window looking out over the Strand. I formed the thought that we could be there.
And we were.
Blackbird staggered, unbalanced slightly by the sudden return of gravity and space. She looked around, recognising where we were. We could see through the window that it had fallen dark outside.
She let out a held breath. 'How much time did we lose?'
I turned back, noting the change in her voice, realising that she had reverted to her older appearance, the one I had first encountered.
'Is something wrong?' she asked me.
'No. It's just I thought… never mind.' I tried to hide my disappointment that she'd chosen to change back.
'If we're going to meet Claire, it has to be as someone she will recognise,' she pointed out, reasonably.
'I know. I understand.' It made logical sense, but I wasn't any happier about it.
She approached me and lifted her mottled hand under my chin. It felt strange, as if her hands weren't hers somehow. It was an effort not to pull away.
'It's still me, Niall.'
'I know, but it's strange. I know it's you, still…'
'How much time do you think we lost?'
'I'm not sure. It couldn't have been long.' It had still been light in Shropshire, but we were further east here, so had we travelled into the dusk? Was that why it was so dark?
She grabbed my hand and started pulling me towards the stairs. 'Niall, you have no idea about time there, do you?'
'What do you mean? It's not late.'
'Not late? My watch says eleven o'clock. Which day is it?'
'What do you mean, which day?'
'I mean we left on Saturday. What day is it now?'
'It's still Saturday, isn't it?'
Blackbird pulled me down the stairs down to the corridor that led towards the street door. 'I shouldn't have let you do that.'
'But we're here, quicker than we would have been. Travelling on the Ways would have taken longer and been much more exhausting.'
'You don't even know what day it is. What if we've missed the smith?'
'We can't have, can we?' I followed her along the darkened corridor to the heavy door leading to the street. I felt a tingling sensation as her power swept out around us so we could exit the door unnoticed.
She pulled back the bolt and twisted the lock, pulling open the heavy door and letting me past before she followed me out onto the pavement. We stepped outside into the street and I waited while she locked the door behind us. Once the door was secure, she let the magic surrounding us dwindle away.
Cars were still rumbling down the Strand, though it was less busy than it had been when we were here before. A paleskinned guy in a duffel-coat, marking him out as a student, was walking towards us. Blackbird stepped into his path.
'Excuse me, do you know the time, please?'
He paused in his path and glanced at his wrist. 'It's just before eleven.' His accent marked him as a West Coast American.
'And it is Saturday, is it?' she asked him.
'Sure,' he said. 'It has been all day. Are you OK?'
'We're fine. Just making sure,' she told him.
He stepped past and walked on, glancing back with a puzzled expression and then shrugged as if to acknowledge the strange eccentricities of the English.
'We're in time,' she acknowledged.
'You see. I told you.'
'Niall, tell me truthfully, before I asked that man, were you sure what day it was? Really?'
I couldn't lie to her. 'No. I suppose not.'
'I shouldn't have assumed you knew what you were doing. We could have missed the whole thing.'
'It would have taken us almost as long to travel back on the Ways, especially if you take the walk into account.'
'Yes, but we could just as easily have ended up at next Tuesday and missed the ceremony.'
'We didn't, though, did we?' It was what she would have said to me in the same circumstances.
Blackbird turned to me, exasperation on her face. 'Do you know where the hospital is?'
'I have the name of the hospital. I think it's somewhere near Marylebone.'
'Then perhaps we should get a taxi. A cab driver should know where it is.'
'Won't that be uncomfortable?'
'We're not going very far and it's safer than other ways.'
She stepped to the edge of the Strand and hailed a passing black cab. It pulled across the traffic and drew up alongside us. I named the hospital to the driver and he gave us a curt nod, so we piled into the back.
The journey to the hospital took us down the deserted shopping streets, the lights still bright in the windows. As we came closer to our destination the shops gave out to offices and residential buildings. The cab turned left into a side street and pulled up by the kerb.
'Here ya go, mate.' The driver announced our arrival.
I paid him out of my diminishing cash and he rumbled away down the street.
'There. That wasn't so terrible, was it?'
'No, but I'm going to need more money soon.'
Trying to get more cash to bolster my diminishing reserves would be an interesting experiment, since I was sure if I used my cash card the police would know both where and when I had used it within minutes. They had already tried to track my phone, so the bank account would be the next logical step.
'We'll cross that bridge when we come to it,' she said.
It was an acknowledgement that if we could get to the ceremony then we would need to start thinking about the longer term. It brought home to me how little I had left. My life was in tatters and I was hunted by both the Untainted and the police. Still, if the re-forging of the knife went badly then there wouldn't be any future for me to worry about. I needed to focus on the task in front of me and set the consequences aside for later in the hope that there would be a later.
'Claire said there was security at the hospital.' I eyed the unguarded doorway as we approached, wondering what form that security might take.
'If they are on the alert for unexplained visitors and strange faces then we may have some difficulty reaching Claire, even allowing for the fact that I can make us less noticeable. We will need to know where they are in the hospital, though.
'What do you suggest?'
'Why don't you go in and use your charm. It worked at the Royal Courts of Justice.'
'Will you wait here?'
'Come back out here when you find out what's going on,' she called after me.
I walked across and up the steps through the front entrance into the well-lit reception. There were closed doors leading off to left and right at the back and a desk in the centre.
'Can I help you?' The middle aged lady sat behind the desk would look more at home in a corporate reception than a hospital.
'Yes, I hope so. I'm hoping to meet up with one of the visitors here. Her name is Claire Radisson. She's the clerk to the Queen's Remembrancer? I believe he's been admitted here and she's here with him. Would it be possible to see her?'
'I am afraid his visitors are restricted,' she told me.
'I'm actually here to see the clerk, rather than the patient himself, but it's quite difficult to contact her while her mobile is switched off in the hospital,' I explained. 'I need to collect some things and I understand she's been here since he was admitted. It's quite urgent.' I stressed the urgent part.
