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Once upon a time, there was a girl - but this story isn’t about her. She was a fairy tale that never really existed.
This is a story about a very real man named Ned.
Real stories about real people should have facts. So, the facts are these:
Ned Wynert was born October 5, 1840, in New York City.
He moved to London in 1865.
Height: 5’4”
Hair: Brown
Eyes: Brown
Feathers: Mostly grey, with tips of black
--
Ned’s mother wanted her daughter to marry a rich man and be a pretty decoration draped in expensive trinkets. Instead, her son became a jewel thief and sold the trinkets his mother so loved for cold hard cash.
The first necklace wasn’t really stolen. Well, perhaps you could say it was stolen from Netta. Although can you really steal from someone who doesn’t exist and never did?
--
Ned Wynert walked into a pawn shop with a diamond necklace burning a hole in his purse. He set it down on the counter and asked, “How much will you give me for this?”
The pawn broker named a price. Ned made as if to return the necklace to his bag. The pawn broker named another, higher price. Ned pretended to consider. The pawn broker made a third offer.
Ned hesitated and glanced at the shelf behind the man.
“Throw in that pocket watch and you have yourself a deal.”
The pawn broker agreed easily. The watch couldn’t be worth more than a dollar. But when Ned held it in his hands, the feeling that this was his was nearly overwhelming.
He stopped by a few more pawn shops that night, careful to only buy one or two items from each. A hat from one, a pair of shoes from another.
The next night he was out and about again, dressed in the suit he’d carefully assembled the night before. His long hair was tucked up under a cap. He sat in the shadows of a bar and sipped a beer, trying not to gag on the taste. No one paid any attention to the slight man in the corner, and that was just how Ned liked it.
--
He pawned three more necklaces in the next two weeks, along with a bracelet and a diamond ring. Gifts from a suitor who would miss the jewels more than he would miss Ned. The hatbox under his bed quickly began to fill with bills and coins. Not enough to strike out on his own – not nearly – but it was starting to add up.
“Is this seat taken?” Ned looked up at the man who approached his shadowy table.
Ned frowned, but said nothing, fearing that his voice might give him away. The bartender might not care, so long as Ned tipped well, but the tall man in front of him looked like trouble.
Ignoring his clear displeasure, the man sat down beside him, one wing brushing against Ned’s back in a possessive move that had to be deliberate.
“What do you want?” Ned asked.
“I heard you’ve been selling some real valuable jewels.”
“So what if I have?”
“They’re either stolen, or you don’t know what they’re worth. You could get twice the amount you’re getting if you brought them to a real jeweler.”
“Are you a cop?”
The man laughed.
“Just the opposite, my dear boy.”
Ned relaxed, if only the tiniest bit. What he was doing wasn’t technically illegal, but if law enforcement got involved, it would be messy. Getting involved with criminals, on the other hand…
“So you want to propose a deal?” Ned guessed.
“Precisely. For a mere twenty percent of the profit, I’ll sell your fancy trinkets to some people I know who will pay a much fairer price for them.”
It was a tempting offer.
“No more than ten percent. And I want money upon delivery.”
“Fifteen percent, Mr. Wynert.”
Ned offered his hand. “You have yourself a deal, Mr…?”
“Worth. Adam Worth.”
--
Unfortunately, “accidentally losing” fine jewelry is a trick you can only get away with so many times, and Ned soon had to turn to more nefarious schemes to keep adding funds to his savings. It should have perhaps been more of a moral dilemma, but Ned took to thievery as easily as a fish to water. Visiting family friends became opportunities to case the security of their homes, and Ned’s exploits became more daring by the week.
“How’s that hatbox of yours?” Worth asked over drinks one evening.
“Nearly full,” Ned admitted.
He’d told Worth the truth some months ago. The man had smiled and called him a “dear boy” and they hadn’t spoken of it since, except that Ned no longer felt the need to construct elaborate lies about the life he led when he wasn’t stealing jewels and frequenting bars.
“And how do you feel about London?”
Ned couldn’t quite hide the way his eyes lit up.
“An interesting city,” he ventured cautiously.
“I’m looking to expand my influence across the pond,” Worth told him. “But I’ll need a man on the ground, setting things up for me. Would you be interested?”
The answer was yes. Obviously, yes. Ned dreamed of London. But it wouldn’t do to seem too eager.
“I could be persuaded,” he offered.
“How much?” Worth asked.
Ned did a few quick calculations in his head. He didn’t bother trying to pretend he didn’t know what the cost of travel to London would be.
“Seventy-five dollars cash should be enough to get over there and get set up,” he conceded. “Once there, I’ll need access to an account with emergency funds for bribes and such.”
He could do it with less than fifty, but he wasn’t going to start with the low offer.
“My accountant has already opened an account with the Bank of England in your name,” Worth told him with a slick smile as he handed over a piece of paper. “Here’s all you need to access it. And here-” he reached under his coat for a packet- “is seventy-five dollars.”
Sometimes, Ned hated how well Worth could read him.
--
“Missing home?” Evie Frye asked, finding him sitting alone on a rooftop.
By the time Ned turned to look at her, her wings were folded neatly behind her back, as if she hadn’t just flown a remarkable four stories into the air for the sole purpose of sneaking up on him. It was unsettling, knowing how easily she could kill him if she chose, and he thought that might have been her intent.
Ned scoffed. “Hardly. What’s there to miss in New York?”
“Missing a person then?” Evie continued.
“Maybe,” Ned admitted. “What are you here for?”
“Just wanted to check in on you. Jacob said you’d been arrested.”
“Well, as you can see, I’m not in jail, and I’ve sent a guy over to the police station with a tidy sum of money to make sure that doesn’t happen again. Don’t worry, Miss Frye. Your brotherhood is in no danger.”
Evie nodded and breathed a sigh of relief. Perhaps she really had been worried he would talk. Or perhaps she was just glad to not have to dance around the real reason she’d come to visit him.
“Good.”
“Were you going to drop me to my death if I’d told the police about your secret organization?” Ned wondered idly.
“No.”
“Liar.”
“I’d give you the mercy of a quick knife to the throat.”
That was a bit more honesty than he would have liked.
“I suppose being murdered by a beautiful woman wouldn’t be the worst way to go. All the same, I think I’d rather hold off on that.”
Evie smirked. “Suit yourself.”
--
Ned read the letter twice. Three times.
“Exciting news, Ned?” Jacob Frye asked.
Ned only barely managed to not jump to his feet.
“How long have you been standing there, Frye?”
Jacob studied his nails. “A few hours.”
“No, you haven’t. You’d have gotten bored of waiting for me to notice you.”
“Okay, no, but I could have been. You get real absorbed in your paperwork, don’t you?”
“I’m a busy man.”
“So what’s the letter?” Jacob asked, reaching across the desk.
Ned snatched the letter away.
“It’s just business. An associate of mine from America is coming over here.”
Ned carefully folded the letter and put it in his pocket, where it should be safe from Jacob.
“Oooh an ‘associate’?”
“What are you even trying to imply?”
“Are you telling me this ‘associate’ doesn’t happen to be a lovely lady with a nice figure and soulful eyes?”
Ned couldn’t help a snort of laughter at how completely off the mark Jacob was.
“Okay, obviously not. A handsome young man with rippling muscles?”
Ned abruptly choked on his previous laughter. That was hardly an apt description of Worth, but he hadn’t expected Jacob to even consider such a thing. Most men didn’t.
“So I’m right!” Jacob crowed.
“Congratulations,” Ned declared in a monotone. “You correctly guessed the gender of my associate on the second try.”
“You know that’s not what I was talking about.”
“Then what were you talking about?” Ned asked with a sly smirk.
He wasn’t going to let Jacob get away with talking around the subject.
“I’m saying that you... uh... he...”
“Yes?”
“You’re sweet on him.”
Jacob’s face was red and his feathers were ruffled. But he didn’t seem to be judging. It almost seemed... No, Ned was almost sure of it.
“You ever been sweet on a guy, Frye?”
“I... uh... a few times,” Jacob admitted. “Girls too,” he was quick to add. “That’s not... normal... is it?”
“It’s also not normal how good you are with those wings of yours,” Ned told him. “Doesn’t mean it’s impossible. Just a bit uncommon.”
Jacob grinned.
“Thanks, Ned!”
He leaned in to kiss Ned on the cheek and then launched himself out the window behind him.
“I have a perfectly functioning door!” Ned called after him.
With Jacob gone, Ned sank back into his chair and smiled. That was Jacob satisfied, and Ned hadn’t even had to admit anything about his own feelings.
He reached for the letter and found his pocket conspicuously empty.
“Frye! Get back here!”
--
This isn’t a fairy tale, so there’s no happily ever after. But there were happy times, and sometimes that’s enough.