Chapter Text
Irene slunk through the dark streets, trying not to be noticed by people going about their day-to-day lives. It was a thin line between looking suspicious, and being surreptitious, but she thought she was treading it just fine.
There were footsteps. Irene told herself for just a few seconds that it was coincidence when they turned to same corner not long after she did, but the success of her mission hung by too tenuous a thread to take such a risk.
She wouldn’t be going straight to the Corkman tonight. They would have to meet without her. She couldn’t risk leading a spy so close to their lair. The key information Irene had been about to deliver would have to wait until she’d lost him, however long that might take. She hoped that Sam would not be too worried when she didn’t arrive at the Corkman, but knew she’d understand the precautions that must go with a successful revolution.
Irene ducked inside the first bar she saw open. She was in a shady part of town, but there was no way to lose her tail unless they were convinced she had reached her destination for the evening, and that that destination was not a seditious one. ‘On Top’ read the sign on above the door, though Irene doubted the bar was at the top of anything, unless it was a list of top ten bars you were likely to be knifed in.
“Hey,” said the man behind the bar. He was lean and well-muscled, with short-cropped dark hair and a charming smile. Irene momentarily forgot her mission. “Can I get you anything?”
“Just a cordial, thanks. Elderflower,” said Irene, pulling her eyes away from his. She had to keep her head clear to focus on the mission, especially with this set back.
She took in the room while she waited for her drink, flicking her eyes back to the door to note anybody who entered just after her. If she had a tail, they would surely be more subtle than that, but she kept her eyes out all the same. You couldn’t be too careful.
It was several minutes later, and Irene had settled into a dark corner of the bar, nursing her elderflower cordial, when he entered the bar. She knew at once that it was him, although she couldn’t say what gave him away. He was tall and dark-eyed, most of his face obscured by a curtain of midnight hair, but beneath a neat beard his face was young. He didn’t look like a threat to the cause, but Irene wouldn’t be alive today if she didn’t know that looks can be deceiving.
Irene sipped her drink and leaned back against the wall, trying to look as though she were casually waiting for a date to arrive, not protecting the secrets of a society sworn to die for the freedom of the nation.
The newcomer approached the bar and leaned against it, his eyes scanning the room all-too-casually as he waited for the barman’s attention. They passed straight over Irene, but she knew that he had seen her. It only remained now to discover what his mission was – whether she was to be captured, killed, or simply followed – and to ensure that it wasn’t carried out, before she could safely make her way to the Corkman, and deliver the information.
She could feel him watching her whenever she looked away – intense dark eyes cutting across the room, pinning her in place, trapping her away from where she needed to be. She would need only a second to get away, but it was a second she didn’t have. This man, whoever he was - and whoever he was working for, for that matter – was good. He bought drinks, he chatted with the other patrons, and he never, for one moment, let her out of his sight.
She may have heard his footsteps, thrown his attempts to discover their meeting place, led him into this bar, but Irene was starting to feel that he had somehow orchestrated that. As the evening drew on, she noticed the meaningful looks passing between him and the bartender. They were subtle, and to anyone without Irene’s years of experience in reading every glance, every movement, for hints to purpose and allegiance, they would have gone unnoticed.
By the time she was halfway though her second drink, Irene knew she had walked into a trap. It would only be a matter of time before it closed around her.
Irene got to her feet. It was time to act, while there were still enough other people in the bar to act as her cover. Taking her drink with her, she strode across the room. If she could force them to act before they were ready, while the bar was still crowded, she might be able to slip through their clutches.
The tall, dark-haired man stood at one end of the bar, closer to the door. The bartender was at the other, serving customers. As Irene rose, she saw them exchange a look. The bartender raised his eyebrows. She thought she saw the tall man give a slight nod. Reluctantly, Irene placed her hand on the hilt of the stiletto dagger she wore concealed beneath her clothes.
Both men began moving from either end of the bar towards her. Irene tightened on hand on her dagger, and knocked the patron next to her. He stumbled, spilling his drink, and Irene did the same, her glass crashing to the ground and shattering around her, splashing the man with elderflower cordial. “Oi, watch where you’re going!” he growled. Irene ducked quickly out of his field of view, and nudged someone else forward in her place. With any luck, the man would be too drunk to notice, and the ensuing fight would keep at least the barman occupied, leaving her with just one of the two to deal with.
But when Irene glanced out of the corner of her eye to check how the two men were reacting, she found that the distraction had drawn the attention of neither of them. They were leaning toward each other from either side of the bar, heads so close together that their foreheads were almost touching. “Tell me I haven’t been misinterpreting your glances all night,” said the bartender quietly.
Well, Irene thought, clearly I have.
The tall man was silent for a moment, and the bartender stepped back. “I’m sorry,” he said. “I didn’t mean to make assumptions.
“No.” The tall man shook his head. “No, you’re not making assumptions. Not at all. I’ve just… I’ve just never seen anyone like you before. Perhaps when you’re not working sometime…”
Taking her cue, Irene quietly slipped out the door.
“Jason, no, bad!” Sam snapped, without taking her eyes off the drinks she was pouring.
Jason looked sheepishly at the tall glass on the table in front of him, which had just refilled itself at the snap of his fingers. “I’m paying,” he protested, and with another snap of his fingers Sam felt the purse at her belt grown heavier.
“But nobody else knows that,” Sam retorted. “They’ll think I’m letting you siphon it off without giving me any money.”
Jason sighed, snapped his fingers one more time, and placed the coins that had appeared in them in Sam’s hand. “Thank you,” she said, and slips them into her purse.
Jason placed an elbow on the bar, and leaned across to Sam. “She’s late,” he said, in a low voice.
“Do you think I haven’t noticed?” Sam asked. “Go out the back and start the meeting. I’ll send her in when she turns up.” Sam didn’t say if. She’ll turn up eventually. They haven’t had a death for… nigh on two years now.
The night drew on, and Irene didn’t appear. Sam fiddled nervously with the studs in her ears, and wiped the bench over again. Irene would be here any minute now, she told herself. She’d just taken a circuitous route to make sure she wasn’t being followed. It was a dangerous world out there, and you couldn’t be too careful.
The last customer left the bar, and Sam had to give in to the sinking feeling in the pit of her stomach. Irene wasn’t coming to the meeting. Pushing away all the awful scenarios already playing out in her head, Sam locked the door and left the bar for the kitchen, and thence to the back room, the threshold from her life as the owner of an ordinary tavern to that of a revolutionary, working tirelessly to bring about a better world.
The meeting was well underway when Sam entered the room. “Look, what I’ve been saying all night,” Phoebe was saying, “Is that we need better intelligence. You’re supposed to be a wizard, Jason. Can’t you do something more useful than summoning alcohol? Can’t you summon us some kind of superspy?”
“We’ll have the intelligence we need,” said Cass quietly, “Just as soon as Irene turns up.”
The room feel silent. Nobody said what Sam knew they were all thinking – that Irene might never turn up. It was a shadow that hovered in the back of their minds every time someone was late, every time someone decided making the meeting that night was too much of a risk. Until they had overthrown their oppressors, it would be a fear that never went away.
On the other side of the closed door behind her, Sam heard the kitchen door creak open. Footsteps across the floorboards. She held her breath, and swallowed hard, turning to face source of the sound. Though she didn’t like to carry a weapon, she’d started carrying a small knife when this lot had set up base in her back room. She was glad of it now.
Behind her, she could hear the revolutionaries picking up drinks, laughing, ensuring they looked like a drunken party that hadn’t wanted to leave when the tavern closed, not the freedom fighters they truly were.
“Hey!” Sam called through the door, “You’re a little late, aren’t you?”
“Sorry,” came the response. “I got held up by Ralph.”
At the familiar countersign, Sam felt the room around her relax. “We thought they’d got you,” she said.
Irene looked at Sam seriously. “They almost did.”