R. J. Anderson

Swift

Prologue

‘You could always make it look as though you had wings,’ said Jenny, her voice echoing off the granite walls of the treasure cavern. ‘A little glamour, just for tonight- ’

Ivy let the delicate wing-chain slide through her fingers, spilling it back into the chest. ‘I’m not that good with illusions. Cicely can cast better glamours than me, and she’s five years old.’ She shut the lid with a snap. ‘Anyway, why bother? I’m not going to fool anyone.’

Jenny looked pained, but did not argue. Already she was growing into a beauty, with the sturdy bones and warm complexion that all piskeys admired. Her wings were no less striking, all grey-white ripples above and a blush of pink beneath. She didn’t need jewellery to make herself look fine.

Ivy, on the other hand, had inherited her mother’s pale skin and small, spindly frame. No matter what she wore, Jenny would always outshine her. But Ivy didn’t care about that. She wouldn’t mind if she were ugly as a spriggan, if only she’d been born with wings like Jenny’s.

Or indeed, any wings at all.

Suppressing her envy, Ivy blew the dust off another chest and heaved up the lid. ‘What are these? Pipes?’ But no, they were too shiny for that. Unusually large armbands, perhaps.

‘That’s armour,’ said Jenny in hushed tones. ‘It must be a hundred years old.’

Ivy had heard of the ancient battles between the piskeys and their enemies, but she’d never seen armour before. Daring, she slid her arm into one of the guards and held it up to the light. But of course it looked silly on her; it had been meant for a warrior, not a skinny girl-child. She dropped it back into the chest.

‘Girls, it’s almost time.’ The soft voice came from Marigold, Ivy’s mother. There were shadows beneath her eyes, and the wan glow of her skin barely lit the archway in which she stood. She’d been working too hard again, no doubt, helping the other women prepare for the feast to come. ‘You’ll have to hurry.’

‘I’m done,’ said Jenny, touching the topaz pendant at her throat. ‘I was just helping Ivy a bit.’ She nudged the younger girl affectionately. ‘I’ll see you later.’

Marigold stepped aside to let Jenny pass, then moved to Ivy. ‘What’s the matter?’ she asked. ‘I thought you’d like to pick out something special to wear to your first Lighting. Do you want me to help?’

Her mother meant well, Ivy knew. But her tastes ran to the pink and glittery, and that wouldn’t suit Ivy at all. ‘No, it’s all right,’ she said. ‘I’ll find something next time.’

She expected Marigold to lead the way out, but instead her mother lingered, fingering Ivy’s black curls. ‘You’ve grown so much these past few months,’ she murmured. ‘My little woman. Are you frightened, to go above?’

‘Not really,’ said Ivy, truthfully. She had made Jenny tell her everything she could remember about her first two Lightings, so she would know what to expect and no one could trick or scare her. It was her only defence against her brother Mica and the other piskey-boys, who would be trying all night to catch her in their pranks.

‘Not afraid of anything?’ asked her mother. ‘Not even the-’ Her voice caught. ‘The spriggans?’

No wonder people said Ivy’s mother was flighty. She was always worrying these days, even when there was nothing to fear. ‘They won’t come,’ said Ivy. ‘Not with Aunt Betony there to protect us.’ Betony, her father’s sister, had recently been crowned as the new Joan the Wad — the most powerful, important piskey in the Delve. It was her task to surround the Lighting with the same wards and glamours she used to protect the mine from intruders, and Betony never did anything carelessly.

Ivy picked up the trailing end of Marigold’s flowered shawl and draped it back over her shoulder. ‘We can go now,’ she said. ‘I’m ready.’

As Ivy followed her mother through the tunnels towards the surface, she was glad for the lights of her fellow piskeys heading in the same direction. Not that she was afraid of losing her way even in the dark, for Ivy knew most of the Delve’s twists and turnings by now. But the tunnels were magnificent, and it would have been a shame not to see them.

Every passage carved by the piskey miners — or knockers — was unique, from the polished granite of Long Way where Ivy’s family lived, to the delicate mosaics of plants and animals on the walls of Upper Rise, where she and the other children sat for lessons. But Ivy’s favourite tunnel was the one they were walking through now, lined with tiles of deep blue china clay. Her father had told her once that it was the colour of the sky, and when no one was watching her, Ivy would run through it with her arms outstretched and pretend that she was flying.

Which was what Jenny and the other girls would soon be doing — spreading their wings and launching themselves up the crude but useful shaft that the humans had dug out long ago, before the mine was abandoned and the piskeys moved in. The Great Shaft was the quickest route out of the mine, and if it weren’t for Ivy, Marigold would surely have flown to the Lighting that way herself. But now the two of them could only plod through the tunnels to the surface, like the men.

Humiliation curdled in Ivy’s stomach. What crime had she or her parents committed, that she’d been born wingless? Her magic might not be as strong as some piskeys’, but it was good enough: she could make herself tall as a human or tiny as a mole, even turn herself invisible if she didn’t mind a bit of a headache afterwards. But something had gone wrong with Ivy’s making while she was still unborn, and she’d come out with nothing but a pair of bony nubs between her shoulders where her wings should be. And neither Yarrow’s healing potions nor the Joan’s most powerful spells, it seemed, could change that.

Though not long ago, Ivy’s mother had said something about her own wings not being right when she was young… or had that been a dream? Ivy had been struggling all day to remember, but every time she tried her head began to swim.

Perhaps she was just tired. After all, she’d been looking forward to the Lighting so much, she’d hardly slept last night.

‘We’re almost there,’ whispered Marigold, taking Ivy’s hand. After the twisting bends of the Narrows and a climb up the Hunter’s Stair, they had reached the Earthenbore, a tunnel of packed clay baked to hardness by the power of the Joan herself. Ivy had never been this close to the surface before, and her pulse quickened as she followed the other piskeys into the passage.

At the first junction they turned right and began to climb again, the tunnel narrowing and the floor rising steeply as they neared the exit. The air smelled earthy, sweet with heather and bracken and the scent of blossoming gorse — plants that until now Ivy had only ever seen cut and tied in bundles. What would it be like to walk among them, to see them living and growing all around her? It was hard to imagine, but in a moment she wouldn’t have to. She would know.

‘Look at her big eyes,’ snickered one of the younger piskey-boys, nudging his companion, and Ivy stiffened. Just like Keeve to tease her at a time like this. He’d be calling her Creeping Ivy next.

‘Ivy’s always got big eyes,’ said the taller boy, elbowing him back. ‘Shut your mouth.’ He glanced at Ivy and gave her a shy half-smile before ducking out the archway into the night.

And that was just like Mattock, always looking out for the younger ones. She thought of her little sister Cicely, tucked into her bed with a sleeping-spell that would keep her there until morning. Last year Ivy had been just as oblivious to the celebrations taking place above her head, but it was her time now. She would not cling to her mother, like a baby; she would step out boldly, as the others were doing. Ivy pulled her hand free of Marigold’s, plunged forward…

And with a crackle of undergrowth and a last wild thump of her heart, Ivy was outside.

As she stepped out onto the surface of the world, the scrubby grass crunched beneath her feet, and a dry rustling filled her ears as the breeze — the first she had ever felt — stirred the gorse and bracken that surrounded the tunnel entrance. Underground the air was still, but here it danced around her, teasing and tugging her from every side. She turned a slow circle, trying to accustom herself to the strangeness of it, as her hair tangled about her face and her skirts swirled against her knees. Then she looked up — and her mouth dropped open in awe.

Jenny had tried to describe the sky to her, and she’d heard the droll-teller mention it in his stories. But what words could capture the grandeur of a roof that stretched out forever, too high for even the mightiest giant of legend to touch? It should have terrified Ivy to stand beneath that vast purple darkness, with the innumerable stars burning white-hot above her and the moon like a crucible of molten silver. But it only made her feel quiet and very, very small.

Then there was the landscape, just visible beyond the patches of waving bracken and bristling tufts of gorse that walled her in. It had no walls to contain it, only a few tangled hedges interspersed with the occasional tree. And those white, square shapes away to her right…could they be human dwellings? Even at piskey size — about the height of a grown human’s knee, or so the droll-teller claimed — Ivy could have walked to one of those houses.

‘Come,’ said Marigold, taking Ivy’s arm as the piskey men led the way up the slope. ‘We mustn’t keep the others waiting.’

The old Engine House stood at the top of the ridge, its broken chimney jutting into the sky. Even after a century of neglect its walls held strong, but their tops ended in nothing but air; the roof had crumbled away long ago. Two of its windows still gaped like empty sockets, but the others were long smothered in a mass of the same plant that had given Ivy her name. From a distance the ruined mine building looked desolate, even haunted.

But that was an illusion, meant to keep intruders away. In reality the place was anything but neglected, for the piskeys of the Delve had been using it as their feasting and dancing ground for decades. They’d piled rocks and soil beneath the lone doorway to make it easy for their people to climb in and out, and smoothed out the precipitous drop in the floor. Now the Engine House was filled with light and festivity, as the piskeys of the Delve bustled about setting up chairs and laying the tables. On the far side of the dancing green her father Flint was tuning his fiddle, while Mica and the other piskey-boys played a game of chase-the-spriggan around the pile of wood that would soon become their wakefire.

‘I’m going to talk to Nettle,’ said Marigold, drawing her shawl closer around her shoulders. ‘Jenny’s over there; why don’t you go and see her?’

‘I will in a minute,’ said Ivy, surprised. Lately Marigold had been staying close to Ivy whenever there was a crowd, in case she felt sick or needed anything. But perhaps her mother had finally understood what Ivy had been telling her for months — that she could manage perfectly well on her own, and there was no need to fuss over her.

She watched her mother make her way to the bench along the far wall where most of the older piskeys were sitting, chatting comfortably to one another. What would Marigold want with Nettle? The old woman had attended the previous Joan and managed to outlive her, and since then she’d been serving Betony as well. But other than that, Ivy knew little about her.

‘Boo!’ yelled a voice, and Ivy let out a shriek as Keeve leaped in front of her. ‘Got you!’ he said, grinning.

Disgusted, Ivy pushed him away and headed towards Jenny. But Keeve affected a wounded expression and fell into step beside her.

‘I just wanted you to notice me, that’s all,’ he said. ‘Pretty Ivy, won’t you dance with me tonight?’

Ivy faltered. The wicked glint in Keeve’s eye had vanished, and his expression was earnest as she’d ever seen it. ‘Do you…you don’t really mean that, do you?’ she asked.

Keeve chortled. ‘Got you again!’ he said, and scampered off.

Ivy ground her teeth. Most piskeys loved pranking, especially the younger ones — and especially on nights like this, when the one who played the most successful pranks would win a prize. But she’d never liked being tricked, or trying to trick others either, and she wished her fellow piskeys would leave her out of it.

‘There you are,’ said Mica, jogging up to her. He was growing broad and strong like their father, his black hair thick over his forehead and his eyes dark as cassiterite. ‘Did you see the giant?’ He pulled Ivy over to the doorway and pointed into the distance, where a pair of baleful lights swept the landscape. ‘See his eyes glowing? He’s looking for piskeys to eat…’

This time, Ivy was prepared. ‘Oh, no!’ she exclaimed. ‘And let me guess — those flashing lights I just saw overhead? They must be wicked faeries spying on us!’

Mica scowled. ‘Jenny told you.’

‘Well,’ said Ivy, ‘it’s not my fault you play the same trick every year.’

Her older brother sighed. ‘Fair enough. You know what those lights are, then?’

‘Human things,’ she replied. Not that she’d ever seen a car or an aeroplane, or had any clear idea how they worked. But everyone knew that there was nothing to fear from the Big People; most of them didn’t even believe in piskeys any more.

‘Keeve and I have a bet on,’ said Mica. ‘He says as soon as he becomes a hunter, he’s going to disguise himself as a human and get a ride in one of those cars. I told him they’ll never stop for him, but he thinks all he has to do is-’

‘All gather for the Lighting!’ bellowed a voice, and the rest of the conversation was forgotten as Ivy and Mica hurried to find a seat. Mica wriggled his way in between Keeve and Mattock, while Jenny patted the bench beside her and leaned closer as Ivy sat down.

‘Wait until you see this,’ she whispered, nodding at the far side of the circle where the Joan stood with her consort by her side. ‘I can’t believe she’s your aunt.’

Betony was a strongly built woman with hair as black as Ivy’s, though longer and not so curly, and their kinship was evident in the angles of her cheekbones, her pointed chin. With grave dignity she extended her arms over the woodpile…

And flames exploded from her hands.

Ivy jerked back, nearly upsetting the bench in her shock. She’d known that the Joan would light the wakefire, but she’d never expected her to do it like this. Jenny patted her shoulder, reassuring, while Betony lowered her blazing palms to touch the kindling. The twigs glowed bright as molten copper, and soon the whole heap of wood was alight.

‘All hail!’ shouted the piskeys together. ‘Hail Joan the Wad!’

Wad was the old Cornish word for torch, and until now Ivy had thought it just a ceremonial title. But no, her aunt could literally conjure fire from the air. How had Betony learned to wield such amazing power? ‘You never told me,’ she said, turning reproachful eyes to Jenny.

‘Of course not,’ replied the older girl, smiling. ‘Surely you didn’t want me to ruin all the surprises for you?’

Around them, the other piskeys were getting up and moving closer to the fire — not for warmth, but for light. This was their opportunity to replenish the natural luminescence of their bodies, which would serve them better than any lamp in the dark tunnels underground. As Ivy stood to join them a tingle ran over her skin, and her lips curved in a proud smile. Now she too would glow when she returned to the Delve, and she could go anywhere she wanted.

Where was her mother? She should be here, sharing this special moment. On the other side of the wakefire, her father Flint nodded and returned Ivy’s smile — but Marigold was nowhere to be seen. Was she still talking to Nettle? No, Nettle was with the Joan, pouring piskey-wine into a bowl for the next part of the ceremony.

Probably Ivy’s mother had just forgotten something underground, and gone to fetch it. Or maybe she just wanted to make sure Cicely was safely asleep. After all, she’d seen the Lighting many times before, and the fire would burn all night. Telling herself it was childish to feel hurt about it, Ivy returned to her seat.

The rest of the evening passed in a blur, one magical moment dissolving into another. Ivy ate and drank and laughed with Jenny and the others, watched the dancers whirl and leap to the music of her father’s fiddle, and basked in the light of the wakefire until her skin could hold no more. Finally, tired and happy, she tumbled down by the old droll-teller’s feet with the other children, and lay half-drowsing while he told stories.

As usual, all the tales revolved around a single theme: how clever piskeys of the past had outwitted their enemies. The first story was about a foolish human miner who tried to trick the knockers out of their treasure and ended up with nothing but a sore knee — all the children laughed at that. Then came the tale of a faery who met a wandering piskey-lad and tried to allure him into marrying her, a dark and sinister tale that made Ivy hold her breath. But fortunately, the boy saw past the faery’s pretty face to her cold heart and escaped.

‘Yet wickedest and most deadly of all,’ said the droll-teller, bending close to his audience as though telling them a secret, ‘are the spriggans.’

The younger children squirmed and cast uneasy glances at the doorway as the droll-teller went on, ‘Like us, spriggans can change their size at will, and they love to play magical tricks. But they’re the ugliest, skinniest, most maggoty-pale creatures you can imagine, and all their pranks are cruel.’

It wasn’t the first time Ivy had heard about spriggans, but still the description made her shudder. She could picture them lurking in the darkness all around the Engine House, rag-wrapped monsters with glittering eyes and long bony fingers, waiting for the first careless piskey to pass by. And not only to frighten them, either. Her father had told her that spriggans were hungry all the time and would eat anything — or any one — they could catch.

‘Spriggans love treasure,’ the droll-teller continued, ‘but they’re too lazy to dig for it. So in the old days when we piskeys lived in villages on the surface, the spriggans would wait until the knockers went off to work in the mine — and then they’d attack.’ His voice dropped to a dramatic whisper. ‘They’d kill the guards and the old uncles and even the youngest boy-children, and cast a spell over all the women that would make them think the spriggans were their own menfolk. Then they’d settle in to feast and gloat over their treasure.’

Ivy’s nose wrinkled in revulsion. It was horrible to think of being caught and eaten, but to be tricked into living with a spriggan as your husband was even worse. She was wondering how such a dreadful tale could end happily when Mattock spoke up from the back of the crowd:

‘But then the knockers would come home and find the spriggans there. Wouldn’t they?’

‘They would, indeed,’ said the droll-teller. ‘Tired as they were, they’d pick up their hammers and their thunder-axes and fight. Sometimes they lost the battle, though more often they won, because a good knocker is braver and stronger than three spriggans put together. But even once all the spriggans had been killed, their evil spells were so strong that the knockers’ wives and daughters didn’t recognise their own menfolk any more. Instead they’d weep and wail over the ugly spriggans — and they’d accuse the knockers of being spriggans instead!’

The girl beside Ivy whimpered and buried her face in her hands. Ivy didn’t feel like crying, but she did feel a little queasy. She was glad when Mattock raised his voice again: ‘But the spell would wear off in a few days, isn’t that right?’

By then the droll-teller seemed to realise he’d gone too far. He patted the weeping child and said, ‘Yes, surely it would. No magic lasts forever, after all. But it wasn’t long before some of the piskeys decided they’d had enough, and that it was time to make a new home for themselves deep in the rock and earth, where their enemies were too cowardly to follow. And that’s how the Delve came to be.’

He smiled and sat back, as though this was the happy ending. But Ivy wasn’t satisfied yet. ‘What about the other piskeys?’ she asked. ‘The ones who didn’t go to the Delve?’

‘The spriggans went on attacking them,’ said the droll-teller, ‘just as before. But now those other piskeys only won the battle sometimes, and before long they hardly won at all. They were too proud to ask the folk in the Delve for help, you see. So they fought alone, and most of them died. But once our people heard of a piskey village coming to grief, we sent our bravest fighters to rescue the women and children and offer them a safe home with us. So the Delve grew and the other clans of piskeys became smaller, until we were the only piskeys left.’

On the far side of the circle Mica sat up eagerly, as though he could hardly wait to become a hunter and fight spriggans. Mattock looked solemn and a little troubled. Keeve, meanwhile, appeared to have fallen asleep — but that was no great surprise, since the droll-teller was his grandfather and he must have heard all these tales a hundred times.

The droll-teller launched into another tale, but by now Ivy was too tired to enjoy it. She searched the crowd for her mother, but there was no sign of her. And now her father had gone missing as well, for his chair was empty and his fiddle propped idle against the wall.

‘Mica,’ she whispered, leaning across to her brother. ‘I’m going back to the cavern.’

‘What for? It’s not nearly daybreak yet.’

‘I want to make sure Cicely’s all right.’ And their mother too, though Ivy didn’t say it. Surely something unusual must have happened, to keep Marigold away from the Lighting so long.

‘Well, you can’t go now,’ said Mica. ‘Not by yourself. You’ll just have to wait for the rest of us.’

Much as it galled Ivy, he was right. The closest entrance to the Earthenbore was well down the slope, too far for any woman or child to go alone. And it was no use asking Mica or Mattock to go with her; they hadn’t even got their hunter’s knives yet, let alone learned to use them. Sighing, Ivy leaned her elbow on a jutting stone and dropped her head against it. She was slipping into a doze when a cry from the other side of the Engine House shocked her awake. Was that her father shouting?

Mica was on his feet and running, pushing through the crowd. The music had stopped and all the dancers stood frozen, staring at the doorway. There stood Flint, his hair dishevelled and his face a mask of anguish, cradling a bundle of fabric against his chest. He stumbled forward and dropped to his knees.

Ivy scrambled over the green and flung herself down beside him. ‘Dad, what is it? What’s wrong?’ Then she saw the cloth that her father was holding. It was, unmistakably, her mother’s shawl — but now the pink roses were splotched with ugly gouts of red, and one corner was in tatters.

‘Stand back,’ commanded Betony, and the crowd parted to let the Joan through. She swept Ivy and Mica aside and stooped over her brother. Then she straightened, her expression grim.

‘The Lighting is over,’ she said. ‘Everyone into the Delve. Now.’

At once the piskeys scattered, abandoning half-finished plates and cups of wine, gaming boards, musical instruments, and even shoes and jackets in their haste. Shouts of ‘Hurry!’ and ‘Watch out!’ rang through the night, as the knockers snatched up their thunder-axes and the hunters drew their knives. Mica grabbed Ivy’s arm and hauled her towards the doorway, but she struggled against his hold, crying, ‘Dad!’

‘Don’t be stupid,’ snapped Mica, giving her a shove. ‘The Joan will look after him. Move!’

Ivy stumbled out onto the hillside, tears burning her eyes. ‘Mum,’ she sobbed, but there was no answer — and though her gorge rose at the thought, she knew why.

Her mother had been taken by the spriggans. one

Five years later

Ivy stood poised on her toes like a dancer, but there was no merriment in her face as she pulled the iron poker from its slot by the hearth and raised it high. A few paces away, a black adder twice her length squirmed across the cavern floor, blood oozing from the gash on the back of its head that should have killed it — but unfortunately, hadn’t.

Why hadn’t Mica cut the snake’s head off before he brought it down from the surface? He’d been hunting for four years now; he should have known better than to assume the adder was dead. But he’d been in such a hurry to get to tonight’s Lighting, he’d merely stuffed his catch into a bag, tossed it through the cavern door and left. And worse, he hadn’t even tied the sack properly, so now Ivy had to finish off the snake herself.

There was no use shouting for help. Not that her neighbours wouldn’t be willing — they’d always been glad to lend a hand whenever Ivy could swallow her pride long enough to ask for it. But by now even the last stragglers had left their caverns and were hurrying towards the surface. In fact, if this wretched snake hadn’t poked its head out as Ivy was getting dressed, she and Cicely would be running right along with them.

‘Oh, Ivy, hurry!’ Her little sister crouched at the edge of her bed-alcove, only her head poking between the curtains. ‘We’re already late!’

‘Stay where you are, Cicely,’ warned Ivy, edging closer to the snake. ‘I’ll be done in a minute.’

Mind calm and hands steady, that was the way. She mustn’t think about what would happen if the snake bit her; she just had to strike as quickly as she could. The wedge-shaped head turned towards her, tongue flickering out to taste the air And with one savage two-handed blow, Ivy smashed the poker down.

The adder’s body whipped into a frenzy, tail lashing around so fast it nearly knocked Ivy off her feet. She leaped backwards, holding the poker ready for another strike. But gradually its convulsions subsided, and Ivy let out her breath. The snake was dead.

‘You can come out now,’ she said to Cicely, dropping the poker with a clang onto the polished granite. The floor was a mess and the adder meat would spoil if she left it sitting, but there was no time to fret about that now. ‘Let me finish getting dressed, and we’ll go.’

‘It’s no use,’ moaned Cicely, knuckling her eyes. ‘We’ll never get through all those tunnels in time.’

‘We’re not going through the tunnels,’ Ivy said, pulling up her breeches. The dress she’d been working on for months still lay across the foot of her bed, but she could hardly climb in that. ‘I know a faster way. Come on.’

‘ Please hurry!’ Cicely hovered next to Ivy, her dappled wings fluttering with agitation. ‘They’ll be lighting the wakefire any minute, and Jenny says it’s the best part!’

Ivy dug her fingers into the next handhold, hauling herself up the side of the Great Shaft with stubborn will. She didn’t pause to explain that she was already climbing as fast as she could; excuses were for the lazy, or so Aunt Betony always said.

Though if it hadn’t been for Mica’s carelessness, she’d have got Cicely to her first Lighting in plenty of time and found her a good seat into the bargain… But if dwelling on what should have happened made any difference, Ivy would have sprouted wings long ago. She set her jaw and kept climbing.

‘Oh, it’s not fair,’ wailed Cicely, as sounds of music and laughter drifted down from above. ‘Ivy, let me go ahead, I don’t need a light, there’s plenty of room-’

‘You can’t fly the Shaft blind,’ said Ivy firmly. True, compared to the piskeys’ own neat tunnels the Great Shaft was enormous. But there was a cap of concrete and metal over the top, and if Cicely didn’t see it coming she’d knock herself senseless. ‘When you’ve got your own glow, you can go ahead if you want. But right now, you stay with me.’

Cicely whimpered, but made no further protest. Ivy reached for a grip and pulled herself up again, her muscles trembling with the effort. By rights she shouldn’t be climbing the Great Shaft at all, and if anyone found out she’d be in serious trouble. It would have been safer to go through the tunnels — but that would have taken twice as long, even if she and Cicely were running. And besides, it gave Ivy a private thrill to know that she alone, of all the piskeys in the Delve, could climb like this.

At last her groping fingers brushed wood, slimy and rough with age. She had reached the old ladder. Ivy hooked one arm over the bottom rung and gazed up at the half-rotted wood and rusted metal before her, chewing her lip in consideration. Once this ladder had carried human miners down the shaft to their day’s work. Then the tin mine had closed, and its shafts were caged off to keep careless humans from falling in. Now and then some idle passer-by shoved a stick or a stone between the bars and let it drop, but apart from that no one had touched this ladder in well over a century. She’d have to make herself human size to climb it, but would it hold her weight?

Well, she’d soon find out. Ivy took a deep breath and willed herself to grow.

It would have been easier if she’d practised first. The shift in size threw her off balance, and she grabbed the next rung just in time. But she had no time to waste on panic. The moment her body stopped tingling she was on the move, scrambling for the top of the shaft. ‘We’re nearly there,’ she gasped to Cicely. ‘It’s not too-’

‘All hail Joan the Wad!’ came a muffled shout from above them, and the top of the shaft flared with golden light. Cicely’s face crumpled. ‘We missed it.’

Guilt and frustration tumbled like rocks in Ivy’s stomach. She’d done her best, but it hadn’t been good enough. There’d be another Lighting at midwinter, but what consolation was that to Cicely now? And as usual Mica was to blame but he’d never admit it, and Cicely would never dream of reproaching him. Not the older brother who brought her berries and bits of honeycomb, and gave her piskey-back rides around the cavern. In Cicely’s eyes, Mica could do no wrong.

‘Well,’ said Ivy, and then she couldn’t think of anything else to say. She reached for the next rung, and continued climbing towards the surface.

‘People of the Delve, be welcome,’ Betony declared, with a disapproving glance at Ivy and Cicely as they crept to a seat at the back of the crowd. She took the copper bowl from Nettle’s hands and raised it high, so that everyone around the wakefire could see it.

‘This is the draught of harmony,’ she declared. ‘Let us drink and be one in heart, proud of our heritage and true to our ancient ways, so that enemies can never divide us. A blessing on the Delve, and a curse on faeries and spriggans!’

‘A curse on the spriggans!’ the others chorused — and Ivy loudest of all. The very mention of those filthy creatures made her burn inside, an old ember of rage and bitterness that would never go out. First they had taken her mother from her, and if that weren’t bad enough, they had stolen her father as well.

Or at least they might as well have. After Marigold disappeared Flint had spent days blindly wandering about the countryside, until the Joan took away his hunting privileges and confined him to the Delve for his own safety. Since then he had done little but work in the mine, hammering away night and day with his thunder-axe. He seldom spoke, and never laughed; he ate the food Ivy cooked for him without seeming to taste it, and slept poorly when he slept at all. He still came to every Lighting, but only long enough to replenish his glow. And he never played his fiddle any more.

‘Curse them,’ Ivy whispered, but Cicely remained silent, her eyes on her lap. Guilt pricked Ivy again, and she gave her sister an apologetic squeeze before reaching for the copper bowl now making its way around the circle. The draught inside was clear as spring water, sparkling lights dancing across its surface; Ivy tipped the bowl and drank a mouthful before helping Cicely to do the same.

‘Oh, it’s wonderful,’ breathed her little sister, surfacing with flushed cheeks and wide brown eyes. ‘I had no idea piskey-wine was so nice. Can I-’

‘Not until you’re older,’ said Ivy, and handed the bowl on. Cicely’s lower lip jutted, but she seemed a little less gloomy as the drink passed from one piskey to another and finally made its way back to Betony, who poured the dregs hissing into the fire.

‘And now,’ the Joan proclaimed, ‘let us eat!’

At once Ivy and Cicely jumped up, following the other piskeys towards the long tables. All Ivy’s favourite dishes were here tonight — from pasties stuffed with rabbit and chopped roots, to roasted woodlice with wild garlic, right down to the thick slabs of saffron cake waiting on a platter at the far end. And to drink there was spring water and chilled mint tea, as well as several bottles of the sparkling piskey-wine — though it would be another year before Ivy was old enough to drink more than a small cup of it, and Cicely was too young to have any more at all. But that scarcely mattered with so many other good things to enjoy.

As they ate, Ivy glanced at Cicely and was relieved to see her sister’s mood improving with every bite. Soon she was chattering to Jenny and giggling at the faces Keeve made at her across the table, and Ivy’s own spirits began to rise as she realised she hadn’t entirely spoiled her sister’s first Lighting after all.

But then she glimpsed Mica strolling by with plate in hand, and her smile faded. There he was, relaxed and dressed in his Lighting best — and here Ivy sat with her breeches and her bare grimy feet. The old aunties gave her pitying looks over their shoulders, and she could practically hear what they were thinking: What a shame young Ivy can’t take proper care of herself, especially when her brother and sister look so fine. But she’s always been sickly, and with no mother…

‘What’s the matter?’ asked Cicely around a mouthful of saffron cake. ‘You look like you’ve eaten gravel.’

‘Never mind,’ said Ivy. ‘It’s nothing you need to worry about.’

‘One-two-three-four!’ called the crowder, and the musicians struck up a lively tune that twanged Ivy’s muscles and tugged at her bones. As a child, she’d been too shy and short of breath to dance in public. Even when all the other children were skipping about, she’d hung back and pretended she didn’t care. But Marigold had seen through her diffidence, and as soon as they got home she’d held Ivy’s hands and skipped around the cavern with her until the two of them collapsed in a giggling heap on the floor.

Marigold hadn’t worried so much about Ivy’s health in those days; she’d told Ivy that her lungs were just a little slower to grow than the rest of her, and they’d soon come right. And she’d promised Ivy that one day she’d be able to dance just as well as any piskey in the Delve, if not better.

Well, now Ivy could. But not to this tune. This was a flying dance, where the males tossed the females high in the air and stepped to one side as their partners fluttered down, and Ivy could not have taken part even if someone had asked her. She walked over to Cicely, who was watching the dancers with the same wistful longing, and sat down by her side.

‘What is it?’ she asked. ‘Don’t you want to dance?’

‘I don’t have a partner,’ said Cicely glumly. ‘And it’s already started.’

Ivy jumped up and thrust out both her hands. ‘Then dance with me,’ she said.

‘Me and you? But you’re-’

‘Stronger than I look,’ said Ivy, grabbing her little sister under both arms and heaving her into the air. Cicely let out a giggle, her moth-wings fluttering as she drifted back to earth — only to have Ivy whirl her around and toss her up again. Lifting her sister wasn’t nearly as easy as she pretended; Cicely was on the sturdy side, and Ivy’s muscles already ached from climbing up the shaft. But it was worth the effort to see those brown eyes sparkle, and hear Cicely’s squeals of delight.

No sooner had the Flying Dance ended than another merry reel took its place, and Ivy and Cicely kept dancing. The two of them whirled arm in arm beside the bonfire, Cicely stumbling over her own feet with laughter, until Ivy was winded and panting.

‘I’m done,’ she gasped, waving a hand. ‘I’ve got to sit down.’

‘Me too,’ said Cicely, collapsing beside Ivy with a happy sigh. Then she sat up again and said, ‘Is that the moon? I thought it was supposed to be round.’

Well, at least she wasn’t terrified. Ivy had seen more than a few piskey-girls shriek and hide their faces at their first glimpse of the night sky. ‘It is, sometimes,’ said Ivy.

‘It’s beautiful anyway,’ Cicely said. She ran a hand over the moss-covered stones. ‘Everything out here’s soft, and smells so good. I wish…’

‘What?’ asked Ivy, with a distracted glance over her shoulder. The place where her wings should have been had just tingled, as though someone were watching her. But the only thing behind her was the fire, and the benches on the other side were empty.

‘I wish we could do this all the time.’

Ivy gave a short laugh. ‘Do you have any idea how much work goes into a Lighting? Collecting enough wood to burn all night, and setting up the tables, and-’

‘I don’t mean that.’ Cicely tugged a loose thread on her skirt. ‘I mean…being here. Up above. The boys get to do it when they’re old enough, so why can’t we?’ But before Ivy could answer she made a face and said, ‘I know. Because of the spriggans.’

Gooseflesh rippled over Ivy’s skin. Had someone pranked her little sister into thinking spriggans weren’t real? Who would do such a terrible thing? ‘Cicely,’ she said, fighting to stay calm, ‘you know what happened to our mother.’

‘I know she disappeared,’ said Cicely. ‘And all they ever found was her shawl. But have you ever seen a spriggan? Has anybody? How do we know they took her, and not… something else?’

‘Like what? Giants?’ Ivy frowned. ‘Those are just stories, Cicely.’

‘No, not that. I mean that maybe…’ Her eyes slid to the doorway, and the darkness beyond. ‘Maybe she didn’t want to be with us any more.’

Ivy choked. ‘ No,’ she said fiercely, when she could speak again. ‘There is no way she would ever have left us like that. And spriggans are real, whether anyone’s seen one lately or not. Who put these ridiculous ideas into your head?’

‘He didn’t mean to,’ said Cicely, shrinking back. ‘I overheard him and Mattock talking, when they thought I was asleep-’

Mica again. Fury scorched through Ivy, and she leaped to her feet. Where was he? Her eyes raked the crowd until she spotted him by the far wall, one arm braced not-quite-casually against the stone as he coaxed one of the older girls to dance.

‘Stay here,’ she told her sister flatly, and stalked to confront him.

‘I need to talk to you right now,’ Ivy said as she stepped between Mica and his would-be partner, who gave a nervous titter. ‘Shall we go somewhere private, or do you want me to shout at you in front of everyone?’

For an instant Mica looked startled. Then his expression hardened. ‘If that’s what you want,’ he said, and with that he seized Ivy’s arm and pulled her out the door.

‘Are you mad?’ exclaimed Ivy, twisting back towards the light. ‘We’re not supposed to leave the Engine House!’

‘You’re safe enough with me,’ said Mica. He marched her down the path nearly to the bottom of the slope, then let her go. ‘All right, we’re private. What is it now?’

‘You!’ Ivy shoved him as hard as she could, too angry to care that he barely moved. ‘How dare you tell Cicely that our mother left us on purpose? How could you be so stupid?’

‘I didn’t tell her that!’

‘Maybe not, but you said it where she could hear you. Or are you going to deny that as well?’

Mica folded his arms and looked away.

‘You disgust me,’ said Ivy. ‘You never think about other people at all, do you? You get some slurry-brained idea in your head and you have to blather it to Mattock, no matter who else might be listening. And if spilling dross about our mother wasn’t bad enough-’

‘I wasn’t spilling-’

‘Now Cicely thinks there’s no reason to stay in the Delve, because spriggans don’t even exist!’

That struck a vein, if nothing else did. Mica paled, and now he looked worried — even frightened. ‘All right,’ he said. ‘I’ll talk to Cicely and set her straight. First thing tomorrow.’

‘Good,’ said Ivy grimly.

‘But I’m not going to lie to her, either.’

‘Nobody asked you to lie!’ Which was a good thing, because most piskeys could only tell a direct untruth if they were joking, and this was no laughing matter. ‘I’m asking you to stop being so careless, and take some responsibility for a change!’

‘Responsibility?’ Mica snorted, colour flooding back into his face. ‘That’s a fine speech from someone who showed up late, dressed in dirt and patches-’

‘I wouldn’t have been late if you hadn’t chucked a live adder through the door! What was I supposed to do, walk off and leave it there?’

‘Adder?’ Mica’s shock was convincing, as was the look of dawning fury that followed it.

But Ivy wasn’t about to be distracted. ‘And I wasn’t the only one who ended up late. Cicely missed the start of the wakefire, because of you. So don’t-’ She broke off, startled, as her brother shoved past her. ‘Where are you going? Mica!’

But her brother was already sprinting up the path, bellowing, ‘Keeve, you little spriggan! I’ll wring your neck!’ And before Ivy could call out again, he vanished inside the Engine House.

Ivy stared after him, appalled. He’d left her alone at the foot of the slope, well outside the circle of the Joan’s protective spells. How could even Mica be so reckless?

Still, the night seemed peaceful enough. Surely there was no need to call for help — that would only give her fellow piskeys more excuse to pity her. All she had to do was walk up the slope. It wasn’t that far.

Yet she’d only taken a step when her spine prickled with the same uncomfortable feeling she’d had in the Engine House, the sense of being watched by someone just out of sight. Her stomach knotted as she remembered how her mother had disappeared, so swiftly and silently that no one even noticed she was gone until it was too late…

Ivy blew out an exasperated breath. This was ridiculous. She wasn’t weak or helpless; she’d faced down an adder and won. There probably weren’t any spriggans lurking on the hillside, but even if there were a thousand, she wouldn’t give them the satisfaction of seeing her panic. She squared her shoulders and started up the path again.

‘ Ivy,’ said a voice behind her.

She stiffened, then relaxed. So Mica hadn’t left her alone after all. There was another piskey out here, probably one of the wood-gatherers or water-carriers for the Lighting, and they could walk back to the Engine House together. She turned, ready to greet him and explain — but the words died on her lips.

It was too big to be a piskey and too small to be human, a spidery figure wrapped in dark clothing. It wore a hood, no doubt ashamed of its hideous features, but no shadow could hide the sickly pallor of its skin, or the hunger in those glittering eyes.

Spriggan. two

If Ivy had wings, she might have been tempted to risk everything on a dash for the Engine House. But though she was quick on her feet, she wasn’t sure she could outrun a spriggan. Especially since he’d crept up behind her so stealthily that she’d never even heard him coming — if he could do that, there was no telling what else he could do.

She took a step backward, feeling the dirt crumble beneath her bare feet. All at once she was acutely aware of the hairs standing up on her forearms and the nape of her neck, the boom-boom-boom of her heartbeat, the stench of her own cold sweat. ‘How-’ Her voice wavered. ‘How do you know my name?’

The spriggan moved closer, teeth gleaming in the shadows of his hood. ‘That’s good,’ he said. ‘I didn’t even have to tell you not to scream. I think we’re going to get along very well.’

The amusement in his tone made Ivy feel sick. She could smell him now, a sharp dry scent like fir needles, and all her instincts screamed at her to turn invisible. But what good would that do? He’d still be able to hear her, and probably smell her as well. She retreated another step, groping with her toes for a loose stone, a clod of earth, a bit of gravel. Anything she could kick that might hurt him, distract him, buy her a few precious seconds to escape ‘Ivy!’ came a shout from up the slope, and the spriggan hissed a curse and darted away. Sagging with relief, Ivy turned to face Mattock as he sprinted down to her, his hair shining copper in the light of their shared glow.

‘Are you all right?’ he exclaimed. ‘When Mica came back without you, I knew something was wrong. But I didn’t expect to find you all the way down here!’ He seized her by the shoulders and gave her a shake. ‘What were you thinking?’

She’d nearly been captured by a spriggan, and he was giving her a lecture? Indignant, Ivy cuffed him across the head. Then she jabbed a finger emphatically in the direction the spriggan had gone.

But the slope was empty, its clumps of heather and bracken undisturbed. The only sign of life was a single tiny bird, fluttering towards the horizon.

‘I know what I saw,’ Ivy insisted as she and Mattock walked back to the Engine House. ‘It was a spriggan, I’m sure of it.’

‘Well,’ said Mattock, rubbing his ear where she’d clipped him, ‘if you’re that convinced, I suppose you’d better tell the Joan. But I wouldn’t mention it to anyone else.’

‘But if there’s one spriggan out there, there could be more,’ she said. ‘We have to warn the others-’

‘They’re safe enough inside the Engine House,’ said Mattock. ‘I’ll keep watch if it makes you feel better, but no spriggan’s going to take on a hundred piskeys at once.’ He quickened his stride as they reached the doorway, where Mica was leaning with a sour expression on his face. ‘Did you find Keeve?’

‘No,’ said Mica. ‘But when I do, I’m going to give him the thrashing of his life.’ His gaze shifted to Ivy. ‘What are you doing here?’

‘You left her down in the valley,’ said Mattock before Ivy could answer. ‘You’re lucky I was the one who found her, or you’d be explaining yourself to the Joan right now.’

‘ Left her?’ Mica said. ‘She’s got legs, hasn’t she? If she didn’t have enough wits to follow me up the hill, that’s not my fault.’ He straightened up, gave Ivy a contemptuous glance, and strode inside.

‘I hate him,’ said Ivy flatly.

Mattock put a hand on her shoulder. ‘He’s half-drunk, and angry at Keeve for pranking him. In a few hours he’ll think better of it.’

‘And I’ll still hate him then.’ She shook him off. ‘I’m going to find Cicely.’

Ivy found her little sister sitting by the droll-teller’s feet with the other children, listening raptly as he spun a tale about a tribe of piskeys who could magically leap from one place to another at will. Ivy had heard the story before and dismissed it as wishful thinking, like the legends that claimed her piskey ancestors had power to heal every kind of injury and disease, or that they could transform their bodies into any shape they wished. Surely, if her people had been able to do such wonderful things in the past, they’d still be able to do them now.

But the spriggan had come out of nowhere, and Ivy was beginning to wonder if there might be some truth to the old legends after all. Maybe piskeys couldn’t transport themselves from place to place with a thought, but what if spriggans could? It would explain how Marigold had vanished so quickly, and why they’d never found any trace of her but her shawl…

Suppressing a shudder at how close she’d come to sharing her mother’s fate, Ivy sat down next to Cicely. She couldn’t tell her sister what had happened, not yet: Cicely was in no danger at the moment, and it would be cruel to steal away her joy in her first Lighting. But if Mica didn’t talk to Cicely soon, or if he couldn’t convince her to take the threat of spriggans seriously, then Ivy would have no choice but to tell her. A few nightmares were a small price to pay for Cicely’s safety.

She glanced across the Engine House to where the Joan sat with her consort, Gossan — the Jack O’Lantern by title, though unlike his wife he wasn’t the sort to stand on ceremony. By rights Ivy ought to tell her story to him as well, for he was the leader of the hunters, and it would be his duty to direct the search if they decided to track the spriggan down. But right now he was engrossed in conversation with Keeve’s father Hew, while Betony was hearing a dispute between two of the women who’d done the cooking, and it would be difficult to talk to either of them without being overheard.

Maybe Mattock was right. Maybe Ivy should hold her peace until tomorrow, when she could talk to the Joan in private. After all, the spriggan was gone, and what were the chances of anyone finding him now?

‘Now then,’ said the droll-teller, sitting back with his bony hands on his knees. ‘What would you like to hear about next?’

‘Giants!’ piped up one eager listener, and ‘Gnomes!’ shouted another. Ivy, who was interested in neither, was about to get up and leave when Cicely called out, ‘Faeries!’

‘Ah, I can’t refuse a pretty lass,’ the droll-teller said. ‘Faeries it is.’ Some of the boys groaned, and he gave a chuckle. ‘No worry, lads, there’s something for you in this story as well. Let me tell you of the last great battle between the piskeys and the faery folk, many years ago…’

He went on to tell a story that even Ivy hadn’t heard before, about a time when the piskey clans of Cornwall — or Kernow, in the old speech — had banded together to defend their territory against an invading army of faeries. The fight had been long and bitter, with terrible magics wielded on both sides, but in the end the piskeys had won and the faeries had retreated to their own lands.

‘And after that day,’ he finished, ‘they never dared march upon our borders again. Once or twice a troop of them came sneaking across the Tamar, claiming some patch of woodland as their wyld and pretending they’d always lived there. But they soon thought better of it once a few of our boys paid them a visit, and now there’s hardly a faery to be found from Launceston to Land’s End.’

Which was probably for the best, Ivy thought. Faeries might not be as vicious as spriggans, but they were far too cunning and ruthless to be trusted. Still, she couldn’t blame Cicely for being curious about them, because they were said to be eternally young and beautiful, with graceful bodies and wings clear as crystal, and as a child Ivy had often longed to see a faery herself.

‘Where’s Mica?’ asked Cicely, as the droll-teller wandered off in search of a drink. ‘He said he’d play jump-stones with me — oh, there he is.’ She moved to get up, but Ivy caught her arm.

‘He’s in a foul mood right now,’ she said. ‘I’d leave him alone, if I were you. Why don’t we play a game instead?’

As usual, the Lighting ended with the first rosy glimmer of dawn. The last of the piskey-wine was poured out on the ashes of the wakefire, and the tables and benches whisked into storage. The Joan pronounced her blessing on the company, and with that all the revellers — yawning musicians and sore-footed dancers, pranksters and victims, knockers and hunters, aunties and maidens — headed back into the Delve for some well-earned sleep.

‘I’m telling you, it was a spriggan,’ Ivy said, as Mica laid the slumbering Cicely in her alcove. ‘If Matt hadn’t shown up when he did…’

‘And I’m telling you it was Keeve, hiding in the gorse-bushes with a tablecloth over his head,’ said Mica. He sat down on the edge of his bed and started pulling off his boots. ‘He did the same thing last year, remember? Jumped up behind the droll-teller and made everyone scream.’ He flopped onto the mattress. ‘I should have throttled him then.’

‘It wasn’t Keeve,’ said Ivy. Keeve’s eyes were black and bright with boyish mischief, nothing like the slate-grey stare that had so chilled her. ‘And I know what a tablecloth looks like. Why can’t you believe-’

But Mica’s eyes were closed, and a snore was bubbling up between his lips. He wasn’t pretending, either. Mica could drop off into a deep slumber in an instant, and Ivy, who often struggled to sleep, found it one of the most infuriating things about him.

Meanwhile, the adder’s body still lay in the middle of the cavern, its blood pooling on the granite. And though Ivy realised now that Mica wasn’t to blame, she resented him for not even offering to clean up the mess.

Flint wouldn’t be any help either, even if she’d had the courage to ask him. He’d left the Lighting early and his thunder-axe was gone from its place by the door, which meant he’d already slept as much as he needed to before heading off to the diggings again.

Resigned, Ivy crouched by the snake’s limp body, pulled the sack over its mangled head and started shoving the rest of it back in. She’d stick it in the cold-hole for now, and give it to Keeve once they all woke up — along with a good piece of her mind. Maybe then he’d think better of switching sacks on his fellow hunters, especially without making sure the snake was properly dead first.

The cavern was still quiet when Ivy woke several hours later, the only light her own glow reflected in its copper-tiled walls. It had taken her father years to refine all that metal and hammer it into shape, but he’d worked every spare moment until it was done. He’d also polished the floor to bring out every fleck and ripple in the granite, and as if that weren’t enough, he’d begun inlaying the stone with silver all around the edges.

He’d only finished half the cavern when Marigold disappeared. A few chiselled swirls continued where the silver left off, but they’d never been filled, and in the end Ivy had dragged an old trunk over those forlorn two paces of stone so she wouldn’t have to look at them.

She padded to the water-channel and washed her face and hands, then opened the clothespress she shared with Cicely and took out a sleeveless blouse and skirt. Closer to the surface the Delve could be cool, but not here, and where Ivy was going it would be warmer still. Once dressed, she studied herself critically in the mirror. Should she leave her shoulder-length curls down, as she usually did? Or would she look older and more serious with her hair up?

‘You look nice,’ said Cicely sleepily from her alcove. ‘Where are you going?’

Ivy put the mirror aside. ‘To talk to the Joan,’ she said.

‘What about?’

She didn’t like to frighten Cicely, especially since Mica hadn’t even had a chance to talk to her yet. But she couldn’t lie to her, either. ‘I saw a spriggan last night, outside the Engine House,’ she said in an offhand tone, hoping Cicely would assume she’d only glimpsed it from a distance. ‘It ran away before I could point it out to anyone, and Mica thinks it was only Keeve playing a prank. But I thought the Joan and Jack ought to know.’

‘Oh,’ Cicely said in a small voice, and Ivy could tell the news had troubled her. Well, maybe that was for the best — it would make it all the easier for Mica to talk to her when the time came. Ivy slid a copper arm-ring up above each elbow and pinched it tight, then stooped to kiss her sister’s forehead.

‘I’ll be back soon,’ she said. ‘Wish me luck.’

‘You’ll need that and a hammer to get Aunt Betony to listen to you,’ said Mica from his alcove. He swept the curtains aside and clambered out of bed, scratching his bare chest. ‘What’s for dinner?’

‘There’s plenty of adder in the cold-hole,’ said Ivy sweetly, and walked out.

As Ivy headed down the stairs to the next level, she was struck by how quiet the Delve was. Usually at this time of day there’d be children chasing each other through the corridors, matrons carrying baskets of laundry up from the wash-cistern, knockers returning from the diggings with their thunder-axes over their shoulders. But right now most of her fellow piskeys were still sleeping, and Ivy walked the passages alone.

Soon another set of stairs took her down to Silverlode Passage, where threads of the precious metal still shone bright against the granite. The tunnel was wider here, as it was one of the main thoroughfares of the Delve, and the most direct route to the cavern where the piskeys held their market. Yet even this passage was empty, which made Ivy feel lonely and strangely liberated at the same time. She appreciated the close-knit community of the Delve, where everyone looked out not only for their own interests but also for everyone else’s. But there were times when her fellow piskeys’ company became stifling, and it was a relief to be by herself for a while.

The Joan’s stateroom was at the far end of the Silverlode, the entrance marked by lit torches on either side — a sign that Betony was inside and ready to hear her people’s petitions. But the door was closed, and Ivy had to knock three times before anyone answered.

‘All right, all right,’ said Nettle’s gravelly tones from within, ‘I’m a-coming.’ The door opened with a creak, and her thin, wizened face appeared. ‘Right then, what’s your business?’

‘I need to talk to the Joan. I think…’ No, she didn’t just think. She’d looked into those cold eyes, and she knew. Ivy stood a little taller and said, ‘I saw a spriggan last night.’

For an instant Nettle seemed taken aback, but then her expression softened. She leaned closer and murmured, ‘Ah, Ivy-lass, your mother was a good woman, and what happened to her was a terrible shame. But you can’t go about-’

‘Let her in, Nettle.’ Betony’s voice carried across the cavern. ‘I’ll deal with this.’

Nettle shut her mouth so hard her teeth clicked, and opened the door at once. Ivy walked through into a broad, firelit chamber, its daunting size made cosy by copper panels, a patterned rug, and draperies in rich, earthy hues. The far end of the room was dominated by a table of carved granite, and Ivy’s aunt was seated in the chair behind it.

‘So you think you saw a spriggan,’ said the Joan. ‘Where?’

There was something about Betony that always made Ivy feel small. Her aunt’s strong bones and striking features, the smooth waves of hair falling over her shoulders, made Ivy keenly aware of her own unruly curls and slight, unpiskeylike figure. And then there were those creamy wings with their shimmering patterns of bronze, so much like Cicely’s that Ivy could never look at them without being reminded of what her own wings might have — should have — been.

‘In the valley below the Engine House,’ she said, subdued.

‘And what were you doing there?’

This was the awkward part. Exasperating as Mica could be at times, he was still Ivy’s brother, and she didn’t want to make trouble for him. But she wasn’t about to take the blame for his carelessness, either. ‘Mica and I needed to talk in private,’ she said at last. ‘He said I’d be safe as long as he was with me.’

‘So he was with you when you saw the spriggan?’

Ivy winced. ‘No.’

‘I see,’ said the Joan. ‘Go on.’

‘He didn’t mean to leave me,’ Ivy said. ‘He thought I was right behind him when he ran up the hill. But the spriggan arrived before I could catch up, and then…’

‘Arrived how? From which direction?’

All these pointed questions were making Ivy feel defensive. ‘I don’t know. He turned up behind me, all of a sudden. It was like he was just…there.’

‘And yet he didn’t touch you, or put a spell on you, or harm you in any way?’

‘No,’ Ivy said, ‘but I’m sure he would have if Mattock hadn’t come looking for me.’

‘So Mattock saw the spriggan, then?’

‘No. It ran off before he arrived. I tried to point it out to him, but-’ She spread her hands, feeling more foolish than ever. ‘It was already gone.’

The Joan leaned back in her chair, fingers tapping the edge of the table. ‘And when you told Mattock and your brother about this spriggan, what did they say?’

‘They said it was Keeve playing a prank. Only I know it wasn’t, because-’

She was about to say he talked to me, but Betony cut her off. ‘Clearly you feel that wasn’t the case. But for a spriggan to appear the moment you happened to be alone, frighten you without doing you any harm, and vanish before anyone else could see him… It does seem unlikely, don’t you think?’

‘But I felt him watching me, when I was sitting by the wakefire,’ Ivy said in desperation. ‘He could have singled me out then, and waited until I was alone to-’

‘But how could he know that you would go outside the Engine House, much less that your brother would leave you alone? And when he had his opportunity, why didn’t he take it?’ She paused, then went on in a gentler tone, ‘No one could blame you for hating the spriggans, or wanting to see your mother avenged. But you were not yourself last night, and the mind can play tricks sometimes.’

What was that supposed to mean? Just because she’d showed up late to the Lighting with old clothes and dirt on her face, the Joan thought she was losing her wits? Ivy gripped her arm-rings, calling on their cold strength. ‘I didn’t imagine it! Why doesn’t anyone believe me?’

But her aunt only looked at her, a faint pity in her gaze. And all at once Ivy remembered Cicely’s words: Have you ever seen a spriggan? Has anybody?

She drew in her breath. ‘You don’t believe in spriggans.’ And neither did Mica or Mattock, judging by their reactions. How could she have been so naive?

‘You mistake me, Ivy. I would never deny that spriggans exist.’

‘Oh, really?’ Ivy was angry enough for sarcasm, though she knew she might regret it. ‘When was the last time anyone saw one?’

‘Must be thirty years ago,’ came the rasping answer, and Ivy started; she’d forgotten Nettle was there. ‘A thin, miserable bit of a thing it was too, all by its lonesome. But it fought like a demon till young Hew smashed its head in, or so he and the other lads said.’

Thirty years… Could it be true? She’d spent her whole life terrified of spriggans, and all the while they’d been practically extinct?

‘Then why are we still hiding underground?’ Ivy asked, rounding on her aunt. ‘If I only imagined what I saw, and my mother wasn’t taken by the spriggans after all-’

‘There are more dangers in the world than spriggans,’ said Betony, with a hard look at Nettle. ‘And good reason for our people to stay underground, even now. As for your mother… I would let that be, Ivy, if I were you.’

‘You think she left us,’ Ivy said, struggling to breathe. ‘Don’t you. You think my mother went away on purpose.’

‘I don’t know what became of Marigold when she left the Engine House that night,’ the Joan replied, unruffled. ‘She may indeed have been caught by the spriggans, for all I know.’ She rose and walked around the table. ‘But you will not bring her back by making yourself miserable — as I have told your father many times.’ She put her fingers under Ivy’s chin and tipped her face up. ‘You have been working too hard. It would do you good to get more rest. Let Mica and Cicely look after you for a change.’

I’m not sick, Ivy wanted to protest, but she’d heard the warning in her aunt’s tone: the discussion was over. And Nettle was holding the door open, in case she hadn’t taken the hint. Hiding her resentment, Ivy bowed her head. ‘Yes, my Joan.’

It wasn’t self-doubt that made Ivy pause halfway through her journey home and choose a different route. It was sheer stubbornness, and as she turned west into Tinners’ Row where Keeve and his family lived, Ivy clenched her fists in anticipation. She’d get to the bottom of this, never mind what Betony said; she’d prove she hadn’t been pranked, or imagining an enemy that wasn’t there.

‘Keeve!’ she shouted at his door, her knocks loud as a thunder-axe in the narrow tunnel. ‘Wake up! I need to talk to you!’

‘He’s not here,’ came the muffled reply.

Ivy was surprised. Last night Keeve had danced harder and drunk more piskey-wine than anyone else she knew; it didn’t seem possible that he’d recovered so quickly. ‘Where is he, then?’

The door creaked open and Keeve’s mother, Teasel, looked out, her face pinched with anxiety. ‘He didn’t come back last night. Hew’s gone looking for him.’

That was even more odd. Keeve had good reason to fear Mica’s wrath after that prank with the adder, but he liked a comfortable bed as much as anyone. ‘I’m sorry to trouble you, then,’ Ivy said. ‘But when Keeve gets back, would you let me know? I’ve got something of his I need to return, and-’

Teasel didn’t wait for her to finish. She gave a tightlipped nod, and shut the door.

‘He’s still not back,’ said Mica several hours later, as he returned to the cavern. ‘And they didn’t want the adder.’

By then it was night-time, and Ivy was brushing out Cicely’s hair before they went to bed. Not that any of them would be likely to sleep well, knowing Keeve was still missing.

‘So Hew couldn’t find him?’ Ivy asked as she gave Cicely’s hair a final stroke and started to braid it again. ‘Are they going to send out a search party?’

‘Two of them,’ Mica said shortly, heaving the adder back into the cold-hole. ‘Gem and Feldspar are leading the first, and Matt and I’ll be on the second. But I doubt it’ll be worth the trouble. He’s probably just gone off to town for a pint.’

‘You mean with the humans?’ asked Cicely, twisting around so eagerly that Ivy lost hold of her braid. ‘Do you really think so?’

‘It wouldn’t be the first time,’ Mica said. But Ivy could see the crease between his brows, and knew that he was more worried than he let on. And rightly so — Keeve might be reckless at times, but he’d never stayed away from the Delve this long before.

‘They’ve checked the milking barn, I suppose?’ Ivy asked. The piskeys kept no cattle, but one of the nearby human farmers did, and Keeve was an expert at coaxing the cows to give up a few extra pints for the piskeys. ‘The cows are bound to miss him, if nobody else does.’

She’d tried to make light of the situation for Cicely’s sake, but her little sister wasn’t fooled. ‘Do you think the spriggan took him?’ she asked in a small voice.

Mica’s eyes flicked to Ivy’s and then away. ‘What would a spriggan want with Keeve?’ he said. ‘He wasn’t carrying any treasure, and he’s far too tough to be good eating. Now off to bed with you, skillywidden.’ He tweaked Cicely’s nose and went out.

That was all the reassurance Cicely needed, and she went to sleep without so much as a whimper. Even Ivy managed to argue herself into a few hours’ rest, telling herself there’d surely be good news in the morning.

But the search parties found no sign of Keeve, and by the time another day had passed, even Mica stopped acting casual. The atmosphere in the Delve grew tense and the piskeys spoke in whispers, as though at a funeral. Gifts began to pile up in front of Hew and Teasel’s cavern.

And before long, Ivy’s story about the spriggan wasn’t a story any more. Mattock came to the door and apologised, his square face sober beneath his mop of rusty hair. Betony called Ivy back to the Joan’s chambers and questioned her again, this time without condescension. Cicely woke sobbing that a spriggan had come to get her, and when she found Mica pulling on his boots for the evening hunt, she clung to him and begged him not to go.

‘Don’t be such a pebble-head,’ he said in a gruff tone, prising her off. ‘I’ll be safe enough with Mattock at my back, and we can always jump down a hole at the first sign of trouble. Or run like rabbits, if it comes to that.’

It was the right thing to say to Cicely, who managed a wavering smile. But Ivy wasn’t so reassured. Mica might be lazy and given to boasting, but he was no coward; what he could do if a spriggan came after him and what he would do were two different matters. ‘Be careful,’ she said, as Mica headed for the door.

Two days ago, her brother would have rolled his eyes and told her not to be such an old auntie. Now he gave a sober nod, and left without another word.

‘Ivy! Wake up!’

What time was it? It surely couldn’t be morning. Ivy raised her head blearily from the pillow to find Mica stooping over her. ‘Ugh,’ she said, ‘you stink. What have you been doing?’

‘Guess,’ said Mica, wiping sweat off his brow and baring his teeth in a grin.

Ivy sat up, abruptly wide awake. ‘You found him?’ Alive, it would seem, or Mica wouldn’t look so pleased with himself. ‘Is he all right? Can he talk?’

Mica gave her an odd look. ‘After Mattock and I jumped on him and beat him senseless, I should say not. Why, did you want to question him? I’d leave that to the Joan, if I were you.’

‘ Beat him-’ For a moment Ivy was too shocked to speak. Then her sleep-addled brain caught up with her, and she understood. ‘You don’t mean Keeve.’

Mica gave a snort. ‘I wish,’ he said. ‘No, we didn’t find him, or at least not yet. We caught the spriggan.’ three

‘Won’t speak a word, I’m told. Just sits there with his ugly mouth shut, and stares.’ Keeve’s mother tugged a fresh coil of roving onto her shoulder, her drop spindle whirling as she spun the soft mass into yarn. Only someone who knew her well would have noticed the tremor in her hands.

‘Maybe he doesn’t know how to speak,’ piped up one of the younger girls from her seat on the rug. Teasel’s cavern was as cosy and well-furnished as any in the Delve, but not even she had enough chairs for twenty. ‘Has anyone ever heard a spriggan talk?’

I have, thought Ivy. But the memory of that soft, insinuating voice made her feel slimy all over, and it wasn’t as though he’d said anything useful. Teasel needed answers, not mockery.

‘Tch! You’d get more sense out of an animal,’ said another woman. ‘It’s useless, if you ask me — meaning no offence to you, Teasel,’ she added as Keeve’s mother bristled. ‘Of course we all want to see your lad safe home again. Only that I can’t see how that nasty creature down below is going to help us find him.’

‘Well,’ said Teasel, pinching the yarn tight between finger and thumb, ‘if the creature won’t give me back my son, then at least we can make him pay for it. That’s what I say, and Hew’s of the same mind. My man killed a spriggan all by himself once, you know. Stove its head in with his thunder-axe, and kicked its carcass into the sea.’

The other women exclaimed and sat up, eager for details, but Cicely edged closer to Ivy. ‘I don’t like it when people talk about killing,’ she whispered.

‘It’s a spriggan,’ Ivy replied, not looking up from the wool she was carding. ‘And if he won’t tell what he did with Keeve, then he deserves it.’

Yet later that evening, after she’d tucked Cicely into bed, Ivy found herself wondering why the spriggan wasn’t talking. Perhaps he was afraid of being executed for his crimes, but he must realise that he was never going to get out of the Delve anyway…

Make him pay for it, murmured Teasel in her memory, and then with grim relish, My man killed a spriggan all by himself once.

But that had been thirty years ago, according to Nettle. If the spriggans had managed to elude the hunters of the Delve for so long, how had her brother and Mattock caught this one so easily? Especially if he’d killed Keeve and eaten him right down to the bones, as no one was saying but everybody feared. Surely after committing such a horrible murder, he’d want to put as much distance between himself and the Delve as he could?

‘How am I supposed to know what goes on in a spriggan’s head?’ asked Mica irritably, when Ivy asked him. By that time Cicely was sound asleep, so they could talk freely. ‘Ask the Joan, if she can get him talking before he starves to death.’ He poured himself a tankard of small beer and sat down at the table. ‘Anyway, why should you care? I thought you’d be happy to see him caught. Revenge for our mother, and all that.’

‘And all that?’ Ivy repeated in disbelief. ‘You caught a spriggan with your own hands! How can you talk as though-’ She dropped onto the bench across from Mica. ‘You can’t still think our mother left us on purpose.’

‘Why not?’ he snapped, then flinched as Cicely mumbled and turned over. ‘All I’m saying,’ he went on more quietly, ‘is that nobody knows what happened that night. And I don’t see how you can keep on about spriggans, when you of all people should know-’ He broke off and pushed back from the table, his lip curling. ‘Oh, what’s the point? You never listen to me anyway.’

‘I’m listening now,’ said Ivy, making an effort at patience. Maybe Mica had forgotten the tenderness in Marigold’s face as she kissed her children good night, or her radiant smile as she danced to the music of Flint’s fiddle. Maybe he truly thought there was some reason their mother would have wanted to leave. ‘Go on. What is it I’m supposed to know?’

‘About the fight, of course.’

‘What fight?’

‘Between Dad and Mum, the night before she disappeared.’ He glanced at the archway to their father’s bedchamber — the only separate room in the cavern. ‘They were in there with the door closed, so there’s no telling how it started. But once they got going you could hear nearly every word. Don’t you remember?’

Her parents, fighting? It seemed impossible — Flint had always doted on Marigold, and neither of them were the quarrelling sort. Ivy was tempted to suggest it had just been a nightmare, but the look on Mica’s face forestalled her. She shook her head. ‘You’re going to have to remind me. What were they fighting about?’

‘She said she was leaving, and she wanted to take you and Cicely with her.’ His voice wavered on the last phrase, and he made a face at his tankard. ‘Dad was furious. He said he couldn’t stop her throwing away her life, but she wasn’t taking his children anywhere. Then she started to cry and I couldn’t make out what she was saying any more, and he didn’t say anything at all. And when she came out of the chamber she was still crying, but quietly, like she didn’t want any of us to know. So I pretended I was asleep.’

Ivy’s stomach felt heavy, as though she had swallowed a stone. ‘I don’t remember any of that,’ she said.

‘Well, you should. Because you sat up and asked her what was the matter. And then she climbed into your alcove and shut the curtains, and the two of you were whispering in there for ages.’ He ran a finger around the rim of his cup. ‘So you knew she was going away, like I did. You just couldn’t bear to face the truth, so you…’ He shrugged. ‘I don’t know, blocked it out somehow. Made yourself believe it was the spriggans who took her instead.’

‘I didn’t make myself do anything!’ Ivy knotted her fists in her lap, so furious she felt sick. ‘What makes you think your memory is any better than mine? Maybe it was you who couldn’t bear to think that our mother was taken by the spriggans, so you invented this story and talked yourself into believing it! You think she bled all over her shawl on purpose, then left it on a gorse-bush for Dad to find so she could…do what? Go dancing with the faeries?’

Mica hunched his shoulders. ‘I don’t know why she wanted to leave,’ he said. ‘And I don’t know what happened to her either. Maybe the spriggans did get her in the end. But I’m not going to waste my life brooding over someone who-’

‘Don’t you dare,’ warned Ivy. ‘If you want to tell yourself that Mum was selfish and uncaring and that we’re well rid of her, then I can’t stop you. But I remember what she was really like, and I will never believe that. Never.’

‘It doesn’t matter,’ Mica muttered into his beer. ‘Either way she’s gone, and she isn’t coming back. Believe whatever makes you happy.’

And all at once Ivy thought she understood. ‘Is that why you never said anything to me about it?’ she said more softly. ‘Because you thought I was happier not knowing?’

‘No,’ said Mica. ‘I never said anything because I knew you’d be like this.’ He drained his tankard, shoved it towards her, and marched off to bed.

Ivy sat unmoving, staring into the foamy dregs. She felt numb and a little dizzy, as though she’d cut herself by accident and was just beginning to feel it. Could she really have forgotten something so enormous, so shattering? Even if she had, shouldn’t she be able to remember it now?

Yet when she forced her mind back to that evening five years ago, she found only a blank fuzzy space — nothing to confirm or deny anything Mica had said. Could she really have been so weak, so desperate, as to erase her own memories? She’d never heard of anyone doing such a thing, but maybe…

No. She wasn’t going to blame herself, or her mother, until she could be certain that Mica’s story was true. Which meant she’d have to wait until her father came home, and ask him.

Or better yet, she could go find him herself, and settle the question at once. After all, what was the worst Flint could do to her? Even a blow or a curse would be better than the silence she lived with every day.

Ivy pushed back her chair. ‘I’m going for a walk,’ she said. ‘Don’t wait up for me.’

By the time Ivy left the cavern, it was so late that most piskeys were in bed, and the others were on their way there. But Flint had given up regular hours a long time ago, so there was no telling where he might be.

Most likely he was working in the depths of the mine, but by now he’d tunnelled so far that Ivy hardly knew where to begin looking for him — a problem that became clear the instant she climbed down the ladder to the diggings. If the other knockers had been working, she could have asked one of them to point her in the right direction. But without being familiar with the labyrinth of tunnels that the piskey miners used, she could wander half the night before she heard the telltale crack and rumble of her father’s thunder-axe.

She called his name as loudly as she dared, but there was no answer. If her father had been any less capable, Ivy might have been worried about him. But Flint was a true knocker, able to sense every strength and weakness of the surrounding granite, and he never caused a rockfall unless he meant to. He was safe enough, and he’d come home when he was ready. But who knew how much longer that would be?

Frustrated, Ivy climbed up the ladder and shut the trap-door behind her. What was she going to do now? It was no use going home to bed in this state: she’d be tossing and turning for hours.

At last she decided to take a walk around the Delve. Perhaps she’d bump into her father, or at least hear him working, along the way — and even if she didn’t, at least it should make her tired enough to steal a few minutes’ rest before he came in.

Over the next hour Ivy made two long winding circuits of the tunnels, climbing every ramp and staircase she found. But by the time she’d finished she felt no closer to sleep than before.

There was only one place she could think of that she hadn’t visited already. Ivy walked the length of the adjoining tunnel and braced her hands on the iron railing at the edge of the Great Shaft, gazing up at the faint glimmer of moonlight high above. Should she climb to the top? The effort would certainly tire her out, but ‘ Bind up my wounds,’ rasped a voice from the darkness.

Ivy jumped back, clapping both hands over her mouth to stifle a cry. ‘Who’s there?’ she tried to ask, but her lips could barely form the words. The sound hadn’t come from the tunnel behind her — it was floating up from the depths of the shaft, from the old human workings where no piskey had reason to be.

‘ Soft! I did but dream. O coward conscience, how dost thou afflict me! ’

Nobody in the Delve talked like that. Not even the oldest piskeys used such formal language, and the droll-teller himself had never spoken with such tortured passion. Ivy clutched the railing and leaned out over it, dreading what she might see. She’d never believed in ghosts, but…

‘ The lights burn blue. It is now dead midnight. Cold fearful drops stand on my trembling flesh… ’ Then the speaker faltered and began to moan, ‘Light! Light! ’ with increasing desperation, like a feverish child begging for water. It was the most pitiful thing Ivy had ever heard.

Might it be a human, who had wandered in through one of the old adits and got lost in the depths of the mine? Ivy would have been relieved to think so, for in that case it would be easy to play will-o’-the-wisp and lead him up to the surface again. But in her heart she knew better. The words might be strange and garbled, but the voice was all too familiar.

It was the spriggan.

She’d never suspected that his cell was so close to the Great Shaft. All she’d heard was that he was being held somewhere far away from the piskeys’ living quarters, and that only the Joan and Jack were allowed to see him. But she’d also been told that the spriggan wasn’t talking…and he was definitely talking now.

‘ What do I fear? Myself? There’s none else by: Richard loves Richard; that is, I am I… ’

He’d calmed down now, at least enough to stop wailing for light and start talking to himself again. Richard? Was that his name? It sounded weirdly human. Ivy hadn’t thought of spriggans as having names before; to her they were all just spriggans, as snakes were snakes.

But if he had a name, then he had a personality. If he could talk about feeling pain and guilt and fear, there was a chance that he might be willing to talk about other things, as well. Like what he’d done with Keeve…

Or what had happened to Ivy’s mother.

Did Ivy dare? Could she climb down into the dark recesses of the shaft, find the tunnel where the spriggan was being held prisoner, and walk right up to his door? If she offered him a glimpse of the light he craved, would he tell her what she wanted so badly to know?

Mind, if anyone found out she had gone near the spriggan, Ivy would be in big trouble. But he could hardly hurt her while locked up in his cell. And if she didn’t take her chance with him now, she might spend the rest of her life wondering what would have happened if she had…

‘ I am I,’ the spriggan repeated, then muttered, ‘Whatever that means.’ And with that he let out a laugh — but it dissolved into coughing, and ended in a breath like a sob.

Ivy inhaled slowly, summoning strength and courage. Then she swung her leg over the railing, and lowered herself into the darkness.

She had never climbed this part of the Great Shaft before, much less backwards. Every new foothold had to be carefully tested, lest it crumble away and send her plummeting into the fathomless sump below. After several minutes of spidering her way down the rock, Ivy’s curls were plastered to her forehead with sweat. Yet she thought of her mother, and kept on.

She swung her left leg sideways, toes groping for another ledge. But her foot dangled into empty air, and no matter how far she stretched she could find no place to stand. Had she reached the lower tunnel already? Digging her fingers into the rock, Ivy eased herself downwards, then arched her back, swung her hips, and let go.

The adjoining tunnel was deeper than she’d anticipated, and for a heart-stopping instant Ivy feared she’d made her last mistake. But then her bare feet smacked stone, and she landed with only a slight stagger. Sighing relief, Ivy straightened up -

And found herself face to face with the spriggan.

At first she was too stunned to speak. Not only because she’d never expected his cell to open straight onto the Great Shaft, but because he was so utterly different from the monster she’d imagined. Pale as a dead thing, yes, and woefully thin — he could never have passed for a piskey. Nor was he pleasant to look at, not with one eye swollen half-shut and a split lip distorting his mouth into a sneer. But apart from that there was nothing gruesome about him, and he was young. Older than Ivy to be sure, more a man than a boy — but he couldn’t be more than a couple of years older than Mica.

Yet he was still a spriggan, and that made him dangerous. Even crouched against the wall with one arm cradled to his chest, he had a menacing air about him, a lithe tension that could explode at any moment into violence. Ivy dimmed her glow and backed towards the shaft, though she knew it was too late: he’d heard her land, seen her skin shining in the darkness, and at any moment…

‘ Is there a murderer here? ’ he whispered, pushing himself to his feet. He lurched forward — but then came a rattling noise, and he jerked to a halt mid-step.

So that was why the Joan hadn’t been worried about him escaping, even with an open shaft mere paces away. While he was still unconscious, Mica and Mattock had clapped an iron manacle around his ankle and chained him to the floor. He couldn’t go more than a stride in any direction, so Ivy was well out of reach — and if she remembered the legends right, the iron would keep him from using magic, too. Only those with knocker blood could endure the touch of iron.

‘You tell me,’ she said, bolder now. She could see him well enough with her night vision, but to him she’d be nothing more than a ghostly shape — a tantalising hint of the light he yearned for. ‘Are you a murderer?’

The spriggan let out a shuddering breath. His head drooped, and he muttered, ‘ No. Yes. I am: Then fly… ’

If only she could. ‘I’m not here to play riddle-games,’ said Ivy. Had he lost his wits? ‘Did you or did you not kill Keeve?’

A long pause, while the spriggan watched her sidelong out of one grey eye. ‘ I am a villain,’ he said at last, then added quickly as Ivy tensed: ‘ Yet I lie. I am not. ’

‘Stop talking nonsense and tell me the truth, then!’

The spriggan leaned against the wall, his distorted mouth closing tight. He did not reply.

Had she been too harsh with him? Would he refuse to say any more? Ivy took a step forward — though not too close, since she had no desire to feel those fingers around her neck. Then she said gently, ‘You want light, don’t you?’

His breath caught, just the briefest hitch, but it was as good as an answer. ‘I’ll give it to you,’ Ivy said, ‘if you answer some questions for me.’

She waited, but the spriggan didn’t respond. Did he not believe her? Or was he too slurry-brained to understand?

Ivy increased her glow a little, hoping to tempt him. ‘See?’ she said. ‘I’ll give you more, if you’ll tell me what you did with Keeve. And even more than that, if you can tell me what happened to my mother. She was beautiful, with light brown hair, and her wings…’

What had Marigold’s wings been like? She couldn’t remember. Ivy cleared her throat and went on, ‘Anyway, she disappeared five years ago. Did you spriggans take her? Is she still alive?’

The prisoner raised his head to hers, lips parting as though to speak. But then his chin dropped and he looked away.

Ivy threw up her hands. ‘This is useless.’ The stench that hung around him was making her queasy, and she was tired of looking at those hollow cheeks and sunken eyes. The spriggan was either delirious or mad or both, and she wished that she had never come. ‘I give up. You can stay here and rot for all I care.’ Defiantly flaring brighter so he’d never forget what he’d missed, she turned and strode away.

‘ Ivy.’

Startled, she looked back to find the spriggan stretching out his one good hand. ‘Don’t go,’ he said, and now his voice sounded ordinary, the formal cadences lost. ‘I didn’t know… I couldn’t be sure it was you, until now.’

Was he trying to make her pity him? If so, it wasn’t going to work. And she wasn’t going to ask again how he knew her name, either — he’d probably just overheard it, back at the Lighting. Ivy tapped her foot. ‘Well?’

‘I didn’t kill Keeve.’ He rubbed his temple, as though concentrating were an effort. ‘I don’t know where he is.’

‘But you were there, the night he disappeared,’ Ivy said. ‘Who else could have taken him?’

‘I have no idea. But it wasn’t me.’

‘Why didn’t you say that to the Joan, then?’ Ivy asked. ‘Did you think she wouldn’t believe you?’

‘I had to give her some reason to keep me alive,’ he said. ‘Until I could talk to you.’

‘Me?’ Ivy was startled. ‘Why?’

The spriggan straightened, brushing the sweat-darkened hair from his brow. ‘Because,’ he said, ‘your mother sent me to find you. She’s alive, and safe. And if you let me go…I’ll take you to her.’ four

Ivy stood still, wide green eyes fixed on the spriggan. For a moment there was no sound except the slow drip of water down the Great Shaft and the creature’s laboured breathing. Then she said in a strangled voice, ‘You’re lying.’ She didn’t even know if spriggans could lie, but what other explanation could there be?

‘I’m not lying.’

‘Yes, you are.’ She spoke quickly, almost gabbling in her panic. She had to stop this before it got out of hand — before she was tempted to believe him. ‘You heard me say I was looking for my mother, and now you’re using that to try and trick me-’

‘Her name is Marigold.’

His quiet certainty shook her, but Ivy wasn’t about to give in. There were any number of ways he could have learned her mother’s name — including under torture. ‘Why would she send you to me?’ she demanded. ‘If my mother was alive, if she wanted to see me so badly, she’d come and see me herself.’

‘I didn’t ask about her motives. Marigold asked me to deliver a message to you, and I agreed because I owed her a debt, nothing more. If you want an explanation, you’ll have to ask for one when you see her.’ His look turned sly. ‘Unless you don’t want to see her.’

Ivy barely resisted the urge to hit him. ‘Of course I do,’ she snapped. ‘Or would, if I believed a single word of what you’ve told me. Where did you see my mother, then — in the bottom of your stewpot?’

‘Actually, it was in Truro.’ He paused and added with a hint of condescension, ‘That’s a human city and not a recipe, in case you were wondering. I don’t eat piskeys, even irritating ones.’

‘That’s ridiculous,’ Ivy said, folding her arms so he wouldn’t see her hands shake. ‘My mother would never live with humans, not when she could be here with us. And even if she couldn’t come back to the Delve for some reason, she’d never make a bargain with a — a filthy, lying spriggan.’

She expected an angry retort, but the prisoner only pinched the bridge of his nose, as though she had given him a headache. Then he said with infinite weariness, ‘I don’t even know what a spriggan is.’

Ivy’s legs wobbled. ‘What? But then…what are you?’

‘A faery. What else?’

What else, indeed. Between the dirt and blood that smeared his body, the ragged clothes and unkempt hair, she would never have taken him for one of the so-called Fair Folk. Yet now that he mentioned it, he did look more like a faery than he ever had a spriggan…

‘Oh,’ she said faintly.

‘Marigold warned me to be careful about showing myself to anyone. She said your people had been living underground for a long time, and that they didn’t take kindly to strangers. But even so-’ He touched his injured arm and grimaced. ‘I wasn’t expecting quite this level of hostility.’

He sounded reasonable now, even sane. But Ivy wasn’t ready to let her guard down yet. ‘Is it broken?’ she asked.

‘Out of joint.’ He moved his hand, revealing the ugly swelling around the elbow. ‘Your brother seemed to think he could make me talk by trying to rip my arm off, but I can’t say it inspired me to much more than yelling.’

Ivy almost asked how he’d known Mica was her brother, but then she remembered: he’d seen the two of them arguing outside the Engine House. ‘So why didn’t you tell him you knew my mother?’ she asked.

‘Because I was too busy yelling, perhaps?’ He spoke mildly, but the words were tinged with sarcasm. ‘Not to mention fighting for my life.’

Even Ivy’s distrust couldn’t keep her from feeling a twinge of sympathy. Faeries might be deceitful and self-centred as the legends claimed, but the stranger was clearly in pain. Maybe that was why he’d been raving earlier.

‘Mica…doesn’t always think before he acts,’ she said, resisting a traitorous impulse to add, I’m sorry.

‘I got that impression, yes,’ said the faery dryly. ‘I don’t suppose you have some kind of magical healing elixir that would put my arm right?’

‘Not really,’ said Ivy. Yarrow’s herbs might ease the pain and bring down the swelling, but they wouldn’t solve the underlying problem. ‘And even if I did, don’t you think the Joan would notice that someone had healed you?’

‘I doubt it, unless she can see through rock.’ He jerked his head at the ceiling-high wall of rubble behind him. ‘She hasn’t bothered to look at me once since I woke up in here. And it seems she’s not planning to give me any food or water either, unless I start talking.’

Ivy was silent, troubled by the revelation. Did Betony really mean to starve the spriggan — or faery — until he confessed to killing Keeve? But what if he hadn’t?

‘I don’t know what you’ve heard about faeries,’ said the prisoner, ‘but if there’s one thing my people honour, it’s a bargain. Help me now, and I’ll do you a favour in return.’

‘Like you did for my mother?’ Ivy asked, moving a little closer. After all, he could hardly overpower her with only one working hand. ‘What exactly did you promise her, anyway?’

‘To tell you that she was alive, and wanted to see you,’ he said. ‘And if you were willing, to bring you back to Truro with me.’

Ivy had no idea how far away the city of Truro was. But she’d never heard Mica or any of the other hunters mention it, so it must be out of their usual range — at least a day’s journey on foot, if not more. How could she possibly travel so far from the Delve without anyone noticing that she was gone?

And yet, if her mother was truly alive…how could she not go?

She was still wrestling with the question when she noticed the stranger extending his injured arm towards her, wincing all the while. ‘What are you doing?’ she asked.

‘I told you. Help me, and I’ll help you. Just do as I say.’ He hesitated, then added with obvious reluctance, ‘Please.’

Ivy sighed. ‘What do you want me to do?’

‘Take my hand, and slide your other hand under my elbow.’

Suppressing her distaste, Ivy reached out and took his limp, white fingers in her own. She had half-expected to find his skin cold and slimy, as a spriggan’s ought to be — but his hand was warm, even feverish, in her grip. Gingerly she slipped her other hand beneath his swollen joint, feeling the dislocation. ‘What now?’ she asked.

‘Hold my elbow steady,’ said the prisoner between his teeth, ‘and pull my wrist towards you. Not too fast, but — aaaaah! ’ There was a sickening pop beneath Ivy’s palm and he staggered against her, gasping. But when he lifted his head again, the relief on his face was close to ecstasy.

‘You have my profound gratitude,’ he breathed, flexing his arm. ‘So does this mean we have a bargain?’

Ivy’s thoughts and feelings were in a tangle, and she had no idea how to reply. Had she really just helped one of her people’s oldest enemies? What would happen to her, if anyone found out? She sat down heavily on an outcropping. When she’d left the cavern looking for answers about her mother, she’d never imagined it would turn out like this. ‘I don’t know,’ she said. ‘I don’t know what to do.’

‘Yes, you do.’ He dragged his chain across the floor and crouched beside her. ‘It’s perfectly simple. You get me out of here, and I take you to Marigold.’

He made it sound so easy. ‘But how would we get there? And when would we leave?’

‘As soon as you like, or near enough. As for how…’ He tapped a finger against his teeth. ‘It would be easiest to travel by magic, but you’ve never been to Truro before, so that won’t work. And you haven’t got wings, so…’ He shrugged. ‘I’ll just have to carry you on my back.’

‘ Carry me?’ asked Ivy, in baffled outrage. ‘I can walk perfectly well, in case you hadn’t noticed! What kind of-’

‘Of course you can walk. But you can’t fly, which is more to the point.’

‘And you expect me to believe that you can?’ Faery or not, he had no more wings than she did. Was the stranger mad after all, or did he really think she was that stupid? Disgusted, Ivy pushed herself to her feet. ‘I’ve had enough of this. I’m going to bed.’

‘Wait.’ His voice sharpened. ‘You can’t leave me here.’

‘I don’t see why not,’ Ivy said. ‘You’ve had your fun, and got your arm fixed into the bargain. What else do you need me for? Wait a few days, and you should be thin enough to slip out of that manacle and fly out of here.’ She made a cynical flapping motion and turned away.

‘You really don’t know what I’m talking about.’ He sounded incredulous. ‘I knew piskeys were different, but I had no idea… Ivy, listen to me!’

Annoyed as she was, his desperation brought her up short. She stopped, waiting.

‘I know I don’t have wings any more than you do,’ he said. ‘Not in this form. But I can change shape — all male faeries can. And if I turn myself into a bird, and you make yourself small enough, I can fly you to Truro and back again before anyone knows you’re gone.’

‘That’s ridic-’ Ivy started, but the word dissolved on her tongue as she remembered the little bird she’d seen flying away, right after the spriggan had disappeared. Was it possible? Could that have been him?

She wanted to believe. Not only that magic could turn a wingless faery into a bird, but that everything else the stranger had told her was true as well. That Marigold was alive and longing to see her, and that one short flight over the countryside would bring them together again.

And that was exactly why Ivy couldn’t listen to the spriggan any longer. Because if she did, she might end up making the worst mistake of her life.

‘I have to go,’ she blurted, and fled.

‘ I shall despair. There is no creature loves me; And if I die, no soul shall pity me… ’

Wearily Ivy raised her head from the pillow, the stranger’s parting words still echoing in her mind. She’d had to listen to him all the way up the shaft last night, gabbling about villainy and murder and vengeance, and guilt had stabbed her as she realised he was already tumbling back into madness. Even without the agony of a dislocated elbow, being locked up in the pitch dark with an iron band around his ankle must be unbearable for a creature used to fresh air and sunlight, and if that weren’t cruel enough, he was dying of hunger and thirst as well…

Ivy kicked back the bedcovers and pulled open the curtains of her alcove, grimacing at the dirty smears her fingers left behind. She’d been so tired when she got back to the cavern, she’d fallen into bed without washing or changing her clothes. Had Mica and Cicely noticed? What would she tell them, if they asked where she had been?

She hopped down onto the rug and glanced in both directions. All the beds were empty, and the door to their father’s bedchamber stood open; bowls and spoons littered the table, and Cicely had forgotten to put the cream back in the cold-hole. It was mid-morning, and they’d all left hours ago — what must they have thought when they woke up and found Ivy still asleep?

She heated water for a bath and scrubbed herself clean, then tidied up the dining table and made the bed Mica had left in disarray. It irked her that he never did it himself, but if she didn’t look after it Cicely would, so there was no point leaving it. After that she’d sweep the floor and make some bread, and finish curing the skin from Keeve’s adder, and then…

Ivy collapsed into a chair, fingers worrying at her black curls. It was no use trying to distract herself, or pretend that her conversation with the spriggan hadn’t happened. What if Marigold really had sent him? Could Ivy let him starve and miss what might well be her only chance to find her mother, simply because she was afraid of being taken in?

Yet she had to find a way to protect herself, before she agreed to anything. Faeries might consider a bargain sacred, but if the old stories were true, they also had a knack for finding loopholes in nearly any bargain they made. And the last thing Ivy wanted was to risk her life for this stranger, only to end up betrayed…

‘You’re up,’ said Cicely, peering in the doorway. ‘I thought you were ill. I was going to ask Yarrow to come and look at you.’

Ivy forced a smile. ‘I’m well enough. I just got to bed later than I should have.’ She climbed to her feet. ‘Why don’t we make some bread?’

‘Did you talk to him?’ asked Mica that night at supper, taking the last roll from the basket.

Ivy choked. ‘What — who?’

‘Dad. It was him you were looking for, wasn’t it?’ He gave her a pointed look. ‘To ask him about…you know.’

She hid her face in her cup and took a long drink, only partly relieved. Why was Mica always oblivious to her feelings except when she didn’t want him to notice? ‘Oh. No, I didn’t. I couldn’t find him, so I went for a walk instead.’

‘What are you talking about?’ asked Cicely.

But Mica didn’t answer, and the silence thickened until Ivy said, ‘Just something that Mica remembered and I didn’t. I thought he was mistaken, so I was going to ask Dad. But then I realised maybe he was right after all.’

‘Took you long enough,’ muttered Mica, but she could see that he was both surprised and pleased. It must have been frustrating for him these past five years, hearing Ivy claim that their mother had been taken by the spriggans when he was certain that deep down she knew better. Not that it excused his attitude towards her — he still deserved a good smack around the head for that, and Ivy wished she were tall enough to give it to him. But it explained a lot about the way he’d been behaving.

‘It’s about Mum, isn’t it?’ Cicely turned accusing eyes to Ivy. ‘You always get that look on your face when you’re thinking about her. What did he say? Was it the same as-’

‘Leave it,’ Mica cut in. ‘Ivy’s tired of talking about it and so am I. It’s not going to change anything.’ He stabbed another slice of rabbit and began cutting it up. ‘Matt and I are going into Redruth tomorrow. Is there anything you want?’

Ivy poked at her meal, torn between gratitude and guilt. Every now and then, along with the small animals they hunted, the fish they caught and the wild greens, mushrooms and berries they foraged, the hunters of the Delve took human-shape and journeyed to the nearby towns for more exotic fare: glittering white sugar and flour ground fine as dust, currants and saffron and citrus peel, slabs of chocolate or sweet marzipan. It was always a pleasant surprise when Mica remembered to ask Ivy what she needed, but if he knew where she’d been last night, he wouldn’t be offering to do her any favours.

‘I’m running out of cinnamon,’ she said at last. ‘And I wouldn’t mind a couple of oranges.’ Cicely loved oranges, so perhaps that would be enough to keep her from brooding over Mica’s reprimand — though judging by the mulish look on her face, it was already too late.

‘I told Yarrow I’d help her grind herbs tonight,’ Cicely said, pushing her plate away. ‘I should go.’

‘All right,’ said Ivy. She waited until her sister had left, then turned to Mica. ‘Have you heard anything more about the spriggan? Has he talked to the Joan yet?’

Mica shook his head in disgust. ‘I told Gossan they should hang him up by his ankles over a smelting-pot and see what he has to say then, but he said we piskeys ought to be better than that, whatever that’s supposed to mean. They’re going to leave him alone for a couple of days before they question him again.’

‘And if he still won’t talk?’

He shrugged. ‘Gossan said they’d mine that vein when they came to it.’ Though the contempt in his tone said how little he approved of the Jack’s forbearance. ‘But whether he tells us what he did with Keeve or not, there’s no way that spriggan’s going to see daylight again. If the Joan doesn’t make sure of that…’ His hand dropped to the hilt of his hunter’s knife. ‘Then I will.’

It was raining that night as Ivy descended the Great Shaft, slow droplets falling between the bars and pattering into the stagnant water below. But she’d brought a rope this time, fastening one end tight at the foot of the iron railing and the other around her waist, so even if she slipped she wouldn’t fall far.

She’d expected to hear the spriggan talking, as he had the night before. But the shaft was silent, and as she lowered herself into his cell the only sounds were the rasp of hemp on stone and the scuffing of her own bare feet. ‘It’s me,’ she whispered, brightening her glow so he could see her. ‘Are you awake?’

The prisoner sat against the wall, hands dangling between his knees. He looked like a corpse at first, eyes glazed and features slack, but as Ivy approached he stirred and gave a feeble smile. ‘ But soft! ’ he murmured. ‘ What light through yonder window breaks? ’

‘What are you talking about?’ asked Ivy, sharp with the effort of hiding her relief. ‘There aren’t any windows here.’

‘It’s a line from a play by Shakespeare,’ he replied. He must have seen Ivy’s blank expression, because he went on patiently, ‘Shakespeare was a human writer who lived a few centuries ago. Plays are stories made up of speeches and acted out in front of an audience. You understand the concept of theatre?’

‘You mean a droll-show,’ said Ivy. ‘Like at midwinter, when the children dress up and pretend to be warriors, or… monsters.’ She had almost said spriggans.

The prisoner’s nostrils flared. ‘I suppose. In a crude fashion.’

Time to change the subject, before he made her feel any more ignorant. ‘I’ve been thinking about what you said to me. And…I’m ready to make a bargain.’

At once his expression changed. ‘Go on.’

‘I’ll take the iron off your ankle and help you get out of here, so you can take me to my mother. But I won’t ride on your back.’

She spoke the words firmly, determined not to betray even a hint of weakness. After all, even if he could transform himself into a bird, there was no guarantee that he wouldn’t fly off without her — or worse, take her somewhere she didn’t want to go.

‘Ivy,’ said the stranger in exasperation, ‘you can’t expect me to walk you there. Even at human size-’

‘No.’ Her heart was fluttering, but she kept her voice calm. ‘Teach me to change shape, like you do. I won’t go anywhere with you, until I can fly.’

He stared at her. ‘You? But you’re a piskey. A female piskey, at that. And you think I can teach you to become a bird?’

‘Why not? You learned to do it.’

‘Piskey magic and faery magic aren’t the same,’ he said with forced patience. ‘There are all kinds of things my people can do that yours can’t. And even among faeries, changing shape isn’t something females do.’

‘How do you know that? Just because you’ve never seen one do it? I wouldn’t bother turning myself into a bird either, if I had wings of my own. But I don’t, so I have to try.’ She folded her arms. ‘And if you ever want to get out of here, you’re going to have to try too.’

He made a faint, disbelieving sound. ‘You drive a hard bargain, lady.’

‘Harder where there’s none,’ she said.

‘Even if you’re right, it’s not going to be easy. Before you can take the shape of a bird or animal, you have to know every part of it. You have to be completely familiar with the way it looks and moves, and know its habits as well as you know your own.’ He spread his lean hands, inviting her to look around. ‘Do you see any birds in here?’

Ivy hesitated. She’d thought changing shape would only be a matter of technique — that all he had to do was explain the steps to her and she’d be able to try it right away. But if she had to actually look at a bird, in order to become one…

‘You’ll have to go up to the surface,’ the stranger went on, ‘in the middle of the day, and spend a few hours following birds around before you find the one that calls to you, the one you need to become. And that’s only the first step.’ He shifted his weight, wincing as the iron band tugged at his ankle. ‘Are you ready to do that?’

To go above in broad daylight, under the merciless eye of a sun she’d never seen before? To defy the rules and traditions she’d been raised with, risk the Joan’s wrath and her fellow piskeys’ disapproval, and make herself a hypocrite for telling Cicely that it was dangerous to go above? To take the chance that Keeve’s murderer was still out there, waiting for another careless piskey to cross his path?

Any one of those ideas was terrifying, let alone all of them together. And yet to trust herself completely to a stranger, to climb onto his back and let him take her wherever he pleased, was even more unthinkable. Either way she’d be taking an enormous risk — but better to choose her own path than to have someone else choose it for her.

And besides, if she could do this, she wouldn’t only have a chance of finding her mother, she’d have wings as well…

‘Yes,’ said Ivy, lifting her chin. ‘Whatever it takes, I’m ready.’ five

The good thing about sneaking out through the Earthenbore was that it gave Ivy plenty of places to hide. Smaller tunnels branched off in every direction, so she could always duck into a side corridor if she heard someone coming.

The unfortunate thing was that Ivy couldn’t be sure she wouldn’t get caught anyway. Turning invisible would keep her from being seen, but it couldn’t mask her scent, or prevent her bumping into someone by accident. And since she couldn’t see unless she glowed at least a little, it would be pointless turning invisible unless she wanted to grope her way through the tunnels with no light at all.

But right now it was early afternoon, the time when the older knockers taught the younger men to refine and work metal, and piskey-wives did their washing and sewing while their daughters looked after the Delve’s small menagerie of livestock, and all the youngest children were at lessons. As long as Ivy didn’t stay away from home too long, there was no reason anyone should notice her missing.

She followed the passage to its final branch, as far from the Delve as she could go while still remaining underground, and began climbing the slope to the surface. Soon the scent of sun-baked earth wafted towards her, and the blackness around her began to lighten. Ivy crept forwards until the ceiling became so low she had to stoop, and then go on hands and knees. At last the tunnel ended in a latticework of brilliant green foliage, with a sliver of sky above it so blue it hurt to look at. She winced and turned her face away.

All her instincts told her to go back, that she wasn’t prepared for this. To leave the earth’s cool embrace and step out into that blazing emptiness, unarmed and unaccompanied, was more than any piskey she knew had ever done. Even Mica had been guided by two seasoned hunters on his first daylight trip, and he’d come back with a headache so fierce he’d spent the rest of the day in bed.

But if Ivy didn’t go out there, she’d never learn to fly.

Keeping her head low to avoid the prickly overhang, Ivy crawled out of the tunnel. Only when the underbrush stopped rustling and she felt the sun’s heat on her black curls did she sit up and slowly crack her eyelids open.

She’d only seen this landscape before at night, when its colours were soft and soothing. Now it shone with a hectic, fevered intensity that made her exhausted just looking at it. How would she ever spot a single bird at this rate, let alone get close enough to study it? She could barely see. If an enemy crept up on her, she wouldn’t know until it was far too late.

Yet Ivy wasn’t about to give up. Learning to climb hadn’t been easy either, and she’d had to start small, scaling the walls of an abandoned stope. And even once that ceased to be a challenge, climbing the Great Shaft had been a terrifying prospect. But Ivy would never forget the thrill when she pulled herself up onto the concrete lip at the top, and leaned out through the bars to feel the rain falling on her upturned face. Fresh air had never tasted so sweet.

She was stronger than anyone knew. She could do this. Ivy squinted, shielded her eyes with one hand, and began edging down the hillside one step at a time.

Some time later Ivy sat cross-legged in the shade of a holly bush, gazing into the sky. Her head throbbed, and sweat trickled down her spine. But her eyes had adjusted to the sunlight now, so she no longer feared that anyone would sneak up on her unnoticed. And she’d already spotted several kinds of birds.

Some had been solitary, winging past with smooth, masterful strokes; others had arrived in clusters, dipping and soaring in patterns intricate as any six-hand reel. She’d seen birds as big as Mica and birds smaller than Flint’s fiddle, birds with long beaks and stubby ones, birds pale as the spriggan’s hair and others dark as her own. But though she’d listened intently to their chirps and cries, none had stirred any answering call in her heart.

Maybe she was just too distracted to concentrate. A few minutes ago a horse and rider had come plunging out of the wood — both of them tiny with distance, but still the sight sent a stab of envy into Ivy’s heart. Even though she’d only seen them in pictures, the love of horses was in her piskey blood, and she longed to leap to her feet and run after it.

But a horse couldn’t take her to Truro and back again before anyone knew she was missing — not like her own wings could. And that was why Ivy had to stay focused until she found the right bird, and learned how to take its shape. So that even if the spriggan turned out to be lying, at least she’d have gained something from meeting him.

Time passed, and more birds with it. But still none of them seemed right to Ivy. She told herself to stop being fussy and choose the next bird that came along, but the moment she saw it — a ragged black creature with a scrap of carrion in its beak — her soul rebelled. No matter how badly she wanted to see her mother, she couldn’t shape a bird like that.

The shadows were growing longer now, the sun slipping towards the horizon. If Ivy didn’t get home soon, Cicely would wonder where she’d gone. Disappointed, she got to her feet and began climbing back up the hill. But at least now she knew she could visit the upper world without getting caught by spriggans or blundering into some unforeseen disaster, so perhaps tomorrow…

Something dark flashed across her vision, and instinctively she whirled to follow it. A little bird with wings like a bent bow, body tampering smoothly to a two-pronged fork of a tail. It swooped over the valley, moving so fast that Ivy’s eyes barely had time to focus before it was out of sight.

Swee-ree, swee-ree, swee-ree, came its song from the distance, a piercing call that plucked at Ivy’s heart. ‘Wait!’ she cried. ‘Come back!’

And to her amazement, it did. Rounding the treetops, it soared towards her and flew a circle above her head, bright eyes watching her all the while. She’d heard that piskeys had a special rapport with animals, but she’d thought that was something only hunters did. She’d never guessed that she could do it, too.

‘What are you?’ she asked, her voice soft with wonder. The bird didn’t answer, of course, but it dipped a little lower. And then a second bird of the same kind came flashing across the hillside to join it, and the two of them chased each other in dizzying spirals across the sky.

It was like magic, and music, and dancing, all at once. And as Ivy’s heart soared with them she knew, as surely as she knew her own name, that this was the bird she wanted to be.

‘Are you sure?’ asked the faery that night, tearing a piece off the loaf Ivy had brought him. ‘Small, forked tail, dark all over? And it stayed aloft the whole time, without coming to land?’

Ivy nodded. She’d stayed as long as she dared studying the little birds, so late that she’d nearly bumped into Mica and Mattock coming back from their trip to Redruth. A quick invisibility spell had protected her, but she still felt sick every time she thought about how close she’d come to being caught. ‘So what kind of bird is it?’ she asked. ‘Does it have a name?’

‘It’s a swift. They’re not resident birds. They winter in Africa and stay here only four or five months of the year. You’re certain that’s the one?’

‘Why do you keep asking me that?’ asked Ivy. ‘I thought you’d be pleased. If I fly then so do you, remember?’

‘Believe me,’ said the prisoner, ‘I haven’t forgotten for an instant.’ He chewed another mouthful before going on, ‘It’s just a bit unusual. I’ve never met anyone who shaped a swift before. So are you ready for the next step?’

‘Of course,’ said Ivy.

‘Then tell me. What do swifts eat?’

‘I’m…not sure. Insects?’

‘Well, you’d better find out, because you’re going to be eating it yourself.’ His gaze held hers, relentless. ‘How does a swift drink? Where does it sleep? How long can it fly, how high, how far? What predators does it fear, and how does it avoid them? How does it behave around other swifts?’

She had no answers for any of those. ‘Why does any of that matter?’ she asked. ‘All I want to do is fly.’

‘Because,’ he said, ‘swifts are communal birds. If you don’t behave like a proper swift the other swifts will sense it, and instead of welcoming you into their midst, they’ll attack. Predators will notice too, and come after you because you’re easy prey. At best you could be driven miles off course, or end up injured and never reach your destination. Do you want to take that chance?’

Ivy blew out a frustrated breath. ‘But I don’t know how to find out all of that,’ she said. ‘I can’t spend all day chasing swifts around the countryside-’

‘Then find out as much as you can. But there’s no way you’re going to be able to turn yourself into a swift until you know a lot more about them than you do right now.’

It wasn’t what she’d wanted to hear. But he had no reason to lie about it, especially with his own freedom at stake. So she nodded, and held out her hand for the water bottle.

‘You’re going already?’

‘Why not? What else do we have to talk about?’

His mouth flattened. ‘What indeed.’ He handed her the bottle and turned away.

‘Richard…’ began Ivy, then faltered as he shot her an incredulous look. ‘You mean that isn’t your name?’

The prisoner started to laugh, a dry and horrible laughter like bones clattering down a mineshaft. ‘ I am justly served with mine own treachery,’ he gasped.

Disturbed, Ivy started to back away, but he held up a hand. ‘No, don’t run. I’m not angry with you. Richard… ’ He rolled the two syllables around in his mouth. ‘Why not? It’s as good a name as any.’

But not his usual name, obviously. ‘So what do the other faeries call you, then?’

‘It doesn’t matter. Richard will do.’ He stretched his arms above his head and yawned. ‘Now if you’ll excuse me, I’m going to sleep.’

Ivy’s gaze travelled across the back of the cavern, taking in the rough-hewn floor without so much as a heap of straw to soften it, the chain that restricted the prisoner’s movements to no more than two small steps in any direction, the iron band clamped around his ankle. Not to mention the acrid stench from the corner — if it was unpleasant now, in another day or two it would be unbearable.

Yet she didn’t dare do anything more to help him, not yet. Bringing him food and water was risky enough.

‘Good night, Richard,’ Ivy said quietly, and left.

‘You’re awfully brown,’ said Cicely in a tone that was half puzzlement, half admiration. ‘Have you been rubbing something into your skin?’

Ivy looked up from the water-channel, the wash-cloth still in her hand. ‘I…no, I haven’t,’ she said, too flustered to think of a better answer. She’d returned from her second trip to the surface in plenty of time, and taken care to brush off her clothes and comb her wind-blown curls. But she’d never realised what all that sunlight had done to her complexion. ‘Why would I want to do that?’

Cicely blushed. ‘I…I thought you might be trying to make yourself look pretty. Not that you aren’t — I mean, I know you don’t usually fuss about that sort of thing, but you’ve been away from the cavern a lot these last few days and Jenny said — I mean, I was wondering-’

‘Jenny said what, exactly?’ Ivy dropped the cloth and put her hands on her hips. ‘And when did the two of you start talking about me behind my back?’

‘It wasn’t like that!’ said Cicely, indignant now. ‘I was feeding the chickens when Jenny came to get some eggs, and she asked me where you were and I said you were at home, and she said you weren’t because she’d knocked and got no answer, and then she said she hadn’t seen Mattock either and maybe…’

So Jenny thought she and Mattock were sweethearts, sneaking away together. Well, Ivy couldn’t blame her for that, even though the idea was laughable — not only because Matt was Mica’s best friend and Mica would probably thump him for even considering it, but what piskey-boy would want a mate with no wings?

‘I’m not prettying myself up for Matt, if that’s what you’re asking,’ Ivy said. ‘I’ve been…working on something.’

Cicely’s face lit with excitement. ‘Is it a surprise? Will I get to see it when it’s done?’

For one wild moment Ivy was tempted to tell her the truth. Keeping secrets was a lonely business, and Marigold was Cicely’s mother too. But then she’d have to explain about her night-time visits to Richard, and that was too much dangerous knowledge for any ten-year-old to carry.

No, it was too soon. Better to leave it until she’d learned to fly, until she’d found Marigold. There would be plenty of time to share the good news with Cicely and Mica then.

‘Maybe,’ she said, smiling at her sister. ‘Wait and see.’

‘I’m ready,’ Ivy told Richard as she dropped to the floor of his cell. ‘And I’ve brought your supper.’

Richard’s lips moved, but only a croak came out. He had to take a long draught from Ivy’s water bottle before he could speak. ‘Lovely,’ he rasped, wiping his mouth on the back of his hand. ‘I trust you’ve been enjoying plenty of sunshine on my behalf.’

Ivy took a loaf from her pack and set it down beside him, along with a hunk of cheese she’d saved from her own supper. ‘Ask me what I know about swifts,’ she said. ‘Anything you like.’

‘I’ll take your word for it,’ said Richard. ‘Why don’t you ask me some of the things you don’t know?’

That was better than Ivy had expected. In truth she knew the answers to fewer than half of the questions he’d originally asked her, but she couldn’t think how to learn more on short notice. ‘Do they ever land?’ she asked. She’d watched a swift skimming over a river to scoop up water with its beak, and seen another snatching insects from the air in mid-flight. But though there were plenty of trees and shrubs nearby, they hadn’t stopped to perch on any of them.

‘Only to nest,’ he said. ‘They eat, drink, mate and even sleep in flight. Have you seen their legs?’

‘They’re short.’

‘Yes. Far too short to allow them to land safely on the ground, or even in a tree. They only perch on vertical surfaces — rock faces and such. And they build their nests under the eaves of barns and houses — the higher, the better.’ He broke off a piece of cheese, popped it into his mouth and said around it, ‘Anything else you want to know?’

‘I’m not sure about predators,’ Ivy admitted. ‘I saw a few bigger birds that looked dangerous, but they didn’t seem fast enough.’

‘Most of them aren’t. But watch out for the hobby — it’s a kind of small falcon that can dive very quickly. That’s about the only thing that can catch a swift.’

Ivy waited for more, but he only tore off another chunk of bread and kept eating. ‘So,’ she said, ‘what now?’

Richard swallowed with an effort. ‘Picture,’ he said, ‘a swift in your mind. Every detail, from beak to tail-feathers. Don’t let any other thoughts come in.’

The moment he said that, it was impossible not to be distracted. All Ivy could think about was Cicely’s quizzical expression as she said, You’re awfully brown…

‘You’ve lost it already, haven’t you?’

‘Don’t talk to me,’ she said irritably.

‘You’re going to have to do this with every kind of noise and distraction around. You might as well start learning now.’

Ivy scowled, trying to marshal her scattered thoughts. Meanwhile Richard, blast him, started whistling — no, not so much whistling as trilling, a persistent chirrup-noise she’d never heard before. What bird sang like that?

And now the swift-image was gone again. She groaned, and screwed her eyes shut for another attempt. Mentally she traced and retraced every line of the swift’s small body, right down to the tiny patch of white feathers beneath its chin — until Richard exclaimed aloud and Ivy opened her eyes to find a perfect illusion of a swift flashing around the cavern.

She threw up her hands, and the glamour vanished. ‘That’s not what I meant to do!’

‘No,’ said Richard, ‘but it’s not a bad start.’ He ran a finger thoughtfully across his split lip. ‘Maybe if you create the illusion first, and focus on that…’

‘And then what?’

‘Then you will yourself into its form.’

That didn’t sound so hard. Ivy brushed a curl back from her forehead, conjured the swift-image again, and silently commanded her body to take its shape. Harder and harder she concentrated, until her skin began to tingle. It was working! She could feel her muscles shifting, her bones beginning to shrink…

But when she opened her eyes, she was still in piskey-form. She’d made herself as small as a swift, but she hadn’t taken its shape. ‘Ugh!’ said Ivy, changing back to her usual size. ‘Why isn’t it working?’

‘I was afraid of this,’ said Richard. ‘Without being able to show you how I take bird-shape, it’s impossible to teach you how to do it. Did your mother ever have to explain to you the steps that go into creating a glamour? Of course not. You watched her a few times, and you knew.’

It was true. Magic was a matter of instinct rather than learning, for piskeys and all magical folk. But Ivy could see where this was leading, and she didn’t like it. ‘So you’re saying that unless I take the iron off your ankle and let you go, I’ll never be able to fly.’

Richard opened his mouth, made a face and closed it again. Finally he said, ‘There are a couple of things you can try first. You might find it easier to change shape outside, where there are no walls or ceilings to hold you back. That alone might work — but if it doesn’t, then try it again by moonlight.’

‘Moonlight? What difference will that make?’

‘It’ll make your magic stronger,’ he said. ‘A full moon on a clear night would be best, but even a little moonlight’s better than none.’

Ivy glanced back at the darkened shaft. She wasn’t sure she had the energy to climb all the way to the top right now — not after so many long nights and daytime trips to the surface. And Mica had come back to the cavern even later than usual tonight, so there wasn’t much time left in any case.

‘All right,’ she said. ‘I’ll try it.’

‘Then I wish you good luck,’ said Richard. ‘But if you could speed up your experiments a little, I’d appreciate it. One meal a day isn’t much to go on, and I’m not sure how much longer your Joan is planning to keep me alive.’

He spoke lightly, but there was a wildness about his eyes that reminded Ivy of how he had looked when she’d first seen him, clutching his injured arm and babbling Shakespeare. Battered, starving, and desperate for light, he might not keep his sanity much longer — and then what would Ivy do?

‘I can’t promise anything,’ she said as she reached for her rope. ‘I have to be careful, or my family will get suspicious. But I’ll do the best I can.’

When Ivy returned home the first sound that greeted her was Mica’s rattling snore, and for once she was grateful for it. Keeping her glow as dim as she could, she tiptoed across to her bed-alcove, pulled off her shirt and grabbed her discarded nightgown from beneath the pillow. If she could stop fretting about swifts and Richard and her mother for a few minutes, maybe she’d be able to ‘Ivy?’

It was only a sleepy mumble, but Ivy’s heart dropped into her stomach. It took her several seconds to collect her wits and whisper, ‘It’s all right, Cicely. I’m here.’

She waited, but there was no answer, and finally Ivy relaxed and lay down. Most likely Cicely was just talking in her sleep again, and would remember nothing of the conversation in the morning.

‘Sleep well, little sister,’ she murmured, and closed her eyes. six

Tired though she was, Ivy managed to wake up at her normal time the next day — early enough to rouse Mica for his morning run, though he looked even more sour than usual about it.

‘You were up late last night,’ she said, as she packed up a cold pasty and a bottle of small beer for Flint’s lunch. His thunder-axe was still propped outside the bedroom door, so maybe she’d be able to get some breakfast into him before he vanished again. ‘What happened?’

Mica poured himself a mug of hot chicory and gulped about half of it, making a face as he set it down. ‘I brought coffee back from Redruth,’ he said. ‘Why are you still making this muck?’

‘If you don’t like it, make the coffee yourself,’ said Ivy. ‘Why are you changing the subject?’

Mica shot her a baleful glare. Then, with a glance at Cicely’s curtained alcove, he leaned closer and muttered, ‘Gem and Feldspar spotted someone — or some thing — sneaking about the Engine House last night.’

Ivy’s lips formed a silent oh.

‘But it disappeared before they could get a proper look at it. So Gossan sent a few of us out to see if we could track it down, but…’ He shrugged, and took another swig of chicory. ‘No luck. Whatever it was, it came and went like the wind.’

‘You think it’s another spriggan?’ asked Ivy. She’d been so caught up in watching the swifts, she’d forgotten that Keeve’s murderer could still be out there.

‘Maybe.’ Mica dropped the empty mug onto the worktop and picked up his hunter’s knife. ‘But we’re not supposed to say anything about it yet, so keep that to yourself.’

‘Ready, Mica?’ The question came so quietly through the crack in the door that only piskey ears could have heard it. It always amazed Ivy that a boy as big and broad-shouldered as Mattock should be so soft-spoken.

‘I’m coming.’ Mica swung his pack over his shoulder, gave Ivy a last warning glance and disappeared.

Ivy returned to the hearth and stirred the porridge, her brows creased in a frown. Who was the shadowy figure that Gem and Feldspar had seen creeping about the hillside? Could Richard have had a companion, who was now looking for him? It seemed unlikely that two strangers would turn up around the same time, if they weren’t somehow connected…

‘Is there any porridge left?’ asked Cicely, climbing out of her alcove. But her gaze was downcast, and she spoke without her usual spirit. Had she overheard Mica talking? Or had she merely sensed Ivy’s troubled mood?

‘Yes, of course,’ Ivy said, doing her best to sound cheerful. ‘With berries and cream too, if you like.’

The two of them were sitting down to eat when Flint emerged from his bedchamber, dressed in the same dusty clothes he’d worn the day before. Once he had been handsome, and so like Betony that the two of them might have been twins. But now his features sagged as though his skin were too big for him, and his eyes were dull as pebbles.

‘Come and have some porridge, Dad,’ Ivy said, offering him her bowl. But he shook his head, and reached for his thunder-axe.

Ivy wanted to grab her father and shake him, but she knew it would do no good. She heard him coughing in the night sometimes, but he’d never let her give him any of Yarrow’s herbal remedies to make it better. His hands shook whenever he gripped anything lighter than a pick or shovel, and his teeth had turned yellow with neglect — yet he didn’t seem to care about those things, either. So why should he bother eating a proper breakfast?

‘Take this, then,’ she said, pushing the packed lunch against his chest. He curled his arm around it, swung the magical pickaxe onto his shoulder and walked out without another glance.

Oh, Mother, Ivy thought, leaning wearily on the edge of the table. Even if you stopped loving him, surely you never wanted him to end up like this?

Going up to the surface today could be the biggest risk Ivy had taken yet, especially with the hunters already on the alert. But she couldn’t let that stop her, especially now. Because if Marigold was alive, she needed to know how much her family missed her, and how desperately they needed her to come back.

Ivy waited until Cicely went off for her lessons, then crept out of the Delve with all her usual caution. All seemed well at first, though as she turned into the Earthenbore she had an uncomfortable suspicion that she was being watched. But no one stepped out to challenge her, so after a brief hesitation she ignored the feeling and kept on.

Once outside she found a good spot on the hillside from which to launch herself, and went through the steps Richard had taught her. Picture the swift. Focus on the swift. Become the swift. Yet after several minutes of jaw-clenching effort, Ivy knew it was no use. No matter how hard she concentrated or how much magic she put into the effort, she was still the same wingless piskey-girl as before.

Ivy hugged her knees to her chest, doubt snaking into her mind. When she’d seen her first swift and felt that powerful sense of connection, she’d felt certain that she was meant to fly. But what if Richard had been right all along, and she couldn’t change shape? What if her piskey blood, or some quirk of her female nature, made it impossible?

Well, she’d know tonight, one way or the other. Maybe Richard was right, and moonlight was the key. But after so many failed attempts, it was hard to believe that such a small thing would make any difference.

Ivy was back in the cavern, making a fish pie for supper, when Cicely came in. ‘Did you have a good lesson?’ she asked, but Cicely didn’t reply. She kicked off her shoes and climbed into her bed-alcove, pulling the curtain shut.

That wasn’t like Cicely at all. Ivy wiped her hands on her apron and followed. ‘What’s the matter? Are you all right?’ She opened the curtain and found her little sister lying on her side, her eyes squeezed shut. Her cheeks were flushed, her forehead warm to the touch.

No wonder she’d been so quiet earlier. ‘Does your stomach hurt?’ Ivy asked. ‘Or is it your chest? Shall I get Yarrow to make you a potion?’

‘No,’ mumbled Cicely. ‘I just want to rest. Please go away.’

With some reluctance Ivy stepped back and let the curtain drop. Perhaps her sister had become overheated running around with the other children, and would be better in an hour or two.

‘I’ll get you some water,’ she said. ‘Drink as much as you can. If you’re not well by suppertime, I’ll call for Yarrow.’

To Ivy’s relief, Cicely seemed to have recovered by the time supper was on the table. She still wasn’t her usual talkative self, but she ate a generous helping of fish pie, and helped Ivy clean up afterwards. She spent the rest of the evening working on the jumper she was knitting for Mica, then climbed into her bed-alcove without complaint.

By the time Mica returned, Ivy had snuffed out the day-lamps and was pretending to be asleep. She waited until his breathing deepened into the usual full-throated rumble, then dropped lightly to the rug and tiptoed out.

All seemed quiet as she made her way through the tunnels, but halfway up the Hunter’s Stair she froze, her skin prickling. Had that been a footstep? She turned, ready to confront her pursuer and brazen it out. But she saw nothing in the darkness behind her, not even the tiniest flicker.

Ivy set her jaw and climbed faster, silently rebuking herself for letting her nerves get the better of her. Yes, it would be disastrous if she were caught sneaking out of the Delve, but she’d already taken that risk three times by daylight and survived.

When she emerged onto the hillside, she had to turn nearly a full circle before she spotted the moon. Only half-full, and dimmed a little by the ragged clouds, but it would have to do. Now, where to begin? She couldn’t return to the launching place she’d used earlier, with its too-gentle slope that reeked of fear and failure. If this were her last chance to change shape, she had to be bolder than that. Ivy set off at an angle across the hill, crunching through the heather and bracken.

After a few breathless minutes she reached a spot where the rocks broke through the soil and the ground dropped steeply away. It would have been a long jump to the bottom even for a human, and at piskey size it was high enough to make her nervous. But it was the perfect place to launch herself from, if she became a swift.

Ivy tilted her head back, closing her eyes as the moonlight tingled on her skin. Summoning the familiar image in her mind, she spread her arms wide, stepped forward…

And a scream rang out from behind her.

Startled, Ivy twisted around — and her foot slipped. Arms flailing, legs tangled together, she let out a cry of her own as she toppled over the edge. But the shout became a shriek, keening high in her ears, and her skin changed into feathers even as she fell. She skimmed a hand’s span over the rocks and zoomed upward, into the open sky.

She was flying! Joy filled Ivy from her crown to her forked tail-feathers. Even though she’d never flown before, she felt no fear or awkwardness; her new body was the perfect shape to bend the air currents to her bidding, and she could change speed or direction with the merest flick of a feather. How could she ever have thought of wind as an insubstantial thing? The updraught beneath her wings felt as solid as the earth itself.

Daring, she rose higher, the landscape dropping away beneath her. Her swift’s eyes were as sharp as her piskey ones had ever been, and she could pick out every feature of the countryside below — hills and valleys, cottages and barns, and here and there the silhouettes of old whim-engine and pumping-engine houses, remnants of the hundreds of mines that now lay abandoned and overgrown. Lights dotted the ground and sprinkled the horizon like bits of shattered crystal — not merely the small clusters of human dwellings she’d grown accustomed to seeing from the hillside, but entire towns and cities glittering in the dark. And in the distance lay more cottages, more towns, more stretches of open country both wild and tame…and beyond them, the grey rolling line of the ocean.

Excitement surged in Ivy’s breast. She could go anywhere she wanted now. In fact, if she’d known where Truro was, she could have flown to her mother this very minute…

Then she remembered the cry that had startled her off the ledge, and the warmth inside her turned chill. It might have been an animal or the shriek of a passing bird, but what if it wasn’t? Ivy doubled back towards the familiar hillside, searching for signs of life. But she saw no frenzied movements or splashes of unexpected colour; all that met her gaze were the dull hues of wild greens and shrubberies, earth and clay and stone. And though she listened closely with her bird-keen ears, the only sound was the wind whispering through the leaves.

Perhaps Ivy had only imagined the scream — it would be a relief to think so. She’d hardly begun to stretch her wings, and there was still a glorious infinity of open sky to explore. But the night wouldn’t last forever, and now that Richard had proved himself a man of his word, Ivy owed it to him to set him free. Maybe, if she moved quickly enough, there’d still be time for him to take her to her mother.

Ivy hurried towards her home cavern, still giddy with the thrill of flight. Before heading underground she’d transformed into a swift and back again several times over, until she could leap into flight as easily as blinking and land with barely a stumble. Changing shape was so easy now, she felt certain that even without moonlight she’d be able to do it again.

I can fly! Ivy’s heart sang out. She wanted to burst into the cavern and shout her triumph, wake up Mica and Cicely so they could see the miracle. But she couldn’t do that yet — it was too risky. She had to at least free Richard first. Dimming her glow to the barest hint of luminescence, she eased the door open and tiptoed in.

Flint’s thunder-axe was propped against the wall in its usual place, with his well-worn boots beside it. Ivy glanced at the bed-alcoves, reassuring herself that all the curtains were drawn. Then with painstaking care she lifted the magical pickaxe, and carried it out the door.

Lowering herself and the thunder-axe down the Great Shaft at the same time was an agonising business. Every time the pick’s weight shifted Ivy held her breath, fearing the precious tool would slip free of her makeshift harness and drop into the flooded depths below. But at last she made it safely to Richard’s cell.

‘I did it,’ she panted as she loosened the ropes around her chest and lifted the thunder-axe free. ‘Now let’s get that iron off your ankle.’

Richard looked blank, and Ivy wondered if he’d understood. ‘I said,’ she began more loudly, but he cut her off.

‘I heard you,’ he replied. ‘I’m just a bit unused to pleasant surprises, that’s all. Are you really planning to strike off my manacle with that thing? From the way you’re staggering about, it seems more likely that you’re going to smash my foot to bits with it.’

‘I’ll try not to,’ said Ivy tartly. She crouched beside him, examining the iron band. ‘How did they put this on you?’

‘I don’t know. I was unconscious when-’ But then Ivy slipped her fingers between the manacle and his skin, and his words ended in a gasp.

‘Did I hurt you?’ Ivy pulled her hand away. ‘I didn’t mean to.’

‘No, not that.’ Richard sounded shaken. ‘It’s — you. You touched iron on purpose.’

Oh, of course. She’d forgotten what a shock that would be to him. ‘My people have been working with rock and metal for centuries,’ Ivy said, feeling her way around the band. ‘If we lost our magic every time we touched iron, how would we get anything done?’ She sat back. ‘I can’t find a hinge or a keyhole anywhere. They must have spelled it right onto your ankle.’

He stared at her. ‘You mean piskeys can use magic on iron, too?’

‘Some of us can. Unfortunately for you, I’m not one of them. That’s why I borrowed this.’ She nodded at the thunder-axe. ‘But we’ll need to put some padding around your ankle first.’

Without hesitation Richard pulled off what was left of his shirt and handed it to her. His skin was sickly-pale beneath the bruises, his collarbones jutting and his ribs clearly visible. ‘Try not to swoon,’ he said dryly.

‘I’ve never swooned in my life,’ said Ivy. She tore the shirt into strips, and pushed as much of the worn fabric as she could between the manacle and the faery’s ankle. ‘Ready?’ she asked.

Richard looked apprehensive, but he nodded.

‘Just one thing,’ Ivy said as she hefted the pickaxe. ‘And I want you to tell me the truth. When you came here looking for me, on Lighting night — did you bring someone else with you? Or did you tell anyone where you’d gone?’

She watched his face, searching for even the tiniest hint of guilt or fear. But he only looked puzzled. ‘Your Joan asked me the same thing, this morning,’ he said. ‘But no, I came alone. And the only one who knew I was coming here was Marigold.’

If he was a liar, he was a very good one. ‘All right,’ said Ivy, and swung the thunder-axe down.

The blade struck with a ringing clank and a spark of brilliant blue light. Richard made a strangled noise, and she knew the blow had hurt him — but when Ivy’s dazzled vision cleared, the band was still intact.

Obviously she hadn’t figured out how to use the magical pickaxe quite right. Maybe if she pushed a bit of her own magic into it first… With barely a pause, Ivy raised the thunder-axe and brought it down again.

This time the spark was so bright, Ivy stumbled and nearly dropped the pick. The iron manacle cracked in two, and clattered onto the stone at Richard’s feet.

‘Finally,’ the faery breathed. He slid away from her and rubbed his ankle, which was cruelly blistered where the iron had pressed against it. She waited for him to do something magical — heal himself perhaps, or spell himself clean, or mend his tattered clothes. But all he did was sit there.

‘Well?’ she asked. ‘Are we going to fly? There might still be time, if we hurry.’

Richard raised his eyebrows. ‘After wearing iron for over a week? It’ll be hours — maybe even days — before I can do magic again. I’m not flying anywhere tonight.’

Ivy recoiled as though he had slapped her. ‘You…you can’t be serious. You said-’

‘I said I’d take you to your mother if you let me go. I never said I could do it right away.’ But there was no triumph in his tone, only resignation. ‘I’m not going to try and escape, if that’s why you’re still gripping that pickaxe. I can’t even get out of this tunnel, unless you lead me out yourself.’

Ivy’s hands tightened on the thunder-axe. ‘I can’t do that,’ she said. She’d been prepared for everything from passionate gratitude to cold-blooded betrayal, but she’d never anticipated this. ‘If we were caught…’

‘Then go, and leave me here.’ He spoke wearily, as though he’d expected nothing better. ‘Maybe your Joan will think I freed myself, when she comes to execute me tomorrow.’

Alarm stabbed into Ivy. ‘Execute you? She told you that?’

‘Oh yes. Quite matter-of-factly. I’m to be hanged in the Market Cavern, with someone called Hew knotting the rope, and my body left in the Engine House as a warning to my accomplice. Whoever that is.’

Ivy wished she could believe he was lying, but his story was far too likely. Keeve’s family were still crying out for vengeance, and if Richard’s body was left on the surface to deter whatever creature had been skulking about the Engine House, it would satisfy the hunters as well.

‘But you never know,’ Richard went on. ‘Maybe before then I’ll be strong enough to fly out of here — though that’s going to be a bit difficult, with no light to see by.’ His mouth twisted ruefully. ‘Pity I never learned to take bat-shape.’

He was right about that too, unfortunately. If she’d been worried about Cicely flying up the Great Shaft without a glow to light her way, how could she expect Richard to do any better? The only way to be sure of getting him safely to the surface was to take him out of the Delve herself.

Yet to free a prisoner that the Joan had condemned to death, and lead him to the surface through tunnels that no one but a piskey had ever been allowed to see — it was unthinkable, unforgivable. If Ivy were caught, it would not only bring disgrace on her entire family, but she’d probably be executed as well.

I can’t, her mind cried out, I can’t do this, there has to be another way. But it was too late for that. First she’d healed Richard, then she’d fed him, and now she’d freed him from his chains. And she’d promised to help him get out of the Delve.

Ivy drew a deep breath, willing herself strong. Then she hefted Flint’s thunder-axe up onto her shoulder and said, ‘All right. Come with me.’ seven

If carrying the thunder-axe down the shaft had been hard for Ivy, getting it back up was even more of a challenge. Growing a couple of hand-spans taller made the pick a lighter burden, but it also made her heavier — not to mention putting more strain on the rope. She’d only climbed a little way before she had to shrink to her customary size, and by the time she reached the iron railing she was wheezing.

‘I’m up,’ she panted to Richard as she clambered over, making her glow as bright as she dared so that he’d have enough light for his own climb. ‘Tie the rope around your waist, and I’ll-’

But Richard was already pulling himself up the shaft towards her, feet braced wide on the rock. His strength surprised Ivy — if he could manage such a climb even in his weakened state, how strong had he been before? But when he reached the railing he stopped, leaning back on the rope.

‘That’s iron,’ he said flatly. ‘I can’t touch it.’

‘You have to,’ she whispered, but he shook his head.

‘Touching iron’s like an electric shock to a faery — it doesn’t just take away our magic, it hurts. It can even knock us unconscious. If I grab it, I may not be able to hang on.’ He shifted his footing on the rock and reached a hand up towards her. ‘I’ll have to jump as high as I can, and let you pull me over.’

This was ridiculous, thought Ivy. They’d never get out of the Delve at this rate. Still, there was nothing else but to try it, so she leaned as far over the railing as she could and gripped his hand in her own.

‘One,’ mouthed Richard, crouching against the rock. ‘Two. Three- ’

He sprang upward, while Ivy braced her feet against the railing and hauled with all her might. The iron groaned as Richard’s weight landed on it, then blazed white as it touched skin. He gasped and convulsed — but in the same moment Ivy dragged him over, and the two of them landed in a heap on the floor of the adjoining tunnel.

‘ Ow,’ Richard breathed, rolling away from her and pressing one hand to his stomach. Dizzy with relief, Ivy sat up and crawled over to the railing to untie her rope. She coiled it up, slung it across her body and reached for the thunder-axe again.

‘Come on,’ she told him. ‘We’ve got a long way to go.’

‘This is incredible,’ murmured Richard. ‘Is that silver?’

She’d told him to stay close and put his hand on her shoulder, so she could keep her glow dim. Not only because she feared they’d be seen if she shone more brightly, but because no outsider should ever see the treasures of the Delve. Unfortunately, the faery’s night-vision was a lot better than she’d thought. ‘Stop it,’ she hissed, quickening her pace. ‘Keep your eyes down.’

He obeyed, or at least kept silent, until they turned the next corner. But then he made a disbelieving noise, and Ivy knew what he’d just seen — the thousands of tiny gemstones embedded into the tunnel walls. Only total darkness could have hidden them, and she didn’t dare extinguish her light or they’d never get anywhere at all. But hearing Richard’s intake of breath and slow, wondering exhale made Ivy feel even more like a traitor than before.

She hugged the thunder-axe closer, arm muscles burning with the strain of carrying the heavy pick so long. She didn’t dare try shifting it to a more comfortable position — if she dropped it, the crash would be loud enough to wake the whole Delve. Richard might be willing to take it from her, but she hated to appear weak, and she didn’t trust him enough yet to hand him something he could use as a weapon. Besides, she was almost home now, so she’d be able to put it down soon enough…

She’d only taken a few more steps when a loose stone spiked into her heel, throwing her off-balance. With a gasp Ivy staggered sideways, bumping into the tunnel wall. The thunder-axe’s head tipped away from her, and she felt the haft twist out of her grip -

Richard leaped forward, his hands locking over hers and catching the pickaxe a mere hand-span from the floor. For a few uneven heartbeats the two of them stared into each other’s eyes, breathing hard. Then Ivy drew herself upright, gave him a shaky nod, and hefted the pick again.

By the time they reached her family’s cavern, all Ivy’s nerves were jangling. Little shivers ran over her skin as she crept inside to put the rope away and prop the thunder-axe in place, and she felt horribly sure that at any moment Mica or Cicely would fling open their curtains and confront her. When her brother stirred and mumbled just as she was lowering the pick to the floor, she had to clamp her teeth shut on a scream. But then the familiar snore started up again, and she managed to quell her panic and carry on.

‘Done it,’ she whispered to Richard as she slipped out, easing the door closed behind her. Then she grabbed his arm and hurried up the corridor. She couldn’t bear to creep and skulk any more; it was too unnerving. Better to make a bold rush for the exit than waste any more time on secrecy.

They’d just passed the Narrows and were starting up the Hunter’s Stair when Richard seized her wrist and jerked her to a stop. Shocked by his rudeness, Ivy was just about to order him to let go when she heard it. Voices.

There was no time to discuss a plan. Leaping down the stair, Ivy pulled Richard into the only hiding place she could find — a shallow curve of the tunnel, barely wide enough for the two of them. Flattening him against the wall with one outstretched arm, she pressed herself next to him, extinguished her glow, and fervently willed them both invisible.

‘…doesn’t mean he won’t be back again,’ said Feldspar’s voice from above. ‘Next time he’ll bring others with him, and we’ll have a battle on our hands.’

‘You think so?’ That was Gem, boots clomping as he headed down the steps. ‘I can’t see it. We’ve always kept our heads down when their kind were about, and we haven’t lost a hunter in years. Excepting young Keeve, of course. But he always was a wild one, and I wouldn’t be surprised-’ He stopped. ‘What?’

‘Hush a minute.’ Feldspar sounded tense. ‘Did you hear something?’

Ivy’s heart was pounding so hard, she felt sure it would smash right out of her chest. She closed her eyes, pushing all her concentration into holding the invisibility glamour steady. Any second now the two hunters would pass by, their combined glows banishing every shadow, and if she let the illusion falter even for a moment…

‘What’s to hear?’ asked Gem with a snort. ‘You think a spriggan could follow us right into the Delve? If he’s that crafty and we’re that blind, we may as well surrender and hand over our treasure right now.’

Richard’s chest rose sharply against Ivy’s arm, and she could practically read his thoughts: Treasure? Her lips flattened. If he turned out to be a spriggan after all, she’d never forgive herself.

Above them, Feldspar chuckled. ‘All right, I’ll quit trying to prank you. But I’m not joking about there being more of those creatures. Two sightings in a week — that can’t be a coincidence. And who’s to say that killing one won’t just make the rest of them angry?’

‘Ah, you’re a twitch-nosed rabbit. We’re safe enough in the Delve, so let ’em come, is what I say…’

Still lost in friendly argument, the two hunters continued down the steps into the Narrows, passing so close to Ivy that she could feel their glows warming her skin. But they never broke stride, or looked around. And soon the sound of their footsteps faded away.

Ivy relaxed, but her mind was still racing. So Gem and Feldspar had been out all night looking for spriggans. How close had she come to meeting them when she’d gone out earlier? Had they heard the scream that had startled her into flight?

Richard gave a little cough, and she realised she was still pinning him against the wall. Embarrassed, she dropped her arm and let him go.

‘We’d better hurry,’ she whispered as she stepped out into the corridor, rekindling her light. ‘It should be safe now, but there isn’t much time.’

When Ivy and Richard climbed out onto the surface the moon had vanished, and a light rain was falling. Ivy rubbed her bare arms, but Richard flung his wide as though to embrace the sky.

‘Finally,’ he exulted. ‘I thought I’d never breathe fresh air again.’

This was the moment Ivy had dreaded. He was stronger and faster than she was, even in his weakened state; if he chose to betray her now, she’d be unable to stop him.

‘You taught me to fly,’ she said. ‘Now I’ve set you free, as we agreed. But there’s one more thing. Swear to me that you’ll tell no one what you saw in the Delve tonight. No one.’

‘A good mouth-filling oath?’ Richard turned, his smile fading to seriousness as his pewter-grey gaze met hers. ‘I swear it,’ he said. ‘By my blood and by my name. My true name.’

Ivy’s apprehension eased a little. Maybe she could count on him after all. ‘But you still have to take me to my mother,’ she said. ‘I’ll come as soon as I get the chance, but-’

‘You’re not coming now?’

‘I can’t.’ It hurt to admit how badly she’d miscalculated, but she couldn’t deny it now. ‘If I don’t get home soon, my family will wake up and find me missing. And when they realise you’re gone as well…’

‘They’ll think we’ve eloped?’ said Richard with a quirk of the eyebrows, but when Ivy glared at him he relented. ‘My apologies. They’ll think I’ve taken you hostage, of course.’

Ivy nodded. ‘That’s why I have to go now. But…’ She drew in her breath. ‘I risked my life for you tonight, and I hope you won’t make me regret it. Promise that when I call for you, tomorrow night or the next, you’ll be here.’

A muscle jumped in Richard’s cheek. He wrapped his arms around himself, as though he’d only just remembered he was only half-dressed. ‘Tomorrow or the next, you say. And if you haven’t come by then?’

‘Then you’re free to go.’ She couldn’t expect him to wait forever, after all. ‘But if you leave a note telling me where my mother is, I’ll be able to look for her on my own. And then you’ll have kept your word to both of us.’

Richard gave her a narrow look. ‘Not to the letter, which is how we faeries make our bargains. But perhaps Marigold will see it differently. As you wish.’ Without another word, he turned and walked away.

‘That’s gratitude,’ called Ivy after him, but the faery didn’t look back. Telling herself it was foolish to feel hurt — what more could she expect from someone who wasn’t even a piskey? — Ivy swept the bracken aside and ducked into the Delve.

Ivy dreamed that she was flying, and at first she didn’t want to wake — until she remembered that she could fly, and broke into an involuntary smile. But her bones ached, and her eyelids felt so heavy she could barely force them open. Surely it couldn’t be morning yet?

But there was no doubting her sense of time; it was as unfailing as her sense of direction. And if she didn’t get up and wake the others, they’d know something was wrong. Repressing a sigh, Ivy struggled out of bed and lit the day-lamps. She prodded Mica with the broom handle until he swore and slapped it away, then crossed to Cicely’s alcove, opened the curtains…

And found the bed empty.

‘Cicely?’ Ivy turned, searching the cavern for her sister’s glow. She passed a hand over the pillow, then the bedclothes, but felt not a trace of warmth. ‘Mica, did you hear Cicely get up a while ago?’

Mica poked his head out between the curtains, his black hair tousled from sleep. ‘What? No.’

A fearful suspicion stirred in Ivy’s mind. She went to the door and opened it, looking both ways down the passage. ‘Cicely! Are you there?’

‘Don’t be ridiculous,’ said Mica, muffled by the shirt he was pulling over his head. ‘Where would she go at this hour?’

He had a point, but Ivy wasn’t about to acknowledge it. She grabbed her wrap off its hook and flung it around her. ‘I’m going to look for her,’ she said, and dashed out.

An hour later she had visited all of Cicely’s favourite places, knocked several sleepy families awake, and walked a circuit of the neighbouring tunnels, calling all the while. Jenny joined her, as did Mica and Mattock, and between them they searched the Delve from Market Cavern to Earthenbore.

But there was no sign of Ivy’s little sister anywhere. Cicely, like Keeve before her, had vanished. eight

Ivy sat shivering by the hearth in the Joan’s stateroom, one of Cicely’s hair ribbons crumpled in her hand. She barely noticed Betony pacing the rug as she questioned Mica about when he’d last seen Cicely, or Gossan’s frown as he listened, or Flint standing in the doorway with a face as stony as his name. All Ivy knew was that her little sister was gone, and that it was her fault.

After the first shock of Cicely’s disappearance, it hadn’t taken Ivy long to realise what must have happened. The uneasy feeling she’d had yesterday, both times she went to the surface…she ought to have trusted her instincts. Because, of course, it had been Cicely following her all along.

Perhaps it had been Ivy’s sun-browned skin that roused Cicely’s suspicions, or perhaps it was hearing her slip back into the cavern in the middle of the night. Perhaps she’d simply been eager to find out what surprise Ivy was preparing. But for whatever reason, Cicely had made herself invisible and followed Ivy all the way to the surface, only to discover that her older sister had been sneaking out of the Delve without her.

Cicely probably hadn’t gone outside the first time — the afternoon light would have blinded her. Instead she’d retreated to her bed, to brood over what she’d seen. But when she heard Ivy getting up later that night, it was the perfect chance to follow her a second time, and find out what she was up to.

It sickened Ivy to think that she’d led her little sister into danger. But more dreadful still was knowing that the scream she’d heard on the hillside — that thin, wailing cry that had startled her into flight — must have come from Cicely. If she’d gone to investigate straight away, she might have been in time to save her. But Ivy had been caught up in the joy of her new swift-form, and by the time she turned back her sister had already vanished…

‘ WHAT?’ exploded Mica, and Ivy nearly dropped Cicely’s ribbon in the fire. ‘That’s impossible! I chained that spriggan up myself — there’s no way he could have escaped!’

‘And yet he did,’ said Betony crisply. ‘Perhaps the iron was not as pure as you believed, or perhaps he found some way to weaken it. But the prisoner has gone, and taken Cicely with him.’

No, thought Ivy in dismay. He couldn’t have, he was with me. But how could she tell them that?

‘I’ll kill him,’ Mica’s voice was savage, his big hands clenched so tight they shook. ‘I’ll track him all the way across Kernow if I have to, but I swear I won’t rest until I break his skinny neck.’

‘There’s a search party heading to the surface,’ said Gossan, ‘and our most seasoned hunters and trackers are among them. They will do everything in their power to find Cicely.’

‘No doubt,’ Mica said flatly, ‘but they can only search for a few hours before they have to come back again. And that’s not good enough.’ He dropped to one knee. ‘Jack O’Lantern, Joan the Wad,’ he said formally to Gossan and Betony in turn, ‘I ask permission to track the spriggan myself, and stay out as long as it takes to find him and get my sister back.’

‘Alone?’ asked Betony. ‘Leaving Ivy with no one to provide for her?’

She didn’t even glance at Flint; they all knew that Ivy’s father was of no fit mind to look after anyone. He was safe enough working in the mine, but send him to the surface and he might well drown himself in a bog, or walk off a cliff into the sea.

‘Mattock would take care of Ivy, if I asked him,’ said Mica quickly. ‘Or Jenny’s clan could take her in, until I get back.’

And there it was again. Just because Ivy was wingless, because she was small and skinny, they were talking about her as though she were an invalid. Never mind that she’d been managing a household for five years and doing the bulk of the chores as well — that didn’t count as real work, apparently.

Betony and Gossan shared a look. Then the Joan said, ‘Cicely must be found, yes, and her kidnapper punished as he deserves. But this is not a matter for any piskey to undertake alone.’

‘Then I’ll put together my own search party,’ pleaded Mica. ‘I’ll take Mattock with me, and Gem and Feldspar too if you want. But you have to let me go!’

‘ Have to?’ Betony said coldly. ‘The Jack and I will do what is best for the Delve, Mica. Not only for you, but for all our people.’ She walked behind her desk and sat down, wings folded primly behind her. ‘I will consider your request, and inform you when we reach a decision. Until then, you may leave.’

Mica’s expression turned mutinous. He sprang to his feet and stalked out.

‘That one will make trouble,’ warned Nettle, as she poured the tea and handed a cup to Gossan. ‘He’s moody, like his mother. And if he’s not kept busy…’

‘He will be,’ said the Joan, and now she sounded weary. Then she turned to Ivy and said, ‘Did you bring something of Cicely’s with you?’

Silently Ivy got up and handed her the hair ribbon. Betony smoothed it out upon her palm, then laid her other hand over it and closed her eyes. She must be casting a spell to try and find Cicely, Ivy realised, and held her breath. Of course the Joan would have tried the same thing when Keeve went missing, but perhaps this time…

‘Nothing,’ said Betony. ‘I fear she is already beyond the range of my spells.’ She laid the ribbon down. ‘Tell me, Ivy. You said you and Mica had both warned Cicely against going to the surface. Do you have any idea what drew her there, or what made her disobey?’

‘I-’ Ivy’s throat was so tight she could hardly speak. ‘I don’t-’

‘My love.’ Gossan leaned close to his wife’s ear. ‘She has already lost her mother, and now her sister as well. Give her time to grieve.’

Gratitude rushed into Ivy, followed by a hot wave of shame. She didn’t deserve the Jack’s compassion, not after the things she’d done. But if she confessed, they’d lock her up in the dungeon. And then she’d never get the chance to go outside and search for Cicely as only a swift could do.

‘Very well,’ said Betony, waving a hand at Ivy. ‘You may leave.’

As Ivy walked to the door, Nettle followed her. ‘I know how it feels, to lose a sister,’ she said in a cracked whisper. ‘It’s a hard, hard thing. I’ll never see my poor Gillyflower again, but I hope you find your Cicely.’ She gave her a last, sad smile, and closed the door.

Ivy was left alone with Flint, who stood like a statue with his thunder-axe over his shoulder. ‘She’s gone, Dad,’ Ivy said, clutching at his free hand. ‘Cicely’s gone. What are we going to do?’

She searched his face for a change in expression, but Flint didn’t even blink. He pulled out of her grip, hefted his pickaxe, and walked away.

‘What is wrong with you?’ Ivy’s voice rose high, breaking on the final word. ‘Don’t you care about Cicely, or anything? Is this all you can do — bury yourself in the ground and hammer away until you drop dead, and we’re left with no parents at all?’

Flint’s head drooped a little, but he didn’t answer. He kept walking past the stairs and the entrance to the Market Cavern, heading for the trapdoor that would take him down into the diggings.

Ivy stared after him until he was nothing but a blur in the distance. Then she wiped her eyes angrily on the back of her hand, and ran to catch up with Mica.

‘I can’t believe Aunt Betony just dismissed me like that.’ Mica paced around the cavern, kicking at the rug. ‘Cicely’s my sister; I should be the one to look for her. And I was the one who caught the spriggan in the first place. But from the way she was acting, you’d think it was my fault he’d escaped!’

Ivy sank into a chair, arms wrapped around her chest to hold the hurt inside. ‘I know,’ she said unevenly. ‘It’s not fair. You’re not to blame.’

‘I can’t understand how he got out of there,’ muttered Mica. ‘The iron was pure — I made sure of that. He couldn’t have got past that pile of rocks in the tunnel, and he couldn’t climb the shaft either, not without a rope…’

Apprehension stirred in Ivy. If she let him go on like this, it wouldn’t be long before he came to the obvious conclusion — that someone had deliberately helped the prisoner escape. ‘What are you going to do?’ she asked, to change the subject. ‘If Betony won’t let you go…’

‘She will. She’s got to.’ Mica flung himself onto the sofa across from her, fists clenched on his knees. ‘I know the surface as well as any hunter in the Delve. I’m not afraid of spriggans. And I won’t give up until I find Cicely, however long it takes. Who else can say that?’

I can, Ivy thought, but she didn’t dare say it. Not until she knew she could trust him. ‘But if she decides not to listen? What will you do then?’

His face creased with anguish. ‘What do you want me to say? That I’d disobey the Joan and Jack, break every rule in the Delve if I had to, just for a chance of finding Cicely again? You know I would. I know you would, too.’

Ivy’s eyes prickled, and she looked down at her lap. So Mica did understand how she felt, after all. If she could only explain to him that she’d felt the same way about finding their mother…

‘Then if someone told you that she was alive, and they knew where she was,’ she said, ‘then you’d do whatever it took to get to her? Even if — if everyone else said it was dangerous, and you shouldn’t go?’

‘Of course.’ His voice sharpened. ‘I’m not a coward. What are you getting at?’

She must be careful now, so very careful. If Mica guessed that Ivy had anything to do with Richard’s escape, he’d turn against her in a heartbeat. ‘I’ve heard stories,’ she said. ‘About our ancestors, and other magical folk. How some of them could change into the shapes of animals, or-’

His face twisted with revulsion. ‘You want me to try and turn myself into an animal?’

Ivy hadn’t even considered that possibility; she’d only meant to prepare him for the shock of seeing her change into swift-form. But perhaps it was a good thing he’d misunderstood. ‘Is that so bad?’ she asked.

‘Of course it is!’ He flung himself to his feet and began to pace again. ‘If you’d ever seen a wild animal, let alone hunted one-’

‘I don’t understand.’

Mica made an exasperated noise and raked his fingers through his hair. ‘Look, it’s common sense. Piskeys have a special relationship with animals — you know that much?’

Ivy nodded.

‘Well, when we become hunters, we swear to help any sick or injured creature we find, and never kill any animal for sport. But they’re still animals, and we still have to eat. If we started turning ourselves into them, how could we hunt them? That’s why it’s forbidden.’

‘Who says so?’ asked Ivy. ‘I’ve never heard such a thing. And anyway, animals eat each other all the time. Maybe you wouldn’t want to kill the exact kind of animal you become, but-’

Mica cut her off. ‘It’s not just a bad idea, it’s against our nature. We piskeys are solid like the earth, not changeable like air or water. That’s how we’ve survived all these centuries.’

That sounded like something Aunt Betony would say, though it made no sense to Ivy. If shape-changing was impossible for piskeys, then why bother forbidding them to do it? ‘But the droll-teller said that our ancestors used to change shape sometimes,’ she protested. ‘And some faeries still-’

‘Faeries!’ Her brother’s mouth worked as though he were about to spit. ‘We don’t go near their kind. Why should I want to do anything they do?’

‘Because,’ said Ivy, controlling her impatience with an effort, ‘if you could turn yourself into a bird and fly over the countryside instead of having to search on foot, you might have a better chance of finding Cicely.’

Mica gave a harsh laugh. ‘A bird! Do you have any idea-’ Then he stopped and repeated softly, ‘A bird,’ as though it were a revelation.

Had he finally understood what Ivy was saying? It was on the tip of her tongue to tell him he was wrong about piskeys not being able to change — or even prove it, by transforming into a swift before his eyes. Maybe then he’d realise how foolish it was to cling to some old hunters’ superstition, and let her help him look for Cicely.

‘So that’s how he did it,’ Mica went on, gazing past Ivy as though entranced. ‘I wouldn’t have thought he could, but maybe…’

‘Mica?’ asked Ivy, wary now. ‘What are you talking about?’

He focused on her, eyes alight with fervour. ‘I know how the spriggan got out,’ he said. ‘And I know how to catch him, too.’

‘What? How?’

‘Never mind that. This is hunter business. I’m going to talk to Gossan.’ He started towards the door, then paused and turned back. ‘But if I were you, I’d forget all that dross about shape-changing. If the Joan knew you’d even suggested it…’ He gave her a bleak smile. ‘Trust me. You don’t want to know what she’d do.’

When Mica had gone, Ivy slumped in her chair, feeling more drained than ever. For one brief shining moment she’d dared to believe that she might not be alone after all, that she and Mica could put aside their differences and work together. And that if she explained it carefully enough, he might even understand why she’d gone outside the Delve and learned to change shape — because she’d truly believed it was the only way to find their mother.

But she’d been wrong, more wrong than she’d ever imagined. Because shape-changing wasn’t merely unusual, it was forbidden. And if Mica saw Ivy turn into a swift, he wouldn’t just be surprised — he’d be horrified.

And now she’d put Richard in danger, too. She’d never meant Mica to guess that the so-called spriggan could become a bird, much less use that knowledge to trap him again. Now he’d come up with a plan — a plan that might even work — and she had no idea what it was or how to stop it. All she could do was tell Richard what had happened, and urge him to be on his guard.

But how could she, without giving herself away? The whole Delve was buzzing with the news of Cicely’s disappearance, and there’d be searchers going in and out of the Earthenbore all day — not to mention plenty of friends and neighbours coming by to offer Ivy their sympathies. Getting up to the surface would be impossible until tonight at the earliest, and it wouldn’t be easy even then.

A knock at the door startled Ivy from reverie. She got up and opened it, to find Mattock standing there with a basket of flat cakes in one hand and a bottle of cream in the other. ‘My mum sent these for you,’ he said.

‘Did she make the hevva cakes or did you?’ asked Ivy, and he blushed. A few years ago Mica had caught Mattock helping his mother make saffron buns and had never let him forget it. ‘It’s kind of you,’ she added, managing a smile. ‘We’ll have them for tea, if Mica’s back by then.’

‘He’s not here?’ asked Mattock. ‘I’d have thought…well, with everything going on, I expected you’d be together.’

‘Mica doesn’t like brooding over bad things,’ said Ivy. ‘He’d rather be doing something about them. Right now, he thinks he’s figured out a way to catch the spriggan and get Cicely back before-’

Her throat closed up, and she couldn’t finish the sentence. She took the bottle and basket from Mattock’s hands and turned away before her face betrayed her as well.

He followed her to the kitchen, his big frame looming over her as she set the gifts down. She could feel his warmth like a solid wall against her back as he said quietly, ‘Ivy.’

‘I’m not crying.’ She ground the words between her teeth. ‘Cicely is alive, and I’m going to find her, so there’s nothing to cry about.’

‘ You’re going to find her? How?’

Ivy wanted to beat her head against the table and curse her own stupidity, but she managed to force a laugh. ‘I mean we are. All of us. Working together. Each in our own way.’

And now she was babbling. Why wouldn’t Mattock leave her alone? Surely he could tell she didn’t want anyone’s company, didn’t want to eat his stupid cakes or drink the cream that only Cicely had ever really liked, didn’t want anything except to find her sister, only nobody would give her the chance Then Mattock put his hands on her shoulders, and Ivy’s resistance crumbled. She turned around and buried her face against his chest. ‘I can’t believe she’s gone,’ she whispered. ‘I should have known, Matt. I should have seen it coming.’

He didn’t say anything, only held her tight. It felt amazingly good to lean against him, feeling his strength like armour all around her — the last person she remembered ever holding her like this was Flint, and that had been years ago.

But she couldn’t cling to Mattock forever, and surely he wouldn’t want her to. Ivy straightened up, brushing at her cheeks. ‘I appreciate you coming by,’ she said with all the dignity she could muster. ‘Please tell your mum I’m grateful.’

Mattock nodded and bowed out of the cavern, closing the door behind him with such exaggerated care that Ivy had to smile. Simple, honest Mattock. Sometimes she wished he were her brother instead of Mica, but that wouldn’t be fair to him.

And it wouldn’t be fair to involve him in her plan to look for Cicely, either. She could only hope he wouldn’t guess, after her foolish slip of the tongue, that she planned to do anything at all.

It was a grim and mostly silent meal that Ivy and Mica ate that night. Without Cicely’s bright chatter the atmosphere in the cavern was oppressive, and even phrases like ‘pass the butter’ fell with the weight of an anvil. Ivy soon found herself wishing that Flint would come and join them, just so she’d have someone else not to talk to.

But she hadn’t seen her father since the morning, and when she’d met Hew coming up grimy-faced and coughing from the diggings, he’d told Ivy that Flint meant to stay even later than usual to make up for the time he’d missed. As though losing Cicely had been merely another interruption to his work. As though it mattered whether he dug any more tin or copper out of that tunnel, or dug any more tunnels at all.

‘He’s a knocker, lass,’ Hew had reminded her gently. ‘He’s only doing what he’s made for. And maybe it’s the best thing for him. Same as your brother, with the hunting. It’s how we menfolk grieve.’

What about me? Ivy wanted to shout at him. I can’t sense ore or shape metal. I’m not allowed to hunt. All I want to do is help look for my sister, but that’s forbidden. How am I supposed to grieve?

But there was no answer to that, at least not that Hew could give her. So she’d held her tongue and nodded, and then she’d gone back to the cavern and made about a week’s worth of meat pasties to keep in the cold-hole, since that at least was something she could do.

‘What did Gossan have to say about your plan?’ she asked Mica, when he’d finished his last bite and she could endure the silence no longer. ‘Did the Joan agree to let you start looking for Cicely?’

‘They said I could go out tonight,’ replied Mica, wiping his mouth, ‘if Mattock and Gem go with me. Only we have to stay together and be home by sunrise, so what’s the use of that?’ He threw the napkin down. ‘We might as well not bother.’

‘But you will,’ said Ivy. She knew Mica too well to believe otherwise, no matter how much he complained. ‘When do you leave?’

‘In a couple of hours.’ He walked towards his alcove. ‘But Matt said he’d come by and wake me when it’s time, so you needn’t worry about it. I’m going to sleep.’

Ivy spent a few minutes putting what was left of the food away, then climbed into bed herself. She was drifting in and out of consciousness, too miserable to sleep but too tired to stay awake, when the door creaked and she heard Mattock tiptoe in. Mica groaned, there was a rustle, and a few minutes later the two of them went out.

Now was her chance. Ivy waited a little longer, to be sure Mica and Mattock were well on their way. Then hurriedly she dressed and slipped out into the passage, heading for the Great Shaft.

The sky above the Delve was clear, the moon a neat half-circle among the stars. To the west, a trio of dim lights bobbed along the ground — Mica, Mattock and Gem. Secure in the knowledge that they’d never recognise her in swift-form, Ivy glided over the ruins of the Engine House, then angled off towards the nearby wood.

It wasn’t a large wood: only a scattering of trees and undergrowth, with a well-travelled footpath through the middle. Ivy flew from one end to the other looking for signs of life, then landed in piskey-shape on the far side. ‘Richard?’ she asked, quietly at first and then a little louder. But though she listened until she grew impatient, there was no reply.

‘Richard!’ She was shouting now, not caring if anyone heard her. Surely Mica and the others wouldn’t recognise her voice at this distance. ‘I’m here! Where are you?’

Still no one answered, and Ivy’s restlessness grew. She couldn’t hang about here all night — she had to find Cicely. But she’d wanted to warn Richard about Mica’s plan. Why didn’t he answer?

Surely it was too soon to give up yet. Ivy walked to the centre of the wood, cupped her hands around her mouth, and yelled ‘Richard!’ one more time. Then she sat down on a fallen branch and waited.

Minutes passed, each more slowly than the next. Something rustled in the leaves above her, and Ivy looked up in hope — but no, it was only a squirrel. A little while later a bird began to sing, but it was a liquid, melancholy tune, nothing like the trilling noises Richard had made back in the dungeon.

Ivy rubbed her palms on her thighs, fidgeting with anxiety. What if Richard had decided not to keep his promise after all? What if he’d decided it was too dangerous to stay, and flown off to some faraway place?

‘Richard!’ she called hoarsely. ‘You’d better come soon! I’m not going to wait forever!’

But still there was nothing. Not a word, not a sign.

The faery was gone.

Ivy took a deep breath and let it go. Then she leaped to her feet, snatched up a stick and hurled it into the underbrush. ‘Curse you!’ she stormed. ‘You liar, you oath-breaker, you — you demon blackguard wretch of a spriggan!’

There was a long silence, while the wind murmured through the treetops. Then a light, ironic voice said, ‘I see my reputation is at stake.’

Ivy spun around. There on the path, as though he had been there all along, stood Richard — but not Richard as she had last seen him, covered in filth and bruises and dressed in rags. His hair hung straight and clean almost to his shoulders, and his jacket and slim trousers looked new. If not for the purple shadow around one eye and the scab on his upper lip, she would hardly have recognised him.

But before she could speak, he vanished. A tiny bird with a blue-black head, shadowy wings and white underbelly flitted past, landed on her other side, and turned into Richard again.

‘I was a few hundred feet up when I heard you calling,’ he said. ‘And I needed to make sure that you’d come alone.’

Blood rushed into Ivy’s face. She’d been so busy worrying that she might not be able to trust him, it had never occurred to her that he could have similar doubts. ‘You thought I’d betray you?’

‘Not willingly, no. But if your Joan found out that you’d helped me, she might not have given you a choice.’

He had a point. Ivy’s fury subsided, and she gave a reluctant nod.

‘Ready to go?’ Richard asked. ‘It’s a little late, but we should be able to get to Truro in time.’

‘I can’t.’ Ivy passed a hand wearily over her curls. ‘My little sister Cicely’s gone missing.’

He frowned. ‘You mean she just disappeared? Like that other one — Keeve?’

Ivy hoped not, since she suspected that Keeve was dead. But she couldn’t deny the possibility. ‘Yes. Do you have any idea where she might have gone?’

Richard looked sober. ‘None at all.’

No easy answers, then. She’d hoped she wouldn’t have to do this, but she could see no other way. ‘Then I’ll have to say goodbye,’ Ivy said. ‘I can’t go to my mother now, not until I find Cicely. Besides, my brother’s figured out that you can change shape, and he thinks he knows how to catch you. It’s not safe for you to stay here.’

‘What do you want me to do, then? Go back to your mother, and tell her you aren’t coming?’

How could a simple little word be so hard to say? ‘Yes. But,’ she added quickly, ‘don’t leave it at that. Tell her everything that’s happened since you and I met — especially the part about Cicely.’ If Marigold knew that her youngest daughter was missing, maybe she’d come and help with the search. ‘And tell her that if she has any more messages for me, she’ll have to deliver them herself. You’ve done enough.’

The faery’s brows lifted, and he gave her an appraising look. Then he bowed to her without a trace of irony, and vanished. He didn’t even turn into a bird; he was simply not there any more. Ivy stared at the place where he’d been standing until her eyes began to burn, and she realised she’d forgotten to blink. Then she shook herself into swift-form, and flew away. nine

Ivy searched for her sister all night, gliding low over the uneven ground. She glimpsed a badger digging in the underbrush, and fox cubs tussling at play; she passed a field where rabbits browsed in the grass, and watched an owl wing silently by. The twin lamps of a human vehicle wound through the landscape, turned into the drive of a little farmstead and winked out, while in the distance hundreds of similar lights marked the boundaries of some great city. Yet she found nothing to suggest that Cicely had passed this way.

She turned westward and winged along the coast, skimming over sweeping curves of sand and coves where foam-capped breakers smashed upon the rocks. The sea-cliffs were riddled with holes, many of them adits from abandoned mine workings that likely connected to the Delve at some point. But still she could find no trace of Cicely.

Absorbed in her search, she scarcely noticed the tiny thread of gold creeping along the horizon. Not until the sky lightened from black to deep blue and the air began to fill with squawking gulls did Ivy realise that it was dawn — and that she should have been home ages ago. Cursing herself for being so careless, she wheeled south-east and flashed towards the Delve. Mica would be returning any minute, and if she didn’t make it back to the cavern before he did…

Then she caught sight of her brother standing at the top of the ridge, with Mattock and Gem at his side. From the way he was waving his arms he must be angry, or at least passionate about something, but that was of no matter. All Ivy cared about was getting down the Great Shaft straightaway

Only she couldn’t, because more birds were zooming towards her from every direction, warbling and squawking in a cacophony of avian language. A pair of swifts darted around her, their black eyes staring cold and bright into her own — and then the whole flock dived beneath her, a whirlwind of beaks and claws and feathers, heading straight for the hillside where Mica and his companions stood.

Bewildered, Ivy hung back and watched as the mixed multitude of birds spiralled around the hunters, still uttering their wordless cries. What were they doing? Had Mica sent them to look for the spriggan? Were they reporting to him somehow? She was still puzzling over it when Mica waved his hand and the flock scattered, flapping off as abruptly as they had come.

Except for the swifts. They hovered before him, uttering staccato shrieks of alarm, while Mica stood still as though listening. Then he made a sharp gesture, and the swifts shot away like twin arrows — straight at Ivy.

For an instant her mind went blank with disbelief. Then she remembered what Richard had said: Swifts are communal birds. If you don’t behave like a proper swift the other ones will sense it, and instead of welcoming you, they’ll attack…

Panic erupted in Ivy’s breast. She whirled and fled, wings flapping frantically as she shot towards the Engine House and the capped shaft behind it. But the other swifts were more experienced fliers, and they quickly cut off her descent. Forced into retreat, Ivy swerved towards the wood, with the other swifts in close pursuit.

‘No!’ she screamed, but it came out as a shriek — and then the swifts were on her, stabbing at her with their beaks and beating her with their wings. Buffeted by the storm of their rage, Ivy struggled vainly to fend them off. Control was impossible, and hopelessness filled her as she realised they were steering her back towards Mica and the other piskeys.

Tsier-sier, sang another bird as it passed above, mocking her with its freedom. Ivy cried out again as a swift’s beak jabbed into her breast, piercing feathers and skin. She had to get away, or they would tear her to pieces. She folded her wings and spiralled earthwards — then snapped them wide and shot up the slope in a last, desperate run for the Engine House.

Mica gave a shout, and the whizzing sound of his sling rippled the air. Ivy sensed the stone hurtling towards her and rolled — a fraction of a second too late. Heat scored across her back, and the muscles of her shoulder separated in a blaze of dazzling pain. The ground spiralled up to meet her, and she knew it would only be seconds before she hit A freak wind blasted the hillside, thrashing the gorse-bushes and rippling the heather in its wake. Still flapping her one good wing, Ivy felt herself tossed upwards on the breeze. Pain blinded her, and she was still trying to regain control when a dark form loomed up before her and ruthless hands snatched her from the air.

Ivy gave a final cry of agony as her injured wing twisted. Then she willed herself into piskey-form, and let the darkness claim her.

She had thought fainting would be like sleep, a quiet place where she knew nothing and no one could touch her. But though darkness hazed her vision and she had a fuzzy sense of being disconnected from her body, she could still hear someone talking to her, though faint and far away.

‘-don’t know where to find us yet, but they’ll be here any-’

A moment of merciful oblivion, then it returned, louder and closer.

‘-hide you somewhere. But if they find us-’

The words rose and fell in gasps, as though the speaker were running. Strangely, Ivy felt as though she were rising and falling, too. But she had no idea where she was, or who was with her. A dull throbbing spread through her shoulder and radiated out from her chest, but she couldn’t think what it meant.

‘-stop it. Do you hear me? You have to-’

She must have blacked out again, because the next time she became aware the up-and-down sensation had stopped. An earthy smell rose around her, dampness seeping into her clothes. She was lying in bed and someone was covering her up, but why was it so wet, and what was wrong with Then the darkness shattered, and pain smashed into her like rocks falling. Ivy would have screamed, but a hand clamped over her mouth, muffling the cry. ‘Stop glowing!’ her rescuer snapped. ‘ Now! ’

Ivy was too dazed to protest. She willed herself not to glow, and tried to breathe through the pain instead. And now all was black again except for a few glints of grey light above her, and she was half-buried in dirt, her head resting on something hard and warm that smelled like fir needles…

Richard.

‘…can’t have gone far,’ said a soft voice from above, and for a moment Ivy felt sure she must be dreaming, because it sounded like Mattock. ‘But how could he disappear like that?’

‘Quiet,’ came the reply, lower and harsher. ‘Keep looking. He could be anywhere.’

Mica. Ivy caught her breath, but agony stabbed her chest and she let out a feeble moan. The foliage above them rustled, and Richard covered her mouth again, all his muscles tensed for flight.

Don’t move, his body told her. Don’t make a sound.

Ivy dug her fingers into Richard’s arm and bit her lip to keep from screaming. How long had she lain in this dank hole? It felt like forever, and the fiery knots of pain in her chest and shoulder blotted out all other sensation. She would have surrendered to Mica and Mattock gladly, if only it would make the hurting stop…

‘…Ivy, it’s all right. They’ve gone.’

She should have been relieved, but now it hardly seemed to matter. Was it getting brighter? It could be the sun’s rays angling into the cave, but daylight had never seemed so inviting. It bathed her wounds, taking away the pain and lifting her tenderly as her own mother’s arms.

‘Ivy?’

The light was all around her now. A blissful peace enfolded her, and she could feel the world slipping away…

‘Oh no, you don’t.’ Richard’s voice was harsh. ‘Stay with me. Ivy!’

She sighed, melting limp against him. Then a hand smacked onto her injured shoulder, and Ivy’s eyes flew open. The golden light vanished, and cold fire seared through her body. She would have screamed, but the pain was so intense it took her breath away.

‘Live!’ Richard shouted, as a second wave of power shocked through her. Ivy convulsed, bolted upright — and slapped him across the face.

For a moment Richard froze, his eyes wide and his neck still twisted with the force of her blow. Then he collapsed against the back of the muddy hollow and broke into rasping laughter. Only then did it dawn on Ivy that the pain in her shoulder had faded, and her chest no longer stabbed with every breath. She felt weak and a little dizzy, but…

‘I’m alive,’ she whispered.

Her skin was glowing again, and now she could see everything: the burrow lined with soil and dead leaves, the mushrooms crowded into one corner, the roots that kept the ceiling from falling in. Some abandoned fox’s den or badger scrape in the depths of the thicket, so shallow that Richard had been forced to shrink himself and Ivy as small as he could just to fit.

And yet he’d done it. She’d told him to go, but he’d stayed, and when he saw her in trouble, he’d been ready. He’d flown to meet her, cast a spell to throw off her pursuers, transformed into faery-shape to catch her as she fell. And now he’d brought her back from the very gates of death, and what had she given him in return? A smack hard enough to rattle his teeth.

The worst of it was, Richard was still laughing. There was more than a hint of hysteria in it, and Ivy was beginning to think she might have to slap him again just to make him stop. ‘What’s so funny?’ she asked.

He let out a last snort of hilarity, wiped his eyes with one filthy hand and sat up. ‘It’s just…there’s this delicious irony to you hitting me, that’s all. The law hath not been dead, though it hath slept.’

Which meant nothing to Ivy, but she didn’t really care. ‘You saved my life,’ she said, and her hand went automatically to her shoulder. It was stiff and tender, but the bones and muscles felt whole and even the skin was unbroken. ‘I don’t know how to…’ No, she wasn’t about to thank him, that would put her eternally in his debt. But she owed him a great deal, and it would take her a long time to repay it. ‘I don’t know what to say.’

‘Then don’t say anything,’ said Richard. ‘You saved my life too, when you freed me from that dungeon. Now we’re even.’

His gaze held hers until Ivy began to feel self-conscious. She brushed the soil from her legs and backed away. ‘Well,’ she said, ‘we’re certainly evenly dirty.’

Richard climbed to his feet, one hand braced on the low ceiling. ‘We need to get out of here,’ he said. ‘I don’t think your brother saw you change out of your swift-form. But if we stay here much longer he’ll realise that you’re missing, and I really don’t want to be around when that happens. Especially not now that I’ve seen what he can do.’

The fevered energy that had filled Ivy since her healing drained away, leaving her shaken. ‘Mica,’ she whispered. ‘I knew he had a plan to catch you, but I never guessed…’ She looked up at him miserably. ‘Richard, I can’t go home.’

‘Why not?’

‘I’ve been gone too long. Even if Mica hasn’t guessed yet that I was the swift he shot, it won’t take him long to figure it out. I’ll be punished for going above — locked up, or put under guard at the very least — and then I’ll never get the chance-’

She broke off, pushing her fingertips against her eyes. The realisation of how badly she had miscalculated, what a disaster she had made for herself and everyone she loved, shook her to the core. ‘I can’t go back,’ she said. ‘Not until I find Cicely. And maybe not even then.’

Richard was quiet a moment, his face unreadable. At last he said, ‘It’s your choice. But if I were you, I’d talk to Marigold first. You’ll have a better chance of finding your sister with her help than you would on your own.’

Ivy wanted to agree, but at the same time she felt selfish for even considering it. She wanted to see Marigold so badly, to know the comfort that only a mother could give — but surely she didn’t deserve anything good after the way she’d failed Cicely? Especially now that she’d abandoned Mica and Flint as well?

And yet punishing herself wouldn’t help Cicely either. ‘I suppose you’re right,’ she said. ‘But…’ She moved her shoulder, wincing at the tug in her muscles. ‘I’m not up to flying yet. I’m not even sure I could hang on, if I were on your back.’ Especially since his bird-form was so tiny, she couldn’t believe he’d made the offer in the first place.

‘Well, we can’t go any farther by magic. I could take you into the wood because I knew you’d been there already, but after that it was back to running.’ Richard tapped his fingers along a root, frowning as he thought. ‘What if we make ourselves human size, and you turn both of us invisible? If we’ve got to walk, we’ll cover more ground that way.’

Ivy still felt wobbly after her near-death experience, and the thought of casting two spells at once made her head ache. But what choice did she have? They couldn’t stay here — the hunters of the Delve would be after them at any moment.

‘All right,’ she said, willing herself to sound confident. ‘Let’s go.’

On the far side of the wood the ground dropped away, sloping down into a little valley where a stream gurgled among the rocks. Richard set the pace, and Ivy did her best to keep up with him. But though nervous energy sustained her for a while, it wasn’t long before her strength began to falter. She’d been up most of the night, eaten nothing in hours, and her shoulder had begun aching again — first in occasional spasms, then with a steady throb that made her feel queasy.

‘So,’ said Richard as the path turned away from the riverbank and began to angle upward, ‘now that I’ve finally convinced you I’m not one, what exactly is a spriggan? Some kind of hideous creature, obviously — and I’m trying not to take that personally — but how are they different from other magical folk?’

‘I don’t know that much about them,’ Ivy said, focused on putting one foot in front of the other. Her chest was hurting as well now, and she found it hard to breathe. ‘Only that they’re thin and pale and ugly, and bring bad luck and bad weather wherever they go. They love only two things — food and treasure — and they steal piskey-women because they haven’t any women of their own.’

‘And they only live in Cornwall? Nowhere else?’

‘I’m not sure,’ she panted, wiping sweat from her brow. ‘Why?’

‘Because I’ve been to quite a few places, in my time,’ Richard replied. ‘I’ve travelled across England and Wales, and I even spent a few months in Scotland once. This isn’t the first time I’ve been to Cornwall, either. But I’ve never seen a single one of these so-called spriggans — look out! ’

Head down, eyes half-shut, Ivy didn’t even see the rock rolling towards her until she tripped over it. She lurched sideways, too startled to even cry out — but when Richard caught her arm, Ivy let out a swift’s shriek of agony. Hastily the faery switched his grip to her other side and helped her to safer ground.

‘This shouldn’t be happening,’ he said, as Ivy sank down on an outcropping. He crouched in front of her, seizing her chin and lifting her head up. ‘How long have you been in pain?’

She averted her eyes. ‘A while. I thought I was just tired.’

‘I put a lot of power into that healing.’ His fingers traced the purpling bruise on her shoulder, and Ivy flinched. ‘Why is it coming undone?’

‘I don’t know.’ She tried to get up, but her knees buckled and she fell back again. ‘But I can’t walk any farther. Just…go. Leave me here.’

‘I don’t think so,’ said Richard. He slid one arm beneath her legs, lifted her from the ground and set off up the hill, carrying Ivy as though she weighed nothing at all.

Ivy wanted to tell him to stop, so she could make herself small and save him the trouble. But her head was already pounding with the effort of keeping them both invisible, and the pain in her arm was growing worse every minute. All she could do was hide her face against Richard’s neck, and try not to be sick down his collar.

Then she lost consciousness altogether, and dropped into a bottomless shaft of oblivion.

Ivy woke to a world of dusty golden light. Above her spread a ceiling braced by dark, square-cut beams, while around her rose walls of stone and mortar. A human building of some sort — a barn perhaps? But if so, how had Richard brought her in here? She’d always heard that faeries couldn’t enter human dwellings without permission.

There was an itch between her shoulders, right where her wings ought to be. Ivy squirmed and reached behind her with one arm and then the other, trying to get at the irritation. She was on her third attempt before she realised she’d twisted her injured shoulder to its limits, and hadn’t felt any pain at all. Wondering, she lowered her hand and touched the place below her collarbone where the swift’s beak had pierced her. There was no tenderness there, either.

So Richard had healed her again while she lay unconscious, and this time he’d succeeded. But it must have taken all his strength, because now he lay sprawled on the floor beside her, so deep in slumber that he didn’t even twitch when Ivy spoke his name.

Well, let him sleep; he’d earned it. Ivy rose, brushing dust from her breeches. The building was old but in good repair, a low rectangle with a broad corridor along one side and the rest divided by wood and metal partitions. An earthy, pungent smell mingled with the scent of dried grass — animals? Ivy stepped out of the doorway, avoiding a heap of suspicious-looking muck in the middle of the corridor, and went to investigate.

She expected she might find pigs or goats in the neighbouring pens, perhaps even a cow. But when she reached the last box a shaggy brown head lifted to greet her, ears pricked and nose quivering. Ivy held out her humansized hand, delighted when the horse lipped her palm. ‘Hello, you beauty,’ she whispered to it, rubbing the smooth arch of its neck. ‘What are you doing in here?’

The horse gave a soft whinny and stamped one foot — but gingerly. And when Ivy leaned over the door she saw the problem at once: its left foreleg had been injured, and it couldn’t gallop until it was better. ‘Oh, what a shame,’ Ivy said, unlatching the door and slipping inside. Rubbing soothing circles over the horse’s chest, she crouched to examine the bandaged limb.

Even through the wrappings it felt swollen and hot to the touch, and the horse shied away from her fingers, neighing protest. ‘It’s all right,’ Ivy murmured. She blew softly into the horse’s nostrils, soothing it, and smiled when it tucked its head down against her chest. ‘I can’t heal you, but when Richard wakes up, maybe-’

A creak resonated through the barn, and Ivy froze as the outer door swung wide. Another horse came prancing in, an elegant dapple-grey with a haughty air that reminded her of Betony. And beside it walked a girl a little younger than Ivy, with a braid of dark hair swinging down her back.

Hastily Ivy made herself invisible, but not quickly enough. The girl’s head turned, her pert features creasing in a frown. ‘Hello? Is someone there?’

The brown horse chose that moment to sidle over and squeeze Ivy against the wall. An oof escaped her, and she shoved at its curving ribs, but it refused to budge. She flattened herself against the wood and tried to edge sideways, but something sharp sliced into her calf and she let out an involuntary yelp.

‘Right, whoever you are,’ said the girl sternly. ‘Come out of there.’ With a slap she sent the grey mare trotting into the neighbouring box, then strode towards them. ‘Budge over, Dodger.’ She shoved the brown horse and it danced sideways, leaving Ivy backed against the wall with blood spiralling down her leg.

‘What are you doing here?’ the girl demanded — but the moment her eyes met Ivy’s, her expression changed. ‘You’re a faery! No, wait, that’s not right.’ She cocked her helmeted head to one side, looking puzzled and awed at once. ‘What are you?’

Gooseflesh prickled over Ivy’s skin. How could a human see through her invisibility glamour like that? She was still trying to think of something to say when a laconic voice spoke up:

‘She’s a piskey, of course. And she’s with me.’

The girl whipped around, and Ivy took advantage of the distraction to make herself small and dart out into the corridor, taking refuge behind a nearby bucket. Once more, Richard had put himself between her and danger. But how were they going to get out of this?

‘Faery man?’ breathed the girl, unlatching her helmet and putting it aside. ‘Is it really you?’

Without hesitation Richard stepped out of hiding to meet her. His clothes were still rumpled and muddy and there were bits of grass in his air, but his eyes were wickedly bright.

‘Hello, Molly Menadue,’ he said. ‘It’s good to see you again.’ ten

The situation had changed so fast, so unexpectedly, that Ivy felt as though she were lost in some strange dream. This human girl had recognised Richard at a glance — even knew that he was a faery — and he didn’t appear to mind it at all. He’d even greeted her by name, as though she were an old friend. But how could that be?

‘You came back,’ the girl said. ‘I thought I’d never…it’s been so long…’ She flung her arms around Richard and hugged him exuberantly, then shoved him away and exclaimed, ‘You just disappeared! Without even a note!’

‘Something came up, and I had to go,’ he said, but his eyes had darkened, and Ivy could tell he wasn’t nearly as indifferent as he seemed. ‘There was no time to explain.’

‘You don’t know what it was like, coming in here and finding you gone.’ Molly sniffed. ‘It was horrible.’ She scrubbed at her eyes, then went on in a brisker tone, ‘But enough of that. You’re here now. So what brought you back? And what are you doing with…did you say she was a piskey?’

‘Her name is Ivy, and we’re travelling together,’ said Richard. ‘We got into a bit of trouble and needed somewhere to hide. This was the safest place I could think of.’

‘Safe from what?’

Richard hesitated, and for a moment Ivy thought he was going to tell Molly their whole story. But all he said was, ‘That’s faery business — or rather, piskey business. But you needn’t worry, you’re in no danger.’

Molly put her fists on her hips. ‘I don’t care about that,’ she said. ‘I’m just dying to hear what you’ve been up to. It’s been ages.’

‘It has,’ Richard agreed solemnly. ‘How old are you now? Eighteen? Twenty-two?’

Molly broke into a reluctant smile. ‘Thirteen, silly. It hasn’t been that long.’

Ivy couldn’t restrain her curiosity any longer. She stepped out into the corridor and grew to human size. ‘How do you know Richard?’ she asked the girl.

‘Richard?’ Molly frowned and glanced at the faery, who gave a tiny nod. ‘Oh. Well…he’s my faery godfather.’

Richard made a spluttering noise, and Ivy was torn between disbelief and a mad desire to laugh. She was still wrestling with the impulse when Molly grinned at her, and after that it was hopeless: she had to smile back.

‘I was out riding Dodger last spring,’ Molly went on, gesturing to the brown horse, ‘and I saw a…a bird, falling out of the sky like it was hurt. So I went to see if I could help, and when I got there, I found him — Richard — lying in the grass.’

She hadn’t been about to say bird, Ivy could tell. She’d started to say something else, but changed her mind. Why?

‘He tried to act like a human,’ Molly went on, ‘but I knew right away he was a faery, and I got so excited. I’d seen a couple of faeries before when I was at the shops in Truro, but they ignored me, and my mum got really angry at me for talking to strangers. But he didn’t seem to mind talking, even though it was mostly nonsense, and he looked so thin and ill that I felt sorry for him. So I invited him home.’

‘ Home in this case being the barn,’ said Richard. ‘Since we both agreed that her mother wouldn’t think much of the arrangement. And then she wrapped me up in blankets and fed me until I could hardly move, which probably saved my life.’

Molly blushed, but she looked pleased. Ivy turned to Richard and asked, ‘Why were you so weak? What happened to you?’

‘That’s another story,’ said Richard shortly. ‘Let Molly tell hers.’

‘He wouldn’t tell me either,’ Molly confided. ‘I think he likes being mysterious. But anyway, he stayed for a few days and we got to be friends, and I told him my mum wants me to be a teacher like her, but what I really want is to be an actress. And he turned out to know loads about theatre, and I did a speech for him and he told me I was really good, and a week later I tried out for our school musical and I got the lead. So that’s why I call him my faery godfather.’

‘Did you!’ said Richard, with a warmth in his tone Ivy had never heard before. ‘Well done, Molly. What did your parents say to that?’

‘I emailed the video to my dad, and he said I was brilliant. But my mum said I shouldn’t let it go to my head.’

Richard’s lip curled. ‘Your mother suffers from a grievous lack of imagination. Never mind her, Molly. There’ll be more lead roles in your future.’

Molly beamed at him. ‘I’ve got to head in for supper,’ she said. ‘But I’ll come back as soon as I can — and I’ll bring you something to eat, too.’ She looked from Richard to Ivy and back again. ‘You’re not going to run away again, are you? You’ll stay the night at least?’

‘We can’t stay long,’ said Richard, with unusual gentleness. ‘But yes. For now, we’ll stay.’

The sun was slipping below the horizon, its last beams slanting across the fields. In the neighbouring boxes the two horses snorted and stamped, while Ivy and Richard lay on a makeshift bed of old blankets and sacking, waiting for Molly to return.

Richard’s eyes were half-closed, with blue shadows beneath them, and the bones of his face stood out sharply in the fading light. Ivy wanted to say something about the way he’d carried her over miles of countryside to this place, and then poured the last of his strength into healing her a second time — if she’d owed him her life before, she owed him twice over now. But Richard hadn’t mentioned it, and Ivy had a feeling that he’d rather she didn’t either.

‘How far from the Delve are we?’ she asked. ‘Are we safe here?’

‘Not too far, but far enough that your people aren’t likely to find us,’ said Richard. ‘And besides, there’s some charm about this place that makes it difficult for magical folk to see — I’d never have found it myself that first time, if Molly hadn’t shown me the way. Some old protective spell set up by her grandmother, perhaps.’

‘You mean,’ said Ivy, propping herself on one elbow, ‘you think her grandmother was a faery?’

‘Or her great-grandmother, I suppose,’ Richard replied, gazing thoughtfully into the rafters. ‘It’s impossible to say. But there’s magic in Molly’s blood somewhere, if she’s been seeing faeries all her life. On her father’s side, probably — it doesn’t seem likely to be her mother’s.’

‘Where is her father, then?’ asked Ivy. ‘Doesn’t he live here?’

‘Sometimes,’ Richard said. ‘But his work takes him away for weeks at a time, so Molly doesn’t see much of him. I’ve never seen him at all.’ He sat up, brushing dirt from his dark jacket. ‘I think I could heal that leg of yours now.’

‘I’d rather you healed Dodger’s,’ said Ivy, getting up and leading the way. She opened the door to show Richard the horse’s bandaged leg, but the faery shook his head.

‘I don’t have your people’s way with animals,’ said Richard. ‘And my sorry experience with this one is that he’d as soon bite me as look at me. He can heal on his own, as far as I’m concerned.’

Ivy wanted to protest, but she owed Richard too much to demand anything. She was about to close the door when a new thought occurred to her. ‘I cut my leg on something in here,’ she said. ‘Maybe that’s what happened to Dodger, too.’ She slipped inside the box, pushing away the horse’s inquiring muzzle, and crouched to examine the partition. At first she saw nothing unusual, but when she allowed her skin to glow a little brighter she caught the glint of some dull metal object protruding from the wood. She closed her fingers around it and felt the faint tingle that told her what it was: iron.

‘An old nail,’ said Richard. ‘Probably worked its way out over the years and no one noticed it. Tell Molly, when she comes back.’

‘Tell me what?’ asked Molly from the doorway, and Ivy pointed to the nail. The human girl gasped. ‘Is that how Dodger cut himself? We thought he did it outside, but we could never find where. Thank you!’

Ivy went rigid with shock at the careless thanks. By the time she recovered, Molly had found a hammer and tugged the nail out. ‘You hurt yourself on it too, didn’t you?’ she said to Ivy as she held it up — a crude-looking thing, rusty with age. ‘That’s how I could see you.’

‘I…hadn’t thought of that,’ said Ivy. She’d been immune to iron when she lived in the Delve, but perhaps Richard’s healing spells had changed her more than she’d realised. Could he have made her part faery by accident? Ivy wasn’t sure she liked that idea at all.

Molly tossed the nail into the wastebin and plopped down on an overturned bucket, crossing her ankles. ‘My mum’s in the study working on some project or other, so we should be all right for a while.’ She pulled out a cloth sack and began rummaging inside. ‘I found a packet of fairings-’

‘Fairings?’ asked Richard.

‘Ginger biscuits,’ said Ivy, helping herself to one.

‘And some sausages — sorry they’re cold. Oh, and pears.’ Molly made a face. ‘It’s not much of a meal, is it? Sorry.’

‘Don’t apologise,’ said Ivy. ‘It’s kind of you to bring us anything at all.’

Molly looked at her curiously. ‘You’re nothing like I expected,’ she said. ‘I thought piskeys were little brown men, all full of wrinkles and mischief.’

‘That’s just local legend,’ Richard interrupted before Ivy could speak. ‘Piskey women don’t get out much, but they do exist. And magical folk don’t have wrinkles. Unless you know what to look for, you wouldn’t be able to tell the difference between a piskey of twenty and one who’s two hundred.’

‘Two hundred!’ exclaimed Ivy. ‘That’s ridiculous. The oldest piskey I know can’t be more than a hundred and ten. And she certainly does have wrinkles; all the older folk do.’

Richard looked surprised. ‘My mistake, then,’ he said. ‘Perhaps faeries and piskeys are more different than I’d thought.’

‘Tell me about your people,’ said Molly, turning eagerly to Ivy. ‘I want to know more about them.’

Ivy hesitated. She hadn’t meant to give away any secrets, and she had a feeling she’d already said more than she should. Not that it worried her where Richard was concerned; by now she felt almost sure she could trust him. But although she liked Molly, she didn’t know the human girl well enough to feel comfortable talking about the Delve in her presence.

‘Well,’ she said slowly, trying to think of an answer that was honest but harmless, ‘piskeys do enjoy a good prank, or at least the younger ones do. It’s a sort of game with our people, to play tricks on each other without being tricked ourselves. And if we can all laugh about it together, that’s the best of all.’

Yet even as she spoke, Ivy had to admit that there wasn’t nearly as much laughter and fun in the Delve as there had been when she was a child. The older folk had a weary air about them, and some of the oldest — especially the older knockers — looked positively grim. Was it Betony’s strict rule that had sobered them? Or was it something more?

‘Go on,’ said Molly. ‘Where do you live? Richard told me once about some faeries who lived in a hollow oak tree. Is it something like that?’

‘No,’ said Ivy. ‘But it’s a safe place. A good place. And it’s…beautiful.’ And with that homesickness welled up in her, and she couldn’t speak any more. She had spent a night and a day out of the Delve now. Would she ever see her home, or her people, again?

‘I’m taking Ivy to visit a relative,’ said Richard, filling in the silence. ‘Someone she hasn’t seen in a long time. Once that’s done, I’ll be on my way.’

‘Where?’ asked Molly.

Richard shrugged. ‘I couldn’t tell you,’ he said. ‘I prefer to keep my options open.’ But a shadow crossed his face as he spoke, and for the first time it dawned on Ivy that he might not be a wanderer by choice — that he might not have anywhere to go.

‘I didn’t mean where are you going,’ said Molly reproachfully. ‘I know not to meddle in your business by now. I meant Ivy. Where are you taking her?’

‘Truro,’ said Richard. ‘There’s a dance and theatre school in the city where her relative’s been staying.’

Ivy sat up with a start, the blood draining from her face. That was where her mother had been all these years? Surely he must be pranking her. She opened her mouth, but Molly spoke first:

‘Dance and theatre? Really? Can I come with you?’ She must have noticed Richard’s dubious look, for she went on quickly, ‘Mum lets me go to Truro on the bus sometimes, as long as I take my mobile and promise to call her when I’m coming home. And she likes it better when I’m out of the house anyway. She won’t say no if I tell her I’m going with friends. Please.’

Richard glanced at Ivy, but she was too choked with hurt and anger to reply. So her mother had abandoned her family to go dancing after all — not with the faeries, but with the humans. No wonder Richard had kept this from her.

But why was he telling her now? Did he think it was safe to reveal Marigold’s secret because Ivy had already committed herself, because she needed her mother’s help too badly to walk away? He was right about that, but she hated the thought that he’d manipulated her so easily — and that she’d been fool enough to let him.

‘You never told me what she was doing,’ she accused, when she could speak. ‘Did she ask you not to? Or was it your idea to keep me in the dark?’

Richard’s jaw tightened, and she could see she’d offended him. But he said only, ‘I don’t think this is the time to discuss it.’ Turning to Molly, he continued, ‘I know we’re in your debt. But I don’t think it’s a good idea. As you can see, Ivy’s a little sensitive at the moment.’

‘Oh, and now it’s my fault?’ exclaimed Ivy. How dare he make her seem ungrateful for Molly’s kindness? ‘I apologise,’ she said hastily to Molly, who had turned pale and then very red. ‘If there’s anything else we can do to repay you, I’d be glad to know of it. It’s only-’

‘Don’t bother,’ Molly said, her eyes on Richard. ‘I won’t interfere in your faery — or piskey — business. But if you had any idea what mum’s been like…’ A spasm of anger distorted her face. ‘Never mind. I suppose that’s all just human business to you.’ She leaped up from the bucket and ran out.

‘Wait-’ Ivy called, but Molly had already slammed the door behind her.

‘Don’t worry,’ said Richard. ‘She’ll be all right by tomorrow. And so will you, once you’ve had a proper night’s sleep.’

Ivy bristled. ‘What’s that supposed to mean?’

‘I told you your mother was at a dance school,’ he said. ‘If I thought that was some kind of dark secret, I wouldn’t have said it. I’ve never lied to you yet, Ivy. Not that I expect you to be impressed by that, but you should be, because I’m one of the few faeries who can.’ He pushed himself upright and went to the window. ‘Marigold will explain everything when you see her — tomorrow. Tonight, you need to rest.’

‘I’m not tired.’ Ivy spoke crisply, to deny the embarrassment crawling inside her. Perhaps she had leaped to the wrong conclusion, and perhaps she was being unfair — but she hated being so vulnerable, so easily caught off guard. ‘Why can’t we go to Truro right now?’

‘Because you’re not ready to fly again, even if you think you are.’ His hands tightened on the windowsill. ‘Do you have any idea how damaged your body must have been, to need two complete healings in a day?’

The reminder of how much she owed him shamed her, but she was determined not to let it hold her back. ‘All right, then we’ll fly slowly. But I’m not staying here.’

He gave an exasperated growl and pushed himself around to face her. ‘Why are you always so stubborn? What are you trying to prove?’

‘Cicely needs me!’ she shouted at him. ‘She’s out there somewhere, and she’s scared and she’s hurting, and nobody’s going to find her if I-’

Content

R. J. Anderson
Swift