Chapter 12
Remembered sights and sounds flashed through Mercury’s exhausted mind for hours. Faces he would rather forget. Voices that still made his stomach clench.
“Lock him in. Prospective parents are coming today.”
“Meals are for boys who answer our questions.”
Anger twisting the orphanage governor’s face.
The other orphans’ laughter floating up from the grounds through his barred window.
Being alone.
So very alone.
Something—he couldn’t with any certainty say what—pulled him from his fitful sleep. He opened one eye just a sliver, enough to know he wasn’t at the orphanage, wasn’t an abandoned child any longer, wasn’t locked away. He was in his sitting room, in his favorite chair, warm under a blanket.
And he could hear Tacey talking. The sound of her soft voice was soothing and reassuring. She hadn’t left him. The enormous strain of the complicated Transferal didn’t ease, but he felt more equal to enduring it.
“You are permitted to wander as much as you’d like,” Tacey said. There was a pause, before Tacey spoke again. “Well, yes, obviously within five hundred feet of where I am. But you don’t generally wander even fifty feet away.” Another pause. “I wish only for you to be happy here.”
She was talking with her Invisible attachment.
He had heard her do so once before, and the tone was precisely what he was hearing now: kind and caring.
Invisibles were a problem for most people who had them.
They—both invisible ghost and the person they were attached to—were treated with suspicion, rejected and shunned for what was considered proof of a predisposition toward skullduggery.
Tacey had to be secretive about hers, but she didn’t seem ashamed or frustrated.
His cold, bare room in the orphanage flashed unbidden through his mind once more.
He shook it off, blinking hard against the memory.
He could still, in his mind’s eye, picture the cocoons he’d associated with the attachments he was releasing.
They were opening. The Transferal was progressing, but slowly.
“Do you need anything, Mercury?” Tacey’s voice pulled him to the present again. “You didn’t seem to be sleeping very restfully.”
“I never do during Transferals.” He sat up straighter, but only with effort.
“If I had managed by now to learn to initiate a Transferal, I could have taken on one of these, and you wouldn’t be needing to undertake two at once.” Tacey looked and sounded unnecessarily guilty.
“Both Mrs. Padmore and Mr. Sappington each have only one attachment. That limits them to up to one swap per six months.” He rolled his head from side to side, stretching against the tension in his neck. “This triangular exchange could only have been accomplished by one broker.”
“Can all brokers manage something this complicated?”
“Very few could.” Mercury attempted a smirk, but was too exhausted to do so convincingly.
Over the waves of memories, the orphanage governor’s voice growled, “Arrogance will be beaten out of you.”
Mercury slowly filled then emptied his lungs. Transferals always made him feel lonely, but he hadn’t often experienced actual memories of misery as well.
Tacey’s gaze moved purposefully to the empty space at her right.
There was no mistaking she was looking at her Invisible attachment.
After a quick nod, she looked back at Mercury.
“He says Granny Grey and the Cream Canary will float through the walls in another instant. Do you wish me to send them away so you can rest?”
He shook his head. “No one usually looks after me while I’m going through this. You will spoil me.”
She laughed a little. “I suspect you deserve a bit of spoiling.”
Why that made him emotional, he couldn’t say, but he refused to indulge it. He tamped those feelings down just as the two anticipated ghosts floated inside.
“You’re awake.” Granny gave him a very maternal look. “We weren’t certain you would be.”
“You were sleeping the last time we checked on you,” the Cream Canary said. “Is sleeping helpful?”
“Necessary. This process is very taxing.” Mercury leaned back, shifting his position in a vain attempt to be more comfortable.
“Would you like something to eat now that you are awake?” Tacey asked. “When I spoke with Smythe he said whatever you need can be provided as soon as you need it: tea, food . . .” Her eyes danced with laughter. “Whiskey.”
Mercury smiled weakly. “As tempting as the latter is, I do need to keep my mind clear.”
Tacey rose and crossed to him. Kindness filled her expression, but thankfully, without pity. “Are the first two tempting also? I’m happy to find Smythe and make the request.”
“You really are going to spoil me.” He blinked slowly, his eyelids heavy.
“I will find Smythe.” Tacey stepped away.
He resisted the urge to ask her to come back. His gaze happened on the Cream Canary.
“How are you feeling? You were uneasy earlier.”
“Feeling a little better all the time,” she said.
That was further proof that the Transferal was proceeding. As their attachment formed, the itch she felt to spill his secrets would ease.
“I’m glad,” he said. And he was, for many reasons. “Once this is complete, I would like to get to know you better.”
“I thought you might.” She sounded a little amused. That seemed to him a good sign that she really was less burdened.
Tacey returned just as Baby Blue floated inside. “You haven’t read me a story.”
“I’ve been looking after Mercury. He is making a Transferal.”
“Oh.” Baby looked at him. “Those make you very tired.”
“Yes, they do.” In fact, he could feel the energy draining from him further.
“If I am very quiet,” Baby said, “may I stay in here?”
“I would like that.” Mercury offered him a quick smile. “And I think Miss Wilde would as well.”
Baby Blue glowed—both figuratively and the tiniest bit literally—at the emphatic agreement that declaration received from Tacey. The little ghost plopped onto the floor at the foot of Mercury’s chair.
A remembered “Lock him in” rushed over Mercury. He slipped his hand into his jacket pocket. The iron key. He couldn’t be locked in. He wouldn’t be.
He wasn’t that abandoned, mistreated orphan any longer. With the last bit of energy he had, he kept his eyes open long enough to look at Granny and the Cream Canary and down at Baby Blue. His gaze lingered on Tacey as he succumbed to sleep.
He was no longer alone.