Page 7 of Immortal Rose

He ambled past us, gesturing up toward the full moon as he called back, “Bad omen, this is. Ours is the sort of business best kept to the dark.”

Mr. Toady did not possess good looks, or manners, or what most would deem the good sense to be afraid of the menagerie of strange, sorry creatures he sold. The lot included a basket of unnervingly crimson eggs, a knot of vipers, and a host of venomous toads that would rival any gentleman’s club for charm.

“Perhaps for you,” I called back to him, “but for some of us, it’s been a blessing!”

Arabella shook her head, her breath escaping in a sharp whistle. “Now ye’ve done it. That’s an invitation to ill fortune if I’ve ever heard one.”

I settled back on my heels with a pleased hum, relishing the weight of the coins in my skirt pocket. If this was to be my last Midnight Market, I’d make a good showing of it. “I have a perfume for that, you know. Three silvers, but I’ll give you a dab for free.”

Arabella shot me a wary look. While she’d gladly doused herself in any of the simple toilette waters and perfumes I made for her, she, like so many others, viewed the few remaining fairyborn with equal parts fascination and apprehension. If church sermons hadn’t convinced them that fairies were demons, there were always the old stories of trickery and misfortune. No one would risk their eternal soul or freedom being caught with a remnant of fairy magic, if they could help it.

She tucked a loose white curl behind my ear with a sisterly tenderness. “So many of them accursed perfumes this week. Did that wily florist give ye the ’eave to? Is that why ye’ve got it in yer ’ead to leave?”

I pulled back, turning away from the tender hurt that crossed her face. “I chose to quit the flower stall,” I assured her, and left it at that. My business was my own.

In the silence that widened between us, I reached up to fiddle with the pearl flower pendant of Mama’s necklace, only to realize I’d forgotten to put it on. The realization unraveled me, just that little bit. I’d never forgotten before. I’d worn it every day since she’d died.

“I didn’t want to work at the flower stall forever.” I wasn’t sure who was more surprised to hear the words pass my lips, then—myself or Arabella, who was accustomed to having to accept silence from me. “I’ve bigger dreams than watching servants buy flowers for their dough-faced employers to go courting.”

You could assemble only so many posies and bouquets for gently bred young ladies before it opened a little ache in you that you’d never receive such a thing yourself.

I might have left the stall at Creed Garden ages ago, had work outside factories been easier to come by. It wasn’t so terrible, in the end. My feet had throbbed each night, but I was walking back to my very own boarding room, one outside the Brickbats. Mr. Stevens let me have my pick of the discarded flowers, and, from those takings, I’d been able to create an array of oils to make my perfumes.

That was all that had mattered. Until yesterday morning.

Anger seared through me. It had been a beautiful day until the shifty-eyed cove had strolled into it, asking Mr. Stevens unwelcome questions while I was away making deliveries. Was there a red-haired girl who worked for him? Did she make perfume?

I quit the moment Mr. Stevens asked me what sort of trouble I’d gotten myself into. Coming here tonight was a risk, but I was short on coin and disappearing came with a cost. Either word of my fairyborn magic had spread and someone was looking to make an arrest, or . . .

There was only one person in Linden who’d be looking for me, and I’d be dead and damned before I let them find me. So, Southpoint it was. Then maybe, after I’d saved enough, I’d make my way onto the Continent and out of their reach forever.

“And what of that gentleman courting ye?” Arabella asked, too innocently. “That boy ye mentioned . . .”

Oliver’s handsome face rose in my mind before I shoved it away, giving the other woman a sharp look. “There is no one, and there will never be.”

I would die before I shackled myself to any man and his whims, cruel or not. Each bottle of perfume I sold now brought me a step closer to that freedom, to choices.

Arabella stroked a comforting hand down my back. On that, we were in accord, regardless of the circumstances that had led us to such a decision.

I hugged my arms to my center, watching the marketgoers flit from one table to the next. Their essences tangled around me like bramble. I let each drift by without stopping to examine the secrets they offered, giving them back a measure of their privacy as I guarded my own.

The Midnight Market prided itself on being a stain upon the city, offering only the most gratuitously illicit wares to those who knew where to find it. Smuggled imports from the Continent, naturally. Mr. Toady’s animals. Medicines from the Far East. And, of course, the purported fairy relics that had survived countless purges to arrive here, in this gloriously dank Brickbats alleyway, at the night’s most brooding hour.

There were other, far more sinister scents, but I knew better than to investigate them. Here, no one asked questions they wouldn’t survive long enough to hear the answers to.

Blood, steel, and ale flooded the air and my stomach instinctively cramped. Two young men, their faces bruised from a recent brawl, sauntered as cocksure as kings through the tables. A rolling hush followed in their wake. Worried, furtive gazes passed between customers and vendors alike. Crossing paths with a Stone Slogger was always an invitation to disaster.

I forced myself to breathe, willing the shadows of the alley to swallow us. My heart drummed a vicious beat in my chest as the thugs neared, then passed by without another glance.

“Cor,” Arabella swore. “Bloody Stone Sloggers, thinking they own the Brickbats now.”

“Don’t they?” I muttered, rubbing at my arms to chase away the prickling chill.

At least the war between the gangs was over. Anyone with half a wit knew Greystone, the blood-soaked king of Linden’s underworld, would prevail and add the Brickbats to his territory.

All the more reason to run.

As the minutes passed, and it was clear the Sloggers weren’t there to cause trouble, the activity in the market—and my heartbeat—eased back into its usual flow.