“That bird on your shoulder is the reason behind the legends,” Murchaud said.
Kit glanced over his shoulder at the elf‑Prince. Murchaud moved wearily, as if his bones ached, frowning as Kit met his gaze. “Too much iron?” Kit asked.
Murchaud nodded. “London is full of it.”
“The reason behind the legends?” Will’s voice, considering. He leaned heavily on Tom’s arm now, to Kit’s concealed annoyance. “That seems to me a statement that begs an explanation, Your Highness.”
Kit coughed, every breath still carrying the metallic reek of the ravens’ blood crackling and itching on his skin. He stopped with his hand across his mouth, his feet suddenly too heavy to lift, and turned to Murchaud in speechless amazement. His mouth worked once or twice. “But he lies in Faerie,” Kit said. “Thou didst show me his bier.”
“Beg pardon,” said Ben, at the front with the lantern. “But all this talking will make it certain that if Baines isahead of us, he’ll hear us coming.”
“Wait, Ben,” Tom answered. “I have a feeling we’d do well to hear this out. Kit, of whom dost speak?”
Kit didn’t look, didn’t lower his eyes from Murchaud’s. The Elf‑knight shrugged. “Aye. He sleeps in Faerie as well, but–”
“All stories are true,” Kit finished, and craned his neck for a better look at the raven. The bird cocked its head at him, a sideways twist like a girl tossing her hair, and Kit laughed low in his throat. “I’ll be buggered,” he said, and angled his gaze to meet Will’s eyes.
Will shook his head. “Thou’rt insane.”
“Arthur Pendragon,” Kit said, and so saying made his nagging suspicion crystallize with a sound like cracking ice. He turned to face Murchaud, and bit his lip on the smile he wanted to taste. “Turned into a raven when he died. Murchaud–”
“Aye?” The Prince did smile. “It changes nothing. We protect the bird, and we climb.”
“Oh,” Will said, craning his neck to examine the profile of the black bird on his shoulder. “And when we get to the surface?”
“We deal with my mother and my wife,” Murchaud answered. “We save the life of a mortal King. We do not let England or Faerie fall.”
“That’s something I’m not sure I understand,” Will said, still idly caressing the raven’s head. “What is it that they hope to accomplish here tonight, Prince Murchaud? Why are the Fae in London at all?”
Murchaud shrugged; Kit felt the heavy lift and drop of the Prince’s shoulders, the swing of his cloak, and spared a moment wishing for his own patchwork cloak. Baines probably burned it.The imagined loss stung. “It’s an auspicious night for the overthrow of regimes. Baines’ plans are not the only ones coming to fruition on November fifth.”
“No,” Kit said. “Lucifer’s as well – ” He was struck by a sudden, vivid memory of the Mebd’s golden hair spread between his fingers, the cool, smooth surface of a tortoise‑shell comb, and he stopped and lowered his voice so that only the Elf‑knight would hear. “Morgan’s. What’s Morgan after, Murchaud? I remember when first I came to Faerie, it was her ear thou didst whisper into, and not the Mebd’s.”
Murchaud rested a hand on his elbow, almost lifting him up the ragged stairs. Only pride kept Kit from leaning hard on Murchaud’s arm. “Thinkst thou so little of me, Sir Poet, that I must serve the agenda of my mother or my Queen, and have no passions of mine own?” The hand squeezed, pulling the sting from the words.
Kit shot Murchaud a sideways glance, and realized it was true. Exactly and precisely: he had indeed assumed that Murchaud served Morgan’s whims, and to a lesser extent those of the Mebd. “Very well,” he said. “What is it that thou dost seek?”
Freedom,” Murchaud answered succinctly. “We all have our own purposes in seducing thee, Sir Poet. Thee, and that which thou dost harbor.”
“Seducing me.” He laughed. “In Morgan’s case, breaking me into a shape of which she approved. She told me she thought I was the one who could reconcile Faerie and Hell, England’s crown and the Prometheans.”
“Aye. And the Mebd thinks that thou – and Mehiel – are the ones who can burst Faerie’s bond with Hell, can destroy the Prometheans so that we no longer need Lucifer’s protection from the avenging spirit the Prometheans would set as the Divine.”
“Lucifer is Prometheus,” Kit said. “I do not understand why he takes payment to protect us from himself.”
Murchaud laughed softly. “An old acquaintance of Robert Poley’s, and thou dost not understand how extortion works? Besides” – a modest pause – “Lucifer no doubt has plans of his own. Which he has not seen fit to share.”
“He maneuvers all the pieces,” Kit answered, climbing. Will slipped on the stairs. Kit reached up to steady him, and Murchaud steadied Kit. Above them, Ben kept climbing, inexorable as a Jewish golem,and at the rear, Tom followed. No one spoke, and Kit realized they were all listening as intently to his quiet conversation with Murchaud as if they leaned close over a candle‑lit table in some tavern, whispering conspiracies. “I believe I know what he wants, Murchaud.”
Murchaud turned his head. “Aye?”
“The love of God,” Kit said plainly, and winced at his own forgetfulness when Murchaud flinched and stumbled.
“Thy pardon, Kit – ”
“Nay,” Kit said. “Thy pardon, I cry. But that does not answer the question that holds me most.”
“Aye?”
“What is it that thouseekest, Elf‑knight? Thou hast not made that plain to me, but thou must have some use for me, or thou wouldst not have been so kind, so long.”
“I–” The Elf‑knight hesitated. “I am Fae.”
It was not an excuse, but simply a statement, and Kit nodded agreement. “‘Tis so. So tell me now.”
A low, solemn laugh. “Thou didst never ask before.”
“I make no argument. And I am asking now.”
“Faerie,” Murchaud said. “Sovereign.” He looked pointedly at the raven huddled on Will’s shoulder. “I would like to see the ghosts and legends settled. I’d like, perhaps, to know for a day what story I might walk through–”
“You want what Baines wants,” Kit said coolly. “You want to choose the nature of the Divine.”
“‘Tis futile,” Murchaud answered. “Say rather I’d prefer that some stories were just stories. That a legend could change without changing the world. Call it the inverse of the Prometheans’ goal–if they wish to shape the stories, I wish to not be shaped by them.”
Kit considered that in silence for a moment or two, and found himself in sympathy. Mehiel?
«Ask me not about morality,» the angel said unhappily. «when I, an Angel of the Lord, find myself in love with Lucifer Morningstar.»
Kit blinked at the words. In love.
«Hast another name for it?»
Slowly, thoughtfully, Kit shook his head. If I found a way to free thee, Mehiel–
«Thou must not,» the angel said. «Thou must not give thy life up needlessly. We will endure.»
–regardless. If thou wert freed, what wouldst thou do?
A hesitation as the angel pondered his question. Fleetingly, Kit wondered if an angel could lie.
«Go home.» Mehiel answered, after a little while.
Return to God’s embrace. Go back to Heaven, and out of Hell. Despite thy love for the Morningstar.
«Wouldst not thou? Wouldst choose love over Heaven?»
Kit chuckled softly. Mehiel.He laid a hand on Murchaud’s arm, and Murchaud gave him the edge of a worried smile in the inadequate, flickering light. I have.
Another pause for thought. «Wouldst choose love over duty, then? Over remaining true to thyself?»
And Kit thought of Edward de Vere, and shook his head. Thou art right. But what wilt thou take home to the Lord thy God that thou hadst not when thou wert taken? Thou, Mehiel. Thou who art a piece of God?
«Thee,» the angel answered without hesitation. «Man, mortal and fragile. I know thee now, and thou art more worthy of brotherhood than I had realized. And I will take in that brotherhood all thou art, and thy true‑love’s grief and pity over his son, over thy pain. I will take the Fae in all their sorrow and bitterness and their solemn pact with Hell.»