by April White
He led us to a door that must have been put in since the War Museum took over the building. Adam was still shaky, but at least he was walking under his own power, clutching Alex’s hand. I didn’t let anyone see how hard I worked to keep my hands steady.
Archer reached above the door to the lintel and pulled down a key. He met my eyes. “Old habits.”
“I’m not complaining.”
A park surrounded the War Museum, and it was deserted at that time of night, which was good. I didn’t think our little tribe would go unnoticed if anyone was out. Archer pointed across the park. “The river’s that way.”
Tom strode off toward it, and we all kept pace. Ava walked with Archer and me, while Alex and Adam stayed back a few feet to talk quietly. In a few minutes we got to a bridge and Tom turned left, heading along the riverbank. “I don’t know exactly where it is, but I think the building is between Lambeth and Vauxhall Bridges.”
He slowed as we approached an older brick warehouse that looked like it had been converted to expensive lofts. There was a security camera aimed at the front door, and an entry keypad instead of a key lock. I looked up. The second and third floor windows were the big arched kind that didn’t open. The top floor had the only windows that looked accessible, but even I flinched at the climb up vertical brick walls necessary to get there. The building next to it was a modern concrete and steel thing, and looked even harder, if not impossible, to scale. Archer and I shared a despairing glance, then he took off around one side, and I started for the other. I was careful to avoid the camera range of the entrance security eye, and we met at a service elevator entrance at the back of the building. Of course it was securely locked and had a solid metal door.
I eyed the big power box under the fire escape. It wasn’t a good option, but it was the only one I could see. Scrambling to the top of the box was only mildly challenging. The real problem was the distance between my outstretched arms and the bottom of the fire escape ladder.
“It’s too far, Saira.” Archer’s voice was an urgent whisper below me. I didn’t look down, concentrating instead on the mortar between the bricks and the distance I’d have to climb. I still wasn’t a hundred percent after that jump with five people clinging to me, but at least the dizziness had passed.
I flexed my fingers and reached up for the first brick. This climb was going to suck.
“Saira! Wait!” Ava’s whisper was too loud and I cringed. The girl clearly had no concept of stealth mode. I let go of the brick and glared down at her, just barely hanging onto a whisper of my own.
“What!”
“You can’t do it. You won’t make that climb.” Okay, she also must not have spent enough time with me to know that ‘can’t’ is the fastest way to ‘oh, yeah? Watch me’ in my world.
She said something to Archer that I couldn’t hear, and I saw him go a little pale.
Then Ava did something that got my attention more than any amount of warnings would have. She looked up at me again, saw me glaring down at her with my hands on my hips for emphasis, and she left.
Just like that.
“What did she say to you?” It’s very hard to whisper a yell.
“I can’t watch her die.”
The dizziness came back with a vengeance, and I put a hand on the bricks to steady myself. “I can do this climb.” I wasn’t sure how convincing I could sound, so I added anger to punctuate the declaration.
He looked up at me for a long moment, then shook his head. “No, something’s wrong. You’ve been … off since you brought us all out of the St. Brigid’s woods.” I remembered then that Archer had his own brand of Sight, and a lot of it seemed to be wrapped up in me and my well-being.
He didn’t move, and he didn’t take his eyes off me. I finally crouched down and jumped off the box. It was probably only about eight feet off the ground, but Archer had to steady me when I landed. He made it look like he was just holding me in his arms, but we both knew I would have fallen if he hadn’t caught me.
I looked in his eyes, slightly terrified at the realization I would have failed. “I can’t do the climb.”
He shook his head. “Neither can I.”
I looked back up the side of the building, at the sheer walls with tiny handholds in the brick mortar.
“We need a thief.”
A Thief
“Ringo could do it.” I said it with a sort of fatality in my voice, but somehow the words lit a little fire that started to burn in my brain. Archer must have smelled the smoke because his eyes found mine and locked on.
“It’s a very bad idea.”
“Probably breaks all kinds of time travel rules.”
“Your mother did it though.”
“And she didn’t have a guide.”
He stared at me for a long moment, and I watched the full range of protective instincts run across his expression. The last one was resignation, and I knew he wouldn’t try to stop me.
“You’re still shaky.”
“I’ll be fine.”
“I can’t go with you. I’m already there.”
“I know.” There was a temporal rule we’d discovered when I tried to take Archer to 1888. Because he was already there … then … whatever, living out his natural life, we ended up slipping back a little further, to 1861, before he was born. The rule was explained as ‘no one can be in the same time as themselves.’ Since Archer had existed steadily since 1861, the last of the nineteenth and whole twentieth centuries were pretty much off limits to him for Clocking.
He thought for a moment. “It’s late March.” His expression fell. “I’m back in Epping with the Missus. I needed to hunt every day to eat, and I tried to stay out of London.”
I didn’t touch that. I didn’t want to know. “It’s okay. I can find him on my own.”
“You could take Arman.”
I could tell how much it cost Archer to suggest that, and I put my arms around his neck with my face about an inch from his. “You’re awesome. But he can’t travel like we do. He’s still freaking out from a local trip. One back to 1889 would send him over the edge.” I kissed him softly on the lips, and his arms tightened around me. “I’ll go alone, and I’ll be back within an hour whether or not I find him.”
I almost laughed when I recognized the pungent scent of the river in Victorian times. The lapping of the water against the pillars of the London Bridge felt like home, and the only people I saw on the street were the ones stumbling out of pubs. As long as I kept my head down and walked fast, I thought I could disappear into the background of the wharf.
But then again, I used to think there was no such thing as time travel, and look where that got me.
I was just about to turn into an alley when someone bumped into me, hard. I’d been so focused on listening for the sound of footsteps behind me that I forgot to look up, and whoever it was came at me from above.
“Oy! Watch where yer goin’!”
“Sorry,” I mumbled, trying not to let the guy know I was female. Instantly, three more toughs materialized out of the shadows, and the certainty that life in the next five minutes was going to get very interesting walloped me upside the head.
The ringleader seemed vaguely familiar. His cap was slung low over his eyes, and he had the wide stance of a guy who didn’t often have to run for his survival. When he spoke again I knew. He was one of the thieves I’d first encountered with Ringo. The guys he’d been proud of having ditched when he went to work for Gosford at the river.
“You’ll not be needin’ yer hock-dockeys then.”
This was not going to go well for me; that much was clear by the shoulder-to-shoulder stance of the ones closest to me. Not that I had a clue what hock-dockeys were, but I didn’t think they were planning to leave me conscious while they took them.
Two options instantly flashed through my brain. Well, three, but succumbing to their fists wasn’t so much an option as a price for failure. I could stand up to them and reveal I was female, in hopes tha
t at least one of them was raised not to hit a girl, or I could run and take my chances. I didn’t know if Victorian sensibilities included rape, but I thought it would be a stretch to imagine any of them was gentleman enough to back off just because of a difference in plumbing.
Right. Run then.
The toughs, including a Nervous Nelly who couldn’t stand still on his pegs, pretty much had forward and backward covered. So my options were limited to up and down. My eyes flicked above me and I flinched. Someone was there, calmly crouched on a window ledge as if waiting for an escape-to-the-roof attempt.
Which left down.
“Yer not movin’ fast enough, nib-cove. I’ll be ‘avin’ yer upper-ben too fer me trouble.”
Yeah, right. What he said. Marble-mouth would have made me laugh if I wasn’t so sure I’d die before the sound made it past my lips. With another quick glance up to see the Roof-Tough hadn’t moved, I dropped to the street, and in one fluid motion of my leg, swept the feet out from under Nervous Nelly. He went down like a bowling pin, taking out Rough and Tumble next to him. Marble Mouth lunged for me, but I was already up and dancing to the side away from his grasping hands.
Even with two down, the alley was too small to stay out of their reach for long, and when Roof-Tough dropped down behind me I knew I was screwed.
Except Marble Mouth’s eyes narrowed as he looked past me at Roof-Tough. His voice was an angry growl. “Yer dead, Keys.”
Keys? Ringo!
I felt him take a step closer and mumble in my ear. “There’s a bottle on the step behind me. Break it and arm yerself.” My heart slammed in my chest at the sound of his voice. If I was going to die a bloody death tonight at least I’d have the company of one of my best friends.
“I’ve done with ye, Lizzer. We’ve no more at stake wi’ t’other. The lad’s a mate, and ye’ve no call to harm ‘im.”
“Mate o’ yers is enemy o’ mine, Keys.” Lizzer spat the words as his toughs regained their feet and arrayed themselves around him. I felt the step behind me and never took my eyes off Lizzer as I reached for the bottle. It felt heavy, like a wine bottle, and Ringo’s voice mumbled at me again. “Smash it on the wall when ‘e moves.” I gripped the neck of the bottle tightly and felt every muscle in my body coil.
“Ye’ll let us by or ye’ll get cut.” There was an authoritative tone to Ringo’s voice I’d never heard before, and I had to remind myself he was only sixteen.
Lizzer barked out a laugh as he lunged. I swung the bottle at the corner of the brick wall, and the bottom shattered off, leaving a jagged weapon in my hand. Ringo had been standing just behind me, so I hadn’t seen him until he blocked Lizzer’s lunge with a swing of a knife. Lizzer dodged the blade in my direction while the toughs jumped in, and I swiped the bottle up in front of me.
Lizzer’s eyes went wide and then he howled.
“Bastard cut me!”
Crap! I was the bastard who cut him with my makeshift weapon. The toughs froze at the sound of their leader’s outrage, and Ringo and I saw the opening at the same moment. We didn’t even have to say the word, we just ran.
When we’d lost the toughs we doubled back on rooftops and dropped down to the dormer ledge of Ringo’s loft. I really looked at him for the first time. He’d grown to about my height, which was tall for Victorian times, and he was wearing workingman’s clothes. I found his bright green eyes under the brim of his cap. “I wondered when ye’d be back to see me.” He looked down to make sure the alley below his building was empty, then quickly slipped the window casement up. “After ye, M’lady.” The grin in his voice was unmistakable and did a lot to calm the adrenaline jitters from our near-death altercation with Ringo’s old gang. I climbed into his loft and gasped at the change.
The basic layout was the same as when I’d stayed there, but there were things now that made it feel like a home. A rug on the wood floor. A pretty shawl thrown over a new settee against a wall. Books stacked against the walls and covering every surface.
“Those aren’t just for show, are they?” I indicated the stacks and Ringo grinned.
“I’m teachin’ Charlie to read now.”
I knew Ringo had given Mary Kelly’s little sister a place to stay after the Ripper claimed Mary as his last victim, but I hadn’t realized they’d set up house together. Looking at the pride on Ringo’s face gave me an interesting insight on how he’d spent the past three months.
Even more striking than the books, there was art on the walls where they had been completely bare before. I studied the drawing closest to me. At first glance the scene seemed like an ordinary scene of a boat docked at the side of the Thames. But then I looked closer, and a set of eyes peered at me over the side of the boat – otherworldly eyes from some vaguely magical-looking creature. And a giant squid-like sea creature was about to wrap its tendrils around the boat from under the water. Also, the fisherman in a nearby boat had pointed ears and a long tail just barely visible behind him.
“This is so cool!” I was in awe at both the skill and the imagination of the artist.
“That’s a compliment then?” A girl’s voice made me spin around in surprise, and my face split into a grin.
“Charlie! These are yours?”
She nodded, and her expression was somewhere between trepidation and pride. She was wearing a simple skirt and blouse, very different from the boy’s clothes she’d worn when we first met.
“I love them.” I’d moved on to the next drawing, which was a marketplace full of little hints of magic all throughout the scene. “You’re very skilled, your style is fantastic, and your imagination rocks the planet!” Whether or not she understood what I was saying, she had to be able to hear the amazement in my voice. She finally smiled.
“I’m not sure about skill or ‘magination. I just draw wha’ I see.”
“Are you kidding? You have an awesome imagination. These are incredible!”
Ringo’s adult voice sounded so odd coming out of his mouth. “She’s serious. It is what she sees, Saira.” He shut the blackout curtain across the window and looked at Charlie. “I’ll need t’ lay low fer a bit. Lizzer an’ me got into it a bit jus’ now.”
I looked from Ringo to Charlie and back again, torn between the conversation at hand and the magical drawings. Typical me, the art talk won.
“These aren’t just made-up creatures?”
“Not to me, they’re not.” Charlie’s tone was tentative. Ringo’s news had shaken her. “Ringo can’t see ‘em, so I don’t actually know what’s real, but I’ve been able to see things like this my whole life.”
It actually wasn’t the idea of the creatures that intrigued me as much as the idea that they could be hidden from most everyone … except Charlie. “So, do these creatures ever do anything, or are they just masquerading as real people?”
Charlie visibly relaxed. I imagined it must be hard to admit this to anyone, especially because she was an underage orphan in a world where Victorian nuthouses were the equivalent of the pit of despair. But obviously Ringo knew. And now I did too.
“This ‘un,” she pointed to something vaguely like a house elf that was pulling an apple off a market cart, “actually stole the apple, but the cart vendor thought it was the little boy behind ‘is ma. ‘E made the boy cry.” She looked around at some of her other drawings. “Mostly they just try to stay out of the way, though.”
“Do they know you can see them?”
Charlie looked sharply at me. “If I say yes then I’m starkers for talkin’ to the things I see, not just mad for seein’ ‘em.”
Ringo’s voice was gentle, and he looked at Charlie with a tenderness that made me realize he was sixteen going on about twenty-six. “Yer saner than me an’ Saira put together. Not that it’s sayin’ much.” His smirk took the seriousness away, and his confidence seemed to give her permission to speak.
She finally took a deep breath. “I learned to ‘ide it. Annie didn’t want to hear nothin’ ‘bout what I saw, and if I wanted
a place to sleep, I kept my mouth shut.”
“So she couldn’t see them?”
Charlie shook her head. “No, but I think our ma could. She never said nothin’, but I ‘member her lookin’ at the creatures I saw. Lookin’ at them and then turnin’ away.”
“I’m going to ask around at school and see if anyone else there can see creatures. And I’m sure you probably don’t think this, but it’s really cool what you can do.”
“Cool?” Charlie looked confused, and I forgot she wasn’t as well-versed in my 21st century-speak.
“She means ream.”
Right, that. I turned to Ringo. “I actually don’t have time to stay and hang out, as much as I want to.” I included Charlie in that statement. She was as skittish as a barely-tamed cat, but I liked her, and I’d promised to be a sister to her. “Archer and I need help.”
Ringo’s ears perked up immediately. “’Ow is ‘e?”
He thought I meant the Archer he knew. “Staying away until he gets things under control. But I mean in my time. We need a thief.”
A whole book of emotions filled Ringo’s face. The ones I could identify were excitement, probably at the prospect of time-traveling to the future, and something that looked like chagrin. I loved that word and had never actually seen it in person, but it was definitely chagrin I saw on Ringo’s face. “I don’t vamp no more.”
“Vamp?”
“Steal. Thieve. Lift. Min. Nail. Mizzle.”
Right. A whole Victorian vocabulary lesson about stealing. Kind of like the thousand words Eskimos have for snow. I looked steadily at him. “I know you don’t steal anymore. But you still have the skills, and we think we’ve found the Descendants genealogy.”
He stared. “The one Archer did for Wilder?”
I nodded. “The Mongers have it.”
His face darkened. Ringo knew enough about Descendant politics to know how much that sucked. “Where is it?”
“In a brick warehouse by the river, between Lambeth and Vauxhall bridges. It’s four stories tall, but the big, arched windows on the lower floors don’t look like they open.”
