‘Snake Eyes,’ my mouth said before I’d made the decision to speak.
The crowd stilled, suddenly silent. Snake Eyes was bad luck, a losing throw; I’d been planning on calling an ace and deuce. I clenched my hands, angry—stupid to have kissed the dice without looking first—but it was too late now, I’d called.
Blue rolled, and I watched with sick inevitability as the first die stopped with one dark pip showing, then the other bounced and landed with two pips uppermost.
‘Ace and Deuce,’ Blue rumbled, carefully pocketing the dice and then drawing the pot of money towards him. ‘Sorry, miss, no winnin’ this time, yous lost.’
Fuck. Playing the crapshoot was supposed to be just a formality if you weren’t human. And the Glamour was on the surface only, it couldn’t affect the outcome. Someone had tagged the dice with some sort of spell. I scanned the crowd—living and ghosts—but nobody’s face registered any more interest than was normal.
I produced another twenty and forced a smile. ‘Let’s try again.’
‘No can do, miss.’ Blue shook his head sadly. ‘If yous don’t win first go-round, yous don’t get no more chances ’til next sundown.’
I crumpled the twenty in my fist. Damn. No way did I want to wait until tomorrow night—
A chill hand wrapped its fingers around mine and tugged at my arm. I turned to stare into the big empty eyes of Cosette, the child-ghost who was haunting me. I froze, my heart pounding as I struggled with the urge to tear my hand from hers and jump up and run like the hounds of Hell were after me.
Cosette tugged again, more insistently this time. I got the message; she wanted me to go with her. With a reluctant look at the crap game, I let her pull me away and out to the museum entrance. As soon as I stepped outside, she pointed up to the street, and then flashed out of existence.
A female stood at the top of the entrance stairs. She stared arrogantly down at me from under the dark brim of her fedora hat, her tall, graceful body clad in a smart russet trouser-suit. Her eyes shone startlingly green, the colour of new leaves in spring, no whites, no pupils. Behind her stood a short, chunky male, his brown pinstripe suit at odds with his rain-wilted straw Panama. His eyes shone the same spring green as his companion’s. Neither had any eyebrows, which made their pale faces look oddly unfinished, and both were obviously bald under their hats, but then, pruning the twigs off their scalps was a long-standing tradition. Shit. What had I done to deserve being waylaid by a pair of dryads?
‘Ms Taylor?’ The female tilted her head and her domed forehead lined in a slight frown. ‘Ah yes, I see now,’ she murmured. ‘The Glamour is very good, Ms Taylor; no wonder the trees took some time to locate you.’
Damn tree spirits, they had their spies everywhere. All it took was a breath of air and info could pass from one side of London to the other faster than it took to ask, ‘What’s that rustling noise the leaves are making?’
Fedora spoke again. ‘I am Sylvia. My mother, the Lady Isabella, wishes to speak with you.’
‘What about?’
Fedora’s mouth thinned in disapproval at my blunt question, but she still answered. ‘She is disturbed by the current unrest in London. It appears to be getting less comfortable for fae as the days and nights go by.’
‘Tell Lady Isabella,’ I said flatly, ‘that I’m sorry for whatever problems she is having, but I’m not sure that my speaking to her right now is going to help.’
‘I think you’ve misunderstood me, Ms Taylor. I am afraid this isn’t a request, and if necessary’—she snapped her fingers, and Chunky in his limp Panama moved to stand at her side—‘I will have to use force.’ Her smile was more a baring of her brown-stained teeth than anything friendly. ‘Although of course it would be better if you accompanied us quietly.’
And of course, going quietly was only better for her, not me! I let my shoulders slump, briefly looking round to see how many more dryads were skulking round. I picked them out by their hats. A tall, slightly bent-over male in a black Stetson to the left, a pair of skinny saplings wearing knitted beanies—yellow and green—the other side of the road, and to the right
... I couldn’t see. The corner of the building had me in a blind spot.
Time to hustle.
I placed my foot on the first step. ‘I really don’t want any trouble, you know, Sylvia,’ I said, keeping my voice soft and calm. ‘But I would like to phone my boss. I don’t want him to worry.’ I took another step up, showing willing.
‘You may contact your employer in the car, Ms Taylor.’ She indicated a glossy green Rolls Royce a few yards along the road.
‘Fair enough.’ I pasted a resigned look on my face, looking up at her and Chunky, and made a show of patting my pockets. Which way to make a break for it, left or right? The car was left, all the easier to bundle me up and into if I went that way. Of course, they’d have to catch me first. So it looked like right was the preferred escape route, even with the blind spot. I exaggerated a frown, then held my hands out, empty. ‘Damn! I’m sorry, Sylvia, but my phone’s not in my jacket pockets.’ It was in my jeans, so not a lie. I jerked my head back. ‘Maybe it’s in the museum?’ I raised my voice in question.
Her pale face narrowed in annoyance, then she breathed sharply in through her nose. ‘Malus, help Ms Taylor retrieve her phone. Quickly, please.’
Chunky nodded and started down the steps.
‘Hey, I’m really sorry about this.’ I smiled sheepishly, took another couple of steps up to meet him, then shot my arm up as if to catch him, saying loudly, ‘Watch out, the steps are slippery from the rain.’
He started and looked down, hands reaching out instinctively as I’d hoped, and I grabbed his wrist and yanked. He overbalanced, teetering forward, then toppled, doing a diving belly-flop into the museum, hitting the ticket desk Panama-hatted-head first.
Fedora’s mouth gaped open in surprise. I took the rest of the steps in a leap, bent forward and head-butted her hard in her stomach. She fell back, landing with a spine-cracking crunch on the pavement, a whoosh of air whistling from her open mouth. I jumped over her trouser-suited legs and ran.
I went right, racing past the shocked face of the two Beanies, and jinked to one side, only just evading the grappling arms of a giant oak-sized guy with a purple-patterned bandana tied low over his mahogany-skinned forehead. I picked up pace and sprinted along Clink Street. The cobbles were still wet from the earlier rain, the air chill with moisture and the early evening greyness was dissolving into streetlamp sodium that spilled halos of light onto the ground.
My heart was beating fast and adrenalin was pumping through my body as I wondered what the hell Lady Isabella was up to. Okay, so maybe her life was out of kilter with the anti-fae demos, but that was no reason to send her dryads out to kidnap me. Had she been the one to booby-trap the phouka’s dice? I stretched my legs, sucked air into my lungs and felt my body settle into a familiar fast-run mode. One good thing about running regularly: a couple of days’ forced bed-rest doped up on morphine hadn’t dented my fitness much. I could keep this pace up for a good few miles, but I could hear the dull boom of feet behind me and the rhythm sounded as practised as mine. I was almost sure it was the guy in the bandana chasing me; the others had looked too stunned to react that quickly—and Bandana Guy had been the only one who’d tried to stop me. I didn’t check behind; I was either faster than him or not and looking back wasn’t going to change that.
The buildings on my left ended abruptly and the bulk of the Golden Hind filled the gap, its masts rising into the star-spiked sky. A crowd of City types heading for post-work drinks at the pub beside the boat spilled across the narrow street in front of me. I waved my arms, grinning like a lunatic, and shouted ‘Whoo hoo! Girl coming through,’ and they laughed goodnaturedly as I dodged between and past them.