Perhaps it wasn’t the most polite way to speak to Madame Fertaglio’s mother, but the Madame would never know. After all, the Madame couldn’t speak to her mother, since despite making her living as one, she wasn’t a medium. Unfortunately, Marina was. And the Madame’s mother had taken to haunting her, with criticisms, airs and graces just like Madame Fertaglio’s. Marina wasn’t quite sure if the ghost was modeling herself on her daughter or if her daughter had picked them up from her mother. One thing was certain: Madame Fertaglio’s mother had not been the genteel but impoverished gentry woman the Madame referred to occasionally while conducting her séances. The woman dressed and looked like a fishmonger. Swore like one too, when Marina didn’t treat her politely. As she was doing now.

  Marina sighed and turned back to kneading the dough. Bad enough having to answer to Madame’s whims and demands, without getting them from her long deceased mother as well.

  “Why me?” she asked herself, digging into the dough a little more vigorously than was needed. Life had been just fine up until that day she had spilled a little of Madame’s “special fragrance” on herself when readying the incense for one of the nightly séances. The “special fragrance” had turned out to be a bit of magicked liquid which was supposed to make the séance attendees a little more disposed to believing Madame’s show. It had turned out to be a show, all right. Only it hadn’t been Madame talking to the spirits—it had been Marina. The exposure to the magic had triggered some latent ability to talk to spirits and she had conjured up the ghost of a Peacemaker who had been killed the night before. Even the other “guests” (as Madame referred to her paying customers) had been able to hear the ghost talking—accusing two of the other attendees of black magic and of arranging his murder. Things might have gone badly for her if another of the guests had not turned out to be a high-up Peacemaker, on the track of the murderers. Yes, it had been quite a show for all the attendees. They had probably dined out on it for months. And ever since then, Marina had been apt to trip over ghosts at odd moments.

  Not, of course, during Madame’s séances. Madame had wanted her to call up spirits and have them talk the way that poor Peacemaker had—only manage it so it looked as though Madame was doing the calling. After all, she was the one who was the “real” medium—at least she had been making her living by giving séances for years. Only it didn’t work that way; for some reason, ghosts didn’t come near Marina when she was in the séance room. No, she tripped over them when buying fish at the market, found them sitting next to her when she went to chapel, and spookiest of all, saw eyes watching her when she had to go down to the root cellar for some vegetables. It had made her much more fond of going to the market for fresh vegetables. Daily. And she now had to put up with Madame’s mother in the kitchen, in her bedroom and all about the house.

  “Wish they’d all just stay dead!” she muttered between her teeth.

  “What did you say?” the voice behind her demanded.

  Marina swung around, glaring, about to blast Madame’s mother, only to find that this time it really was Madame Fertaglio. For such a large woman, she could move as quietly as...well, a ghost.

  “Pardon?” Marina asked.

  “What were you just saying?” Madame demanded imperiously.

  “Oh, I was just saying to myself that I wished, umm...the nut rolls were...like bread. I mean that you could buy them in the market...” Marina stuttered.

  “Lazy girl. Then what would I employ you for?” Madame said and exited the kitchen.

  Just about everything else that gets done around here, she thought, glaring at the retreating back of her employer. Beds, marketing, cooking, séances and cleaning up; by the time I get to bed it’s time to get up again and start all over! Wisely, she didn’t say any of it out loud; Madame could have remarkably good hearing at times. And besides—it really was a good job. Not half so bad as working in the markets—or even worse having the kind of job you could get in the warrens. Or no job at all. Marina had been born in the warrens; her mother, sister and brothers still lived in them. Marina had been lucky to find a job outside of them, that paid a wage as well as room and board. It was just the damn ghosts. They were getting on her nerves.

  Marina sighed and put the problem out of her mind. If she dallied much longer, she would be late in getting the nut rolls—and everything else—ready for the evening. Just as she finished rolling the dough into balls and placing them on the baking sheet, there was a sharp knock on the back door. She wiped her hands on her apron and went over to open it. Her younger brother stood on the doorstep, an anxious look on his face.

  “Thomai! What are you doing here?” she asked. “Mom...?”

  “Mom’s fine. Can I come in?” he asked while already ducking under her arm to do so. He carried a covered basket in his arms, the smell of fish wafting up and replacing the pleasant odors of the kitchen.

  “Oh, for heaven’s sake, Thomai! Get that smelly fish out of here!” She started to shoo him out the door.

  “Please, Mari!” he protested, the look on his face getting even more anxious. Marina stopped trying to shoo him out, and shut the door behind him, smelly basket and all.

  “What is it?”

  “I think I saw something. Well, I know I saw something—I just don’t know if I really saw it...” Thomai stuttered.

  “What?” Marina asked, totally confused, and starting to feel anxious herself. Her little brother got odd jobs down at the docks, and the docks were almost as bad as the warrens for having all sorts of things go on that you weren’t supposed to see. But Thomai, like she herself, was used to that.

  “You know that foreign guy you caught?”

  “I didn’t catch him, the Peacemakers did,” Marina automatically corrected.

  “You know what I mean. The one they hung for bringing in black magic spells and killing that Peacemaker guy.”

  “Yes, I know who you mean,” she sighed.

  “Well I saw him down at the docks.”

  “You couldn’t have, they hung him. And wait a minute, how would you even know what he looked like?”

  Thomai looked down at the kitchen floor and muttered: “I went to see them hang him.”

  “Thomai! You know what our Mum says about that.”

  “I know—but all my friends were going. And besides, I’m growing up now. Seeing things like that is important.”

  Marina rolled her eyes, but figured it was a lost cause. Boys would be boys, and the hanging of a black magician was a big event.

  “Well, it couldn’t have been him, since he’s dead. What made you think it was him?”

  “It was him Mari, I swear!”

  Marina paused and looked closer at her little brother. Could he be seeing ghosts, too? “Could you see through him?”

  “Of course not!” Thomai said, looking at her as if she was daft. “I could see him as plain as you...and I think he might have seen me, too....” he finished in a low mumble.

  Marina felt a wave of fear move down her back. If whoever her brother had seen was any relation or associate of the late Ser Kiasie, of the yellow hair and black magic, he was dangerous.

  “Quick!” she said, snatching up the fishy smelling basket her brother had brought in with him, opening it and pulling one of the fish out.

  “Hey, those are for Mum!” her brother protested. “She even gave me money to buy them!”

  “If you get murdered on the way home, she won’t get these fish either now, will she?” Marina demanded. She thrust the basket back into her brother’s hands. “You take these to the house three doors down, with the yellow shutters, and go to the back door. Tell the cook Marina sent you, that you’re the new fish boy. Then go across the corner from there and up two, to the small house with the brown trim and do the same. Haggle a good price from both of them—out on the doorstep if you can manage it. Then duck around the back of the brown-trimmed house as if you were moving up to the next street level, but leave the basket under the porch—the maid leaves others there—and hike yourself fast up the big tree in back. Hunker down and stay there, as still as if we were playing catch me up on the roofs at home. Stay there until it’s dark. Then work your way back across the street up in the branches of that tree and go into the attic of the house at the end of this row. I’ll bring you some food and we’ll see about getting you out safely and back home, then. It’ll be late, as Madame has a séance tonight, and I have to be there. But I’ll come up after that. These row houses are all connected up along the attics, if you know how to find the passages.”

  “I’m not sure he saw me, Mari,” her brother protested.

  “That man was evil, Thomai! Do you want to trust your life to “maybe?” You been out of the warrens too long, if you have!”

  “Okay, okay,” her brother muttered, and Marina hastened to the door. She just hoped they hadn’t been in here too long, in case there was a watcher. She flung the door open and called after the “fish boy,”

  “You mind, bring some red snapfish tomorrow. And no trying to pass off spalnock as plaice, again, you hear? I know the tests!”

  “Alright, alright! You had your say,” her brother answered back, hoisting the basket up higher and heading to the yellow-shuttered house. Marina closed the door firmly, as if annoyed and then crept back to the window, trying to watch through the gauze window covering to see if anyone was following her brother. She thought she saw a movement in the shadows, several houses down, but couldn’t be sure. It could have been a breeze lifting a piece of debris, or even a cat. She might not even see a follower, if he was using the magic arts. From what she’d heard, they could creep up on you as silent and unseen as a wisp of wind.

  “What are you looking at?” a voice whispered behind her. Marina jumped a foot and spun around.

  “Oh. It’s you.”

  Madame’s mother again. She sighed and moved away from the window. She’d done her best, and if Thomai did what she’d told him, she’d be able to get him away up safe to the warrens, where he could lie low for a few days. If whoever he’d seen looked like that Kiasie, then he was foreign and chances were he wouldn’t be in port very long.

  Did all the foreigners from wherever he’d come from look alike? Is that why her brother had thought he’d seen a dead man? Or what if Kiasie wasn’t really dead? Marina shivered again and moved back across the kitchen and opened the stove to put the nut rolls in to bake. The familiar warmth gushing out soothed her, but she still felt cold. If there was one person Kiasie had reason to hate, it was her. But he was dead!...wasn’t he???

  ~o0o~

  “Those lights are too bright; turn down the flame!”

  Marina moved across the room and turned the key on the one in the corner, lowering the flame to barely a flicker.

  “What are you doing, you stupid girl?” Madame Fertaglio demanded. “I won’t be able to see my hand in front of my face, let alone the guests!”

  “But you just told me...” Marina stopped, realizing the first command had come from Madame’s mother. She gritted her teeth and moved the gas light to its former setting.

  “I don’t know what has come over you, lately,” Madame complained. “You don’t do anything right anymore!” She left the room in a huff, the slight train on her gown trailing behind her.

  Marina gritted her teeth still harder. She knew she wasn’t doing anything different—well, other than having to deal with Madame’s mother and other sundry ghosts all the time. Madame was still miffed at her inability to channel any ghosts in her séances and thought she was willfully refusing to do it to spite her.

  Despite the lack of any help from Marina, though, attendance at the séances had increased dramatically ever since the incident with the dead Peacemaker appearing. News of that had spread far and wide and Madame now had to maintain a reservation list and limit attendance at each séance to twenty—when she had been happy to get ten at a time before. It was Marina’s duty to take the reservations and make sure that those arriving at the door were actually on the list for that night.

  She moved to do that now, as the first guest gently rapped the knocker. As each one arrived, she checked their name, took the card sent when they booked their attendance, and locked them, as well as the payment envelopes each guest handed to her in the drawer in the foyer. Each séance had a mix of newcomers, occasional attendees and regulars. One man who had started coming regularly ever since the news of that infamous evening was a slight man with mousy brown hair and nothing really remarkable about him. Marina didn’t know what it was about him that bothered her—it was almost as if he smelled peculiar—but she had been close enough to him when taking his coat and payment envelope to know he actually smelled of DestaBrown, a cologne you could get for 10 silvers uptown and for 1 silver in the market down at the docks. In a less fancy bottle, of course. Maybe it was just because he had started coming so soon after the Peacemaker night and always seemed to avoid her gaze. It made her nervous.

  The two Gantry sisters, however, made such a fuss and bother every time they came that Marina quickly forgot the mousy-haired man and had her hands full trying to get them to move along into the sitting room without forgetting their gloves, their payment, or each other in the process.

  Finally all of the guests were seated around the sitting room, sipping at the small delicate glasses of wine and nibbling on Marina’s nut rolls prior to being moved on over to the large table where Madame seated her guests for the actual séance. The wine, nut rolls and other sweets were Madame’s idea and Marina had to admit that both regulars and newcomers seemed to relax and enjoy these few minutes, whether they were nervous about coming to a séance or merely flustered from having to rush here from other business or appointments. It also set the stage for Madame to make her gracious entrance and enquire how each of them were doing and how their day had been and gather all those bits of information she sprinkled back to them, sometimes several séances later. She was good at this, Marina thought wryly.

  At last they all moved over to the large table, Marina trailing behind and lowering the lights to the level Madame dictated for the actual “event.” She then moved over to her chair in the corner, to watch in case someone needed something—or gave Madame any trouble.

  Her mind drifted to her brother, wondering if he was still up in the tree or had already managed to creep over to the attic down the way. That was assuming he had made it to the tree in the first place, with no one following him or finding him hiding there. Who on earth had he seen down at the docks? And was he really in danger or had he just been spooked by someone who looked like the man he had seen hanged?

  “He done me in, you know,” a man’s voice complained.

  Marina blinked and focused back on the séance. That was an odd thing for one of the guests to have said. Usually they spoke of their “dearly departed” in glowing—and maudlin—terms. Maybe tonight would be more interesting than the usual run. It must be one of the newcomers.

  She cast her glance over the men at the table; there were only two who had not come before. But neither were speaking. Indeed, all the attendees had their eyes fixed on Madame Fertaglio, who was humming and swaying in her seat.

  “He did, you know, girly,” the voice said again. “That man you’re scared of up and done me in—I was only in for petty theft, I was.” Marina slowly moved her gaze sideways and saw one of “her” guests standing next to her. A ghost. She glanced quickly back at the table, but none of the others seemed disturbed... except for the mousy-haired man, who was watching her. He quickly flicked his gaze back to Madame Fertaglio. So, it wasn’t like the last time, when everyone could hear the Peacemaker.

  “You don’t say!” another voice chimed in. This one she recognized, with dread. Madame Fertaglio’s mother had entered the fray. “What did he do, knife you in the cell?” she asked with interest.

  Madame Fertaglio’s head whipped around. “Marina!” she exclaimed, spots of anger on her cheeks. Obviously, this time, everyone had heard the mother speak.

  “It wasn’t me!” Marina protested.

  “Oh, hush, Bertie!” the Madame’s mother exclaimed. “I want to hear this gent!”

  Madame’s eyes grew round. “Mother...?” she asked in a faltering voice.

  “Yes, yes, your long-lost mother. Now hush!”

  “No, he didn’t knife me, you fool! He took my place,”

  “Who are you calling a fool, you old hangallows!”

  “Marina, are you doing this?” Madame demanded.

  “No, I mean, not on purpose! They’re just talking. Ummm—can you hear both of them?”

  “Both of who? All I hear is a voice like my mother’s.”

  “Oh, hush, you old besom!” the man exclaimed. “I came here to tell this girly she’s in danger and you keep interfering!”

  Madame’s look of outrage and confusion didn’t change, so it was clear she hadn’t heard the “old besom,” remark. But her mother certainly had. She shut her semi-transparent mouth like a steel trap and glared at the other ghost.

  “I’m in danger?” Marina asked.

  “You are if you keep mocking me by imitating my mother’s voice!” Madame Fertaglio declared.

  “I’m not imitating her voice!” Marina cried. “That’s her. And I never knew her, anyway. You know that. She’s been dead for longer than I’ve been alive. And she’s been haunting this house for the last three months! What do you mean, I’m in danger—and what about my brother?”

  “What brother?” the ghost asked

  “What brother?” Madame Fertaglio asked.

  “Her brother, you fools,” Madame’s mother declared. “Now hush up and let’s hear what the man has to say about danger before we’re all murdered in our beds!”

  A small shriek emanated from one of the Gantry sisters and the two of them clutched at each other’s hands.

  “This girly’s in danger and a man can’t get a word in edgewise around here!” the ghost exclaimed and moved as if to walk away.