Page 48 of Angel’s Flight (The Phantom Saga #4)

He drifted in the shadows, his body limp as his heart slowed, untethered from time.

It wasn’t sleep, this quiet state of bliss and relaxation; it was something more and less at the same time, and he had no energy left to parse it.

At some point, the weight on top of him disappeared, then his hands were unbound, and gentle lips kissed his cheek.

There was a cool cloth against his scalded skin, cleaning the wax and making him whole.

The waves rocked them and he found himself in her arms, safe and still. There was no pain or guilt there now. Only her and the sea and the silence.

Calais

S haya was glad to be on the ferry at last, after long days and sleepless nights.

He had tried to rest, of course, but his mind had been overcome with an endless stream of worry.

It had taken too long to make arrangements, too long to pack and reassure Darius, his train from Paris had been delayed by a damn cow on the tracks only for the ferry to be canceled for two days straight due to storms. The English Channel wasn’t even that wide!

Some madman had swum across it in a rubber suit five years ago!

Shaya had been ready to swim it himself, but finally, he was aboard the ferry, under overcast skies, on the way to England.

He found little relief in his mind from his guilt as he walked the deck and stared out over the roiling seas.

How could he have been so stupid to not think they were watching his mail?

It was a brilliant tactic, though risky.

Shaya himself had employed it in the court of the Shah, where only fools put their plans in writing.

Now he and Erik were the fools. He couldn’t imagine the lengths to which Pomeroy and his cohorts had gone to watch what Shaya was writing and to whom, or who they would have had to pay off.

No matter the method, the damage was done.

The ferry deck was bustling already, with merchants and travelers alike enjoying the fresh air and chitchatting in English and French.

Shaya’s English was passable but rusty. He had never made the trip to the Isles himself, as he shared Erik’s contempt for the English.

They were a scourge on Persia and her neighbors, regarding those ancient lands as nothing more than resources to be exploited.

Cows to be milked for riches and access, with no regard for their people or history.

Shaya shook himself from the grim thoughts as he went back inside, where there was a small stand set up to sell papers, coffee, and food.

Best to eat his fill now – he had heard nothing positive about the food in England, and he’d come to enjoy the pastries of his adopted country.

Shaya took his bun and coffee out to the deck with his paper and sat down on a bench to read.

He flipped to the arts section first, noting the reviews for the most recent performance at the Opéra.

He hoped the positive marks for Robert Rameau were enough to keep up Armand’s spirits ahead of facing the wrath of little Meg Giry.

He also hoped the girl wasn’t getting into too much trouble.

Shaya froze with his coffee halfway to his lips as he stared at the latest news next to the review. In bold, blaring letters the type declared: Another assault in the streets at the Opéra!

Shaya read as swiftly as he could, cup forgotten and suspicions rising.

A helpless chill went up his spine as he read étienne d’Amboise’s name in black and white, thinking back to the mystery he had left unsolved at the Opéra.

Was it foolish to go to London? Would more people be hurt if he did nothing?

Meg would be snooping into this, but that wasn’t much consolation.

She was barely more than a child and didn’t have all the facts.

It was she, more than any patron, that Shaya worried about being hurt.

If this was Richard playing, he wouldn’t hesitate to hurt a girl like Meg.

The Opéra ran on the pain of young women, and no one even noticed.

Shaya looked down at the papers, eyes widening as he read.

Was that the point? This new ghost, if it was Richard, was baffling.

Was he trying to get the attention of the old one?

Trying to draw him back from the grave? Sabine and Richard knew, somehow, that Erik was alive, and what better way to entice him into a trap than to tarnish his legacy?

Something else that Shaya had been instrumental in informing Erik of.

“Shit,” Shaya whispered under his breath. This was all the more reason to get to London and sort this out. Pomeroy’s men hadn’t found Erik there yet, he hoped, and Shaya had to believe he was a better detective than them.

Ireland

C hristine understood now why they spoke of this country in terms of green.

It was hard to take her eyes away from the scenery passing outside the train window.

She had not expected Ireland to be much different than England, but she had been wrong.

There were similarities, of course. It was still damp and rugged in a way that France was not, still an island and world unto itself, but it was like a melody that had been reused in a different song, played on a different instrument in another key.

There was a wildness here, a sort of ancient, whispering magic in the hills and rivers that was all its own.

It was beautiful, and more than that, it matched the visions she had seen in her dreams for weeks.

.. Maybe those dreams had been a warning, for they could not have been a promise, as much as she wished they were.

It was autumn now, Christine realized. The hills of green were dotted with trees painted vibrant shades of orange, yellow, and red by the change of the season, standing out starkly against the slate sky.

It was utterly beautiful in a way she had not seen for months.

As they passed by creeks and cairns, her eyes drank in the beauty.

She admonished herself to only admire it.

There was no point getting attached. She had managed that well enough in Dublin, though it had been an effort.

She had disembarked from many ships and trains and carriages over the recent months.

They had all started to feel the same, which was what made the exit on the dock in Dublin surprising. It was different.

She had told herself it was just an echo of how pleasurably they had spent the crossing, but the city itself had won her over with its beauty.

Bisected by the River Liffey flowing into the bay, it was a modern, bustling metropolis like London, built on foundations going back a thousand years.

Compared to Paris and London, it was practically new, Erik had smugly informed her.

Far more people had been leaving the port than arriving.

It had made Christine sad in the same way she had been in Genoa to see so many people waiting to get on ships to leave their home shores.

She had understood better after riding through the city and seeing the poor, many of them living in little alleys called ‘closes,’ where the buildings all seemed to lean in on one another, ready to fall.

The air was like London’s too, thick with soot from factories, though not nearly as bad.

They had only been there for a night after dealing with matters at a dull English bank before catching the train that morning. Only once they had left the city, heading northwest, had Christine truly begun to enjoy the views as the train cut through the morning mist.

“It feels so remote, doesn’t it?” Christine asked Erik, trying to think how long it had been since they had seen anything bigger than a village from the rails.

“It’s far from everything, including the civilized world, according to some,” Erik replied from where he had wedged himself into the corner of their rail compartment.

(Snob and misanthrope that he was, Erik had insisted on a first class, private compartment, as usual, and Christine had teased him that they would run out of money before anyone could steal it away).

“According to you? I thought you enjoyed at least part of your time here,” Christine asked back, taking in her husband’s appearance as she did.

Since the incident with the thug in London, he’d kept himself as concealed as possible, making sure to add his wide hat and scarf to his intricate mask and keep his head low.

She hated how he felt the need to make himself small and hidden, like a wounded animal cowering from a wolf.

“You like wild, empty places where you can roam free.”

“I do like them when they’re truly empty,” Erik replied with a sigh. “People always find you eventually on an island, even one this big.”

“I thought you were going to tell me some story about the woods being full of fairies.” Christine scooted closer to Erik and leaned against him.

“Well, that’s true too.” She liked the sound of a smile in his entrancing voice.

“Tell me about them.”

It was an easy thing to get him to tell her a tale. He loved to paint pictures with words and she loved to listen to them, curled against him and sharing his warmth. If she could spend every afternoon like this, without the running, she would.

“You must be careful, first of all, in how you speak of them. They are ‘the good folk’ or ‘good neighbors, ‘for they take offense quite easily. They live in the mounds that dot the lands, like that one right out there.” Erik gestured towards the window and what Christine had thought was an odd hill alone in the landscape. “They’re old tombs, some say, or they’re gateways to the fair realm. They open the doors on the great festivals, like Samhain and Beltane, and send forth frightful hosts to hunt mortals and ensnare them forever.”

“Sounds like the elves my father used to talk about,” Christine mused, her mind filling with pictures.