1867

Summer

Dust covered all. The homes of faded paint, the post office, the rail yard, the fields of cut trees. It clung to the legs of stomping horses, the footprints in the muck, the cuts and sores of the mine’s weary men. Only two pairs of shoes in this town were clean of it: Menowin’s, and her’s.

But she could already guess that that wasn’t why so many folk were staring.

She walks slowly through the main street, her hand never leaving Pa’s gun. Her felt hat’s come off, replaced by a golden bandana that just fails to cover her short hair. She wears a long, white shirt, loose leather jacket, colourful patchwork pants - enough to pass for a boy, if she wasn’t so weighed down by all the amulets, rings, and a loaned earring. With every step, her clothes ring, laced as they are with tiny bells.

She leans into Menowin. “These pants are huge. They’re gonna slide off.”

“That’s why I gave you a belt.” He smirks. "Perhaps boy clothes don't suit you?"

She growls. Berkeley - a town named after its founder - reminds her of nothing good, and plenty bad. The sermons her pastor gave in Keokuk painted the West as a lawless Gamorrah, a land of outlaws, fallen women, and few friends. She wasn’t sure about the townspeople - a few seemed upstanding, or at least kept to their chores. But she couldn’t ignore the hungry gazes, the emaciated dogs, the women who dressed…

… well, not like her mother.

“‘EY, GYPSY!” One girl hollers from a balcony, in a wooden building full of drunken men. “Ya can swing with me when ya get bored with her! I hear it’s GOOD FORTUNE!”

Harriet looks at her, aghast. She’s covered in makeup, fishnets, a corset torn at the ends. Even now, a dust-covered hand kneads her thigh.

“Durikerav, gadži!” Menowin shouts back. “There’s room for two!”

That gets a raucous reply from the balcony. Harriet clings to him. “They don’t really think we’re…”

“Romni nashli so zeita. They do, chindilan!” He pats her back hard enough to spin her forward. “Why else would I bring a girl?”

She turns red. Suddenly, another door opens, and a drunkard flings from the saloon’s back. Falling with him, a surge of chips, playing cards, all caught in the dirt and wind. Another player follows down the creaky steps, revolver in hand, clambering over the first and beating, beating, beating, to the cheers of the table inside.

Harriet watches it all with wide eyes. “W-we have a plan, right?”

“Sure. You go kirchima, buy me a beer, loviné, and then I sit back while you make the noise.”

She shrivels when she hears the gambler’s bones crack. “Me? Why jes' me?”

“Because you wanted to help, rakli.” He violently grabs her hair.

“L-Let go a’ me!”

“You should be leaping at any chance I offer.” His grip tightens as he drags her up the front steps. “Like a dog.”

Before she can stop him, he throws her through the swivelling wooden doors. "Now, bark!"

Harriet crashes onto the floor, quickly scrambling to her knees. It’s a massive hall. Crowded tables, discarded bottles, gargantuan men. There’s a game of blackjack in the corner, more girls in fishnets on the stairs, the distinct smell of piss by one of the tables. Two men tend a bar chock-full of glasses and kegs, nestled close to a team of fiddlers.

Almost everyone has a gun.

There isn’t a child in sight.

And the moment Harriet bursts through, they all turn their eyes towards her.

She blinks at them, bewildered. “Uh…”

Suddenly, she feels something push into her ass. Menowin’s given her a light kick. “Loviné, chindilan.”

She waits until she can't hear the bells that join his footsteps, before climbing to her feet. “Asshole…”

She walks directly, seriously, her eyes never leaving the bar even as she suffocates beneath the silence all around her.

As she struggles to climb up the stool, the Springfield still strapped to her back, the bartender looks at her like she's a carcass being picked clean. “Um... we don’t usually let kids up-”

“Whiskey. Scotch.” She says it all a beat too fast. “Two glasses a' the strongest shit ya got.”

He hesitates for a moment more before getting to work. Harriet turns to all the stares she's still getting, and starts combing through her dishevelled hair. “What? Never seen someone get a drink?"

Two shot glasses slam onto the counter. “That'll be twelve cents.”

Instantly, she pales.

"Cents?" She chuckles, awkwardly, and starts pawing through her clothes. Menowin must have sewn a dozen pockets onto this thing, but all of them are empty. "Heheheh..." She tries, and fails, to laugh it off. "I... shit, th-that's right, I gotta-"

"Yer not tryin' ta gyp a few drinks off us, are ya?"

The slur makes her quiet, and she watches the bartender's hand slowly move down to his hip. She casts a desperate glance to Menowin. He's smiling.

... this is his distraction, isn't it?

Harriet scowls at him. "Sonuvabitch."

"What wazzit?"

"Nothin'!" She swivels back to the bartender, eyes wild. "Uh... l-lissen, pardner, I might, at this current time, be a lil' strapped fer cash-"

She sees a hint of metal.

"BUT BUT BUT there are other ways a'... tricks." She blinks a few times, the idea forming in her head. "What if I did a trick fer it?"

"A trick?" The bartender doesn't look very impressed.

Harriet smiles, leaping off the stool and swinging the rifle into her hands. “Name a target, any target. An’ I could be drunk, bound-up, one-eyed, but I’ll hit it! Whaddaya say? Folks gimme a challenge, but when I win, they buy my glass!"

"Hahaha!" When of the men at the bar. “Girl, give that gun back to yer Pa. It's nearly big as you!"

“That don't matter."

“Good Lord, don’ lissen ta her, Zachariah.” Another man further down slams his shot glass on the counter. “These gypsy fortune tellers an' magic men, they're always fulla-"

There’s a roar, a burst, a scream. The man hurries back, hands over his face, as his glass erupts into shards. Everyone stops, staring at it, only breaking from their fugue when she blows the smoke from her gun barrel.

"I said..." She opens her palm, revealing a half dozen musket balls. "... I'll hit."

Everyone's silent as she starts replacing the powder, inserting the ball. But eventually, one man particularly reeking of alcohol leans into her. “Ya see that Chinaman by the tables?”

“Uh-huh.” Harriet brings the gun to her shoulder, looks down the sight. “He the dealer?”

“In the flesh.” She squints. The table’s far. Far enough to ignore her last shot and continue with their game. The dealer has a strange mustache, pins in his hair to keep on a tiny hat. “Always good ta prank the yellow bastard." The drunkard rants on.

Harriet tunes him out. Holds her breath.

"I’ll buy ya three scotches if ya hit that tiny-”

A roar. Smoke. The saloon fills first with gasps, and then furious Cantonese.

While the men look on in awe, Harriet swipes her two glasses, quickly downing them both.

“Blegh. Ya owe me three!"

The other men surround her with offers, but the bartender Zachariah's catches her first. “Ya see that birdnest by the roof?”

She lifts her gun. “In the rafter there?”

“I’m s’posed ta knock it off,” he starts filling her shots. “But if ya can shoot it clean-”

“From the ground?” A miner slams his hand on the bar. “I'll bet twenty cents, no way in hell.”

Someone else shouts “Thirty cents, she does!”

“Fifty cents, she hits the fuckin' bird!"

“Zach.” The other tender grabs his arm. “What are ya doin’? Silas already raged at us ‘bout causin’ damage-”

“We'll tell Silas I got it done!”

Harriet tunes them out, eying down the nest. Concentrate... concentrate...

Menowin watches silently from the wall, chomping on another piece of farmer's gum. He’s unsurprised when men start crowding around the girl, and unsurprised when Gawen Rowe approaches him with two mugs in hand. “How’s the distraction going?”

The gun fires. Rowe turns just in time to see falling pieces of the nest. It's followed by curses and cheers.

Menowin swipes the glass and says before he downs it, “Činavas, so čoxani farmičevas.”

He sputters, and looks at the mug. The Black Prince has handed him water.

“Forty cents!” “Fifty cents!” “Sixty!” The betters are getting louder and louder. Rowe makes a face when Harriet lifted onto the table, and the bartender pours whiskey into her mouth, straight from the glass.

"We should stop them. She's going to get sick."

“I think it's part of the next challenge."

Rowe watches his eyes. “You called her a čoxani. Mercy if I'm false, but doesn't that mean 'witch'?"

Another gunshot. Even louder cheers.

Menowin gnaws for a bit longer, before folding his arms. “How long has she been riding with us, Rowe?”

“Maybe four months.”

“You ever see her miss?”

His smile grows as the Black Prince slowly frowns. At the bar, the bets are going into the dollars now. Harriet’s being hoisted up on people's shoulders.

Rowe turns resolute. “You were wondering how she survived. Now, we know.”

“Are you serious? I might not know war like you, gadjo, but I’ve never heard of a rifle so good-"

“What are you playing at, Menowin? She's an excellent shot? Great. Even better that we brought her! But it has you clucking like the morning hen." He gives him a look. "Feeling outmatched?"

Menowin yanks the farmer’s gum from his mouth, waving it. “Rowe, I know you so adore the miracles of your nailed god, but if you think they're really real-"

Another roar. Menowin yelps, his hand reeling back. The farmer’s gum is gone. In its place, a hole in the wall, a few scattered bits of wheat.

Menowin turns. Harriet's slurredly walking up to him, nearly tumbling as she gives a bow.

"Farmačeva. Are you fucking with me!?"

"Course." She gives him a big smirk, and repeats one of his barbs. "Why else would I fuckin' bring ya?"

“Hey there, pardner. How’s it-” She hiccups. “G-goin’?”

The crowd loses it. They’ve stopped betting on whether she’ll hit and started betting on how many drinks it will take to knock her down. Rowe pulls Menowin back before the traveller can show fang.

“Menowin, wait. This isn't-"

Rowe feels something get pushed into his pocket, before Menowin pushes off “Alright, rakli. You want a fucking trick?” He opens his hand, unveiling a slim silver dollar. “Let’s try a moving target."

Harriet pales. The men behind her start whispering.

“Take a good look at this coin, chindilan. In ten seconds, I'm throwing it in the air. You don't want a bruise on your cheek, you'll knock it out before it hits the ground."

“It can’t be done!” Someone shouts.

“Ten dollars it fuckin' can!"

Menowin keeps the coin outstretched, letting Harriet stare at it with a blank, uncertain face. Then he spins on his heel, walks as far as the saloon goes. Harriet's squeezing her gun. Her face hardens, and she lifts it onto her shoulder, eyes set.

He smiles. Spins the coin a few times in his palm. She opts not to watch him, but the air above. Waiting for the arc. She’s hit moving things before, squirrels in the treetops, rabbits in the grass. But those were easy. This…

“Ready?!” Menowin shouts.

She brings the gun to her face before giving a curt nod.

His thumb flicks. She holds her breath. Hold...

A tiny sliver of light spins through the air.

Hold…

“Stop! STOP!” A portly man in a fine suit bursts through the doors. “Gentlemen, gentlemen! What in tarnation are ya-"

A roar. The room falls silent. They all wait, and watch, and breathe in the black powder. But eventually, they all hear a coin land.

And see the smoke rising from a deeply-cut tent.

The entire saloon goes wild. People crowd around her, gaping, pointing, hoisting her up. The well-dressed man - and the shotgun-wielding mountain of a bloke behind him - witness it in clear confusion. “What are ya jackals doin’?! This is my saloon! I don’t pay you people to make mincemeat of my-”

“Silas Berkeley!” Harriet slides off a miner's shoulders, finger pointed in the air. “I... hic... I’ve been…”

For a few seconds, she wobbles, then crashes straight into one of the tables. The cheers that accompany each of her actions suddenly grow more confused.

“Jes' the man I..." She springs back up, trying and failing to make a salute. "I was hopin' ta speak with ya."

Silas looks at her seriously for the first time. “An' who are ya?"

“Harriet!” She blinks, correcting herself. “FIRESIDE!”

“An’ what can I do ya fer, H-”

“I heard ya was fuckin’ rich.”

Silas stares at her. She smiles.

"Ya know... hic... f-f-fer money... I can perform a trick or two."

The Black Prince pales. Harriet's still wearing a dumb smile, but the men around her turn stone cold.

Silas laughs, then saunters up to her, scanning her like the prize at a county fair. "Well, heheheh... I'm not usually the one receiving offers fer tricks but..."

Rowe starts rushing forward, but Menowin holds him back. "What are you doing!?"

"Making a new plan."

"Have you gone mad!?"

Harriet gasps when Silas grabs her shoulder. Holding it firm and tight. "Wait! Wh-whaddaya-"

“Shhhh." He puts a finger on her lips. "I can think of a few."

Her eyes grow wide. She reaches for her Springfield, but the mountainous man moves first, lifting his shotgun. The men that were surrounding her are all looking away. The girls in fishnets already.

If you stumble upon this tale on Amazon, it's taken without the author's consent. Report it.

"N-No..." Her voice turns harried. "Th-th-th-that wasn'-"

“Come on, little lass…” Silas presses her into his chest. "I'll get ya some nice jewellery."

“Get off, Menowin!" Rowe growls.

"Quiet." Menowin pushes him into the wall as Harriet's dragged away. "Where better to hunt a lion then its den?"

"She's gonna get hurt!"

"She?" Menowin smirks. "Check your pockets, Rowe."

Rowe gives him a confused look. "My pocket?"

"That's where I left it, right?"

Rowe fishes in, his eyes widening as he feels the rivulets of a second silver dollar. Menowin watches expectantly as Rowe slowly pulls it out. The Black Prince's expression falls.

The coin is warm to the touch, and dented, as if somebody shot it.

Rowe looks back, to the smoking spot where the first coin lay. He looks at Menowin, his brows wide. “How…”

“Perfect copies, Gawen.” Menowin grins. “They have to be.”

+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

2004

The Yeoman’s Respite Casino is an ostentatious, arrogant place. One of the oldest casinos in Soho, it has swallowed the many small shops and pubs and townhouses that were once crammed in the street beside it. Henri remembers when its walls were wood, not brick and marble and glass. Neon flashes across the entrance at all hours, bathing him in an almost heavenly light. Calling with gold letters and whirring sounds for the shoppers from Oxford Street, the tourists of the Circus, and the addicts from every growing shithole in this country to buy, buy, buy!

Spin, spin, spin.

He waltzes through the grand hall, a facade of gold and bronze and alabaster. Up the steps, and through the dens, private rooms of darkened lights, where old-fashioned men can smoke their fags on couches of red velvet. Under a gorgeous chandelier, the casino truly begins rows and rows of slots, tables of roulette, craps, pai gow, baccarat. The bars give free drinks, the dealers are required to have beauty checks. And with his aether so in touch to the building, Henri can hear the thrumming beat of his club deep below. The Underground: his latest and greatest. Where the young of this city can drug and fuck and hand him cash, while pretending they’re still better than their 'upstairs' fathers.

Yes. In the Respite, there is only luxury. One finds no clocks or windows or prices as they walk down its polished steps. Intoxicating music abounds, and his palace is surrounded by a nigh invisible army of managers, bouncers, and hustlers. They keep the cash-flushed drunk, the too-drunks clean, the cashless quiet, and the troublemakers.

… well…

If one were to check in the corners, at the couples almost kissing, they would learn what the Respite does to troublemakers. What the Court’s allowed them to do.

But no one ever spies. And Henri Ombras handles it personally when they do.

As he climbs up an antique Persian rug, to the quieter, high-roller rooms, Henri reflects on how his business has grown these hundred-odd years. Before, the Respite was popular, now it’s irreplaceable. There’s nowhere more legal to feed, and the food clamouring to get in. So much free flesh and blood that it's perhaps the one place that everyone goes. Courtman, Unbound, the Respite never cares. That kind of space can be useful. At times, it was all that kept the Scáthshiúlóir solvent.

Once or twice, it's even kept the Reeves' blades off his neck.

He's in the upper bar, the sole part of this old building he's kept intact, for his most ancient of clients. But even then, in the back of his mind, he hears faint new sounds.

Whispers of fourth drinks, and Albania.

“Mr. Ombras.” A tuxedoed attendant clings to him, clipboard in hand. “I just wanted to review with you the-”

“Approved. Go.” Henri pulls open a door, storms into the private bar, and lifts a finger against the sharply-dressed figure turned away from him. “You better have a bloody good reason to-”

The pop of champagne.

Captain Edward Morris turns on his heels, as stiffly as the day he became a corpse. He pours two glasses in his dress blues, with gold sashes around his arms, a ceremonial sword at his hip. When he's finished, he hands a bewildered Henri a glass, staring back with midnight black eyes.

“Henri. My schedule is packed from now to December, so I had to make sure we celebrate this."

Henri peers down. The glass is only half-full, but it's likely the most generous serving of alcohol Edward Morris has ever poured. "Celebrate what?"

“On November 5th, a hundred and ninety-nine years ago," Morris lifts his drink. "Your side fought mine on the waves of Trafalgar."

Henri blinks a few times as Morris clinks his glass. The old bar is a space of dark wood, few lights, luxury gin, walls that smell like cigars, complete and utter silence. "Excuse me?"

“I was a boy in that battle, fifteen years old. Serving as midshipman under Captain Pellew’s Conquerer.” Morris pauses, letting the champagne fizzle by his eternal stubble. “But I sailed out of that fight a man."

“Morris, how many times do I need to tell you? There is no my side or your side. I wasn't even born in France!

“You were born in Calais. Calais is in France."

“Only because you sods managed to lose it!”

“Perhaps we didn’t lose it.” Morris lifts a brow. “Perhaps, upon meeting your personage, the King and Court both decided to cut our losses on the continent, lest we attract more with your miserable sense of humour.”

They stare at each other for a few silent moments, before bursting into a laugh.

“How are you doing?" Morris smiles. "Former Keeper?"

“Well, I was doing quite well,” Henri bobs his head “Had a nice sauna and meal waiting for me at the Grand before you-”

“Would 'meal' be shorthand for another prostitute?”

Morris turns again, towards a gramophone. But Henri gives him a look. "Don't tell me your still on about that."

Morris sighs. The gentle piano keys of Bellini start filling the room. “By law, Ombras, you are Sovereign, and so can do as you will on your properties. Since my moral arguments seem to inevitably fail-”

“What arguments? They’re whores!”

"You terrorise them. Murder them-"

"Only when I can't help it!" Herni folds his arms. "And we're not in a Dickens novel, Morris! They’re not all battered women anymore. This one was quite aware of what she was doing, I will gladly say, which was scamming me out of every hapenny she-"

“You are talking about a living being, not a toy!"

"We are vampires!" Henri makes a face. “What do you think we were built for? And - and you know this is nowhere near as depraved as the others get! Shit, this casino probably kills twice as many through suicides every year! I just wanted a little adrenaline in my supper."

"Is that so?"

"'Is that so?'" Henri mimics his voice. "Well, okay, Captain Boy Scout, how do you feed?"

"Consent." Morris finishes his drink. “I find mortals I can trust, mortals that can share a secret. You'd be surprised how many are honestly willing to help."

"Oh my God." Henri's face falls. "You just hate having fun."

Morris looks at him. "Fun?"

"Yes. Can you imagine? I'm a five-hundred-year-old monster, and sometimes, I don't want to be brooding and miserable. Sometimes, I want to have fun!" Henri tilts his head. "And it was an expansion of my palette. I've never tried somebody from Albania!"

"Albania? What, are you collecting them?"

"Yes. Like you collect your little ships in fucking bottles."

Somehow, Morris still doesn't seem to get it. "Are you actually having fun, Henri?"

"Pardon?"

"When you take glee in all the suffering? Treat everything like a game? Or is it more like the man playing slots in your casino? Who's already lost hope, already lost more than he could ever regain, but he keeps playing and playing because it's all he has left?"

"I actually don't spend much time thinking about them, Morris."

"Neither does he?"

"Well, I'm not at risk of going broke." Henri flashes that Cheshire Cat smile.

But inside, the shadows are trickling in. Bits of aether, and moments lost. There are so many voices now, swirling in that faceless mass. Screaming for mercy. For their children.

Morris frowns as he turns away. "Aren't you?"

The Captain climbs onto a stool and lowers his head. Henri watches with mild curiosity. Morris looks... old. Granted, he always did, even when Henri fished him out as a bloated half-corpse from Portsmouth. But now it's... marked.

"I apologise, Ombras. Might not be the company you would seek on this night."

“Why? Long night at the Magistrates?”

“Longer than most.” Morris sighs again.

Henri moves behind the bar, unlocking a cupboard. “Let me guess. Did Caedmon slam his axe into a Kept, or did Davison got on all fours and start barking at the stars?”

“Worse. We got a visit.” Morris pours a much larger glass of champagne “From High Inquisitor von Lamberg.”

Henri pauses. Sometimes, in complete honesty, Morris’ position as Magister of the Shadow-Walkers takes a bit of his piss. For five-hundred years he’s served the Court, and for five-hundred years, he’s been nothing but a rubber stamp, approving whichever twelve Kepts the Court thinks most deserve him. Sure, Morris would say that Magisters should demonstrate ‘an inclination towards good governance,’ but he doesn’t even hunt people, so what does he know? It’s enough to make Herni feel almost humanly angry.

Until he remembers that Margarete von Lamberg, High Inquisitor of the Veneficii, walks this Earth. If giving up top to Morris means he doesn't have to share a room with her, the Magistrate is all his. "What did Margarete want this time?"

“I’d need a stronger drink than this.”

Slam! Morris watches a black tentacle lower Henri's best gin onto the bar. Tonic water and a box of Cuban cigars quickly follow. Morris plucks one out, offering a slight grin. "You know, the young ones make fun of us for doing this."

He offers no resistance. “Caedmon was first, worried about the protests of the war. Just the protests, mind. I'm sure he'd be bombing Iraq to pieces, too, if he could find the place on a map.”

“What was he asking for? More security?"

“That’s a word for it.”

“Ah.” Henri pours his own glass. “Best stop breathing on the streets, then.”

“Hawthorne’s next, regarding Oathsworn. Seems he’s having trouble rearing Kepts from the political aides, wants to skip straight to MPs.”

“Keeping MPs?” Henri rolls his eyes. “Has Hawthorne considered that he might be struggling because his politics were unpopular in 1825?”

“Somehow, I don’t think the thought has occurred to him. I resisted, of course, and Reeve Wynters was even harsher. He reminded everyone of the security risks, how we need to lay low, how Blair’s government already doesn’t trust us and how the war's so dramatically increasing surveillance. The diplomat he is, Hawthorne made a... poorly-worded joke about the Reeve's stature."

“Oh.”'

“Oh.” Morris repeats. “The Reeve only stopped stabbing him when the New Sun commanded it."

Henri sighs. "One has to wonder why she tolerates all this tomfoolery.”

“Wynter’s, or the council’s?”

“Both.”

“Because Davison is her maniac,” Morris shrugs. “And the tomfoolery suits her."

Henri frowns. Politics. So often it felt no different from the talk of fishwives. But he supposed such was inevitable. The Court might have several thousand Kepts, but its Sovereigns barely numbered two-hundred. Imagine that. Two-hundred faces, amidst a sea of names that will all die before you can even remember them. A Sovereign will only see those faces, every night, for the tens-of-thousands of nights he's forced to live.

Who wouldn't be at each other's throats?

“Doesn’t seem quite like our High Inquisitor to just watch this all with a stiff upper lip.”

“Oh, she wasn’t there. Only burst through the door when I started my speech.”

“You say that like she was just waiting outside for the chance to interrupt you.”

Morris gives him a look.

Henri looks back. "What did she say?"

“Aisha Lakhani. Anastasov’s Poiosned One, maybe sixty years old. They've lost another, Henri. She’s gone striga.”

Striga. Henri’s face twitches, and he casts his eyes to the side. By the Court’s reckoning, a striga was the most dangerous sort of renegade one could come across. And Henri was actually old enough to remember why.

But that’s not what’s causing his heart to stop, his gut to turn. He’s dealt with striga before, but…

“Henri…” Morris notices. “Did you know her?”

Henri looks away. “... We were acquinted.” He can feel Morris' expression grow dark. “Edward, please. I can’t control who stumbles into my office hours.”

“You never thought it strange that a veneficii would seek you out?”

“She wanted to know what the Middle Ages were like! Who else was she going to turn to, fucking Caedmon?”

Morris' hand rolls over his tightened face. “If Lamberg finds out about this-”

“How could she?”

“- aiding a rogue Kept is treason. A rogue Veneficii…”

“We’re Sovereigns! The Court would never stop us from ruling as we please.”

“As long as that rule pleases them!" Henri looks up. "But we don’t, Ombras. Do you have any idea how deeply our bill has put me in hot water?”

“Our Bill? It was yours! And a half-arsed, futile, limp-wristed attempt at that! A Bill of Rights? For Kepts!? How did you think that was going to go? What's next! Are we saving all the little children in Africa?”

“The Kepts need protections. Legal, economic, physical. That isn’t an opinion, it's necessity. These escapes will only cease when we actually address-”

“You're preaching to the wrong crowd, Captain.”

“So why am I lacking your support?"

Henri throws up his arms. “What support can I give? Look around! A striga’s out, a Reeve’s shot on his own street! And sure, Keaton's calmed down, but the other Freeholders snap at their leashes. The New Sun's preparing for war, Edward!"

“All the more reason to shore up our relations with-”

“It will never pass! It has nothing to do with its value! You could strap the damn thing on the back of Sunwalker himself! It doesn't matter. At a time like this, they won't sign anything penned by a Shadow-Walker."

Henri frowns, and plucks a cigar with his tendrils before adding. “You’ve helped make sure of that.”

The Captain downs his gin straight, grimacing at the taste. He doesn’t make eye contact with Henri. “You helped, too.”

They’re speaking of a false fact. A thing that never occurred. Saying otherwise would be treasonous.

And yet the nothing is well-remembered.

Everyone knows that 1848 sparked the “Seventh Revolt," with Freeholders like Keaton exploding onto the scene. Caedmon wasn’t Seneschal then, he was Potentate, head honcho, officially given the position when his superior, Sunwalker, formalized his decades-long absence to his sole-surviving get in a dream.

Everyone knows that Caedmon rose to the occasion, like he always has; Sunwalker could never choose wrong. The Unbound were fought back with bravery and valiance and most of all, restraint. It wasn’t at all a bloodbath, protestors shot, nobles hung, cavalry tearing through the streets. A group of 'vampire hunters' didn’t swell with the disillusioned, didn’t revel in the new chaos. The Court was never at risk, never lost ground.

Everyone knows that.

When Caedmon stepped down, it wasn’t after the Order of the Confessor killed sixty Sovereigns and three Magisters in a single night. Those numbers are just hearsay, Unbound propaganda, to hide the fact that even if it occurred, hypothetically, the Unbound surely lost more. Caedmon took the vote of no confidence wisely, nobly, realising that his age had become the Court’s only weak link in an otherwise perfect chain. The Seneschal, Joan Byron - and by Joan Byron, he means the New Sun, who has always been the New Sun and never once gone by another name - was crowned in his place, and gave Caedmon her old title. It was only natural. He was the perfect ruler, and she was his perfect Kept.

But she still took it with hesitance, see, and only at the desperate Council's demand. As the perfect Kept, she understood better than anyone how stringent Sunwalker’s laws were against female rule. Thankfully, Sunwalker’s aether ran in her veins, and it was discovered - in another dream - that this imbued her with the masculine energies needed to rule. And in such an emergency as this, was it really worth fretting about ancient laws of gender? No, said the New Sun, very wisely. In fact, she replaced every lost position with a woman who seemed perfect for the role. Almost like it was planned.

But it wasn't, of course. That would be treason. And the New Sun had been perfectly loyal to Caedmon before. She was his perfect Kept.

There was one exception, of course. Edward Morris, elevated after only twelve years of unlife to become the (then) youngest-ever Sovereign, along with the New Sun's promise that those Scáthshiúlóir purges that maybe possibly occurred would never happen again. His domain, incidentally, would be the old grounds of the Order of the Confessor, who had mysteriously vanished just as quickly as they didn’t actually bring the Court to its knees.

That’s what really happened.

It would be treason to say the New Sun went to the Scáthshiúlóir.

It would be treason to say the Shadow-Walkers wanted that genocidal maniac Caedmon gone.

It would be treason to say the hunters killed only and all of Caedmon’s Court allies.

It would be treason to say that women were only promoted for the debt they’d feel, that Caedmon only stayed because he was too expensive to remove, and it would definitely be treason to say that Morris and Ombras personally dealt with the vampire hunters they anonymously tipped.

It would be.

And still, despite everyone knowing these events were false, it seems like nobody really trusts them.

Henri pours himself a drink. “Every century, there is a crisis. Every crisis, the knives come out. Every knife finds itself pointed at the Scáthshiúlóir. You know that, Edward. Your honour, your popularity, everything and anything about you will not change that.”

Morris doesn’t reply, staring instead into his empty glass.

“We were once above them, you know," Henri continues. "They say our kind were the closest to the Predecessors, and the last to resist. That’s the… root of it all."

“The veneficii were close to the Predecessors too. They kept their power.”

Henri lifts an eyebrow. “Did they?”

Morris finally turns to meet his eyes.

“Because they scorn us, we must act. Because they will kill us, we must kill first. And we work with Kepts because maybe, possibly, they won't hate us like their forefathers! But moving too fast on any of them bolsters our enemies' words, vindicates their thoughts, and in the end dooms us all. On the Night of Screams, I gave you that request, Morris. Not Joan, not Wynters, not any of its ringleaders, me. Because I knew what kind of man you were. You act. But I needed to make sure you knew when to act…”

He clutches his former Kept’s arm.

“... and when to wait.”

Morris keeps the stare for a moment, before shoving free of Henri’s grip. With those ever-stiff muscles, he reaches for his belt, pulling out a fine leather scabbard and placing it on the bar.

Henri gives him a look. “You know, I usually ask for more in my bribes..."

“Hold the sword, Henri.”

Morris stands, waiting, until Henri slowly slithers up, placing his hand upon the hilt. His thumb rubs across a familiar texture. The handle's ivory.

Fluidly, Henri unsheathes it. From long lost days, he knows how to feel the weights, how to properly stand. His slash whistles in the air. He pulls it close, inspects the metal. Clean blade, gold plating, Latin engravings along the guard. It’s an old weapon, a beautiful weapon, one he knows that Morris got before he became immortal, and one that even his noble family could never hope to afford.

“The Lord Mayor gave me this sword," Morris starts. "For Trafalgar. For Navarino. It was the gift my country, the greatest in all the world, offered for all the glory I had won her. I had never felt more honoured. I should have felt proud. But... when that pommel was given to me with the blacksmith's bowed head, I almost couldn't hold it."

“Why?”

“Because I had hid in Trafalgar. Up in the crow’s nest, a boy of fourteen, watching bodies crash into the waves like they were leaping off the cliffs of my youth." He manages a shaky smile. "Because in Navarino I watched men get split in half by cannons, or fireships melt their skin. They called me a hero, Ombras, but I'm not one. In every battle, every war, I saw more deserving men die, and get no reward but a burial at sea, and the fear of their families starving. They are the ones who deserve that sword. They are the ones who preserved the institutions our Court wants to strangle."

Henri pales at that, and purses his lips. “Careful, Edward. We might be alone, but we aren’t unheard.”

“And perhaps they’ll listen. I came from a democracy, Ombras, as did every Kept, every Oathsworn. Can we expect our young to follow us, when they are born free and brought into chains? Can we expect to steward a nation that values rule of law above al, when we do not even follow the-"

“You sound like you're Unbound."

“I am not." Morris huffs. "Every time they bomb a building, or shoot a bureaucrat, they attack the same idea. The same people I’ve sworn to defend, on the graves of my comrades, at the feet of a dozen kings and queens."

Morris approaches, taking the sword from Henri’s hand. With a flourish, he sheathes it, moving more fluidly than Henri has seen in years.

“Someone must defend Britain. What its people are. What it’s chosen to be. The New Sun won’t, the Unbound won’t, and so I must. The Kepts are British, Ombras. They deserve the protections their countrymen have earned. As do you.”

He taps on Henri’s shoulder with the sword.

“Even if you were born in Calais.”

Henri watches him with unblinking, void-like eyes. Britain. There was no ‘Britain’ when he entered the world. No flags, no democracy - hell, even the rulers spoke French. He wants to tell Morris that it’s just an illusion, an illusion he had seen be constructed. Britain was no different than the lights he puts on the Respite’s signs, or the lies he tells his food. The men who fight and die for it fight and die as fools.

But telling Morris would change nothing. Morris is too old to not know that already.

Immortality is a game. Not for the strongest, or the smartest, and definitely not the best. Those who last only do so by holding onto some piece of their old selves, some miniscule slice of living they can never afford to lose. It could be as banal as holding a woman’s hair, or as twisted as hanging innocents by their guts. It doesn’t matter. It just needs to keep you breathing.

Britain is Morris’ tether. If it were to vanish tomorrow, he would vanish too. As would the New Sun without her power games, Lamberg without her duty, or Caedmon without… whatever that bag of ancient bones holds onto.

It should probably worry Henri that he can’t remember his own. But it doesn’t.

The Wilds are calling him. Calling him back to whatever plane of existence he stole his unlife from. At first, it only spoke in his dreams, in the very pit of the death-sleep. But now, it follows him, wherever he goes.

Whispering of fourth drinks.

And Albania.