Page 111 of The Mask Falling

“There’s nowhere to go,” I pointed out. “Just give her some space. Let her get used to you.” I took a tissue from my sleeve and coughed into it. “She can sleep in my room. I’ll take the couch.”

“You have had enough trouble sleeping. Take my bed.”

“If you’re sure.”

“Yes.”

In my room, I changed the bed linen and laid out a nightshirt. On second thoughts, I put it back and left the drawer open, so Ivy could choose something she felt comfortable in. I knew from Wynn Jacob, who loved Ivy like a mother, that she had scars from her torture.

In the kitchen, Arcturus boiled the kettle and put a heat pad on charge while I prepared a hot meal. I had never been much of a cook—in the gang, we had usually eaten at cookshops, unless Nick graced us with something homemade—but I could cobble a plate of comfort food together. Mashed potatoes soaked in gravy, a heap of buttered peas, two oven-ready pies.

A creak sounded in the corridor. I turned to see Ivy in long sports trousers and a sleeveless top, hair towel-dried into spikes, skin flushed from the shower. She shot Arcturus a wary look.

“Better?” I asked.

She blew out a breath. “You have no idea.”

“Good. Now, how do you like your tea?”

“Milk and four sugars, please,” she said. Her top exposed the mottled scarring on her right arm, where the Rag and Bone Man had burned off her tattoo. “Can’t believe I’m actually inParis. And that I just had a hot shower. I’d forgotten what warm felt like.”

I took a carton from the fridge. “I can’t imagine.”

“Oh, I reckon you can. The waterboard couldn’t have been much cozier than the Beneath.”

After a moment, I poured the milk. “You know about that, then.”

“I didn’t see your so-called death, but Eliza told me about it.” She watched me stir the tea. “She and Glym made sure everyone knows who janxed Senshield,” she went on. “The syndicate loves you now.”

“Really?” I said, skeptical.

“Well,lovemight be too strong a word. The syndicate does not want to strangle you with your own intestines now.”

“Oh, stop, I’m blushing.”

Ivy grinned, giving me a glimpse of the gap between two of her bottom teeth. “Still can’t believe you actually handed yourself over to reach Senshield.” She accepted the mug of tea from me. “I don’t know whether you’re brave or stupid, Paige, but you get things done.”

“I try my best.”

“Seriously, though, are you all right?”

There was understanding behind the question. She knew what it was to be tortured.

“I’m . . . trying to be,” I concluded. “I imagine you’re doing the same.” When she nodded, I showed her through the open doors to the parlor. “Make yourself comfortable. You must be tired.”

“Yeah.” She curled up in the armchair. “Sorry if I doze off. Haven’t slept since I got to France.”

“Get some food in you first.” I sat on the couch. Arcturus stayed in the kitchen, within earshot, clearing up the chaos of saucepans and spoons I had left in my wake. “How did you get here?”

“From Dover. Glym bribed an old friend of his to get me across in her fishing boat, which dropped me in Boulogne,” Ivy said. “Somebody else drove me to Paris.”

She was fortunate to have survived the journey. “Why?”

“Two reasons. The first is because we need help.”

“Go on.”

“You might already know that Scion has started a military operation to root out the Mime Order. Operation Albion,” she said. I nodded. “Even though Senshield is gone, there are more soldiers than ever, and it’s getting harder to move around. Spot checks. Random searches for numa and weapons. Brutal interrogations. London is still under martial law.”

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