Fingers beginning to tremble, Alice gripped the pages tightly and began at the top.
Gas Leak Chaos at Marble Arch! Following reports of a dangerous mains leak last night, the Bow Street Runners responded by evacuating the area around Marble Arch, causing trouble for local residents and late-night business owners. It was declared safe early this morning. A spokesperson for Radiance Utilities has accused the Runners of overreacting to what has now been labelled a false alarm: ‘The Runners’ heavy-handed approach has cast a shadow over our good reputation. It’s a disgrace that they acted against our calls for calm investigation. We can assure the public that the safety of our services remains uncompromised and as efficient as ever.’
When asked for a comment, Commander Risdon said only, ‘The Runners take all threats seriously and will continue to uphold the highest standards of security on behalf of this city.’ Meanwhile, sources tell us that the death of an unidentified mainlander, found in London on the other side of Marble Arch, was unrelated to the alleged gas leak and is now a matter for the London Metropolitan Police. We ask our readers, were you among those inconvenienced by the Runners’ error? Or have you fallen victim to other mistakes by the force that claims to protect us? Contact our hotline today to tell your story!
Alice swallowed heavily. That was the night the world had ended. The night Jen had been taken by Sir John Boleyn’s men and Alice had set out to retrieve her from Marble Arch with the Runners’ help; the gas leak had been a ruse to clear the area.
With a shudder, Alice reread the article. There was no mention of the real nightmare that had unfolded. Jen had only been a pawn. It was Alice that Sir John Boleyn had wanted, because he’d learned her real identity and knew the truth about her deathly soul – that if it was released, it could wipe out all life in the Rookery.
Alice glanced up at her pale nightjar. A pulsing, incandescent cord was tied to the bird’s leg and looped down to circle Alice’s wrist. The cord connected them – connected her – and yet, that awful night, Boleyn had sliced through it. Her nightjar had flown free and, without its guard, her soul had escaped and almost purged the entire Rookery. Reuben Risdon, the commander of the Runners, had cut Jen’s throat to save the city; he’d sacrificed her best friend on the altar of Marble Arch, using Jen’s blood to repel Alice’s soul from entering the Rookery – like the lamb’s blood on the doors in Egypt during the tenth plague.
With a shaky breath, Alice traced the words near the bottom of the article, death of an unidentified mainlander. Jen had died to save their city and they didn’t even know her name. There was no mention of Alice Wyndham either, so it seemed she too had retained her anonymity. Maybe Crowley had made a bargain with Risdon to keep her out of it, or maybe it was Risdon’s small attempt at penance for his part in Jen’s death.
Alice pushed away the newspaper and leaned back against the tree with her eyes closed. Crowley had sent the papers to prove it was safe for her to return and that no one outside their small circle of trusted friends knew who or what she was. But Alice still knew.
‘Here you go,’ said a gruff voice.
Alice’s eyes snapped open. Her dad was bearing down on her with a plate of treacle bread and a cup of tea. ‘If you don’t try it soon, she’ll be beside herself. And even if you hate it, you’re to tell her it’s the best thing you’ve ever tasted.’
She smiled up at him and accepted the offerings. ‘Message understood. Thanks.’
‘The wind will have this one halfway down the lane if you’re not careful,’ he said, bending to grab a loose paper starting to drift over the lawn. He handed it to her before retreating indoors.
Alice watched him go, jumping when her nightjar shot over her head, as aerodynamic as a bullet. She gave it a withering look. It had been pestering her for weeks. Alice knew what it wanted: a name. But the bird wasn’t a pet, and naming it would give it an identity of its own, making it too difficult to ignore.
‘Your showy displays are verging on the egotistical,’ she told it. ‘And to be honest, as the manifestation of my soul’s guardian, I think they’re a bit beneath you.’
The bird gave her a guilty look and vanished.
With a satisfied nod, Alice peered down at the other paper from the parcel, the application form. A tree symbol on the letterhead represented House Mielikki: a society for those with specific magical gifts. Almost without thinking, Alice pressed her fingertips into the grass until they touched the soil. A tingle of warmth spread up into her palm and it vibrated gently, as if something was trapped beneath her skin – the magic an itch that needed to be scratched. Alice exhaled slowly, and the grass rustled as she pushed. Half a dozen daisies slid out of the soil between her fingers, their heads unfurling rapidly and tiny petals flickering in the breeze.
House Mielikki’s members could wield power over plants, trees and wildlife. Alice glanced again at the application form. She had intended to apply anyway, without Crowley’s prompting. When she’d first moved to the Rookery, Crowley had urged her to stay focused on mastering her aviarist gifts rather than becoming distracted by other potential abilities. He’d told her she could pursue them later, if she’d wanted to – and in Ireland she had. Was this another olive branch?
Alice sighed. Exploring her other gifts wasn’t the only reason she planned to apply. Joining the House might also help her deny her most terrifying qualities. The magic of House Mielikki was the magic of life itself. Everything that it stood for was in contrast to the identity reflected by her nightjar: death.
She’d developed a strange, grudging bond with her soul-bird, and yet there were still times Alice couldn’t bear to look at its pale feathers: a white nightjar for the Daughter of Death. She knew she was capable of being more than that, and she planned to prove it.
The back door banged open and Alice flinched in surprise, her fingers tightening in the grass. Two white blurs burst from the kitchen door, barking happily, and Alice relaxed. It paid to be alert, but always anticipating danger was exhausting.
As Bo and Ruby dived straight over the stack of newspapers, scattering them across the lawn, Alice glanced down. Between her fingers, the newly grown daisies were withering. Their petals blackened and drifted away, and the dull yellow heads began to crumble. In seconds, all were rotted beneath the rowan tree.
Alice stared at them with a dispirited frown, nausea growing in her stomach. Overhead, her nightjar re-emerged in a flurry of feathers, pale wings striking against the air. Alice refused to look away from the corpses of the daisies in the grass.
I can be more than this.
Someone was following her. Alice was sure of it. She fixed her eyes on the pavement, watching for movement in her peripheral vision. Tension coiled beneath her skin, magnifying every shadow that crossed her path. The breeze sent a discarded wrapper skittering across the stone and her pulse jumped when her boot crunched down on it. Litter. Just litter. A drizzle of sweat slid between her shoulder blades, sticking her shirt to her back. Alice tugged it from her waistband and shook it out with a trembling hand, wafting cool air against her torso. She’d been carrying a fever for weeks; it made her light-headed and sluggish and she could afford neither. Not tonight.
Something rustled behind her and Alice’s hearing sharpened. She glanced over her shoulder, but her eyes failed to pick out anything unusual. It was a short, narrow street lined by a row of Georgian terraced houses. A handful of vintage saloon cars sat outside them, their paintwork glinting below the gas street lamp.
This part of the city was quieter; there were fewer pubs and bars here to invite interest after midnight. It made it easier to block out the distant sounds of urban life and listen for the noises that didn’t belong: a whisper of muffled panting; the turn of a coat; the heavy tread of footsteps striking the pavement in an alternating rhythm to her own. If she slowed, the footsteps slowed. If she stopped – silence. She peered into the gloom, searching . . . but there was no one there. The street was empty.
A strange sense of c
laustrophobia tightened her chest and the sound of her breathing was loud in her ears. The dark night pressed in around her, reminding her that she was alone. Fenced in by buildings and high walls. Trapped. A bead of sweat gathered at her hairline and she swiped it away with a grim smile. No. That was the fever talking. Just fever-driven paranoia; she’d had months of it. It had started in Ireland, and got worse, not better. Alice loosened another button on her shirt and gave herself a mental shake. She should have been in bed, resting and trying to build her strength; instead, circumstances had forced her to travel across the Rookery in the middle of the night, and she only hoped it was worth the effort. Her pace quickened as she crossed the road and fought to maintain her focus.
She couldn’t be far from the entrance to The Necropolis. The private members’ club had an invitation-only policy and she’d been warned it would go into lockdown at the first sign of trouble. Trouble in the form of the Bow Street Runners. The city’s police force was desperate to get inside the club and shut it down. Luckily, without an invitation they would never discover the hidden entrance.
Behind her, the sound of footsteps grew louder, and Alice’s nerves pulled tight. Not fevered delusions, real footsteps that smacked and echoed from the stone – and they were growing closer, rounding the corner towards her. What if she had been followed by a Runner? Her foot touched down on a grimy kerb at the junction of an alleyway and she made a sudden decision. Darting into the passage, she pressed her back flat against the wall, the rough brick snagging at her greatcoat. She exhaled quietly. The alley was deserted and steeped in shadows: ideal for lying in wait, unseen.
Removing her clammy hands from her pockets, she curled them into fists, eyes pinned to the entrance. The footsteps stopped abruptly and Alice stiffened. She hadn’t been imagining it; someone had been following her – and whoever it was had seen her take the detour; they knew exactly where she was. Why, then, were they stalling? The muffled panting had slowed and Alice could almost taste their hesitation. If her pursuer crossed the pavement at the end of the alley, she might see their face in the glow from the street lamp. Come on, she urged. Move into the light. She shifted her weight to see more clearly, her skin prickling with adrenaline.
Wings. A streak of bone-white feathers at the corner of Alice’s eye drew her attention to a stack of abandoned pallets on the cobbles. There, claws gripping the wood precariously, preening itself, was her nightjar. In the right light, it might have been mistaken for a white dove. Doves, however, were tall, with elegant necks and beaks and perfectly proportioned round heads. This bird was squat, with a puffed-up chest, no visible neck and large eyes. Its beak was short and thin, with bristles either side, and its long wings were pointed and kestrel-like.
The nightjar darted its head towards her, peering from its makeshift perch. It churred, low in its throat – a repetitive trilling sound – and Alice knew, suddenly, what to do about her follower. Glancing up the length of the alley and back, Alice crooked her finger at the pale bird and it swooped towards her. She flinched when the nightjar landed on her shoulder.
‘Give me a bird’s-eye view,’ she hissed.
The bird’s claws pinched her arm, just briefly, and it stretched upwards, its magnificent wings unfolding as it rose into the air. Despite their strained relationship, Alice had spent months experimenting with her nightjar connection; it had been a revelation to discover that, when focused, she could see the world through her soul-bird’s eyes. The eyes were the windows to the soul – so why not vice versa?
Alice steadied herself against the brick wall, took a sharp breath and grasped the cord binding her wrist to the bird’s leg. A burst of euphoria rushed through her body, and she blinked rapidly to maintain her concentration. The cord pulsed gently and her palm tingled with shivers of pleasure. Light bled through the gaps in her fingers as she tightened her grip and stared into the dazzling brightness. A flash of white . . . and then Alice’s consciousness snapped along the cord like electricity, hurling her mind into the waiting nightjar.
Alice’s vision juddered. She could see the top of her own head and shoulders: a sensation that always tripped her nausea. Maintaining the hold on her nightjar’s sight meant discarding the solid floor she knew was beneath her and the heavy gravity that weighed down her flesh-and-bone body. She forced her mind to open itself to the steady stream of images pouring in through the glowing cord. She hovered several feet higher, resisting the urge to swoop away. Caught between two bodies, she scanned the alley from above: the top of the pallets, the dustbins, the battered cardboard boxes . . . all laid out beneath her.
With another waft of her wings, Alice propelled herself through the air, gliding along the alley and turning sharply at the end. Around the corner, there was a figure resting against a set of iron railings – oblivious to the nightjar’s invisible presence. A roll-up cigarette dangled from his lips, and in his cupped hands he struck a match. It dwindled immediately and he tossed it into the road before trying again. This time, the flame caught and he lit his cigarette, tipping his head back with a satisfied grin. His straw-like hair shone in the street lamp’s glow.
‘Alice?’ he murmured. ‘Is it you hiding down there?’
Alice’s consciousness shot back to her human body and she jerked upright, thoroughly disoriented.
‘August?’ she snapped, scrabbling against the wall for balance as she rose. ‘Why the hell are you stalking me?’
He stepped out into the road, casting a long shadow into the dark alley. Alice exhaled in a bid to ease some of the tension trapped in her muscles. Bloody August. Still, it was good to see him. They’d briefly shared a house owned by Crowley: Coram House, the jewel of the Rookery’s version of Bloomsbury and home to waifs and strays. August was one of the trusted few, along with their other housemates – Sasha, Jude and, of course, Crowley – who knew the full and unvarnished truth about who she was. They’d all been at Marble Arch that night, and yet none had retracted their offers of friendship afterwards.
She looked him up and down. He’d lost a little of his trademark scarecrow look in the many months since she’d seen him last. The shock of hair had been tamed, and though his faded black corduroys and jumper were as shabby as ever, they were at least clean. He’d filled out a bit too – the sharp edges had softened and now he was tall rather than scrawny.
‘I was early,’ he said, ‘so I thought I’d come and meet you. I wasn’t sure it was you and I didn’t want to draw attention to myself by shouting.’ He glanced cautiously along the street. ‘We can walk together. Are you coming?’
She nodded. August was the one with the invitation to The Necropolis – not her. He was the one who belonged to the private members’ club – not her. Alice didn’t really belong anywhere.
A curl of smoke wound through the clubhouse. It weaved between the busy tables and darkened booths, snaking over shoulders and wreathing heads that were bent in furtive conversation. Sandalwood and pine incense courtesy of the reeds burning on the bar’s countertop. It was, according to August, a security measure: the warm, musky blend was known for its calming effects – just as the drinking den was known for its unrest, heavy on incense, light on trust.
Alice watched the sinuous wisps dance closer. The fragrance wasn’t quite a sedative – no one would be reckless enough to come to a place like this and risk having their senses dulled completely – but it paid to remain on your guard. Doubly so when you were battling the lethargic side effects of a fever.
‘There’s something wrong with you,’ said August, squinting at her across the round table, ‘and it’s not hay fever or flu or whatever else you’re going to fob me off with.’ He rapped the surface with his fingertips, scattering ash across the polished wood. ‘Are you going to tell me what?’
She swigged a mouthful of gin and sat back, shaking her head. ‘No. Are you going to tell me what your secret new job is?’
August shrugged. ‘It’s not important.’
Alice raised an eyebrow. ‘It’s
kept you from coming with Sasha and Jude every time we’ve met up for the past few months. Sounds important to me.’
He gave her a shifty look. ‘If I tell anyone, I’m done. Fired. My esteemed employers have already made that pretty clear.’
Alice’s eyes narrowed. ‘You’re not working for the Fellowship again?’ she asked sharply.
He choked on his drink. ‘What, you think my IQ is in single digits?’
She relaxed in her chair. The Fellowship were a death cult, led by a sadistic hemomancer named Marianne Northam. Alice despised her, and the feeling was mutual.
‘Anyway, stop changing the subject,’ said August. ‘You don’t look right. Tell me what’s wrong.’
Alice sighed. ‘No.’
‘Because?’
‘Because you have all the subtlety of a town crier.’
He grinned and leaned back, scraping a hand through his hair. ‘Ouch.’ Then he added, ‘You’re worried I’ll tell Crowley?’
‘No.’ Alice sighed and absently drew her finger through a dribble of gin on the table. ‘Maybe.’ She’d done her best to avoid Crowley since her return to the city. She wasn’t ready to see him – maybe she never would be – and he was trying to respect her wishes. ‘I don’t want this to be the reason we—’
‘You don’t want a pity party,’ said August. ‘I get it.’
‘No. And no one can know we’ve come here. Not yet.’
He grinned. ‘Clandestine meetings at night . . . secret drinks in strange bars . . . People will talk.’
She raised the glass and pressed it to her forehead, closing her eyes at the cool relief it provided. ‘If they do,’ she said, ‘just tell them . . . tell them you’ve defied expectations and finally managed to come in useful.’
Something brushed her hand and Alice’s eyes flew open.
The Rookery Page 2
