All is Fair

by Emma Newman

  “The Patroons know, and some of the people there were placed by their families,” Max said. “You would upset a lot of powerful people if you challenged it.”

  She nodded, chewing her thumbnail. She was silent for almost an hour, staring out of the window. “And all of that stuff you told me about the Agency breeding perfect staff and the way they treat them… like slaves. It isn’t right. But it’s all so big. I don’t know what to do about it all. I just know it’s wrong.”

  There was a thud in the boot and she twisted to look into the back of the car. “Did we just hit something?”

  “No.”

  “I don’t even know who’s in charge of the Agency, or where they’re based. Even if I did I wouldn’t know what to do.”

  Another thunk, this time louder, as Max exited the motorway and headed into the outskirts of London.

  “There’s something wrong with the car,” Catherine said and he shook his head.

  “There isn’t.”

  The back portion of the rear passenger seat was knocked into the foot-well and the gargoyle poked its head through the gap between car and boot.

  “So you were in there.” Catherine stretched back and clasped the gargoyle’s paw.

  “The whole bloody time.” It clambered onto the back seat; at least it had the sense to stretch itself along the width of the car to keep out of sight of the other drivers. “We need to talk.”

  “We need to stay focused,” Max said. “You know what we have to do after we’ve taken Catherine home.”

  “That’s exactly the reason why,” the gargoyle replied. “If we die without telling anyone about what the Agency is doing, nothing will put a stop to it.” It shuffled about so its head was closer to Catherine. “I need to tell you so I know that something will be done. Ekstrand doesn’t give a rat’s arse and he’s mental anyway.”

  Catherine repositioned herself so she was facing the gargoyle more comfortably. “All right. I’m listening.” She looked at Max. “Are you OK?”

  “He’s fine,” the gargoyle said. “Listen to me. The Agency headquarters is a place that only exists in the Nether without an anchor property and the only way it can make that is by keeping all these people in the basement like… like… machines.” It described everything Max had seen, as if it had been in that room with him.

  “My God, is there anything these people aren’t doing?” Catherine said, and then asked questions about what they saw that day the Agency was taken over, which the gargoyle answered readily. Max focused on the road and the heavy traffic. The gargoyle was trusting her with sensitive information. Should he pull over and kick her out of the car? Why hadn’t he done that already?

  “It’s because she needs to understand how bad this is,” the gargoyle said to him. “It’s because we know we need to do something.”

  “But they’re not protected by the Treaty.”

  “Did I miss something?” Catherine asked but the gargoyle was focused on Max.

  “But they’re being screwed over like we were. Don’t you get it? We’re just the same as those poor bastards strapped in those chairs: we’re nothing but a tool, made for a specific purpose. We didn’t choose this, just like they didn’t.”

  “What do you mean?” Catherine asked.

  “This isn’t the right time,” Max replied.

  “Why are you afraid of her knowing this?” the gargoyle asked. “You don’t really think it’s ever going to go back to the way it was, do you? Most of the Sorcerers are dead and the two that are left are trying to kill each other. Ekstrand is a fruitloop. We’re on our own. We’ve come this far without his orders, why not do the right thing whilst we’re being insubordinate?”

  Max pulled over when he saw a parking space free at the rear of Catherine’s anchor property. Catherine was staring at him.

  “You can’t show me the asylum and tell me all this stuff about the Agency and think I’ll just forget about it.”

  “I don’t.”

  “Then what are we going to do?”

  “I have to speak to someone,” Max said, thinking of Faulkner’s Chapter Master. “I think he’ll lead us to the root of these problems.”

  “And then will we do something?”

  “I don’t know. I need to think about it.”

  Catherine groaned. “I’m going.” She glanced at the gargoyle. “I hope you come back. And I hope you can convince him to get off his arse and commit to taking action.”

  “I’ll do my best.” It grinned at her and she left.

  They sat in silence for a few moments, then Max noticed the time on the dashboard clock. “We’d better get moving,” he said. “The Chapter Master will be at the park soon. And we’re already taking action,” he added, prompted by the gargoyle’s stare.

  Sam pumped the bellows until the fire was hot enough and put in a length of iron. It was the first time he’d been in the forge since his predecessor’s suicide. He’d been apprehensive about coming in, fearing it would trigger unpleasant memories. It made him think about what happened but he no longer felt unsettled. He just wanted to beat the iron until he was ready to go back to Exilium.

  The meeting with the Directors wasn’t a clear success or an obvious failure. He decided to feel good about starting the ball rolling at least and as time went on and he learned more about how it all worked he would make the changes he wanted. At least the PR guy was behind him. Instead, it was time to focus on the other benefits his new status accorded. Mazzi had said the Fae would fear him and he knew which one he wanted to terrify the most. But how to do it? How to get back to Exilium on his own terms, rather than at the summoning or permission of Lord Poppy? He wanted to take the Fae by surprise.

  He looked down at the anvil, breathing in the sense of potential. What would he make as he considered his plan? A spear to run Poppy through? A sword to threaten him with, like Cathy’s husband had wielded? He swore at the thought of her stuck with him, deluding herself into thinking she could do something about the way they lived. As soon as he was free of Poppy’s interference, he’d go and free her too.

  He went to pull out the iron but found himself drawn back to the anvil. The floor had been scrubbed and he noticed a feature for the first time: the anvil was resting on a solid circle of iron set into the floor. At its edges he could see slivers of what looked like copper, running at intervals around it. He pulled the length of iron from the fire and abandoned it in the plunge bucket, steam accompanying the loud hiss of hot metal meeting cold water.

  Grunting with effort, Sam pulled the anvil off the circle, certain that, without the “affinity” Mazzi had spoken of, he’d never have been able to budge it an inch. He crouched down and scraped the black grime from the groove between the circle and the flagstones and had a sudden sense of its base being deep in the earth, so deep that the forge had been built around and on top of it, rather than being set into the floor as a feature.

  He pulled the abandoned rod of iron from the bucket, tossed it aside and threw the water over the circle, washing away the outline of dirt left by the anvil base. It was solid iron and close to the diameter of a postbox. He thought of the pillar in Exilium, the one Poppy couldn’t bear to be near. That had been a similar size and also had copper riveted to it. Then he noticed a haze in the air. He thought for a moment that it was steam from the cooling rod but that had already dissipated. He stared at the iron set into the floor and the haziness increased until it was as if a fog were forming in the air. He crouched down beside it as the tiny hairs on his arms and the back of his neck prickled, and reached towards the space above the circle. Where he thought his fingers would pass through the air, they instead brushed iron.

  There was a terrific lurch in his stomach and he tipped forwards, his hands slapping against iron with copper bands riveted around it, familiar formulae etched into the metal. He was on his knees, palms still on the metal, and no longer saw the forge, only mists, as if the strange fog that had been rising now encompassed everything. Then he reali
sed he wasn’t in the squat little building in Mundanus any more. He was in the Nether and the iron was stretching ahead of him now, like a path through the void.

  Cathy pulled off her gloves and dumped them on the chair, feeling exhausted and yet as tightly wound as a nervous man’s watch. She felt as if she needed a release, like a long cry or the opportunity to scream at someone, but neither was forthcoming.

  She was too full of terrible knowledge. How could she sit there in her library in front of the fire when so many people were being mistreated? Her efforts felt like they’d come to nothing; she’d found people who knew Rainer but they were either unwilling to help her or incapable of it. She knew about the atrocities committed by the Agency but felt powerless to act. Bennet had managed to curse her once already; if she moved against them she had no doubt he would see his threats through and she’d be hauled in front of Dame Iris and probably shipped off to the asylum herself. That Will knew her past would make no difference if the Irises were publicly humiliated.

  Could she rely on Max to come back and form a plan with her? He was acting without the knowledge of the Sorcerer. Would he be able to take on the Agency without his Master’s blessing?

  There was a knock on the door and Morgan entered with a note on a small silver tray. Cathy recognised Bennet’s handwriting before she touched it.

  I am aware of the visits from a certain Arbiter and your recent contact with Charlotte Persificola-Viola. If you continue to pry into matters that are no concern of yours, I will contact Dame Iris and have a frank conversation with her about your previous interests.

  “Morgan!” Cathy called him back from the doorway, planning to show him the evidence of blackmail, but by the time he’d crossed the room the ink was sliding from the page like mascara in the rain.

  “Is there a reply, your Grace?”

  “No,” she said, crumpling the paper in her fist. “No reply.”

  Cathy went to the fire and threw the note onto it, then put both hands on the chimney breast, leaning over until she felt the warmth. She had decided to stay in the Nether with a head full of noble ideals but still felt powerless. Had she made the wrong choice? Was she deluding herself that anything could be done by one woman?

  She shut her eyes, letting her head droop between her arms, thinking of the people she’d left at the asylum, the truths the gargoyle told and Max talking about the Fae and the Agency matching people for goodness knows what. She thought of Miss Rainer scrubbing pans, a shadow of herself, and Charlotte, trapped in her own body and living in a gilded prison. And what had she done since she’d made the decision to stay instead of run away? Looked for someone else to help her, looked for a group of people to get behind, looked to Will to stand up and fight the system so she could stand beside him.

  “I’m still a coward,” she whispered. She wasn’t going to find someone to show her the way to change things because that person didn’t exist. She had to do it herself. She would find a way to free all of the people held by the Agency, and she’d find a way to give women a voice and recognition and rights in Society even if it meant destroying her own life in the process.

  A pulse of magic rippled out from her, making her fingertips tingle as it left her body. The third wish! She’d felt something similar for the first and second when they were cast, but when she told Lord Poppy her last wish she’d felt nothing. Until now. She knew what her true potential was: it was to change Society by becoming the force of change herself.

  The place to start was the asylum and the main obstacle was Bennet. She needed to distract him long enough to go there herself and lead those people out. Out where? The flat in Manchester was too small and there would be no way to protect them there anyway. She thought of the empty rooms in the house and imagined them filled with illegal guests. The thought made her smile but the staff would report back to Bennet and she couldn’t keep him distracted for that long. She needed to change the household into a safe haven by the time he realised what she’d done.

  She straightened, took a deep breath and then called for Carter. He entered and stood to attention. “Yes, your Grace?”

  “Carter… shut the door. The Arbiter wasn’t here about the attack. He took me to a place in Mundanus where people are being kept prisoner even though they’ve done nothing wrong. People who used to live in Society. They’re being left there to get old and die.”

  He looked appalled. “Why would the Arbiter do such a thing? And why did you go, your Grace? You could have been at risk.”

  She realised he was more upset about that than about the news of the place itself. “Because I asked him to find some people who disappeared. And we didn’t tell you because I know that you report to Bennet.” She paused, expecting the usual tightness in her chest that always came when she thought about Bennet and what he held over her. But there was no change. “He’s been…” she took a breath, ready for the coughing fit to start any second. “Bennet has blackmailed and threatened me.”

  The curse had been broken! Of course, how could she reach her potential with that constraining her? Poppy’s magic had actually done something useful!

  Carter was gawping at her. “I had no idea, your Grace.”

  “He cursed me so I couldn’t tell anyone.”

  “Mr Bennet said I had to report all your movements to him as well as the Duke to ensure your safety. He said all personal guards of people of your status have that duty.” He looked down at the carpet. “I should tender my resignation. I failed in my–”

  “Oh, don’t be ridiculous,” Cathy said. “You couldn’t possibly have known.”

  “I can only offer you my word that I will not make any more reports on your actions to Mr Bennet. I trust you’ll tell the Duke upon his return?”

  “Yes, I will. But quite frankly there are much more important things to worry about now. I can’t just carry on with my life knowing about that asylum. I have to do something and I want to free those people and bring them here, to stay, until they get back on their feet and work out what they want to do for themselves.”

  “I see, your Grace. This sounds like a noble thing to do.”

  “It’s run by the Agency and Bennet is in charge of it.”

  His expression darkened. “But if the Agency are–”

  “Listen, I need your help to get them out. The Agency don’t have the right to keep them there, and it’s only one of a long list of terrible things they’re doing. They’ve been keeping all kinds of people silenced for the Patroons for far too long now and it has to stop. Now, I understand if you don’t want any part of it, but I want to offer you a choice. If you want to help me do the right thing, I’ll support your resignation from the Agency and I’ll pay your wages myself. You’ll have the same job security and–”

  “I’m sorry, your Grace, I don’t understand what you mean. I don’t receive wages.”

  “But I’ve been paying the Agency thousands of pounds for everyone’s…” Cathy shook her head. None of that money had been passed on to the staff and they had no idea the Agency were charging money supposedly for them. Of course not. Why in the Worlds would the Agency teach their indoctrinated slaves about the right to earn a living? “All right. You have the choice to come with me and free those people – if you do, I’ll make sure the Agency don’t take you away and you’ll be my personal employee. That means I’ll give you money for you to spend on whatever you like, and time off when you want it. Or you can let me go by myself.”

  “I should, in fact, stop you from going at all, with all respect, your Grace. The Duke gave me explicit orders.”

  She folded her arms. “That may be so, but unless you want to lock me in a box, that isn’t going to happen. I know you’re a good person, Carter, you just didn’t know what the Agency is capable of. I need you. I need you to help me do the right thing.”

  She didn’t take her eyes off him, hoping he would see her conviction. After what seemed like an age, he nodded. “I’ll help you, your Grace. I trust you know what’s be
st.” She thought it would be harder to convince him. Was it the wish magic? “But if we’re going to do something that might upset the Agency, we need to convince the rest of the staff it’s the right thing to do too. I know enough about them to be able to advise you on the best way to approach it.”

  Cathy nodded. “You’re right. I’ll call a meeting. Everything’s going to change now, Carter.” When he frowned she smiled as confidently as she could. “But it’s all going to be for the better. I’m sure of it.”

  It took only moments for Will to explore the boundaries of his prison, then he had no choice but to wait. He worried about the air running out, then decided Margritte wouldn’t have gone to all the trouble to engineer his kidnapping only to leave him to suffocate in a large box. Besides, the Sorcerer or the Arbiters could have killed him just as easily as imprisoning him.

  There was total silence, not even the slightest vibration in the floor. Will suspected the prison was a Sorcerous construct in the Nether and that rescue was therefore probably impossible. He sat in the corner and the fingers on his left hand started to sting. He tried to feel for any splinters but in the total darkness it was only possible to pull out the largest slivers of wood. It didn’t feel like he was bleeding enough to be a concern. The fact that the Sorcerer wielded magic capable of shattering a ring made by the Fae King and Queen both impressed and frightened him.

  Will stretched his legs out and felt his right ankle throb. It wasn’t painful enough to be broken, but was still uncomfortable.

  He rested his head against the corner where the two walls met and took a few moments to breathe deeply and steady himself. He’d had a shock and it was natural to feel frightened in the circumstances, so he permitted himself a few moments of unbridled fear. He blinked a few times, disturbed by how hard it was to know whether his eyes were open or closed, and wondered what they were going to do to him.

  How had Margritte secured the support of a Sorcerer? And why had they mentioned Ekstrand? Will had only seen him for as long as the other people at the party; he hadn’t even spoken to him. That night seemed like it was years ago but it was only a matter of months. He had the feeling there were other agendas playing out around him; the matter of the Londinium throne shouldn’t be of any interest to the Sorcerer of Mercia, nor any of the others for that matter.