In her fingers there appeared a shilling, flipping silently across her knuckles. She held it up, turned it in the glow.
“There are two sides to everything that is,” she said quietly. “A facing side, and a hidden side, if you will. At any given time, it is so. But imagine that both sides are the facing sides. And that the hidden side is a third side, a side you never see. Inside the coin. The living and the dead are like the two sides of this coin. But there is a third side. And that is what these children are, these … talents.”
“What happened to speaking plainly?”
Mrs. Harrogate smiled. “Jacob Marber, who hunted you in New York, was a talent once, not so different from Marlowe or Charles. A dustworker. But he fell under the sway of a creature of malice and evil. It has had many names, but we call it the drughr. It is, or was … oh, how can I explain it?” She pursed her lips. “The talents, Miss Quicke, are like a bridge between what is living and what is dead. They exist between states of being. Between worlds, if you will. The drughr is a corruption of all that. A darker talent. The part of it that was living … is gone.”
“And what came after us in New York was a—”
“Jacob Marber came after you in New York. Not the drughr.”
“But he was doing its bidding?”
“He is its servant. Yes.”
“What does it want, this … drughr?”
“The children,” said Mrs. Harrogate simply. “It eats them.”
Alice, about to take a drink, froze with the teacup at her lips. She made an angry noise in her throat, halfway between a laugh and a growl.
“Understand, the drughr is not a creature of the flesh. But still it can decay. Its being must be … sustained. When it is strong enough, it will be able to walk in this world unmolested, it will be able to feed on the talents, both young and old.”
“This is madness,” Alice whispered.
The older woman frowned. “It’s been thirty years since I felt what you’re feeling. I forget how peculiar it all seemed, at first.”
Alice looked away. She was remembering her first encounter with Harrogate, in the hotel room, when she’d been recruited. She was trying to understand how any of this fit with what she’d been told then. And then she remembered something.
“My mother,” she said, picking her words carefully. “You said it was because of what happened to her, what she saw, that you … sought me out. You said—” Alice swallowed. “You said you knew about it.”
“Yes.”
“What my mother saw that day. When Adra Norn walked out of that fire, unharmed. Her … miracle. Was Adra one of your … was she like your orphans, a … a talent?”
Mrs. Harrogate smoothed out the skirts in her lap. “I’ve said too much already,” she said reluctantly. “Dr. Berghast can tell you more.”
“Dr. Berghast—”
“At the institute. He knows what happened at Adra Norn’s community.” Her hair fell across her face, obscuring it. When she spoke next her voice had changed, had stiffened, was colder and distant. “We leave for Cairndale in the morning. All of us. Mr. Coulton has suggested it is time you were told more of what we do. I agree. Come north with us. Ask Dr. Berghast yourself whatever it is you wish to know.”
“I’m not going to Scotland,” she said.
Mrs. Harrogate got to her feet. She was looking past Alice, and when Alice turned, she saw Coulton had come in, was watching in the gloom. She didn’t know how long he’d been there.
“Get some rest, Miss Quicke,” said Mrs. Harrogate, the teacups clinking in her hands, the bottle vanishing into her skirts. “I hope you will reconsider. The express departs early. It will not do to be late.”
When she was gone, Coulton gave a long low groan and came forward. He sat where she’d been sitting. He looked awful, she thought, his face gray and lined with exhaustion. “Sleep for a bloody week, I could,” he muttered. He managed a smile. “But it’s good to see you.”
Alice watched him. “You and Harrogate not talking now? Is that it?”
“We’re good.” Coulton pinched his eyes shut in the lamplight. “Or will be. There’s just too much to say sometimes, it’s hard to get started. Bit of a disagreement about old Mr. Laster. I see Marlowe’s in one piece.”
“He’s better than Charlie.”
“Aye. The poor lad.”
“Marlowe’s taken a shine to him.”