Page 15 of The Unweaver

“Hmm.” She tapped her nails. “What did Mr. Moriarty say Mr. Bane’s greatest weakness was?”

“Something called Coshoy’s Egg. And me.”

A long pause, followed by a heavy sigh. “Drat. I might just have to keep you, then.”

The obelisk was plucked away. Cora blinked at her empty hand, shaking her head to clear her cottony thoughts. What had they been talking about?

“Now. If it’s not too much of an imposition, go and do the job I am paying you to do. My note shall contain the instructions.” Mother didn’t spare Cora a glance as she locked the strange object in her desk drawer. “That will be all.”

Ah, so Owens was to deliver her personalized punishment at Mother’s convenience. Thus dismissed, Cora made her leave.

She collided with a girl in the doorway. Icy fingers latched onto her arms and held her in place. The girl, blonde and moon-pale, slowly raised her head and perused Cora with silver eyes too ancient for her young face. On a velvet choker around her throat glittered a bloodred ruby.

Cora broke away from the silver gaze when she heard someone call her name from far away. She searched the hallway, but it was only her and the girl whose lips hadn’t moved.

“Cecelia?” Mother called out. “There’s been a change in plans, darling.”

The girl didn’t move. Cora shrugged out of her grasp and hurried away, feeling the girl’s gaze between her shoulder blades like the sharp point of an icicle. She didn’t pause for breath until Mother’s house was well out of sight.

Chapter 4. Desecrated

Smoke drifted from her lips into the cloudy night. With one last puff, Cora flicked the cigarette she’d bummed from the drummer into a dirty puddle.

Fifteen minutes was never a long enough break from the Starlite Club’s perfume of unwashed bodies packed shoulder-to-shoulder in an unventilated basement. It wasn’t even midnight and the crowd was so boisterous she’d barely heard the music she was playing. She had retreated into the grimy back alley with the uproar still ringing in her ears.

Through the club’s muffled din, she heard the band starting up again, and beneath that, her now constant companion, the rattle of an approaching death. The sensation plaguing her since the Silvertown docks had grown overpowering. A certainty that festered at the back of her mind, lingering like the stench of rot.

Death was near and Cora was not particularly concerned. Death was the only cure for the human condition, after all, and it had been the sweetest relief before. The sooner her futile race against death’s hourglass ended, the better.

Stuffing her hands in her pockets, she wondered how death would claim her this time. A specter stalking the darkness? The eyeshine watching her from the shadows? Or the Realmwalker himself?

She studied the Chronomancer’s key, warm from its hiding place beside her heart.That key’s theonly way to get to the Realmwalker, Horace had said.

Portal Keys, specialized for traversing between linked doors, were often ornate. This key, however, seemed like an ordinary skeleton key. Things were seldom as they seemed.

With a pang of unease, she tried the key in the club’s back door. Horrifyingly, it slid into the lock without resistance. Tumblers clicked when she turned it left. She braced herself for—

Nothing. Nothing happened. She was still in a freezing alley, staring at a closed door like a bloody moron. Her tense shoulders fell.

Unless her fate awaited beyond the door.

She reached for the handle. At best, the Starlite’s raucous interior would greet her. At worst, Malachy Bane would stroll through, and he’d break more than her ribs this time.

Holding her breath, she cracked open the door and peered inside.

The room that greeted her was from a century back in time. A library, in the charmingly chaotic Victorian style. Ceiling-high shelves ascended the two-story tower, overflowing with leather-bound books. Mahogany furniture, paisley wallpaper, and thick drapes clashed in vibrant patterns. A fire crackled in the hearth.

Cora slammed the door shut, heart galloping and breath fogging. Far from ordinary, indeed. Instead of traversing between linked doors, this Portal Key allowed for near infinite entries into Bane’s presumed inner sanctum.

In the wrong hands, the key was dangerous. In hers, it felt like power.

Where else could it take her?

Curiosity eventually overcame trepidation. She slid the key back into the lock, turned right, and opened the door on a sharp inhale.

Inside was a spacious, walnut-paneled officethat was tastefully appointed and mercifully unoccupied. With dark leather furniture and a sedate refinement that oozed wealth, the office was dominated by a massive desk, covered with meticulous stacks of ledgers. Not a single pen or paper was out of place.

Sounds of a tuning trumpet, clinking glasses, and muted conversation reached her ears. Her head swiveled, but the sounds didn’t grow closer. There was only the cold alley at her back and the inviting warmth of the office before her. She took a timid step inside. On the far wall was an emblem that halted her. The gilded shamrock of the Emerald Club.

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