Rise of the Darklings (12 page)

“Why?” asked Emily. “What does it do?”

“That, I cannot tell you.”

Emily hated people keeping secrets from her. She tried to hide her disappointment as Merrian handed the satchel across to Corrigan.

“Tell me, lass,” he said, turning his attention back to Emily, “did you notice anything strange when you traveled here?”

“Strange? Like what?”

Merrian gently pushed her to the door. “What do you see?”

Emily looked outside. “People. Gray clouds. Wet streets. Horses. Carriages.”

“You’re not
looking
, Emily. How did you find this shop? Because you shouldn’t have been able to. It has a glamour cast over it. When you came here, you were walking through
the streets, the way you normally do. But when you got close, what happened?”

Emily shrugged. “I imagined the shop in my head. I knew I was on the right street, so I just tried to remember where it was.” Emily was unsure what Merrian wanted her to say. “I knew it had to be here, and it was.”

“Try and get back into that frame of mind,” said Merrian. “Then look outside again. Carefully, this time.”

Emily tried to think about how she found the shop. She had felt distracted, because most of her thoughts were on Ravenhill, but in the back of her mind, she had still been thinking about the shop. She tried to repeat the feeling now, letting her mind drift, but still focusing on Merrian’s words. Then she looked at the people walking along the street, their heads down to the ground as they hurried about their business. She saw nothing unusual.

But then she realized this wasn’t true. As she watched, it was as though people, previously hidden to her, somehow
faded
into view. Only, that wasn’t right. They had always been there, she just hadn’t been able to see them. Her eyes simply … 
skipped
over them.

They were the fey, walking along the street as if they didn’t have a care in the world. And the normal, ordinary Londoners couldn’t see them. They walked right past them without giving them so much as a second look.

A man walked past with a bag of coal over his shoulder. The bag bulged and moved, as if a cat or some other animal were inside. But then a small head poked up out of the bag, and another, and another: three small olive-skinned creatures were stealing a ride. A woman approached Emily, her skin white as freshly poured milk. As she passed by, Emily saw that the back of her body was entirely hollow, like a scooped-out doll.

Emily turned to watch her go, amazed.

“I was right,” said Merrian, satisfaction heavy in his voice. “You’re a True Seer.”

She glanced at Merrian. “A what?”

“A True Seer. Some of your people have the ability to see through our glamour, to see us when we’d rather stay hidden. When you saw the fight this morning—when the piskies’ glamour was weakened—it must have woken your talent. It’s happened before, many times. No doubt it will happen again.”

“What happens to these Seers?”

“Sometimes the Invisible Order finds out and recruits them. Sometimes they go mad. Sometimes they write books, paint paintings.” Merrian shrugged. “Sometimes, they just carry on with their lives.”

“Has it always been like this?” Emily gestured outside. “I mean, have you always been here?”

Merrian nodded. “For as long as London has existed. And long before that.”

Emily turned her attention back to the street. Two tall, elegantly dressed women walked past, but it was clear to Emily they weren’t human. Their limbs were too thin, too stretched. Their eyes were beautiful and golden, yet at the same time cold and cruel, as if they had never given or received any kindness, and worse still, didn’t care. A small trunk floated along the ground behind them. As Emily watched, they plucked a dirty bonnet from the head of a young woman and dropped it into the trunk. The woman didn’t notice a thing.

“What are they doing?”

“Shopping. Well,
taking
. They’re hoarders. They take everything and anything, as long as it’s made by a human.”

“Why?”

“No idea. Never bothered to ask them.”

Emily was about to ask how many of these “True Seers” there were, but at that moment Ravenhill suddenly stepped into view, framed in the open doorway.

“Hello, Miss Snow. May I join the party?”

Merrian cursed and yanked Emily out of the way, pushing the door shut. But not before Ravenhill threw something through the narrow gap. Emily felt a wet splash across her face, and Merrian growled in pain. He turned a key in the
lock and staggered back, holding his arm out before him. Emily saw that the skin on his forearm was smoking, and an ugly wound was opening up before her eyes. He staggered to the counter and grabbed some of the leftover paste from that morning, slapping it over his arm.

“What was that?” asked Emily, frightened.

“Holy water,” said Corrigan. “Don’t worry, it won’t affect you. Merrian, what do we do?”

There was a hammering on the door behind them.

“You need to complete your mission and get the parchment to the Queen. If the Order gets it, there’ll be hell to pay.”

Corrigan grabbed the satchel and strapped it to his back.

“Take the girl with you. She knows too much to let the Order get her.”

Corrigan hesitated. “Are you sure?”

“Aye, I’m sure. Hurry up. Go out the back way.”

“What about you?” asked Emily.

Merrian smiled coldly, and Emily almost felt sorry for Ravenhill. Almost.

“I’ll delay them,” he said. “I’ve a few tricks up my sleeve. Don’t worry about me.”

There was another bang on the door. This time it rattled on its hinges.

“Go, Corrigan. I’ll see you later.”

Corrigan hesitated. A pane of glass shattered behind
them as a stone flew through the window, hitting one of the book towers. The falling books hit another pile, and this one fell against a cabinet, smashing the glass and sending bottles and jars crashing to the floor.

Corrigan jumped from the counter onto Emily’s shoulder. “Come on,” he shouted. “Through the curtain.”

Emily darted behind the counter. She took one last look over her shoulder and saw Merrian arm himself with a club and turn to face the front of the shop.

Emily ran through a kitchen and yanked open the back door. It led to an overgrown garden, choked thick with grass and nettles and a tall thorn tree. A gate led into a litter-strewn alley.

Emily stepped through the gate. As soon as she set foot in the alley, there was a shout off to her right, and she turned to see Blackmore running toward her. Emily turned and ran in the opposite direction. The exit to the alley was about fifty paces ahead, a bright gap between the walls, a promise of escape and safety. But as she drew closer, the light was blocked out by the silhouette of a man.

“Don’t let her through!” shouted Blackmore from behind her.

The man spread his arms and legs wide, trying to block off as much of the alley as he could. Emily couldn’t stop. There was no other way out.

Instead, she picked up speed.

“What are you doing?” shouted Corrigan. “Are you blind as well as stupid?”

Emily ignored the piskie. As she drew closer, she could make out the face of the man ahead of her. He was grinning, confident he would stop her.

Emily glanced over her shoulder to see Blackmore lagging behind, huffing and puffing.

She was no more than ten paces away from the end of the alley.

Five paces.

Four.

And then Emily reached up and grabbed hold of Corrigan. He cried out in surprise, but that was nothing compared to the shout he gave when Emily bent back her arm and threw him high into the air over the man’s head.

The man straightened up in shock, his head tilting back as Corrigan sailed above him. Emily dropped to the mud, skidded between his legs, and pushed herself up again, still on the move. Corrigan was now falling from the sky, tumbling end over end. Emily put on an extra burst of speed, just managing to catch the piskie before he crashed into the ground.

She gripped him to her chest, put her head down, and ran as though her life depended on it.

Which it probably did.

C
HAPTER
S
IX

E
mily felt rather strange hurrying through the streets of London with a piskie perched on her shoulder—a piskie no one but she could see or hear.

Although, at the moment, she found herself wishing she
couldn’t
hear him.

“I can’t believe you did that,” said Corrigan. “What if you hadn’t caught me?”

“But I did.”

“But what if you hadn’t?”

“Then you would have a few scratches, wouldn’t you?”

Corrigan didn’t say anything. Emily glanced at her shoulder and saw that he was sitting with his arms folded. Sulking.

Let him
, thought Emily. At least she’d get some peace and quiet.

Now that Merrian had shown her the fey, she found that with a little concentration, she could see them everywhere. Here was a small, dirty dwarf with an unhappy-looking flying sprite tied to a piece of string so it couldn’t get away. There was a bald woman wearing a cloak totally covered in thick, hairy spiders the size of Emily’s hand, spiders that turned their glinting eyes in her direction as she walked by. And most astounding of all, she saw a trio of what appeared to be children, but all with fox heads. They walked along the street, their tongues lolling out of grinning mouths that showed sharp, dangerous teeth. Emily paused to watch them pass. How on earth had she missed all of this before?

They walked on for about another twenty minutes, then Corrigan stiffened and straightened up on her shoulder. “Stop,” he ordered. “Don’t go any farther.”

“Why?”

Corrigan looked around. Emily did the same. They were alone on the road. “Go back and take the first right. Hurry up.”

“Why? What’s down this road?”

“Take a look for yourself,” said Corrigan.

Emily looked. At first she couldn’t see anything, but then she noticed the glint of eyes behind a hedge. A moment later, a group of piskies leapt over a wall and stood on the
pavement some twenty paces ahead of them. They looked like the piskies Corrigan had been fighting that morning, except the black tattoos on their skin were different.

“Is that the Black Sidhe?” she asked fearfully.

“No. That’s a different tribe. They are Unseelie, though. Another two steps and you would have taken us into the Dagda’s territory. We’d already be dead.”

Emily took a nervous step backward.

“Keep going,” said Corrigan. “They can’t have heard about the parchment; otherwise they’d have attacked us by now.”

Emily turned and hurried back the way she’d come. She cast a nervous glance over her shoulder. The piskies were gone.

“Is the whole of London separated into territories, then?”

“Not all. Some of the city is neutral, but most of it’s fair game. We fight, we win, we take their territory. We fight, they win, they take ours. Turn left here,” he said, pointing down a side road.