The Crooked Sixpence by Jennifer Bell Page B

accident.
‘There was a snowstorm that night,’ she recalled slowly. ‘Granma Sylvie had a car crash that gave her amnesia. She doesn’t remember anything about her life before the accident.’ She gestured around the storeroom. ‘She doesn’t know about any of this stuff.’
    Ethel’s eyes widened. Her spoon was shaking in her hand. ‘She don’t know?’ she whispered. ‘But . . . ?’ She looked down at the coin in Ivy’s hand. ‘Then whatcha doing ’ere, with that?’
    Ivy tucked the old photo back into the handbag and unfurled her fingers so that the silver coin was lying flat in her palm. The heat soaked into her skin, making her fingers twitch. She wondered if the sensations were connected to her being an uncommoner – maybe it happened to others as well.
    In the low light she could just about see the masked face on the coin. ‘We found it,’ she explained. ‘My brother and me. We were at Granma’s house this morning and there was this black feather writing on the wall.’ She swallowed as her mind took her back. ‘It said
We can see you now
.’
    Something flickered in Ethel’s stony eyes.
    â€˜What’s wrong?’ Ivy could tell that the message meant something.
    Ethel’s jaw was tense. ‘There’s only one organization that uses black featherlights: the Dirge.’
    â€˜The Dirge . . . ?’ Ivy’s skin prickled as she turned the coin over, remembering the creepy dust-puppets she’d seen in the arrivals chamber. The image on the other side of the coin changed to another hooded, masked face, this one with fangs. ‘I read that word on the coin. What does it mean?’
    Ethel turned away, staring into the lamplight. ‘It’s a long story; one that folk don’t talk about no more.’ She settled her bowl back on the shelf and sighed. ‘Uncommoners belong to guilds. Each guild ’as a particular responsibility and a particular coat of arms. I belong to the Right Honourable Guild of Bell Traders, for example. The Dirge was an ancient guild of scientists ’oo studied uncommon objects. Their coat of arms showed a coin – an old crooked sixpence.’
    Ivy looked down at the silver coin in her hand. When she’d first found it, she noticed that it was bent in the middle.
    â€˜In the beginning,’ Ethel continued, ‘the Dirge’s research ’elped build Lundinor and many other undermarts around the world. They discovered ’ow to use uncommon colanders to filter the air, ’ow to carry ’eavy loads on uncommon rugs – it made ’em famous. But they soon became obsessed with unlocking much darker secrets – things to do with controlling the very essence of uncommon objects: human souls.’
    Ivy had a sinking feeling. She didn’t like the sound of where this was going.
    â€˜When everyone discovered what the Dirge ’ad been up to, a new GUT law was passed that forbade anyone from tampering with the uncommon part of an object. The Dirge were ordered to disband and, over time, their story became no more than a page in uncommon ’istory. Then, sixty years ago, when your gran and I were teenagers, they reappeared.’
    Ivy gasped. ‘What happened?’
    â€˜It started with the disappearance of a child,’ Ethel told her. ’A young boy no older than you was kidnapped in the dead of night from ’is room above one of the shops on the Gauntlet. ’Is parents found a crooked sixpence resting on ’is pillow and a black featherlight from the Dirge ’overing above ’is bed. The message claimed that the boy had been taken for research. When the coin was examined, it showed six disguised faces – the new members of the guild.’ Ethel paused. Ivy could see the lines around her eyes more clearly than ever. ‘Within weeks, children were going missing from all quarters of