by ‘You’re saving Farringale,’ I repeated, with perhaps an unwise emphasis on the first word. I was conscious of a stir around me: a reaction from the assembled Society, but I couldn’t turn to gauge what it was. I kept my attention on Fenella.
‘Of course,’ she said grandly. ‘Urgent work, I am sure you must agree. The Court won’t thank you for getting in the way of it.’
‘Oh? You’re here on the authority of Mandridore, are you?’
‘Of course,’ she said again, to my great surprise. I’d expected hedging, deflection, excuses, but not a bare-faced lie.
For an instant, I wondered if it might be true. The king at Mandridore had tasked us with rehabilitating Farringale, if we could; might they have contracted Ancestria Magicka to do the same? From their perspective, the end goal was important, not the tool they used to achieve it. It was plausible.
But I remembered the patent horror with which the Court had heard the news of Fenella’s incursion. The urgency with which they’d appealed for aid. It was possible they had employed Ancestria Magicka, and that grubby organisation had betrayed them—but I didn’t think so. More likely a lie.
But a believable one. Now I understood how Fenella had recruited trolls to her cause.
‘That is untrue,’ I said. ‘We’ve just come from Mandridore, and they certainly didn’t send you.’ Futile, really; my word against hers; their word against ours; people would go on believing whatever they wanted to believe.
Fenella waved this away with visible scorn. ‘I suppose you’d like me to believe they sent you.’
As though it was so far-fetched a possibility, considering she’d called me Merlin herself. ‘What’s your plan?’ I said, tiring of the tit-for-tat.
Fenella, off-balance, blinked at me. ‘What?’
‘Your plan. For saving Farringale.’ I swept an arm out, indicating the sorry state of the noble griffins, the clusters of her people guarding the mews, and the expanse of our people ranged in opposition. ‘This is all part of it, I suppose?’
I was curious to see whether the whole story was a lie; the “saving Farringale” a story spun to justify the looting, the thieving. Or was there some truth to it after all?
‘I’m sure you don’t need me to explain it to you,’ she answered, which was a cop-out, but also true. I didn’t.
I was looking at everything they’d done in Farringale with fresh eyes. What they’d done to the griffins.
If we—I—wanted to restore Farringale, we had to neutralise its wild magick, which meant neutralising—temporarily—the griffins. Is that what they were doing?
And what of the library? Had they been looting it, or extracting it prior to potentially damaging magickal procedures?
They’d stolen our regulators from Silvessen, but not, apparently, to sell them, or even to copy them (though I’d be willing to bet they’d be doing the latter at some point). They’d brought them here, to Farringale, and—used them. Hmm.
‘And what happens once you’ve saved it?’ That was Jay, his tone ringingly sceptical. ‘Who gets control of it?’
‘Why, Mandridore, of course,’ said Fenella, sweetly.
I sighed, frustrated. It might have been true; it wasn’t hard to imagine the kind of fame and favour they could win by such a feat. The Troll Court would owe them for generations.
It might have been a lie, too; I wouldn’t put it past Fenella to covet a small kingdom of her own, given half a chance.
We had no way of knowing, and we were wasting time arguing about it. I opened my mouth to say—I don’t even know what, I was running out of ways to counter such slippery insincerity from Fenella—but at that moment Milady materialised, as if from nowhere (and, being Mab, she might have).
Her abrupt appearance caused a fresh stir, on both sides—and stopped Fenella cold. It helped that she was laying it on rather thick, hovering at near eye level with the proud leader of Ancestria Magicka, her wings a glittering blur. She shimmered with myth and magick, a palpable power beyond anything most of us had ever experienced. She inspired the purest awe—and, I hoped, a modicum of fear.
For the first time, I detected uncertainty in Fenella’s face. She knew a great many things she shouldn’t have, but she had not discovered this secret.
Milady spoke, and her voice rang with all the power and majesty of a legendary queen. ‘Fenella Beaumont.’ The syllables rolled and echoed, like suppressed thunder. ‘This is not your task to perform.’
Fenella straightened her spine, lifted her chin, and stared right back at Mab. ‘I say the task belongs to anyone who can perform it successfully.’
‘And can you?’
‘Yes,’ said Fenella, without hesitation. Bravado? Or did she truly have a workable method?
A pause. Then Milady spoke—Milady again, not Mab; those low, calm, soothing tones I’d heard so often at the top of the tower at Home. ‘In that case, you will agree to a co-operation pact.’
‘We require no assistance,’ said Fenella, instantly, and with scorn.
‘You may enjoy our assistance or endure our opposition,’ replied Milady coolly. ‘You will, of course, make the wisest decision.’
I wanted to object. They were not to be trusted; they had not honour enough to keep to their promises. They would pretend cooperation, and then betray us at the first opportunity.
I needn’t have worried, however. Fenella had not the wisdom Milady credited her with, nor the guile I’d expected. ‘There will be no cooperation,’ she declared. ‘Farringale is in safe hands. Ours.’
Another pause. This was not the response Milady had expected; she did not have an immediate answer to offer. Tension built; Rob and his team shifted, gathering themselves, preparing to oppose Fenella with force, if necessary.
A terrible prospect, and one Milady had always dedicated herself to avoiding. The Society did not cut swathes through our opponents, maiming at will; we certainly did not kill.
But we could not simply walk away, and leave Farringale in their hands. Theirs were not safe hands; never that. If they would not work with us, then we would have to remove them—by any means possible.
Rob lifted his Lazuli Wand, letting Fenella see it. He was legendarily fearsome with it. ‘Release the griffins,’ he said, deadly quiet.
Fenella levelled her own Wand at him, stared defiance. Giddy gods, had she such unshakeable faith in the might of her own people? Or was this foolish recklessness, an inability to admit herself bested?
Was she bested? I felt a creeping sense of unease, felt it radiating from Jay beside me. We didn’t know the extent of either her forces or the powers they mustered between them. We’d seen giants at the bridge, and trolls; we knew she had the likes of Katalin Pataki and George Mercer at her disposal. As to what, or who, else… we were woefully underinformed.
What if we were the ones outmatched, and unable to see it?
‘Stop,’ I blurted. ‘Please. Wait.’
Everyone looked at me. The combined weight of so many surprised, shocked, wondering, tense, frightened, enraged gazes made me shrink, for a moment, bowed under the combined pressure.
And it made it so much harder to continue. Milady wasn’t going to like what I had in mind; the glimmers of a plan so risky I felt nauseated from the strain of it.
But it was that, or—disaster.
‘You’re right,’ I said to Fenella. ‘The important thing is that Farringale is saved, and if you’ve got a surefire way to do that then you should go ahead and do it.’ I was babbling a bit, not at my most eloquent by a long shot: but I was committed now, and rushed on. ‘I expect you’ll be wanting to take the griffins out of here, and we won’t oppose you, but as a gesture of good faith we would like to offer you the assistance of one of our best agents. She’s a world expert on the care and handling of magickal beasts, including mythical ones, and will assist you very creditably in keeping them safe and well.’
There, let her refuse that without losing face. She could hardly reject my offer, not without undermining her own claim to be “safe hands” for Farringale—and the griffins. I couldn’t see Miranda in the crowd, but knew she must be somewhere nearby. She’d stay as close to the beleaguered griffins as she could.
Jay was silent at my side, rigid with tension and (probably) anger. He wasn’t questioning me, he wouldn’t undermine me in front of Fenella. But he had, must have, grave doubts. I could only hope he—and Milady—would trust me.
I could only hope I deserved to be trusted.
Fenella took several long, terrible moments to consider my proposal, and I couldn’t breathe for fear that she would decline, this too—or that my own people would break, that Milady would publicly overrule me.
‘Very well,’ said Fenella, though the questioning look she cast at Milady showed how well she understood the limits of my authority.
I waited in fresh agonies for Milady’s response. Would she trust me this time? Could she? What I asked required a huge leap of faith, and I couldn’t explain why—
‘Stand down, Society,’ said Milady, softly, and I could almost have wept with relief—and panic.
We were committed. Now I had to make it work.
Miranda went past me, heading straight for the griffins, now she had official leave—directing at me a tense, questioning look en route. I met that gaze squarely, trying, probably futilely, to telegraph reams of thoughts with a mere glance: keep the griffins safe. Stay close to them. Tell us exactly where they’re being taken.
I knew she would perform the first two without question, but the latter? I was gambling on Miranda, too, on the chance that her confused loyalties had settled: that she was a Society agent again, through and through.
Nothing in her face told me whether or not I was right to put faith in her. Time would tell.
A great deal happened after that, and quickly. Milady mustered our people, and pulled them back; Fenella consolidated hers around the griffins, now surrendered into her dubious care.
Jay bristled with something: either rage or fear, I couldn’t tell. I followed him over to Milady, and Rob, and about thirty other Society agents all staring at me like I must be crazy. Or a traitor.
We fell all the way back, leaving the mews to Ancestria Magicka, and regrouped at a safe distance. Handsome townhouses rose on either side of me, looming in judgement, empty windows staring out of stuccoed facades.
‘Well?’ said Milady.
Jay, beside me, didn’t move, or barely so. But he’d stopped very close to me: his arm pressed against mine, a reassuring pressure. He might think I was crazy, but he was standing beside me anyway.
My courage rose.
‘The thing is,’ I began. ‘She’s right. Someone’s got to save Farringale. We can’t just leave it like this, and now we have the technology to—’
‘Our objective in coming,’ interjected Milady, severely, ‘Was to eject Ancestria Magicka, and reverse any damage they may have caused. That is all.’
‘I know, but we can’t do that without a fight, a very damaging one, which nobody wants, and we might be—we might be the ones driven out. But if the griffins aren’t here—’
Rob said, in a voice of controlled anger, ‘Ves, the griffins are not safe in Fenella Beaumont’s hands. She’ll never return them. You cannot conceive how priceless they are—’
‘I know, which is why I sent Miranda with them. She’ll see to their safety and make sure we know how to get them back, later. We didn’t come prepared to remove them, but they did, so it’s actually quite perfect. And in the meantime—’
‘Later? She could take them away and kill them and there would be no later—’
‘She won’t. Not when they’re so priceless. Please, Rob. I’m going to need your help.’
He eyed me with a look of frank disbelief, a boundless exasperation, and my heart sank.
Milady hadn’t relented either, and I couldn’t blame her. At last she said, ‘Ves. Are you certain you can do this?’
I was silent for a second, in consternation, the full enormity of what I proposed to do settling over me like a leaden cloak. Was I sure? Truly?
‘With the right help,’ I said, mustering my courage. ‘Yes, I think I can.’
Milady nodded once, and that was it. We were committed. I was committed.
Giddy gods. What had I done?