A Star Shall Fall

Pacing at the base of the stairs outside, the gallant growled a string of curses. “It isn’t the will of his divine Master—it’s our doing, and our fault.”

“I wouldn’t tell Sir Isaac that,” Winslow said, trying for a hint of humor. “He isn’t likely to believe you if you tell him there’s a Dragon on that comet, and a bunch of faeries put it there.”

Dragon. A word not often spoken in the enlightened halls of Gresham College. Neither was the word faerie, and yet here she stood: Dame Segraine of the Onyx Court, lady knight to a faerie queen, come in masculine and mortal guise to confirm the warning they’d received.

She put one hand on the corner post of the wall at her side. The architecture was old; this building hadn’t burnt in the Great Fire of 1666. It was one of the few that hadn’t. Flames had consumed four-fifths of the land within London’s walls, and some of the land without them, while the mortal inhabitants of the city fought to stop their progress.

One of two battles that raged during those infernal days. The other was between the city’s faerie inhabitants, and the spirit of the Fire itself: a Dragon.

Which, in 1682, they exiled to a star in the sky—not knowing that the star would return.

Inside the chambers of the Royal Society, Edmond Halley was concluding his presentation, saying, “I advise posterity to watch for it most carefully in the year 1758, at which time may science be vindicated in its prophecy.”

“We have fifty-three years,” Winslow said to Dame Segraine. “Thanks to your Irish seer, we’ve been alerted to Halley’s work, and its consequence for us. We have time to prepare.”

And prepare they must—for without a doubt, their banished enemy had not forgotten them. Whether from a desire for vengeance or simple ravening hunger, it would seek out the meat it had before.

London.

Fifty-three years. As Winslow opened the door to the quadrangle of Gresham College, Dame Segraine murmured, “I hope that will be enough.”

PART ONE CONGELATIO Autumn 1757

Purged by the sword and beautified by fire,
Then had we seen proud London’s hated walls.

THOMAS GRAY,

“ON LORD HOLLAND’S SEAT NEAR M——E, KENT”

The blackness is spangled with a million points of light. Stars, galaxies, nebulae: wonders of the heavens, moving through their eternal dance.

Far in the distance—impossibly far—a bright spark burns. One sun among many, it calls the tune to which its subjects dance, in accordance with the immutable law of gravity. Planets and their follower moons, and the brief visitors men call comets.

One such visitor draws near.

The oblong is frozen harder than winter itself. The sun is yet distant, too distant to awaken it to life; the light barely even gilds the black substance facing it. The spirit that dwells within the comet sleeps, driven into torpor by the endless cold of space.

It has slept for more than seventy years. The time will soon come, though, when that sleep will end, and when it does…

The beast will seek its prey.

MAYFAIR, WESTMINSTER

30 September 1757

The sedan chair left the City by way of Ludgate, weaving through the clamour of Fleet Street and the Strand before escaping into the quieter reaches of Westminster. A persistent drizzle had been falling all day, which the chairmen disregarded, except to choose their footing carefully in the ever-present slime of mud and less savory things. The curtains of the chair were drawn, blocking out the dismal sight, and the twilight falling earlier than usual.

Inside, the blackness and rhythmic swaying were almost enough to put Galen to sleep. He stifled a yawn as if his father were watching: Up late carousing, no doubt, the old man would say, gambling your allowance away at Vauxhall. As if he had much of an allowance to wager, or any inclination to such pursuits. But that was the simplest explanation for Galen’s late nights and frequent absences, and so he let his father go on believing it.