With Fate Conspire (17 page)

She just had to wait a little longer.
You’re not Eliza O’Malley,
she told herself, straightening her apron and heading for the servants’ stair.
You’re not even Elizabeth White. You’re Hannah, a sorry replacement for the only good maid Mrs. Kittering ever had. Eliza O’Malley would run, and that sergeant would notice. You’ll stay, and be patient, and God willing, get what you want.

The Goblin Market, Onyx Hall: April 12, 1884

Given enough time, Dead Rick could track just about anyone through the Goblin Market. But that was if he knew who he was hunting. His current question was one his nose couldn’t answer for him: who he was working for.

The obvious suspects were the other powers in the Goblin Market, the fae who challenged Nadrett for control. There were three of any importance: Lacca, Valentin Aspell, and a Welsh gwyllion whose name nobody could pronounce, so they just called him Hardface. Any of the three would leap at the chance to steal Nadrett’s idea out from under him.

None of them, however, sounded like the voice that spoke from the air. That didn’t necessarily mean much; he could tell the stranger was making an some effort to disguise his speech. Lacca could lower her voice, Hardface could hide his Welsh accent, Aspell could discard the oily contempt that dripped from his every word. There were other reasons to set them aside, though. Aspell wouldn’t need Dead Rick’s help for something like this; he had plenty of his own spies. Lacca didn’t have the subtlety for it; she would just shoot Nadrett and be done with it. Hardface
did
have the subtlety, but he’d rather cut off his right arm than ask Dead Rick for help, ever since the skriker had chased him into the sewers six years ago.

It didn’t have to be someone at the top. If there
was
some way to make a passage to Faerie, control of it would be enough to make anybody a king.

Which might be enough to tempt Charcoal Eddie. The shape-changing puck worked for Nadrett, but believed he could rule the Goblin Market better than anyone if he only got the chance. Creeping about once more in dog form, Dead Rick found Eddie near a busy crossroads of the Market, drinking and boasting to his mates about his exploits this All Hallows’ Eve past. “Scared three men straight to death,” the bird-man said, lowering his voice to what he clearly thought was an impressive growl. “And that’s how it should be, you know?
All
the time, not just one night a year! Time was, men were afraid to stick their noses out of doors after dark, for fear we’d snap them off; now they’ve got lanterns and gaslight and all, and they’re more afraid of bashers with truncheons than they are of us. Did you hear about the electrical lights they tried on the Embankment?” Charcoal Eddie spat in disgust. “Ought to smash them, I say. Smash it all.”

He got noises of agreement from his listeners, huddled around the old door that served them as a table. But they were only a small knot of goblins and pucks, thoroughly drunk, and none of them with bread enough to do anything about Eddie’s ideas. And it seemed awfully complicated, Eddie trying to get Nadrett’s secret so he’d be rich enough to cause better trouble in London. The puck wasn’t smart enough for that.

Hafdean, on the other hand, was. The hob had managed the Crow’s Head since before fae who weren’t Dead Rick could remember, and he dealt in information, too—sometimes, but not always, on Aspell’s behalf. Spitting out the rank-tasting bone he’d been chewing on for cover, Dead Rick licked an itchy part of his foot instead, considering.

He didn’t get far in his thoughts. Through the constant din of the Market, Dead Rick’s sharp ears caught a swelling uproar, one passage over.

The skriker leapt to his paws and ran to see, weaving through legs that paused as their owners realized there was trouble nearby. Through a broken doorway, around a corner, down a short hall—and then he stopped, because he’d gotten more than close enough.

The half-dozen fae edging their way toward the fork in the passage were not part of the Market; a glance made that obvious. Three were elf-knights, two men and a woman, in ordinary clothing, but with a fineness that stood out in this ragged place. The others were a mixed trio, a puck, a sprite, and a goblin Dead Rick recognized as the barguest Bonecruncher. Every last one was armed to the teeth—in Bonecruncher’s case, quite literally. He snarled at everyone in front of him, eyes flaming red, and pointed his pistols at anything that moved.

The six of them formed a protective ring, weapons facing outward, and in the center of it was a cluster of mortal children. That, in combination with the elf-knights, told Dead Rick everything he needed to know: the Prince had decided to assert his authority over the Onyx Hall, and sent his underlings to carry out a raid.

It happened every once in a while, on no particular schedule. Maybe the Prince heard about some atrocity too big to ignore; maybe he just woke up one day with the burning need to prove he wasn’t completely impotent. Dead Rick always avoided these raids when they happened. Sighing, he turned to go.

And found a gleefully drunk Charcoal Eddie charging straight for the intruders, brandishing his pint glass like a weapon.

The tense stalemate broke instantly. A sound went off like a gun firing underwater, and an enormous web spread itself over Eddie and his friends. One strand at the edge caught Dead Rick’s tail; when he pulled away, all the stuck fur ripped free, leaving him with a bald patch. He howled in pain. Then a second time, when a fleeing hob stepped on his paw.

The rushing crowd parted enough for him to see most of the raiding party fleeing down the right-hand passage. Covering their retreat was the sprite, a slender, almost boyish thing, far too skinny for the absurd-looking gun she held. She whirled to shoot someone else, and Dead Rick saw another web cough out of the barrel, expanding as it went.

Then she ran. But her delay had separated her from the group, and when she reached the fork in the passage, she went left.

Dead Rick wasn’t even sure why he ran after her. To steal that gun, in the hopes of selling it for bread? To point her back toward her friends, in some misbegotten echo of his former self? Or just for the pleasure of the hunt?

None of those three, he realized when he finally caught up to her, and his brain caught up to him. He’d followed because of the brief flicker in her brow when she saw him, before she turned to shoot the others. A flicker that returned when she whirled to shoot
him,
and saw he was alone. They’d lost the rest of the pursuit.

“Dead Rick?”

He skidded to a halt on the stone, paws splaying wide.
Is this who ’e sent?

Sounds behind him. They hadn’t lost everybody, not yet. Dead Rick twisted upward into man shape, grabbed her by the arm.
I’m a bleeding idiot.
The voice was right; this was dangerous. But he didn’t care.

She swallowed her protest as he dragged her toward a broken slab of stone, leaning against a pillar. Gun shoved into the band of her trousers, the sprite scampered up it with more agility than he could manage in following, but they both made it to safety before the hunt came streaming through.

Perched in the crook where the stone vaulted outward to arch across the small chamber, they waited until the place was as close to silent as it would get. This was too near a bad patch of the palace for anyone to live in the room, though there were fae nearby.

The sprite let out the breath she’d been holding, turning it into a quiet laugh. “Blood and Bone—am I glad to see you. I went the wrong way, didn’t I?” Dead Rick nodded mutely, trying not to stare at her. “I never did learn my way around this warren. Doesn’t help when bits of it keep falling off, either.”

The sight of her mesmerized him.
She knows me. I should know ’er.
But there was only blankness in his mind.

When he found his tongue, he whispered, “Who sent you?”

Another quiet laugh. “Who else? Hodge, of course. Heard Aspell had a flock of children he was going to trick into swapping places with changelings, so Hodge sent us to get them out. Well, he sent Peregrin and the rest; I begged to come along. Can’t pass up a chance to tweak Aspell’s nose.”

Hodge. It took a moment for him to recognize the name, so few people used it.
The Prince.
“Nobody else? Nobody told you to come find me?”

She gave him a peculiar look. “Why should they? I thought you’d gone in search of Faerie years ago.”

About seven years, he guessed. Or maybe longer; for all he knew, those lost memories included a hundred years away from the Onyx Hall. But he doubted it. “Peregrin. Or the others. Are they trying to do anything about Nadrett?”

The sprite had begun lowering herself down; there really wasn’t room for two of them in the crook of the pillar. She paused long enough to make a disgusted face at him. “If only they could. We’re fool enough to make the occasional raid, Dead Rick; we’re not suicidal.”

Those two elf-knights would sound like gentlemen, surely; the puck might be able to pretend. And they served the Prince now, not the missing Queen. Dead Rick pursued the sprite back down to the floor. “’Eard any rumors about ’im? Maybe that ’e’s got some secret plan, some way to get to Faerie?”

She’d been brushing her palms off against her trousers; at his words, her hands froze in midair. Dead Rick cursed his tongue, so ready to wag at the first sign of a friend. “A passage, you mean? One people don’t know about?”

Better not to say anything more than he already had. “Something like that.”

Her green eyes went very wide. “If something like that existed … Ash and Thorn, Dead Rick. Half the Onyx Hall would sell their souls to the devil for a path to Faerie. The half that have to worry about iron. What do you know?”

This wasn’t how it was supposed to go. He’d demanded the voice send someone as proof partly because he wanted to learn more about himself, but mostly because it would give him a chance to identify his mysterious ally. So far, he hadn’t made much progress with either. And this was a terrible place to be having any kind of conversation, but his refuge lay too far away to take her there, even if he was willing to show that kind of trust.

Dead Rick compromised by jerking his chin toward the far corner of the room. The sprite watched in interest as he pried up a hinged stone in the floor, revealing a tight passage beneath. “It runs right past a bad patch,” Dead Rick warned her.

She flashed him a grin before dropping into the hole. “I’m not afraid.”

I am.
If the bad patch had grown since he last went this way, at best they ended up in another part of the Onyx Hall. At worst, they would find out where the fae who vanished had gone. Dead Rick doubted it was Faerie.

But at least the tunnel was private, even if he nearly planted his knee in his teeth with every crouched step. “I don’t know a lot,” he said, edging his way along. How much to tell her?
You were once a faithful Queen’s man.
“There’s … rumors that ’e’s got something secret, or ’e’s working on it, anyway. Something really big, and I figures it’s about selling passage to Faerie. But the only secret thing I’ve found ’im doing is photography.”

“Photography? That sounds more like Academy business, not Market.”

“If it ’as anything to do with this, then it’s power. And that’s Goblin Market business.”

“True.” For the first time, a grim note entered her voice. But a howling mob hadn’t been able to depress her spirits for long; neither did this. More cheerfully, she said, “I still have a lot of friends in the Academy. I can ask.”

Dead Rick’s heart thumped harder. “Be careful. This gets traced back to me, I’m dead.”

Then they were at the other end of the hidden passage, and he directed her in how to open the panel. No way to check if there was anyone on the other side, but not much need; the sprite gagged at the smell of sewage that rushed in. Even hardened goblins avoided this spot. Dead Rick climbed out after her, leaving the panel open behind him, and cocked a thumb to the right. “Go through there, turn left, and you’ll see a hole in the stone. It’s where the sewers broke through into the palace. Sorry to put you into the mortal world, but I couldn’t get you to the other doors, not without you ’aving to shoot ’alf the Market.”

“I wouldn’t have minded.” She pulled the web gun from her trousers, cocked it, then looked at him with a sharpness that took him by surprise. “Are you a prisoner?”

His skin jumped as if she’d pointed the gun at him. In the wake of that shock came shame.
She knowed me before. I don’t want ’er to know what I am now.
But he had to say something, and he didn’t have time to think of a good lie, even if he could tell it convincingly. “No. Not exactly. It’s complicated.”

“Come with me. You can explain as we go.”

Shattering glass echoed in his memory. ’
E’d destroy ’em all.
“I can’t. Look, you’ve got to get out of ’ere, and I’ve got to get back. Just—if you ’ear anything about Nadrett, can you send word? Without anybody knowing.”

Her mouth quirked at the added requirement, but she said, “If it will help you, I’ll try.”

“It will.”

She turned to go, and the question burst out of him. “Who are you?”

It gave away too much. He saw a degree of understanding come into her green eyes, and prayed she wouldn’t ask. He couldn’t bear having to explain.

She didn’t ask. She merely said, “Irrith,” and then she was gone.

Irrith. He knew that name; she’d once put Valentin Aspell in prison for a hundred years.
Can’t pass up a chance to tweak his nose.

Had she, too, once been a friend?

Whispering the name to himself, Dead Rick crawled back into the tunnel and closed the door behind him.

The Prince’s Court, Onyx Hall: April 12, 1884

The door swung open dramatically, and Irrith announced, “I’m not dead.”

None of those gathered in the Prince’s chambers tried to hide their relief. Ever since Sir Peregrin’s raiding party had come back without Irrith, Hodge had been pacing, using up energy he could ill afford. It had been a risk, sending them in the first place. In the early years of Hodge’s reign, Sir Peregrin and the rest of the Onyx Guard had been eager for any chance to strike at the festering sore known as the Goblin Market. Some of them died there, and others fled when the decay brought on by the opening of Blackfriars and Mansion House stations ate great chunks out of the Hall. The rest soon learned pragmatism: if they stood foot to foot with those thugs, they would lose. Especially if the thugs belonged to Nadrett.