Page 94 of The Song Rising

“The news came to us this morning, by way of Glasgow,” she said. “Catrin Attard had joined a Mime Order raid on a factory and killed the Minister for Industry, the man they call the Ironmaster. Roberta confronted her and the two of them ended up fighting for leadership of the Scuttlers.” She shook her head. “Terrible thing to happen. Roberta was a good woman, by all accounts. She wanted the best for her people.”

I sat quietly.

An Underqueen should consider this purely in tactical terms. And maybe in those terms, this was good; this was progress. Catrin was a warmonger. With her sister gone, she could prepare the voyant community to take action against Scion. This was war, and war was ugly.

Yet the knowledge that my actions had resulted in Roberta’s death, even if it hadn’t been my intention, was stomach-turning. Catrin would have killed her brutally, publicly, to prove that she was the one their father should have chosen, the one who would do anything for the Scuttlers. She had warned me. She had said there would be trouble between them.

I had turned the Manchester underworld upside-down, and I had no idea what would happen to it now.

“On you go.” The Spaewife nodded to the glass in my hands. “Hot toddy. Always makes me feel better.”

I had to put Manchester behind me. Now was the time to reveal what I was really here for. When I raised my head to address the Spaewife, I caught sight of faces behind her.

Photographs clung to one wall of the vault, yellowed and faded by age. In one of them, a family of three stood in the mist, with verdant hills in the background. One was a thin woman with a wistful expression; the other, a man in an oilskin, smiling in a way that didn’t reach his eyes. They each held the hand of a small girl with the same black hair, coiled into ringlets and bound with ribbons on either side of her head. Even though I’d met her many years after this photograph had been taken, I knew her.

“You knew Liss Rymore?” I said.

“Aye.” The Spaewife studied me. “And who might you be?”

I hesitated before unwinding my scarf, revealing my face. The hooded voyants exchanged glances before looking back at me.

“Goodness me,” the Spaewife muttered. She clasped her shawl around her shoulders. “Paige Mahoney.”

I nodded.

“You were in Manchester? You led the raid on the factory?”

“I did. I wanted to steal a military secret from Scion. What I found there led me here, to Edinburgh,” I said. “I’m close to uncovering the information I need—so close—but I need allies here, people who know we have no choice but to fight. If you want to help the Mime Order, then help me find what I’m searching for.”

She raised her eyebrows. “You sent the visions?”

“A friend of mine did that. An oracle.”

“And you let Catrin kill the Minister for Industry.”

My lips pressed together. “Catrin Attard made her own choice,” I said after a moment. “What she did to Price, and to Roberta—that was not on my orders.”

One of the other voyants grasped her arm suddenly. “Wait, Spaewife,” he said.

He spoke to her too quickly for me to properly follow, but one word got my back up:fealltóir, an Irish word, used during the Molly Riots to refer to the handful of Irish people who had assisted Scion.

“I’m no traitor,” I said curtly.

The Spaewife’s eyebrows crept higher. “You have Gàidhlig, do you, Underqueen?”

“Gàidhlig or no, she ought to prove her claim,” the bearded man beside her said, looking askance at me. “You might be one of Vance’s spies, for all we know. Someone who onlylooksa great deal like Paige Mahoney, and who wants us all on the gallows for treason.”

“Don’t be a fool. The Underqueen is a dreamwalker,” the Spaewife said. “Have you ever seen that sort of red aura?” Apparently the whole of Britain knew about my gift. “Besides,” she went on, “she knows Liss.”

She went to stand beside the wall of photographs and gently touched the one that Liss was in. For the first time, I saw the resemblance.

“Are you—” my mouth was dry. “Are you Liss’s mother?”

“Close enough. Her aunt. Elspeth Lin is my name.” She returned to the cushion and poured herself a drink. “You ken my niece, then?”

The truth would hurt her, but I had to tell it. It wasn’t fair to leave her with false hope. “I’m sorry you have to hear this from a stranger, Elspeth,” I said. “Liss is . . . in the æther.”

Elspeth’s smile receded.

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