"There was another girl a couple of months ago—another stray Lolli decided to bring underground. It was when Lolli first got the idea that they could inject the potions. Lolli and the girl, Nancy, wanted to cop some dope, but didn't have any money. Then Lolli started talking about what else they could shoot and they did some of the stuff from one of Dave's deliveries. All of a sudden, they start talking like they can see things that aren't there and, even worse, Dave starts seeing the shit, too. Nancy got hit by a train and she was grinning right up until it hit her."
Val looked away from the flickering candle, into the darkness. "That sounds like an accident."
"Of course it was a fucking accident. But Lolli loved the stuff, even after that. She got Dave to do it."
"Did she know what it was?" Val asked. "Did she know about the faeries? About Ravus?"
"She knew. I told Dave about Ravus because Dave's my brother, even though he's an idiot. He told Lolli because she's a tease and he would do anything to impress her. And Lolli told Nancy, because Lolli can't keep her fucking mouth shut."
Val could hear Lolli's brittle laugh in her mind. "What's the big deal if she tells people?"
Luis sighed. "Look at this." He pointed at the pale pupil of his left eye. "Disgusting, right? One day when I was eight, my mother takes me to the Fulton Fish Market with her. She's buying some soft-shell crabs—bargaining with the fish guy, really getting into it because she loved to haggle—and I see this guy carrying an armful of gory sealskins. He sees me looking and grins real big. His teeth are like a shark's: tiny, sharp, and set too far apart."
Val clutched the banister, paint flaking under her fingernails.
"'You can see me?' he asks, and because I'm a dumb kid, I nod. My mother is right next to me, but she doesn't notice anything. 'Do you see me with both eyes?' he wants to know. I'm nervous now and that's the only thing that keeps me from telling him the truth. I point to my right eye. He drops the skins and they make a horrible, wet sound, falling all together like that."
Wax dripped down the side of the candle and onto Luis's thumb, but he didn't flinch or change the way he held it. More wax followed, forming a steady drip onto the stairs. "The guy grabs me by the arm and pushes his thumb into my eye. His face doesn't change at all while he's doing it. It hurts so bad and I'm screaming and that's when my mother finally turns around, finally sees me. And do you know what she and the soft-shell crab guy decide? That I scratched my own fucking eye somehow. That I ran into something. That I blinded myself."
The hair was standing up along Val's arms and she had that chill running down her spine, the one that told her just how freaked out she really was. She thought about the sealskins in his story, about the mermaid body she'd seen by the river, and came to no conclusions, except that there was no escape from horrible things. "Why are you telling me this?"
"Because it sucks to be me," Luis said. "One wrong step and they decide I don't need my other eye. That's what the big deal is.
"Dave and Lolli don't get it." His voice dropped to a whisper and he leaned close to her. "They're playing around with that drug, stealing from Ravus when I'm supposed to be repaying a debt. Then they bring you in." He stopped, but she saw the panic in his eyes. "You're stirring shit up. Lolli is getting worse instead of better."
The troll appeared at the top of the ledge and looked down at Val. His voice was low and deep as a drum. "I cannot think what it was you came back for. Is there something you require?"
"The last delivery," she said. "It was a… mermaid? She's dead."
He went quiet, stared.
Val swallowed. "She looks like she's been dead awhile."
Ravus started down the stairs, frockcoat billowing. "Show me." His features changed as he got closer, the green of his skin fading, his features shifting until he looked human, like a gawky boy only a little older than Luis, a boy with odd, golden eyes and shaggy black hair.
"You didn't change your—," Val said.
"That's the way glamour is," said Ravus, cutting her off. "There's always some hint of what you were. Feet turned backward, a tail, a hollow back. Some clue to your true nature."
"I'll just get out of here," Luis said. "I was on my way anyhow."
"Luis and I have had an interesting conversation about you and the manner of our meeting." said the troll. It was disorienting to hear that deep, rich voice come from a young man.
"Yeah," Luis said, with a half-smile. "He conversed. I groveled."
That made Ravus smile in turn, but even as a man, his teeth looked a touch too long at the incisors. "I think this death concerns you too, Luis. Put off sleep a little longer and let's see what we might learn."
The only sounds on the waterfront came from waves lapping against the stones at the edge of the shore when Ravus, Val, and Luis arrived. The body was still there, hair flowing like seagrass, necklaces of shell and pearl and sand-dollar doves caught around her neck like strangling ropes, white face looking like a reflection of the moon on the water. Tiny fish darted around her body and swam in and out between her parted lips.
Ravus knelt down, cupped the back of the mermaid's skull in long fingers, and lifted up her head. Her mouth opened farther, showing thin, translucent teeth that looked like they might be made from cartilage. Ravus brought his face so close to the mermaid's that, for a moment, it looked like he might kiss her. Instead he sniffed twice before gently lowering her back into the water.
He looked at Luis with shadowed eyes, then shouldered off his frockcoat and spread it on the ground. He turned to Val. "If you take her tail, we can move her onto the cloth. I need to get her back to my workroom."
"Was she poisoned?" Luis asked. "Do you know what killed her?"
"I have a theory," said Ravus. He pushed back his hair with a wet hand, then waded into the East River.
"I'll help," Luis said, starting forward.
Ravus shook his head. "You can't. All that iron you insist on wearing could burn her skin. I don't want the evidence contaminated more than it has to be."
"The iron keeps me safe," Luis said, touching his lip ring. "Safer, anyway."
Ravus smiled. "At the very least, it is going to keep you safe from a repugnant task."
Val waded into the water and lifted the slippery tail, its ends as ragged as torn cloth. The fish scales glittered like liquid silver as they flaked off on Val's hand. There were patches of pale flesh exposed along the mermaid's side, where fish had already started to feed on her.
"What a petty drama to watch play out," said a voice coming from the valley between the mounds.
"Greyan." Ravus looked toward the shadows.
Val recognized the creature that came forward, the mannequin maker with the greening beard. But behind him were other folk she didn't know, faeries with long arms and blackened hands, with eyes like birds, faces like cats, tattered wings that were as thin as smoke and as bright as the neon lights from a distant bar sign.
"Another death," one of them said, and there was a low murmur.
"What is it that you are delivering this time?" Greyan asked. There was a burst of uncomfortable laughter.
"I came to discover what I could," said Ravus. He nodded to Val. Together, they moved the body onto the coat. Val felt nauseated as she realized that the fishy smell was coming from the flesh in her hands.