The initials on his knife. There were so many things he didn’t understand—would never understand—about the weapon, its monogram, and the life that went with it. (Were the letters English? Or Arnesian? The letters could be found in both alphabets. What did the L stand for? Or even the K, for that matter? He knew nothing of the letters that had formed his name—K.L. had become Kay-Ell and Kay-Ell had become Kell.) He was only a child when he was brought to the palace. Had the knife always been his? Or had it been his father’s? A token, something to take with him, something to help him remember who he’d been? Who had he been? The absence of memory ate at him. He often caught himself staring at the center map on the wall, wondering where he’d come from. Who he’d come from.
Whoever they were, they hadn’t been Antari. Magic might live in the blood, but not in the bloodline. It wasn’t passed from parent to child. It chose its own way. Chose its shape. The strong sometimes gave birth to the weak, or the other way around. Fire wielders were often born from water mages, earth movers from healers. Power could not be cultivated like a crop, distilled through generations. If it could, Antari would be sewn and reaped. They were ideal vessels, capable of controlling any element, of drawing any spell, of using their own blood to command the world around them. They were tools, and in the wrong hands, weapons. Perhaps the lack of inheritance was nature’s way of balancing the scales, of maintaining order.
In truth, none knew what led to the birth of an Antari. Some believed that it was random, a lucky throw of dice. Others claimed that Antari were divine, destined for greatness. Some scholars, like Tieren, believed that Antari were the result of transference between the worlds, magic of different kinds intertwining, and that that was why they were dying out. But no matter the theory on how they came to be, most believed that Antari were sacred. Chosen by magic or blessed by it, perhaps. But certainly marked by it.
Kell brought his fingers absently to his right eye.
Whatever one chose to believe, the fact remained that Antari had grown even more rare, and therefore more precious. Their talent had always made them something to be coveted, but now their scarcity made them something to be gathered and guarded and kept. Possessed. And whether or not Rhy wanted to admit it, Kell belonged to the royal collection.
He took up the silver music box, winding the tiny metal crank.
A valuable trinket, he thought, but a trinket all the same. The song started, tickling his palm like a bird, but he didn’t set down the box. Instead, he held it tight, the notes whispering out as he fell back onto the stiff cot and considered the small beautiful contraption.
How had he ended up on this shelf? What had happened when his eye turned black? Was he born that way and hidden, or did the mark of magic manifest? Five years. Five years he’d been someone else’s son. Had they been sad to let him go? Or had they gratefully offered him up to the crown?
The king and queen refused to tell him of his past, and he’d learned to stop voicing his questions, but fatigue wore away his walls, and let them through.
What life had he forgotten?
Kell’s hand fell away from his face as he chided himself. How much could a child of five really have to remember? Whoever he’d been before he was brought to the palace, that person didn’t matter anymore.
That person didn’t exist.
The music box’s song faltered and came to a stop, and Kell rewound it again, and closed his eyes, letting the Grey London melody and the Red London air drag him down to sleep.
THREE
GREY THIEF
I
Lila Bard lived by a simple rule: if a thing was worth having, it was worth taking.
She held the silver pocket watch up to the faint glow of the streetlamp, admiring the metal’s polished shine, wondering what the engraved initials—L.L.E.—on the back might stand for. She’d nicked the watch off a gentleman, a clumsy collision on a too-crowded curb that had led to a swift apology, a hand on the shoulder to distract from a hand on the coat. Lila’s fingers weren’t just fast; they were light. A tip of the top hat and a pleasant good night, and she was the proud new owner of a timepiece, and he was on his way and none the wiser.
She didn’t care about the object itself, but she cared a great deal for what it bought her: freedom. A poor excuse for it, to be sure, but better than a prison or a poorhouse. She ran a gloved thumb over the crystal watch face.
“Do you have the time?” asked a man at her shoulder.
Lila’s eyes flicked up. It was a constable.
Her hand went to the brim of her top hat—stolen from a dozing chauffeur the week before—and she hoped the gesture passed for a greeting and not a nervous slip, an attempt to hide her face.
“Half past nine,” she murmured deeply, tucking the watch into the vest pocket under her cloak, careful not to let the constable catch sight of the various weapons glittering beneath it. Lila was tall and thin, with a boyish frame that helped her pass for a young man, but only from a distance. Too close an inspection, and the illusion would crumble.