Oliver scowled at him. “It shouldn’t be that difficult. It is our job to provide some measure of security for the people in our territory, Huntley. Otherwise they will lose faith in us, and that leads to attempted coups.”

Huntley crossed his arms over his chest. “No. My job is to keep you safe. Worst case scenario, I go out there and end up getting arrested, and then something happens to you.”

“I’m not completely helpless without you, you know. I’ve handled myself against worse threats, and I’ll stay hidden in the carriage the whole time.”

Outside, the coppers had stopped beside a stall selling thin bowls of steaming soup run by a scowling middle-aged woman. The one who’d pocketed the coin swaggered up, saying something to the woman. Perhaps a threat, or perhaps just a request for a bowl of soup.

She sneered, crossing her arms over her chest as she retorted.

Oliver noted the subtle antlers painted clumsily on the corner of the wooden sign that hung from the stall.

The crowd outside grew thicker as people stopped to watch the commotion, scowling and muttering.

The older copper said something to his younger partner, gesturing for them to leave, but the young man ignored him, stepping around the stall to drag the woman out into the street by her arm.

“Just go out and act vaguely threatening, Huntley. They’re going after a woman now. I’m worried things could go poorly.” More passersby were now stopping to glare at the coppers, and the muttering was growing louder.

A thickly muscled man in a leather apron yelled out an angry remark that Oliver couldn’t make out, but which roiled the crowd and drew hostile looks from both coppers. People were beginning to mill around the carriage, blocking the horses, so they couldn’t leave anyway.

Huntley settled back, crossing his arms. “This isn’t a negotiation. Even if I was inclined to abandon my duties, which I’m not, Katerin would kill me. The proprietress will be fine. At most, the coppers will mess the stall up a little and make her come in for questioning. That’s half a day’s earnings gone. If I go out there, all it gives us is a minor show of force against two beat coppers who don’t much matter. Either I threaten them and they come back more angry, with a legitimate reason to arrest me, or I bribe them to go away and we still look weak.”

“I think it could be worse for her—”

The woman spat in the copper’s face.

Oliver’s heart sank.

White-faced, the man shoved her to the ground, his hand going for the battle wand at his waist.

Oliver lunged for the door handle, but Huntley blocked him. “He’ll kill her!” Oliver snapped.

Huntley hesitated, following Oliver’s gaze out of the window.

While Huntley was distracted, Oliver slipped on his Lord Stag mask, letting its suction settle onto the skin of his face, and opened the carriage door. The angry clamor from the crowd flowed over him. He paused, because the copper hadn’t used the battle wand to shoot a spell but had instead cracked the woman across the cheekbone with it.

The man raised his hand to repeat the action just as a skinny, dark-skinned young man stumbled his way out of the surrounding crowd, tripped, and went sprawling onto the cobblestones.

He was carrying a bulky device in both hands, which fell across a box of soup ingredients set next to the stall, and the sharp flash of blinding-white light from it was evidence enough of what had happened, even with the sound of the camera obscura’s shutter being drowned out by the screams.

The copper stopped his second swing mid-way, turning toward the fallen young man with an expression of stunned alarm that quickly morphed into rage.

His older partner was obviously uneasy, and he stepped forward to put a restraining hand on the younger copper’s arm.

Many of the crowd probably didn’t know exactly what the artifact was, but they knew magic when they saw it, and the response of the coppers was enough to spread a hush through them.

Oliver heard it clearly when the young copper asked, “Did you just take a photograph of me?”

The dark-skinned young man scrambled clumsily upright, almost tripping over his own feet again as he did so, fumbling to get his wire-rimmed glasses to sit straight on his face. “No—I—it was an accident. I just need—” He cut off with a twisted, horrified expression.

A shockingly loud, stuttering grumble of flatulence tore through the crowd. The young man jerked, his hands twitching toward his backside as if he could hold the sound in—to no avail, as it ripped through him, the occasional squeak interrupting the rumble until it finally died out with a reluctant wheeze.

The silence in its absence was deafening. The boy’s face was noticeably pale despite the dark tint of his skin, giving him a greenish pallor. “I’m sorry, that was an accident. I ate something bad, and I thought I was going to—at least it was only gas. Better out than in, my dad always says!” he added with a high-pitched, anxious laugh, his eyes darting around as if searching for an escape route.

The coppers were not amused.

“That’s right, you tell ‘em!” someone in the back of the crowd called, vibrating their tongue and lips together to create an exaggerated farting noise of their own. Someone else soon repeated the sound.

The boy paled even further, shaking his head desperately as the young copper stepped forward, swinging the baton once more, this time aimed at the young man.

The boy lifted a forearm to block the blow, and the copper punched him with his other hand, sending his glasses flying.

The boy cringed away, falling to his knees as he felt about frantically for the glasses.

The copper lunged forward as if to kick him in the side, but before he could do so, someone in the crowd threw a small stone, hitting the man in the back of the head.

The older partner spun around, lifting his wand and throwing up a shield spell. That only set off the crowd, and soon more projectiles were flying. Mud, stones, and even chunks of trash and old food.

“Don’t you dare shoot at the crowd!” the older copper screamed over his shoulder at his young, foolish partner who had gotten them into this precarious situation.

Oliver’s carriage driver had apparently had enough, and he tried to get them away, but the crowd was blocking the road and the horses quickly grew spooked. Oliver was worried that they might panic and trample someone.

When an angry citizen tipped a whole barrel full of coal out of the wagon a few meters in front of them, blocking the way with too little room for them to maneuver, even Huntley knew there would be no easy escape.

Both coppers were shielding now, standing back-to-back and preparing to try to ram their way through a thin section of the crowd before things escalated further. The older copper tossed out a couple of philtres of stench, the nausea-inducing clouds sending people coughing and retching to the ground.

Both the stall owner and the young artifact-toting boy had scrambled away in the confusion.

“Well, I suppose you’ve gotten your wish,” Huntley said bitingly. “We have to get out and retreat on foot. We are not wading into the fray, sir. Keep your hood up and follow me.” Without waiting for a response, he jumped down to the ground, his wand out with its own protective barrier springing from the tip. The man winced at that small exertion, lifting one hand to his side. The broken ribs and punctured lung he’d gotten in the fight against the Morrows were still healing.

Huntley yelled for their driver to take care of the horses, to cut them free from the carriage if necessary.

Oliver kept a firm grasp on his own wand, his cloak obscuring his mask as they wove through and among the crowd. Oliver was less worried about someone seeing Lord Stag out and about than recognizing Oliver Dryden and making an unfortunate connection. Perhaps one day he would be able to go around his territory as “Mr. Oliver” again, but at the moment the situation was too fraught, tensions too high.

Oliver and Huntley weren’t the only ones escaping the fray, and other than a few jostles against elbows and shoulders, they managed without incident. As they turned the corner a block away, with Huntley angled to shield Oliver’s back and side, someone coming around in the other direction slammed directly into Oliver with an audible “oof!”