The Pale Dreamer

  Eliza retreated without protest.

  The Threadbare Company were hot on our heels. We crashed through the wrought-iron gate beside the den, into the shaded passageway that led to the courtyard. Nick cleared the steps in one jump, chased by a furious Metyard and an equally angry Anne, while I turned to lock the gate – just as one of the Threadbare Company’s members slammed into it, his face contorted with such outrage that my hands shook in panic.

  ‘Let it go,’ he snarled, spewing spittle, ‘or I’ll carve a necklace on your throat.’

  ‘Can’t if you can’t reach me,’ I bit out, shoving the gate closed with my shoulder.

  Sarah Metyard rushed between the bars, turning my skin cold. I twisted the key and ran around the corner and after Nick, leaving the Threadbare Company to scream their threats.

  This was absurd. Absolute madness. I would have been laughing if not for the danger.

  As I rounded the corner, I sensed Anne nearby, but it wasn’t Anne that scared me. I reached for the handrail and threw myself after Nick. He was standing at the far end of the courtyard with Eliza at his side, feet planted a shoulder’s width apart, both hands outstretched, palms facing Metyard. She had backed them into the doorway on the opposite side to this one, which was blocked by another gate.

  Where the hell was Jaxon?

  Nick gathered another spool to defend himself. I ran towards him. As Metyard rushed him, the spirits formed a shield, but she was stronger than all of them, older and incensed. He clenched his teeth as he tried to hold the spool together. The hangman had slain Sarah Metyard, but her lust for violence had followed her to the æther.

  When I got too close, she lashed out at me. I actually felt the sensation of a hand against my chest, a shove driven as if by living muscle, before I went flying. I twisted just in time to land. The impact was so hard that I lost my footing and staggered into the tree. I caught myself and flung a spool of my own, but I was so new to the art that my efforts were little more than a beesting to Metyard. All her attention was fixed on Nick and Eliza, who were trembling with the effort of keeping her at bay. Eliza had also formed a spool, and they were working together to suspend the poltergeist between them, giving her no way out. Anne lingered behind my shoulder, almost as if she was watching the show.

  The back door to the den finally opened. Jaxon Hall stepped on to the bone-pale paving stones.

  From his leisurely pace, he had to have been testing us with his absence – for the last few minutes, at least. Seeing how long we could hold on to Metyard.

  He carried a knife with a white handle. Nothing else. I had never seen Jaxon use his clairvoyance before. He was secretive about the nature of it – with me, at least. I knew he was a binder, someone able to bend a spirit’s will to his own, but I didn’t know exactly how he did it – only that it involved using a spirit’s name to exert control over them. And a knife, apparently. He levelled an amused gaze on his prize before calmly unbuttoning the cuff of his shirt and pushing it up to the elbow.

  Metyard had caught wind of danger. She shook off Nick and Eliza and hurtled towards Jaxon. Before I knew what I was doing, I had sidestepped, putting myself in front of him.

  I didn’t have enough time to make a spool.

  What I did have was my gift.

  It stirred in me again. It opened like a flower, and it grew, too big for me to grasp. It was a mechanism, designed to respond to danger. Metyard met it with a force that I felt in every nerve-end. A poltergeist could interact with living flesh: rend it, scar it.

  Jaxon had to be able to imprison her. I had to give him time.

  All at once, I was soaked to the bone in icy sweat. Behind me, Jaxon hissed through his teeth as he began the binding.

  My hands pushed out – not because I thought I could shove Metyard away, but to convince myself that I was in control of this force inside me. I was a pressure-cooker on the brink of boiling over, brimming with power.

  Jaxon muttered under his breath. Agony swelled at the front of my skull and exploded into black and red light. I wasn’t strong enough. A copper taste ran over my tongue and licked down the back of my throat. Blood oozed from my nose and dripped down to my chin, soaking into the collar of my blouse.

  ‘Jax,’ Eliza shouted. She, too, was trembling under the strain.

  ‘Keep her there’ was his only reply.

  She clenched her teeth. ‘No rush. Really, I’m loving this—’

  ‘Keep. Her. There.’

  He went back to his murmuring. Wisps of hair were plastered to my temples. More and more strength was leaving me, pouring away by the moment. Sensing weakness, Metyard pushed closer, making my muscles tremble. Anne shoved at her, to no avail. If Metyard touched my skin, I would be scarred for life, like I had been as a child. Eliza and Nick brought their spools to bear against her, but it was me she was after, me she had to remove if she wanted to incapacitate Jaxon.

  ‘More, Paige,’ Jaxon said, low enough that only I could hear. ‘Come, now, Pale Dreamer. Let your spirit fly at last.’

  A soft, unbroken ring filled my ears. I wanted to answer, but I couldn’t breathe.

  ‘Do it. You’re a dreamwalker, darling. I know you can do more than this …’

  I tried. Closing my eyes, I pictured all the moments in my life that had made me afraid. The school corridors, lined with mocking smiles and dagger eyes. The streets of Dublin, where I had seen my cousin for the last time. My father in his armchair, hiding behind his newspaper, avoiding my gaze whenever we spoke, never telling me why.

  It wasn’t enough. Metyard’s rage had festered and boiled for three centuries – it eclipsed mine. The poltergeist shoved closer, buckling my knees. I didn’t know what he wanted me to do, or how to do it. Jaxon let out a low curse.

  ‘Someone has made an error,’ he said to us. ‘The binding has had no effect. The name must be incorrect.’

  I was too aware of my heartbeat.

  ‘Try it with another “e”,’ Eliza called, panting. ‘M-E-T-E-Y-A-R-D. Some of the documents spelled it that way—’ Her words slid into a groan. ‘Hurry.’

  Nick reeled another spirit into his spool and pushed back against the poltergeist, releasing the pressure on me for just long enough for me to get back to my feet. I thought of how Anne Naylor had been beaten and terrorised, treated like dirt, and how no one had helped her. How that happened all too often. How it still happened now, three centuries later. I would fight this battle with her, even if it killed me. I would help give her the justice she had been denied in life.

  Moisture seeped down my cheek from my hairline and soaked the back of my neck. Finally, Jaxon said, ‘No effect.’ Almost lazily, he drew up a spool of his own and added its strength to our labours. ‘Are we quite sure that this poltergeist is Sarah Metyard? It would hardly surprise me if Didion had misidentified it.’

  ‘It must be.’ Nick’s voice was straining. ‘Who else would want to confront Anne?’

  It had to be Sarah. The woman who had starved and neglected the girl to death. The woman who had carried her body in pieces to the gully-hole. Who else could it be?

  Suddenly I found myself thinking back to the paperwork, remembering what the frightened children had cried when they found Anne senseless in her bindings.

  Miss Sally! Miss Sally! Nanny does not move.

  It hadn’t been the old woman they had called for. It had been Sarah Metyard the younger. The daughter. If she does not move, she had answered, I will make her move.

  Sally.

  Sally, who had been brutalised by her mother – who had beaten the girls in the shop, and been beaten herself. Sally, who had eventually run from the house Anne had died in.

  Sally, who had condemned them both when she confessed their crime.

  As the pieces slotted together, it began to add up.

  I will make her move, Sally had said. But even though she had struck Anne’s corpse, even though they had shaken and screamed at her, Anne had not moved. That stillness continued to mock Sa
lly.

  I will make her move. I will make her move.

  Now she was here again, to make Anne move. To keep her moving, so she would never have peace.

  ‘There were t-two Metyards,’ I said. My lips were trembling. ‘This is the daughter.’

  Realisation dawned on Nick’s face. ‘But she was called Sarah Metyard, too,’ Eliza said, her voice cracking with frustration. ‘Sally was just a nickname.’

  ‘I seem to remember a middle name,’ Jaxon said. ‘From the record of the hanging.’

  ‘Oh! Yes, yes – she did have a middle name. Wait.’ Sounding frantic, Eliza released her spool and pelted past us, back into the den. ‘I need to see the death record. Just hold on for a few more seconds—’

  ‘Hurry, Eliza,’ Nick said. Sweat was streaming off him, and he was deathly pale.

  All I could taste was metal. I thought I would die of the pain in my temples, but I had crossed a line somewhere. I could hold on. I could survive this.

  It must have been seconds, but it felt like hours before the shout came from the window above us:

  ‘Morgan. Sarah Morgan Metyard!’

  Jaxon set to work at once. In the final moments of the binding, I fell to my knees again, almost retching at the pain. Another soundless scream went through the æther.

  And then, just like that, the poltergeist was calm. She hung between us – passive and still.

  The beast had been tamed.

  Silence descended in the courtyard. It was as if I had been swimming underwater and my head had finally broken the surface. All the tension in my back and shoulders melted away, and I slumped forward, trembling all over. As I caught my breath, Anne Naylor drifted close to me – as close as she could come without touching my face. Every hair on my arms stood on end.

  ‘She won’t hurt you any more.’ I couldn’t raise my voice above a whisper. ‘I promise.’

  I thought I felt a small glow in the æther. Anne brushed past my aura, turning my skin to ice, and slipped quietly out of the courtyard.

  ‘Don’t try binding her, Jaxon,’ Eliza said. ‘You’re going to lose too much blood.’

  ‘Yes. Thank you, Eliza,’ was the curt reply.

  Nick crouched beside me and grasped my arms. My eye sockets felt tighter, my jaw too stiff to move, and my vision was furred with black around the edges, but I could still just about see. Spots of ruby dotted the paving stones around Jaxon’s shoes and veined one of his arms. I looked up to see him wiping the blade of his knife with a silk handkerchief.

  ‘Done,’ he said, his eyes on the docile spirit. ‘Not the Metyard we wanted, but I suppose it is a Metyard.’

  ‘Maria won’t bargain with you now,’ I rasped. ‘She wanted Sarah, not Sally. So we’ve lost Anne, too.’

  His face was blank. ‘Yes.’ He beckoned to the spirit. ‘Maria and I are old friends – we may be able to come to a new agreement. If not … well. I’m sure we can find some way to make this day something other than an abject waste of time.’

  As he walked into the den, Sally followed. I was drained, weighed down by the sense that he was disappointed in me, but relief spread through my chest. Let Anne Naylor return to the resting place she had chosen for herself. Let her be still. Perhaps she wouldn’t scream now, knowing that her pursuer was gone. That was a victory, I supposed.

  It just wasn’t the victory Jaxon Hall had hoped for.

  In the den, it was as if nothing had happened. I washed the blood off my face and changed into a new shirt. Jaxon asked me to kindly make him a black coffee and get back to work on the rent, which I did, but no sooner had I sat down than I succumbed to exhaustion. My head dropped on to the desk, and I knew no more.

  When I opened my eyes, I was in my own room, and it was dark. In the moonlight, I could make out a moth on the open window.

  I jolted upright, only to reel back to my pillow, swallowing a groan. My head was killing me. When had I gone to bed? Had I finished the paperwork? I shifted on to my side, fighting to gather my thoughts. Gooseflesh washed over my skin.

  When I remembered what had happened, I pulled a sheet over my head. I had failed. Jaxon would fire me in the morning. I stifled a weak laugh at the prospect of dismissal from my criminal job. First I had failed to impress him with my gift; then I had fallen asleep mid-task. I might as well pack my bags and go now, save myself the humiliation.

  A light switched on outside my room. I kept the sheet over my eyes. A weight sank on to the edge of the mattress.

  ‘Paige, are you awake?’

  ‘What time is it?’ I murmured.

  ‘One in the morning.’ Eliza poked me. ‘I made tea. Dealing with ‘geists always gives me a chill.’

  I emerged, pushing my curls back from my face. Eliza was in her nightclothes and a cardigan, and her face was bare. She offered a steaming mug, which I took.

  ‘Did you fall asleep?’ I asked.

  ‘No. I had to finish your paperwork,’ she said. When I dropped my gaze, she touched my shoulder. ‘Jaxon did, though. Nick and I were using spools – you two were using your gifts. Yourselves. This is part of what it is to be clairvoyant. There’s a saying in the syndicate: the æther takes as often as it gives.’

  Jaxon had been just as burned out by the encounter with Sally, then. It was only a small consolation.

  Eliza produced a hand-chased silver pillbox from her pocket. ‘Here.’ She flicked it open and plucked out a pill. ‘Nick said you’d have a headache.’

  ‘Jaxon’s going to fire me, isn’t he?’ I asked quietly.

  No reply. I wasn’t sure whether she hadn’t heard, or was just ignoring me. She busied herself with inspecting my cheek, where Bloatface had caught me with his elbow.

  ‘That’ll be a nasty bruise,’ she said. ‘And your throat – that will hurt for a while.’

  ‘Eliza.’

  ‘We’ll talk about Jaxon later. You’ve been asleep for hours – you need something to eat. I think it’s about time we introduced you to Chateline’s, the best cookshop in London.’

  ‘Now?’

  ‘It’s open all night. Rumour has it that the owner never sleeps – he won’t let anyone else cook.’ When I went for my clothes, she said, ‘No need to dress up. I regularly go in my slippers.’

  A lump was swelling in my throat. She and Nick often went for supper in the evenings. They had never invited me before. This must be a final kindness before they cut me loose.

  I gave my hair a quick brush and shrugged on a jacket. We went into the night – she really did wear her slippers – and I listened to her talk about how wonderful Chateline’s was, and how much she liked the eponymous owner, and how he could turn even the simplest meal into a work of art. She was obsessed with Chat’s honey loaf; the recipe was a closely-guarded secret. As she brought it to life with her words, I felt I was glimpsing a world I would never belong in. If I had just worked out what Jaxon had wanted to see from me, this could have been my life.

  We passed the sundial pillar, and she led me into the tiny, inconspicuous alleyway that led to Neal’s Yard, a hidden nook between the buildings of Seven Dials. Inside was a shop – or what I’d thought was a shop – that I’d passed a few times while I was carrying out errands; I’d never had cause to go in. Eliza pushed open the door.

  The interior was beautiful in a moth-eaten way, an ode to lost grandeur. Patrons crowded the tables, which were lit by wax candles. Nick was waiting for us in a booth in the corner.

  ‘Evening, Muse.’ A bald, ruddy man was cleaning the bar. ‘I see you’ve finally brought the newcomer.’

  ‘I’ve decided to let her in on our haven,’ Eliza said, and he chuckled. ‘Dreamer, this is Chateline.’

  ‘Chat.’ He held out a callused hand. The other arm ended in a stump below the elbow. ‘Muse and Vision have been telling me all about you.’ I blinked. ‘Seeing as this is your first time eating here, dinner’s on the house. Whatever you want.’

  ‘That’s kind of you,’ I said, surprised. ‘Thank you.’


  ‘Ah, if you’re a friend of Binder, you’re a friend of mine.’

  We joined Nick at the booth. He, too, looked as if he had just rolled out of bed.

  ‘Hi, sötnos,’ he said, moving a silk cushion to make room for me. ‘I took the liberty of ordering our usual. We wanted to give you your official Chateline’s initiation.’

  ‘We have a tradition,’ Eliza chimed in. ‘Breakfast for supper, here, every Friday.’ She leaned closer and laid a ring-clad hand over mine. ‘And from now on, you’re coming, too.’

  I tried to smile, with limited success. ‘I’m honoured.’

  They chattered away for a while, and seemed content to let me nod and smile in the right places. Chat brought us platter after platter of breakfast food, cooked to perfection, along with a brimming coffee press and a silver tureen of cream.

  ‘What made you choose West Street?’ Eliza said to me, between mouthfuls of pancake.

  I poured coffee. ‘I just … thought Metyard would dispose of the body close to home.’

  ‘I should have realised, too. The watchman who found the body – his statement says that he was based in Holborn, round the corner. I was reading in such a rush the first time.’ She pulled a face. ‘You saved my skin by guessing right. Jax would have been furious if we’d chosen wrong, with the answer right under my nose.’

  ‘It was a guess. A lucky one.’

  ‘Like the lucky guess that Sarah was really Sally,’ Nick said, nudging me. ‘And the lucky guess that Anne and Metyard would confront each other at the gully-hole.’

  ‘It made the most sense.’

  Eliza took the coffee I handed her. ‘You sound down, Paige. Aren’t you happy?’

  ‘Happy?’ I echoed.

  ‘With your success.’

  I looked between their smiling faces. Confused, I said, ‘But I wasn’t successful. Whatever Jaxon wanted to see from me earlier, he didn’t see it.’ When neither of them replied to this, I put down my cup. ‘Look, it’s lovely of you both to do this for me, but … I’d rather it was a clean break.’ My breath came short. They exchanged quizzical glances. ‘Please, just tell me. Is Jaxon going to let me go?’