Ivy stood before the stage in a moth-eaten blazer. One sleeve hung empty where her left arm had been folded into a sling. The other was bound to a brazier by a length of lapis-blue ribbon.
‘Guilty.’
Minty Wolfson’s pen scratched in the record book, which looked as if no one had touched it in a century. Apparently, all syndicate trials had to be chronicled for posterity.
‘Miss Jacob, please tell the court about your involvement with the Rag and Bone Man.’
I hadn’t seen Ivy since the scrimmage. She had been staying in a cell north of the river, kept in her own room to prevent revenge attacks. She had gained a little weight, and her hair, which had been shorn off in the colony, was coming through soft and dark.
With composure, she repeated the story she had told at the scrimmage of how she had been taken in by the Rag and Bone Man, made his mollisher, and ordered to send him talented voyants for ‘employment’.
He had vanished after the scrimmage, as had all his allies. Ivy was the loose end. Our last clue as to where he might have gone.
We were in another neglected building, a music hall near Whitechapel that had been closed down for showing free-world films. The high commanders and my mollishers were fanned out in seats on either side of mine, listening to Ivy describe the voyants’ suspicious disappearances. Errai Sarin stood in a corner at the back of the hall, while above us, in the gallery, were eighteen observers, who would report the trial to the rest of the syndicate.
‘You observed that these voyants were disappearing, and you became worried. You tipped off Cutmouth, who was mollisher supreme at the time,’ the Pearl Queen said, in her clear, fluting voice. ‘You must have thought her trustworthy. Will you describe your relationship?’
‘We were close. Once,’ Ivy said. ‘There was a time when we couldn’t have lived without each other.’
‘You were lovers.’
‘Objection, Pearl Queen,’ Minty piped up. ‘That is your insinuation. The accused has no obligation to—’
‘I don’t mind,’ Ivy said. ‘She fell in love with Hector when she joined the Underbodies, but yes. Before that, we were lovers.’
Minty shot the Pearl Queen an exasperated look, but noted down the information.
They combed through Cutmouth’s investigation of the Camden Catacombs, the imprisoned voyants she had found there, and her report to Haymarket Hector. How Hector’s lust for easy gold had persuaded him to join the grey market instead of suppressing it.
My gaze flitted towards Errai, who wore all black, as the Ranthen usually did. I knew he had little patience for syndicate politics, but I felt his scrutiny. He would report every word of the trial to Terebell.
‘Were you aware that the missing voyants were being sold to Scion for your master’s financial gain?’
‘No,’ Ivy said.
Minty continued scribbling as if her hand would drop off.
‘Who else was involved in the ring?’
‘The Abbess, obviously. Faceless, the Bully-Rook, the Wicked Lady, the Winter Queen, Jenny Greenteeth, and Bloody Knuckles. Some of their mollishers, too. Not Halfpenny,’ she added. ‘He didn’t know about it.’
A small relief. Halfpenny was well-liked, and I hadn’t wanted the evidence to force me into banishing him.
‘At any point,’ the Pearl Queen said, ‘did you see the White Binder, mime-lord of I-4, associate with the group?’
‘No.’
Murmurs from the gallery. I gripped the arms of my chair.
It was tough to believe that Jaxon, if he had been associated with the Sargas for two decades, hadn’t known about the grey market.
The Pearl Queen hesitated. ‘To your knowledge, did any members of the grey market have dealings with the White Binder or speak of his involvement?’
‘I wish I could say “yes”,’ Ivy said darkly, ‘but I won’t lie. It’s possible he could have been involved without my—’
‘No speculation, please,’ Glym rumbled. ‘This is the Underqueen’s court, not one of your palm-readings.’
She dropped her head. ‘For what it’s worth,’ she said, her voice a notch higher, ‘I’m sorry. I should have done more. And earlier.’
‘Yes, you should have, vile augur,’ someone bellowed down at her. ‘You earned your name!’
‘Scum!’
‘Enough,’ I barked at the gallery.
Some of them shut up at once, but after a lull of about five seconds, the abuse started again. The deep-seated hatred towards vile augurs was never going to disappear in a matter of weeks. Another one of Jaxon’s glorious contributions to the syndicate.
‘Silence.’ The Pearl Queen banged her gavel. ‘We will have no disruptions from the observers!’
Hearing the story for a second time had made it no less disturbing; I wondered how much more there was to it than Ivy knew. From the sound of her account, she had only been a pawn.
‘Now,’ the Pearl Queen said, ‘the ?ther must determine if any lie has passed the accused’s lips.’
Ognena Maria sprang down from the stage. She was a pyromancer, a kind of common augur that used fire to reach the ?ther. She struck a match and tossed it into the brazier, which was already piled with wood and kindling. Once a fire was burning, she said, ‘Come here, Ivy.’
Ivy shuffled towards the brazier. Maria placed a hand on her good shoulder and drew her closer.
The ?ther quavered. Maria leaned so close to the flames that sweat dewed her upper lip.
‘I can’t see a great deal,’ she said, ‘but the fire is bright and strong, and it was easy to light. Her words were truthful.’
She patted Ivy’s arm before leaving her. Ivy shied away from the flames.
‘The high commanders will now cast votes,’ the Pearl Queen said. ‘Guilty?’
She raised her own hand. A moment passed before Maria, Tom and Glym also held up theirs. Nick, Eliza, Wynn and Minty kept theirs down.
‘Underqueen, the deciding vote is yours.’
Ivy kept her head down. Scars were hatched into the smooth brown of her skin. The marks of Rephaite cruelty. I remembered her so clearly from the first night in the colony, with her electric-blue hair and trembling hands. She had been the most fearful of all of us, this woman who had helped sell other voyants into slavery; who had been with me in the darkest time; who had survived to cast a light on the corruption.
I had also spent years grafting for a mime-lord whose true nature I hadn’t known. I had carried out his orders without question. If I could work in the service of a traitor and end up as Underqueen, I had no right to deprive Ivy of a place in the syndicate for committing the same crime.
‘I have to find you guilty.’
She didn’t flinch, but Wynn did.
‘Under my predecessors, a crime like this would have been met with the death sentence,’ I continued. Wynn stood with a screech of chair legs. ‘However . . . these are exceptional circumstances. Even if you had known about the trade with Scion and sought help, you would have found none from the Unnatural Assembly. I also believe your crimes have been punished enough by your time spent in the penal colony of Sheol I.’
The scrabbling started again. Tom leaned towards me.