A Darker Shade of Magic (36 page)

And then the man smiled and said in stiff English, “I am presenting whom?”

“Excuse me?” asked Lila, keeping her voice low, gruff.

The attendant’s brow crinkled. “What title and name should I announce you under, sir?”

“Oh.” Relief swept over her, and her hand slid back to her side. A smile spread across her lips. “Captain Bard,” she said, “of the
Sea King
.” The attendant looked uncertain, but turned away and said the words without protest.

Her name echoed and was swallowed by the room before she’d even stepped inside.

When she did, her mouth fell open.

The vivid glamour of the world outside paled in comparison to the world within. It was a palace of vaulting glass and shimmering tapestry and, woven through it all like light,
magic
. The air was alive with it. Not the secret, seductive magic of the stone, but a loud, bright, encompassing thing. Kell had told Lila that magic was like an extra sense, layered on top of sight and smell and taste, and now she understood. It was everywhere. In everything. And it was intoxicating. She could not tell if the energy was coming from the hundreds of bodies in the room, or from the room itself, which certainly reflected it.
Amplified
it like sound in an echoing chamber.

And it was strangely—
impossibly
—familiar.

Beneath the magic, or perhaps because of it, the space itself was alive with color and light. She’d never set foot inside St. James, but it couldn’t possibly have compared to the splendor of this. Nothing in her London could. Her world felt truly grey by comparison, bleak and empty in a way that made Lila want to kiss the stone for freeing her from it, for bringing her here, to this glittering jewel of a place. Everywhere she looked, she saw wealth. Her fingers itched, and she resisted the urge to start picking pockets, reminding herself that the cargo in her own was too precious to risk being caught.

The curtained doorway led onto a landing, a set of stairs sloping down and away onto the hall’s polished floor, the stone itself lost beneath boots and twirling skirts.

At the base of the stairs stood the king and queen, greeting each of their guests. Standing there, dressed in gold, they looked unbearably elegant. Lila had never been so near to royalty—she didn’t count Kell—and knew she should slip away as soon as possible, but she couldn’t resist the urge to flaunt her disguise. And besides, it would be rude not to greet her hosts.
Reckless
, growled a voice in her head, but Lila only smiled and descended the stairs.

“Welcome, Captain,” said the king, his grip firm around Lila’s hand.

“Your Majesty,” she said, struggling to keep her voice from drifting up. She nodded her mask toward him, careful not to jab him with her horns.

“Welcome,” echoed the queen as Lila kissed her outstretched hand. But as she pulled away, the queen added, “We have not met before.”

“I am a friend of Kell’s,” said Lila as casually as possible, her gaze still on the floor.

“Ah,” said the queen. “Then welcome.”

“Actually,” Lila went on, “Your Highness, I am looking for him. Do you know where he might be?”

The queen considered her blankly and said, “He is not here.” Lila frowned, and the queen added, “But I am not worried.” Her tone was strangely steady, as if she were reciting a line that wasn’t hers. The bad feeling in Lila’s chest grew worse.

“I’m sure he’ll turn up,” said Lila, sliding her hand free of the queen’s.

“Everything will be okay,” said the king, his voice similarly hollow.

“It will,” added the queen.

Lila frowned. Something was wrong. She lifted her gaze, risking impertinence to look the queen in the eye, and saw there a subtle gleam. The same shimmer she’d seen in the eyes of the guard after he’d slit Fletcher’s throat. Some kind of
spell
. Had no one else noticed? Or had no one else been brazen enough to stare so baldly at the crown?

The next guest cleared his throat at Lila’s back, and she broke the queen’s gaze. “I’m sorry to have kept you,” she said quickly, shifting past the royal hosts and into the ballroom. She skirted the crowd of dancers and drinkers, looking for signs of the prince, but judging by the eagerness in the air, the way eyes constantly darted toward doors and sets of stairs, he’d yet to make an appearance.

She slipped away, through a pair of doors at the edge of the ballroom, and found herself in a corridor. It was empty, save for a guard and a young woman wrapped in a rather amorous embrace and too occupied to notice as Lila slid past and vanished through another set of doors. And then another. Navigating the streets of London had taught her a fair amount about the mazelike flow of places, the way wealth gathers in the heart and tapers to the corners. She moved from hall to hall, winding around the palace’s beating heart without straying too far. Everywhere she went, she found guests and guards and servants, but no sign of Kell or the prince or any break in the maze. Until, finally, she came upon a set of spiral stairs. They were elegant but narrow, clearly not meant for public use. She cast a last glance back in the direction of the ball and then ascended the steps.

The floor above was quiet in a private way, and she knew she must be getting close, not only because of that silence, but also because the stone in her pocket was beginning to hum. As if it could
feel
Kell near and wished to be nearer. Again, Lila tried not to be offended.

She found herself in a new set of halls, the first of which was empty, the second of which was not. Lila rounded the corner and caught her breath. She pressed herself back into a shadowed nook, narrowly missing the eyes of a guard. He was standing in front of a set of ornate doors, and he was not alone. In fact, while every other door in the hall stood unmanned, the one at the end was guarded by no fewer than three armed and armored men.

Lila swallowed and slid her newest knife from her belt. She hesitated. For the second time in as many days, she found herself one against three. It had yet to end well. Her grip tightened on the knife as she scrounged for a plan that wasn’t sure to end in a grave. The stone took up its murmuring rhythm again, and she was reluctantly about to draw it from her coat when she stopped and noticed something.

The hall was studded with doors, and while the farthest one was guarded, the nearest one stood ajar. It led onto a luxurious bedroom, and at the back of it, a balcony, curtains fluttering in the evening air.

Lila smiled and returned the knife to her belt.

She had an idea.

IV

Kell spat blood onto Rhy’s lovely inlaid floor, marring the intricate pattern. If Rhy himself were here, he would not be happy. But Rhy wasn’t here.

“The stone, my rose.” Astrid’s sultry tone poured between Rhy’s lips. “Where is it?”

Kell struggled to get to his knees with his arms still pinned behind his back. “What do you want with it?” he growled as the two guards dragged him to his feet.

“To take the throne, of course.”

“You already have a throne,” observed Kell.

“In a dying London. And do you know why it dies? Because of you. Because of this city and its cowardly retreat. It made of us a shield, and now it thrives while we perish. It seems only just that I should take it, as reparation. Retribution.”

“So you would, what?” asked Kell. “Abandon your brother to the decaying corpse of your world so you can enjoy the splendors of this one?”

A cold, dry laugh escaped Rhy’s throat. “Not at all. That would make me a very poor sister. Athos and I will rule together. Side by side.”

Kell’s eyes narrowed. “What do you mean?”

“We are going to restore balance to the worlds. Reopen the doors. Or rather, tear them down, create one that stays open, so that anyone—
everyone
—can move between. A merger, if you will, of our two illustrious Londons.”

Kell paled. Even when the doors had been unlocked, they had been
doors
. And they were kept closed. An open door between the worlds wouldn’t only be dangerous. It would be
unstable
.

“The stone is not strong enough to do that,” he said, trying to sound sure. But he wasn’t. The stone had made a door for Lila. But making a pinprick in a piece of cloth was very different from tearing the fabric in half.

“Are you certain?” teased Astrid. “Perhaps you are right. Perhaps your half of the stone is not enough.”

Kell’s blood went cold. “My half?”

Rhy’s mouth curled into a smile. “Haven’t you noticed that it is broken?”

Kell reeled. “The jagged edge.”

“Athos found it like that, in two pieces. He likes to find treasure, you see. Always has. Growing up, we used to scavenge the rocks along the coast, searching for anything of value. A habit he never lost. His searching merely became a bit more sophisticated. A bit more pointed. Of course, we knew of the Black London purge, of the eradication of artifacts, but he was so sure there must be something—
anything
—to help save our dying world.”

“And he found it,” said Kell, digging his wrists into the metal cuff. The edges were smooth, not sharp, and dull pain spread up his arm, but the skin refused to break. He stared down at the blood from his lip on Rhy’s floor, but the guards were holding him up, their grip unyielding.

“He scoured,” continued Astrid in Rhy’s tongue. “Found a few useless things secreted away—a notebook, a piece of cloth—and then, lo and behold, he found the stone. Broken in two, yes, but, as I’m sure you’ve noticed, its state has not stopped it from working. It is magic, after all. It may divide, but it does not weaken. The two halves remain connected, even when they are apart. Each half is strong enough on its own, strong enough to change the world. But they want each other, you see. They are drawn together through the wall. If a drop of your blood is enough to make a door, think what two halves of the stone could do.”

It could tear down the wall itself
, thought Kell. Tear reality apart.

Rhy’s fingers rapped along the back of a chair. “It was my idea, I confess, giving you the stone, allowing you to carry it across the line.”

Kell grimaced as he twisted his wrists against the iron binding them. “Why not use Holland?” he asked, trying to buy more time. “To smuggle the stone here? He obviously delivered that necklace to Rhy.”

Astrid drew Rhy’s lips into a smile and ran a finger lightly over Kell’s cheek. “I wanted you.” Rhy’s hand continued up and tangled in Kell’s hair as Astrid leaned in, pressed her stolen cheek to Kell’s bloody one, and whispered in his ear, “I told you once, that I would own your life.” Kell wrenched back, and Rhy’s hand fell away.

“Besides,” she said with a sigh. “It made sense. If things went wrong, and Holland was caught, the guilt would lie on our crown, and we would not have another chance. If things went wrong and
you
were caught, the guilt would lie on your head. I know of your hobbies, Kell. You think the Scorched Bone keeps secrets?
Nothing
goes unnoticed in my city.” Rhy’s tongue clicked. “A royal servant with a bad habit of smuggling things across borders. Not so hard to believe. And if things went
right
, and I succeeded in taking this castle, this kingdom, I couldn’t have you out there, unaccounted for, fighting against me. I wanted you here, where you belong. At my feet.”

Dark energy began to crackle in Rhy’s palm, and Kell braced himself, but Astrid couldn’t seem to control it, not with Rhy’s crude skills. The lightning shot to the left, striking the metal post of the prince’s bed.

Kell forced himself to chuckle thinly. “You should have picked a better body,” he said. “My brother has never had a gift for magic.”

Astrid rolled Rhy’s wrist, considering his fingers. “No matter,” she said. “I have an entire family to choose from.”

Kell had an idea. “Why don’t you try on someone a little stronger?” he goaded.

“Like you?” asked Astrid coolly. “Would you like me to take
your
body for a spin?”

“I’d like to see you try,” said Kell. If he could get her to take off the necklace, to put it on him instead …

“I could,” she whispered. “But possession doesn’t work on
Antari
,” she added drily. Kell’s heart sank. “I know that, and so do you. Nice try, though.” Kell watched as his brother turned and lifted a knife from a nearby table. “Now,
compulsion
,” he said—she said—admiring the glinting edge. “That’s another matter.”