Page 37 of Blackwicket
“Ms. Elyse Jonas,” he repeated, jotting down my name. But when he looked at me, a smile lifting the ends of his moustache towards his eyes, there was a change in him, a sort of halting like a toy whose wind-up mechanism had stalled.
I kept my smile on, bright, leaning forward to see what he was writing.
“It’s E-l-y-s-e.” I said.
He continued to stare, his grey eyes magnified by the thicklenses of his spectacles. He abandoned his clipboard, a sheen of sweat appearing on his brow as though it were suddenly summer.
“Mr. Thatcher?” I said, concerned he was having a heart attack.
“Eleanora Blackwicket?” He breathed at last. “God, you’re the mirror image of Isolde.”
I forced my comforting smile to remain steady.“You’re mistaken, Mr. Thatcher. Are you well? Do you need me to call for someone?”
“I’m sorry,” he mumbled, his jovial demeanor becoming anxious haste. “If you’d come any sooner, I… William Nightglass was just here.”
To ensure my exit was caved in.
“Please,” I said, quiet, hopeful.
“I wish I could help you,” Mr. Thatcher said, tears bright in his eyes. “I can’t go against a Nightglass.”
The flimsy scaffolding of my alternate persona crumbled.
“You could.” It was a condemnation.
“No. The cost is too high. I’m sorry.”
Taking the glasses from his nose, he raised his arm to grab hold of the rolling panel at the window, snapping it shut.
I lingered, hoping Mr. Thatcher would reopen the window, gesture for me to come forward, and risk his life to sell me a ticket. As the station clock struck the hour, I left. No driver would take me to the next town with snow covering the cliffside roads, even if they didn’t know who I was, and walking would be as reckless as trying to swim. My earlier plan to stay a few more days was no consolation to the new, persistent impulse to flee. But now, there was nowhere to go but home.
Home.
I rejected the word bitterly as I exited the station. This wasn’t home. It was a cage, and I was trapped between the Brom and Authority, options of Annulment or a life of servitude as awhore to the Nightglass family’s suspiciously saccharine ideologies.
I walked briskly, seeking to expel the nervous energy built up since my arrival, threatening to drive me screaming mad. As I reached the second block, heading to town, a man, dressed in an old brown overcoat a size too large, wool flat cap pulled low, stepped into my path.
“Miss your train, Ms. Blackwicket?” he asked. Though I couldn’t see his face clearly in the dark, it hardly mattered; he'd the same dockman lilt as Coppe, the same nasty swagger.
“Tell William his message was clear. I want no more explanation or gangster theatrics. I’ll seek him out when and if I’m ready,” I replied with utmost contempt, attempting to bypass him, only to encounter another figure blocking my path. A second goon, similarly clad in faded brown, shorter by a head and much younger. He spat at my feet, prompting me to take a swift step back.
“We don’t have nothin’ to do with William Nightglass, miss. Our boss is a big fan of yours, though. Would love a chat. Sent us to escort you to him, safe and sound.”
“Don’t be stupid,” I countered. “If you know anything about me, you know you can’t make me go anywhere I don’t want to go.”
“Sure, we can.” The taller of them flashed a trench knife pulled from his coat. He held it with a practiced casualness, used to the weight of the hilt in his palm. “Magic won’t do you no good with a hole in your guts, girl. You’ll get me, but I’d get you right back, right under the sternum. You really want to die on this sidewalk because you were too stubborn to accept a friendly invitation?”
For the first time, I regretted I didn’t have a curse on me. Exhausted, angry, and thoroughly trapped, I gave up.
“Go ahead,” I offered, weary. The knife wielder released abark of incredulous laughter as I unbuttoned my coat, pulling it open to expose the threadbare wool vest and linen shirt, inappropriate for the cold. The thin fabrics would allow a blade to slip through nicely. “There. Under my sternum, you said.”
The second man broke first, casting an uneasy glance at his cohort. Clearly, I wasn’t wanted dead. “Hey, Patrick, ya can’t...”
“Shut it,” my assailant barked, expression twisting. He was being bested, and he wasn’t taking it well, complexion splotchy with rage, grip tight around the hilt.
“You’ve got one swing. Make it count, you sorry little shit,” I growled, ready to court death with a recklessness I’d never entertained. Insulted and happy to oblige, the thug twitched the knife a hair lower in preparation for its inverted arch into my stomach.
“Eleanora.” The voice thundered through the street, and my would-be murderer snapped his head up. He hastily concealed the blade with a motion that seemed magic. The firm touch at my waist was unexpected, and I tensed, but the voice had been familiar.
