7
Tacey opened the wall and let Mercury out of the tunnels. The ghosts were all floating through and into the dungeon. Snaffle was almost certainly back at the stable. The other isolated ghosts hadn’t joined either. But those who were there watched Mercury in anticipation.
“The Vanns are locked inside the room we wanted them in,” he told them. “They aren’t very happy about it, as you might imagine. But they threatened Tacey again. So they get to experience our exceptional hospitality.”
He didn’t necessarily see looks of relief.
“How long will they be availing themselves of hospitality?” the Quiet Queen asked.
Mercury had suspected he wasn’t the only one who wondered a little about the morality of imprisoning people in the dungeon.
“Not forever,” he assured them all. “They and others who are likely to come here in search of me have information about the one they’re working for. If we can learn enough to eliminate the threat of their puppet master, then we won’t have to keep them here.”
“And if they won’t spill what they know?” Testy Tolver asked.
Mercury didn’t have a ready answer to that. “We will cross that bridge if we come to it.”
They all exchanged looks of both determination and uncertainty.
Mercury looked over at Wallaby. “Will you act as warden? Keep an ear out and maybe go peek in on them once in a while. They can’t escape, but I think we’d best know if they’re trying and if anything unexpected happens.”
Wallaby nodded. He never left the dungeon as it was, and the tunnels were an extension of it.
The Vanns could reveal why people were hunting Mercury. If his ghosts were going to be told, he would prefer that he be the one who told them.
“As I’ve told you, there’s a bounty on my head. I have been accused of being a criminal and a fugitive from the law.” He didn’t see any real concern on any of their faces. “The accusations are true.”
Some surprise popped up around the room, but still no condemnation or worry.
“Most of you haven’t been with me long enough to know this about my past. Those who do know have honored my wish that it not be spoken of.
” He took a quick breath. “I was raised in an orphanage. I wasn’t ever adopted, which means, according to the law, all of my ghosts are the property of the orphanage governor.
Everything that happens to them is supposed to be decided by him.
Any amount of money I make as a result of brokering, he has a legal claim on.
I, however, have hidden my identity, kept all those profits for myself, and am hiding from the legal consequences of that deception. ”
No matter that he had explained this a few times of late, his stomach still clenched at speaking the words out loud.
It wasn’t that he was ashamed of his past or felt badly about what he’d done.
The law was unfair and unkind. And the way he had been treated at the orphanage warranted doing everything he could to create a life as far from it as he was able.
But those consequences were being borne by others now. That was what he felt badly about.
“So is it the head of the orphanage who’s put the bounty on your head?” Captain Capitate asked.
“Could be. Or someone who has figured out who I am and hopes to collect a reward for turning me over to face justice.”
“And what does that justice look like?” Mawky asked, looking on the verge of fainting, which was a very common thing for her.
“Seizing all my assets, including this house. Likely being thrown in debtors’ prison.”
“Is debtors’ prison better than regular prison?” Gary the Green asked.
“I don’t know,” Mercury admitted. “The enormity of the sum I owe to Moor Cross Home for Orphans might warrant ‘regular prison,’ as you call it.”
“Enormous enough to warrant hanging?” Weeping William burst into tears at the question.
“Also possible,” Mercury said. “I suspect not, though. Or at least that it would be argued against. If I’m dead, all of my ghosts get redistributed.”
They all nodded at that. When the person to whom a ghost was attached died, that ghost immediately became attached to a newborn infant. And the orphanage only had claim on ghosts attached to him. Allowing Mercury to be hanged would cost them a fortune.
“But a lifetime spent in prison is a decided possibility.” The Quiet Queen sniffed in disapproval. “Barbaric.”
“I agree,” Mercury said. “Especially because all of you would have to stay within five hundred feet of whatever prison I’m placed in. And if the prison is large enough and I’m housed in the middle of it, you’ll be stuck inside until you’re traded.”
“Could you be forced to trade your ghosts?” Testy Tolver shook his head. “No. That can’t be right. Both people and both ghosts have to be in agreement.”
“But should any of you wish to no longer be in the prison with me, I would trade you if I am able.”
Captain Capitate waved that off. “It won’t come to that. There are a lot of rooms in the tunnels. We can herd a great many people down there. Soon, no bounty hunter will even attempt to snatch you away.”
“I wouldn’t have burdened you with this secret if it wasn’t crucial that you know the reason we’re in our current predicament and what that means for your futures,” Mercury said.
“We are perfectly capable of keeping secrets and carrying burdens,” the Quiet Queen said with an arched eyebrow.
Mercury breathed more easily. “I will do everything I can to keep all of us free and safe.”
“Safe?” Gary the Green gave him a dry look.
“Little can be done to ghosts. Yes, we would be forced to stay within five hundred feet of your prison cell, but we can’t be hurt or killed.
We can’t really be punished. You are the one we are protecting.
You and Miss Wilde. And we will do so in any way we are able. ”
Mercury thought on that long after he’d left the dungeon and retreated to his sitting room.
His ghosts were choosing to protect him.
For so long, he’d kept his past hidden, not wanting to burden them, while at the same time feeling guilty that their precarious situation wasn’t entirely known to them.
But they not only hadn’t held it against him, they were willingly and anxiously protecting him.
Tacey was the first person he had told, and that had been excruciatingly difficult to do.
Yet she hadn’t flinched, hadn’t blinked.
He had initially arranged for her to stay at Aventine so that Granny Grey would stay.
The offer had been selfish in so many ways.
Yet, Tacey had proven a miracle in his life.
How could gratitude and guilt be so tightly intertwined?
It was in the midst of these swirling thoughts that an enormous boulder of a ghost slid through the wall of the sitting room.
“The Reluctant Recluse told me he believes you would like to speak with me,” the Violet Giant said.
Mercury sat up straighter. “I have been trying desperately to communicate with him ever since you revealed his existence to me, but I haven’t been very successful.”
“He’s able to hear you. He is struggling, though, to make himself heard by you.”
“He’s been attempting to write with a quill but can’t seem to manage it.” Mercury rubbed at his forehead. “He’s fluttered newspapers in front of me, which has helped me learn things. But he can’t seem to move anything heavier than a sheet of newsprint.”
“He is decidedly frustrated.” The Violet Giant’s voice had a tendency to rumble inside a person. That took some getting used to.
“While you’re here, perhaps you could act as messenger?” Mercury suggested.
The ghost’s eyes darted a bit to the side the way Tacey’s did when she was listening to her Invisible attachment. The Reluctant Recluse was likely standing there.
“He says that won’t work in the way he needs it to,” the Violet Giant said, looking at Mercury once more. “I am guessing there’s something he needs to tell you that I am not meant to hear. Or for some reason, he’s prevented from saying it.”
A message so important that the Reluctant Recluse was trying exceptionally hard to get it to Mercury, and the Violet Giant could hear and see this enigmatic Invisible but couldn’t act as a much-needed go-between.
“Do you intend to tell the Vanns that I aided your efforts here today?” the Violet Giant asked.
“When you aided my efforts in London, you asked me to remember that. And I do. I won’t repay your kindness then with unkindness now.”
“I know the Vanns are horrid people,” the Violet Giant said. “If it were within my power to do so, I would not spend another moment within fifteen miles of them, let alone fifteen feet.”
Mercury stood and crossed closer to him. “I wish I could broker a trade for you so you could have that escape. I would not, however, resign any of my ghosts to living in the Vanns’ household, and I don’t think the Vanns would agree to it anyway.”
“Focusing on what cannot be done is futile,” the enormous ghost said. “Let us, instead, discuss what we are able to do, so we can do it.”
Mercury studied him. “Does this mean you intend to keep helping us?”
“If I can.”
Mercury began pacing, his thoughts racing. “How much trouble did the Vanns come here intending to cause?”
“They came back for you,” the Violet Giant said, “but were willing to take Miss Wilde again, if need be.”
“They said, while they were trying to find me in the tunnels, that they would have made her harder to find this time.”
The Violet Giant eyed Mercury as he paced past. “On the journey here, they said they were willing to hurt her if it would force your cooperation. They weren’t exaggerating.”
They would not be permitted to so much as look crosswise at her. The now-grown street urchin, who was as good with his fists as he was at brokering, would make absolutely certain of that.
The Vanns were contained. But they were not the true threat. One didn’t fell a tree by snapping off a branch. It needed to be taken out at the roots.
“The one offering to pay a bounty for me,” Mercury said, “is the Forever Flame. I anticipate that particular ghost will come here at some point.”
“If you are not captured by his minions, he will eventually come for you himself.” The Violet Giant narrowed his gaze a little. “Something about you is of particular importance to him.”
“I don’t know what the Forever Flame looks like. I won’t recognize him when he comes to Aventine.”
“No one who runs bounties for him or owes him favors or allegiance has ever seen him. He’s secretive and hidden, which makes him more dangerous.”
Mercury had hoped the Violet Giant could help him identify the Forever Flame. It clearly wasn’t going to be that easy.
“There are many others who will come here, doing the bidding of the Forever Flame,” the Violet Giant said. “I can likely recognize most if not all of them.”
Mercury stood quite still in the middle of the room.
The Violet Giant was willing to help him even more than he already had.
Mercury had nothing to offer him in return.
“Why? Why are you so willing to help me? I can’t do anything for you.
I have never done anything to earn your kindness or your assistance. ”
The Violet Giant’s entire air softened. “You remind me of someone I knew long ago. Someone I miss.”
“Is this someone still alive?” Mercury asked.
“I hope so.”
“If we’re able to escape the danger we’re in now,” Mercury said, “I promise I will do what I can to help you find this person.”
The Violet Giant dipped his head. “Thank you.”
Mercury swore to himself that he would one day make good on that promise.
“Make yourself at home while you’re here,” Mercury said. “It’s not as restful of a home as it once was, but at least you’ll be away from the Vanns for a time.”
Something of a smile crossed the enormous face. “I will enjoy that while it lasts.”
The Violet Giant turned to go. But, before he reached the wall, Mercury remembered something.
“If you could speak as quietly as possible at night, that would be appreciated. Your voice has a tendency to rattle Baby Blue and disrupt his sleep.”
“I do remember that from when I was here before,” the Violet Giant said. “I won’t wake the little thing.”
“Thank you. He has been through a lot lately. And, though I don’t understand why he needs to sleep, the fact that he does means I will make sure he gets to.”
“You’re very fond of that tiny ghost,” the Violet Giant said.
“I am,” Mercury said. “And I’ll protect him in whatever way I can.”