The Masked City

She was drowning in his closeness, his presence, his hair like silk against her cheek, his voice in her ear, his hands on her face and her neck. Long, cool fingers that traced across her skin and left her shivering and faint. All her responsibilities pulled at her and tried to draw her away - the reason why she’d come here, the Library brand across her back. But all she wanted was to want what he wanted, to let go of the petty discomforts of reality and to fall down into his eyes, to see where that voice and those hands would take her.

Which was not going to happen.

She braced herself by holding on to all that she was - I am a Librarian, I am Irene, I am not anyone’s victim - and dug in her metaphorical heels. Perhaps this was Silver’s story. But it wasn’t hers. She was not going to play his game. ‘Lord Silver,’ she said, her voice grating to her own ears, after the soft velvet of his tone, ‘you haven’t finished telling me everything I need to know.’

‘But do you really care?’ He drew back a little, enough to look her in the eyes. ‘Wouldn’t you rather …’ He let it trail off, but the meaning was clear.

He’d rather spend his time seducing me than let me save him from certain destruction. And that really said everything one needed to know about Fae who had gone too far into their archetype.

Irene put her hands on his shoulders, holding him away from her. ‘Yes, I do care,’ she said. ‘And no, I wouldn’t.’

Silver drew back from her in a smooth flex of movement that she couldn’t help interpreting as elegantly muscular and seductive, even if the functioning part of her brain labelled it as a flounce. ‘I could turn you in,’ he said. ‘The Ten would appreciate a Librarian spy to question.’ It was meant to sound like a casual threat, delivered from a position of power, but she saw the fear in his eyes, and it came out as a petulant complaint.

‘And I suppose you’d say you lured me here to hand me over,’ Irene said. She kept her own tone balanced and uncaring. The one who cracked first was the one who would lose in this Fae game. And the stakes were too high for that person to be her.

‘Well, of course.’ Silver shrugged. ‘And anything you’d say about me inciting you to rescue the prisoner would be dismissed as lies.’

Irene let herself smile. ‘Then you wouldn’t care that I would be accusing you of collusion with the dragons to rescue Kai,’ she said.

Silver stared at her. ‘Nobody would believe you.’

‘Ah, but we’re in Venice.’ Irene shrugged, just as he had done. ‘You said it yourself. This is a city of spies and prisons. We’ll end up in adjoining cells. If I go down, Lord Silver, then so do you. You have everything to lose.’

A threatening silence filled the air between them, louder than any argument. Outside, the lapping of the canals and the distant ringing of bells seemed to be a thousand miles away, as the two of them stared at each other.

He was the first to look away.

‘You believe Kai is there,’ she said. Best to get the information and then get out of there, before he tried to challenge her again. ‘In those Prisons, those Carceri. Are they part of what this Venice offers to visitors? The ideal prisons to hold one’s enemies?’

Silver shrugged. ‘So I believe. I haven’t been in there myself, needless to say. They say that the Carceri could hold ones who are far stronger than me. I am sure your dragon would be a mere fly-speck within them.’

‘Then where in Venice are they?’

‘If I knew, my lady Winters, then I would tell you, but unfortunately I don’t know. The Ten consider it, shall we say, inappropriate to share that sort of information, and I have to say that I see their point. But all my sources do agree that you can only reach the Carceri from somewhere here in Venice.’

In that case there was little point wasting her time questioning him further. ‘So, Lord Silver, to summarize: Kai is somewhere here, in a prison that can only be reached from this city, but you don’t know where the entrance is, or how to get in, or what the conditions inside may be - except in terms that a pseudo-Gothic melodramatic author would consider overblown. And you are, I presume, unwilling to be of any further assistance, in case it is traced back to you. Though if I am caught, we both know Lord and Lady Guantes will assume that you were to blame in any case.’

‘Accurate on the whole,’ Silver agreed. ‘Except for that comment on my prose style.’

‘Well, in that case, Lord Silver …’ Irene considered her immediate needs. ‘I need a pair of shoes, a cloak or shawl, some money, a knife and directions to the nearest large collection of books. Given all that, I will do my best to avoid contacting you again.’

Silver frowned. ‘Is that bribery, my lady?’

Irene rose to her feet. ‘Merely pointing out our mutual advantage, Lord Silver. You will no doubt be watched, if the Guantes suspect you. If I stay well away from you, it’s safer for both of us.’

Silver considered, toying with the collar of his dressing gown. Finally he said, ‘You may be right, my lady. Johnson! See to all of that, if you please. And one more thing.’ He took a step closer. ‘I wasn’t speaking in jest when I said the airs of this place will be antithetical to your dragon. As a Librarian, you are neutral to it, and you’re wearing the tokens I gave you, which shield you a little. The dragon is purely antagonistic to this world. Once you release him, you had best make plans to remove him from this sphere as fast as possible. And yourself, too.’