than the time and the constraints in which I lived. I couldn’t count on society to know how to adapt alongside me.
“How did you know to come here, Jonathon?” I murmured, turning my face to graze my nose against his fine cheekbone, warmed also by the fact that he wanted to touch and be close to me no matter the clothes I was in, a reassurance that reached across myriad boundaries.
“I asked you first,” he countered.
“A dream. Foretold,” I answered. “You?”
“I followed him.” Jonathon indicated the man in question, who was ordering a round of drinks for his captive audience. “From one of Brinkman’s addresses. He was coming around from the back of the building. I saw a sparkle of the red and gold of the demons’ light bounce about him, the color flashing out of the corner of my eye. No other addresses seemed to wield anything of particular interest or note. I’d watched each for many hours. I didn’t really think, I just came this way.”
“Same, once I put the pieces of the dream together enough to evince the clues as leading to this location, I donned this disguise and made my move.”
“Is this what you wore the last time you went someplace a lady shouldn’t go on her own?”
I nodded. Jonathon held back a laugh. Whether I was or wasn’t convincing, he didn’t say, and I didn’t get the chance to ask before the man we were watching pulled a few glass vials out from his long, pale coat pocket and put them on the table, where the youthful audience stared at them with a mixture of hunger and apprehension. Jonathon seized my tall glass of stout and a second glass of ale that had been abandoned upon a nearby ledge. Gesturing for me to stay put, he then suddenly he stepped out from the shadows. I noticed he’d dressed down considerably, to mere shirtsleeves, suspenders, and trousers like a regular factory worker. A grubby cap with the brim pulled low concealed his fine black locks and a bit of soot was smudged over a chiseled cheekbone.
It’s true that his more lordly appearance might have given him away, and in this case he didn’t seem to wish to play the demon to this Stevens fellow, just in case he was being sought as such. We both had come in covert costume, it would seem.
Jonathon stumbled artfully forward, careful not to tip the glasses, until he jostled toward the table. He ran right into Stevens, first spilling the dark stout onto the man’s beige coat, then spilling the second glass over the glass vials, overturning them, sending a tiny puff of red powder near Jonathon’s face. He batted the particles away with a faux drunken movement. I wasn’t sure how potent or volatile the substance was, and I hoped there was no effect from his proximity to it.
Disrupting the whole scene rather brilliantly, causing far greater hubbub and commotion around him, Jonathon fumbled over an apology—in an impressive New York–styled accent—before stumbling on to say he’d go get someone to help clean it all up. Stevens barked after him not to bother, the man’s dark and troubled eyes flashing, his drawn face scowling as the youths at the table blinked and reacted.
Jonathon circled round the tavern, I lost sight of him in a cluster of bodies for a moment, and suddenly he returned to me in the shadows. Upon his return, he was sans cap and wearing a dark black jacket, blending into the shadows with me.
“Where did you...” I gestured to the coat.
“Hung upon a coat tree in the back of the bar,” he replied. “Brinkman wrote me a note with a few tips. Useful things, really.” Before I could ask further about fresh communication from the spy, Jonathon continued. “Watch for any changes or anything to do with those vials or the content. I’m going to speak to the management about someone coming and trying to make sales of products that were not sold by the tavern itself, something that might keep Stevens watched, and hopefully reported to the authorities.” He stalked off, and I
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