“...and then the person sees Mordon's name, calls up their 'financial supporter', and passes the letter over?”
“The 'financial supporter' as you called them then forges a stamp and returns the bill to Mr. Mason. No traces are in the Constabulary records of this letter, even as Mr. Mason thinks it is legitimate.”
“Which would make Mr. Mason a victim,” Lilly said.
We thought about it a minute.
“Are the Blackwings victims, too?” I asked.
Everyone stared at me as if I'd gone looney.
“Well,” I said, “the Blackwings didn't put the Unwritten on the wall, and neither did Mr. Mason.”
“How can you be sure?” Leif asked.
“The Unwritten was the same as the one that killed Railey. It creates Immortals, but to do that it has to claim a lot of lives first. If the Blackwings knew about the spell, they would not have set foot in the room. I think the Blackwings wanted to get to Mordon to find Anna, but he's not an easy guy to get the drop on, so they had to work with Mason to lure Mordon. Now, the thing about the Unwritten is that there's only one man who we know who has that particular colonial-era demonic spell.”
Leif rubbed the back of his neck, letting out a long sigh. “Cole.”
“Yes, and what happens to people that fail Gregor Cole when he pays well?”
“It was a clean up job,” Barnes said grimly. “A way to express his disappointment and send a message to others who fail him.”
Leif nodded. “Mordon would be a bonus. If he even knew that Mordon was supposed to be there.”
Lilly said, “You're saying our story looks like this: Cole hires the Blackwings to get Josephina and Anna. The Blackwings subcontracts Mason Security for one reason or another. When Josephina goes missing, Mason and the Blackwings try to recoup their losses. However, Cole is already tired of their incompetence and arranged to murder all of them, thus removing any trace of their connection to him.”
I said, “That is exactly my thought. But does the Blackwing Chief know about Cole's betrayal?”
Barnes grunted. “If he does, he would renegotiate a deal with Cole. Money soothes all ills, and the Blackwing Chief won't be caught napping twice in a row. Cole and he will have come to a new arrangement by now.”
“Which means Anna can't be without sturdy guardian constantly at hand.” I sighed. I poked at Anna's foot, making her wriggle. “You've cost me my freedom, little rugrat. I hope you're happy.”
She started to blow foam bubbles.
I continued, “If I can't pop by the market whenever I need something, I want to get a decent collection of potions plants. Think if I lay her down for a nap that one of you can babysit her while I get things?”
No one immediately jumped at the opportunity. They'd been working all kinds of random hours lately with the increase in activity going on around Merlyn's Market. Supposedly one of the judges had left for another market, and they had yet to replace him.
Lilly brightened. “I can get you the plants.”
“Can you tell the difference between Taraxacum officinale and Hypochaeris radicata?”
She nodded enthusiastically, but what came out of her mouth was, “Ummm...tarragon versus basil?”
“The first is the common dandelion. The second is known as catsear, flatweed, or false dandelion. It has more jagged leaves than the common dandelion, and its leaves are rarely bitter. They do make acceptable substitutes, but it can be deadly to confuse other plants. No, Lilly, it's best that I go. Potions need the right plant, and you never know if the seller genuinely knows plant identification or not.”
Chapter Fourteen
I'd had it with the crying. She wouldn't let me shower in peace unless she was in the room with me and the curtain was cracked so she could see me. That wasn't the full extent of the trouble. It was that to get into the water, I either had to leave her line of vision and thereby suffer a wailing fit, or I had to open the curtain wide enough that the water went everywhere and the draft made my legs cold.
“I didn't think they were supposed to be so clingy. Not yet, anyhow,” I said, my hair still wet, possibly still soapy, when I was downstairs next and speaking to Mordon. “All I wanted was fifteen minutes to myself. Is that too much? I mean really, is it?”
She started to cry again. I wanted to pull my hair out or scream or something, but all I did was give a resigned sigh and reach for the diaper bag.
“What does she want, Love?” Mordon asked.
“The other half of her feeding, probably. She was being picky earlier. Such a shock to have me getting clean, you know.”
“That, or the sight of your nakedness—”
I slugged him, hard, on the shoulder with a vengeance which had been reserved for giving dead arms to my brother. “Don't you dare finish that sentence.”
He laughed, not even doing the courtesy of giving me a little wince. I must be weaker than I thought. That or my brother was a real royal pansy. I crossed my arms and let out a huff.
“Love, don't be upset. I was going to say that she was crying because she wouldn't inherit your beauty.”
Was I charmed or annoyed?
“I shouldn't have hit you. Sorry.”
Mordon rubbed his shoulder. “It's nothing. But I wasn't expecting you to throw it so well. If you had chosen a different target, I'd be in considerable pain.”
That made me smile. Sadist, whispered my inner voice. I tried to shrug it off. “All the same, though. I don't think I've walloped Leazar like that in years.”
Anna was not happy to have been ignored for all of two minutes. Her voice hit pitches I thought impossible. Mordon took the bottle from me and picked her up, instantly calming her.
“You have a list of things you need from the market, don't you?” he asked. “Why don't you go get it?”
“But...”
“I'll take care of Mommy's Girl. Even if she blows out my eardrums.” Mordon kissed my cheek. “Don't worry, it'll be fine. When you get back, she will be sleeping so hard, you will wish she misbehaved for me instead of you.”
“What a reassurance.”
“It is a matter of time before I am ready to cut the wind, too.”
I burst out laughing, confusing Mordon beyond all measure. “I think that phrase means a different thing in Kragdomen. You should stick with 'go out flying.' That's a better phrase.”
Mordon frowned, insulted rather than amused, but he didn't ask what 'cut the wind' sounded like, so I didn't tell him before leaving for the market.
***
In the distance, a small party was burying their dead on the grassy upper levels of the market. It wasn't the first time I had snuck out into Merlyn's Market, but it was the first time I had done so with Mordon's help. He'd provided me with a portal which would deposit me someplace outside of the norm. That someplace turned out to be in the cemetery, a quiet enough place. I lingered a minute near the corner where I knew Railey was buried, but resisted the urge to go visit her grave. I didn't know if I wanted to see her or not.
As I huffed my way down the carpet stairs, taking them at the springy jog people did when they had a place to be, I marveled at how free I felt. I could bounce and run and even trip without worry. The freedom of movement was just awesome. Being rid of several pounds latched to my torso was an amazing thing. It was at about the sixth level down, a textile and robes market, when I had to stop and catch my breath, consulting a sign.
Several more floors down to reach Living Specimens and Botanicals, a place I hadn't been before out of fear of how much I'd want to take home with me. Today I had both money and a list. Hopefully I could stick to the budget. And to the list, too. I trudged downstairs two more sets of carpets, and then slumped miserably into one of the cafes built into the wall of the market.
As I waited for a doughnut I knew I'd hate but couldn't resist getting, I sipped at the water and watched people go about their business, haggling with vendors and scolding children who were old enough to know better. I
pulled out my list. Frequent trips to the Potions Ingredients level had irritated me so much that it was almost a relief that Anna's presence made it necessary that I buy the actual plants.
White Dead-Nettle
Sea Buckthorn
Eye of Newt
Toadflax
Monk's Rhubarb
Mallow
Comfrey
Figwort
Fairy Flax
Coltsfoot
Witch-Hazel
Jaborandi
Passion Flower
Mandrake starts (Aunt Linnia?)
It wasn't all that great of a start to a potions garden, but I had to begin somewhere, and I was reasonably sure that I should be able to get the list here. Once my legs stopped protesting from all the stairs. I was such a pansy.
“Pardon me, may I take this seat?”
A medium-height, average-looking woman seized the back of the other chair before I could answer. When she sat I saw that the only real noticeable thing about her was that she dressed expensively—in the steel-gray pants suit that the ruling class women wore, complete with the RJO embroidered on her shirt sleeve. Long brown hair was pulled back into a bun.
“The cafe's empty,” I said.
“Dismal, isn't it? Ah, thank you.” The woman didn't even glance at her cappuccino, much less the young man who brought it to the table. She extended her hand, not to be shaken, but to be genteely held, the greeting I'd seen upper-end women give each other. A gold and ruby bracelet coiled around her wrist, the stones so dark they appeared maroon. I didn't take her hand as she said, “I am Mrs. Shelly Johnson, and I want to say first that it's a terrible shame what happened to you.”
“Mrs. Johnson, is there a reason you invited yourself to my table?”
“Invited myself! Why, I asked if it was taken.”
“Which you took before allowing me time to reply. But as you are already seated, please remain so. I have a meeting to attend, but please stay and enjoy your drink.”
So saying, I took my list and doughnut and walked out the door. People like her never paid up front, they required a tab which they'd run up and up until they felt ready to move on. But she couldn't leave without paying, because the market laws at least were strict on everyone on that topic. While I opened the door, she bolted upright, spilling some of her drink, and she turned to hiss her annoyance at the table—by the time she looked back, I'd gone invisible by using my favorite ring.
I didn't go far. I leaned against the side of the cafe and watched. Supposedly no one stole because the crime was enforced using anti-theft spells which made the sky light up and painted the thief neon pink. I wanted to see if that was true.
At first she didn't seem to believe that I'd walked out on her—then her porcelain painted face turned colors. Not that I'd ever seen someone so angry that they'd turned black, but this was about the closest thing that I could imagine to match the turn of phrase. She mouthed words and sat down, then stood up, sat down again, took the cup and blew over it, then saw it was dripping into her lap and put the thing down again. She stomped over to the counter and rang the bell in a rapid beating. The young man had gone in the back, presumably to check the toilets or something.
While she waited for him she scowled at the door and rocked from heel to toe, toe to heel, and back again. When less than a minute passed, she set about pacing back and forth between the door and counter. By the time a whole minute was up, she stood in front of the door, glaring at it. When the attendant arrived, he saw her impatience and took his time entering the wrong thing into the till, having to redo it before counting out her change. Then she was storming out the door, still struggling to stuff her wallet into her clutch.
On the walkway, she gazed up and down, left and right, then all of it back over again, before she turned my way. I shrunk tight against the column of the building. She passed by so close I smelled the floral-musk of her perfume. It smelled nice, too bad it was on a woman like her. After she'd gone some ways and decided to go towards King's Ransom, I went in the other direction and downstairs.
A big drawback to being invisible in a crowd is that no one can see you. Of course that's the whole point behind being invisible, but usually when you are invisible it is because you want certain people to not see you—not to get unintentional elbows in the back or pushed over the edge. Once I was sure that Shelly Johnson was gone, I removed the ring and made some man yelp and leap into a vendor's baskets which she was trying to sell. Before she could turn her ire onto me, I kept going.
The next level down, I had only to peer over the edge to see a jungle-like mass of vegetation below. The urge to play Tarzan made me want to jump onto a palm tree, but maturity prevented such an action. No point in breaking my neck when I had a child at home, after all. Once I was level with the plants, all thoughts as to sticking to list or budget were put out of mind.
Flowers of all sorts crowded the deck from ankle to high overhead, blocking out the light from fairy orbs underneath the decks above. Micro-flora grew on pieces of display stumps or roots or branches. In a few places, brightly colored birds roosted in the branches of bananas and oranges. For a long time I just went from one end of the deck to the other, taking in all the twists and turns of the path, then returning back the way I'd come. Conscious of the space restrictions in my house, I picked out the things on my list, seeing what each vendor could offer.
“Mandrake? Have you the permit?” asked a tall, lean man upon inspecting my list.
Attempts to regulate some potion items, such as mandrake and nightshade and hemlock, was largely contained to the actual production of the plants but there were rumors of extending that legislation to include the purchase of items. While this might be enforced in the larger markets, such as Merlyn's, it wouldn't stop the black market.
I was about to answer the vendor that I was waiting for an inspector for my facilities when a familiar voice said from behind, “That is not needed, she can use the fey specialty loophole.”
“Mrs. Johnson,” the man said and bowed.
Shelly Johnson smiled at me. “Isn't that right, Miss Swift?”
The way she said it sounded like a rankled cat hissing at a toddler. I did not smile back at her. “Mrs. Johnson, I was about to say that I have a temporary number from the constabulary.”
“Is the creature immunity not enough for you?”
“The creature immunity does nothing except label me as a thing which is less than human.”
“It serves us as it serves you. Your recent court proceedings would have been very different had you been a pure blood.”
She was right about that, but I wondered what was behind the comment. Resisting the urge to cross my arms, I kept my voice soft and behavior open and pleasant. “I followed the guidance of those who know far more than I do about the letter of the law. However, doesn't it strike you as a bit unequal to have different procedures and consequences and opportunities for pure or mixed bloods?”
“Opportunities? How so?”
I resisted the urge to count them off on my fingers. The poor vendor was a helpless observer to our fight. “With the exception of a few businesses, every place requires permits which are obtained through the constabulary. If the immunity and the permit are equal, this distinction should not be made. This is enough in itself, but it is harder for a mixed blood to obtain a permit because they assume that your 'creature social regulation' has somehow forbidden you from using the immunity. It was a bit of hassle to get the constabulary to confirm this wasn't the case.”
“Miss Swift, you certainly must admit that the races have different strengths and weaknesses, and that in order to provide an equal—”
“—I do not agree. In the non-magical world, they've fairly proven that there is no difference. In fact, they can't even tell the DNA of a pure blood apart from the DNA of a mixed blood. It all looks like familial traits, nothing more.”
“That's rubbish,” Shelly Johnson said. “We are nothing like you.”
&
nbsp; “You've never been beyond the magical world, have you?”
But of course she hadn't. Few of the ruling class had. I turned back to the vendor, gave him my temporary number, and he murmured something about sending my order of plants along with the others.
As I made my way to go home, Shelly Johnson followed. “Miss Swift, please forgive my hasty words. I admit there are things I haven't experience with yet.”
Lost Magic (The Swift Codex Book 3) Page 10
