At the Ulysses household in Hampstead Heath, an uninvited creditor ushered in chaos.

“Sigh…” The man downed another swig of whiskey, the bottle glugging noisily.

“A shred of dignity, if you please,” Ulysses said frostily. “Day-drinking reeks of desperation—or have you developed a taste for jailhouse hospitality?”

Alcoholism plagued Albion like a fever. Countless laws aimed at sobering the populace had failed. Drunks brawled in alleys; constables scraped them off cobblestones.

“You owe me,” Maskelyne muttered, bleakness etching his voice. “This requires your… expertise.”

“Another scandal needing press suppression?”

“Worse. I’ve misplaced an object. Retrieve it.” The creditor’s fingers twitched in his hair.

“Call in Alto, then. The Chief Inspector excels at hunting strays—and debts.”

“No. That stone-faced bore would blabber to the whole Order!”

Ulysses’ brow creased. “A relic?”

“A camera. It photographs spirits.”

“Hardly catastrophic—provided we find it before some fool snaps a poltergeist.”

“Ah. Therein lies the rub.” Maskelyne winced. “The fool already has. My district’s drowning in ghostly pamphlets.”

Yvette gaped. Even idle at home, Ulysses couldn’t escape calamity. Controlling narratives was his burden—now Maskelyne’s bungling entangled them both.

“…The device hinged on an occult breakthrough. Corpses’ eyes retain death-images—necromancers have harnessed this for millennia. Postmortem scrying, I termed it. But what if the eyes belonged to… other entities?” Excitement warmed Maskelyne’s voice. “A colleague procured a mutated giant squid’s eye—enormous lenses, perfect for crafting optics. And it worked! The camera reveals ethereal energies!”

He brandished the whiskey like a torch. Ulysses yawned.

“Spare me the theatrics. How’d you lose it?”

“My workshop’s cluttered with clocks and rifles. Cameras are fiddly novelties. I… stashed it inside a clock case. Forgot. My apprentice sold it.”

“When?”

“Last week? Or the one before…”

“You remembered after the flyers appeared.”

“…Yes.”

Ulysses massaged his temples.

If you discover this narrative on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen. Please report the violation.

Maskelyne unfurled a cheap broadsheet—half text, half ghostly photograph. The image showed a filth-caked girl in a derelict alley, neck craned unnaturally. Hair veiled her face, but shadowed eyes burned through the newsprint. Even in grayscale, the dress stains evoked blood. Her translucency screamed supernatural.

PYE STREET PLAGUE—PHANTOM’S CURSE?

Yvette frowned. Ulysses had debunked such myths, proving plagues stemmed from tainted water. Yet specters still haunted public imagination.

“The Order knows,” Maskelyne hissed. “They’ve sent the Funerary Dame. Beat her to it, Ulysses. Please.”

“A necromancy expert should handle this.”

“No! She’ll trace it to me! My research permits—gone!”

“I’m a doctor, not an exorcist.”

“You. Owe. Me.”

Ulysses shrugged. “I lack genie powers.”

Yvette stirred. Ulysses’ debt stemmed from forging her weapon. Guilt tugged at her.

“Let me try,” she whispered.

“This doesn’t concern you,” Ulysses snapped.

Maskelyne brightened. “Capital! Young Mr. Fischer to the rescue!” Rumors painted Yvette capable—she’d impressed even Inspector “Hound” Alto. If Ulysses refused aid, the favor remained intact. Perfect.

Once alone, Ulysses eyed Yvette. “Why volunteer?”

“The debt’s mine to bear.”

“Foolish pride. Maskelyne wants secrecy—no Order resources. His Clerkenwell cronies print those flyers. He’s hit dead ends already.” His gaze sharpened. “This ends badly. Still determined?”

The following dawn found Ivette weaving through London’s underbelly, her transformation complete.

Gone were silks and lace. A coal-smudged urchin now walked the cobbles: beret askew, rough-spun shirt billowing under a boy’s outsized jacket, trouser cuffs riding high above scuffed boots. Her hair—pale as unbleached flax—lay hidden beneath knitted wool. Perfect. Exactly what Ulysses had prescribed. Show up swanning in brocade, he’d warned, and witnesses would clam up faster than a Whitby oyster. Centuries of Albion-Français squabbles ensured that.

Petticoat Lane rags, these. Winslow’s clockwork servant had procured them, then boiled the lot thrice over. Wise—given what festered in those stitches.

This borrowed skin granted passage to another city entirely. No more bows from grocers, no sing-song “At your service, young sir.” Here, shopkeepers clutched their wares when she neared, eyes sharp as magpies’.

Small wonder. The law hanged thieves here—unless they were knee-high. Hence the rookery gangs: old sharks schooling shoals of starveling children. Factory rats at seven, pickpockets at eight. Girls? Different market. (Twelve, the law whispered, was old enough. God help Albion’s statutes.)

Even as Ivette pondered this, shadows slithered. A leering voice from an alcove: “How much for the night, pretty pigeon?”

Her fist answered first—a useful trick from the Parisian gutters. The man reeled, dignity bruised. She walked faster, tasting London’s rot beneath its gilt. Ulysses could keep his parliament gossip and royal luncheons; this festering wound needed lancing.

Mousskin’s blunder had opened the way. The fool inspector haunted goldsmiths’ row—clean lanes guarded by silver-topped canes. But two turns east, the world curdled. Brick warrens hunched back-to-back, landlords grafting illegal attics like fungal growths. Ropes heavy with washing blotted the sky; filth gurgled between cobbles.

No maps charted this cartilage. Ivette navigated by stench and suspicion until—behind a yard choked with flyblown paper—she found her prize. Three presses clattered in the gloom, cranking out cheap broadsheets. Same ghostly lithograph as Mousskin’s leaflet.

“Came in last week,” the printer coughed. “Red-haired codger, eyes like burnt holes. Paid him five shillings, he scarpered. Then two days back—gent buys the original plate. Heavy purse, military trim.”

Not Mousskin’s doing. Special Ops, then—snuffing leads. But why?

Ivette nursed bitter dregs in a workers’ café. The brew tasted like ditchwater strained through newsprint. Her bread wore a grease some charlatan called “butter.” Walls bore threats: STEAL A SUGAR LUMPS WE’LL STEAL YOUR TEETH. She’d skipped the stew; Ulysses’ warnings echoed: “Expect newts in the broth. And not the green kind.”

Gnawing the rock-hard loaf, she marshaled her thoughts. Sugar would spark the mind, even from this grim fare. Somewhere in London’s smoke, a phantom grinned—and she’d carve that smile into answers.