Page 5 of Dark & Darker Still (Vane and Roc: Origin)

Five

Roc

Pastries are not my favorite. I much prefer peanuts and bourbon and blood.

But a promise is a promise. I am a man of my word, after all.

As we walk, Alice and I share a cigarette.

We are silent, but the city is not. Darkland never sleeps.

In the distance, I can hear the dockhands shouting to one another.

A few dogs bark in a chorus, fighting for scraps.

Behind us is the loud rumbling thump and grind of the factories.

In front of us, the melody of music grows in volume as we near Fortune’s Lane.

Fortune is known for three things: street musicians, good luck trinkets of any shape and size, and pastries.

It’s Al’s favorite part of the Umbrage as she loves both music and pastries, and while she doesn’t believe in luck, I’ve caught her buying a rabbit’s foot or two from the shops on the Lane.

“What’s your pick?” I ask her, because we have at least four bakeries to choose from.

We come up on Fortune from the west on Fourth Avenue, where it splits the Lane in half. If we go right, we’ll be in the thick of the music and the fortune vendors. If we go left, still more music but fewer trinkets.

“I want to go to The First-Born Baker.” Al takes another hit from the disappearing cigarette and hands it back to me.

“I hate the First-Born Baker.”

She makes an O with her lips and exhales smoke. “That’s because she won’t take your shit. It’s my favorite thing about her. Other than her croissants, of course.” Al smiles up at me, the flames from the gas lamps sending dancing orange light across her face.

There is something special about Alice’s features that doesn’t exist here in the Seven Isles.

There’s a flatness to the bridge of her nose, a roundness to her eyes and an equal roundness to her face.

Her ears aren’t pointy like most of the fae in the Isles, but they aren’t soft either.

She is the closest thing I have to Wonderland other than Vane and being with her feels like home in a way that’s hard to articulate.

Lainey may be our sister with the same mother and father, but she was born here on Darkland soil, and I think despite our shared DNA, the Isles somehow seeped into her blood, making her more Darkland than Wonderland.

Honestly, I’m glad my baby sister has no connection to our homeland. She is the opposite of me and Vane. If we are a boneyard, she is a meadow. If we are a violent storm, she is a morning of sunshine.

She would hate to know her older brother thinks of her as warm and innocent and bright, but in the dark, unforgiving world of Darkland, being all those things is a victory.

I pull on the cigarette, taking the last hit before dropping it on the cobblestones where it hisses and goes dark in a puddle of water.

We go left.

There’s a musician on the street corner playing the lute over a tin can slowly being filled with coinage. I flip him a cut, the coin ringing out against the metal and he moves his body in my direction, the music now aimed at me.

He has a singing voice like wheat grass, a dry rasp that I enjoy, but I don’t fuck musicians. I have too big of an ego for that.

Fortune’s Lane is one of the oldest streets in Darkland and the cobblestones are uneven, the mud between turned black by the soot and dirt of multiple centuries.

Because of that, traffic is lighter so it’s mostly pedestrians filling the street with some of the shops and vendor stalls spilling over the curb and into the right of way.

Alice and I skirt a tent selling charmed quills and good luck beads strung on leather and chain.

“A charm for the lady?” the man says, stretching his hand out with a flourish. There’s a bronze medallion in the squishy cup of his palm with a triangle etched into the metal.

Triangles, especially triangles with a straight line through the top, are ubiquitous in Darkland. The symbol has multiple meanings, depending on who you’re asking, but for the most part, it’s meant to be a protection symbol, but sometimes it can also mean change.

“No, thank you,” Al says, barely looking at the man.

“Ahh come on, sweet girl! So pretty. So small and delicate! You need protection from the monsters of the Umbrage!”

I step out of the shadows, grab Al and push her behind me, then press forward into the man’s personal space letting my eyes bleed to bright yellow.

“She needs no protection from the monsters when she has one in her bed.”

“Christ!” The man leaps back. The bronze medallion slips from his grip, clattering to the cobblestones. “I didn’t see you there, Mr. Crocodile.” He makes the sign of the serpent over his face as a way to ward off evil, the evil being me. “Apologies. Sorry. So Sorry!”

The man disappears into his tent, the medallion forgotten in the street.

“A monster in my bed, huh?” Alice says.

“Not a lie.”

“If only I could keep him there.”

“Don’t start.”

“I’m not.”

“I will never belong to one bed. You know that.”

“Never?” The line of her brow lifts. She’s playing with me, laughter trembling on her red lips. She already knows the answer to that question—absolutely not, not ever—but it doesn’t stop her from trying, from hoping.

I hook my arm around her and pull her in close. “Who am I to deny others the pleasure of my company?”

She groans.

I yank her even closer and kiss the top of her head.

“But you will get the most of me and that will have to be enough.”

“It’s not,” she mutters, but I pretend I don’t hear her and she pretends she didn’t say it and we go on with our night.

The First-Born Baker is, as the name implies, a firstborn daughter.

I usually perform well with firstborn daughters because they’re accustomed to caring for everyone around them, doling out orders, cleaning up messes, and being the one in charge.

When it comes to the bedroom, usually they are happy to give up control, if just for a moment, so their brain can rest, so the itch can be scratched.

But Kenny has rebuffed every one of my advances and at first I thought it was cute, a game we were playing, but she keeps doing it.

When we walk into First Born Baker, she looks past the group of customers at the register and spots me.

She doesn’t react because she’s the consummate professional, but as soon as the customers are finished and filing out the door, she crosses her arms over her chest and slings her hip back, giving her curvy body a serpentine form.

God she’s hot. Is she doing that on purpose? If she would just give in, I would have her trembling beneath me in record time.

“Hey.” Alice snaps her fingers in front of my face. “Stop gaping at Kenny.”

“Sorry.” I smile at the First-Born Baker. She smiles back, but it’s the smile of a gravedigger who’s just patted a grave smooth. “Kenny. Looking lovely as always. Did you change your hair?”

Kenny has a mane of thick, bright red hair. It reminds me of the crimson corral on the reef north of Caligo Port. Tonight, and most nights, she has it pulled back in a high ponytail so that inches and inches of red waves cascade down her back.

“Crocodile,” she says. “You haven’t been stabbed yet?”

I lean into the counter. It’s red forest oak with ancient saw marks still visible at the edges. “Oh Kenny. You know I’m a special boy. Only a special blade will hurt a special boy and I’m the only one with the special blade. Did I tell you I’m special?”

Kenny turns her gaze to Alice. “How do you stomach his ego on a day-to-day basis? Also, can you get me that blade?”

Alice sniffs back a laugh.

“She wouldn’t dare. I’m her favorite Madd Brother after all. I’m the only one who buys her pastries.”

“That can’t be true.” Kenny tilts her head, the ponytail swinging. “Tell me he’s not your favorite, Al.”

“Have you met Vane?” Alice says.

This game we are playing is delightful and cute.

I slide my arm around Al’s shoulders and tug her into my side. She brings with her the scent of petrichor and tobacco.

I’m not her favorite, not by a long shot. She would push me over a cliff if it meant having Vane. And she would push me and Vane over a cliff if it meant having our uncle. There’s a long line of Madd men she’s fucked and loved in her own twisted way.

Maybe there’s more of Alice in our veins then there is Wonderland.

“I prefer Vane to this one,” Kenny says and then slides her hands into the back pockets of her high-waisted trousers. “At least he’s quiet.”

Alice’s shoulders shake with laughter. She glances up at me. “She has a point. You never shut up. You love the sound of your own voice.”

“Now you’re just being mean,” I say, but I can’t hide the amusement on my face.

Kenny rolls her eyes.

Alice wraps her arm around my waist and gives me a reassuring squeeze.

“Do you have any of the chocolate croissants, Kenny?” I ask. “Despite what you may think, we did come here for your baked goods, not your enchanting personality.”

Alice digs her fingernails into my side sending a sting of pain through my ribs. A warning to behave myself. Acquiring pastries is the highest priority, and any deviation will not be tolerated.

“Pretty please, Ken?” she adds, pretending she didn’t just assault me under the cover of love.

“For you, of course.” Kenny slides open the door on her side of the glass case and reaches in with a sheet of parchment paper. She pulls out two croissants.

“Make it three,” I amend, and she adds one more to a white paper bag. “For Lainey,” I whisper to Alice and she nods against my shoulder.

“Good thinking. Who’s buying?”

Vane and I have done well for ourselves since taking over the Umbrage, but even so, Alice is not hurting for money. We don’t charge her rent or expenses, which means any money she earns just piles up.

“You.”

“I didn’t bring any money.”

“Then why did you ask?”

“I was just being respectful.”

I snort and start counting out coins as she adds chocolate crisps, latticed sweet tarts, several petit fours decorated with edible pansies and one gingerbread man because they’re Lainey’s favorite.

Kenny hands the bags over and taps in a few buttons on the register. “Ten sterling.”

I give her two gold dormunds, or dormies, and tell her to keep the change.

Kenny eyes the gold. “That’s too much.”

“It’s never too much for you, Kenny.” I wink at her. She frowns. Alice snorts and pushes me to the door.

With our treats acquired and back on the Lane, Alice and I head north for the Darkland Highlands and my baby sister.