This time Dead Rick let himself go under. He kept his paws between their bodies as best he could, fending off the padfoot’s weight, hoping he was right and Rewdan was too tired to resist if Dead Rick tried to throw him off. But he let himself be wrestled onto his back, matted fur grinding into the filthy sand, and the padfoot’s jaws dove for his throat—
A thunderclap obliterated the cheers. Rewdan jerked sideways, and all the strength went abruptly out of his body; he collapsed onto Dead Rick, no longer fighting, his snarls twisting off into an agonized whine. The reek of blood flooded Dead Rick’s nose, obliterating the sour smelclass="underline" blood, and acrid gunpowder. He squirmed out from under the padfoot’s twitching, dying body, and looked up.
Nadrett stood at the top of the stairs, a smoking pistol in his hand. Raggedly, the arena fell into silence; even those cursing their losses over the padfoot stopped when they saw the cause.
Dead Rick’s master waited until he had quiet, except for the padfoot’s last, gasping breaths. Then he said, “Who put my dog in the pit?”
No one answered. Nadrett lifted his gun again. It was a Galenic Academy design, adapted from the American Colt so as to fire elfshot; the cylinder clicked smoothly around as the master cocked it a second time. “I decide ’ow long my dogs live, and ’ow they die. And I ain’t given no orders for this other one to die. Who put ’im in there?”
Confession would win nothing for the guilty party, except possibly a bullet between the eyes. Betrayal, however, was more profitable. A dozen hands moved to point, at seven different targets. Nadrett aimed his revolver at the one who had collected the most fingers: a puck in a knee-length leather coat. “Nithen, put ’im in the cages. I’ll deal with ’im later.”
The fetch shoved his way through the crowd to obey. Dead Rick, crouching in the pit, didn’t look at the dead padfoot. He’d hoped Nadrett would end the fight; he’d known Nadrett might end it with murder. It told him what he needed to know, which was that the master had, in fact, given the order for Rewdan to die. Which meant there never would have been any chance to question him, regardless of how the fight ended. Dead Rick hadn’t found him fast enough.
The master left the room, trailed by his lieutenants. Only when he was gone did the voices feel safe to rise, grumbling to one another and settling their bets. Dead Rick gathered his back feet under himself, waiting for a small gap to open up in the crowd; with a tired leap he made it to the pit’s edge. Then he wormed his way between the legs until he reached the wall, where he could safely change back to man form.
“Bloody clever of you.” Gresh leaned against the wall nearby, digging in his pockets for pipe and tobacco. “Getting Nadrett to settle it like that. Cost me a mint, you bastard; I’d bet Rewdan wouldn’t drop ’til the fifth fight.”
Maybe there was still some hope of finding out what the padfoot had been doing. “Who was ’e, anyway, and did ’e bite Nadrett in the knackers, or what? ’Ow’d ’e get ’imself stuck down there?”
Gresh shrugged. “Ain’t seen ’im before myself. I ’eard ’e’s some kind of courier, and tried to sell some of ’is shipment to the Academy. You know, make a little bread on the side.”
“Shipment?” Dead Rick straightened, despite the complaints of his weary back. “What was ’e carrying?”
The goblin hawked and spat, then began sucking on the pipe. “The sort of thing the Academy likes. I look like a bleeding scholar to you?” Dead Rick held his breath, not wanting to betray his curiosity by prompting. Gresh got his pipe properly lit, then said, “Compounds of some kind. Lunar caustic, satyr’s bile—valuable, from what I ’ear, but not if it gets you on Nadrett’s bad side.”
Dead Rick knew enough to recognize those as faerie compounds, rather than mortal. Brought in from Faerie itself? Perhaps. One of them must have been what he smelled on the padfoot, that oddly sour scent. Dead Rick opened his mouth to ask what Nadrett wanted them for, but closed it before he could be that stupid. Gresh wouldn’t know—but he’d take note of the fact that Dead Rick had asked. And maybe sell that information to others.
Someone in the Academy might know what they were useful for, at least. Whoever Rewdan had tried to sell to, if that rumor was true. Some of the scholars weren’t above getting their materials from the unclean hands of the Goblin Market.
To distract Gresh from the real point, he said, “Am I going to ’ave ’is friends coming after me?”
“Friends, hah. Think anybody’s ’is friend, after ’e got dropped in there?” Gresh jerked his patchy beard at the pit.
Well, that was one less worry. Now all I’ve got to worry about is Nadrett. “Sorry you bet on Rewdan. I’ll buy you a beer in the Crow’s Head, to make up for it.” One good thing from the breakdown of the palace: it had forced the pub to move from its old location to a spot inside the Goblin Market, where Dead Rick could go freely.
“That don’t ’alf make up my losses,” Gresh complained, but he was never one to turn down beer. And it would give him reason to forget anything Dead Rick had said. Clapping one hand on the goblin’s shoulder with a friendliness he didn’t feel, Dead Rick headed for the pub.
Cromwell Road, South Kensington: March 27, 1884
To the uncritical eye, Miss Louisa Kittering’s bedroom appeared a model of respectable young femininity. It was agreeably papered in a floral pattern, with sunny landscapes and paintings of birds upon the walls, and a soft rose carpet upon the floor. The lace-trimmed curtains at the windows were neatly tied back; the one minor sign of disarray was an embroidery frame balanced upon the arm of a chair, as if the needlewoman had set it down just a moment ago, and would return at any second. But the frame had lain there since Eliza began working in the Kitterings’ house three days ago, and not a stitch had been added to its contents in that time: one of many little marks of Miss Kittering’s rebellion.
Eliza studied the room, running the tip of her tongue absently through the gap in her teeth. She kept being distracted by the Kitterings’ unfathomable wealth; the lace on the curtains alone was worth more than she would earn in a year. Every time she touched something, she felt guilty, as if the basic grubbiness of her own birth would somehow stain the finery. If the Kitterings weren’t so desperate for servants, she never would have had a place here; everything around her, even the servants’ quarters in the garret, shouted that she didn’t belong.
I’m only here for one thing, Eliza reminded herself. Once that was done, she could go back to where she did belong. But first: Where would a young lady hide her secrets?
Not under the mattress. In a house like this, mattresses were turned every day, and the linens aired; Eliza would have seen it her first morning. Nor behind the headboard of the bed, which had been her second guess. She’d had regrettably little time for prying, though; if she fell behind on her tasks, Mrs. Fowler would come looking. And if Eliza were found with her nose in the young miss’s belongings, a sacking would be the least of her concerns.
But she had to keep trying. As quietly as she could, Eliza dragged a chair to the wardrobe, then tossed a rag over the seat to protect it from her shoes. The top of the wardrobe, unfortunately, held nothing more than a shameful quantity of dust, undisturbed by any human touch. Underneath was cleaner, but likewise empty.
She put the chair back, wondering if she dared search the writing desk. There was little reason for any honest maid to be going through those drawers, and if someone were to find her… Eliza told herself it was not merely caution that kept her away, but common sense. Mrs. Kittering was very obviously the sort of mother who had no compunctions about going through her daughter’s letters. If Louisa was keeping secrets—and her behavior in Islington made it clear she was—then she had to be keeping them elsewhere.