by Lola Gabriel
“What happened?” Boden asked, genuinely concerned, “Are you okay, Aaron?”
Aaron nodded, strangely enthusiastically. “Am I? AM I? LOOK!”
He held up his right hand triumphantly, and in it, a scroll! The scroll!
Boden started forward so quickly, he almost pulled the sheet off Jane, who pulled it back roughly.
“Is that really it, Aaron?” Jane asked.
Aaron nodded wildly. “Yup,” he said, “yup yup yup yup. I bet you thought I’d run away, right? From the great hall. But the thing is, what she said…what Talia said, about it being a pickup point…” He was gesticulating to the extent that Boden was a little worried for the ancient, dragon skin scroll in his hand. But Jane was listening carefully, and so he knew he should too. The scroll had been through plenty.
“I thought, where could that be? And then, I thought about the tunnels. All the secret passages in the palace, they connect chimneys and cellars and plenty of passageways to outside. And no one knows about all of them! I mean, I’ve been studying ancient texts and I know quite a few, but, you know, a few people know more, I suppose.”
“You crawled around secret passages for five hours to find that, Aaron?” Jane asked. Aaron stopped and gazed at the scroll in his hand. “Yes,” he said, “I did.”
Jane looked at Boden, and then back to Aaron. “Aaron, give us the scroll and go to bed, for goodness’ sake. And shower. In the morning, we’ll announce your new position in the archives, won’t we, Boden?”
She elbowed Boden, and he started. “We will,” he said, “most definitely, with time off to study or do work away wherever you like. And chambers here, if you wish. Now, Jane’s right, go to bed. Take the blue room.”
Aaron nodded, almost vibrating with excitement. He put the scroll down on the end of the bed and turned to leave.
“Oh,” Boden said, remembering the morning, “and we’ll get someone in to work with you on your weird flying thing. Turn the light off as you leave, will you?”
In the dark, with the door closed and the scroll safely put away, Boden said, “See, you make an excellent queen.”
“And you make an excellent alpha, when you’re allowed to try,” Jane replied, wrapping her soft arms around him and snuggling close.
“You make me good at it,” Boden said, his face in her hair, sleep finally rising up to take him from this strange, strange, life-changing day.
Archibald: High Warlock of London
1
Archibald
Archibald sighed and smoothed back his hair, which was long enough to flick around his ears and fall across his forehead and into his eyes. In his other hand was a quill, a long, grey, silver-tipped feather. He dipped it in the inkwell and tutted to himself when it scratched dryly at the yellowish paper he was trying to sign after he had pulled it out. Archibald rang a small bell that was sitting on his desk, and as if by magic, a shortish man in a suit pushed through the double doors of the office.
“Sir?” asked the clerk, bouncing eagerly on the balls of his feet.
“Ink, please,” Archibald said, pushing the pot toward his man. Erik had been with the family a long time and had served his father. He was a very good servant and never crossed into insubordination, though he was often fizzing with whatever the hell he wanted to say. Usually, Archibald tried not to ask, but it was almost like a physical force pushing against him this morning.
“What’s gotten into you?” he asked and regretted the question before it was out of his mouth.
“Oh, no, sir,” Erik said, talking fast, pretending to be shocked. Or trying his best anyway. “I couldn’t possibly. And cook says not to disturb you until you’ve had your swim and your lunch. Quite right too, routine’s important, isn’t it? There’s work to do…only it’ll be interrupted this afternoon, of course.” Erik widened his eyes and pasted an oopsie daisy kind of a look on his face.
“Erik,” Archibald sighed, taking the inkwell out of the smaller man’s hands and putting it in front of himself, “no games, please. I have to read all of these and get them signed before I head to the pool.”
Erik shook his head. “Well, I say, your father never bothered with all that reading! Surely someone’s already looked them over in the planning office?”
“Yes,” Archibald replied, “of course, but I’m not signing something I haven’t read, that’s madness. What if one of them turned out to be…oh, I don’t know…me signing over the deeds to the palace? None of us would be happy then, would we? Now, tell me what’s going to be so awful or exciting about my afternoon, please. You’re clearly dying to.”
Erik looked up at the High Warlock with a mild glint of disappointment in his slate-gray eyes.
“I know,” Archibald said, sitting back down on his leather office chair, one mustard-socked ankle over the other, “my father was never so boring. But no one has ever stepped down as High Warlock before, so obviously that approach wasn’t the best, was it?”
Erik seemed aggrieved about this take-down of his old master. Archibald often wondered why his dad hadn’t taken his faithful man with him to Madagascar, or wherever the hell he was now. Maybe the quote-unquote normal life he wanted didn’t involve being waited on, but Archibald doubted that. Or doubted that had stuck anyway.
“You’ve got,” said Erik moodily, but leaning forward across the desk nonetheless, “a visitor this afternoon.”
Archibald let out a groan. “If it’s Brunhilda again, tell her…”
“Oh, noooo,” Erik was close to smiling now despite his mood, because if there was anything that could be relied on to cheer Erik up, it was gossip. “No, it’s not a witch, not this time. Far worse.” He paused for dramatic effect, but when met by Archibald’s stony gaze, he went reluctantly on. “It’s only the fae king,” he said. “Old Albaline just made an appointment for what he assured me will be a flying visit!”
Erik’s smile told Archibald that he knew exactly how aggravating this was to the young High Warlock. Yet Archibald couldn’t help but suck air through his teeth in a pained way. “Do you know what he wants, Erik?”
Erik shrugged, waving off Archibald’s question. But Erik knew everything. His roots were deep in the palace, and in the magical world outside. Archibald assumed he had friends everywhere. And to be fair, as unorthodox as the manservant…butler…whatever he was…as unorthodox as Erik was, he was impossible not to like and had been there as long as Archibald could remember. He had his own house on the grounds, where his partner and their large wolfhound led an apparent life of leisure, and was more in the loop in the palace, on every level, than any other single person including the High Warlock himself. And so, Archibald raised his eyebrows when Erik met his question with a silent shrug.
“Really, you’ll have me believe you have no idea?”
Erik shook his head. “Oh, no, sir.” There was a pause. Then he cracked a smile, “I mean, you wouldn’t want to dirty your ears with rumors!”
“Erik, come on,” Archibald said, “you don’t have to play your game. Spit it out.”
Erik crossed his arms, then uncrossed them to smooth his mustache down with a finger. “That’s not very polite,” he said. “You know, plenty of palace snoops would charge for this kind of information.” But a smile was flickering at the edges of his mouth. He just liked messing around, always had.
“Well, plenty of High Warlocks would have you out on your ear, Erik. But I have loyalty. Even if you like to test it.”
“I rocked you in your cradle, Archie!” Erik looked aghast. “How could you?”
Archibald shook his head. Only Erik could call him Archie, and even that was sometimes touch and go. You see, with a father like his, being childish had never been an option. Maybe that was why Erik liked to play games with him even now. Keep the child inside alive. Just about.
“You really want me to believe you took part in childcare, E?”
“Well…” Erik shrugged, “Damon helped out. You were often in the cottage. I didn’t perso
nally change any nappies, of course. Oh, even I’m getting tired of this now.” Erik waved a hand, dismissing the game of cat and mouse. “All I know is it’s about Albaline’s daughter, the older one, Lyric. The fae do have the oddest names, I always wondered about their process there… Anyway, you remember her surely, her mother was—”
Erik stopped speaking for a moment here, froze, and twiddled his mustache. A classic sign of nervousness in the man.
“You used to play with her when you were young. Maybe you remember. She was always wild, getting you into scrapes. The number of healing spells needed after every playdate was absurd. Anyway, she didn’t grow into a responsible type like you, she’s the one of Albaline’s daughters with the reputation. Always getting into trouble. Does her father’s head in. No idea what she’s done this time, but it seems he wants your help with something. Maybe they want to find her a match, and figure you know all the eligible bachelors…”
Archibald leaned back in his chair, his quill laid down on the table now, and crossed his arms. The chair bent back a little when he leaned and he had to tense his shoulders. It was uncomfortable.
“No,” he said, “send him away. I’m not going to help them. They didn’t help my father, so I won’t help them. It’s as simple as that. And it won’t change.”
But Erik still looked excited. He had a glint in his eye, and he was almost vibrating with the need to speak again. Slowly, Archibald allowed his eyes to drift to the older man’s still almost unlined face and his eyebrows to raise themselves, asking the much desired question.
“Archie, Albaline has something to offer you. And you would be, pardon my French, absolutely nutty to turn it down.”
2
Lyric
Lyric opened her eyes. Her head hurt, and she wasn’t at all sure where she was. It was chilly and there was a crack of light filtering through a set of mostly drawn curtains on the other side of the room. Her head was foggy and her mouth was dry. Her eyelids were trying to stay stuck together. She pushed herself up and realized she had been sleeping on just a thin piece of foam matting, or that was what it felt like. What had happened? She remembered flying north, and flashes of sandstone, and dark rooms. It had been raining, she knew that much. And there had been strange voices.
The room smelled terrible. Lyric managed to get to her hands and knees. A low groan startled her for a moment, before she realized she was the one making it. Slowly, she moved toward the light, though the light itself hurt her, dull and white as it was. Cloud light, Lyric thought. The drafty window must open onto a cloudy sky.
The floor under her knees and palms was rough wood, damp in patches. A couple of times, she bashed into hard objects that rolled away loudly. After each of them she froze, her heart in her mouth, not wanting to draw attention to herself.
Soon enough—well, not soon enough for Lyric, who wanted to stay low to the ground—she reached the flat cool of the wall and half leaned against it to push herself to a standing position. She allowed her gaze to rest just beside the opening in the curtains and watched the color that swam across them as a result with interest. She was trying to get herself used to the sunshine, but it was taking too long and eventually she took a deep breath and lifted a hand, pulling the heavy curtain along its rail and revealing half the bay window. Even squinting, it was a few moments before Lyric could see.
Outside, the street was wide, with a few trees at intervals just coming into bloom. They were high up, on the top floor, it looked like, and the buildings were all a warm orange stone. They were built from great blocks of it. Quite grand. The pavement and the road surface were shining with rain that was no longer falling, and a few potholes loomed black and of indeterminable depth. From here, it was easy to imagine that she would be able to fall into one and drown, or let gravity take her and end up somewhere new entirely. The underworld, maybe. The sky was, as Lyric had predicted, grey and clouded, heavy and wide and dirty-looking, like an unwashed comforter that has been sweat into night after night after night.
Lyric’s hand was against the glass, though she hadn’t meant to put it there. The glass was solid and cool, and Lyric’s nails tap-tap-tapped against it. The rhythm of a worried heartbeat.
She wondered what her dad was doing, back at home. If he was looking for her. Who he was shouting at.
Under her hand, the window was steaming up. When she moved it, there would be a greasy mark, but no one on the street would see it; she was too high up. And anyway, the street seemed to be deserted, apart from a chubby, grubby city fox sauntering confidently down the pavement as if he were out on a constitutional.
Suddenly, Lyric’s stomach rumbled. When had she last eaten? She turned and finally saw the room she had been asleep in. There was a ratty futon on the floor, and almost nothing else. A few glass bottles peppered the bare boards, and there was some other rubbish in the corners. It was all a little damp with spills. Lyric wrinkled her nose. Wobbling, she pushed off the wall, which was painted a bright blue color and didn’t help her sore head one bit. She began to pick her way to the door. Her feet were socked, nothing else, and she was afraid she would step on something.
Food had been the key, though. She was thinking of food, and she had begun to remember when she last ate. What happened after she left the house the night before?
3
Archibald
The knock on the door was short and sharp. Three raps of a set of knuckles. Archibald had already been sitting upright, but he stretched his spine longer and straighter, and then changed his mind, stood up, and straightened his blazer. He did up his bottom button. Then he undid it, shook his head, sat down. He rolled his chair as close to the desk as it would go and flattened his hair down.
“Come in,” Archibald called, his elbows resting on the big oak desk, his fingers steepled in front of his stoic lips.
The door creaked open and Albaline blustered in. His waistcoat was gold and his white-blond beard appeared to have a blue tinge to it, matching his blazing blue eyes.
“Archibald!” Albaline exclaimed. “I haven’t seen you since you were…” He leaned over, held a hand somewhere below his own bulging waist.
Archibald smiled a tight smile and nodded slowly. “Indeed,” he said, “since before my mother died.”
To Archibald’s surprise, this didn’t stop Albaline. Not at all. On the contrary, he smiled widely and said, “Yes, wonderful woman, your mother, so charitable, it was a terrible…” He cleared his throat, and his puffy face seemed to deflate somewhat.
“In fact,” he said and took another couple of large strides forward, grabbing a chair that seemed far too small ever to support him by its back and pulling it toward the front of Archibald’s desk. “May I?” he asked, nodding to the chair.
Archibald let out an affirmative noise, and Albaline sat heavily. There was a moment in which Archibald feared the chair might crack and break, but it didn’t.
“In fact,” Albaline repeated, leaning forwards so that the two men’s faces were uncomfortably close together, “my current situation…well…you might be able to empathize, given the fate of dear Miranda.”
Archibald thought he might be sick. Albaline’s breath was strangely sweet, as though he had been chewing toffees, and yet also swampy. But that wasn’t what was causing the nausea. Was he comparing the latest fuck-up of his wayward firstborn to some facet of Archibald’s mother’s life or death? The hairs on the back of the warlock’s neck were standing up, and he was beginning to tense from shoulders to toes.
“What?” Archibald managed, in a voice that emerged surprisingly measured from his throat.
Albaline’s blue eyes were wide. “Well,” he said, “of course I hope that the outcome will be different. I…well… Goddess knows we all loved your dear mother…”
Archibald felt himself breathing faster. His left hand crawled slowly toward his quill, as images of stabbing it into the fae king’s fat neck flashed before his open eyes. Just as he reached it, Albaline said, “What I mean
to say is, Lyric has been taken. She’s gone. And I need your help to get her back.”
After his announcement, Albaline stared off into the distance for a while, unfocused. Then his eyes got wet.
“What?” Archibald croaked. Then he jumped as the quill in his hand snapped, and ink sprayed from its tip all over his face and hair.
“Fuck!” It was even in his mouth. He grabbed for his pocket square and wiped, but could feel it being spread across his chin and cheeks.
“Oh dear!” Albaline said, in too cheerful a voice. “These things happen!” And he produced something from an inner waistcoat pocket and gave it a flick. There was a robotic kind of noise, and then it was the length of a ruler, pencil thin. A telescopic wand. It had that telltale fairy-light glow at its end. Archibald was about to protest, but with a flick, the cleaning spell was cast and he was engulfed in the lily of the valley scent and unmistakable tickle of fae magic.
Archibald sneezed. He waved his hand in front of his face, but knew it wouldn’t work; you couldn’t flap magic away.
“Well, you’re clean, aren’t you?” Albaline snapped, retracting his wand and shoving it roughly back into the pocket hidden in the silk lining of his waistcoat. His eyes were almost grey when they met Archibald’s, or he thought they were for a moment, but it was like he’d blinked and they were blue again. Archibald was probably bringing his own prejudices into the picture…not that they weren’t justified. He smoothed his hair again.
“I see,” he said. “Do you know who has her?”
Albaline sighed and leaned back in his chair. Again, Archibald braced for the crack of wood. “No,” the fae king said, “but they went north. They picked her up from the garden. She was watering the sunflowers. I suspect vampires, and we can only assume they aren’t English.” he shrugged. “You see, that’s where you come in.”