Winter (The Manhattan Exiles) (14 page)

Aine ignored the grey-eyed boy’s mimicry.
“Surely that’s enough of a connection for you? A queen, a court. He stole me from Court, from my queen.”

“Ulysses, or Odysseus as he is more commonly known, was King of Ithaca, an island in Greece. His queen was Penelope, from all accounts a very chaste and steadfast woman. I doubt she had a drop of fay blood in her veins. Pope’s not writing about Gloriana, princess. He’s simply retelling an old, droll tale.”

“
An unhappy one.” Aine read through the poem a third time. “There’s no mention of a sword, only his dog.”

“
Odysseus was famous for his bow and arrow. The poem ends unhappily for his hound, but the king was reunited with his faithful Penelope. You needn’t shed tears on his account. By all tales told Odysseus was a cruel and crafty sort.”

Aine bit her lip to hide her disappointment.

“Don’t worry, princess. We’ll think of something else -” Winter stopped short and straightened. “What are you doing?”

“
Well, we can’t take the entire volume, can we?” Aine asked. The old vellum made almost no sound as it tore from the binding. “The book’s too heavy. Or do you plan to lug it about?”

Winter snatched the book from her hands and cradled it gent
ly. “This is likely a very early copy. And you’ve defaced it.” He put the book behind his back as though to protect it. “I didn’t take you for a thief.”

Aine creased the torn page with a neat
ness learned from pressing the queen’s linens, and tucked it up her sleeve.

“
Not usually,” she admitted. “But I’ve been known to steal sweetmeats from the kitchen. And I’ll not hesitate to take anything that might return me home. We need this, I know it.”

“
I think the nice lady at the front desk would have let us photocopy the page.” He wasn’t quite snarling.

“
Photocopy?” Aine crossed her arms over her chest. On the small chance she’d acted too hastily she wasn’t about to admit it.

Winter muttered rudely in the Gaelic. He turned back to the shelves and slid the volume back in place. As he did so the bright square of sunlight on the carpet disappeared.

The room dimmed as the clear blue sky was blotted out.

Winter whirled around. Aine gaped past the bookshelves at the near window. Beyond the pane it seemed night had suddenly fallen.

“What is it?” she asked, even though she thought she knew. “What’s that sound?”

Fright bumps were rising along her arms and the dark outside the window was d
eeper than night, thick and black as despair.

“
Sluagh
,” Winter confirmed. He approached the window carefully, even as he motioned Aine back. “What sort of sound?”

“
Scraping, like knives. Chisels. Knives against stone. Winter -”

“
Get back beyond the shelves,” he ordered.

The sound grew louder. Skittering, scratching, like the tall grass outside her bedroom window when the Progress worked through a particularly windy patch of the long plains.

“Winter!” He couldn’t hear it, he couldn’t know. She jumped forward and grabbed at the back of his coat, meaning to pull him away. “I think -”

The window burst. Shards of glass fountained inward. Aine pressed herself against old books, covering her face with her hands. She thought Winter had fallen. Sh
e smelled the distinct, stomach-turning perfume of rot and damp, and felt the seep of cold fog against the back of her legs.

“
Child,” said a voice, high and lovely and warm as spring time. “Turn around and look at me.”

Aine didn’t want to turn around. She wanted to bury herself in the book shelf, and close her eyes, and whimper until the monster went away.

The air against the back of her neck grew chill. She heard the flat dry sound of old leaves rustling.

“
Child,” it said again. “Let me see you.” The sweet voice was insistent.

She didn’t think it would let her run. She didn’t think she had the strength to run. Terror ate at her from the inside out, turning her bones useless.

“Don’t turn away. Never let your nightmares see you flinch.”

Aine exhaled and opened her eyes. She forced her clenched fists down against her thighs, took a step away from the shelf, and
spun around.

The
sluagh
smiled.

At least, Aine thought it smiled. It had a a wild pig’s mouth, tusked and wrinkled and full of crooked teeth. When it spread its lips and showed those teeth a pale white worm of a tongue gleamed.

“Exactly as I supposed,” said the
sluagh
. “An excess of fuss over nothing.”

It took a step forward, and Aine saw that below the neck it was built like a man, bony and swathed in rags. A pair of large leathery wings sprouted from its spine, and trailed on the glass-strewn carpet.

Bright green eyes shone between porcine folds. It lifted a skeletal hand and crooked a finger.

“
Come closer.”

Aine clenched her teeth to keep them from chattering. She shook her head. The stench in the room made her head spin.

The
sluagh
took another step forward, snuffling. Its wings twitched and rustled.

“
Nothing,” it sang on a high, beautiful trill, “can still be useful. Come and be something, something more than nothing. The bait in my trap. Come and be everything, if only for a mortal breath.”

It reached for her arm. Aine flinched away, grabbed a book from the shelf, and threw the volume at the monster’s snout.

The book bounced from the
sluagh
’s chest. When it hit the carpet it broke into a thousand frozen pieces. The monster gnashed its teeth, laughing.

“
Don’t let it touch you,” Winter warned from behind Aine. “And try not to breath too deep.”

Some of the terror went out of Aine’s knees. She felt the grey-eyed boy’s hand on her shoulder, and knew that she could move again.

“Not yet,” he said. “One more step and I’ll have the bastard. Let it come to you. Be the bait in
my
trap.”

Aine looked at the drooling pig face and the wormy white tongue. She shuddered.

“I hate you,” she hissed at Winter.

“
Join the club, princess. When I tell you to duck, don’t hesitate.”

The
sluagh
was still laughing. It bent at the middle, leaning forward, like a courtier begging for a kiss.

“
Nothing, nothing.” It giggled. “I can make you something.”

“
Duck
.”

Aine fell to her knees. Winter smashed the butt of his gun across the monster’s face. The
sluagh
screamed and scrambled backwards, dark blood fountaining from its snout.

“
Don’t let it touch you,” Winter repeated. He held the gun in two hands, taking his time.

Aiming, Aine realized.

“Close your eyes,” he said.

But Aine didn’t. So she saw the monster crumple, pierced by iron bullets. More blood spattered, across the carpet, across the broken window, across a pretty little desk intended for study.

Where the blood hit, small puffs of cold smoke rose.

Night lifted and late morning sunlight flooded the room. Noxious fog fra
yed and disintegrated, sucked back through the smashed window.

“Are you hurt?” Winter asked. He had her by the shoulders, and this time he did shake her, just a little.

“
Nay,” Aine said, unable to turn away from the broken monster smoldering on the carpet.

“
Aine!” He gave her another shake. “Look at me.”

Aine blinked and straightened. Winter’s eyes were wide and luminous, pupils dilated. Staring into them she was able to take one deep breath and then another.

“I’m unhurt,” she said. And then, surprised: “I heard you. In my head.”

“
Really?” Winter released her shoulders, and turned away. He tucked the gun back under his jacket, glancing out the window. “Time to go.”

Aine heard voices in the hallway, and knew he was right. She couldn’t guess how human scholars would react to the mess in their library, but she didn’t imagine they would be pleased.

Even fay scholars would be more than a trifle disconcerted.

“
I’m won't climb out another window,” Aine said.

“
Of course not.” Winter nodded at the doorway. “We exit the way we came. With dignity.”

She must have hesitated because he took her hand, pulling her in his wake through the door. They weren’t quite running, but Aine didn’t believe a quick trot was at all dignified.

The group of mortals gathering outside the Folio Room paid them no attention. Nor did the crowd of uniformed human children clustered on the stairs. The tall woman seated behind an old desk in the foyer didn’t look around as they hurried past.

“
Is it like Richard?” Aine panted. “Have you a knack?”

They were almost at the library doors, and she heard no cry from the floors above.

“No.” Winter pulled open the doors, and ushered her through. “You’ll find humans tend to ignore what they don’t want to see.”

As if on cue a bell begin to clang.

Winter grimaced.

“
Now we can run,” he said.

They ran until they could no longer see the library, and fetched up in another alley. This one smelled of fish and of overripe fruit.

“
Do you never get tired of narrow spaces?” Aine put her palms on her knees, sucking in deep breaths of fetid air. She wasn’t exactly out of shape, but the most running she’d done in the queen’s service was up and down the back stairs in search of sweets and tea.

It occurred to her that if she were more like Winter she might never have been stolen from Court in the first place. She might have been strong enough to outrace Michael Smith.

She might have been wise enough to carry a knife, and brave enough to cut Smith with it.

“
I want a knife,” Aine decided, still gasping.

Winter stood at the mouth of the alley. He didn’t even look her way.

“I sent my last proper knife away with Lolo. You need a pistol. And a few shooting lessons.”

The thought was repugnant.

“No guns.”

“
Let me know when you change your mind.”

Aine straightened. Winter was still watching the street.

“Are we pursued?”

“
Librarians aren’t much for the chase. No, by now they’ll have summoned the cops, which means Bran, which means I’ll be called onto the carpet before the day is out.”

“
Called onto the carpet?” Aine echoed, puzzled.

They grey-eyed boy turned away from the street.

“Asked to give explanation.” He sighed. “Come on. We need to meet Richard and I need to find something to eat.” His lips curled. “And you have glass in your hair.”

“
It itches.” Aine dug her fingers into her curls and massaged.

“
Careful,” Winter cautioned, still faintly smiling. “You’ll cut yourself.”

Aine took her hand from her scalp. Blood beaded on the tip of her thumb. She licked it away and sighed.
“I miss the Court baths. I stink and I’m cold all the time. Surely you get tired of washing with a rag and tepid water.”

Winter stilled,
then laughed.

“
Poor princess,” he said. “We’ve neglected to introduce you to the showers. Come on, then. We’ve time for food and a wash before Richard hunts us down.”

The shower was divided from the toilet by a curtain. Aine rubbed the curtain between her fingers. The fabric was one she had never encountered before, stiff and flexible at the same time.

“
Pass your clothes around,” said Winter. He’d perched on the seat of the closed toilet, and was studying the scrap of paper Aine had stolen from the library. “I promise not to peek.”

A dripping pipe jutted out of the wall over Aine’s head. Two levers at shoulder height were labeled
“H” and “C”. Aine stripped hurriedly, tossed her clothes around the curtain, and twisted the “H” lever.

The water trickled from the pipe in a lazy, spitting stream, but it was hot, so hot that Aine yelped in delight.

“This hostel, it has other showers?” She tipped her face into the flow, closing her eyes.

“
Three,” replied Winter. “This is the best of the group. Although Lolo says the one down the hall with the leaky faucet has great acoustics.”

“
I saw rooms.” Aine rinsed her mouth, and spat onto the dingy tile floor. “With real beds. And a kitchen. And this place has windows.” She rinsed a second time, and scrubbed at her teeth with a knuckle. “It’s warm. Real floors, no iron road. The footman seemed kind enough. Why don’t you live here?”