“I understand. Would you perhaps let me ride with you? I have a very particular proposition, you see, that I did not want to make before the others—it is for you only, Miss Kittering, because I can see that you are a more… visionary spirit than the others. I suspect you could accept, even embrace, truths the others are not yet ready for.”
Miss Kittering’s interest sharpened visibly. Eliza curled her hands around the bars, as if they were the only things holding her in place. Otherwise she might fly up the steps and accost this stranger on the spot.
“What truths?” the young lady asked, curiosity clear in her voice.
The other woman hesitated, then stepped closer. Her reply was so quiet that Eliza could only barely make it out. “That the materialistic views which bind so many in this scientific age are not the whole of the story. I know more of faeries than I have admitted publicly, Miss Kittering. And I tell you this: You are in a position to do a great favor to one of them, and receive a favor in return.”
Miss Kittering’s laugh was much louder, and half disbelieving—but only half. “Me? I don’t see how—”
“This is not the place,” her companion said, a tilt of her head toward No. 9 making her meaning clear. “If I may ride with you, though…”
“Yes, of course—I am quite intrigued. And I mustn’t delay here any longer; Mama expects me home. Come, and we’ll talk along the way.” Together they went toward the carriage. Desperate, Eliza risked coming up the steps, as if she’d just emerged from the house’s cellar; she was rewarded by hearing Miss Kittering tell the coachman, “South Kensington, please.” Then they were inside, and the coachman mounted his box once more; with a flap of the reins they were away.
Leaving Eliza standing in the middle of White Lion Street in a daze. Was she lying?
It might be like the fraudulent spiritualists who claimed to summon ghosts, only their manifestations were nothing more than a conjuror’s tricks. Whitechapel had its share of confidence men—and women, too—swindling the gullible, and Miss Kittering was both young and wealthy enough to be a tempting target.
Or that woman might have been telling the truth.
If only Eliza had gotten her name! But—her feet paused on the pavement—she did have Miss Kittering’s name. And a district, too: South Kensington. Should the woman’s claims prove true, Miss Kittering would have her own connection to the faeries.
Which Eliza could make use of. If she found a way to get close. And for Owen’s sake, she would find a way.
She almost forgot her barrow in her haste. Eliza dragged her second skirt back on, hauled the barrow up the steps, not caring if she spilled oysters now. Miss Kittering. South Kensington. With that, I won’t have to wait another month.
Owen—I’m coming.
The Goblin Market, Onyx Halclass="underline" March 19, 1884
“Dreams, good and bad! Loved ones back from the dead, very cheap right now, or demons chasing you for just a little bit more… morning there, my canine friend. I ’ear you’re doing well these days.”
Dead Rick scowled at Broddy Bobbin, waving for him to lower his voice. “You think I want that shouted all over the Market, man? Just because I’ve got enough to keep people from breaking my fingers, don’t mean I’m ready to go around flashing my bread like some rich toff.”
The crate Bobbin stood on only brought him to Dead Rick’s height; like most hobs, he was barely child-size. Any child that ugly, though, risked being drowned in a river. He smiled at Dead Rick, but it was a hideous thing, bad enough for a goblin’s face. “So you do ’ave bread. In that case, let me show you—”
The skriker rolled his eyes. “I told you, I’m paying off my debts. Even if I wanted your grubby little second’and dreams, I wouldn’t ’ave anything to spare for ’em. I’m just looking for Cyma.”
Bobbin pouted, but his wounded look was even worse than his smile, and he knew it. Giving Dead Rick up as a lost cause, he jerked one knobby thumb farther down the chamber. “She were talking with Charcoal Eddie a little while ago. You tell that bastard ’e’d better steal some worthwhile dreams next time. That last lot was pure rubbish.”
They were always rubbish these days. Stealing dreams properly took time and effort; the goblins and pucks who did that sort of thing could no longer afford either. Mostly the Goblin Market made do with what it already had, everyone buying and selling the same trinkets and scraps over and over, like a leech feeding on itself. And the wares got more broken and worn out with every exchange.
That didn’t stop them from trying, though. This, the largest of the Market’s actual markets, was full of noise and movement. No mortals—those were sold elsewhere, in a flesh market of squalling babies and people in cages—but a thousand kinds of things, from captive dreams to scratched phonograph cylinders. Fae of all kinds and nations came here, to buy or to sell; the majority might be English, but there were Scots and Irish and Welsh, Germans and Spaniards and French, creatures from so far afield they might be a different sort of being entirely. One pen held an enormous three-headed snake, which the alf standing in front proclaimed was a naga from distant India; it watched the passersby with drugged and unfriendly eyes.
Dead Rick found Cyma standing in front of a cracked mirror, holding a dress of printed cotton against her body. It was a strange-looking thing, with a tiny bodice that went no lower than the breasts, and a narrow skirt falling loose from there. “Where in Faerie did that come from?”
Cyma shook her head at him, amused and pitying. “Don’t you remember? They used to wear these, years ago—mortal women did. During the Prince Regent’s reign. I found them delightful. Very Greek, don’t you think?”
It could have been Chinese for all he cared. Dead Rick sidled closer and muttered, “I can pay you back now. Mostly, anyway—I’m still a bit short. But if you let me keep a bite or two, I can probably get the rest.”
He’d left Cyma for last because she was kinder than his other creditors. She had been a court lady, rumor said, back when there still was a court beyond the Prince’s few followers, but she didn’t spend her time dallying in the surviving gardens with the scant handful of lords and ladies that remained. She couldn’t: Cyma had her own debts, of a sort that couldn’t be repaid in bread, and Nadrett held them. It gave her more sympathy than most; she might forgive him the extra delay.
Dead Rick was startled when she smiled and patted him on the cheek. “You’re a sweet one, aren’t you? Paying me back, when I know you’re all but penniless. You needn’t worry. Keep it for yourself; I don’t mind.”
He stiffened warily. “In exchange for what?”
Cyma’s eyebrows rose. “Why, nothing. I don’t need it, Dead Rick.”
The use of his name was as good as a whole message in code. Nobody else used it; almost nobody in the Market knew it. He was just Nadrett’s dog, a nameless slave. Hearing those words on Cyma’s lips told him she wasn’t playing some game, bargaining forgiveness for some favor from him; she meant it. He didn’t owe her.
Why?
Even if she was leading some mortal lovers about on a string, the bread would have been valuable; with it, she could buy practically anything she wanted. That dress, and everything else the bored puck behind her had to sell. Everything but freedom from Nadrett. “What did you do, loot a bakery?”
She laughed. “No, no. Better than that. I’m leaving, Dead Rick. I’ve had enough of all of this.” One hand swept a graceful arc, indicating the tawdry excesses of the Goblin Market around them. “I’m going away.”