Not that Lune herself fared much better. She suffered not just on her own behalf, but that of the faerie palace, which grew colder and more brittle with every passing hour. “Of course,” she said, struggling not to betray the frayed state of her own nerves. How do mortals live like this—knowing every moment brings death one step closer? “It is closed, and as sealed as I can make it—but that is not enough.”
“What about—” Irrith persisted, but the question ended in a yelp as the door to the council chamber slammed open. They could not keep doors closed anymore; everything blew open, sooner or later, scaring everyone out of their wits.
But this time the movement had a human cause. Jack Ellin hauled at the door’s edge, struggling futilely to close it, before swearing and giving up. Lune’s councillors flinched away from the tall man as he came up to the table; the presence of a mortal echoed the wind’s promises. Lune had to hold herself still as he reached out and laid one hand on her cheek.
The gesture was dispassionate, a physician’s touch. They had discovered this by accident, when a chance brush of his fingers lifted some of the darkness from Lune’s spirit. For Jack Ellin, as for any mortal, the promises of the Cailleach were inevitable nature. He bore without thinking a weight that threatened to crush Lune. And thanks to the bond that connected them, she could share that weight with him, and gain some measure of clarity for herself.
She allowed herself a grateful look but no smile as the Prince of the Stone dropped his hand, leaving her to stand on her own. It was a temporary reprieve, nothing more. But it gave her hope.
Then Jack said, in a deceptively light tone, “Madam—were you aware that your roof is on fire?”
Lune’s attention went upward before she could stop it, accompanied by the shameful thought that she might almost welcome the Onyx Hall bursting into flame, if only to end the unbearable cold. But the stone was frost-rimed and black.
“Pudding Lane,” Jack said, kindly ignoring her foolish impulse. “And now Fish Street Hill as well.”
Warmth. Light. She had to work to remind herself that he was speaking of destruction, not salvation. “Fires happen, Jack.” And she had an abundance of other matters to concern her.
“So you will let it burn?”
His expression said everything his voice left unspoken. The wry eyebrows had risen in surprise, and a cynical twist shaped his lips. He came here expecting us to help.
As he had every right to. And Lune had an obligation to answer the Prince’s call.
In Mab’s name, I swear to you that I will do everything I can to preserve London and its people from disaster—and let fear hinder me no more.
Her own words echoed in her ears, spoken a bare year before. This was the very purpose for which she had chosen Jack; the physician was no courtier, but he was devoted to the safety and well-being of London. She could hardly ask him to champion that cause, then ignore him when he did so. Even without an oath to bind her.
The part of her mind that cowered like a mouse before a hawk protested shrilly that it was not fear hindering her, but cold calculation; what help could she spare Jack, with the Cailleach howling death in their ears?
A great deal. Lune had already confiscated all the bread in the Onyx Hall, once she realized her people were likely to flee before the onslaught. That was what Nicneven wanted, why she had sent the Blue Hag against them: to empty the palace, leaving it unguarded against a physical assault. But Lune could give some of her people a respite, and send them to aid Jack.
She extended her senses upward, feeling the heat scorching the stone and earth of those two streets. No comfort there; her whole body shuddered, caught between fire and ice. But now she had the shape of it, and the direction.
“Billingsgate is clear,” she said. “Take any half-dozen you feel will be useful—any you can trust not to leave. More if you need them. You have the bread.” Casting her eye around the table, she settled on Irrith. The Berkshire sprite did not know London well at all, but much more of this wind and she would break. “Go with the Prince. Be our messenger, in case he needs aught else.”
Irrith bowed to her and to Jack. He smiled reassuringly at the sprite, but did not reach out; without the tie that bound him to Lune, Prince to Queen, his touch did more harm than good. Amadea had screamed when he tried before, weeping that she felt the decay in his flesh.
“I’ll do what I can,” he promised, before hurrying out the door. “Perhaps we can turn this to our advantage against the Hag.”
RIVER THAMES, LONDON: six o’clock in the morning
Jack Ellin was no graybeard doctor, but he had worked through fever and plague, in the face of fell death itself. He knew the value of a comforting lie. Belief in a hopeful future, no matter how unfounded, could give a patient strength, and Lune needed strength right now.
But the truth was that he had no idea how to turn the heat above to combat the cold below. Jack was a curious man, always hungry for knowledge; when it became apparent that the unnatural wind was the breath of the Cailleach Bheur, he began asking questions about the Scottish hag. His curiosity went mostly unfed: the London fae knew hardly anything of her, and were too distracted by unfamiliar thoughts of death. It gave him little to work with.
I’m more inclined to take it the other way, he admitted ruefully as he hoisted himself out of a shaft into the tiny courtyard of a Billingsgate house. If he could strangle the fire with cold, he would; conflagrations were terrifying things, in a City built so largely of timber. And with the summer so dry…
Up here, however, the wind bore no particular chill, for all that it blew from the east, against the habit of the region. All those fine gentlemen in their Covent Garden houses will be smelling the City’s stink, he thought, blinking in the morning twilight. It did not amuse him as much as he hoped.
Behind him, his troop of faerie helpers followed him out of the entrance. Jack hoped they would do some good; he still was not entirely certain what fae were capable of. Surely their arts would have use, though. And he had bypassed the courtiers, seeking out Lune’s humbler subjects; the goblins and hobs he chose were tougher and more used to physical labor. Fighting fires was hard, grinding, filthy physical labor indeed—even, he imagined, with magic to help.
Three goblins, two hobs, and one sprite, all covered by concealing glamours. They did not have to look hard to spot the fire; its sullen glow made a false dawn above the rooftops to the northwest, not far away at all. “To the river,” Jack told his companions, after a moment’s consideration.
“We can’t go that way?” Mungle demanded, pointing toward the smoke. Judging by the filth that caked his body, the bogle had not gone within arm’s-length of water for longer than Jack had been alive. “My lord,” he added, as an afterthought.
“Not quickly,” Jack answered the goblin. “And I’m not ‘my lord’ here, nor Prince of the Stone. We shall have enough to do without someone asking when I was ennobled, and whether I can help them at court. As to your question: the fire is tending south and west; we’ll be more use on the other side. But the streets are packed with people moving their belongings out of harm’s way, so we shall get a wherry and come at it from the river.”