Tom thought he’d done good. He thought. That’d been satisfaction in her voice, hadn’t it? He tried to think of the way she’d said it. He was sure that’d been satisfaction warming up her tone. She’d looked expectant there for a moment, he thought, and he thought since he’d played mung, she’d –
Down the narrow dark hall. He kept his gait even. Heel to toe, back straight, arm still around Ava’s shoulder. Except now he could feel something whisper through her bones, even through the soft silk, like the tremble of branches on a tree. Her throat caught, and Tom felt his eyes burning. There was something wet at the corners, and he blinked it away. He didn’t feel it on his cheeks.
There was nothing of it in Ava’s voice, though. It was low, now. Husky. He felt his stomach turn over, a familiar numb tingling spread through his jaw. He didn’t know how to, he’d never, not with –
“I don’t know, my dear,” replied Anatole, a little louder, confident. Loud enough for anybody nearby to hear. “There’s a fine little sitting-room facing the south garden…” He let it drift off, a giggle burbling up from his diaphragm, cut off quickly. He sped up his pace.
Down that hall, down… He tried to remember. It’d been hard, damned hard – concords hard – to get a map of the place, and even then, it’d been incomplete. He thought he was going south, though; he thought surely he was. Because there was a turn there, he thought, and then another, and then –
The brass pendulum again, glinting softly in the low light. Shifting his weight, he guided Ava back, away, down another hall. Oes, he thought. East. This felt right. It was quieter here, tomb-quiet, with a fresh, night-smelling draft in the air. It was very, very dark, so dark Tom almost couldn’t see. At the end of this hall, though, there was a sliver of strange, soft light, very unlike the lamplight.
As they moved toward it through the pitch-dark, his gait shifted, ever so slightly. He loosened his arm round her shoulder, relaxed his posture. Padded toe to heel.
The room was small, lit in a watery wash of starlight and the faded yellow of a distant streetlamp. The walls were paneled with bookshelves, the spines indistinct shapes in the shadows. It was full of the night breeze, full of the song of crickets. One small window opposite the door was open, and the pale, gauzy drapes ruffled and billowed in the wind, casting shifting shapes across the floor. Nearby, there were two leather armchairs and a fine circular end-table, the light reflecting ghostly on its polished surface.
“Thank you, beata.sister; close friend” It was just a murmur, only just loud enough for her to hear. It came out unexpectedly, but he didn’t regret a syllable of it, warm with all the gratefulness he’d been holding since the carriage.
He clasped her shoulder once; then his hand slipped away, and he with it. He closed the door behind them, leaning back on it ’til it clicked, then moved hastily away. The slim shadow of him crept across the moonlit floor, over to the open window. He waved the drapes aside with a skinny arm, braced himself against the sill, then hunched over out the window and convulsed quietly.
There wasn’t much noise of him retching, save a couple of rasping lungfuls of air. He picked his glass back up off the sill, took a mouthful, swished it round, and spat it onto the shrubs. Dumping the rest of the brandy out the window, he turned away. “Good for the greens,” he slurred, then shambled on his shaky legs away from the window.
He wilted into the nearby armchair, running a hand through his hair and knotting his fingers in a tangle of red. Before he looked up, he made himself breathe in and out until he could count a few seconds between the breaths.
“What the fuck did she mean by that,” he breathed, finally lifting his eyes. The room still spun; he tried to focus on Ava, blinked and squinted his eyes until the two of her shivered into one. “Are you all right?” The line of his mouth trembled, just a little. “There’s no –”
He caught a whiff, suddenly, of something sickly-sweet, some clinging – he caught a whiff of his own cologne and gagged again, tears prickling in his eyes. He swallowed. “You should know,” he said quietly, “they can’t scry through me, or anyone in my field. The mona won’t comply. We’re – they can’t watch us like that.” He pressed the palm of his hand to his forehead, taking a shuddering breath.