he is, and honest. He said she was covered in blood.”

“She’s the girl on the screens. Did you hear?”

“Mm. Shady business, that. Maybe Hector sold her out, and that’s why she killed him.”

Chat came out with the rack of buttered sandwiches, and I went back to my seat. “They’re talking about us,” I said to Jaxon, who grew still. “The people behind the screen.”

“Are they, now?” He tapped his cigar into a glass ashtray. “And what are they saying?”

“That we killed Hector. Or I did.”

“Perhaps,” Jaxon sneered, raising his voice so half the bar looked up at us, “they should mind their tongues. I understand the mime-lord of I-4 does not tolerate slander. Least of all from his own people.”

There was a brief silence before a trio of soothsayers rose from behind the screen, took their coats from the nearest stand, and left. They kept their faces turned away from our table. Jaxon sat back in his seat, but his gaze followed them as they hurried away into Neal’s Yard.

The others went back to their meals. “One of them knew.” I glanced at Jaxon. “He knew Grover.”

“Perhaps they ought to read the old laws of the syndicate. The First Code states that without sufficient proof, the word of an amaurotic is rotten.” He raised his cigar back to his lips. “It’s hearsay, O my lovely. Don’t fret. You have me to vouch for your good nature. And once I am Underlord, these allegations will disappear.”

And with them, any chance of changing the syndicate. That was the bargain he offered: protection in exchange for my compliance. Jaxon Hall had me in a bind, and worse, he knew it.

I tuned out the rest of the conversation. As I sipped my coffee, I sensed two auras nearby. Gooseflesh rose along my abdomen.

Two
silhouettes were just outside the window.

The cup fell from my fingers. Two pairs of eyes looked back at me, firefly lights in the gloom of the passage.

No.

Not now. Not them.

“Paige?”

Eliza was staring at me. I looked down at the spilled coffee and broken glass, numb. “Apologies, Chat,” Jaxon called. “Excitement gives her butterfingers. We would be more than happy to pay double your usual tip.” He waved a few notes. “A tremor, I presume, Paige.”

“Yes,” I managed. “Yes. Sorry.”

When I looked back at the window, there was no sign of anyone. Nick gave me a curious look.

It had to be a mistake. A nightmare. My broken dreamscape, blurring memory and reality.

If not, I’d just seen two Rephaim in I-4.

****

Jaxon was planning to order another five courses, but I made an excuse and slipped out of the restaurant. It was only a few seconds’ run to the den. Every shadow grew taller; every streetlight flashed like Rephaite eyes. As soon as I was inside, I tore up the stairs and grabbed the backpack from under my bed. I ripped it open with one hand, almost breaking the zip, and crammed a blouse and trousers inside it. Sharp, angry breaths escaped me, verging on sobs.

It hadn’t been Warden. Who else would have come for me? Who else could know where I lived? Nashira must have worked out where the sundials led . . . I’d have to go back to the doss-house. Make a plan. Get away. I yanked my coat from the back of the door and pulled it on. When Nick came in, he caught my hands.

“
Paige, stop, stop.” I struggled, but he held me. “What are you doing? What’s wrong?”

“Rephs.”

His face stiffened. “Where?”

“Outside Chat’s. The alley.” I stuffed a spare jacket into my backpack. “I have to go, or they’ll target you as well. I have to go to the doss-house and—”

“No. Wait,” he urged. “You’re safer here, with us. And Jaxon isn’t just going to let you leave, not now he’s going for Underlord.”

“I don’t care what Jaxon does!”

“Yes, you do.” He spun me to face him. “Just put the bag down,
sötnos
. Please. Are you absolutely sure they were Rephs?”

“I felt their auras. If I stay here, they’ll take me to Nashira.”

“They could be Warden’s allies,” he said, though he looked doubtful.

“What was it you said, Nick? ‘The Rephaim are enemies until categorically proven otherwise.’ ” I sifted through my nightstand, pulling out socks and shirts, scarves and glovelettes. “Will you give me a ride, or am I walking?”

“This is the eve of Jaxon’s personal revolution. He won’t forgive you if you leave, Paige—not this time.”

“They’ll nip his revolution in the bud if they find us.”

Three loud raps came on the door, startling us both, before it almost flew off the hinges. Jaxon seemed to fill the door frame. His cane banged down on the floorboards.

“What is the meaning of this?”

“Jaxon, there were Rephs outside the bar. Two of them.” I stood. “I have to go. We all have to go,
now
.”

“We are not going anywhere.” He used the cane to push the door closed. “Explain. Quietly.”

“Where are the others?”

“Still at Chateline’s, where they will be staying for the next few hours, blissfully unaware of this conversation.”

“
Jaxon,
listen
to her. Please,” Nick said firmly. “She knows what she saw.”

“She may think so, Dr. Nygård, but we all know what recurrent exposure to flux can do.”

“What the hell is that supposed to mean, Jax?” I stared him out, livid. I could just about sympathize with Eliza thinking I’d lost my mind, but Jaxon had been there. “You think I’m having flux flashes? Were you having one, too, when you saw the colony for yourself?”

“This isn’t a matter of disbelief, O my lovely. This is a matter of decorum. Of dedication. Despite your repeated contact with experimental psychoactive drugs, I do believe your story. As you say, I can hardly deny what I saw with my own eyes,” he said, pacing to the window. “I do not, however, see any reason for the people of I-4 to act upon it, nor for the Unnatural Assembly to hear of it. I have already said this to you in as many words. Must I really repeat myself?”

In exchange for his protection, he was asking me to close my eyes to everything I’d learned. “I can’t understand you,” I said hotly. “They are
here
, in I-4. How can you just ignore it?”

“You don’t need to understand my actions, Paige. You need to do as you are told, as we agreed.”

“If I’d done as I was told in the colony, I’d still be there now.”

There was a long silence. Jaxon turned his head.

“Explain this to me. I find myself puzzled.” He stepped toward me, raising a finger. “You’ve always known that Scion’s doctrine is rooted in injustice. You’ve always known that their inquisition into unnaturalness is reprehensible. But only
now
do you think we should intervene. Were you too afraid to strike when their corruption was only human, my Paige?”

“I’ve seen what started it. I’ve seen what indoctrinated them,” I said. “And I think we can stop it.”

“You think fighting the Rephaim will bring a halt to the
inquisition?
Don’t labor under the illusion that Frank Weaver and his government will become devoted friends of yours if you destroy their masters.”

“Surely we have to
try
, Jax? Who’s going to rule I-4 when they come for us?”