Shana Abé: The Dream Thief

The only thing Zane truly disliked about the fog was what it did to gunpowder. He’d never found a brand that didn’t lump into muck in humid weather.

From the hours outdoors, his hair had worked loose from its queue, unfashionably long, distinctive. It would be dark against his skin and the dull white of his cravat. He should have worn a wig. A wig, a cheaper hat, a plainer greatcoat: it would have been more anonymous. But what was done was done; he wasn’t a man to linger long in regret. The people he’d cornered these past few days were paid too damned well to remember his face, anyway.

At least tonight was over. Tomorrow he’d start again, but right now he was hungry, he was tired, and he was very much looking forward to a meal and his bed-and what awaited him in that bed.

The candle lantern just past his house burned sulfur-yellow, a very dim sun choked with mist. None of the small, neatly spaced houses he passed were even visible through the gloom. He found his way because he’d always known it, because he’d lived here since he was a child and had mapped the streets and pavements and gutters in his mind so well he knew every alley, every door, every possible route of escape.

He made himself part of the night. He made his footsteps silent, his breathing imperceptible. He listened to the dark so intently it sounded like his own heartbeat, familiar and calm.

This was his realm, for better or worse. This was the place he claimed and defended, a tiny, ragged patch of safety in the midst of chaos.

And so in the back of his mind, past his awareness of the fog and the candle lantern and the muffled thumps and groans of the city, Zane was counting off his steps.

Twenty-two, twenty-three… there would be an oil lamp flickering in the front window of Madame Dumont’s two-story, for the wastrel son who whored away half the night.

Thirty-seven, thirty-eight… step over the exposed root of the elm that had finally cracked the pavement into halves.

Forty-five. The black cat watching from the roof of Lucy Brammel’s.

Forty-seven. The loosened trellis the cat used to climb to the roof; Zane had pulled it free of the chimney last January to see if it would hold his weight-it wouldn’t-and Lucy still hadn’t noticed.

Fifty-one.

He paused, another reflex. Fifty-one marked his first step onto his property. Too many men relaxed when they reached their own doors. It was one of the easiest places to make a kill.

But Zane was not like other men. He wasn’t like anyone else on this clean, comfortable street, and it was one of the things he appreciated most about Bloomsbury. Despite being a neighborhood of actors and artisans, the truth was that everyone here was rigorously, predictably, church-squeaky good.

Another advantage to a man who lived in disguise: it made his sort stand out all the more.

He slipped around to the back of his house, evading all the traps he’d set, finding the short rise of stairs through the clouded darkness and then the keyhole to the kitchen door.

Joseph was waiting inside. He was seated at the side table, eating a bowl of something that smelled like very bad eel.

“Late,” he grunted, by way of a greeting.

Zane removed his cocked hat, running a hand through his hair. “Whatever it is you are consuming, I do not want it served at my table tonight. Or any other night.”

The man’s brows arched; past his scars and badly mottled skin, he looked pained. “It’s me mum’s recipe.”

“Then she is welcome to my portion.” He bolted the kitchen door closed once more, had worked the top buttons of his coat free and was heading for the hall, for bed, when he was halted by his front man’s voice.

“Got a visitor.”

“I know.”

“Not Mim.”

Zane slanted a look back at him. Joseph shrugged. “A girl. Put her in the parlor.”

“A girl,” he repeated slowly. “Are you certain?”

“Aye,” answered Joseph, with exaggerated care. “I’m certain.”

Zane turned again and silently left the kitchen.

His house was dark. He’d grown up with it this way and kept it as a useful habit. A house ill-lit on the inside revealed much less of its inhabitants; he nearly always preferred to see and be unseen. But Joe had apparently felt the girl in question required a great deal of illumination. When Zane stopped at the arched doorway to the parlor, he saw that every lamp was burning, plus the pair of candelabras from the dining room. The contrast was almost like daylight: the reds and blue-greens of the Peshawar rug searing bright, the carved corners of the paintings rubbed with gilt, the gleam of the satinwood chairs eye-wateringly sharp.

The child slumped aside in one of them, head back, eyes closed, lips apart. There was a half-filled cup of chocolate tilting precariously on her lap, her fingers still curled around the handle. Her frock was girlish blue sprigged with daisies, her pumps were dirty, her hair was mussed. Limp ringlets of darkened gold fell softly against her cheeks. She looked pale and gaunt and remarkably plain, despite the beauty of that hair. Everything smelled of hot wax and honey.

He stood there and felt, to his distant surprise, none of the anger he had expected but instead a profound sense of relief.

To manage it he took the cup from her fingers and gave the chair a hard kick.

She came awake at once, straightening, her hands fluttering across her skirts.

“Lady Amalia. I wish I could say I was happy to see you, but I’ve already endured the pleasure of the Marquess of Langford’s company thrice in the past two days. What the devil are you about?”

“Father’s here?” she asked, looking around them.

“Not at the present. No doubt it won’t be long before he returns. I don’t believe he’s fully convinced I haven’t hidden you away somewhere in the house. Imagine my joy,” he added silkily, “at walking into my parlor tonight and discovering it to be true.”

“I’m sorry. I…” She trailed off, shaking her head, then covered her eyes with one hand. “I haven’t been sleeping well.”

“Perchance it has something to do with the fact that you’ve been riding in a public coach for-let me see-almost a fortnight, isn’t it? That’s about how long it takes to travel from Darkfrith to my door by stage. Unless, I suppose,” he paused, “you flew here.”

He hadn’t meant it as a barb, but she grimaced, just a little. Then her hand lowered; she gazed at him steadily.

“I didn’t fly. You know I can’t. And that’s not why.”

Zane didn’t like that look, long-lashed, brown-eyed, direct. It reminded him too much of her mother. They stared at each other in the growing silence. Amalia’s lips slowly compressed into a thin, stubborn line.

With a sigh he gave it up, lowering himself into the opposite chair. He glanced down at her cold chocolate and then tried a taste, feeling his stomach rumble. Hell was going to cut loose sooner or later, and he’d already missed supper.

The drákon did not take kindly to losing one of their kind. He knew that too bloody well.

Lamplight glinted silver along the scrolled edge of a tray beside him. Saints be praised, Joseph had left her food. Scones, orange cake, a dish of honeyed nuts and dried fruits-he leaned forward and helped himself to half an apricot and a sliver of cake.

“Bad dreams, snapdragon?”

“Yes.” It was a miserable whisper.

“How unfortunate. I’m certain it was worth fleeing your home without a word to anyone-without, I am equally certain, permission from your almighty drákon council-to come here to tell me.”

But she still didn’t avert her gaze. She didn’t even seem abashed. All her initial, drowsy confusion appeared completely vanished. She looked cool and composed and very much older than her years, even in her wrinkled skirts. Whatever it was that had compelled her halfway across the kingdom was well hidden behind that mask of mulish calm.