Suzanne McLeod - The Shifting Price of Prey

The tourists (apart from the lip-locked couple) looked round as the five of us invaded the lane. The women’s eyes widened with curiosity while the burly man grabbed his burger and high-tailed it away, to a narrow-eyed frown from Constable Taegrin.

Mary checked her crystal against the map. It pointed at the decorative willow wall blocking the end. ‘We’ll have to double round.’

Something about the location snagged my memory and I jogged to the wall. At its centre was a woven willow arch backed with mirrored foil. A label stuck to the foil quoted: Extend your garden vista safely: won’t scratch, chip or crack . And as I squinted at my distorted reflection, it clicked where we were.

‘We won’t need to,’ I called. ‘This is an entrance to one of the Other areas. It’s got a Look-Away on it.’

Out the corner of my eye, I saw the lip-locked couple pull apart. The girl – a pretty, freckled redhead – nudged her boyfriend, who was well worth the tonsil tangling, if tall, dark and handsome flipped your switch; obviously it did hers—

And Katie’s too.

I stared in disbelief.

Tall, dark and handsome was Katie’s new boyfriend.

Marc. Marc’s eyes met mine curiously for a moment then, as he realised who I was, colour stained his cheeks and he turned away, suddenly very interested in showing his redhead girlfriend whatever was on the barrow.

I clenched my fists, wanting to grab him and ask him what the hell he was playing at. This was going to break Katie’s heart when she found out. Crap. I knew the guy was too good to be true.

‘You all right?’ Mary said quietly as she and Dessa joined me.

‘Yeah,’ I muttered, glaring at Marc’s back. ‘Sorry—’ I stopped as, from behind another section of willow screen, two more figures appeared: an older male I recognised as Marc’s uncle from their picture on their plant nursery website, and a small, squat and disgustingly familiar gnome: Mr Lampy. The gnome was followed by one of his cats, its tail held high. Marc bent to stroke it, nearly managing to hide himself under the stall as he did so. Well, looked like he had been telling the truth when I’d caught him spying on me, about speaking to one of the gnome’s cats before doing business with Lecherous Lampy. Not that it made me feel any better. Neither did the fact that as the gnome saw me, he waved, mouth splitting into his awful denture-filled leer.

I half-heartedly lifted a hand in greeting then suppressed a groan as he rushed over.

‘Ms Taylor, how fortunate to see you here.’ His beady eyes leered from behind his round glasses. ‘Doing a bit of shopping are you? I’ve got some juicy worms marinated in sugar syrup with deadnettles if you’re interested? Jarred for portability? I know you fairies like those.’

Dessa made a choked noise behind me as I said, ‘I’m not a fairy, Mr Lampy, I’m a sidhe. And I’m not shopping. I’m here on official business.’ I waved a hand at the four police officers. He had to be blind if he couldn’t see them.

‘Of course.’ The gnome nodded his lichen-covered head agreeably. ‘I won’t hold you up, then, but you haven’t forgotten about my licences, have you?’

Out-of-season desiccated dead garden fairies are hard to forget, much as I wanted to. ‘No,’ I said. ‘I’ll get back to you as soon as I can, Mr Lampy.’

‘Wonderful, Ms Taylor.’ He turned away, then spun back and leaned in way too close to my chest. I stepped back, bumping into Dessa. ‘There was another small item,’ the gnome said in a conspiratorial voice. ‘The pathway on Primrose Hill seems to have developed a problem. Perhaps you could look at it sometime?’

Pathway? I frowned . . . Oh, right, there was a small patch of Between tagging Primrose Hill to some of London’s other green spaces that acted as a shortcut for a lot of fae. It wasn’t really anything to do with me or Spellcrackers, but . . .

‘What’s the problem?’

He clasped his sausage-like fingers over his pot-belly. ‘I’m not really sure, Ms Taylor. I haven’t seen it for myself, just heard a rumour.’

‘Fine. I’ll look into it.’ Anything to get rid of him.

‘Wonderful.’ The gnome gave me anther denture-blinding smile and hurried back to his stall. The freckled redhead was still there talking to Marc’s uncle. The gnome’s cat had been joined by another, and the pair were under the barrow, ears flat and bottle-brush tails suggesting a spat was in the offing. But Marc had obviously made himself scarce. Damn. I was going to have to break the bad news about him to Katie; so not a conversation I wanted to have.

‘Juicy worms?’ Mary murmured. I shot her a look and she held her hands up. ‘Hey, just asking.’

‘Sorry. Disgusting client.’

‘Yeah, I can see that,’ she agreed, her sympathy only just edging out her mirth, then got back to business and indicated the willow arch with its mirror. ‘How do we get through?’

‘Just walk,’ I said. ‘It’s an Illusion spell designed to stop anyone entering by accident.’ I stepped towards the mirror, only to have Mary’s hand clamped on my arm.

‘Genny,’ she warned, ‘we’re doing this by the book, remember? Which means we need backup.’ She thumbed her radio. It crackled into life.

I sighed impatiently as Mary gave out orders, then pursed my lips at the pretty redhead, wondering if she knew her boyfriend was chatting up seventeen-year-olds on the side. And wondering why she wasn’t slapping the disgusting gnome for so patently leering at her cleavage while bagging up what looked like a sheaf of A4 pages and various concoctions for Marc’s brother. Why on earth would a nurseryman want all those magical ingredients? Curious. I pinged him: human. The girl, though, had a touch of fae, or maybe witch, blood—

‘Okay.’ Mary clicked off her radio, and I put the gnome and Katie’s treacherous boyfriend away to deal with later. ‘Backup’s on its way in ten.’ She motioned to the other WPC. ‘Constable, wait here for them, and while you do take statements from the stallholders.’ She extended her baton with its jade-tipped Stun spell and pointed it at the mirror. ‘Constable Taegrin leads the way, as he’s less likely to be affected by any magical attack. I’ll go next, then Constable Dessa. Genny goes last. That way if there’s anything dodgy on the other side, she’ll be protected.’

Taegrin nodded grimly as Dessa extended her own baton with a ferocious snap. ‘Yes, ma’am!’

‘You know I could snag your Stun spells before either of you could blink, don’t you?’ I said drily.

Mary shook her head. ‘Doesn’t matter, Genny, you’re still a civilian. Now, is there anything you can tell me about what to expect?’

I shifted through my mental Carnival files, and as it clicked exactly which Other area this was, an errant moment of mischief made me say, ‘A few shows, nothing special.’

‘Let’s go, then.’

Taegrin ducked under the willow arch, disappearing through the mirror. Mary and Dessa followed, and like the good little civilian I was, I brought up the rear. The mirror’s illusion slipped over me like a chill breeze, and I found myself standing between my three protectors, in a visitor-free clearing, ringed by half-a-dozen exhibition tents. And when I say exhibition, I mean exhibition !

I’d read the shows’ listings on the Carnival’s manifest, but words on paper couldn’t compare. For a moment I stood and stared with the rest.

Tents one to three, respectively, offered: Dwarf Smelting ~ Golden Showers a Speciality , Sing-a-Long Sea Shanties with Susie the Siren and Swan Maiden Dancing . Though if the gaudy painting of a swan-headed girl, scantily clad in white feathers and wrapping her long legs round a pole, was right, it definitely wasn’t the usual ‘suitable for children’ show.