by Morgan Rice
Worse, even if he survived, there would be no way for him to protect Kaia. The most he could hope was that she was taking this moment to get away…
Instead, she screamed, and memories of Kaia screaming before filled Pinsley’s mind even as the sound filled his ears. He remembered this from when the constables had tried to arrest her to drag her to Bedlam. He remembered the sound of it from the chapel, as well. Pinsley clapped his hands over his ears.
Even as he did so, the young men around him were sent flying by some unseen force, picked up and thrown away from him like cricket balls delivered by some gigantic bowler. They tumbled, and slammed against the houses. Some of them rose with groans, others had to be helped to their feet by their friends. All of them looked terrified. Somehow, that force didn’t touch Pinsley, as if it recognized him as a friend, or as if Kaia was able to aim it.
They turned and ran, off into the morning mist of the city. Pinsley let them go, instead sitting up and staring at Kaia. The echoes of her scream were still ringing out, and this time, Pinsley couldn’t dismiss it as some trick, some chance happening.
She’d just done something impossible, and Pinsley couldn’t even begin to explain how.
CHAPTER FIVE
Kaia stood there panting in the wake of what she’d just done. She felt empty and exhausted, as though everything inside her had poured out in one go. Emotions roiled in her, from the residue of the fear that had been in her before, to satisfaction at sending her would be attackers flying, to shock that she had somehow done it.
Even having used these powers before, it still took her by surprise. No, it wasn’t quite right; she hadn’t used the powers, it was more like they’d used her, flowing out of Kaia without any decision on her part. Now, she didn’t know what to feel, except grateful that the attack was done.
“You found me,” she said, going to Inspector Pinsley. She helped him to his feet. “If you hadn’t come along…”
“It looks as though you might have been able to save yourself,” Pinsley said. He looked shocked, like he’d seen a ghost. No, it was more than that, like he’d seen a ghost after years of thinking that no such thing could possibly exist.
“I don’t know if this would have happened if the situation had been different,” Kaia said. She was so touched that he’d come after her. No one else had ever been there for her, yet here he was
“What exactly did just happen, Kaia?” Pinsley asked. “What did you just do?”
That was the inspector Kaia knew, always looking for an explanation, trying to reason out what was happening in the world.
“I’m not sure,” Kaia said. “But it has something to do with the Shadowseers, something to do with the shadows, and all of this.”
“I…” She could see Pinsley trying to make sense of it. “I do not know what to say to all of this. I have seen you send five young men flying, and yet I cannot comprehend it. Such a thing feels like it must be a trick, and yet I cannot see how it would be. I must believe that you have done this, but for the how of it… there must be an explanation. There must.”
“That I’m what Xander said I was?” Kaia said.
She saw the inspector freeze in place. “Kaia… there is something I must tell you.”
The graveness of his expression said that whatever he had to say, it was serious.
“Xander is dead,” the inspector said. “By his own hand.”
Kaia felt shock at the suddenness of that. She also felt a wash of pity for the former Shadowseer who had become a murderer under the influence of the shadows. He had deserved so much better than that.
“I’m sorry,” Pinsley said, reaching out to touch Kaia’s arm.
“I know you don’t believe all the stuff about the shadows, or the Shadowseers,” Kaia said. “But will you at least acknowledge that there are other forces at play here?”
“There is something happening,” Pinsley said. “But even after this, as a man of reason, I cannot simply accept that some great play of supernatural forces is at work.”
“But you still came after me,” Kaia pointed out, feeling gratitude that he had, until one reason why he might have done that occurred to her. “I’m not going back. I know you don’t believe me, but I have to get to France, whatever it takes.”
“I can see that you’re determined,” Pinsley said. “And that’s part of the reason I have decided that I cannot permit you to go alone.”
“You can’t stop… wait, you’re not trying to stop me?” Kaia asked, caught a little off guard. “You’re coming with me?”
“It is all I can think of that will keep you safe,” Pinsley said. “And I believe that the death tonight speaks to something larger happening, supernatural or otherwise. So if you insist on going to France to pursue the matter, I will accompany you.”
Kaia hugged him out of sheer joy. She knew it wasn’t the appropriate thing to do out in the street like that, but she couldn’t help herself.
“Thank you!” she said. “Does this mean… should we go to the station?”
Even after everything that had just happened, she was eager to get started.
“If we are to do this, then we will do this properly,” Pinsley said. “We will return to the vicarage and collect whatever travelling clothes Lottie can find for you. I will return to my club, and collect what I need. We will make an application for the appropriate travelling papers. Then we will take the train and find a boat.”
*
“You want what?” The civil servant in front of them was in his middle years, of medium height, and apparently doing his best to be middling in every way. He stared at Pinsley and Kaia in clear disbelief.
“I want travel papers for myself and Kaia here,” Pinsley said. They were currently standing in a small office in Whitehall, wood paneled and almost deliberately drab.
“That part isn’t the problem,” the man said. He shook his head. “The problem is that you want them today. Such things take-”
“I know how long they usually take, Cecil,” Pinsley said, using the man’s given name deliberately and carefully. “That is why I’ve come to you. Do I need to remind you about the time back in the army when you chose to charge an enemy position single handed?”
“And you had to bail me out,” the civil servant said. “No, you don’t need to remind me.” He took out a couple of carefully written sheafs of paper. “But this makes us even.”
“Of course,” Pinsley said.
“Now, I know your name, but what about you, young lady?”
“Kaia,” Kaia said.
“And your family name?”
Pinsley saw Kaia freeze, obviously not knowing what to say. He hadn’t considered this.
“Smith,” he supplied, picking the commonest name he could.
“Kaia Smith,” Cecil repeated, writing it in, and then stamping both passports with an India Rubber stamp. “There, as far as the world is concerned, you both have the full protection of her majesty’s government around the world, such as it is. Her majesty’s government requests and requires… and so on. We’re still working on the wording from when we switch from the French.”
“For now, French is perfect,” Pinsley said. “After all, Kaia and I are headed to Paris.”
He saw the civil servant’s expression change. “You’re going where? Now? No, you can’t, think of the trouble that would…”
Pinsley didn’t wait for Cecil to finish. Instead, he snatched up the passports and turned to go.
“Thank you for your help,” he called back. “I’ll be sure to call in again next time I need something.”
“You said this made us even, Pinsley!”
*
“Tickets please!”
Pinsley enjoyed Kaia’s delight as she handed over her train ticket. She brought a joy to things that he had grown to see as ordinary, such as taking trains or riding in carriages. It reminded him a little of Olivia, but more than that, it reminded him of what it was like to be young.
Their bags,
a small travelling bag for Kaia and his old kit bag for him, rested above. They had to share their compartment today on the train, with a man who appeared to Pinsley to be some sort of travelling salesman, and a young man whose bearing suggested that he had once been a soldier, although he clearly wasn’t now.
“Are you travelling far?” the salesman asked.
“To the coast,” Pinsley said. He didn’t elaborate on their plans beyond that.
“I’m travelling all the way to Calais,” the salesman said. “I know they say that France is no place to be English right now, but the Emperor is a reasonable man.”
“A reasonable man who helped arrange the overthrow of the old king,” the former soldier said. “And then got himself into position as president so that he could take the country nice and legally. No one who gets ninety seven percent in a plebiscite is honest, or reasonable.”
“A sentiment I will not be raising there, I assure you,” the salesman said.
Pinsley watched out of the train’s window as they headed south and east, down towards the point on the coast closest to France. The smoke from the train made it hard to see properly, but still, it was pleasant to watch the countryside flashing past. Most of it was still countryside, although the smoke stacks of towns were visible in the distance. Kaia seemed to watch all of it with delight, at least until tiredness started to catch up with her, and she drifted into a doze in her seat.
It was starting to catch up with Pinsley, too. After all, he’d spent the night running around London, fighting dangerous criminals and being hurt. His side still ached where Xander had struck him, and if he’d had more time, Pinsley might have found a doctor.
As it was, he slept. He slept until he woke with Kaia shaking his shoulder.
“I think we’re here!” she said with a note of excitement.
Pinsley looked out of the window and saw the station at Dover. He and Kaia took their luggage and stepped out. Outside the station, the first thing that Pinsley noticed was the sea air. Kaia clearly noticed it too.
“It smells so… fresh!” she exclaimed.
“It does,” Pinsley agreed. That was one of the things about London: it was easy to learn to ignore anything, including the stink of so many people so close together. It was only now that he was here, with the salt air of the sea in his nose instead, that Pinsley was reminded of how bad it could be.
“So,” Kaia said. “What’s next?”
“Now, we find a boat to take us across the Channel,” Pinsley said. “There will be someone, even if it is only a fishing boat willing to make the journey for the right payment.”
The two of them headed down towards the docks. Pinsley’s eyes took in the range of different vessels there, from small fishing skiffs to huge steamships, even a whaling ship or two in port before their next voyage. He observed them all with a practical eye, trying to judge which looked to be getting ready to leave port and which had only just come in. It would be better if they found a captain heading their way quickly, rather than having to wait a day or two. Judging by Kaia’s expression, she was more caught up in the wonder of it all.
“There are ships on the Thames,” she said. “But not like this.”
“Not like this,” Pinsley agreed. Thames ships tended to be barges, certainly once they reached the bridges. These were bigger and sleeker, some still powered by sails alone, but more starting to be a mix of sail and steam, or steam alone.
His eyes sought out a likely looking vessel. It was an older looking sloop, but it looked sound enough to Pinsley’s eyes, and it was clearly loading, ready to leave. He took in the crates being loaded, and the markings on them.
“Ahoy there!” he called out.
An older man in a woolen hat and slightly outdated frock coat came up to the rail.
“Ahoy yourself,” he said.
“Are you heading across the Channel?” Pinsley asked.
“All the way to Calais,” the man said, with a shrug. “Someone’s got to.”
“And are you minded to take passengers over with you?” Pinsley asked.
“Aye, maybe. I suppose coin’s coin. Just you and the girl?”
Pinsley nodded.
“Ten shillings each.”
It was more than Pinsley would have preferred, but he suspected that no other boat would be ready to leave as quickly. Besides, it wasn’t as if he normally spent much of his wages. He took out the money and handed it over.
“We’re leaving straight away,” the sailor said. “If you were thinking of a leisurely tour of the town, find another boat. Probably best to get aboard now. You and your… daughter?”
That word hit Pinsley like a punch. Still, he did his best to disguise it.
“Kaia is not my daughter,” he said.
“Oh, your niece, then?” the sailor said, and this time his laugh was enough to raise Pinsley’s hackles.
“I’m not his ‘niece’ either,” Kaia said, in a tone that suggested she understood exactly what he was implying.
“She is my…” Pinsley struggled to think of a good word for what Kaia was “…my ward, and if you are not capable of behaving with courtesy around her, we will find another vessel on which to travel.”
“No, no of course, forgive me squire,” the sailor said, and showed them aboard, leading them to a cabin before hurrying off about his tasks.
“I am surprised that you understood what he was implying there, Kaia,” Pinsley said.
“At the orphanage, the expectation was that we’d end up in service to a family, or maybe to a wealthy man. They didn’t talk about it openly, but we all knew what it meant,” Kaia said.
The thought of that filled Pinsley with disgust. “When we get back, I intend to see that the place is shut down.”
“You can do that?” Kaia asked.
“I can try.”
“Thank you,” Kaia said, as if he’d just given her a gift. “Thank you so much.” She seemed to think for a moment. “If you knew that was what he was going to think, why didn’t you just agree that I was your daughter?”
Pinsley shook his head quickly. “That wouldn’t be right.”
“I know it would be a lie,” Kaia said quickly. “I just thought-”
“No,” Pinsley said, firmly. He couldn’t even explain why he was reacting like this to her, because that would involve delving into things that were far too personal, and far too painful. “Excuse me, I need some air.”
He hurried out of the cabin, back up onto the deck. The ship was casting off, out into the Channel. The last time Pinsley had been on a boat leaving England, it had been with the army, making his way over to the Crimea for war. Now, he was heading to Paris for reasons he didn’t entirely understand, with a girl who had the ability to do things he didn’t want to accept as real, very probably at the cost of his position once he returned home.
It should have felt like absolute folly. Pinsley was abandoning his duties, going off to a place that wouldn’t welcome him, at a time when things were in flux there. All because Kaia had persuaded him.
He stood there waiting until the white chalk cliffs of the English coast disappeared out of sight. The sea was calm, but even so, Pinsley felt as if his stomach was roiling with the enormity of what he was doing.
Kaia came out onto the deck, watching alongside him. She didn’t ask him about his walking out like that. Instead, she stood staring out with him at the horizon.
“I don’t mind what your reasons are for coming,” Kaia said, keeping her eyes, straight ahead even when Pinsley looked over to her. “I don’t get why it’s so strange, pretending I’m your daughter, when you can say that I’m your ward, but I don’t mind that either. What matters is that you’re here, doing this.”
“I just hope that we find what you’re looking for,” Pinsley said. He had to hope that there would be some kind of answers out there, in Paris, or beyond.
“I hope so too,” Kaia said. “And I hope that I can prove to you that all of this is real.”
Pinsley wasn’t sure what to say to that, or what to hope. If Kaia was mistaken about all this, or somehow lying, then he was coming all this way for no reason. If she was right… if she was right, then it risked undermining everything he’d ever believed in.
Even so, he had to know. Not knowing what else to say, he stood there, looking out at the horizon as the ship made rapid progress across the waves. Gulls flashed past, and Pinsley thought he saw the flicker of a shoal of fish under the water, near the surface. Kaia laughed with delight as a couple leapt clear. Again, Pinsley had the impression of seeing the world through her eyes, but this time he couldn’t enjoy it quite as much, because it reminded him too much of the daughter he’d lost.
In spite of that joy, the journey still took several hours, and Pinsley was only too grateful when the unrelenting water on the horizon ahead finally gave way to something else. The thinnest ribbon of land lay there in the distance, barely visible, but there nonetheless.
“Is that…” Kari began.
Pinsley nodded. “France.”
And from there, they just had to make their way to Paris and finding answers to the situation that had somehow enveloped them both.
CHAPTER SIX
Kaia wasn’t sure what she’d expected when arriving in another country. Perhaps for it to be an almost fantastical place, full of wonders that the mind could barely comprehend. Perhaps hostility, or to be turned back.
Instead, there was a dock that looked remarkably similar to the one that they’d left, with ships arranged along it, and sailors hurrying about their business. One official looking man climbed aboard the boat, but after a quick inspection of the cargo and a brief conversation with the captain, he quickly left again.
“A customs official,” Pinsley guessed. “And that went more smoothly than I could have hoped. He didn’t even check our papers.”
They gathered their belongings and stepped off the boat, onto dry land. It briefly felt as though the whole world was swimming around Kaia, refusing to stay still, even for a moment. The inspector had to catch her arm, holding her up.
