All is Fair Read online

  “Habit,” Derne replied but Max sent the gargoyle ahead as a precaution. No darts were fired and he released Ekstrand’s shoulder. Going down the stairs made his leg ache and he leaned more heavily on the walking stick but he eventually made it to the bottom without incident.

  There was another fortified door and a similar conversation with another guard through a slot. The stone floor was less even and the walls were made of the same stones as the mundane foundations. They were in the only part of the building truly reflected in the Nether.

  “Before we go in, I must ask you to be quiet. You’ll need to put on a hooded cloak and move slowly.” He frowned at the gargoyle. “That… thing can’t come in.”

  “Best you stay out here and keep watch,” Max said to it. He didn’t want all of them to be on the other side of the doors, even though they were with Ekstrand. The Agency was using magic beyond sorcerous knowledge and there was every possibility Derne was leading them into a trap.

  The gargoyle took up a position outside the door, sitting on its haunches and leaning forwards as if perched on top of a cathedral.

  On the other side of the second door was a small chamber with several grey cloaks hung on a row of pegs, a table and chair for the guard, and another door, less fortified. The guard wore a holster with a semi-automatic pistol still tucked in it, something Max had never seen in the Nether. The puppets shunned modern weapons; for them anything more advanced than a flintlock was seen as uncouth. The guard held his hand a couple of inches above it.

  “Don’t touch that,” Max said, and Ekstrand noticed the weapon.

  “Or I’ll extract all the water from your body,” the Sorcerer added.

  Whilst the threat did make the guard look nervous he didn’t stand down until he had a nod from Derne. They were well trained and loyal. They had to be, for the Agency to have stayed secret for so long. Max wondered how Derne elicited such loyalty.

  Derne put on one of the grey cloaks and handed another to Ekstrand. He stared at Ekstrand’s top hat when the Sorcerer held it out to him and, not taking the hint, pointed at a hook on the wall. Max collected a cloak for himself and checked it inside and out before draping it around his shoulders. There was a hook-and-eye at the neck to hold it in place and a generous hood, not unlike that worn by mundane monks.

  “Remember, move slowly, and once we’re through that door you mustn’t speak. No doubt you’ll have questions. Save them for when we’re back in this room.”

  Ekstrand gave a curt nod and all three of them put up the hoods. The third door was opened and Max saw it was thick enough to be soundproof.

  They were led into a large room with a low ceiling, a space Max suspected was once the cellars – and possibly dungeons – of the former castle but with all the dividing walls removed to make one space. The air was stuffy and thick with the scent of flowers that irritated the back of Max’s throat. There were thick columns of stones at intervals to bear the weight of the building above but little else Max saw made sense.

  About fifty or so men and women were seated around the room, strapped into wooden chairs. They weren’t straining against the bonds, rather it looked like they were being held in, as all were slumped and slack faced. The chairs were positioned in small groups around tables brightly lit from above by lanterns which left the rest of the room in shadow. On the tables were models of different parts of the building. Some featured the whole structure, others individual floors. The people strapped into the chairs were staring at the models and nothing else.

  A movement drew his attention to a person on the far side of the room, dressed in the same grey robes as they’d been given, moving very slowly towards one of the men in a nearby chair. Drool was wiped from the chin of the slack-faced man who didn’t seem to notice.

  Ekstrand walked slowly around the room, inspecting the models and the seated people. Max saw three other people wearing robes, all tending to various needs. When he saw one lingering behind one of the chairs he too went further in and looked more closely at the nearest chair. Its high back also formed a sort of cupboard in which an IV bag was hung at the top and another bag lower down collected urine. The woman in the chair was so pale he wondered if she’d ever left the Nether since reaching adulthood.

  The model on the table was a perfect replica of the exterior of the Nether building down to every detail, including slight imperfections in the individual stone blocks. Max stooped a little to try and get an idea of what the woman could see as she stared at it. When he straightened back up again he looked at the man seated opposite her. Something about his nose caught Max’s eye and he seemed familiar. He was thinner, paler and his hair had been shaved off, but Max was certain it was Horatio Gallica-Rosa, the one who’d tried to pass off Lavandula’s secret house as his own.

  So that was what happened to the Roses.

  Max had a sudden awareness of the gargoyle on the other side of the door, ready to pounce on the guard. It was time to leave. Ekstrand had seen enough too and they both headed for the door, Derne close behind the Sorcerer.

  The gargoyle was staring at the guard, who was standing in front of the door and had to be pushed aside by Ekstrand. The gargoyle’s teeth were bared and its head was low and shoulders high. Derne closed the door and ushered them towards the exit but the gargoyle headed for Max.

  “We have to go back in there,” it growled. “We have to stop this.”

  “Not an option,” Max replied and took off the robe. “If the building collapsed or stopped existing it would kill all the people here or, at best, they’d be lost in the Nether.”

  A low rumbling percolated in its throat. “We can’t ignore it.”

  “We need to go, sir,” Max said to Ekstrand.

  “Not yet, I have questions. Derne, those people in there, they are the anchors, aren’t they?”

  Derne nodded, his eyes darting to the gargoyle and back to the Sorcerer. “Yes. It’s a form of wish magic altered for our purpose.” He glanced at the gargoyle again. “They collectively wish the building into existence in the Nether, and the mundane foundations are enough to hold it in place.”

  “Ingenious,” Ekstrand commented.

  “Ingenious!” The gargoyle focused on Ekstrand. “Are you–”

  “I’ll take it upstairs,” Max said and headed for the door. “Come on,” he said to the gargoyle.

  “I won’t be long,” Ekstrand said. “Now, tell me, how do they maintain their concentration?”

  Max didn’t hear the answer as he started up the stairs. The gargoyle followed him, muttering to itself all the way. When they were back in the hallway upstairs it prowled up and down as they waited for Ekstrand.

  “Wait till we get back to his house,” Max said when the gargoyle opened its mouth to speak. “Not here.”

  Max leaned against the wall. He was tired and his leg ached. His thoughts kept returning to the sight of the Gallica-Rosa in the basement. He’d only seen him briefly in the ballroom after he’d rescued the Master of Ceremonies and hadn’t given any more thought to what had happened to the family other than where he could find them for interrogation.

  “That code in his file must have something to do with it,” the gargoyle said. “We need to ask them what it all means.”

  “They’ll tell us now,” Max replied.

  “If I had a stomach I’d be throwing up,” the gargoyle added. “This is–”

  “Wait until we get back,” Max said, and the gargoyle went back to its prowling.

  Ekstrand took longer than he said he would but Max had anticipated that. He emerged from the doorway down to the basement with Derne. “That’s everything for now,” he said.

  “Sir, there’s a code in Horatio Gallica-Rosa’s file,” Max said. “We need to know what it means.”

  “Write that up, will you?” Ekstrand said to Derne. “Max will collect it soon.”

  Derne sucked in a deep breath through his nostrils and then nodded.

  Ekstrand moved to the edge of the carpet runn
er and tapped on the flagstone floor with the tip of his cane. “The doors will open again in one minute. I’m leaving now but remember, I’m watching you.”

  “I doubt I can forget it,” Derne replied.

  Ekstrand opened a way into the Nether and, when they stepped through, the building was a hundred yards away. Ekstrand looked at it for a few moments and then opened a Way to the hallway of his house. The moment they were through and the Way closed behind them, the gargoyle rounded on the Sorcerer.

  “So when are you going to shut the Agency down?”

  “Why in the Worlds would I do that?” Ekstrand asked as he took off his hat.

  “Because of the people in the basement.”

  “What about them?”

  The gargoyle didn’t answer immediately; it just stared at Ekstrand with its stone marble eyes. “You don’t give a flying buttress about those poor bastards, do you?”

  “Mr Ekstrand.” Petra’s voice cut cleanly through the gargoyle’s outrage. “I’ve finished the last autopsy and there’s something you need to know.”

  Max glanced at the clock. It was three in the morning and she looked exhausted. “About the Sorcerer of Essex?” He knew Dante was the last one to be autopsied of the dead Sorcerers.

  Petra nodded. “Yes, Dante. Sir, his heart was turned into stone too, just like the other Sorcerers and the people in the Bath Chapter. But Dante was different; that didn’t kill him.”

  “I beg your pardon?” Ekstrand was now focused fully on her.

  “His heart being turned to stone didn’t kill him because he was already dead.”

  2

  “This is it.”

  Will peered out of the taxi window at the terraced mundane house. It lacked any of the beauty and majesty of Bath’s splendid architecture. He asked the driver to wait and got out. Although the prospect of enduring the terrible smell of the mundane car once again didn’t appeal, it was less troublesome than having to find another in the rain. The driver nodded and parked whilst opening a packet of crisps with his teeth at the same time. That explained the beefy tang to the taxi’s smell but not the odour of rotten eggs.

  He walked to the gate and had a moment of doubt. Should he have brought his armed footmen? Was this a good idea at all? He frowned at the thought of being so crass. He might be Duke of Londinium now but it didn’t mean he couldn’t take care of a personal matter alone and in the way he saw fit.

  He’d spent days at Cathy’s bedside, racked with guilt about the stabbing and endlessly ruminating upon the scant information he’d been given after the attack, only to discover how much she’d been hiding from him. The man from the Agency had delivered the dossier on his wife’s secret life four days earlier. It detailed a flat she rented in the dark city of Manchester – the only city in England without a single Nether property, or so he’d been told. She’d even attended university there.

  The dossier created more questions than it answered. It listed, amongst other items, the mobile phone that she’d used to call the man who saved her from the assassin. Quite how she’d struck up a relationship with a dull computer programmer from Bath wasn’t forthcoming, but he had to make sure that, however it had started, it was going to stop now. He pushed the gate open.

  Two of the tiles on the doorstep were cracked and there were weeds poking their way through the path. Beer cans and fast food cartons were banked against the inside of the garden wall like a snow drift made of urban decay. He pushed the doorbell, expecting nothing to happen, but it actually worked.

  He waited just long enough to wonder whether anyone was in before seeing a shape move on the other side of the dappled glass in the front door. It was opened by a very mundane man, dressed in black trousers and a white shirt. He was holding a black tie in his hand and the collar of his shirt was turned up as if he were about to put the tie on. Will noted his stubble, the dark shadows beneath his eyes, the brown hair that hadn’t felt a comb for a couple of days. His face was familiar but Will couldn’t place where he’d seen him.

  “Hello?”

  “Are you Sam? Samuel Westonville?”

  The mundane scratched his chin. It sounded like he was sanding wood. “Maybe. Who are you?”

  “I’m Catherine’s husband.”

  The mundane’s mouth dropped open. “Oh, right. Yeah, I’m Sam. Come in. How is she?”

  “Recovering,” Will said, relieved that the house wasn’t the hovel he expected on the inside, but the air smelt stale and there was a pile of unopened post to the side of the door. Some of the envelopes had footprints on them.

  “I can offer you coffee but there’s no milk. No milk that’s safe to drink anyway.”

  “No, thank you.”

  Sam led him to a small living room filled with boxes. “Sorry about the mess.” He tossed the tie on the arm of a chair and lifted a box off the sofa. He gestured for Will to sit down, which Will ignored.

  “I won’t keep you long. I wanted to know why you were in the park with my wife.”

  Sam scratched the back of his head and looked uncomfortable. “She… Look, there isn’t anything going on between us, you do know that, don’t you?”

  “But why were you there when she was attacked?”

  “Well, I was just passing by.” He was a terrible liar.

  “After she phoned you.”

  “Um, yeah. Look, there’s nothing dodgy going on. Haven’t you asked her?”

  “She’s barely been conscious since the attack, that’s why I’m asking you.”

  “I met her when everyone was looking for her uncle, do you know about that? It was before she was… um, before you were married.”

  “Yes, I know all about that. Go on.”

  “She helped me get a memory back and that helped the… people looking for her uncle to find him.”

  Will suddenly knew where he’d seen him before. It was in the ballroom at Horatio Gallica-Rosa’s failed housewarming. He was with the Sorcerer and the Arbiter. “You know the Sorcerer Guardian of Wessex?”

  “Yeah, he was the one who introduced me to Cathy.”

  “And…”

  “And… that’s all,” Sam said, his hand sliding down the back of his head to rub the back of his neck. “You sure you don’t want a drink?”

  Will wanted a glass of the best single malt at Black’s, not anything that might be tucked away in a mundane’s house. His jealousy about a possible affair was fading the more the mundane spoke; he was too mediocre to be a lover worthy of concern. However, the connection to the Sorcerer of Wessex was worrying. Why would Cathy maintain a friendship with this man if not to maintain a connection to the Sorcerer? And why else would she do that, other than if she was going to run away again? That was why she was in the park; that was why she still had her old flat, her bank account, her old life in Mundanus. She was still planning to go back to it. She was going to leave him.

  “Why did she phone you?”

  “To see if I was OK. Look, Cathy knew me and my wife were having problems–”

  “You’re married?”

  “Was. She died.”

  “Oh. My condolences.”

  “Yeah… she was still alive when Cathy was at the park. She wanted to know if I was OK and I wasn’t so she offered a friendly ear.”

  “So you weren’t just passing by. You were at the park to meet her, in secret.”

  “There was nothing dodgy about it, though.”

  “Then why lie? Why say you were just passing?”

  “Because I knew you’d think the worst, OK? Cathy wouldn’t do anything with me, it’s not like that between us, we’re friends.”

  “My wife is the most important woman in Londinium.” Will kept his voice calm and low. “You are nothing more than a mundane with a talent for getting yourself tangled up in things you should not. Catherine is not your friend and you will not see her again.”

  “Now just wait a minute.” Sam’s voice rose. “I saved her life! And it’s not up to you to decide who is her friend or n
ot, it’s up to her.”

  “Perhaps I’m not making myself clear enough for your limited capabilities. Stay away from my wife.”

  “I don’t know who the fuck you think you are, coming into my house and–”

  Will felt for the scabbard of his rapier, glamoured to be invisible to mundane eyes, and drew the sword in one motion. The Charm was broken and Sam yelped at the sight of him drawing the weapon seemingly out of thin air. Will held the sword perfectly still and straight with its point pressed lightly against the mundane’s throat.

  “I am the Duke of Londinium, a Reticulata-Iris and the man responsible for my wife’s honour. Now before you force me to be any more impolite I will leave you with a message you may better understand.” He leaned forwards and increased the pressure fractionally. “Don’t fuck with me or my family or I will kill you.”

  Margritte lifted her heavy black taffeta skirts as she ascended the staircase to her son’s study. The Wesley room, made famous by one of the mundane alumnae, was one of her favourites in Lincoln College but today the memories of the times she and Bartholomew had spent there were not welcome. She had cried enough. Now it was time to do something about the crime committed against her family.

  She knocked on the door and entered when called. Her eldest son was sitting on one of the leather armchairs in the centre of the room, reading. The walls were covered in dark wood panelling, exquisitely carved, the room lit by the sprites trapped in glass globes at intervals along the walls. She couldn’t stop herself looking at the stone fireplace and the small marble bust on it. She remembered Bartholomew showing it to her for the first time and how they had kissed in front of it.

  “I’ll be with you in a moment, Mother,” Alexander said.

  She forced herself to breathe again after looking over at him. From behind, he looked too much like his father: his hair just the same shade of dark brown, tied back with the same small black ribbon her husband favoured. She clutched at the locket hanging over her bodice, thought of the lock of her husband’s hair within and marvelled at how yet more tears were ready to come.