signatura,” she said.
“Because it binds you,” Ink said.
“Yes,” Graus Claude agreed. “Precisely its purpose, as a matter of fact.” The Bailiwick tapped his manicured claws against the wood. “Signaturae were developed to safeguard against human entrapment, making slaves of the Folk under the yoke of their True Names. By transferring our magic to sigils, we have secured our freedom. The Scribes, Invisible Inq and Indelible Ink, were created for the sole purpose to mark humans with signaturae.” The great toad’s eye ridge twitched. “That is what they do.”
“But it must be given willingly,” she said. “A signatura taken by force is powerless. So if Ink doesn’t agree, then that’s that.”
“I believe you have remarkable talents of persuasion, should you wish to employ them,” Graus Claude said drily. “And it need not be Master Ink’s signatura. It could be anyone’s, but the bond does carry certain obligations and responsibilities that are essential to the Twixt.”
Joy hadn’t realized that she and Ink had been bound to anything other than one another. When she had been marked as his lehman, Joy was considered to be his human lover/slave/helpmate. What other promises had Ink made by marking Joy? What did the Council know that she didn’t?
“She is human,” Ink said. “And, unlike us, she has her freedom.” Ink placed a hand over Joy’s. She looked at their joined fingers: human and almost-human, wound together. “She should not have to give that up under pressure from the Council.”
“Well, I’m not giving you up,” Joy said, dismissing the third option. She looked defiantly at Graus Claude. “I won’t.”
The Bailiwick sighed around his chins. “One cannot have it all, Miss Malone,” he said, giving his head a palsied shake. “Every choice has its price.”
Ink regarded Graus Claude coolly. “There must be another way,” Ink said. “And if anyone would discover it, I trust that it would be you.”
The massive toad’s great eye ridge arced in surprise. “Flattery?” the Bailiwick asked, smiling. “That is a new trick for you, Master Ink.”
Ink shrugged. “I am learning.” He touched the skin of Joy’s wrist gently, as if remembering how her touch was his first hint at being human, the music of fingers touching, skin on skin.
Graus Claude rearranged random things on his desk before two of his hands opened a polished wood case and a third withdrew a set of gold-rimmed spectacles. “Very well. Leave me the sword—let me ruminate on the rest. See if I cannot invent some solution.” He nodded to Joy. “Miss Malone, I ask that you consider the obvious alternatives within the month. By then, the Council will most likely demand a formal audience with you, and while I have labored to shield you from them, I cannot sway them from such an action as it would be well within their rights. They will customarily ask you for your voluntary acquiescence to respect their ruling and it might be in your best interest to express a preference with humility and sincerity. The Council is more impressed with a show of vulnerability than strength.” He peered through his tiny lenses, his nostrils squashed flat against his face. “In the meanwhile, Master Ink has informed me that your home is still well fortified with wards of his design. You should be safest there. Wait for my summons, and we shall see what cleverness I can devise.”
Ink tapped Joy’s hand, but she was the first to speak.
“Thank you, Graus Claude.”
“And thank you for your efforts to protect both our worlds,” he replied. “For anyone on the Council to condemn you without question is poor recompense, and I assure you that I, for one, will not allow it.”
Ink stood. “We are in your debt.”
Graus Claude speared the Scribe with a sharp glance. “Mind your debts, Master Ink,” he said. “I am certain your sister would counsel likewise.”
Joy thought back to Inq’s centuries-old deal with Aniseed, the one that might have first inspired the dryad alchemist to try spreading her fatal disease through signaturae. That one tiny trade almost destroyed all of humanity and the Twixt.
As if by magic, the doors parted and Kurt stood ready to escort them out. “Away with you, now,” Graus Claude said good-naturedly. “Master Ink, always a mystery. Miss Malone, always a pleasure.”
Ink bowed. “Thank you again, Bailiwick.” He held Joy’s hand as they left the office, exiting into the now-empty foyer with its dark wainscoting, oil paintings and ivory-colored walls. Joy wondered what had happened to the frightened robed woman. Perhaps she’d grown tired of waiting? Joy was suddenly exhausted. An eight-hour shift plus a run for your life, a hot shower and a formal audience with an eight-foot, four-armed amphibian took a lot out of a body.
“I think we’re starting to annoy him,” Joy said to Kurt as they approached the front door.
“Nonsense,” Kurt said in his smooth tenor, which Joy still thought at odds with his heavy muscleman body. “The Bailiwick looks forward to your visits. He remarks that they are rarely dull.”
“I’m so glad that my life is entertaining,” Joy said.
Kurt bowed a fraction. “Most mortals’ are.”
Joy considered his words and his carefully neutral expression. Kurt had been a human child who’d survived the Black Plague; his mother had called upon the Folk to save him and the Bailiwick had agreed in exchange for the boy’s servitude, extending Kurt’s mortal life so that he could work off his debt. Kurt had been Inq’s lover, yet never one of her lehman, dedicating his life to killing Aniseed and recently regaining his voice by breaking her curse. He had been trained in swordsmanship, marksmanship, magic, healing and service. His eyes looked old although his face barely looked thirty, and a long scar split his throat like a gruesome smile. Kurt’s life had been entertaining Folk for centuries. Joy wondered if he still considered himself mortal or not.
“You sound like my sister,” Ink said.
Kurt almost snorted. “A recreational hazard.”
Joy smiled. “Please tell Inq hi from me.”
Kurt placed a gloved hand on the doorknob. “You know she’ll take that as an invitation.”
“She might, as well,” Ink said. “We would welcome her thoughts on this matter.”
“I’ll tell her you said so,” Kurt said as he nodded his goodbye and, checking the perimeter, let them through the door.
Flicking his straight razor, Ink slashed a gaping hole through the thick of the world. Black eyes hard, he shielded Joy from the open air and any who might be watching. Joy slid against his chest as he pulled her forward into nothingness.
* * *
Joy stumbled into her room, banging her shin against the side of her bed. Ink strode past her, emerging from the rent inside the closet to check his wards on the window and the door to her room before striding into the hall to examine all the exits. Joy trailed behind him, switching off the house alarm and flipping on lights. It had been barely a minute since they’d left. Time did strange things when she traveled by Scribe.
“Everything safe?” she asked.
Ink ran his fingers over the security keypad. “As safe as I left it, but not as safe as I would like.” He marched a quick circuit around the condo.
“Do you think anything could happen here?”
Ink crossed the room. “No. I placed enough wards to keep the Folk at bay. Only Inq or I can enter here.”
“What about Folk like Graus Claude? Or Filly?” Joy asked, thinking of the last time the young Valkyrie had appeared in her kitchen, summoned by a trill of bells. Of course, that hadn’t actually been her kitchen, it had been an illusion, a trap, and, looking around, Joy doubted that the eight-foot-tall Bailiwick could even fit through the hall.
“Not without your