Going Under by Justina Robson Read Free Book Online Page B

strandloper?" Lila asked.
    "Soon as," the faery said. He returned his cup to a side table and straightened his coat. "I have to be getting back. A few matters ... well, you'll see."
    She guessed that his stiff formality was a signal to her that what ever was bothering them in Otopia was particularly irritating. He was usually so relaxed, this businesslike attitude was the equivalent of some other person's major anxiety attack. So she nodded agreement and gave him a reassuring smile, hoping it didn't seem to eager. On top of everything else she was fighting hard not to admit that going along with the Demon code of marry-to-payback might have been a mistake. Visions of having to live with Teazle and Zal forever danced regularly through her head like a tacky vaudeville show. But she didn't want to think about it. The Ignore file in her brain would just have to get to gigabyte sizes.

    "Before you go. I wanted to ask. Do you know anything about this?" Lila reached into her neckline and pulled free the faery necklace with its spiral. The other was tangled up and came with it, but it was the spiral she held forward.
    Malachi glanced at it, almost nonchalantly although his wings gave a sudden flick and discharged about a pound of coal dust into the air in a glittering black cloud. The sooty bits spun and danced, forming curious storms. They would not sink down but circulated around him, globulating as if they wanted to make forms but couldn't decide what. A tang of citrus flavoured the air suddenly. Lila recognised a local magical sink forming, her conviction boosted by Tath's sudden nudge as the aether made him alert. The spiral tingled between her fingers as if it had been attached to a small battery and a tendril of white metal energy stretched cautiously forward from her fingertips towards it, but did not make contact.
    "Is that the one the eachuisge singer gave you?"
    Lila recognised the strange sound as the official faery name for Zal's backing singers-water horse fey. "Poppy. The annoying one. Yes, her."
    "Is it now?" Malachi had become almost somnolent, his eyes glazing with a look that was focused into the never. He stepped forwards with his usual grace but slowly and raised a hand up towards the spiral, stopping when he was inches away. "When did she give it to you?"

    "She gave it to Zal to give to me actually, before he tried to come here and ended up in Zoomenon instead. He gave it to me when he got back."
    "So he carried it while he was there ..." this was a statement, not a question and Lila didn't say anything. Malachi's expression was serious, his gaze drifting idly, it seemed, down to the spiral, though he kept his faraway stare so that he was both looking and not looking at it. "I'm supposing she didn't say why or what it was for?"
    "A good luck charm," Lila said, repeating what Zal had said, although he'd been so casual about it she never thought it was more than a bit of decoration with some faery twirl set on it, the kind you could buy for a few pounds at any fey roadside caravan or truck stop. They were magical items, of the only kind available in Otopia under the present laws, and usually held a petit-glamour of some kind, such as adding a little brightness to the eyes or, in the case of the famous Faeryware, enhancing flavour in food.
    "Aye, it was lucky for him to survive more than a few hours in Zoomenon, locate the only source of organised energy in that world, free a lot of ancient ghosts from millennia of torment and in so doing discover the one shameful secret of elven history that would give him proof that the shadowkin and the elves of light are blood relatives. So it was. Lucky indeed." Malachi said quietly and let his hand drop without touching the spiral. Motes of carbon flirted with touching it and rebounded, as if repelled or frightened. He shook his head and broke his own trance, "Have you ever tried losing it?"
    "No, why would I?"
    "You should ask Poppy where she found it."
    For the first time