Claire went on, with a tight smile. “The victims are human. Five of them, none who would be missed — low in gang hierarchies, grimy and ill-fed, too insignificant to be worth a House’s regard.” There was no mistaking the anger in her voice. Among other things, Lazarus ran charity kitchens, hospitals, and hostels, where, regardless of your allegiance or your past, you would be made welcome for a few nights.
“Which gangs?” Philippe asked sharply.
Claire gave him an appraising look. “None of the Red Mambas, though I would guess your… friends will be worried as well.”
“Those deaths don’t really concern the House,” Madeleine said, though she didn’t know, not really. It was dark out there, in the devastated streets of the city; and if one crazy person had got into his head to play serial killer, she wasn’t really sure what Silverspires could have to do with it. “I’ll tell Selene, but you know I can’t guarantee anything.”
“No, of course not.” Claire inclined her head. “But it’ll be something. Good-bye.”
It was only after she and her entourage had gone, when Isabelle looked up and asked, “But surely she could tell Lady Selene herself?” that Madeleine thought back on what Claire had said. “I don’t know,” she said. “I don’t like it. There’s a sting in here somewhere for Silverspires, but I don’t know what it is yet.”
“She wanted something out of us,” Philippe said. “And I’m not sure if she didn’t get it.”
“How do you know her?” Madeleine asked.
Philippe looked straight at her; and suddenly she understood why he rarely met people’s gazes, because there was something disturbingly intense about him, a coiled strength that made her feel as though her ribs were being compressed against her lungs, as though some icy hand were squeezing her heart. “I was in one of her hospitals for a while,” Philippe said at last. “Not for long, and not with an entirely satisfactory resolution, but that’s another story.”
And that seemed to be the end of it; his gaze, boring into her, dared her to question him further; she had no desire to do so.
They were all uncannily silent as they walked through the rest of the market; even though Oris, who hadn’t said anything in Claire’s presence, attempted to maintain a one-sided patter, oblivious to the yawning maw of heavy silence that his words fell into. Isabelle was the only one seemingly unaffected by it, staring wide-eyed at the bead necklaces and crystal bracelets on the stalls they walked by.
What had Claire wanted? Information? She’d sounded as though she believed Selene would have information on the dead humans — but surely that was a trivial affair, some madman in a mad city; unfortunate, but surely not worth mentioning?
Except that Claire seldom mentioned things just for the pleasure of it; and she certainly wouldn’t have bothered to lean so much on it if she’d thought it insignificant. Madeleine would have to find someone in Lazarus; perhaps Aragon had contacts there who’d know what was going on.
Lost in her thoughts, she almost bumped into Philippe — who had come to a dead stop at an intersection on the edge of the market, mere meters from the ruined entrance of Notre-Dame. “What—” she asked; and then saw the procession.
It was coming up Pont-au-Double, the small cast-iron bridge that stopped at the edge of the parvis. There were a good twenty people with the gray-and-silver uniform of House Hawthorn, the same one Madeleine had once worn. They walked slowly, leisurely, as though they had all the time in the world, as though they weren’t standing close to the river, close enough for a spinning arm of water to snatch them over the parapet, or for a toothy creature to rise and attack them. Few people in Paris were mad enough to linger near the Seine, nowadays; only God knew what kind of power the accretion of war magic had released in the blackened waters.
Madeleine’s gaze, sweeping over the procession, caught a glimpse of familiar faces: Sare the alchemist; Samariel, ever as achingly young and innocent; Pierre-François, older and grayer but still every bit the consummate bodyguard — she remembered that night, when the noise had erupted, and he had simply reached for a knife and a gun, and rushed out of the room without any further words.
And, at their head…
He hadn’t changed, not one bit; but of course Fallen seldom did. He was tall and thin, with horn-rimmed, rectangular glasses — his particular affectation, since all Fallen had perfect eyesight — his hair dark, save for a touch of gray at the temples; his hands with the thin, long fingers of a pianist, even though the instruments he played on did not make music — unless one counted cries of pain and ecstasy as music, as Madeleine knew he did.
“Who is he?” Isabelle asked in a whisper, and it was Oris who answered her, with the barest hint of pity in his voice.
“Asmodeus. Head of House Hawthorn.”
He hadn’t changed. He still leaned on the same ivory cane with the ease of a gentleman who had no need for it; still had the same sharp, pointed smile of predators, the one he’d worn in the House — how could Uphir not see it, not feel the naked ambition burning that would one day depose him? How could Elphon not have seen it — not suspected anything, until the thugs’ swords slid home into his chest and blood spouted over her — a split second before they sent Madeleine to her knees, struggling to breathe through the pain of shattered ribs?
Asmodeus’s entourage had almost cleared the bridge: they had finished negotiating with the guards at the booth that guarded Pont-au-Double. He saw her then, bowed gravely, without a trace of irony, and turned right into the heart of the food market. Madeleine was surprised to realize her fingers had clenched into fists.
Breathe. She had to breathe. He had seen her, and turned away. She had nothing to fear from him: it was just her memories of that time that wouldn’t be banished. He had no interest in her, no grudge: she had been among the lowliest of the low in Hawthorn, and he must have been barely aware that she existed. And then, with a feeling of dread that pulled her bowels into knots, she remembered that he did know who she was. Else why would he have bowed to her?
Surely he—
Her gaze, roaming through the market — somewhere, anywhere she wouldn’t have to look at him again — fell on the rear of the procession, where three of the escort had stopped for a moment while one of them readjusted the straps on a large basket; which, judging from the movements from inside, probably contained some large, live animal. The first two were the kind of pale, faded women Asmodeus enjoyed having around; the third one, head bent over the basket, was a brown-haired man….
No.
There was something — something in the tilt of his head, something in the bearing of his body…
And, having finished with his work, he raised his head, and she saw.
He, too, hadn’t changed much: he was perhaps younger, less hardened, with the particular mix of innocence and agelessness of newly manifested Fallen. But the face — she would have known that anywhere.
Elphon. Oh God, Elphon.
It was impossible. Elphon was dead. She had seen him die; had felt his heart stutter and stop, seen the radiance fade from his translucent skin until there was nothing left but dead meat. Then, weeping, she had started the long crawl that would lead her to Silverspires and Morningstar’s arms.
Surely it was another Fallen; surely…
He rose, precariously balancing the basket against his waist, and smiled at his two companions, in a way that was engraved into her memory.
No. That wasn’t possible. The dead did not walk the earth again; not even dead Fallen.
“Wait here,” she said to the others, and elbowed her way through the crowd of Pont-au-Double, struggling to reach the little group before they moved away from her. By the time she caught up with them in front of a fowler’s stall, her ruined lungs were protesting; and, at the worst possible moment — when she stood in front of them — a bout of coughing racked her body and left her, wrung, to stand in their path.