Under the Poppy by Kathe Koja Read Free Book Online

me with his boot when I explained how the thing was done.” Guillame laughs, as if this story is no news to him. “That same man offered me a franc to fondle one of my old mecs, and when I said no, asked was I fool enough to believe in my own magic.”
    Guillame grins. “How else shall the magic work?”
    Lucy plucks up one of the apple slices, thumbs off a brownish spot. “Which old mec?”
    “An operatic lady, her name was La Duchessa. I don’t use her any longer.”
    “Why not?”
    “She came apart at the seams. There was a man, I believe he was a priest—”
    “Oh how dare you,” venomous and stealthy as a viper from the floorboards, all of them, even Istvan, startle, Omar almost drops his little cup. “How dare you all sit there and cackle over what you have done?”
    “Decca,” Guillame the swiftest to recover, awkward to his feet, a supplicating, warding hand. “Decca, we made money—”
    “Don’t speak.” Hair dragged back in a frightful bun, her face a study in mottled red and whey, she stands in the doorway as if to block their communal escape. Too overrun last night to punish them, she has been roiling inside, a brew of outrage and terror and relief. “Every single one of you, lying to me—even you,” one finger leveled like a duelist’s at frightened Jonathan, “you who cannot speak a word, yet found a way to lie. Did you think I wouldn’t know you brought him the music? Or you,” to Guillame, “who engineered the whole mad enterprise? Or you,” last and angriest to Lucy, “who birthed his ugly toy out from under your skirts? Well, you can find yourself another house to tarnish, or go rot in the Alley with the rest of the muck. You’ll not stop here another evening.”
    “Mr. Rupert—”
    “Mr. Rupert is amazed that things grew no worse than they did! Do you not understand that this was a private party, a special evening for the elders of the town, and for their guests? You could have ruined us all with your capering! There was a military presence—”
    “I know!” Lucy shouts. “I fucked most of them!”
    “The colonel of the garrison—”
    “I fucked him too!”
    Istvan laughs, calm again, plying his little knife. The smell of apple is sharp and sour. Decca does not even look at him, addresses a spot on the wall as “You ought to go,” she says, “tonight. Pack up your traps and go.”
    “What of Pan? Is he allowed to linger?” but “Quiet,” says a very quiet voice. “Decca, Lucy, you can be heard all over the house.” Rupert in shirtsleeves, unshaven and pale to the lips; he looks at no one but Istvan. “You. Come with me.”
    No one says a word, not even Decca, as Istvan, knife and apple follow Rupert up the stairs. Behind Decca’s back, Guillame raises his eyebrows at Omar, who shrugs minutely. Jonathan disappears like smoke in a breeze, Lucy glares at Decca whose gaze is aimed at the ceiling, the parlor office upstairs, the closed door behind which Rupert stares at Istvan who stares back without a smile.
    “Hello, Mouse,” he says.

Mouse! the hiss, the reaching hand from the sliver of dark, black space between two crooked buildings, shit stench, an impromptu pissoir with no exit save the street but Take a breath, the breath against the skin, one boy whispering to the other. You’re all in.
    They—followed—me.
    I know. I saw, I followed them…. Just breathe. One arm warm around his neck, thin ropy arm in the ragged greatcoat, silver braid on the collar, Lieutenant Flat-Boy, rent boy, from behind with his hair in braids he can be a rent girl, too. He can be whatever you want, whatever you pay for, for as long as you pay, or until he decides to be something else. Like mercury on glass, Mercury the patron of thieves and travelers, feathers on his helmet, wings on his feet. Air enough, now? Come on, then.
    Where? but already he’s climbing, swift and vertical on the bricks, his toes and fingers finding purchase to clamber up, up, up to the sway of iron,