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debtors prison, never to see the light of day again. Though whether or not they would think the trade a
fair one, she didn t know. At least in prison you were fed and had a roof over your head.
The market was small and crowded, sandwiched between an abandoned courthouse and several rows of
large townhouses, which had been broken up into tenements. Vendors sang or shouted their wares:
"Pepperpot! Pepperpot! Get it while it s hot!"
"Scissors to grind! Knives to grind! We grind anything!"
"Hot corn! Lily-white corn!"
A teamster tried to navigate his cart through the narrow aisles, upsetting a stand of dried fruit and sending
chickens flying. A guttersnipe took advantage of the opportunity to dart in and begin stuffing the fallen
wares into his pockets. A moment later, he was running from a stick broom that the vendor began laying
indiscriminately on him and the teamster alike.
Mina took a deep breath, smelling the scents of cooking food and rotting vegetables, of beer and piss,
dung and spices. She slipped one hand into her pocket, fingering the small stones she had picked up on
her way there from the factory. Nervousness tightened her belly and made the disguised chain around her
neck weigh heavy as a real collar.
Truthfully, she didn t know whether this would even work. Duncan had only begun to show her how to
cast glamour. What if there was something she didn t know? What if something went wrong?
Don t do anything to attract attention, Duncan had warned again and again. If her spell went awry,
then it was likely there wouldn t be anyone in the entire market who didn t know what had happened by
the end of the day.
It s worth the risk. I know what I m doing.
Taking a deep breath, she stepped up to the first vendor, a wizened old woman selling sacks of flour
brought in from some small mill outside the city. The woman fixed sharp eyes on her and thumped the
nearest sack, so that a small white cloud rose up into the air. "Finest meal in Dere," she swore in a voice
like a crow cawing. "As white as anything to be found in the royal kitchens!"
Mina rather doubted the truth of that statement, and said so. They haggled back and forth for a while,
until finally settling on a price. Her belly twisting itself into knots, Mina dug the stones out of her pocket,
laying glamour over them as she did so. Copper flashed in the afternoon sun as she counted out the false
coins for the woman and accepted the small sack of flour in return.
After about an hour s shopping, she hoisted her purchases in her arms and started back towards the
apartment. Leaving the market, she took the route along the Blackrush, breathing in the stinking scent of
the garbage-laden waters. She wondered if the aughisky slept in the depths during the daylight hours.
"Hello, child. Been trying out your powers, I see?"
Mina stopped, heart pounding at the sound of the silken voice. Looking frantically about, she spotted a
tall man standing in the shadows of a bridge. "I don t know what you re talking about."
He laughed softly. "Don t insult me." He moved out of the deeper shadows, as if to give her a better look
at him. He was dressed all in black, archaic clothes that had gone out of style centuries before. Their
darkness contrasted sharply with the long curls of his golden hair. His features were strikingly
handsome but were by no means human.
She swallowed against a sudden lump in her throat. "I ve been warned not to talk to fae."
"Have you, now?" He grinned, revealing small, vicious teeth. "Perhaps whoever warned you feared what
I might have to tell you, eh?"
She felt cold even in the painful blaze of summer heat that surrounded her. "I won t let you trick me."
The man chuckled. "As you will. But ask yourself what it is that they aren t telling you." The fae turned
away, then glanced rakishly back over his shoulder. "And then ask yourself what they re afraid to tell
you."
And with that, he was gone, as if the cool shadows beneath the bridge had simply swallowed him.
~*~
Mina thought she would tell Duncan about the strange encounter that she d had that afternoon. But
instead she found herself watching him over the pages of the book he had her reading, wondering what
secrets might lurk in his blue-gray eyes. Ask yourself what they aren t telling you, the fae had said. On
one level, she recognized that she d be a fool to listen to the soft words of a creature that most likely had
nothing good in mind for her. Or, if it troubled her so, she should simply confront Duncan and ask him if
there was anything he had held back.
But the words stuck on her tongue. If Duncan and Bryan were keeping things from her, wouldn t they
simply lie about it?
She had no experience in these things, she realized bitterly. She had passed her life with the casual
acquaintances of orphanage and factory, none of which had ever been close enough to trust. Then
William had come along, teaching her that trust was nothing but stupidity and love nothing but lies.
There was Abby, of course. But Abby was so open and, in her own way, innocent, that deception never
appeared to occur to her under any circumstances.
Duncan was not Abby. Mina could all but feel the secrets he held close about him, dusty decaying things
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