The Serpent's Shadow

the street, waving wildly at a hansom cab just up the block. The driver looked vaguely familiar—was it the one that often brought Maya home at night? At any rate, he knew a desperate man when he saw one; he pulled up his horse long enough for Peter to fling himself inside, waited only to hear the address before shouting at his beast and giving the reins a mighty

shake to send it into a headlong gallop, cracking his whip over its head to urge it on. The cab lurched as the horse surged forward into the traces so eagerly it might have been a racehorse or a cavalry mount that had only been waiting for the opportunity to launch into a full-out charge. Peter clung to the inside of the cab like grim death; either the driver had guessed at the level of emergency from his face, or he was hoping for a handsome tip—which he would get— or both.

Probably both.

Hansoms were two-wheeled vehicles; this one not only bounced over the cobbles but occasionally went airborne for a moment as it hit a particularly large bump. People flung themselves out of their path as they careened headlong down the street, but they needn't have bothered; the driver and his horse showed a level of skill at judging the traffic ahead and the places that they could squeeze through that was positively supernatural. The horse was soon drenched in sweat, drops of foam and sweat flying from its mouth and neck as it pounded around a corner, yet it showed no sign of wanting to slacken its pace, and the driver never again touched his whip, which remained in its socket up beside him.

The torture of each hard bump and landing was nothing compared to the torture of his heart. His gut clenched; his heart was a cold lump of icy terror. The cab swayed wildly from side to side as the driver swerved around slower-moving vehicles. Mindful that he might need the man's services immediately after he got to Maya's home, Peter let go of one side of the cab and pulled out his notecase, extracting a tenner which he stuck in his breast pocket. He stuffed the pocketbook back in his coat, grabbing the side of the cab again as they cut around a corner on one wheel. A tenner was more than double the proper fare; the man and his horse weren't going to suffer for this.

At last the cab clattered down Maya's street, and pulled up to the door, the horse actually going down on its haunches and skidding to a halt. Peter thrust the money up at the cabby as he leaped out, then had a second thought, and called 'Wait a moment!'

He pulled out his notecase again, and scribbled a note to Almsley. At this hour, his Twin would still be sleeping the sleep of the idle rich in his Piccadilly apartment. He extracted another note and thrust it and the note with Peter's address on it at the cabby.

'Give this to Lord Almsley's man,' he said, already turning away. 'Tell him it's an emergency.'

'Roight yew are, guv'nor!' the cabby said, and before Peter had even touched the door, was off, his horse again at the gallop, drawing on reserves of strength and stamina that Peter would never have expected.

The door flew open as he turned back around; it was Gupta, who uttered an inarticulate groan, and gestured him inside. Peter pushed past him.

He didn't have to ask 'where'—there was a small crowd crammed into Maya's office and spilling out into the corridor. It was all of Maya's own household, neighbors—

The sight of one of them, a girl in shabby satins, triggered another brainstorm. He knew her only from Maya's description, but he had no doubt who she was, and he grabbed her by the elbow. She rounded on him. fist pulled back and clenched to strike, eyes red, hair disheveled, and face streaked with dirt and tears.

He grabbed her wrist before she could hit him. The wiry strength in it didn't surprise him. 'Norrey!' he hissed, and she started back, eyes going wide, at the sight of a strange man dressed like a 'toff' who knew her name. 'Listen to me—you have to do something for us. Maya needs your help, and she needs it now.'

'But she's—' the girl burst into tears, and Peter let go of her wrist, seized her shoulders and shook them until her teeth rattled and she pushed him away, angry again.

'No, she's not!' He was certain, as he was certain of nothing else, that whatever had happened to Maya, she was not dead yet, no matter what this girl might think. Her shields were all still in place, and her magic was still a presence that would not have been there if she was dead. But overlying it was another magic, an inimical force that might well kill her unless he could somehow find its source. 'I know who did this to her, but I don't know where they are, and if we're going to help her, I have to find that out!'

Norrey's tears stopped as if they had been shut off, and her expression warred between doubt and hope. 'But—'

'You get your friends, and you get the word out, girl!' he said fiercely. 'The people that did this are Hindu, Indians like Maya and Gupta. They'll have taken a place somewhere that they think they won't be noticed. There'll be a lot of them—mostly men. You might think they're thieves; they aren't, but that's what they'll move and act like.'

Norrey's eyes narrowed in concentration as he described the look and habits of dacoits as he recalled them from India. 'Now, do you think you can pass that on? We need to know where they are quickly, Norrey, the quicker the better.' He took a risk, and lowered his voice still further. 'This is magic, Norrey, black, evil magic; we have to find the people who are doing it and stop them, or they will kill her by midnight!'

' 'f they be in th' city, Oi'll winkle 'em out!' Norrey said, with the fervency of a vow. She wriggled out of his