Join the Dance

ix. The Ghost of Christmas Yet to Come

"Ghost of the Future!" he exclaimed, "I fear you more than any spectre I have seen. But as I know your purpose is to do me good, and as I hope to live to be another man from what I was, I am prepared to bear you company, and do it with a thankful heart. "

- Charles Dickens, A Christmas Carol

Rafe shivered: a strange occurrence for him. The dark was coming on. The first stars were blinking into being, and the moon was visible behind grey clouds above the still busy southern streets. 

Predictably, Abigail had been the first child at hand when they returned to the main body of the church. She'd responded eagerly when he called her over, and even more eagerly when he told her that Kate needed new clothes.

"Boys' clothes," Rafe specified. "The Imps're looking for her. The more hidden she is, the better." He supposed she'd look different enough in pants than in that bright yellow dress. "And a cap for her hair!" he yelled at Abigail as she tugged Kate away.

"I know!" she yelled back. "I'm not stupid."

She was putting on the confidence for her company, because he heard her add to Kate, "He acts like I'm stupid."

He knew she wasn't stupid. None of them were stupid, except maybe himself. He was breaking Miss B's curfew running out of the church like this. But he was glad it wasn't snowing yet. If it were, he'd really be stupid. And he'd never have got out of the churchyard.

"Don't tell Miss B," he'd murmured to Caitlin and Tommy while he was pretending to help them clean the outhouses.

"What would we have to gain by telling on you?" said Caitlin. "She'd forgive you if you ran away to the moon."

Tommy nodded with a laugh.

Rafe tossed the mop into the soaking tin bucket. "Really? That just proves you don't know her very well."

"It proves the point!" 

"What point?" asked Rafe.

She rolled her eyes and threw her sponge at him. Rafe dodged it, scoffing indignantly.

"We ain't gonna tell her, Rafe," Caitlin sighed. "She'll think you're down here in this freezing courtyard cleanin' shit so she can have a nice, clean Christmas Eve. She won't suspect a thing."

Rafe rolled his eyes this time, and went down the side alley as Tommy called after him, "Unless we tell her you fell down this hole!"

It didn't take him long to run five blocks to the south. He passed shop fronts with sparkling Christmas trees, and dwarves selling wooden toys and leather-covered books, and though everything looked exciting, he couldn't stop. He walked quickly down alleys crowded with last-minute Christmas shoppers and people lining up for restaurants, until he reached the most derelict, unwelcoming part of the Magical Quarter.

Rafe was confident neither the Imps nor Rourke would touch this place with a ten-foot pole. Especially now that the gang would be searching for the girl. This was the last place she would be. The shabby, boarded-up tenements were enough to make even a stray cat turn away.

He pushed through a gate down to a basement apartment. Number 12. He knocked three times. 

An old, bent woman whose very bones dragged her closer to the ground peeked through the crack. Her name was Mrs. Janus, as far as he remembered. She was paid to only let in those with magic, and even they had to pay for entry. Rafe offered her a few pennies he'd taken from his money drawer. Her hooded eyes considered him, recognised him, then she placed the coins in her apron and let him inside.