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Lucy stepped through the doorway to the Orpheus Society’s reading room and felt her breath hitch, like a hand was squeezing her lungs. She was ambushed by a vivid memory of the last time they had stood in this room, when Penelope Fittes had offered a semi-hostile takeover of Lockwood & Co. They hadn’t known who she really was at the time, of course, but they had all bristled at the offer. Lockwood had rejected it out of hand, politely and with aplomb, as was his way. They had been blissfully unaware of how lucky they were to have gotten out of the room with their lives. And their souls.
The room had been turned into a temporary field office, filled with bustling UPRA personnel. Montague Barnes himself stood near the fireplace and Lucy was relieved to see that the picture of Marissa Fittes had been removed from above it. To have her staring down at them as they undid all her hard work would have been too spooky, she thought. And that was saying something coming from a girl who regularly talked to ghosts.
Lockwood and George stepped in behind her and she could feel them on either side without even looking. The weight of their combined presence was an achingly familiar reassurance that they had all made it through, that they were still intact, at least mostly. The wound in Lucy’s side still hurt if she twisted or moved too quickly. George bore a few faint bruises from the beating Gale’s men had given him. And while Lockwood looked for all the world to be untouched by the events of recent weeks, beneath his crisp white shirt, Lucy knew that he carried several shiny new ectoplasm scars along his arms, souvenirs of his reckless charge through the Hall of Pillars to get to her.
Lockwood’s shoulder brushed against Lucy’s as he took the lead, striding confidently across the room, into the thick of the action. She would never get tired of watching him like this.
“Commander Barnes,” he said, using Barnes’ new title as head of UPRA. “Lockwood & Co. are at your service.”
“For a well-negotiated consulting fee, I believe,” Barnes said, barely glancing up from his paperwork.
“Well, this is quite a special circumstance, sir,” Lockwood replied smoothly. “We have unique experience, both with the Society and with the particular influence of Ms. Fittes. On top of which you require a certain level of discretion–”
“Screw discretion,” interrupted Barnes, and now he fixed each of them with his trademark glare. “This is top secret and if any of you breathe a word of this to anyone I will have the whole lot of you arrested.”
Oh my, thought Lucy. Someone is feeling tetchy this evening.
Lockwood nodded and shut up. He knew when it was unwise to poke the angry badger. Not that he always refrained from doing it anyhow, but at least he knew.
“That includes you as well, Miss Bonnard.” Barnes looked past them and Lucy turned to see that they had indeed been joined by the fourth member of their little team for the evening. Flo was lounging against the arm of a very fancy looking sofa, hip cocked, arms crossed, looking as out of place as a welly on a supermodel.
Holly and Kipps had both refused this job point blank. George had as well and Lockwood was ready to tell Barnes to pound sand, but Lucy had decided that this was something she wanted to do. Lockwood, never to be outdone in the recklessness department, had changed tack and haggled mercilessly with Barnes over their consulting fee. George had grumbled and groaned, but he wasn’t about to be left behind. He had apparently mentioned it to Flo, despite it not being clear that she was one of the few people not covered by their ironclad NDA, and she had insisted on joining as well. So now they were a quartet.
“Right you are, Inspector,” Flo said with her signature cheeky grin.
“Wade has the paperwork for you all to sign,” said Barnes. “Once you do, we can begin.”
They signed the paperwork and in due course were led downstairs to the Orpheus Society basement. They had expected to see it, had been told it was there, but the gate to the Other Side was still a shock to the system. The moment they walked through the heavy iron doors at the bottom of the stairs Lucy was hit with a blast of psychical energy, buzzing against her nerves like a chainsaw.
This gate was smaller than the one in the basement of Fittes house that they had stumbled out of a month earlier, but no less permanent. A steel bridge crossed a deep pit, filled with swirling and shifting ghosts. Lucy could pick out the individual forms of phantasms, spectres, wraiths, even a limbless, all glowing with powerful Other Light in the aura of the pit. The walls of the room were covered with iron strips, explaining why they hadn’t felt anything at all while they were upstairs.
Lucy glanced to the side and saw that Lockwood, already wearing his sunglasses, was still forced to shield his eyes with one arm.
“I take it from your reactions that the gate is, indeed, active,” Barnes said, coming up behind them.
“What was your first clue,” said George sarcastically.
“Yes, it’s active,” Lucy rasped. “Very active.”
“Well then, I suppose you know what to do,” said Barnes.
They did. Lockwood, George, Flo and Lucy got suited up in the Orpheus robes (though Lucy still preferred her Spirit Cape) and fortified themselves for the passage through the gate. That is, they drank tea from a thermos that Holly had packed and downed a load of biscuits. They didn’t plan to be gone long, but they knew that time could do funny things on the Other Side.
The bridge over the pit was narrow enough that they were forced to go one at a time. Lockwood’s hand found Lucy’s and gave it a quick squeeze before he started across. She looked over at George, who nodded seriously, and Flo, who grinned in excitement – this was her first time and boy was she in for a shock – then Lucy followed Lockwood to the Other Side.
The nausea hit as she stepped through the gate, sending her to her knees for several subjective minutes. Lockwood stood beside her, breathing shakily. Where was George? As soon as she could pick her head up, she looked around and spotted him on Lockwood’s other side, doing some kind of controlled breathing technique with both hands on his belly, his breath steaming in the frigid air. Flo was standing next to him and while she didn’t seem to be in any great distress, she was also not moving an inch. Her stomach was probably as strong as they came, but there’s only so much one can do to resist the weird slip of gravity that comes with a trip to the Other Side.
Lucy swallowed the bile that had been trying to rise in her throat and stood up. She popped a stick of gum in her mouth, then offered gum to Lockwood and George and they each took a stick. Flo popped a licorice candy, sucking on it noisily. They stood there, chewing and sucking for a bit, acclimatising to the subtle wrongness of the Other Side.
For all they could tell, they were still in the basement of the Orpheus Society. There was the pit, with its intense aura. There were the iron rings set into the floor around it and the steel panels on the walls. The only real difference between this side and the other was the lack of warm bodies. Aside from theirs, of course.
Once they’d settled their stomachs, they did a circuit of the room, then headed up the stairs. Lockwood was in the lead again, carrying one of the strange weapons they’d found upstairs, and that George was very certain was designed to work on spirits. Or quite certain at any rate. Or well, he had a good feeling about it and wanted them to test it out if they got the chance.
But they didn’t get the chance. The house was eerily silent, no creaking or settling of the old building, no echoes of their footsteps on the carpeted floor, no distant thrum of traffic or hum of electrical lines. They saw no one and nothing until Lucy happened to glance out of a window in the library on the first floor. The Orpheus Society had set up barriers of silver all around the house, the same sort of fences they’d seen in Trafalgar Square.
“Guys, come look at this,” she called softly. Lockwood came to peer over her shoulder, Flo and George sharing the next window over.
“Defences,” Lockwood said with a note of satisfaction. “I figured they must have done something like this. The denizens of the Other Side are drawn to living beings like moths to flame. If they were venturing out through here regularly, they would have wanted to have a safe position to fall back to when the locals got uppity.”
Lucy tried very hard not to think about how close she and Lockwood had come to being caught that first time in Aldbury Castle. She glanced up at him, still standing at her shoulder, but the hood of the silvery robe hid his features. She longed to trace the outline of his profile, his long nose and expressive lips. More than anything, she wanted to kiss those lips, over and over again, to know that he was real and alive and hers.
He looked down at her and their eyes connected. Heat began to creep up the back of her neck and across her cheeks. Sometimes she was afraid he could look into her eyes and read her thoughts off the inside of her skull. Other times she hoped he would.
“Alright, Luce?” he asked softly, his voice sending a warm tingle up her spine.
“Fine,” said Lucy, pleased that her voice was much steadier than she felt.
“Is that a ghost?” Flo asked, pulling her attention back to the window. A shadowy figure walked along the street, then stopped and turned in the direction of the Society’s house, tilting its head up toward the second floor where the team stood.
“It’s a spirit, yes,” said George. “Looks like it can sense us through the silver, even if it can’t cross through.”
“And you’re sure it can’t cross through?” Flo asked. She didn’t sound nervous, but then she rarely did.
“Quite sure,” said George. “Well, I think we’ve learned all we can here. We’ve confirmed beyond a shadow of a doubt that the gates map to their exact location in Other London. We know that this side is secure for UPRA to send their scientists through. They’ll want to consider whether they need both gates active or if they can dismantle one. I would still like to test one of those ghost weapon packs, though. Maybe if we–-”
“Yes, I agree that we’ve done what we set out to,” Lockwood said quickly before George could suggest taking pot shots out the window at spirits walking by, or something equally insane, for science. “We should head back.”
The foursome walked slowly downstairs. Not because they were dawdling, but because it took tremendous energy to move any faster. For once, they were in no hurry.
Lucy emerged from the gate into a world of warmth and light and nausea once again. This time there were UPRA medics standing ready to wrap her in wool blankets and pull her out of the gate room. One medic who looked to be a woman of a motherly age, though Lucy was never entirely sure with adults, handed her a lollipop. The sour cherry flavour steadied her nerves and calmed her heaving stomach.
Lockwood was sitting only a few feet away, his back to the wall. Lucy scooted close enough to loop her arm through his. He went rigid for only a moment before he relaxed, and she leaned her head on his shoulder. He had thrown off the silvery robe and she could feel the firm solidity of his muscles through his cotton dress shirt. She didn’t want to admit how much she needed to feel that right now. How much she needed to feel him.
They had just come back from the literal Other Side. She hoped that nobody would have any reason to think her behaviour was anything other than exhaustion on her part. She was just leaning on an associate after a harrowing experience, that was all. Yeah right.
He shifted imperceptibly and Lucy sprang back immediately. No, she didn't feel at all guilty or self-conscious about the way she was behaving toward Lockwood, why would anyone think that?
Lockwood stood up as Barnes approached and they walked off a little ways to talk. Barnes was nodding, his expression serious, not that it was ever anything else. George had struck up a conversation with a couple of UPRA scientists, leaving Flo and Lucy still sitting on the floor, backs to the wall. Flo had her legs splayed out in front of her, muddy boots waggling back and forth.
“That sure was a trip,” she said. “That sky was something else.”
“Yeah,” Lucy said slowly. She’d had many nightmares about that sky.
“I guess I’d be willing to go again,” Flo said musingly. “It’s no colder than a winter night on the Thames so long as we’re wearing the robes. Georgie had me thinking it was going to be a lot worse.”
“You really didn’t find it horrible and disturbing?” Lucy asked incredulously.
“Oh sure, it was. But like, no more so than normally horrible and disturbing, you know? I’ve been paid a lot less to do a lot worse, I can tell you that.” Flo waggled her boots some more and sucked on her lollipop. Lucy thought she probably didn’t need it for the nausea. She just liked sweets.
“Barnes will be pleased to hear that, I’m sure,” Lucy said dryly. She’d heard from George that Barnes and Flo had had quite a long talk a couple of weeks after the fall of Fittes. He’d pulled her file and gone to find her down by the river. Which said something about Barnes, given how busy he must have been with everything going on at the time, between cleaning up Fittes and setting up UPRA.
He’d spoken to Flo about getting a stipend for housing from the Fittes fund and getting her into counselling. She’d rejected the first offer out of hand, but he’d pressed hard on the second. Eventually they had come to an arrangement where Flo would attend counselling and be able to pick up stipend cheques for agents injured on the job. In turn, Barnes agreed to turn a blind eye to her living situation and line of work, at least for now. George was quite pleased with the outcome. He was of the opinion that Flo wasn’t ready for a permanent roof over her head and it would do no good forcing her.
Lucy and the others were thoroughly debriefed, then a UPRA van drove the four of them back to 35 Portland Row. The sun was coming up by the time they climbed the front steps. What had felt like only twenty minutes to them on the Other Side had taken a good six hours on this side. Lockwood said that Barnes had been debating sending in another team when they finally reappeared.
Flo joined them for a quick breakfast of tea, toast and soft boiled eggs. It wasn’t much, but to Lucy’s way of thinking, when you were looking at dawn from the wrong direction, it was just the thing. Especially when she ate it in the comfortable and familiar surroundings of Portland Row.
The food was reduced to crumbs and eyelids were beginning to droop when Flo slapped her legs and stood up. “Well, I’ve gotta split.”
George suddenly sat bolt upright. “Flo, you promised,” he said, a faint note of reproach in his voice. Lockwood and Lucy exchanged a glance. What was this?
“Honestly, Georgie, I feel fine.”
“Journeys to the Other Side are well documented to cause fatigue and nightmares,” said George. “When the adrenaline runs out you’ll collapse. Where would you rather be when that happens?”
“I’d rather be somewhere where I can see the sky,” Flo said, crossing her arms.
“I’ll leave the window open.”
“It’s not the same.” Lucy noticed that while Flo’s chin was thrust out stubbornly she wasn’t meeting George’s eyes.
“Then I’ll come out to Mathilda with you. Or you can sleep in the garden. I just don’t think it’s a good idea for you to be on your own.” Lucy's gaze bounced back and forth between them, like she was watching a tennis match. George might be on the defensive but she suspected he had the upper hand.
Flo paced the kitchen, head down, evidently searching for a counter argument in the shiny new linoleum floor. George waited. He was a surprisingly patient hunter. Flo passed the back door and her eyes flicked toward it. George must have seen it, because he stood up, crossing his arms implacably.
“You promised,” was all he said.
Flo threw her hands up in the air. “Fine, whatever, I’ll try and see if I like it. But if I can’t sleep, I’m off.”
George held the kitchen door for her and she stomped past him. He turned and followed her, not even bothering to wish Lucy and Lockwood goodnight.
Lockwood let out an explosive breath, his eyes wide. It had been quite a match.
“That was unexpected,” he said.
“What, them sleeping together?” Lucy frowned. They’d been taking things slow, but this didn’t seem too wildly out of the way of things. They probably were just sleeping, after all.
“No, Flo giving in on something.”
Ah, well that was a good point. Lucy stood and started to clear up the breakfast dishes. Lockwood hesitated only a moment before starting to stack plates. Holly had been so busy with their schedule and fielding all the press requests over the past month that they had been forced to start helping around the house more. Even Lockwood.
Lucy started washing dishes while he tidied up the table. She liked this sort of quiet domesticity. Working in tandem, without need for words. At times she felt like she and Lockwood communicated best when they didn’t speak at all. As he passed behind her in the small kitchen, she felt his arm brush against her back and she nearly dropped the dish she was washing. He really had no idea what those sort of casual touches did to her. Or perhaps he did.
“Do you think she’ll stay?” Lucy asked, her voice only a tiny bit squeaky in her own ears
“Yes, I expect so,” he said, glancing back the way the pair had gone. “George is very persuasive.” He looked contemplative for a moment, then, “Maybe I should ask to use your bathroom for a couple of days.”
“Well, I suppose technically they’re all yours,” she said. “It is your house.”
“You know, that’s true,” he said, smiling as he leaned against the counter next to her. “But I would hate to impose.” His eyes, however, were dancing. If Lucy hadn’t been up to her elbows in soapy dish water she could have reached out and grabbed his tie, dragging him in for a long, heated kiss. But they were and she didn’t. She just thought about it way too hard for a few seconds.
Finally, Lucy cleared her throat and turned back to the plate she had been scrubbing absently into oblivion. “Next thing I know you’ll be asking to share my attic to get away from their wild, monkey-sex noises.”
“They won’t make wild, monkey-sex noises.”
“How much are you willing to bet on that?” she asked, looking at him askance, He was still leaning against the counter, his long legs crossed at the ankle, his muscles all lithe and lean and supple. No, stop that, she thought, giving herself a mental shake and focusing on the dishes. There were only a few more to go.
She heard the rustle of his shirt as he moved. Then both his hands whispered from her shoulders down to her waist and she gasped. His voice tickled her ear, low and husky. “Are you offering?” he asked.
She twisted her neck to look up at him. His eyes were deep, endless pools. She could drown in their depths. He brushed his lips against hers. They were warm and smooth and tasted like tea. He pressed them more firmly against hers and she melted into the kiss.
After a moment though, she broke the contact. Her neck was hurting and her hands were still soapy.
“Lockwood, I…” she began.
“I know,” he said. “I’m sorry, I’ve been wanting to do that all damn night.”
“I just need to finish washing two more cups and then we can go upstairs, alright?” she said.
“Sure,” he said, though his hands remained at her waist. “I was serious about sleeping in your attic, though.” He pressed a kiss into her shoulder, then several more butterfly kisses up the side of her neck.
“Damnit, Lockwood,” she giggled and shook him off. “Two more cups! Just keep it in your trousers until then, alright?”
He laughed, and finally released her. “Alright, alright. Speaking of trousers, I need to get my pyjamas. How about I meet you up there?”
“Yes, sounds great. Grand. Terrific, even.” Lucy’s brain may have gone a bit fuzzy from all the kissing. Lockwood tended to have that effect on her.
Ever since he’d kissed her on that walk in the evening light, with his mother’s sapphire pendant hanging around her neck, they had taken every opportunity to do so again. It felt like they were making up for lost time, even as they tried to take things slow.
They weren’t allowed to kiss in front of George, since he’d told them he didn’t appreciate the view and had been quite vocal about what he thought of the noises. And they had agreed not to do it in professional settings. The possibility of getting distracted at the wrong moment just wasn’t worth the risk. But the rest of the time they seemed to find each other like magnets drawn inexorably together, touching, kissing, caressing. Lucy really couldn’t blame George. The truth was, they had become basically unbearable to be around.
This was a step they hadn’t taken yet, actually sleeping in the same bed. It had Lucy feeling a bit giddy as she hastily finished up the last few dishes. They would need to set some ground rules, of course. If they didn’t, Lucy thought she might have trouble keeping her hands to herself and they might not get much actual sleep. And who could blame her, really?
With a grin she couldn’t seem to keep off her face, Lucy dried her hands and traipsed up the stairs to find Lockwood.