Read Online A Star Shall Fall by Marie Brennan - Free Book Online Page A
Authors: Marie Brennan
Tags: paranormal romance
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fine shops, and made a face of equal parts frustration and worry.
She’d left for Berkshire fifty years ago because there were things she hated about London. Mostly the faerie courtiers: vipers, all of them, saying one thing and meaning another, then biting you when your back was turned. The longer she stayed, the greater her risk of getting caught in their political coils.
But she also loved the City. She loved it for the smart stone and brick buildings that stood where plaster and timber had once been. For the gin shops, with the poor and working folk standing around drinking poison and talking of what their mistress read in the newspaper today. For the little boxes people rode in, carried along on long poles, and the bewildering variety of their wig styles, and the Chinese wallpaper being sold in the shop in front of her.
A few days here would not be enough to scratch that itch. Not after fifty years of absence, and not if this might all come to an end in a year and a half.
She could always run for Berkshire at the first scent of politics.
Irrith jumped sideways to avoid a carriage forcing a path through the crowd, and found herself against a wall plastered with advertisements. One of them caught her eye, with a word that did not belong on a sheet of paper stuck to the wall of a Cheapside shop.
DR. RUFUS ANDREWS
presents
His MARVELOUS MENAGERIE
featuring many Strange and Rare
Half-Breeds and Homunculi
including the
ORONUTO SAVAGE,
two
RED INDIAN MAIDENS,
born joined at the Hip,
and most wondrous strange,
the half-Man, half-Goat
OLYMPIAN SATYR
She stared at that last word, then scrubbed her eyes. It did not oblige her by vanishing.
There was more, in smaller print, crammed in toward the bottom of the sheet; it seemed these wonders could be viewed for a fee at some place in Red Lion Square. Ladies were coyly advised that the satyr might be shocking to their delicate constitutions.
Irrith was prepared to be more than shocked, if this Dr. Andrews had an actual faerie in his menagerie. Could he? The Greek fae were not like English ones; iron didn’t bother them. Maybe a satyr could survive in mortal captivity, without wasting away to nothingness.
Her fingers scrabbled at the edges of the sheet. Half stayed behind when she tore it free, but the satyr stayed, as did the address.
Irrith had no idea where Red Lion Square was, and she wouldn’t go there on her own even if she did. Should it be true this man had a captive satyr, she would need help to get the prisoner free.
The Onyx Hall, London: October 7, 1757
The pure ring of silver echoed off the polished stone of the walls as Irrith approached the set of chambers collectively known as the Temple of Arms. Hidden in the heart of London, where outsiders could not easily attack them, the fae of the Onyx Court rarely saw battle. Still, those among them with a martial bent yet practiced their art, no more able to abandon it than rain could stop falling downward.
They had all the accoutrements of war at their disposal, short of seige equipment: axes, maces, swords both large and small, centuries of armor. One long gallery had been converted into an archery range; another was dedicated to pistol practice. But the room Irrith sought was the central one, a large, octagonal chamber, its sleek floor covered with a hard-packed accumulation of dirt and straw the masters of the training ground refused to let anyone clean away. Here she found what looked like the entire fighting contingent of the Onyx Hall, watching two of their number at work.
For the second time that day, Irrith’s heart leapt into her mouth. They were fighting the Dragon.
Her common sense caught up a moment later. When she blinked, she recognized the terrible beast as nothing more than a glamour, roaring silently in the center of the room. But there were plenty at court who remembered their foe; the illusion was uncomfortably lifelike. The serpentine creature, if it reared upward, would nearly strike the
She’d left for Berkshire fifty years ago because there were things she hated about London. Mostly the faerie courtiers: vipers, all of them, saying one thing and meaning another, then biting you when your back was turned. The longer she stayed, the greater her risk of getting caught in their political coils.
But she also loved the City. She loved it for the smart stone and brick buildings that stood where plaster and timber had once been. For the gin shops, with the poor and working folk standing around drinking poison and talking of what their mistress read in the newspaper today. For the little boxes people rode in, carried along on long poles, and the bewildering variety of their wig styles, and the Chinese wallpaper being sold in the shop in front of her.
A few days here would not be enough to scratch that itch. Not after fifty years of absence, and not if this might all come to an end in a year and a half.
She could always run for Berkshire at the first scent of politics.
Irrith jumped sideways to avoid a carriage forcing a path through the crowd, and found herself against a wall plastered with advertisements. One of them caught her eye, with a word that did not belong on a sheet of paper stuck to the wall of a Cheapside shop.
DR. RUFUS ANDREWS
presents
His MARVELOUS MENAGERIE
featuring many Strange and Rare
Half-Breeds and Homunculi
including the
ORONUTO SAVAGE,
two
RED INDIAN MAIDENS,
born joined at the Hip,
and most wondrous strange,
the half-Man, half-Goat
OLYMPIAN SATYR
She stared at that last word, then scrubbed her eyes. It did not oblige her by vanishing.
There was more, in smaller print, crammed in toward the bottom of the sheet; it seemed these wonders could be viewed for a fee at some place in Red Lion Square. Ladies were coyly advised that the satyr might be shocking to their delicate constitutions.
Irrith was prepared to be more than shocked, if this Dr. Andrews had an actual faerie in his menagerie. Could he? The Greek fae were not like English ones; iron didn’t bother them. Maybe a satyr could survive in mortal captivity, without wasting away to nothingness.
Her fingers scrabbled at the edges of the sheet. Half stayed behind when she tore it free, but the satyr stayed, as did the address.
Irrith had no idea where Red Lion Square was, and she wouldn’t go there on her own even if she did. Should it be true this man had a captive satyr, she would need help to get the prisoner free.
The Onyx Hall, London: October 7, 1757
The pure ring of silver echoed off the polished stone of the walls as Irrith approached the set of chambers collectively known as the Temple of Arms. Hidden in the heart of London, where outsiders could not easily attack them, the fae of the Onyx Court rarely saw battle. Still, those among them with a martial bent yet practiced their art, no more able to abandon it than rain could stop falling downward.
They had all the accoutrements of war at their disposal, short of seige equipment: axes, maces, swords both large and small, centuries of armor. One long gallery had been converted into an archery range; another was dedicated to pistol practice. But the room Irrith sought was the central one, a large, octagonal chamber, its sleek floor covered with a hard-packed accumulation of dirt and straw the masters of the training ground refused to let anyone clean away. Here she found what looked like the entire fighting contingent of the Onyx Hall, watching two of their number at work.
For the second time that day, Irrith’s heart leapt into her mouth. They were fighting the Dragon.
Her common sense caught up a moment later. When she blinked, she recognized the terrible beast as nothing more than a glamour, roaring silently in the center of the room. But there were plenty at court who remembered their foe; the illusion was uncomfortably lifelike. The serpentine creature, if it reared upward, would nearly strike the
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