Page 102 of Veil of Blood and Bone

Nicholas

This area of Boston reeks.

It’s desperation and survival. It’s hunger and longing and lust.

The scents spin in my head, and my mouth waters at the coppery undertone of fresh blood roping it all together. A haze hangs in the air overhead as if someone turned on the sprinklers.

I lope across the street toward a narrow structure tucked between a pawnshop with a perpetual closed sign and a liquor store. Wrought iron vines, discolored with age, frame the doorway, and dirt-encrusted jars line the stoop.

Stubs of candles have burned down to pools at the bottoms, and if one inspects too closely, they’ll highlight the green tint of ghost flames.

The embers gutter without wind. Inside, a faint piano refrain thrums.

Mortals walk past and see a leaning door, a condemned building held together with police tape.

Supernaturals mark the candle flare and how the door creaks open without a hand to guide it.

The alley is colder than those around it where the mist from the veil seeps through the cracks in the cobblestone. Between Beacon Hill and the Common, along the tread of North End brick, you’ll find gas lamps flickering.

And following the scent of wax and damp, stone and iron, you’ll encounter The Fenlight.

This particular bar is famous for its zero point, its neutrality. Bloodletters, dark Fae—as though Wren’s king needs a better way to market himself—giants and creatures from history congregate within the battered walls.

I push inside and shrug deeper into my trench coat.

Wards keep people from the street from wandering in. For the most part.

Occasionally a wayward soul stumbles through the doors, front or back, and never goes out again. It’s the way of life in places like these; little pockets of darkness pop up in every major city.

Boston happens to be the closest and the largest nexus point, one of the thinnest parts of the great tree.

All kinds of things find their way here as easily as stepping out of a car.

A chain-smoking bloodletter at the door nods to me on my way inside. The Fenlight is a nod to Boston’s marshes and ghost lights, welcoming me with open arms.

Here, the regulars have no names. Only debts.

Here, rickety furniture holds up stronger beasts than it looks like it can bear. My boots stick to the floor, and the lighting comes from sconces holding flameless fire. They cast no shadow, only dull cones of amber light up to a charred ceiling.

Monsters hide in the corners and alcoves. Monsters like me. For once, my gums aren’t aching and my stomach isn’t quite as empty.

I bump into a selkie nursing a whisky sour. She flashes me green teeth and goes back to digging superstitious nonsense into the surface of the black bar with a claw

“Silver, I told you not to show your face here unless you had a bag of cash over your shoulder. And you're not exactly Santa fucking Claus.” Maeve MacCallan’s voice slices, Boston-bred and sharp as a blade.

She brushes fingers to the barrel of the revolver tucked beneath the bar, the iron bullets for spectacle and pain.

She took over the place after the previous owner, a lich, vanished under peculiar circumstances. He’s buried in the catacombs below Fenlight.

The floorboards creak like they remember the cadence of every new footstep or stride. Candlelight and piano music older than memory cast odd shadows on Maeve’s face.

I dig my hand into my pocket and throw the coins at her. “Keep the change, love. I always pay my debts.”

She glares at them. “This isn’t a bag.”

“Thicker than the average doubloon,” I reply. “Test it. You’ll see.”

Her scowl fixes in its usual position, erasing some of her unnatural loveliness. The creature beneath the glamour is as old as I am, another relic from a time long gone. Slowly she gathers the money and the coins disappear in the palm of her hand.