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What? “No,” I answered. Of course not.

Crowe bent and stared straight into my eyes. “I will kill the dragon,” he said.

Sootle pulled out a long, thin knife and held it up to Pip's cage.

My heart gave a sudden jolt of dread and fright. I gripped the wire mesh. “No!”

Crowe nodded at the swift, and he shook Pip's cage. Sparks flared and Pip thrashed, making a high, keening sound. “I will kill it,” Crowe said again.

He would. I tore my eyes away from Pip. “Please, please don't. Don't hurt it.”

“You will work for me,” Crowe said.

Yes, anything. I'd do anything. I nodded.

“You do this job for me and I will spare the life of your dragon. You agree?”

“Yes,” I said. My voice sounded choked, and I realized I was crying. I rubbed the tears off my cheeks and took a shaky breath. Yes. I'd work for Crowe if it meant saving Pip's life. He'd calculated that right.

“I thought you'd change your mind, Connwaer,” Crowe said. He turned and spoke to the other swift. “Get a pencil and paper.” The swift nodded and left the room.

Crowe examined me with his pale eyes. “First, Connwaer, you are going to write a note.”

 

C
HAPTER

21

C
rowe's chimney swifts blindfolded me and led me out of the place they'd brought me and rowed me across the river to the dim-dark, damp Twilight. They took off the blindfold and stayed right on my heels as I left the dockyards and warehouses and climbed the steep streets.

I paused in the alley across from the chophouse on Strangle Street. It was good to be out of the cage, feeling the magics around me again. They were still settled in their places, but they both felt . . . prickly. Uneasy. I couldn't do anything about it, now.

“This it?” the swift Sootle asked. He carried a knapsack.

I didn't answer.

My men will go with you
, Crowe had said
. They will be listening, and they will know if you give the wizard some kind of signal. Get in, do the job, and get out. The dragon pays for any misstep on your part. Understand?

I understood. I wouldn't try anything. I would do the job and I would go straight back to the house, back to Pip.

Still, Crowe hadn't won yet. If the mudlarks had delivered my message to Nevery, he'd know something was wrong, that I'd written the note asking him to meet me here because Crowe had his hooks in me. He'd be careful.

But if the mudlark Den hadn't delivered the message yet, Nevery'd be walking right into a trap.

Across the street, the windows of the chophouse glowed dimly. The cobblestones gleamed, wet with the day's rain. Fog lingered along the edges of the falling-down buildings. My sweater was still damp from my dunking in the river, and I shivered. Nevery might wait for me in the chophouse for a long time.

The chophouse door swung open. Somebody stepped out into the street.

“That him?” whispered the swift named Drury, who loomed beside me.

I shook my head.

After a while, a group of factory workers coming late off a shift trooped past. They didn't see us where we lurked in our dark alleyway. The street fell quiet again.

At last, the dim light in the chophouse went out. The door swung open and a dark figure stepped out.

Nevery.

He paused and adjusted his hat, then, without a backward glance, set off toward the river, his cane going
tap,
tap
against the cobblestones.

Taking a shaky breath, I left the shadows of the alley and went after Nevery on feather-light feet, following him down the dark, steep street.

One thing a good pickpocket learns is
tells
, which is when people tell where they're keeping something valuable. They don't mean to tell, but they almost always do something to give it away.

Nevery usually kept his locus magicalicus in his cloak pocket, but when he'd stepped out the chophouse door, I'd seen his tell—he checked the breast pocket of his suit coat, patting it with his hand before he went on. He probably thought he'd put it there for safekeeping.

It wasn't safe from me, though.

As he turned off of Strangle Street, I darted up beside him, no more than a shadow in the night, dipped into his suit pocket and—
quick hands
—snatched up his locus magicalicus.

He missed it at once and whirled, his cloak swirling around him.

I ducked away, but not fast enough. He saw me.

Sorry, Nevery.
Sorry.

“Connwaer!” he shouted, and I was gone, melting into the shadows.

I heard the
step step tap
of him coming after me, and then I slipped into the alley where Sootle waited with his knapsack. He pulled out the tiny tourmalifine cage and I dropped the locus magicalicus into it. He snapped it closed. There. Nevery wouldn't be able to sense where it was. To him, the stone had just disappeared.

 

My eyes blindfolded again, I climbed the stairs with a swift ahead of me and one just behind with his hand on my shoulder. They marched me up to the attic and took off the blindfold.

“Back in the cage,” Drury said, giving me a push.

Not yet. I stumbled to the table and bent to look into Pip's cage. The little dragon lay on its side, panting a little. Its scales had turned dusty-dull. “Will you put it in with me?” I asked. Pip might do better if its slowsilver scales weren't touching the tourmalifine wires.

The room's door opened and Crowe came in. He saw me. “Put him back in the cage,” he said sharply.

Sootle touched a keystone to the side of the big cage and it swung open. Drury grabbed me by the scruff and shoved me inside. He closed the door behind me, sealing the cage, shutting me away from the magics again.

Crowe came farther into the room. “You have it?” he asked.

“Yes, sir,” Sootle said, and pulled the tiny tourmalifine cage from the knapsack.

Nevery's locus magicalicus lay inside, a small stone so dark it was like a bit of swirling night against the glimmering green wires.

Crowe turned the box, examining the stone inside, and then set it on the table. “Good,” he said. “Now for the last magister's locus stone.”

For once, Crowe had counted wrong. “You've got Nevery's,” I said. “That's all of them.”

“No it isn't,” Crowe said, his voice cold and quiet. “There is one more. You're a magister too, Nephew. The ducal magister. Had you forgotten?”

What? “But my locus stone is in Pip.”

“Yes,” Crowe said. “That is a well-known fact.” He turned away from my cage and spoke to the swift. “Take the dragon out.”

Sootle took a pair of leather gloves from his coat pocket and put them on. Then he touched the keystone to the side of Pip's cage and it opened, and he reached in and pulled Pip out. Pip shivered, but didn't fight. The dragon looked very small in Sootle's gloved hands.

“Do it,” Crowe ordered.

With a quick glance at me, Sootle reached into his pocket and pulled out the long, thin-bladed knife.

What?
“But I did the job!” I gasped out. “You said you wouldn't hurt Pip.”

“So I did.” Crowe turned away. “Get on with it,” he ordered. “Cut the locus stone out of the dragon.”

Pip! I flung myself against the wire mesh and the cage rocked.
No,
no,
no!

Frowning, Sootle brought the knife up to Pip's chest and glanced at Crowe, who nodded.

A quick thrust, and the knife plunged into Pip, right up to the hilt. My own heart shuddered and shattered into a thousand pieces.

In the swift's hands, Pip twitched and went limp. Sootle let go and Pip's body tumbled to the floor.

C
HAPTER

22

I
crouched with my forehead pushed up against the cold wires of my cage.

Pip's body lay crumpled on the floor, just beyond the reach of my fingers. It lay on its side, one wing crushed beneath it, the knife hilt sticking out of its chest. In a moment, Sootle would come and cut my locus stone out of Pip's body so Crowe could use it for whatever he was planning.

Crowe, his back to me, was talking to the swifts, giving them more orders, but the words didn't make sense, they just sounded like a roaring in my ears. I felt stiff and heavy and numb. I'd been stupid. I should've known better than to steal Nevery's locus stone for Crowe. And now Pip was dead.
Dead.

Pip's body shivered.

I blinked. Had I imagined it? I scrubbed a hand across my eyes and then gripped the wires of my cage, straining to see better.

Pip's wing stretched. Its ember-bright eyes blinked open. It shook its head and then scrambled onto its claw-paws and looked around, its tail twitching.

“Pip?” I breathed.

The knife hilt stuck in its chest quivered and then clattered to the floor.

At the sound, Crowe turned. He looked at me, then down at Pip, on the floor. His eyes narrowed, and he flinched back. “The dragon is alive,” he spat out.

Oh, how could I have been so stupid? Of
course
Pip was alive! It wasn't made of flesh and blood and bone like a person or an animal. It was made of magic! A knife couldn't kill it.

Sootle, still wearing his gloves, lunged after Pip, and the little dragon leaped backward, snarling.

“Catch it!” Crowe ordered. Sootle lunged again. The other swift picked up the small tourmalifine cage.

“Get out of here, Pip!” I shouted, jumping to my feet in my cage. Then I shouted it again in the dragon language.

With both swifts grabbing after it, Pip scrambled under the table and then crawled straight up the wall and crouched at the edge of the ceiling, snarling and lashing its tail. Sootle charged after it.

“
Go!
” I shouted again, then in the dragon language, “
Valaré!
”

Pip leaped, opening its wings, and like a flaming spear it shot across the room and blasted through one of the windows. Out into the night the dragon flew, trailing sparks and shattered glass.

 

After cursing at the swifts for letting Pip escape, Crowe and Nimble went out, muttering to each other, making new plans. They left Sootle on guard by the door. He had a werelight lantern turned low and the smaller tourmalifine cage on the floor next to his chair. Waiting to catch Pip in case the little dragon came back, I guessed.

I'd been stupid to think Crowe would keep a promise, but I wouldn't be stupid again. I'd fight him with everything I had.

From inside the cage there wasn't much I could do except try to escape and keep an eye on what was going on outside. This I could do with the seeing-and-hearing spell. It might work, even from inside the cage, even without me touching Pip. I'd cast the spell before the magics had settled, so it had effected with such power that all I had to do was say Pip's true name, and the spell should effect again.

I crouched in my cage, feeling the cold from the wires seeping up through my bare feet, and a chilly wind blowing in from the window Pip had smashed. I closed my eyes, concentrating.

“
Tallennar
,” I whispered.

I blinked, but nothing had changed; I pricked my ears, but I still heard as a boy, not a dragon.

Try again. I stood up, facing the broken window, pressing my face up against the wire mesh of the cage. “
Tallennar!
” I shouted. My voice echoed in the attic room.

By the door, Sootle lifted his head, but he didn't get up. “Be quiet, charboy,” he said.

I closed my eyes and felt the spell click into place.

When I cracked them open again, my Pip-eyes saw a dark rooftop and chimneys edged with a line of flickering flame and, far below, a courtyard and . . . something dark and ruffled. Was that water?

Wait. I knew where we were. Nimble's house on one of the magister's islands in the river. I could throw a stone from here and hit Heartsease, just about. Pip was outside, perched on the edge of a chimney. “Pip!” I called softly.

My Pip-ears heard my own voice leaking out from the smashed-open attic window. They also heard Sootle get up from his creaky chair and take a few steps toward my cage. “What're you up to?” the swift asked.

Keeping my eyes closed, I crouched in a corner of the cage. “Nothing,” I answered him.

“Hmph,” he snorted, and went back to his chair and sat down.

“Go to Nevery, Pip,” I whispered. “Nevery Flinglas at Heartsease.” Sure as sure, Nevery was furious with me for stealing his locus stone, but if he saw Pip he'd know I was in trouble.

Pip crawled along the edge of the roof, then launched itself into the sky. My vision spiraled, and flame-edged chimneys and the roof flashed by, then, below, the river, dark and flowing, and then Heartsease loomed up. Pip shot past the big tree in the courtyard. Lights shone from the kitchen windows and upstairs, from Nevery's study and workroom. Pip swooped over the courtyard cobblestones and up the outside wall of Heartsease and landed, clinging to the bricks. The window glowed just above it. Pip crawled up the wall and peered in, pressing its snout against the window glass.

Inside, a fire burned in the hearth. Nevery's hat, cloak, and cane had been tossed in a heap on his chair. Nevery himself, dark and tall in his black suit, stood before the hearth. Benet waited by the door, his burly arms folded across his chest.

“—if you say so, sir,” Benet was saying. To Pip's keen ears, his voice sounded loud, even from outside the closed window.

“I do say so,” Nevery snapped. “And bring up some tea. I'll have the note ready in a moment.”

Benet went out. Nevery paced before the fire, frowning and pulling at the end of his beard. “Curse it, Connwaer,” he muttered. “What are you up to?” He went to the table, cleared off his chair, pushing everything onto the floor, and sat down to dash out a note.

Benet came in with a pot of tea, cups, honey, and a plate of biscuits on a tray, which he set on the table.

“Ah, good,” Nevery said. He handed Benet the note. “To Brumbee, as I said. Bring him and his apprentice straight here, no arguments.”

“Yes, sir,” Benet said. He headed for the door. Then he paused.

“What is it?” Nevery said.

“You think he's all right?” Benet asked.

“I think he's gotten himself into trouble, as usual,” Nevery growled.

“Must've had a reason—” Benet started.

“Yes, I know, Benet,” Nevery said. “To you he can do no wrong. But he's stolen my locus magicalicus. A serious problem, I hope you agree.”

Benet nodded. “Yes, sir.” He didn't move from the doorway. “D'you miss him, sir?”

Nevery got up from the table, still looking cross. “Yes, of course I do.” Then my Pip-ears heard him mutter something into his beard that sounded like
stupid question
.

“He might not know it,” Benet said.

“What?” Nevery asked.

“Did you ever tell him?”

Nevery stared at Benet, who stood stubbornly in the doorway with his burly arms folded. After a moment, Nevery spoke. “If we're going to get the boy back”—he stopped to clear his throat—“back home, we don't have any time to waste. Go and deliver the message to the duchess.”

With a glower, Benet turned and stalked out of the room. “Idiots, the both of you,” my Pip-ears heard him say as he hurried down the stairs.