Mr. Drake and My Lady Silver

(Tales of Aylfenhame, 4)

by

Charlotte E. English

Copyright © 2018 by Charlotte E. English

Cover art © 2018 by Elsa Kroese

Illustrations © 2018 by The PicSees

All rights reserved.

This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be re-sold.

Chapter One

Woah there, hold yer horses! Literal-like, I ain’t using a figure o’ speech. There, thas better, now we can have a comfortable coze for a minute or two. I won’t invite ye t’ get out o’ yer carriage, not in weather like this! Has it been snowin’ all yer journey through? Yer brave, t’ make it all the way t’ Tilby in this muck. Oh yes, I do live under the bridge. All the way under! Aye, I thank ye, it’s cosier than ye might expect. Mayhap I’ll show it to you, sometime.

Seein’ as the weather’s so foul, I won’t charge me usual toll t’ pass the bridge. Nay, don’t thank me. I may look fearsome, but there’s nowt t’ fear from this old troll. Ask anybody in these parts, they’ll tell you right enough. Old Mister Balligumph, ye’ve no cause t’ be scared-like o’ him.

I do talk on a bit, though, no denyin’ that. But what’s better than a tale t’ liven up a chilly winter’s afternoon? Comin’ from Lincoln-way, are ye? I know a fine tale from them parts. Took place not so long ago, in point o’ fact. Care t’ hear it? It won’t take long, an’ with just a little magic — there! — ye’ll find yer carriage plenty warm an’ snug fer the duration. Nay, don’t thank me.

All right, then. This tale is about a young chap wi’ the fine name of Phineas Drake. He worked in his father’s bakery-shop, and ‘twas on a day rather like this one tha’ some strange events came t’ pass. Come to think of it, ‘twas Winter Solstice, an’ very almost Christmas…

***

The cathedral bells chimed the fourth hour of the morning, and before the ringing sound had died away, Phineas Drake was out of bed and shivering in the piercing cold. He washed with haste, breaking the ice which coated the surface of his washbasin to reach the frigid water beneath, and dressed as quickly as he could with fingers that shook with cold.

He crept onto the landing and down the stairs, mindful not to incur his father’s wrath by waking him at such an hour, and hastened into the kitchens at the rear of the building. Everything was already laid out for him: bags of flour, pungent yeast, great basins to mix the dough in, and ewers of water. He had only to begin, and this he did with all possible dispatch, for while the shop would not open for a few hours yet, he would need every minute of that time to prepare the day’s wares.

He set the great stone ovens afire first and stoked them well, for one long counter-top was crowded with wads of dough left to rise overnight, and ready now to be shaped and baked. These would make the morning meal for many of the workers of Lincoln, whose labours brought them out of bed at an early hour, and whose morning could be a little brightened by a fresh loaf.

Two hours flew by as Phineas formed loaves and rolls, mixed dough and ferried bread into the ovens. Then came the difficult part. While the final batch of the morning’s wares was in the oven, he would have to leave the bakery in order to make his first deliveries: sugared plum-cakes and mince pies for those already living in happy anticipation of the season’s festivities, and inclined to begin a little early. Phineas spared a thought to wish, as he frantically packed cakes and pies into boxes, that his father might spare the coin to hire a delivery boy. Phineas might then be able to resign the freezing duty, and properly tend to the ovens instead. Wishes proving as futile as ever, he abandoned the dream and set out into the snow.

Darkness still shrouded the city, and few were yet stirring abroad; he had a quiet, cold walk up to the top of the hill and into the Bail. The black skies were empty of snow, but a great deal had fallen overnight. It soon saturated the thick leather of his boots, and the wet cold seeped through to his toes.

Quite the largest plum cake he had ever made went to the Porters’ household on Newport, and three boxes of mince-pies to smaller houses along the way. By the time he had retraced his steps and passed back towards the Cathedral, he had only one box left: a meagre parcel with a small cake, two pies and a fresh loaf for the Trent sisters on Pottergate. Miss Trent would be waiting to accept it in person, however early the hour, and Phineas hastened along, mindful both of Miss Trent’s eager anticipation and of the bread still baking at home. The cathedral loomed to his left, dark and silent, its spires glinting with the soft light of a moon not quite set. There was no sound save the crunching of fresh snow underfoot and therefore, Phineas was doubly surprised to discover that he was not, after all, alone.

A woman hurried through the darkness some little way ahead of him. She was almost running, splendidly oblivious to the inclement weather, except to keep pushing her wind-tossed hair out of her pale face. That hair was beautiful, but strange: a tangled cloud, too pallid for her apparent youth, for her frame was lithe and her movements sprightly; this was no elderly lady. She wore only a thin gown of some gauzy substance, its style not at all after the fashions of the day, and an airy cloak which streamed uselessly from her shoulders. How she had not already frozen to death was the thought uppermost in Phineas’s mind, until she swept past him — without seeming to notice him — and he saw that her ears were curled at their tips.

‘Wait!’ she called.

‘I—’ said Phineas, but she had not been addressing him, for she ran on, heedless.

‘Please, wait!’ she cried again.

Phineas wondered if he had, perhaps, fallen asleep over the warmth of the ovens and merely dreamed his expedition abroad; it would not be the first time if he had. He opened the lid of the Misses Trents’ box of cakes and inhaled, filling his nose with the scents of brandy-soaked fruit, and sugar, and bread. Too rich to be dreamt, all that, and oh dear, that meant the lady was real, too, however peculiar her ears, or her attire, or for that matter her conduct. ‘Madam?’ he blurted, and set off after her. ‘M’lady? Pray, pay some heed to the weather! You will catch your death of cold!’ He was half-frozen himself in spite of his sturdier garments, and his lips were numb; the words emerged in stammers, half-garbled, and the winds perhaps stole whatever coherence was left, for the lady did not stop.

Clutching his box to his chest, Phineas followed, uncertain how he was to help but unable to abandon her to the merciless cold. She flitted through the silent streets, always ahead of him no matter how fast he moved, and darted into the sloping mouth of the Greestone Stairs.

By the time Phineas arrived at the top of the hill, she was already halfway down it, almost beyond his sight. He frowned, bemused, for there came a flicker of movement which did not seem to belong to the lady, and even in the pale moonlight he could discern traces of richer colours which made no part of her attire: crimson, perhaps, or purple. It was a mantle of some sort, he would have said, worn by a man of stooped posture, for he was remarkably small. But it could not be another person, for the shape abruptly vanished, as though the mantle and its wearer had turned a corner, or passed through a door.

The street was lined on either side by impassable walls, and there were no doors there.

‘M’lady?’ he called again, desperate now, for a light snow was once again drifting serenely out of the leaden skies and her arms were bare from elbow to wrist. Had she come, perhaps, from some dinner engagement, and forgotten to collect her warm cloak and bonnet as she left? ‘If you are in need of aid, please consider me your servant!’

And, at last, she heard him, for she came to an abrupt halt upon the hill and turned. She stared at Phineas, eyes wide and surprised, as though it were he and not she whose behaviour might be considered bizarre.

‘I am sure I can help,’ he said, approaching more slowly, for her manner held something of the startled deer, and he did not wish to frighten her. ‘Perhaps I might offer you my—’

He broke off, for though her gaze had met his for a mesmerising instant, and held, she had not spoken so much as a syllable in reply. She had turned her back on him again, and taken a step, and… she was gone, just like that, as though she, too, had stepped through a door.

Phineas approached with caution, step by step, until he stood in the very spot the lady had occupied moments before. There was no sign of her, and no apparent means of exit; the icy slope rose behind him and fell away ahead, empty. Naught remained of her save a set of small, narrow footprints in the snow… and something else. There came a glitter near his right boot, and a blush of soft colour.

Phineas stooped, and found a rose. It was in full bloom, somehow, defying winter with the same insouciance as its mistress. Its petals were lavenderish, though so thickly crusted with frost that little of the hue still showed.

It was only after Phineas had made his belated delivery to the Trents, and retraced his steps home, that he discovered just how unusual the rose was. For, when left safely upon the windowsill in his own small room — a chamber by no means warm, but much milder in temperature than the freezing winter outside — it lost none of its coating of frost. It glittered on, white and crystalline; and when, wondering, he picked it up again, a faint, sweet fragrance teased his senses.

‘Sugar?’ he breathed, unbelieving. But this surmise he discarded, for when he touched the tip of his tongue to one delicate petal, the frost was icily cold, and the flavour that filled his mouth was not sugar at all.

He set the rose carefully down and stood a moment in thought, as though a prolonged scrutiny of the mysterious flower might persuade it to surrender its secrets. But no answer could he find to the puzzle of the vanishing lady, or to the frosted rose, or to the door that wasn’t there.

Chapter Two

If ye’ve heard any of me tales afore — or, for that matter, even if ye haven’t — ye might have a guess as t’ where that lady came from, or went to. An Aylir out of Aylfenhame! Though what one o’ the Aylf-folk was doin’ roamin’ the streets o’ Lincoln at that hour, wi’ snow all about and not a hat t’ her name, well… listen on, an’ I’ll tell ye.

Despite the delay, Phineas returned in time to save the batch of loaves he had left in the oven. They were a fraction browner on the top than was typically considered ideal, but they were not burned. They would do.

He was mixing up a great bowl of fruit and meat for more pies when his father emerged, at last, from slumber. Phineas was adding spices, his favourite part of the process, for the aromas of nutmeg and cloves and mace filled the room, exotic and warming, and he had already the smells of citrus peel and apples and brandy to enjoy…

‘You are adding too much,’ said Samuel Drake, shattering Phineas’s culinary reverie by appearing suddenly at the door. ‘I should make you keep the books, Phineas. If you knew the price of nutmeg, perhaps you would not waste it.’ He took a mouthful of fresh bread, one of those Phineas had just baked, and added with a sigh, ‘You have burnt these.’

Phineas knew better than to hazard any answer, much less a defence of his conduct. He waited in silence, eyes lowered, as his father made a perfunctory effort to neaten his sleep-disordered hair, straightened his shirt and apron, and went forward to open the shop.

Once the kitchen was empty again save only for himself, Phineas quietly stored away the spices and went to work on the pastry. He heard his fathers’ voice greeting the first of the day’s customers; gruff and sour moments before, now it was raised in jovial good cheer. Samuel Drake had a reputation for a certain glib charm; it was one reason why their little shop had never yet failed.

The forceful accents of Mrs. Batts followed; as always, Phineas heard every word. ‘… that fine son of yours?’ she was saying. ‘You’re a fine family, Mr. Drake. I fancy the young ladies would welcome a glimpse o’ young Phineas a bit more often. And you’ll want every advantage you can get what with — thank you, yes, one plum-cake, and just the two mince pies — what with that fine, new place openin’ any day now.’

‘One cake and the pies, then, Mrs. Batts, and a good white loaf — just taken out of the oven with my own hands!’ There came the clink of coin, and only then did Samuel say, with studied casualness, ‘What place might that be?’

‘Why, fancy you not knowin’! There’s to be a new pastry-shop up in the Bail. I had it from my sister’s girl, whose young man is hired as baker’s boy, soon as it opens. It’s to be a grand place, so they say, though not so grand that folk like me ain’t lookin’ forward to a peep. We all like a little bit of the best now an’ then, don’t we? Thank you, Mr. Drake, that’ll be all for now. Wishin’ you good day.’

Mrs. Batts’ voice faded, and it was some half an hour before the rush of customers ebbed enough to liberate the elder Mr. Drake from the shop. Phineas was amusing himself shaping roses from pastry, to adorn the new pies, but he hastily abandoned this at his father’s reappearance, and returned to rolling out tops.

‘Mind the shop,’ Samuel said gruffly, and tore off his apron. This he threw in Phineas’s general direction, and left the kitchen in three quick strides.

The shop door slammed behind him.

Phineas did not suppose that he had been promoted to the shop floor on Mrs. Batts’ advice. More likely, his father had gone after news of the pastry-shop. Was it too much to hope that the report might be mere gossip alone, to be relied upon with as much confidence as the majority of Mrs. Batts’ news? Alas, no. her authority appeared to be too sound to be dismissed, and it was not the sort of nonsense tale that usually got about.

A whisker of fear uncurled within, and Phineas shuddered. The Drake family bakery had withstood troubles enough; what would such daunting competition do to their business now?

And what might the prospect do to his father’s temper?

Phineas tidied his own hair, donned a cleaner apron, and dusted the flour from his shirt. He tried his best to put the matter out of his mind, for the calls from the shop-floor indicated that he was in for a busy morning.

The morning wore away, and the light faded, until by the stroke of four it was dark once again. Phineas lit the lamps in the shop, and turned them low; his father said this made for a cosy, welcoming atmosphere, or at least that was what he said to the customers. But Phineas knew that it had more to do with the price of oil. For the kitchens and Phineas’s own room there were only candles, all made from cheap, stinking tallow.

He was not obliged to remain in the shop all the day through, for those who went out to buy plum-cakes at the dawn of the day went home to enjoy them in the afternoon. He spent the quieter hours in the back, turning out pies; and, when he grew wearied of that, tending to the little frosted rose.

He had brought it into the kitchens with him early in the day, for he loved to look upon it, and it seemed wrong to him to leave so rare and lovely a thing alone and unappreciated upstairs. But it had begun to alter as the hours slipped by. The blush of lavender dimmed, and the glitter faded from its petals. He thought, fancifully, that perhaps it hated the dull glow and reeking stench of tallow-light as much as he did, but when he carried it into the shop it remained as it was; the purer, cleaner light of the oil-lamps could not restore its lustre.

It ought to be revived, he thought. He had no means of restoring that odd layer of chill frost, at least not by any lasting method. He did have sugar, however.

And the colour…

Phineas remembered, then, another such day at the end of autumn, when his father had been gone from the bakery for three days together. With a supply of sugar near at hand, an array of vegetables new-harvested which had been meant for his father’s supper, and a head full of ideas, Phineas had made a joyous mess of the kitchen as he strove to invent a coarse, glittering sugar with colour enough to adorn some delicate piece of confectionery… he had hidden the results behind the flour-jars in the storeroom, lest his father should discover it and pronounce his efforts as Waste. There the little bags had lain ever since, mere cloth scraps tied tightly with string. The shop was empty and the street was quiet; Phineas hastened down into the cellar.

The colour had bled a little through the cloth, and the passage of a few weeks had inevitably faded the tints; his vibrant red had become an insipid pink, and his delicate purple a dull, washed-out grey; the latter he instantly threw away. But the blue, though dimmed, retained brilliance enough to please and he seized it, filled with a happy purpose, and returned to the kitchen.

He did not seek to dip every inch of the rose in the sugar, for he had not enough to coat it all over. The tips only he treated, and when he had finished he carried the rose forward once more to admire it in the lamplight.

He was pleased with the effect, for the mix of glittering-blue and dusty lavender now appeared elegant rather than lifeless; perhaps even a little magical, once again. Phineas left the rose on the windowsill, where he could see it, and took up his station behind the shop’s counter in much better spirits.

He wondered whether his father would notice the flower upon his eventual return, and half-hoped, half-feared that he might. But when Samuel at last came home, it was after dark upon the following day, and very late; the shop was closed, and all the lamps were out. He did not greet Phineas, but went in heavy silence into his own bedchamber whereupon he slammed the door, his passage leaving the tiny landing reeking, fleetingly, of stale alcohol.

Phineas did not dare ask after the news; not then, and not the following morning when his father awoke, and lumbered down into the kitchen. Samuel barely spoke to his son at all, and took no note of his busy labours; his thoughts were elsewhere, and unpleasant they were, judging from the heavy frown which darkened his brow.

Phineas did not feel comfortable again for some time.

The eve before Christmas dawned, and still the rose lay untouched upon its chilly windowsill. It had not withered, to Phineas’s interest, nor had it deteriorated any further at all. An intriguing puzzle, but Phineas had little time to think of it — or of the lady who had dropped it — for his father had driven him through a host of tasks with unusual urgency. He spent a whole afternoon cutting sprigs of holly and ivy, branches of laurel and hawthorn, and delicate boughs of evergreen; these he dispersed artfully about the bakery-shop until it looked properly festive. It took him another two hours in the freezing wind to find a sprig of mistletoe with which to fashion a kissing-bough, and by the time all these preparations were complete he was blue with cold. He had still, then, to stack the windows with sugared cakes — which, unusually, his father had permitted him to decorate as intricately as he chose; to set the wassail-bowl in pride-of-place, with bowls of apples to float in the punch come Christmas Day; to wrap plum-puddings in cloth, and prepare the great basins of water to cook them in.

Samuel Drake surveyed all this with a critical eye late in the evening, and by the light of the flickering lamps. Phineas expected some comment upon his profligacy, as might be usual. Instead, his father said, upon a moment’s thought: ‘It must be more inviting, Phineas. More…’

‘More…?’ Phineas ventured, when his father did not complete the sentence.

‘I want no one to pass the door without coming inside.’

Phineas looked at everything he had done, and wondered. The room bristled with festive greenery; it was packed with sumptuous food, with decorations, with gaieties implied; it had not looked so delightful in years. ‘How?’ he said. ‘What more can be done?’

‘You have your mother’s way with such things,’ said Samuel simply.

Phineas did not try to point out that everything had been different in his mother’s time. There had been both money and merriment, more than enough of both to fit the demands of the season. He merely went into the spice-jars, and took precious nutmegs and cinnamon sticks to add to the array — carefully, leaving them intact, so that they might later be reclaimed for use. He fetched his old, red shirt, the cloth worn but sound, that he had intended to wear through the days of Christmas, and cut it up for ribbons. And, heart heavy with regret, he pawned his mother’s silver ring and used the money to buy an array of fine, beeswax candles, with which to deck the windows.

When all was done, Phineas fell exhausted into bed and slept the night away, his dreams a confused flurry of kissing-boughs and wine, cold sleet and wind, and his mother’s reproachful face when she learned what he had done with her ring.

The rose lay forgotten, half-hidden beneath a spray of evergreen.

Chapter Three

Phineas’s work achieved its desired effects, at least for a time. The new candles blazed cheerfully in the windows, their bright flames beckoning chilled passers-by inside during the cold, dark hours; the vibrant greens, the crimson berries and ribbons, and the glimpse of the apple-laden wassail bowl performed the same work during the daylight hours, and Phineas knew that the heady aromas upon entry — the scents of bread and fruit, of meat and wine, and the spices he had hung all about — would keep his father’s customers spellbound until they had partaken of some one or other of his wares.

Only, there were not enough of them. Whether it were the desultory flurries of snow that drifted at intervals out of the cold, grey skies, or merely the warmth and companionship to be found at home, something kept the revellers of Lincoln off the streets, and away from the bakery. Not even the prospect of an extra sugared cake, or the need for a new, last-minute batch of mince-pies, could draw them in.

In better years, the Drakes, too, would have been too busy enjoying the season to keep open the shop. But such times were long gone, and Phineas kept his station by the counter all the long, empty day through, surrounded by the semblance of high good cheer yet feeling none of it himself.

About three o’ clock, in walked Mrs. Batts.

‘Phineas,’ she said, surveying first the room in all its splendour, and then him in all his gloom. ‘Your mother would have been proud, wouldn’t she? Where is your father?’ She was wearing a green gown, and had sprigs of holly tucked into her stout pelisse. Positioned before the doorway, with her cold-reddened cheeks and dark hair, she looked almost a part of the decorations herself.

‘I do not know,’ answered Phineas, a little glumly, and wished Mrs. Batts the joys of the season by way of changing the subject.

These she returned, but she was not to be distracted. ‘I come with an invitation,’ said she. ‘There’s me and my daughter sittin’ at home with more than enough to share, and you and your father…’ She paused, and went on: ‘Well, I’ve a good fire, and there’s to be bob-apple later, and a game of Hoodman Blind, and I know not what else. Just with one or two of our neighbours — pleasant folk, you’ll like them. You’re welcome to join us, Phineas, and your father, too.’

Phineas had no power but to thank her sincerely and explain that his father gave no thought to festivities nowadays, even if he could be found — which, just at present, he could not.

‘He’s worritin’ himself about that pastry-shop, is that it? I never would ha’ mentioned it, only I thought as he must’ve heard on it already.’

Phineas tried to convince her that his father had no such concerns, and hoped that the bright array in the shop might serve to give weight to his argument, and preserve the Drake family’s dignity. But his words sounded weak even to him, and Mrs. Batts raised a sceptical brow.

‘Well,’ she said, when he had exhausted his stock of lies and fallen silent. ‘Remember my invitation, Phineas. You’re welcome to join us at any time today, or tomorrow, or the day after.’

After which she went away, leaving Phineas to wish, secretly, that he might accept. Miss Batts was a merry girl, and her mother good-hearted; he would like to join them. But there was no one save himself to mind the shop.

Later, when darkness once again shrouded the streets and he had lit all his cheerful candles afresh, he had reason to feel glad that he had declined, and stayed where he was. For the door opened, and in swept a flurry of wind and snow and cold air — and in its midst, the lady of the rose.

She stood framed in the doorway for some time, her eyes eagerly scanning the contents of the room. Those eyes were odd, Phineas noted with dazed interest: hazy silver shaded with grey. Her dress was purple today; some draped velvet confection with a great deal in the way of skirt and sleeve, but not much in the way of warmth. She did not look cold, however, even though snowflakes glittered in the pale mass of her hair. She looked a little flushed, heightened colour blooming in her cheeks. Had she been running again, or was it the eager way in which she surveyed all of Phineas’s decorations that brought the pink glow to her face?

She was beautiful. The word flitted uselessly across Phineas’s thoughts, insufficient to describe the perfect coils of her pale hair; the exquisite features of her pale, perfect face; and those eyes… A glow seemed to hang about her, an air of vibrancy, of energy, of — of — Phineas could not describe it.

He thought, briefly, of the girls he had previously considered comely. Lizzie Batts, and little Jenny Worther… they withered in his imagination, mere weeds to this woman’s glory. Phineas stood with weakened knees, words fleeing from his lips as quickly as he strove to muster them, and said nothing.

Did he flatter himself that she looked upon him with approval? No. Her hopeful air faded, dashing Phineas’s private, half-felt wish that she might find something in his work, or in himself, to admire.

‘I do not understand,’ she announced in a clear, ringing voice, advancing further into the room. ‘Who are you?’

‘My name is Phineas Drake, ma’am,’ he managed to answer. ‘You — you may remember that we met, a few days ago? After — after a fashion, that is.’

She looked at him strangely, head tilted, as though he were some manner of creature she had never before encountered, and was not certain that she liked.

She didn’t remember.

One long stride (for she was tall) carried her to the window, and she snatched the rose from beneath its evergreen bough and brandished it at Phineas. ‘Where did you get this, Phineas Drake?’

He gaped. ‘You dropped it. A few mornings ago, on the Greestone Stairs, when you — when you, um.’ He wanted to say “vanished”, but could not make the word come out of his mouth; not when she stood there, so undeniably solid before him.

Realisation dawned in her, and with it came dismay. She gave a great, weary sigh, and drifted listlessly in the direction of the counter, towards Phineas himself. ‘You were the boy who was chasing me.’

Phineas did not much relish the word “boy”, for he was three-and-twenty, and had therefore been a man for some years already. But he let this pass, instead saying apologetically, ‘I did not mean to chase you. I was only afraid that you would catch cold.’

‘Catch cold?’ she repeated, and her odd eyes smiled upon him in some amusement. ‘Do I appear as though that is likely?’

‘It — well, no,’ he admitted, though he did not at all see how it was possible that she should be immune to the inclement weather.

‘What would you have done, had you caught me?’ She was intrigued, surveying Phineas with a thoughtful air that he could not help but find a trifle intimidating. He felt that there was some expected answer, and that he could very well offer a wrong one.

‘I might have given you my coat,’ he offered, ‘or — or brought you here, for it is always warm in the kitchens…’ He said no more, for her attention had wandered back to the rose, which she had set upon the counter before herself, and she was frowning at it.

‘How kind of you,’ she murmured abstractedly, and touched a finger to the tip of one blue-frosted petal.

Phineas’s spirits sank at once. ‘I am sorry,’ he said, seeing dissatisfaction in the crease of her brow. ‘I ought not to have taken such a liberty with your rose, only I hated to see the colour fade so, and I thought—’

‘You did this?’ She said the words sharply, and since the question was attended by a narrow-eyed, searching look, Phineas felt very uncomfortable indeed.

Then again, she did not appear to be angry.

‘Yes,’ he whispered.

‘How?’

So Phineas tried to explain, but he had not got much farther than the part about the cabbages and the sugar before he visibly lost her interest.

‘Cabbages!’ she repeated in disgust.

Conscious that he had displeased her, but unsure how, Phineas was silent.

The lady’s lips tightened, and she drummed her fingers impatiently upon the counter. ‘I did not drop this flower,’ she said crisply. ‘I was following the person who did, but I did not catch him. Again, I could not catch him! When I saw the rose in your window, I thought… but you know nothing of this, your expression proclaims it.’

Phineas could only give her a wide-eyed stare which said, quite clearly, no.

‘You do not know Wodebean?’ she said suddenly. ‘You are quite certain?’

‘I know no one of so strange a name.’

‘Strange, do you call it?’ That won him a curious look, but she was not long to be diverted from her purpose. ‘Who is the owner of this establishment?’

‘My father.’

‘Ah! And he is, perhaps, four feet tall? More, if he would not stoop so dreadfully! With an unlovely countenance, and an eccentric mode of dress?’

‘No,’ said Phineas, bewildered.

‘You would call him by some other name, naturally, but his friends might call him Bean. Or perhaps by some other jauntily abbreviated epithet?’

‘No!’ said Phineas again. ‘My father’s name is Samuel Drake, he is taller than me, and I don’t think that Mrs. Batts would say he is at all unlovely. She thinks him quite handsome.’

‘I do not know who this Mrs. Batts may be, but since no creature alive could imagine Wodebean to be at all handsome, it is quite evident that we are not speaking of the same person.’ She paused, and her eyes lit up again. ‘Unless, perhaps, he has acquired some manner of Glamour! He has made a human of himself, and set up as a baker in this charming establishment! Indeed, I do not know why he would do anything of the kind, but it is perfectly…’ She looked keenly at Phineas, and added, ‘Only, I do not see how you would fit in.’

‘I found the rose,’ said Phineas steadily. ‘I brought it here, since I did not like to leave it to die in the snow. I made it blue when the colour ebbed—’

‘With cabbages,’ said the lady, with a hint of scorn.

‘With cabbages. And I left it on the sill. That is all I’ve had to do with it.’

The lady gave up her hopes in a sad rush, and drooped before Phineas’s eyes. ‘It would not matter so, if only it were not so important,’ she said, suddenly forlorn, and Phineas’s feelings of mild indignation melted away.

‘I would help you, if I could,’ he said, quite in earnest.

She looked at him steadily. ‘Would you, Phineas Drake?’

Phineas swallowed, for under the weight of that stare her words seemed to gather some unspoken but palpable meaning.

‘Er,’ he said. ‘Yes, of course.’

She smiled. It was the first time he had seen her do so, and it transformed her slightly severe features with bright sunshine. ‘I will remember your name,’ she said, and these words, too, rang with something Phineas could not identify.

Sweeping up the rose, she turned to leave. She had made it to the door before Phineas managed to blurt, ‘May I know yours?’

She turned back to regard him, and her smile flickered again. ‘That is fair, is it not?’

She seemed to require an answer, so Phineas nodded.

‘My name is… it is Ilsevel.’ And with a graceful inclination of her head, she passed through the door, and was gone into the night.

Only then did Phineas realise that the door had stood wide open throughout the odd interview, and he was half-perished with cold.

Chapter Four

T’ain’t so very odd t’ see Aylfenhame folk wanderin’ the streets of England on the Solstice days, in the usual way o’ things. Thas when the borders weaken, an’ the gates fly open, an’ anybody may pass back an’ forth quite easy-like, if they happen t’ know the way.

But Ilsevel, she ain’t quite yer usual visitor. Ain’t yer usual anythin’, come t’ that. There’s her clothes, fer a start. Nowt but the best on her — silks, jewels, everythin’ fine — an’ she’s trampin’ about in ‘em in the snow? An’ the style! Fashions like that, well, I’ve seen nothin’ like it in Aylfenhame fer twenty year at least — an’ never in England at all.

What, thought I, is such a woman doin’ in England? Especially since she didn’t go back Aylf-side when th’ Solstice was over. Oh, no. Stayed in the city, day after day, always askin’ after this “Wodebean” fellow. Well, now. Thas a name I hadn’t heard in more’n twenty years either…

Mrs. Yardley’s boarding house was not, Ilsevel soon found, in an especially salubrious part of the city. In fact, the neighbourhood was rather dreary. Narrow, cramped streets, characterless houses, and, at times, a medley of unsavoury aromas. What with the cheerless weather casting a pall of gloom over everything, she soon began to wish herself back home in Aylfenhame.

But little was left there to welcome her; and Wodebean’s trail had, for some reason, led her to this grey little city. What the elusive wretch could want with such a place she could not imagine, and on this point — as, indeed, on every other — nobody could help her.

No one had even heard of Wodebean. She asked everybody she met, from Mrs. Yardley herself (‘Mr. Wodebean? I am not acquainted with anybody of that name, dear. It’s to be a bit of mutton for supper, and a bite of apple tart. Shall you be wanting any? And do put a proper gown on. What will people think?’) to Mrs. Yardley’s household brownie, Pettivree (‘Wodebean? No such person in these parts, miss,) to the odd boy at the bakery (a blank, gaping stare, and some rambling tale about his father). Wodebean must be calling himself by some other name, she supposed, but after three days in Lincoln she was no nearer to discovering what it might be, or where he might be hiding himself either.

And now they were all caught up with their winter festivals, and everything was Christmas this, Christmas that… Mrs. Yardley could no longer be drawn upon any subject save for mistletoe, and bob-apple, and negus, whatever those things were, and Ilsevel herself was forever being pressed to participate in some noisy festivity with her landlady, and her fellow boarders.

The latter did not much regret Ilsevel’s absence, at any rate. Lacking Mrs. Yardley’s motive for tolerating Ilsevel’s eccentricity of dress, her ignorance of social customs or her lack of respectable connections (that being monied folk; the good landlady was clearly hard-up;) the boarders made their feelings clear with their chilly, reluctant greetings and their habit of giving her a wide berth whenever they should happen to meet her in the hallway, or over the supper-table.

Ilsevel barely noticed these incivilities. They could not, or would not, help her upon the only point that mattered; and therefore, she had no use for their friendship. And Mrs. Trott snored so loudly at night, Ilsevel could hear her through the wall.

The day after Ilsevel’s disappointment at the bakery, she rose early, well before the sun showed its weak winter rays to the world, and sat awhile in bed, thinking. No fire brightened the empty grate — the scant stock of comforts at Mrs. Yardley’s establishment did not include such luxuries as warmth in the mornings. Candles were in short supply, too, and since Ilsevel could not muster any interest in finding her way to a chandler’s shop and haggling with the proprietor over a purchase, she simply bore with the darkness.

At least her clothes contrived to ward away the cold; they might, some of them, have got a little moth-eaten down the years, but their enchantments had hardly faded at all.

The Greestone Stairs. That was where she had last seen Wodebean — disappearing, so she had thought, through a Solstice-Gate, and back into Aylfenhame. But when she had gone through herself, he had been nowhere in evidence. Invisible? Or had he, somehow, contrived to go somewhere else altogether? The rose had not been a typical example of his arts; it was too delicate, too pretty, and above all, too useless. She did not see that there was much chance of a market for such a frippery, or not one that would much interest Wodebean. He did not deal in trifles.

So: why had he been carrying it about with him?

She got out of bed and lit her sole candle, but its wan glow did not afford her any glimpse of the odd rose in any part of her room. The flower proved to be absent from her chest-of-drawers, and her closet too. Where—

Oh. It darted into her head, then: a memory of the rose, lying on the counter in the baker’s shop, and of herself, walking away without it.

‘Fool!’ she cried. The one link she had with Wodebean, and she had left it with that blank-faced baker’s boy? Who knew what he might have found to do with it by now?

‘Cabbages and sugar,’ she muttered with a sigh, discarding her nightgown — ouch, the sudden bite of the cold ate at her perishing flesh before she contrived to don her undergarments, and her favourite carmine gown. Half-boots! And today, a hat, for perhaps she ought to make some small concession to appearances once in a while. Away she went into the dark early morn, the sky snowless by some small blessing, though a brisk wind did its best to carry her hat away again.

‘Come now!’ she protested, clutching her bonnet as she hurried through the empty streets. ‘Propriety dictates that I must have a hat! You would not wish to expose me to still more censure, surely?’

The wind, being an uncaring sort of fellow, did not lessen its importunity one whit.

No lights shone in the bakery, yet, and Ilsevel was reduced to pacing impatiently outside. She could dimly discern, by the light of a pallid, sinking moon, that the rose was not on the windowsill where she had seen it before. But the rest of the shop was sunk in impenetrable gloom, and she could not determine whether the flower still lay on the counter.

Then came the rattle of locks turning back their tumblers, and with a soft clatter, the boy came issuing from a side-door.

‘Good morning!’ said Ilsevel briskly, and stepped forward to meet him.

The boy — Phineas, that was it, Phineas Drake — blinked at her, silent, and dropped a box into the icy street. He stooped at once and scrambled to collect the contents spilling out onto the cobbles. ‘G-good morning,’ he said while thus engaged, and without meeting her eye.

Ilsevel went to help, but his nimble fingers had everything retrieved and tidied in a trice, and she was not required. ‘I’ve come about my rose!’ she said, before he could drop anything else.

Phineas regarded her properly, and after a moment’s pause — dismayed, perhaps? — he said: ‘Oh, I… I thought you said it was not yours.’

‘I said that I did not drop it.’

A faint glimmer attracted her gaze: moonlight glinting off frost and sugar. He was wearing the rose in one of the button-holes of his overcoat. ‘Oh,’ he said again.

He had fallen in love with the pretty thing, of course. They all did, these starry-eyed human-folk, the moment anything magical came in their way. She suppressed a sigh and said, as kindly as she could: ‘By rights, I suppose, it is yours indeed, for ‘twas you who found it. But I have great need of it. Will you perhaps lend it to me?’

Phineas shifted his burden of boxes to one hand; with the other, he tenderly plucked the rose from his button-hole and gave it to her. ‘No,’ he said incongruously, and then to Ilsevel’s surprise he added: ‘It is yours. Take it.’

Not a trace of resentment was there in his words or his manner; nor of reluctance, either. He adored the absurd thing, but gave it freely nonetheless.

She remembered his odd solicitude about her attire, some days before. Would he really have given her his coat?

‘Thank you,’ she said.

He ducked his head, apparently incapable of further speech, and made to pass her. The boxes, she supposed, had to be distributed somewhere.

‘Wait,’ she said.

He stopped.

Why had she said it? The word had emerged from somewhere within her; she could not have said where. She thought quickly. ‘Do you know this city well?’

He nodded. ‘Yes, milady. I have lived all my life here.’

‘Suppose I might like to buy some illicit goods. Where ought I to go? Will you take me there?’

Phineas gazed at her. ‘Illicit goods…?’

‘Poisons and cursed trinkets,’ Ilsevel elaborated. ‘Elf-bolts and changeling-stocks. Grass stolen from a faerie throne. A convincing replica of the rosewater-strung Lyre of Maldriggan.’ She thought a moment, and amended her speech. ‘No, I retract that last one. Wodebean does not deal in fakery. If he purports to be selling the rosewater-strung Lyre of Maldriggan then it is the real one.’

Phineas was still gazing at her.

‘No?’ she prompted. ‘There must be somewhere like that around here.’

‘The…’ began Phineas, and stopped. ‘Elf-bolts and faerie thrones? You are… quite well, milady, are not you?’

‘Does your household have no brownie?’ she answered, a trifle impatiently. ‘You cannot be entirely oblivious to the ways of Aylfenhame, surely?’

‘My — m-my father drove him off,’ mumbled Phineas, blinking, and then said, as though the idea came as a surprise, ‘You are of Aylfenhame.’

‘Naturally I am.’

‘That does explain one or two little matters,’ he said, and actually contrived to smile at her. His gaze flicked to the soft, velvet folds of her gown, so different from the drab fabrics he was himself swathed in.

Ilsevel smoothed a hand over her bodice. ‘I will not be here for long, therefore it is not at all necessary to blend in.’

‘I quite see that, ma’am.’

‘I wish you will cease calling me by that title, for it is not quite correct.’

The boy blushed. ‘I am sorry. What had you rather I called you?’

Ilsevel opened her mouth, and her true title hovered for a moment on the tip of her tongue. But one or two lucky recollections saved her from making what must be an unwise revelation, and she bit back the words. ‘You had better call me Ilsevel,’ she ordered. ‘It is a serviceable enough name, is it not?’

‘It is a beautiful name.’

‘Very well. Now then, the elf-bolts? Not that I wish to procure any such wares, you understand. I merely need to question the proprietor.’

‘I am but a baker,’ said Phineas. ‘I know nothing of faerie thrones or magic lyres.’

Ilsevel looked him up and down, taking in the scuffed hem and cuffs of his threadbare overcoat and the worn, obviously beloved cap crowning his head. ‘I suppose you would not, at that. But tell me, Phineas the Baker: if you wanted to buy something questionable, where would you go?’

‘I… have never thought about it before.’ He hesitated as he spoke, and there was a look to his face that told her he was not telling the truth.

Ilsevel, exasperated, made him a tiny curtsey and turned away.

‘But,’ he added. ‘I— I— if I wanted something such, I might go to one of the pawn shops.’

Ilsevel turned back. ‘Pawn shop? What is that?’

‘If I was short of money I might take something valuable — a watch, say, or a piece of jewellery — to the pawnbroker and he would give me something for it, and then sell it in his shop. It’s sometimes said that pawnbrokers are not too particular about where the items come from.’

‘Stolen goods?’ Ilsevel pondered that. ‘It is not Wodebean’s trade, but perhaps such a person may know more. Let us go to one of these pawnbrokers.’

Phineas looked down at the pile of boxes he carried, nonplussed.

‘After we have delivered your confectionery,’ she amended.

‘We?’

‘Shall you object to my company?’

‘N-no, ma’am — um, I could have no objection.’

‘And since my hands are free I shall also carry a box.’

Phineas blinked, and offered her the stack of boxes almost reverently. Ilsevel selected two from the top, and tucked them under her arm. ‘Shall we hurry?’ she suggested. ‘It is rather cold.’

‘You don’t look like you feel it,’ said he, setting off up the street.

‘No, not in the least. But you do.’

Phineas threw her a startled look, as though he were not at all used to having his comfort considered. His nose was already blue with cold; and the fool boy had been planning to give her his coat?

Ilsevel received a curious stare at the first house they stopped at. At the second, an outright disapproving one. Quickly realising that her accompaniment of Phineas might set tongues to wagging, and perhaps to his detriment, she took to waiting in the street while he went up to the doors, her back turned.

And then it was off to the peculiar establishments he had called pawn shops, where she took an instant dislike to the pawnbrokers.

‘But it is Queen Amaldria’s ring!’ she protested for the benefit of a stout, florid man who had, by the scent of his breath, been busy at the port already. ‘She is a legend in Aylfenhame! And it is real emeralds, not glass. I will need much more for it.’

The pawnbroker, whose cramped little establishment in an insalubrious part of town had at first raised her hopes, eyed the ring again. ‘It’s real emeralds, all right,’ he agreed. ‘But if it’s the property of some queen, how did you come by it?’

Ilsevel, quite prepared for this question, launched into a rather involved tale. She had amended some of the truth, and presented a story wherein, she strongly implied, she had appropriated the article for herself under questionable circumstances.

Phineas, more practical than she, allotted some thirty seconds to this narrative, and then said crisply: ‘It isn’t necessary to ask too many questions about that, is it sir?’

The stout man snorted, and handed back the ring. ‘What would your father say, Phineas Drake, if he knew you were consorting with thieves?’

It would depend upon the thief, Phineas thought involuntarily.

So much for the florid man.

Phineas took her to two more such shops, with similar results. In one, she surmised, he was not only known, but had actually made use of its services — and recently, too. Hard up, was he? He ought not to be, not with such a fine little shop under his stewardship. Frowning, she tucked that information away — and tucked a sapphire ring from her left little finger into his coat pocket, too, when he was not attending to her.

The fourth pawn shop proved, to her relief, more useful. Unusually (as she was beginning to learn) the proprietor of this dusty little place was a woman, and a sharp-eyed, shrewd sort. She examined Queen Amaldria’s ring with efficient professionalism, pronounced it acceptable, and took it without question, even when Phineas had made clear its questionable provenance.

The money she offered for it was insultingly low, but that was all right. She would not be keeping the ring for long.

She was a shade insolent, too. Eyeing Ilsevel’s very handsome dress, she said: ‘T’ain’t wise, walking about in stolen dresses. Sell ‘em to me, and I’ll replace ‘em with something less eye-catching.’

With dignity, Ilsevel declined. It was bad enough to part with Amaldria’s ring, however temporarily. To sell her gowns! Unthinkable! And the idea that they were stolen! Forgetting, briefly, their masquerade, she advanced upon the pawnbroker, her mind agreeably full of wretched and painful things to do to her.