The surrounding storefronts all told the same story, but the burly man with a Fu Manchu mustache and long braid manning the door practically dragged us inside.
“Up the stairs and to the left!” he boomed. “Madame is always happy to help those in need, gwai lo or not.”
“Don’t know why they call us that,” Cal muttered as our combined weight made the stairs creak and snap.
“It means ‘foreigner,’ ” Conrad said. “It’s not very nice.”
Madame Xiang’s drawing room was done in the same opulent style, walls hung with red silk embroidered with flowers and forest scenes, deer and tigers and the aftermath of their meeting.
A table covered in green velvet sat at the center, a single ornate chair at the head and four chairs arrayed around it.
“Hello?” Cal called, peering cautiously toward the beaded curtain at the far end of the room.
The whole place gave off the air of a carnival—arranged for a specific purpose, but not real. I’d heard stories about Spiritualists, of course, mostly from Proctor information. They were heretics. Not only did they believe in a soul, an afterlife and magic, but they claimed they could use magic to communicate with the dead.
Believing in ghosts, the Proctors would allow. Believing in magical powers that allowed a living person to commune with the dead essence of their loved ones—that would earn you a fast trip to a heretic prison.
Madame Xiang might be full of it, but hopefully she’d know where Nerissa’s doctor was, or if he existed at all.
When she appeared, Cal gave an audible squeak. I felt like joining him, and only a lifetime of not showing my true reactions in self-preservation kept my face composed.
Madame Xiang wore a long blue-and-gold gown weighed down with so much embroidery it bowed her shoulders. Her eyebrows were dramatic, and a tiny crimson bud of a mouth bloomed from the vast wasteland of white pancake makeup on her face. Her hair was done in elaborate loops, and giant glittering hair sticks protruded from the crown, studded with a bloody handful of rubies that swung and caught the golden light of the oil lamps.
“Welcome, travelers,” she intoned in a perfect British accent. “Do you seek the counsel of spirits this night?”
“We …,” I started, but she minced across the room, sat in the largest chair and stuck out feet roughly the size of my fist.
I’d read about foot binding in my history classes, but to see the result was gruesome. I tried not to stare.
“Sit!” Madame Xiang commanded, then rang a small silver bell that she pulled from her voluminous sleeve.
I felt now as if we’d not only walked into a carnival but also gotten on a ride with no end in sight.
A servant appeared. He was enormous—quite possibly the largest fully human man I’d ever seen. So tall he had to duck under the beaded archway, his suit strained at every seam and the tea tray he carried was comically small in his hands.
I didn’t know where to look—at Madame’s face, at her feet or at this mountain, who set down the tea and retreated.
“Thank you, Fang,” Madame said, and smiled at us. “Please. I can discern through the aether that you are weary. Warm yourselves.”
We all took a small handleless cup, more to be polite than anything.
The tea was bitter. It reminded me of medicine Nerissa used to force on me when I was feverish and coughing.
“We have a question for you,” I said.
Madame waved me away. Her nails were painted gold and shone like eagle talons under the lamps. They looked like they could rip my flesh.
“They all come with questions, but the spirits already know the answers,” she said. “Drink! All will be revealed in time.”
“No, you don’t understand,” Conrad said. “We didn’t come here for a reading.…” He trailed off, and blinked in confusion, looking at Cal and me as if we’d all woken up in a particularly gaudy bad dream.
Worry started deep in my mind and quickly blossomed into alarm. Conrad’s words sounded as if they came to me down a long tunnel, and were drowned out by the booming of Madame’s precise English syllables.
“Just relax, dear hearts,” she said. “It’s nothing fatal. Just a little nip to help you sleep.”
Too late, I recognized the taste hiding under the bitter tea. Medicine, yes, but the kind Nerissa used to help herself sleep. Strong opiates that would tumble you down a tunnel of dreams as quickly as you could swallow it.
“You …,” I slurred, but the horrible room tilted sideways, and I felt the faint impact of my body hitting the dusty Persian carpet.
Madame approached and nudged me with one of her horror-feet. “Don’t worry, my sweet,” she intoned as black whirlpools consumed my vision. “It will all be over soon enough.”
When I woke up, I saw a much less nightmarish version of Madame Xiang standing over me. Her hair was done in short, fashionable curls. My drug-addled mind realized she’d probably been wearing a wig before.
Her makeup, too, was chic and light, though I could see a white rim where she’d wiped off the pancake stuff.
“Awake?” she said, and smiled at me. “Good. Beginning to think I gave you too much.”
I tried to stay calm and see if I was tied up. I wasn’t, but as my vision cleared I saw that Fang stood in front of the only door, arms folded, staring at me impassively. I didn’t see anyone else, and hoped that Conrad and Cal had fared better than I had with the drugged tea. I still felt as if I were seasick on the deck of a ship.
“You …,” I started, but then thought better of it. She was fully aware of what she’d done, and I didn’t have the strength to be righteously angry. Mostly, I was just relieved that I wasn’t back among the Proctors.
“I’ve got good news,” Madame Xiang said, “and I’ve got bad news.” She was still wearing the robe, but she moved normally, and I saw that the bound feet were prosthetic, an illusion furthered by the folds of her robe.
“Good news,” she said. “You and your friends are young and strong. That means Fang won’t just dump you in the bay, or leave you to wander out into the street in a haze and get rolled for your vital organs. There are degenerates out there, you know.”
“And the bad news?” My mouth felt like cotton and my mind felt like someone had used it for batting practice. I wondered what could be coming if that was the good news. I didn’t like the way Madame was looking at me, but there was nothing I could do. I was weak and dizzy, and I knew from when Nerissa used laudanum to help her sleep that it took hours to wear off.
“The bad news,” Madame said, patting her curls, “is that none of you have any money. So I’m going to have to make back the time I took with you some other way.”
She gave me a nudge and a sweet, motherly smile. “What were you thinking coming to the Boneyard with no money, dear? It’s positively silly.”
“I …” I licked my lips, trying to work some feeling back into my face. “I didn’t want a reading. I want Crawford—the Death Doctor.”
“That sad drunk?” said Madame. “Why on earth does a sweet girl like you want him?” She stood, removing the robe and revealing a smart narrow-skirted day dress, stockings and subtle gold jewelry. She stepped into black pumps and affixed a small white hat to her hair.
“I lost … someone,” I said. I rolled my eyes around, but I didn’t see Cal or Conrad. I heard a snore, though, and that made me feel a bit better. At least one of them was still alive.
“Oh?” Madame paused, taking her hat back off. “I was going to go meet with the leader of our tong to negotiate a price for the three of you, but now I’m interested. You’re actually going to attempt the doctor’s journey?”
“I have to go to the Deadlands,” I muttered, squinting against the glare of the lights. They seemed to grow brighter with each passing second. “I have to get Dean.” The filter that kept me from blurting things out and that connected sentences was broken, that was for sure.