They said Lune was very good at it indeed before she became Queen, disguising herself as a human woman for months on end. Some said that was why she had such strange mortal notions—that even the “safe” bread of the tithe left a taint of mortality, if eaten for long enough. Irrith thought it had more to do with loving a human man, but perhaps the two went hand in hand.
Distraction, all of that, from the fact that she didn’t know what to do. Irrith was jarred out of it by movement below.
She had spied on people from the concealment of trees, and this was not so different. Her blood quickened as she recognized the thrumpin from the Crow’s Head, the Sanist who helped start that brawl. He knocked on Aspell’s door, and handed a folded slip of paper to the hob who answered.
Irrith leaned forward, hoping for something of interest, but the hob merely bowed and closed the door, and the thrumpin went away. Frustrated, she smacked one hand against the stone. Seeing Aspell receive a message from a known Sanist was no use at—
The door opened again, and Aspell emerged.
Despite herself, Irrith grinned. She might not be much of a liar, nor a thief, nor a knight—but trailing someone in secret?
That, I can do.
She went from buttress to buttress until she reached the end of the gallery. Then, unfortunately, she had to drop to the floor, which meant following at a greater distance, with a charm to silence her feet. Aspell had cast no such thing, which made her frown. If he wasn’t bothering to be secret, then maybe this was nothing to do with the Sanists, thrumpin or no thrumpin.
Her mind was so on that question, and on the challenge of neither losing her quarry nor betraying herself to him, that she paid little attention to their path. With a start, she realized they had passed the only remaining branch in the corridors, and that only one thing lay ahead.
The Newgate entrance.
Blood and Bone!
Aspell was going above. No need to hide that—it was ordinary enough—and once up there, easy enough to give the slip to any pursuers. And Irrith, searching desperately through her pockets, realized what bread she had was in Ktistes’s pavilion.
Aspell went into the chamber. She drew close, into the shadow of one of the pillars supporting the arch, and saw him don a glamour. Then the air whispered, ghost-quiet, as he stepped onto the roundel and floated upward.
Irrith gritted her teeth.
I should let him go. Too hard to follow him, too dangerous, and what proof have I it’s even worth the risk?
Proof didn’t matter. Only the possibility. In her heart, Irrith had sworn she’d find a reason to take Aspell down. It was the only way to purge her own guilt.
Cursing softly, Irrith began to build her own glamour.
Newgate and Holborn: March 16, 1759
Luck seemed to be smiling and spitting upon her by turns. First it sent the thrumpin to Aspell; then it put no bread in her pocket. Now it gave her the gift of a city in the dark of night, when almost no one would be on the streets to wave iron or invoke the Almighty, and by doing so shatter Irrith’s unprotected glamour. Still, she wondered what ill luck would follow in turn.
She got her answer when, out of habit, she glanced up to judge the time.
A waning moon shone in the sky, its light breaking through wisps of cloud.
Irrith’s heart tried to burst right through her ribs. She actually pressed her hands to her breast, as if that would help her slow its sudden pounding. Hemmed in by walls, she could see only a little of the heavens; the rest looked to still be shrouded in clouds. Hadn’t Galen said the comet was near the sun right now? The sun was hours from rising. The comet couldn’t possibly be visible. They were still safe.
But the clouds had begun to fail.
Irrith forced herself to concentrate. She could do nothing about that right now, and if she didn’t move, she was going to lose the one thing she
could
do. Where had Aspell gone?
Fortunately, the likely guess turned out to be the right one. The Newgate entrance, like the Fish Street arch, saw a great deal of use these days, thanks to the growth of Westminster and the areas between, and there was a gleam of flame headed down Snow Hill. Aspell, and someone else—a human, it looked like, carrying a link to light his way. A real human, not a faerie under a glamour. He must have been waiting for the Lord Keeper, and that was the content of the thrumpin’s note.
Grinning, Irrith followed. Soon they were on the much wider street of Holborn, and still going west. If they were going to some secret meeting, it could be anywhere in Holborn or the north of Westminster, but it certainly wasn’t in the coffeehouse Aspell had taken her to before.
Too easy to guess, probably. He thinks like a spy, well enough not to repeat himself.
Suddenly fearful, she cast a glance behind her, but saw no one. Of course not: he was still Lune’s Lord Keeper, with no reason to think the Queen suspected him of anything. And the link-bearer glanced back occasionally, but with that light in his eyes, he hadn’t a chance of spotting her. Irrith had spent long enough in the city to be almost as good at hiding as she was in the Vale—except when the occasional bit of passing iron made her queasy.
When they turned right at last, her heart began pounding almost as hard as it had upon seeing the moon. She’d been down this road, twice before. Once with Segraine, and once following Galen.
They were going to Red Lion Square.
In the dark of night, when no one was around to see. Irrith quickened her step, risking them seeing her. Aspell had spoken so much of last resorts—but they had another, didn’t they? The alchemical plan. She’d told him about it herself. Only she hadn’t told him everything: the role Lune might play, and the possible danger they’d uncovered. Whether the scholars had settled the question of the philosopher’s stone, Irrith didn’t know, but it didn’t matter. So far as Aspell knew, alchemy held a way to save the Onyx Hall, without harm to Lune.
Unless he and the brawny man with him did something to prevent it.
In her haste, Irrith almost fell prey to an easy threat. A constable coming down a crossing street made her pull back into the shadows, crouching and holding her breath. Fortunately he was a lazy fellow, whistling as his own yawning link-boy trotted on ahead, making no real effort to see beyond its smoky light. By the time he passed, though, Aspell and his man were already in Red Lion Square.
She peered carefully around the corner of a building and saw nothing but an empty square. Coming farther out, she studied the front of Andrews’s house. The blue door was black and silent, and the shutters were closed against the night.
The lock on the front door was beyond her abilities, and the shutters of the ground floor windows out of reach thanks to the open space of the area. How was she to get in?
Against her will, Irrith’s gaze went downward, and she cringed in dread.
The area. It lay at the bottom of a set of steps giving access to the cellar, where the kitchens would be located.
Those
shutters, she might be able to open.
But first she would have to get past the iron railings that helpfully prevented passersby from falling down the steps.
She’d come this far. Even now, Aspell and that man might be creeping into Dr. Andrews’s bedchamber, putting an end to the old man before consumption could. And then what he knew would die with him.
Thinking about it wouldn’t make the task any easier. Biting down on her own hand, Irrith forced herself down the steps, feeling her glamour crumble around her.
Don’t think about the iron fencing you in. Don’t think about how one careless brush of your elbow could— oh,
Mab—
don’t think about it, just keep moving . . .
She had to remove her hand from her mouth when she reached the bottom, so she could deal with the window. The slender knife she kept inside her coat was perfect for sliding in between the shutters, fumbling around until she felt the latch lift. When she drew it back, though, the faerie silver of its blade had dulled and blackened, from the iron of the shutter nails. Gagging, Irrith took hold of the wood with her fingertips and pulled it back, until the panels swung clear. Then she was shoving at the window’s lower sash, sliding it upward, hardly caring how much noise she made, until she could squirm through the gap and into the cellar beyond.
It wasn’t much better here. Iron screamed at her from all over the kitchen: pots, hooks, more things than she wanted to think about. Irrith stumbled forward blindly, and gagged when her hand touched a hinge. Stifling her cries, she dragged the door open and fell out into the blessed darkness of the passage. She fled to the base of the stairs and stood there gasping, cradling her stinging hand.
I’m a fool. A reckless fool.
Carline’s mocking voice sounded in her head.
And what will you do when you go upstairs, little sprite? Attack those two, all on your own?
Yes, if I must.
She had her pistol. But only iron shot. Could she even bear to load the gun?
It was that or the knife, and that would mean going within reach of the link-bearer’s brawny arms. But even as Irrith marshaled the will to go upstairs, she heard something that stopped her where she stood.
Voices. Valentin Aspell’s, sibilant and oily, recognizable anywhere. And a hoarse, whispery reply, coming from a chest that could no longer manage anything more.
Dr. Andrews.
“Will you live until the morning?” the Lord Keeper asked cynically.
“I will. I must.” A pause for coughing. “I have not endured this long only to die now.”
“We’ll need bread.”
Irrith tensed. Bread would be in the kitchen. But it seemed Andrews was prepared, for she heard a soft
clink,
as of a bowl placed on the floor. “Or should it be the doorstep?” Aspell must have shaken his head, for Andrews recited the rote phrases, tithing bread to the fae. When it was done, Andrews said, “Send your people in pairs. I don’t want suspicion.”
“Dr. Andrews,” Valentin Aspell said, with an edge sharp enough to draw blood, “do not presume to tell me my business.”
Footsteps, and the front door opening and closing. He was gone.
Irrith sank onto the bottom step, mouth open.
What was that?
She didn’t have long to wonder. More footsteps, these light and uncertain, but headed toward the head of the stairs.
Blood and Bone!
She couldn’t go back into the kitchen—not with all that iron—
Her eyes had adjusted enough to the darkness that she saw a second door, close by her hand. Irrith pushed this one open and slipped through, praying there would not be another world of iron behind it.
The chamber smelled of alcohol and less pleasant things, but no iron scraped across her nerves. Unfortunately, luck was spitting upon her again; light came through the gap of the door, heralding an approaching candle. Irrith’s hand bumped a table, and she dove underneath it just before the candle entered the room.
Andrews was dressed, despite the black hour. She watched his feet shuffle unsteadily around the room, light blooming in his wake, as he lit a set of lamps. It revealed two more tables apart from the one she hid under, all three of them large, heavy things, and shelves along the walls. Then the rustle of paper, as he turned the pages of a book.
Pressed into the corner of the walls, concealed by the table, Irrith wondered what to do. Stand up and announce herself? But then she would have to explain what she was doing in Andrews’s cellar, and whether she’d heard that strange and worrisome conversation. Any kind of cooperation between him and the Sanists troubled her. How could Aspell—
Her entire face creased into a silent wail.
My fault. Again. I told him about the alchemical plan; he must have gone to Dr. Andrews. But what are they planning?
Gentle tinkling: the doctor was ringing a bell. A moment later, he repeated it, more insistently. She heard him cough, then mutter something too faint to be made out. His feet shuffled from the room, and back up the stairs. Blessing whatever servant was failing to respond, Irrith slipped from under the table, intending to escape while she could.
Horror turned her to stone.
One of the other tables held a crumbled, indistinct shape, so far gone all that could be told was that it had once been very small. The other was much newer: a river nymph, pale and cold and unmoving.
And the third . . .
Irrith staggered away from the table that had sheltered her. Savennis’s clouded eyes stared blindly at the ceiling, as if refusing to look at the gaping hole in his chest. Alcohol, and less pleasant things: she’d been smelling old blood. It stained the table, the shackles that held Savennis, the cracks between the stone flags of the floor, where no amount of scrubbing could remove it.
Her mind refused to put the pieces together, the corpses and the blood and the knives, the rowan chains no faerie could break and the jars of alcohol holding things she didn’t want to recognize. Dr. Andrews. Valentin Aspell. There was a picture here, but she could not see it around the scream that filled her mind.
She ran. Even iron couldn’t keep her out of the kitchen, her one route to safety; she was through the window and up the stairs before she knew she was moving, running away from Red Lion Square, back to something like safety.
But time had passed; people were beginning to move, in the murky predawn light. She tried to put up a glamour, lost it before she’d gone ten steps. Irrith snatched desperately at everything she knew of London, every black alley and hidden nook, every series of rooftops that afforded her a road away from where people could see. She had to make it back to the Onyx Hall. Had to stop Aspell, whatever he was planning for the morning. She
had to.
She made it down Holborn, past the flat new space of the Fleet Market where sellers were beginning to set up their wares, through the broken mouth of Newgate, until she was on the roof of the pawnbroker’s that held the hidden entrance.
Church bells caught her there, and she fell.