Thrilling Tales of the Ministry of Peculiar Occurrences by Pip Ballantine

same. “Caution. Now, we need somewhere quiet, cool, and like as not to be overlooked. Any thoughts on the matter, Miss Kennedy?”
    As she expected, the girl’s gaze went straight for the back. “Aye,” she said, and strode for that wall. She rolled her sleeves up as she did, baring sinewy forearms pale as milk save where the natural ruddiness of her colouring tinted the skin. The revolver in her hand remained gripped tightly.
    As it turned out, Bertie Bannigan was every bit the fool Miss Snow considered him.
     

    The first bullet splintered the stairwell she hurried down. Caity’s heart surged into her throat, but she did as instinct demanded and leapt to the floor to hide behind a stacked mass of barrels.
    Miss Snow did much the same, choosing another barrel to crouch behind, so that they viewed each other across a narrow causeway.
    “Bannigan, cease fire this instant!”
    Caity didn’t expect Miss Snow’s demand to be obeyed. On cue, another bullet cracked against the stone floor, shooting sparks between them.
    Her jaw set. The pistol in her grip shook, but she firmed her hold and tried not to imagine that she might have to shoot a body, after all.
    The air was wrong down here. It should have been fresh and cool, but it smelled of old rot and forgotten meat.
    “’Tis not too late,” Miss Snow called, her back pressed to the wooden keg. She spared an encouraging smile for Caity. It faded just as quickly. “You can still make this right.”
    “You’re the one meddling,” the barman shouted, his voice sounding not at all as Caity remembered. Hoarse. Shrill despite the rasp. A little bit mad. “All you have to do is go back to where you came from and this will all fix itself!”
    “Bertie, come out here this moment!” Caity called, injecting her voice with all the stern authority she’d heard her da employ. “Enough is enough.”
    Her demand earned another shot, echoing in the dank cellar. “I’ve unlocked the old ways. The famine will ease, don’t you understand? Without your nosey friend, this might have gone on without blood.”
    “Without blood?” Caity repeated, aghast. “Bertie, me da’s dead! Fifteen more, all gone, because of you!”
    “I had nothing to do with it.”
    “Lies,” Miss Snow called, her tone sweet but firm. “You might not have intended it, Mr Bannigan, but you know as well as I the nature of artefacts. Especially that of the old ways. What did you do?”
    For a moment, he was silent. Wood creaked. Then, “In my family’s field. We found a gold idol in the earth.”
    Caity frowned. “Why didn’t you sell it?”
    “I was going to,” he called back, impatient enough that Miss Snow lifted a finger to her lips. “Then I remembered about... about—”
    “You can’t say his name, can you?” Miss Snow asked. She sidled along the barrels. “They won’t let you.”
    “They?” Caity whispered.
    “Him,” Bannigan shot back. “I’m being respectful!”
    “You are being puppeted,” Miss Snow replied. “Set down your weapon, Mr Bannigan. You know the consequences for toying with artefacts.”
    “No! I won’t let you interfere,” he shouted, and another gunshot tore through the edge of the barrel Miss Snow had sidled away from.
    Caity flinched. “Miss Snow?”
    “I’ll duck about,” she said, pitching her voice low, but reassuring. Her eyes sparkled, a becoming flush upon her cheeks. “I want for you to pop out and fire wildly at whatever you choose. Keep him occupied so that I might sneak up on him.”
    Caity nodded, though her heart was beating all too hard and she wasn’t certain she could hit anything. Perhaps if she fired, he might duck for cover.
    “I am ready,” she whispered.
    As one, Miss Snow slipped around the far side of the barrels just as Caity leaned out, her shoulder hitting the floor, and fired the pistol gripped in both her sweaty hands.
    In that moment, she glimpsed Bertie Bannigan, his hair wild about his head and his eyes so wide, the