“What an odd question.” Arachne didn’t look up from her work. “You’re hardly going to turn her out on her own.”
“Of course not. It’s …” I hesitated. “Am I teaching her right? She’s still pushing to get involved with other mages. I thought she’d ease off on that. I mean, she gets to meet people at the shop.”
“Not very often, from what you tell me.”
“She can’t afford to do it very often. With her curse …”
“Is that the real reason?”
I sighed and let my shoulders slump. “No. It’s that I don’t want her around other mages more than I can help it.” Even as I said it, I knew it was true, and it shocked me a little. The whole reason Luna had come to me in the first place was out of a hope that she could become part of the mage world. And yet I’d been trying to avoid it …
Arachne only nodded. “And she can tell. And you feel guilty for keeping her away.”
“I’d feel more guilty if I got her into trouble.” I looked up at Arachne. “I still don’t think she understands how dangerous mage politics can be. I was out tonight on a hunting mission. But tomorrow or next week or next year those same men might be my enemies. And if she’d been there …”
Arachne didn’t answer. “You think I’m trying too hard to protect her,” I said at last.
“I think what you’re really afraid of is that you’ll introduce her to something that’ll get her hurt or killed.”
I sometimes wonder whether Arachne can weave more than threads; whether she can see the connections between people, as well. She can seem to pay no attention, and yet strike right to the mark. “I’ve done it before,” I said.
“Yes,” Arachne said. “But it was her choice too.” She set down the dress and turned her eight eyes on me. “Alex, the trouble with you is that you’ve spent so long on your own you’ve forgotten how to live with someone else. The only way she’ll learn these things is by experience.”
“Yeah, well, I guess she’s getting that one way or another. She’s bringing some guy to the shop tomorrow.”
“Jealous?”
“No,” I said automatically.
Arachne just went back to her sewing. She doesn’t have any eyebrows to raise, but somehow she conveyed exactly what she thought of that.
I sat grumpily for a minute before remembering the other reason I’d come. “Oh. Something weird happened tonight.” I put Luna out of my mind and leant forward. “Talisid tracked down the barghest in Deptford, and he called me in to help. I met up with his team outside the lair, and we made it all the way in. But here’s the thing: it was dead. Someone had taken it out before we got there.”
“Strange.” Arachne picked up the dress she was working on in her front two legs and examined it, turning it around. It was turning into a narrow, vaguely Chinese-looking gown that reflected the light and sent it back with a pale green shimmer. She put the dress down at a different angle and returned to work. “Have you any idea who it was?”
I frowned. “No. And it’s a bit odd. I mean, sure, that creature was preying on people, but it’s not as if most mages would care. Not enough to risk a fight anyway. I mean, barghests have a pretty scary reputation. Why would anyone go after one when they could just wait and have the Council take care of it?”
“Was it an escapee?”
I nodded. “Yeah, Talisid and I were wondering that. If it was some mage’s fault that the thing was there, then it makes sense they’d want to clean it up quietly. But we couldn’t find any trace that it used to be someone’s property. Besides, if they really wanted to keep it quiet, they would have gated away the body—oh. And another thing. There were signs of a battle at the lair—fire and ice magic—but no freeze or scorch marks on the barghest.”
“What killed it, then?”
“Nothing. At least, nothing I could see.”
The ftt-ftt-ftt stopped. I looked up to see that Arachne was watching me, her needles still. “Elaborate.”
“Um …” I tried to think of what to say. “It was just … dead. Wolf form. No marks. I thought it might have been death magic but …”
Arachne didn’t answer. “Arachne?” I asked.
Arachne seemed to twitch, then returned to her sewing, the ftt-ftt starting up again. “I see.”
“Something wrong?”
“Perhaps.” Arachne paused. “If you could establish the cause of death, I would appreciate knowing.”
I hesitated a second before nodding. “Okay. I’ll see what I can dig up.”
Arachne went back to her work. She didn’t say anything further, and I didn’t ask. “How many of them do you think there are?” I said after a pause.
“Of which?”
“Magical creatures like that barghest. Living here in our world.”
“Few. Fewer each year.” Arachne continued to work, but there was something a little distant about her voice. “So many have been killed or enslaved. The survivors have hidden themselves in remote places or in other worlds. Perhaps what you saw today was the body of the last barghest.”
An hour later, walking back home through the darkness of the Heath, I found my thoughts going back to Arachne’s words. I’m so comfortable with Arachne that I forget other mages think of creatures like her as aliens at best and monsters at worst. This was the first time I’d gone on this sort of hunt, and I’d had a good reason—but that didn’t change the fact that the creature I’d been intending to kill was basically not that different from Arachne.
For the first time I wondered exactly how long magical creatures would still be around. As far back as mage histories go, they’ve always been there, but for a long time the number’s been decreasing, mostly because of expeditions like the one I’d been on today. Usually it’s only the dangerous ones that mages go after … but not always, and dangerous is pretty subjective. Now that I thought about it, the only magical creatures I’d seen over the past few months had been either working with mages or under their control. I hadn’t come across one in the wild for a long time. If things kept going the way they had been, then the only creatures left would be property, powerful enough to hide themselves, or dead. It would mean no more killings like the ones the barghest had been responsible for … but it would mean none of the gentler or more wondrous creatures, either.
I wasn’t sure how much I liked the idea, and I wasn’t so sure any more that I’d done the right thing by agreeing to help Talisid. I headed home to sleep and to see what the next day would bring.
chapter 2
It was a new day and it was raining.
My shop’s tucked away down a little side street in Camden, only a minute’s walk from the canal. The rail and road bridges that interlock the area make it tricky to find, but plenty of tourists still filter through. The sign above my door says Arcana Emporium, along with a description of the contents that’s technical enough to stop most people immediately thinking magic shop. A notice on the door lists my opening times as ten A.M. to five P.M. Mondays to Saturdays, and every now and again it’s actually right.
As far as I know, I’m the only mage in England who runs a shop. Most mages think it makes me eccentric or just plain stupid, and to be fair they’ve got a point. Money isn’t a big concern to most mages. Sure, they need it, but it isn’t the primary medium of exchange the way it is to regular folk, for the simple reason that most mages who know what they’re doing and are willing to put in the work can leverage their power into as much money as they’re realistically likely to need. They aren’t all millionaires, not by a long shot, but they don’t generally have to worry about paying the rent either. So as a rule you can’t buy anything really valuable from a mage with cash, because cash isn’t scarce enough for them to value it.