Page 189 of The Bone Season

‘Some of your memories were locked fast,’ Warden said. ‘There is one in particular, quite recent. A knot in your flowers’ roots. It troubles you.’

‘Do you want to see it?’

The offer must have surprised him. He tilted his head, eyes narrowing.

‘You showed me your dreamscape by choice,’ I said. ‘I don’t mind, Warden.’

‘I desire to know you,’ he said, ‘but I would not see what you do not wish to share.’

‘You saw Dublin. That was the event that changed my life – when I came so close to death I could smell it, taste it. Anything else is small in comparison,’ I said. ‘Anyway, I wouldn’t be so cruel as to deny you one last glimpse. Nothing’s worse than a story without an end.’

‘Is this memory the end of your story, then?’

‘It’s the last chapter of my life before I came to you.’ I smiled joylessly. ‘And to think, I really thought it would be the worst night of my life in London.’

I thought I knew what this memory was. The only way to be sure was to dream.

Warden took his pillbox from his doublet. I accepted a green tablet.

‘This is the last one I will ever give you,’ he said. ‘Are you sure, Paige?’

‘Yes.’

‘Then sleep,’ he said. ‘I will do the rest.’

DANCE UPON NOTHING

14 December 2058

We gathered in a circle, like we might in a séance – five of the mighty Seven Seals. Jaxon Hall had dreamed us to this place, and here we stood.

From our name, an outsider might think that each of us came from one of his seven orders, but Jaxon still had no great love for soothsayers or augurs, whatever his publisher had forced him to say. He just happened to like the number, given the name of our district.

Seven voyants from five orders, blown from six countries to blossom in London.

Nadine Arnett was about to either weep or kill someone. Her arms were wrapped around her brother, whose wrists were tied with velvet sashes to the chair she stood behind. His face was drenched in sweat, hair stuck to his brow.

Jaxon was perplexed by Zeke, and Jaxon did not like to be perplexed. A short challenge, yes, to be unpicked with cleverness – but more than a year of mystery had chipped away at his patience. So he sat in his chair, smoking a cigar, waiting for one of us to break Zeke.

We had been put to work at dusk. Now the sky was dark. No matter how much Zeke pleaded for us to stop trying, Jaxon would not relent. If unreadability could be mastered, it would be a tremendous asset to the gang – the ability to resist all external influence from the æther. It would make us invincible in spirit combat. All we had to do was learn how to mimic it without losing our gifts.

Zeke already had. Once, he been a whisperer – like Nadine, and like their mother, Ayuko. When Zeke played his piano in Oaxaca de Juárez, every nearby spirit had flocked to him. Since his dreamscape had collapsed and regrown, he had lost that gift, changing his aura. Now he could sense the dead, but could no longer make them dance.

I had no idea why he had become unreadable. Only Jaxon knew that.

While Jaxon obsessed over Zeke, the rest of us had been forgotten, me included. Jaxon tended to pick a flavour of the year, and I was off the menu. I had shown no progress in months, and he was giving me the cold shoulder for it.

At last, my shine was rubbing off.

Zeke sobbed in agony. After so much pondering, even Jaxon had failed to predict that he would be in this much pain. We had flung spool after spool at him, to no avail. His mind sent them ricocheting all over the room, like water off a marble slab, hard as his syndicate name – Black Diamond.

‘Come on, come on, you wretched rabble,’ Jaxon shouted. His fist pounded the desk. ‘I want to hear him scream three times as loudly as that!’

All day, he had been drinking wine and listening to ‘Danse Macabre’ – never a good sign. Eliza gave him an exasperated look.

‘Jaxon,’ she said. ‘I need you to take several deep breaths, then some laudanum. Did you wake up on the wrong side of the chaise longue today?’

‘Again.’

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