A Split Worlds Omnibus Read online

  He put the atomiser back and looked at her as if he wanted to say something but couldn’t find the best way to begin. “You can’t keep me chattering all day, Catherine,” he finally said, “there’s work to be done.”

  He headed towards the office at the back of the shop and she followed, leaving the crowded shelves behind. Unlike the majority of the shops she’d become accustomed to in Mundanus, no two items for sale were the same, and there was no obvious order to their arrangement. She’d come to realise that it was far from a lack of organisation on the part of the Shopkeeper, instead it was a way to keep control whilst displaying the abundance of goods. With no labels, price stickers or signs, it meant the customer was forced to consult him before every purchase. It also deterred shoplifting as there was no way to tell what was being stolen; with curse-bearing artefacts placed next to those that gave amazing boons, it wasn’t worth the risk.

  At first, she’d hated having to work for him every holiday, but over the last year she’d somehow grown fond of him. It was probably something to do with his gruff delight whenever she made sense of the ledger, or his veiled compliments whenever she brought in a new system that made the shop easier to run.

  It hadn’t taken much to make a difference; he was utterly hopeless at administrative tasks. Thousands of wholesale purchases and sales had been recorded haphazardly in his spidery scrawl. Either he’d never had to refund a customer in all that time or he couldn’t bring himself to record them. From what she could tell, he’d been trading for over three hundred years without any system in place and she had no idea how he’d managed to become such a success and maintain his monopoly. The Emporium was unique, the only establishment that catered for the Great Families.

  “I remember the important things,” he’d said when she commented on the chaos. His memory was remarkable. He could recall where the most obscure stock was secreted and he remembered all of the prices, no matter how obscure. She had suspected he made some of them up, noting inconsistencies across the years, but he’d explained that he charged more if the customer was impolite or poorly dressed.

  “This would be much easier if you let me bring my laptop, you know,” she said as she followed, the strange smell of grassy almonds tickling her nose. She missed the gentle mustiness.

  “How many times have I told you? I will never let one of those machines into my shop.”

  She liked to suggest it at least once every few months, but he’d never change. He’d never even seen one, she was certain, but, like most of the people caught in the web of the Great Families, he harboured a deep distrust of technology. The Shopkeeper took it to extremes, however, extending it to most things made of metal and not even permitting coins to change hands within his premises. Thankfully the prices he charged rarely had anything to do with money, but it did make the bookkeeping difficult.

  He tapped the lamp on the office desk, waking the tiny sprite inside. It was only the size of a ladybird but could still throw out a terrific amount of light. Only the best for the Shopkeeper.

  “I’ve put all of the latest purchases into the ledger as you asked,” he announced, as if he had done something remarkable. “And I’ve used my notation system to detail the customers.”

  She nodded. “It won’t take me long, I did most of it yesterday.” She’d given up trying to deduce who bought what. If there had been any chance of her finding out, he never would have employed her. She didn’t mind though. Unlike most of the people in the life she’d escaped, she had no interest in what everyone else was buying from him. His legendary confidentiality was the only reason she’d been able to approach him for help in the first place.

  It had taken a month of her holiday to get things straight, but she knew she’d be leaving everything in good shape before going back to university. She wouldn’t miss the uncomfortable wooden stool and the cramped conditions. It was more a glorified nook than a back office, and moving anything on the untidy desk made dust plume and irritate her nose. Why he never used the anti-dust Charms in places customers didn’t see she’d never felt cheeky enough to ask.

  The Shopkeeper clattered about in the shop. Usually he read as she worked, but he was unsettled today and Cathy felt sorry for him. He didn’t seem to have any friends, though of course she only came when the shop was closed, to minimise the risk of discovery. The news that Tom had been back for a stronger Charm was niggling her; perhaps it had upset him too. She’d hoped her family would give up on her, but it seemed they weren’t ready to give up the search yet. Poor Tom. They probably had him running all over the place casting Seeker Charms before fleeing from the Arbiters. That it was affecting him was the one thing she felt guilty about. He was the only one she missed.

  “Have you finished?” The Shopkeeper lurked in the doorway.

  “Nearly.”

  She’d already assigned a numerical value to the prices of the sold items, making it possible to calculate the profit; all that was left was totalling the column, which she did as quickly as she could. He didn’t return to the shop and she looked back up at him. He was staring at her with such sadness that the anxiety bubbled up again.

  “You’re very good at putting things in order.”

  It was the first open compliment he’d ever given.

  “Thank you.”

  “I…I will miss you, Catherine.”

  “It’s only a few weeks,” she said again, mustering a smile.

  The Shopkeeper drifted away from the doorway to potter about in the shop again.

  “All done,” she said less than five minutes later, tucking the stool back under the desk. “I’ll see you in December.”

  The Shopkeeper fiddled with the hem of his jacket. “Catherine…would you be kind enough to go to the stockroom for me?”

  It was certainly a day of firsts. He only ever let her in the stockroom when he was with her, and that was still rare. It only reinforced how out of sorts he was.

  “What do you need?”

  “Nothing for me…you’ll see when you go in there.”

  He didn’t say it like it was a surprise present, more like he’d found a giant spider in there and couldn’t bear to get rid of it. Then she remembered she was in the Nether, not Mundanus, and one of the few advantages it had was a lack of insect life.

  “Please?” he added.

  “All right,” she agreed, worried her father might be putting pressure on him. Surely he’d know the only way she could stay hidden for so long would be with the Shopkeeper’s help?

  She resolved to go and look in the stockroom and then have it out with him over a cup of tea. They needed each other too much now for her father to ruin it all, and she needed to remind him of that fact, especially before leaving for three months. It would be long enough for him to forget how useful she was.

  Leaving the Shopkeeper lurking in the dusty nook, Cathy pushed the heavy wooden door open with her backside and went in before its weighted hinges could push her back out again. She reached for the hammer-cord to strike the large globe hanging from the ceiling and wake the sprite within.

  But the large room, crowded with shelves and boxes, was already lit. A beat later she smelt a gentle floral fragrance and then she saw Lord Poppy leaning on an elegant black cane and smiling broadly.

  Feeling like all of the blood in her body had dropped into her toes, Cathy scrabbled for the door handle, instinctively wanting to bolt out of the room again. She stopped when he shook his head. No act could be more futile than trying to flee a Lord of the Fae Court.

  3

  A black-haired faerie was perched on Lord Poppy’s shoulder, wearing a dress of blousy poppy petals, the red striking against the black of his frock coat. It was scowling at Cathy as if she’d personally offended it. Cathy realised a look of abject horror was not an appropriate nor a polite greeting for the patron of her family.

  She dropped into a low curtsy, breathless with panic. She’d never seen Lord Poppy in person, but her father had, and he’d drummed a healthy fear of
the Fae into her at an early age. She struggled to remember the etiquette she’d been taught, but using the correct form of address was hardly going to change the fact that she’d run away from the family, disgraced the Rhoeas-Papaver line, and most probably infuriated Lord Poppy to such a degree that he was there to enslave or curse her. Or both.

  “Catherine Rhoeas-Papaver,” he said slowly, his voice silken. “What an extraordinary delight to find you at last.”

  She trembled, keeping her head bowed, not sure what to make of the statement.

  “Do stand up so I can see you, my dear, one does prefer to speak to a face rather than a crown of hair.”

  “It’s a very dull brown,” the faerie commented as Cathy straightened up. “And such a plain face. I’m very disappointed. She isn’t worth–”

  “Hush, or I shall send you back to Exilium,” Lord Poppy said and the faerie pressed its lips together. “Now…”

  He walked towards her, the cane striking the floor with every other step. His supernatural grace made her feel clumsy. His skin was flawless, his long black hair beautiful and his lips as red as the poppy petals. His eyes were pools of black, no iris or white discernible, and as quick as she saw them she looked away, chilled.

  “I’ve been looking for you,” he said as she shivered. “But you’ve been hidden away in Mundanus, in the dark city.”

  She stayed silent, not trusting her voice.

  “My sources inform me that three and half years have passed in Mundanus since you first piqued my interest.” He stopped barely a metre away, well within her personal space. Not that one of them would appreciate such a human concept. “I simply cannot understand how you’ve survived so long all by yourself. You have none of your Mother about you, even after all the effort to breed her beauty into the line, no presence, nothing remarkable whatsoever.”

  Cathy could barely think as her panic reached its crescendo and then an incredible sense of calm washed through her, as if her body had used up all the adrenalin it had. If she didn’t remember the hours of training she’d tried to bury along with most of her other childhood memories, this conversation could be the end of her, or of freedom. There was little to distinguish between the two.

  “She survived because of the Shadow Charm, my Lord,” said the faerie.

  Either they could detect it, or they’d got the information out of the Shopkeeper. The former was more likely. If that was the case, Cathy thought, then they would see the curse too, and if there was one thing she had to do, it was convince them she knew nothing about it.

  “Ah, perhaps that’s the problem, let’s get rid of that first.”

  Thumb and forefinger poised like pincers, he reached towards her shoulder but stopped just above her clothing. He pinched the air and slowly drew his hand back. She could see nothing between his fingers, but noticed the shadow cast by the stockroom’s sprite changing. It looked like a blanket was being pulled off her, one invisible to the eye, but visible in shadow. When it broke contact with her body, it faded to nothing.

  “Oh. You’re still dull. The Shadow Charm hid her from her family,” he said to the faerie, “but it didn’t help her to navigate Mundanus…it’s such an exciting mystery. My dear,” he focused back on Cathy, “you are a tight bud with so many hidden petals yet to unfold.”

  He scooped up her hand with a fluid movement. His was cool and dry, and she was aware of the clamminess of her own, thinking he wanted to kiss it as many of the men in the Great Families still did. But instead he turned her palm towards the ceiling and bent towards it. An inhumanly long tongue flicked out from between his lips and he licked the tender skin of her wrist.

  It felt like a feather, leaving no saliva, just a faint tingling and a wave of nausea.

  “Mmmm. No trace of interference as I’d feared and no contact with the Arbiters, that’s good. She has potential, but far from realised.” He was speaking to the faerie again, as if Cathy were simply an exhibit in a petting zoo. “There’s little more to her than what we see here. But the curse is interesting.”

  That drew the faerie close.

  Lord Poppy was examining Cathy’s face now, searching for a reaction.

  “Curse?” she asked, hoping that only innocence would be seen. It was a tiny thread of a lie amongst a tapestry of deception.

  He smiled, his thumb now stroking the inside of her wrist. “So you have been good, after all.”

  “What curse? I want to see it!” the faerie said, but Lord Poppy swatted it away.

  “I’ll tell you later.” It tumbled in the disturbed air before righting itself with a look of indignation. “Now…” Lord Poppy let go of Cathy’s hand and she folded her arms. He took a step back, twisting his cane thoughtfully. “There’s something I want to know. When a girl as plain, inelegant and quite frankly graceless as you has the chance to ask for beauty, poise or even just good taste in clothes, why in the Split Worlds would she not?”

  So this was the reason this nightmare was weaving itself around her. He knew about her coming-of-age ceremony.

  She was the middle child of one of the most prominent Papaver families in Fae-touched society, the Rhoeas-Papavers. Her family had many traditions, most of which she’d strained against and resented as much as the next child, but one in particular she’d managed to turn to her advantage. At the age of eighteen, all children had the right to make a request of the head of the Papaver families. When she was brought in front of the Patroon she’d asked to go to university instead of something shallow, as she’d been coached. Of course it had reached the ears of their Fae patron. No women in Fae-touched society ever went to university and few of the young men did either. So many of their parents, born in a different age, regarded further education as a sure means of ruining a young man. Cathy saw it as a sure way to freedom. They couldn’t deny her the request and even though they tried their best to make it as difficult as possible she still got to university several months later.

  “Is that the reason for your interest, my Lord? An unorthodox request?” Her voice was a little high, but at least she was able to speak.

  “It’s more than unorthodox, it’s positively scandalous. It was sufficient to catch my eye, yes. But it’s also the fact you ran away and have hitherto eluded your family with great success. Your tactics even challenged me, and there are not many who have been able to do that, my dear.”

  “But you did find me.” She wondered what boon the Shopkeeper had received for betraying her, and his air-freshener experiment took on new meaning. He’d been trying to mask the scent of the Fae Lord who’d presumably walked through the shop just before she arrived.

  “So I did. But, sly one, you didn’t answer my question.”

  “I wanted to go to university because I wanted to learn.”

  He wrinkled his nose, as if she’d just belched rather than told the truth. It was important to sprinkle some in amongst the lies.

  “Learn what?”

  “Everything I could.”

  “But why?”

  She had to think about that. “Because I had to know the truth about Mundanus.”

  He frowned. “Why learn the truth about a place you were never destined to be part of? You must have planned to run away, even when you curtsied in front of your Patroon and accepted his gift.”

  Her body found a new reserve of adrenalin, but Cathy forced herself to think carefully. She had to gamble. “Not when I made the request to the Patroon, my Lord, but later, yes, I did plan to run away. I had to, otherwise I would have failed.”

  “So something happened that made you want to stay in Mundanus, even though it would age you? Even though it would disgrace your family and you’d live a cursed life?”

  “Yes,” she said, throat dry. She couldn’t reveal everything, she’d never tell anyone the real reason she’d fled her family. But she had to give him a sliver to be believable. “I fell in love with Mundanus. I didn’t want to go back and live in the Nether like everyone in the Great Families. I couldn’t bear to
leave it. So I ran away and hid from my family so they couldn’t stop me living there.”

  Eyebrows high, he sucked in a breath and the hand that had caught hers fluttered over his chest. “Oh! Oh, darling child, I understand. I know what agony it is to fall in love with something we can never have. And what deserves our love and attention more than Mundanus? Poor, empty world, denied our gifts and beneficence for so long!” He clasped her hand again, this time pressing it over his heart, but she felt no beat through the silk shirt. “Now I understand what a delicious creature of passion you are. It was buried so far beneath an inconsequential face and forgettable body that I almost missed it!”

  Cathy wondered if this was what it was like to meet someone who was truly insane. Someone so mad that speaking to them demonstrated how the world they lived in was so very different to everyone else’s. She couldn’t decide whether delighting the insane was good or bad.

  “I’m so glad you understand, Lord Poppy.” She managed a smile.

  “As am I! I arrived with a heavy heart, convinced that I was going to have to turn your tongue into a tethered wasp and then enslave you for eternity for having been so disloyal to your family.” He paused as the colour sank away from her lips. “But now I don’t have to, because I understand that it was love that drove you, and how can I deny love? And it really is such a relief, as it would have been so inconvenient – everything has been arranged for so long, I was struggling to imagine how I would recover.”

  Cathy wanted to take her hand back, wanted to run out of the room and disappear, wanted to huddle in the corner of her student digs wrapped in a blanket and cry over a cup of tea. But he was still pressing her palm against the cool silk and showed no sign of letting go. Then she processed what he’d just said.

  “Inconvenient, my Lord?”

  “Yes, if you’d been unable to return to Aquae Sulis.”

  It had been a long time since she’d heard that name, and she hadn’t missed it. Hers was one of the most powerful families in Aquae Sulis, the Nether reflection of the city of mundane Bath, both places she never wanted to see again. Whilst the mundane city was beautiful and vibrant, full of greenery and the excitements of modern life in the normal world, such as electricity and films, and technology designed to make life easier and more entertaining, its Nether reflection was not. Only a few roads and buildings had been reflected; she had grown up in Great Pulteney Street, the long avenue of reflected Georgian houses owned by her family, and of course, the anchor properties in Mundanus were protected by their clever network of legal expertise and their stronghold on the mundane Corporation of Bath. Now she’d lived in Mundanus – what she had come to think of as the real world – as an independent woman, she couldn’t bear the thought of returning to that suffocating existence. “But…but I don’t want to go back there. I can’t!”