New anthology features “The Counterfeit Viscount,” a brand new novella set in in Crowncross, the world the world of Wicked Gentlemen.

The Counterfeit Viscount

Chapter One

The vast majority of days came and went for Archibald Lycrugus Granville, Viscount Fallmont, with the genteel luxuries of fresh-cut flowers, boots polished to a razor gleam, suppers served on gilded plates, and night after night of card games, at which he never lost more than he won.

Butter upon bacon, as Nimble would describe it.

Archibald owned a stable of high-strung racehorses and retained a vast staff at each of his estates—though he rarely strayed from his elegant townhouse to visit either. From time to time, he pretended to woo the latest foreign heiress released into the staid waters of the peerage, and on occasion he indulged the expenses of a handsome artist or pretty actress.

Aside from the wide red shrapnel scar hidden beneath the snowy breast of his shirt, he appeared wholly unmarked by hardship. Fair, tan, and slim, he passed for a blithe youth even now at twenty-five.

His could’ve been a carefree life, except for the one day every third month when he descended to the pits of Hells Below and paid his devil.

March 21st, he woke before daybreak and slipped away from his attentive staff and current houseguests. He walked through the wan blue light, alongside herb girls and the last of the night patrolmen. Somewhere to the west, men called out the wonders of their coffee carts, and Archibald imagined that he could smell the aroma of the bitter black stuff rising on the clouds of steam that drifted from the river and blanketed the streets.

Sunlight burned through the fog by the time he reached the cold, clean room he rented at the Briar Hotel. There he exchanged his fashionable sable coat, his glossy top hat, and his silver pocket watch for the oilcloth cloak and worn cap common to the multitude of vagrant war veterans he’d once numbered among. He took up his bludgeon of an ironwood walking cane and traded his calfskin shoes for the battered army boots that had been far too big for him when he’d first been issued them at fifteen.

The brass mirror on the dresser door cast him in golden tones, but he certainly didn’t cut the figure of Viscount Fallmont anymore. Just plain old Archie now, and not so important that it would do anyone any good to mind where he went or what company he kept.

He departed the Briar by a back door and clipped through the bustling streets, leaving the realm of marble facades and large green parks far behind as he passed through blocks of modest brick businesses, and tramped on across the Crown Tower Bridge. Out in the less seemly section of the city, he picked his way through narrow alleys of cramped tenements, roaring factories, and sparkling gin palaces already filling up with shadows of human beings seeking bright oblivion. Here a few people knew him as Archie—an apple seller and a cat’s-meat man. They exchanged friendly greetings and a little news, then went their separate ways.

At last he reached the towering granite arch that rose over the worn stone stairs leading down to Hopetown—much more commonly known as Hells Below. Archie descended into the humid shadows slowly, admiring the ornate, soot-stained beauty of the mosaics decorating the walls on either side of him. Even through the ages of dirt and in the dim light, he made out bright shards of color and fantastically graceful figures. The mosaics supposedly chronicled the glorious day, hundreds of years ago, when the terrifying and beautiful armies of Hell had ascended to accept salvation and conversion at the hands of the church. Gleaming serpents and winged lions numbered among the burnished gold figures of fallen angels and towering warriors. Satanel, Leviathon, Sariel, Rimmon. Archie traced his finger over the surface of the inlaid metal-and-glass tiles, admiring the magnificence of those beings who’d once claimed dominion over lightning, raging seas, and the souls of the dead.

Not that anyone like them persisted in the vast ghetto beneath the sprawling city of Crowncross nowadays. Their descendants were called Prodigals, and most labored in dark, hard, and hazardous industries, where their natures supposedly lent them resistance to poisons, smoke, and exhaustion. Many weren’t too easy to recognize at a distance, though up close their yellow eyes, black fingernails, and jagged teeth tended to give them away, as did the citric scent of their sweat. But beyond those superficial traits, most Prodigals had as much in common with their preternatural ancestors as Archie had in common with Lord Bottham’s pet macaque. There were the exceptions, however.

As had become his habit, Archie paused, studying the mosaic. One devil’s familiar figure always held his attention. Broad and bronzed, with black hair and eyes as yellow as lemon drops. Even obscured within a procession of infernal dukes and damned princes, that single devil seemed to gaze back at Archie with an unreasonably amused and assured smirk. That was the face of a devil who knew he possessed rare and wondrous powers.

Archie could have sworn it was his own Nimble Hobbs, just about to say, “One day every three months, you’ve sworn to be mine, body and soul. So, haul your pampered ass down these dirty stairs and pay me what you owe me, Archie.”

There were far worse ways to pay a debt than in Nimble’s arms.

Archie took the steps by twos and soon reached the vast cavernous catacomb that spilled out beneath the city. It seemed to burrow deeper yearly, as more and more sewer pipes and gas lines invaded from the city above. Churches and storefronts leered out of the stone faces of the walls, and chipped gravel studded the tracks of mud that passed for streets. Yellow gaslight flickered from the occasional streetlight, and oily droplets of condensation dribbled from the pitted stone ceilings high overhead. The air smelled like grapefruit, piss, and burning shoes.

Archie drew his kerchief up over his nose and mouth before they started to burn. A pair of goggles offered his eyes some protection as he strolled along the wooden walkways, greeting crews of miners, dyers, tanners, and hatters as they passed on their way back from working long night shifts.

A gray-haired, legless Prodigal soldier on a street corner hailed him, and Archie stopped to hear a little of his story; he’d defended Sollum Hill as Archie had, but hadn’t been lucky enough to have Nimble stand over his bloody body, safeguarding him through the last night of cannon fire and cavalry charges.

“We held that damn hill, though, didn’t we?” The soldier’s yellow eyes looked as faded as old newsprint. He gazed past Archie into a remembered distance.

Archie nodded and shuddered as a droplet of condensation from the cave ceiling spat down the back of his neck. “You fellows in the Prodigal battalions won us the hill and the war,” he said, and that was the truth. The Nornians had possessed better steel, more deadly bombs, and enormous cavalries, but hadn’t had Prodigals. They’d been utterly unprepared for the monstrous ferocity and inhuman endurance of those few Prodigal forces.

“If it hadn’t been for your lot, we’d all be speaking Nornic, using paper for money, and eating dry fish for every meal,” Archie added.

A flush colored the old soldier’s sallow cheeks. He studied Archie. “You must have been one of them infants they conscripted to drive the guns and carry the silver crosses. You kiddies did right by us, hauling up fresh water and ammunition.”

“Third Children’s Brigade.” Archie managed a smile, though the memories made his skin feel cold as clay slip. He’d not been called up in a lottery, like so many of the Prodigal children who’d been taken from their weeping parents. No, his uncle had handed him and his brother over, like pennies proudly tossed into a collection plate.

So, haul your pampered ass down these dirty stairs and pay me what you owe me, Archie.”

There were far worse ways to pay a debt than in Nimble’s arms.

“We held that damn hill, though, didn’t we?” The soldier’s yellow eyes looked as faded as old newsprint. He gazed past Archie into a remembered distance.

“If it hadn’t been for your lot, we’d all be speaking Nornic, using paper for money, and eating dry fish for every meal,” Archie added.

“Rifleman in the Fifth, me.” The soldier scratched at the stump of his left leg, then glanced away to glower at a fat black rat. He picked up a pebble and flung it hard enough to stun the rodent.

While the soldier appeared distracted, Archie slipped a generous contribution into his beggar’s canteen—enough to keep him through this year at least. Then he wished the man a good day and went on his way, up the wooden walkways and over the slate roof of the Blessed Medicine Distillery and through the doors of Mrs. Mary Molly’s Boarding House.

Inside the warm, well-lit establishment, Nimble stood strangling a plump little man dressed in a priest’s frock coat…