Two.

"What do you know about the Quiet People, who live in tunnels below London?" Abigail asked Indigo. They were sitting in the bushes in the park across the street from the Kentish Town West Underground station. Since making friends with the foxes, Abigail had started hanging out in parks a lot more.

"Not much," Indigo said. "We observe and report, but they're better at blending in in the city than we are."

"Yeah, but you both live underground," Abigail pointed out, scratching Indigo in her favorite spot. "Your dens and their tunnels never cross?"

"They're a lot further down than we are," Indigo said, "and we don't use the trains like they do. Why do you want to know?"

"Peter's taking me to meet some of them," Abigail said. "The kids who come up to the surface for school and to get used to the light. And maybe they'll let me visit their tunnels, if they like me."

"That would be interesting intelligence," Indigo said.

"I'm sure it would be," Abigail said, but if she paid the foxes for intelligence, she certainly wasn't going to give them any for free. Not when it wasn't what the foxes called an operational matter. It was the principle of the thing. Though obviously they wouldn't be trading for food. "Maybe if you have interesting things for me, I might trade. Things I find interesting," she clarified, because they sometimes had very different ideas of what was important.

"I'll have to check with my superiors," Indigo said.

"Fair enough," Abigail said.

Indigo left, and Abigail took the Tube to meet Peter.

…

…

Peter'd warned her the Quiet People were, well, quiet, but she hadn't really thought they'd be this quiet. The whispers were honestly getting to her.

"Is it true that you all have sex before fifteen?" Molly Ryan said so quietly Molly almost couldn't make out her words despite the fact that Molly was right next to her. She was about Abigail's age, dressed in jeans and an embroidered white blouse with a high collar that could have passed on any BBC costume drama without question.

"No, of course not," Abigail said quietly back. "Where did you hear that?" They were sitting in a circle, with Peter and the teacher talking quietly in the corner. Her introduction had turned quickly into an interrogation as the other kids peppered her with questions about what life was really like on the surface.

Molly flushed as the other kids snickered. "John Digger said—"

"I think we all know why he'd say that," one of the other girls muttered scornfully. She was wearing modern clothes, except they didn't look quite right, and from her posture Abigail thought she might be wearing a corset under her T-shirt.

"Well, obviously, but at least he's been out on the surface by himself," Molly said. "He has friends up here! All I've done is ride the Tube."

"Couldn't you look it up on the internet?" Abigail asked. "I know you've got computers here." Wi-fi might not work in their tunnels, but it definitely worked in their classroom on the surface, and there were three computers set up in the corners. They were even oriented so that the person using them had their back to the wall, and nobody could see what you were doing with a casual glance, which Abigail approved of.

"The internet's full of lies, though," Molly whispered. "I wasn't sure I'd find a reliable site. I'm not that good at telling the difference, yet, and I certainly wasn't going to ask for help." She glanced over at Peter and the teacher, and shuddered.

"You could go to a library," Abigail said. "That's more likely to have reliable sources. You'd need a card to check books out, but even without one you can read any book in the library as long as you do it in the library."

"What's a library?" one of the boys asked. Abigail thought his name was Riley; he was dressed like he'd just stepped out of the 19th Century, with brown wool trousers held up by suspenders, and a collared shirt with a neckerchief.

That took a bit of explaining, and most of the kids seemed really excited by the idea of a place they could get books for free. Abigail was a bit taken aback, but then she realized that not only did they not have the internet down in their tunnels, they wouldn't have TV or radio. Books would be a form of entertainment they could bring home with them. So Abigail told them about the different genres of fiction, so they'd know what sort of things they might like to try when they got their library cards, and looked up which libraries were closest to which tube stations.

"So what do you think about the surface?" Abigail asked, when all the questions about libraries and books had been answered. It was the question she'd wanted to ask since she learned about the Quiet People.

The kids had a wide variety of expressions. "It's alright, I suppose," muttered Riley, wrinkling up his nose. "But everything's so ugly. And plain. You don't decorate anything."

Everyone nodded, which surprised Abigail. After all, they lived in a dark hole in the ground with pigs. Even if it was neat and tidy, how nice could their tunnels be?

"There's so much cool stuff, though," said one of the girls who was wearing jeans and a hoodie. Abigail hadn't caught her name.

"If you can afford it," someone whispered.

"It's so expensive, and doesn't even look good," the girl with the excellent posture said. "What even are they doing with all the money? Have you seen those condos for rich people? Big glass and steel boxes! I know they can afford to make things look nice, so why don't they? What's the point of building anything if it doesn't satisfy the soul as well as the body?"

A murmur of agreement went around the circle.

"I'm glad we can come up more easily, now," Molly said. "I'd like to meet more people. I like that I have the chance to learn more, and maybe have a job outside the tunnels. But mostly, I just want them to run lines down so we can get electricity and TV and the internet."

There was another round of nods and agreement.

Now Abigail was even more curious about their tunnels. Even granted that people tended to like things that were familiar, she'd expected them to all think the surface was cooler. It had more space, more stuff, and the sun.

That visit didn't end with an invitation to their tunnels, but they did ask her to come back the next time they had school and she didn't. Although, she wasn't sure whether that was because they genuinely liked her and wanted to know more about the surface, or because they liked sitting around talking instead of doing schoolwork.

…

…

"Make any friends?" Peter asked as they drove back to Russel Square.

"Maybe," Abigail said. The Quiet Kids were alright, but none of them really stood out to her. "Apparently nobody's ever told them about libraries, before."

"Really?" Peter said in surprise. "I'd have thought that would be the first place they'd have a field trip to."

"Do they have field trips?" Abigail asked. "And also, Miss Ten-Tons is a Quiet Person herself. Even if she's got regular textbooks to teach from, how would she know about things like libraries?"

"And Lady Ty aside, Zach's their big contact, and I doubt he's much for libraries," Peter said. "If I talked to Miss Ten-Tons about organizing a field trip, would you be interested in going along?"

"Maybe," Abigail said. "Depends on how busy I am. Who's Zach?"

"He's a … honestly, I'm not sure how he'd classify himself, but I know that calling him a 'goblin' is an insult," Peter said. "Does a lot of odd jobs around the demi-monde, knows everybody, compulsively moves all the time."

"Can I meet him?"

"No," Peter said firmly.

"Why not?" Abigail asked.

"Because your mum and dad would kill me if they found out I introduced you to a petty criminal like Zach," Peter said.

"You didn't say he was a criminal, and he must be at least sort of reliable if he's the main contact for the Quiet People School," Abigail said. Someone who knew everybody was likely to be an interesting and useful person to know.

Peter grumbled a bit, but was unmoved.

At least for now. She'd have to work on him a bit.