Reserved for the Cat

and hate and rage washed over her, so thick it was a bitter taste in her mouth and a lash to her back, with terror putting wings on her feet.

She didn’t remember reaching the stage door, only that she found herself babbling to the doorman and a crowd of people who had run to the door at the sound of her screams. She thought she was saying something about a man attacking her, but her mind was so filled with fear that she scarcely could put two sensible words together. The doorman in his turn left her in the care of the wardrobe mistress and summoned four stagehands, leading them out in a wrath-filled group into the alley while the wardrobe mistress plied her with brandy and water and sent one of the boys for Nigel. The wardrobe mistress, under any other circumstances a crusty old dame with a formidable temper, put an arm around her shoulders as motherly as her own Maman could have been. “Here, sweetheart,” she soothed, “now drink this down. Did he hurt ye? Hit ye? Thank God it wasn’t dark out there—”

She shook her head and gulped down brandy that tasted salty from her own tears. “He wanted—he wanted —to kill me—” she babbled, as the terror slowly, slowly ebbed.

“I misdoubt it was killing he was after,” the woman murmured blackly, but at that point Nigel and Arthur came pounding up, with Wolf clinging like a limpet to Arthur’s shoulder. Without a word, Nigel scooped her up, as Arthur gave the wardrobe mistress orders that sent her scurrying determinedly away on some errand.

Things blurred for a moment, and she found herself on the couch in Nigel’s office, with Arthur peering into her eyes, Wolf still clinging to his shoulder and peering at her first with one eye, then the other. “Definitely psychic shock,” he pronounced, as she gazed up at him in bewilderment. “Honestly it is amazing she didn’t just freeze there in the alley and let him do—whatever it was he was going to do. Whoever he was.”

“He got away?” she gasped, panic rising in her again. “He got away?”

“Ninette!” Wolf barked, and flew down and bit her little finger, hard.

The physical pain snapped the panic, and the fear ran out of her like water from a cracked pot. She clasped her injured finger to her chest and stared at them all, unable to think, benumbed.

Arthur put his hands on her shoulders and shook her gently. “Ninette, it’s all right. At least it is for now. Whoever he is, he can’t get in here to harm you. Now tell us what happened.”

She gulped, reached for the glass of brandy that Nigel held out wordlessly to her and in halting tones, told what little she knew. “I cannot understand—” she faltered. “The horror—the fear—”

Nigel patted her hand, and Wolf rubbed his head apologetically along her wrist, but it was Arthur that answered. “Ninette, there is magic, and then there are the powers of the mind itself. It seems you have something of the latter.” He smiled encouragingly. “I do, too. I am about half magician and half mentalist. Tell me, have you been able to tell what the audience feels about you? As if you were feeling what they feel?”

She nodded slowly. “Mais oui. Since I came here to England, certainly. I am not sure about before—” But now that she thought about it, it did seem to her that she had always had a sense for who was friendly, who was not, and who might even be dangerous. She had just never thought about it very much.

Arthur nodded. “Probably talking with Thomas as you do has made all this stronger. And this man, whoever he is, has a similar ability. I don’t know why he hates you so much, but for you it was like someone with a megaphone shouting at you right into your ear. All you could feel was the hate and anger.”

“Oui,” she said slowly. “It felt like—like a blow.”

“It was a blow,” Arthur replied, and tapped her between her eyebrows on her forehead. “To your mind.”

“My head feels bruised inside,” she said, feeling dazed in a way that mere brandy could not account for.

“I am not surprised. Fortunately I have a remedy for that.” He smiled down at her. “You are going to take a refreshing little nap, and when you wake up, you will feel quite yourself again.” She felt his palm resting on her forehead, and suddenly her eyelids were too heavy to keep open. With a sigh, she surrendered to his will. After all, this was Arthur, and she had nothing to fear from him.

Nothing at all.

Nigel stared down at the sleeping dancer. “I never want to hear you denigrate your powers ever again, my friend,” he said soberly. “I certainly could not have done that, just now.”

Arthur shrugged. “Well, now we know what it is that she has that holds an audience,” he said pragmatically. “And it’s not a bad thing.”

“Not at all, you’ll just have to teach her control. And ethics.” Nigel turned away and paced towards the window.

“That’s hardly relevant at the moment. Who in bloody blazes attacked her?” Arthur picked up Wolf and replaced the bird on his shoulder. “Was it the Earth Master?”

Nigel shook his head. “No. The Sylphs are absolutely certain there is not a breath of Earth Magic, inimical or otherwise, around this building. Whoever it was has those mental powers, and nothing else, and for some reason he wants Ninette dead.” He turned away from the window, as a knock came at the office door. It was the chief of the stagehands, cap twisted between his hands, looking hangdog.

“Sorry, Mister Nigel, sir,” he said unhappily. “We lost him. He must’ve been faster as a ferret an’ twice as twisty.”

“That’s all right, Bob,” Nigel replied, though the man winced at the frustration in his voice. “It’s hardly your fault. Just tell the lads to be on the watch for him.”

“We will, sir,” the stagehand replied, and hastily made his escape. Nigel turned back to face Arthur, running his hand through his hair with agitation.

“First the Earth-Mage, then the other dancer, and now this,” he said with a touch of anger. “What next?”

Arthur could only shake his head.

22

NOT needing corsets, Nina never wore them if she could help it. So while the women all around her looked like marble monuments, she was able to undulate rather than walk, and lounge luxuriously rather than sit. This, apparently, was either very attractive to men, or made them acutely uncomfortable. Sometimes both.

The reporter had turned up at her flat—fortunately after she had awakened. Last night had been relatively good, despite the idiocy of her tool. She had decided that she would deal with him later, she had fed, though it was not what she would call a gourmet repast, and she was looking forward to unleashing another round of harassment via the newspapers in the next few days. She received her visitor leaning comfortably back in her velvet chaise, leaving him to take the uncomfortable chair with the itchy horsehair upholstery. She waved him languidly to it, and waited for him to tell her what the next barrage from him against the imposter would be.

But the reporter put paid to that idea.

“You lost it?” Nina said, incredulously, sitting bolt upright with shock. “You lost it?”

The reporter looked uncomfortable and indignant at the same time. “More like it was stolen,” he protested. “Along with a lot of my other papers, everything in my desk but my bills, things I was looking into for other stories. It took me this long to get my place cleaned up to figure out exactly what was taken. The thieves tore the whole flat apart looking for something, and it looks like in the end they settled for taking every scrap of paper that looked important.” He shrugged. “There are some stories I am pursuing that could cause scandal, perhaps even divorce. I expect that was what the thieves were looking for. They’ll most likely look through what they took and burn what they don’t want.”

“Why didn’t you keep these things locked away?” she snarled, her hands clenching and unclenching as she strove to control herself. “Are you so completely a fool? Why were they not in a safe?”

Now he looked angry. “Do I look like the sort of man that can afford a safe?” he snapped. “And even if I could, the landlord is so cheese-paring it would probably fall through the floor! Besides, what does it matter? You can send for more—probably better—bona-fides.” He gave her a superior look. “I told you that we needed those anyway. This time, get something I can actually use. Something a bit more convincing than photographs and impersonal letters.” His eyes glittered. “Letters from admirers would be the best. Especially things on letterhead with a crest. You can’t forge that.”

She glared at him. Give him letters from admirers now? And if she had been