Pip had spent all of yesterday and most of this morning hunting through the city’s sprite network, following whispers and rumors about Crimson, the red-haired messenger. When she’d finally shown up at my door an hour ago, she’d been bouncing on her toes... mid-air, with nervous energy.
“Found him! Took forever because private messengers have about seventeen hiding spots, apparently. But I asked around, and the Circle was kind of helpful, mostly not, but... anyway, he’s really scared. We should bring him something nice. Maybe candy? Everyone likes Dewberry Confectionery's Nutmeg Nips.”
The buildings rose three and four stories high, shops and apartments meant for average-sized people, but their brick facades had been colonized by sprite dwellings. Tiny doors and windows had been carved into the walls at various heights, some barely reaching my knee, others at eye level. Miniaturebalconies jutted out at odd angles. Laundry lines were strung between buildings, holding everything from tiny ball gowns to underpants. The sprites clearly had no shame.
Lanterns the size of thimbles glowed in windows, casting pinpricks of light that made the alley shimmer like scattered stars, or glitter, if you asked Pip, I was sure. Signs above the doors here advertised courier services in perfect script, though the sign above Starwing Deliveries had faded enough I had to squint to read it. The smell of baking bread mixed with something fouler, and from somewhere above, faint music drifted down. It might’ve been a fiddle, accompanied by laughter that sounded like wind chimes.
Wickett had insisted on coming, despite my protests. Calder had simply followed, and then Lucette had invited herself with a look that suggested arguing would be pointless. Lucette was tough, I was learning, but wildly smart and possibly a little cunning. I knew I’d need to keep my eye on her, but also, she could be such an asset if I played my cards right.
“Stay close,” Wickett ordered, his hand finding the small of my back for a brief second.
The touch burned through the scratchy uniform, proprietary and controlling. Every instinct screamed to put Calder between us, to summon Silas from the skies, to remind him I wasn’t his to command. I didn’t. Because I knew he was doing it to push my damn buttons, and I wasn’t going to give him the satisfaction.
“This way!” Pip announced, hovering near a rusted gate that led to the rail station. “He’s hiding at the rail station. Just remember, scared people need gentle coaxing. My mama always said you catch more cooperation with kindness than with threats, and she was hardly ever wrong about people things.”
Nothing was guarded as we approached. No hunters keeping watch to deter looters. No one waiting to catch the train that hadn’t run since the night Vitoria had been accused. It was aperfect hiding spot. I kept my eyes peeled for Vitoria as much as the sprite, and when Wickett made us all stop so he could search the perimeter, I held my breath until Calder nudged me so I wouldn’t pass out.
There was no chance he was going to find her here. I knew that. She was smarter than that, but the lack of knowing anything at all made it feel like everything was a possibility.
He moved, strung tight like violence waiting to happen. Muscles taught, hands ready. But Wickett was also fast. In everything he did, there was a trace of power. The perfect hunter. The perfect weapon. My perfect enemy. Who’d said nothing when I left him standing dumbfounded in the kitchen earlier. As if hewantedto be more than what most saw him as. As if he was so shocked to be treated as anything but feared, he had no response to it.
I smoothed my fingers over the raised mark on my palm, reminding myself I couldn’t give him the benefit of the doubt. I couldn’t forget what he was. Who he was. A monster in a beautiful mask. Perhaps a victim of his father’s, but then so was the rest of the city, so he would get no sympathy from me on that front.
When he decided the yard of the rail station was clear, Wickett led us forward, finagling the lock until the door gave way. Silverline Station sprawled before us, vaulted ceiling held up by iron columns polished until they gleamed. The ticket windows stood empty, their brass grilles catching what little light filtered through the tall windows. Our footsteps echoed across the marble floors as we moved deeper inside, past rows of wooden benches where travelers would normally wait. The departure board hung silent and still, no trains scheduled, of course.
Train cars sat idle on the platforms, some even half-loaded with cargo for canceled runs. Pip led us to a cargo car sittingalone on a side track, its door hanging half-open. Before we could get inside, Silas swooped in through the gap and landed gracefully, doing a once-over.
Once we were finally inside, we found the sprite cowered in the far corner, dressed in tiny formal wear, a navy suit with gold trim, glasses perched on his nose, a pocket watch far too large for him clutched in trembling hands.
“Crimson!” Pip flew toward him immediately, her voice bright with relief. “Oh! Thank the Furies, you’re okay! Well, not okay-okay because you look terrible, no offense, but you’re alive! I brought friends. Good ones. Promise.”
He looked up at her, terror warring with desperate hope. “Pippy. You shouldn’t have come. If they find out I talked?—”
“We won’t let anything happen to you,” I said, already pulling water from a barrel wedged between two crates likely meant for the steam engine’s boiler.
“Don’t make promises you can’t keep,” Wickett said, his tone flat but not unkind. Just brutally honest.
He was right. I knew he was right. But looking at Crimson’s face, at the fear and fragile hope warring there, I couldn’t bring myself to take the promise back. Sometimes people needed hope more than they needed truth, even if that hope was built on nothing but good intentions and desperate optimism.
Silas positioned himself between me and Wickett, hackles raised.
“Control your familiar,” Wickett said coldly.
“He’s not my familiar, but heisprotective. Deal with it. And maybe don’t worry about things that don’t concern you, hunter.”
I knelt slowly, whispering, “Serenus.”
The water lifted into the air, dissipating into a calming mist. Lavender and moonflower, the scents Gran had taught me for easing fear. The magic fought me. Not like it did at thecompound, which was almost limiting. This was different, like a curse lingered in the air.
“See? Water magic!” Pip gestured enthusiastically. “It’s pretty and calming. Syn’s really good at this stuff. She makes the best runes in the whole city, too. Well, she used to, I’m pretty sure.”
“Pip,” I said gently.
“Right. Sorry. Nervous talker.” She turned back to Crimson, her voice softening. “But really, we’re here to help. That’s what the Circle does, right? We look out for each other.”
“I won’t drag this out,” I said as calmly as I could. “We just need to know the name of the person that hired you to deliver messages to Vitoria Nindle, the woman that lived above Thistle and Thorn. Late at night, you would come to our apartment, do you remember? We just need that name. That’s all.”
Crimson breathed in the mist, his wings slowing fractionally. “Can’t speak,” he gasped, blood flecking his lips. “Contract binds. If I say a name?—”
