Between Two Thorns (11 page)

“Now,” he said, hand on the handle of the communal front door. “Do I need to lock you in the boot of the car?”

“No,” she said quietly, thinking that if he put her down by the car, she could sprint away and call for help.

“And Catherine,” he added, turning the handle. “If you do anything except get in the car and put your seatbelt on without saying a word, I will use a Doll Charm on you.”

She thought she was going to be sick. She’d heard rumours of that Charm, one of the least acceptable in Society; it rendered the victim powerless over their body but still aware. The victim could be frozen rigid or kept pliable like a rag doll. Either way it would make escape impossible and he’d have to carry her into the family house utterly helpless. It would be obvious that she’d resisted him.

“I understand,” she whispered, cowed.

He dumped her by the side of a black VW Golf, too modern to belong to the family. She saw the hire-car information on the passenger seat as he unlocked the door for her. It took several goes; he was briefly befuddled by the buttons on the keychain remote, and he held her arm with his other hand as he muttered in frustration.

He opened the door for her and pushed her inside. She sat on top of the bits of paper, realising that this was it, she was leaving Manchester, kidnapped by her own brother.

“Seatbelt,” he ordered and she clicked it into place. The thought of seeing her parents by the end of that very day made her throat tight. Cathy tugged down her sleeves, twisting the cuffs as the panic surged through her, unravelling her ability to do anything except shake violently.

The door was slammed shut and he marched around to the driver’s side, looking up and down the street nervously. She was amazed no Arbiters had appeared. Perhaps they weren’t as scary as she’d been led to believe.

“Can’t I just get my bag?” she asked as he got in and put on his seatbelt.

“No.”

Just one minute would be enough time to grab her phone and hide it somewhere useful later on. “But I have things I need in–”

“Don’t you understand, Cat?” He twisted in his seat to face her. “It doesn’t matter any more. It’s over.”

He stalled the car as he tried to pull away and she sank in the seat. Could she bolt at a service station? She sighed at herself. Lord Poppy wasn’t going to forget about her, even if she did manage to get away from Tom.

“I’ll never forgive you for this,” she said, watching her street disappear in the wing mirror.

“As you’ll soon discover, sometimes we have to do things we don’t want to,” he replied, tapping the sat nav. She noticed his hands were shaking. This had been hard for him too. He was just as trapped as she was.

“We could make a plan, Tom, if we worked together–”

“Stop it!” he shouted and hit the steering wheel with the palm of his hand. “Just… just accept it and start working out what you’re going to say to Father, not how you can get out of this. Whether you like it or not, whether you hate us or not, you will be engaged to William, you will do your duty, you will marry him, and you will live in the Nether and that is that.”

She turned away, curling up her legs and looking out at the city and its traffic. She felt her heartbeat pounding in her temples, her stomach knotted. She still had a wish to make and the only thing she wanted she wasn’t permitted.

It was hard not to think about giving up.

Soon they were leaving the redbrick urban sprawl behind and the view opened out onto green fields and occasional farmhouses.

“When will we be there?” she asked.

“After dark.”

“Why don’t you take the motorway if it’s such a rush?”

“I don’t like driving on them. Everyone drives too fast.”

She faced forwards and noticed how slow he was driving. “You know we can go up to sixty on this road?”

“I’ll go at the speed I want to,” he replied, arms held rigidly straight at the wheel.

“What’s Lucy like?” she asked, hating the atmosphere, bored with the questions and worries battering her skull.

“Clever. Funny. She has good taste.”

“You like her then?”

He shifted uncomfortably. “I was relieved she wasn’t like her parents.”

Cathy smiled. Poor Tom, utterly incapable of talking about how he felt. “I’m sorry,” she said, the guilt welling again. “I missed you. I thought about you all the time.”

“I just can’t believe you did it by yourself. I thought I was going to have to fight off kidnappers and rescue you.”

“But you turned out to be the kidnapper,” she said and then clamped her mouth shut. “Sorry, that came out wrong.”

“It just came out,” he corrected. “It was exactly what you were thinking. I see you’ve lost your good manners and the ability to keep your thoughts to yourself.”

She kept her mouth shut, trying to disprove him.

“What did you think you’d find in Mundanus?”

“I already found it,” she said. “Freedom.” And love, she thought, but didn’t dare mention anything to do with Josh.

“But what did you want to actually do there?”

She fiddled with a cuff again, uncertain whether to tell the truth. It wasn’t that she didn’t trust Tom. She was worried he’d laugh at her. Her mouth twitched into a smile at the memory of when Josh had coaxed it out of her. He’d asked a few times at the end of a film and she’d brushed the question off, finding it hard to undo a lifetime of hiding her ambition from everyone around her. Then he tickled her until she’d fallen off the sofa but she still refused to tell him. He sat back and with a terrible sadness in his eyes said, “If you don’t feel safe to tell me, that’s OK.”

That was the first moment she wondered if she was falling in love with him. She sat back on the sofa, tucked her toes under his leg and took a deep breath. “For the first few months away from my family I thought about opening a bookshop with an open fire and comfy chairs and free tea.”

“Sounds good. Only sci-fi books?”

“Maybe. Lately I’ve had another idea… but I don’t know if I could do it.”

He smiled, rested a hand on her knee. “What did Doc Brown say?”

She grinned. “‘If you put your mind to it, you can accomplish anything.’ OK. Promise not to laugh?”

“I promise.”

“I want to do something in human rights. I want to protect people who don’t have a voice.”

He nodded. “Cool.”

She searched for any hint of scorn, any impending jibes, but there was nothing except a gentle smile. “Josh,” she said, leaning closer. “I… I think I l–.”

“Did you hear me, Cat?” Tom called. “What did you want to do in Mundanus?”

She blinked. “I wasn’t sure yet.” She swallowed the lump in her throat and looked out over the fields.

“Did you really want to stay in Mundanus forever?” he asked after a few minutes.

“Yeah,” she said wistfully.

“Even though you’d get old?”

“Oh, for God’s sake, there’s more to life than worrying about bloody wrinkles, you know.”

He winced. “Don’t speak like that once you get back to Aquae Sulis. They’ll pick you up on every little thing.”

“Didn’t they always?”

He nodded. “You’ll just have to make the best of it. William’s family are very wealthy and very powerful. It’s a very good match. You’ll want for nothing.”

“Except freedom, some basic human rights, the ability to own my own property – because that’s all I’ll be: property.”

“Cat.”

She closed her eyes, overwhelmed. If she’d had an off button, she’d press it now. She was too tired to think straight and too wired to sleep.

The car’s brakes squealed and she was thrown against her seatbelt. When she opened her eyes, she saw a car blocking the road ahead, a black vintage Bentley with a driver in goggles and leather driving gloves still behind the wheel. A young man in his early twenties was leaning against it, slapping his paired kid gloves against the palm of one hand.

He was dressed as if he’d stepped out of a shooting weekend in the Twenties. He too was wearing a very out-of-place sword.

“A Rosa,” Tom said. “Fool, what does he think he’s playing at?”

The buttonhole was the main clue: a gorgeous deep-red rose. He had a handsome face but an unfortunately large nose, dark hair scraped back and an arrogant tilt of the chin.

Tom brought the car to a stop in a narrow layby. “Stay in the car,” he said and got out. Cathy pulled up the handbrake before it could roll backwards and got out to join Tom, who clicked his tongue in irritation but carried on.

“I say, what on earth do you think you’re doing?” he said, striding up to the man. “You could have caused an accident.”

“Thomas Rhoeas-Papaver?”

“I am,” Tom replied, a foot taller than the source of his irritation. “And who might you be?”

“Horatio Gallica-Rosa,” he said with a slight bow. “And you must be the elusive Catherine Rhoeas-Papaver, so famously being schooled in Switzerland.” His eyes ran up and down her jeans and hooded top. “Is that the fashion over there?”

Catherine took Tom’s advice to not speak her thoughts; there were far too many expletives. Something about the way Horatio looked at her got her hackles up. She decided to clean the rust off her old skills.

“Mr Gallica-Rosa,” she said, with a small curtsy that felt ridiculous in jeans and trainers. “Good day to you. Has your car broken down? Do you require assistance?” The words felt so wrong, like someone else was speaking them.

“All manners now, I see,” he replied petulantly, resting his left hand on the pommel of his sheathed sword. “Pity they weren’t in evidence yesterday.”

She frowned. “I’m sorry, I don’t understand.”

“Don’t play the coquette with me, Miss Papaver.” He sighed at her blank stare. “The wish magic you cast, you foolish girl. Your meddling prevented the delivery of a mundane that was promised to me by Lady Rose.”

“How dare you speak to my sister in this manner,” Tom said as Cathy tried her best to link either of the wishes to Lady Rose. Between the sleep-deprivation, background dread and rising anger at having been called a “foolish girl” there was little left for deduction.

“Which mundane?” she asked, resting a hand on Tom’s arm.

“Ella Jacobs, the film star. The woman currently cavorting around Londinium with a veritable brown-paper bag of a mundane who was never destined to meet her.”

The Guccified redhead, Cathy realised. “Lady Rose promised
her
to you? A mundane? Wouldn’t the Arbiters have something to say about something that dodgy?”

She heard a tiny groan from Tom and realised she’d stopped thinking about how to speak.

The Rosa tutted. “That is irrelevant. What is of the utmost relevance, however, is how your trickery, and quite frankly disgusting thoughtlessness, has resulted in depriving me of one of the most alluring beauties of this mundane generation.” As he spoke, he took a step towards Tom. “In accordance with the rights of my birth, and with the approval of Lady Rose, I demand satisfaction.” He looked up at Tom, who was turning that awful shade of scarlet again. “And I assume, that as Miss Papaver’s only brother – and may I offer my deepest condolences to you for such a difficult burden – you will be the one to give it.”

 

12

 

Max had no idea he’d slept late until he looked at his watch. It was mid-afternoon and the room was dark; all houses in the Nether had heavy curtains to compensate for a lack of discernible night time. He ached. It was too dark to see the gargoyle but he knew it was in the corner nearest the door, just like he knew his fingers were cold and his leg hurt like hell. He pulled the cord by the side of the bed to summon help.

Axon was proving to be an excellent nurse and helped him get into a presentable and mobile state. He gave Max leather gloves to protect his hands whilst using the crutches and another shot of morphine. Axon didn’t ask stupid questions or make accusations either. All the while, the gargoyle watched, its scowl demonic.

“I’ll serve a luncheon of cold meats in the dining room, when you’re ready to eat,” Axon said and left.

“We need to talk,” the gargoyle said, clunking over to sit between the bed and the door.

“I’m hungry.” Max hoped that a full belly would help with the lightheaded fuzziness the morphine had caused.

“We can’t just ignore what’s happened in London,” said the gargoyle, coming closer. “Our first duty is to protect innocents, and they’re not being protected there. It’s up to us to step in.”

“The Chapter is gone. Without the Chapter Master, Mr Ekstrand is my direct boss now. What he says, we do.”

“My stone arse!” The gargoyle sat back on its haunches, its face level with Max. “He’s obviously a few sandwiches short of a picnic and he doesn’t know what it’s like out in the field. We do.”

Max shook his head. “Disobeying a Sorcerer is not the most sensible course of action.”

“I’m not saying we go and stick our fingers up at him and catch the first train back to London, I’m saying we can’t just shrug and forget about it.”

“I don’t plan to do that. I’m going to ask him more about the Chapter, now I’m feeling better. I wasn’t at my best last night either. And we can’t rush into anything with the London problem; we don’t know how high the corruption goes, or how widespread it is. Montgomery and Faulkner now are connected to the Camden Chapter. Are only Faulkner and the one who shot me corrupt? Is it all of that Chapter’s Arbiters except for Montgomery? Is it the Chapter Master?”

“I was thinking about this whilst you were asleep,” the gargoyle said. “We need to find out if that kind of corruption is in other places.”

“But how? Even if we ignored the fact that we’d be breaking territorial rules, we have no support staff or liaison teams to flag up anything for us to look into. In London we’re blind.”

“True,” the gargoyle said. “What I don’t understand is why he isn’t hopping up and down spitting for blood after all his Arbiters, bar us, were murdered. Why isn’t he banging on the door of the Camden Chapter, or the Sorcerer of Essex?”

There was a knock on the door before Max could reply and Axon came back in. “Mr Ekstrand has asked for the gargoyle.”

“What does he want with me?” The gargoyle sounded nervous.

“I have no idea,” Axon replied and stood aside, gesturing for the gargoyle to leave. “Would you like to have lunch now?” he asked Max, who nodded.

He ate alone in a dining room with walls covered in landscape paintings whilst considering his options. It didn’t take long. The food was simple and tasted good. Cold cuts with salad seemed to be just what he could manage. Axon had arranged a chair and cushion for his leg and the woolly feeling in his head slowly improved until he felt ready to talk to Ekstrand.

He made his slow and tiring way into the hall and heard the Sorcerer’s voice.

“Good afternoon. How are you?”

“I’m very well, thank you, how are you?” That was Petra.

There was a long pause. “I’m not sure what to say,” the Sorcerer eventually replied.

“Generally, ‘I’m fine, thank you’ will suffice.”

“Even if I don’t feel fine?”

“It depends on who the person is; whether you’re addressing an acquaintance or someone you know well.”

Max went to the door and saw Petra stand up as Mr Ekstrand hurried to the other side of the room. He was dressed in a casual lounge suit and woollen waistcoat. She was wearing another curve-hugging suit. Unlike the night before, Max felt indifferent about it.

“Good afternoon,” Mr Ekstrand said to Petra, taking hesitant strides towards her with an outstretched hand. “How are you?”

Max cleared his throat.

“Ah!” Ekstrand beamed at him, none of the suspicion from the day before in evidence. “Maximilian, how are you? Do come in.”

“You look better than yesterday,” Petra said, helping him onto the sofa and placing cushions behind his back.

“I slept well.” Max watched Ekstrand sit opposite him with a fixed smile on his face. “Is everything all right?”

“Yes, I am fine, thank you.” Ekstrand spoke like a poor actor in a play. “I imagine you’re wondering about the gargoyle. I’ve prepared it for fieldwork and we had a very interesting conversation about hospitals. It’s in my laboratory whilst the modifications settle.”

“Good,” Max said, deciding not to concern himself with the change in the Sorcerer’s behaviour; it seemed to have made him more useful.

“Now that you’re up and about, I need you to get this investigation underway.”

“Mr Ekstrand, Max can’t even walk yet!” Petra said, sitting down nearby with her notebook and pen.

“He can with those,” Ekstrand flapped a hand at the crutches. “Besides, we don’t have time to waste; the season is about to start and I need to know what’s going on with the Master of Ceremonies.”

“Lavandula?” Max said. “He’s the one who’s gone missing?”

“Indeed,” Ekstrand said, his focus interrupted by a flash of delight at seeing tea being carried in. “Axon, you read my mind. Earl Grey?”

“Of course, sir,” Axon replied and served the tea discreetly as Ekstrand continued.

“Lavandula is arguably one of the most cooperative Fae-touched within the boundaries of the Heptarchy.” Ekstrand took his cup and breathed in the ribbon of steam. “Earl Grey is the most superior of all teas, I find, don’t you?”

He glanced at Petra as he said it, as if looking for approval. She rewarded him with a nod and he turned back to Max. “Mr Lavandula always informed me of any new Nether properties in Aquae Sulis, and the families involved. It’s far more civilised than the way things are in Londinium and Oxenford. And now he’s disappeared. I need him back.” He frowned into the bottom of his teacup. “I don’t like change.”

“Do you suspect foul play?”

“Absolutely. Why would the Master of Ceremonies leave two days before the start of the season without telling me?”

“Perhaps he had a personal emergency,” Max said.

“If he did, then I should know about it.” Ekstrand sipped the tea. “Personal or not, any emergency that calls him away without so much as a polite letter is my business too. Besides, he understands the importance of doing things properly so he would have sent a messenger. Something is wrong, and I don’t want to be forced to get used to a new Master of Ceremonies when I’ve just become accustomed to this one.”

“And there’s the data from the other night,” Petra said, and Ekstrand set his cup down.

“Indeed!” He looked up at the ceiling, and then that odd fixed smile was back on his face again. “Would you like to see the monitoring chamber?”

“All right,” Max said, noticing the way Ekstrand looked to Petra for approval again. She gave him a little smile, which pleased the Sorcerer immensely.

Once Max was up and the crutches in position, he followed the Sorcerer out of the sitting room and down the corridor, along a wing of the house he hadn’t yet visited. The first few doors were painted white and were the same as any period house in the Nether or Mundanus. But the further down the corridor they went, the less conventional they were. One was covered in writing that had been painted on with something sparkling like starlight. Another was made of a smoky crystal slab, replete with the occasional flaw. The one Ekstrand stopped in front of looked more like a pressurised door from a submarine, made of riveted metal and with a small wheel instead of a handle.

“This is one of my favourite rooms,” he said. “It’s also top secret.”

“I understand, sir,” Max said, wondering why he was being brought into the Sorcerer’s confidence when, only the day before, Ekstrand had been reluctant to even talk to him.

Ekstrand twirled the wheel, the door hissed and opened inwards. Max took care with the crutches to get over the lip of metal, not seeing all of the machinery until he was inside. The room was large, comparable to the generously sized living room, but felt cramped, filled with pipes, wires, dials and all manner of machinery that made no sense to Max.

At the centre of the far wall was a large drum of paper and several mechanical arms tipped with miniature brass model hands holding quills connected to individual ink reserves. They were moving independently, leaving ink trails on the paper as it turned on the drum.

“This took me years to build and refine,” Ekstrand said as he patted his pockets. “I read about something called a seismograph and it inspired me to adapt the idea for my own purposes. None of the other Sorcerers have one.” He turned back to Max. “That’s because their understanding of the sorcerous arts is inferior.”

“What does it measure?” Max asked, hobbling closer to the drum as Ekstrand located his spectacles.

“Nether entrance and egress in the city of Bath. Isn’t it beautiful?”

Max was indifferent. “You know when the Fae-touched go in and out of Aquae Sulis?”

Ekstrand nodded, grinning. “And their staff. Whenever they open a Way, the sensors I have all over the city detect the activity and convey the information here. The only drawback is having to have extra coal brought in to feed the boiler. Petra tried to make me read a book about something called electronics that she believes would be more efficient, but I don’t like that idea. For one thing, it would need electricity, which is vulgar. For another, I simply cannot put my trust in a machine without visible cogs, gears and levers. Who knows what ‘electronics’ might really be doing?”

Max, assuming the question was rhetorical, moved closer to the drum. “I always wondered how the Chapter Master knew so quickly when there was increased activity in certain areas.”

Ekstrand nodded. “Axon keeps an eye on it, and sometimes the others too, but only on Saturdays. Obviously.”

“Others?” Max asked, but Ekstrand had moved on and was rummaging in a box of paper by the side of the drum.

“Here it is,” he said, holding up a section of paper. “See here, this is what it looks like when a Fae-touched or one of their servants opens a Way in the normal fashion.”

He pointed at one of the lines that wobbled no more than half an inch away from its normal trajectory. Max looked back up at the drum and saw a similar wobble being produced by one of the quills and then another. “It’s busy today.”

“Yes, the season begins tomorrow, so they’re all running around like idiots. Now look at this.” He unfurled the paper a little more, revealing a huge block of black ink. “Know what that is?”

Max shook his head.

“That is someone opening a Way that is locked, using incredible force to do so.”

“A break-in?”

“Exactly.”

“At Lavandula’s house?”

“Yes. Petra did some calculations. But look at how long it was being held open.”

Max inspected the paper, realising that the lines marked time as well as location. “It seems much longer than all the others.”

“Someone broke into his Nether house from Mundanus, held the Way open and then left again.”

“I can’t imagine another one of the puppets being strong enough to break his lock,” Max said.

“They’re not. He had the best protection Charms in the city.”

“Not one of the Fae?” Max said.

“I think it’s very possible, which is why you’re going there now to see what you can find. If the Fae Court is meddling with key people in Aquae Sulis, nothing good is going to come of it.”

“I agree, sir. May I ask a question?” At Ekstrand’s nod he said, “Regarding the loss of the Chapter, sir… it must be connected to the corruption in London.”

“I’m making preparations to look inside the Cloister. I don’t want to rush into anything reckless.”

“That’s excellent news, sir. May I have permission to go and see what happened there, and to ask Axon to monitor the London press for any signs of–”

Ekstrand held up his hand. “London? Are you still determined to go back there?”

“Not physically, sir, I’m not very useful, and it’s clear that’s a hostile territory now, but I do think it has to be followed up.”

“If there’s corruption within one or possibly more north London Chapters, it becomes a matter for the Heptarchy. All of Albion’s Sorcerers need to be contacted and a Moot called. It takes a dreadfully long time to do that.”

“But if you told them why, surely they’d meet quickly?”

“I can’t disclose the reason for the meeting unless all are present.”

“In case the Sorcerer of Essex is the source of the corruption?”

Ekstrand laughed as if Max had told a brilliant joke, then stopped when he realised that an Arbiter would never do such a thing. “Nonsense. Because Dante is likely to take terrible offence if I so much as hint that there’s a problem in his Kingdom, and that would cause another war. Much better to embarrass him in front of all the other Sorcerers, then they’ll back me up when I demand an explanation.”

“How long will it take?”

“Not long. A few weeks maybe.”

“The innocents are being taken now, sir. We don’t have a few weeks.”

“I can’t help the fact it will take time to open a proper dialogue; there are protocols to be followed, it’s a sensitive business getting in touch with a Sorcerer, let alone to make everyone aware something’s gone rotten in his territory. If we progress an investigation without informing him, it would be a terrible breach of sovereignty, not to mention appalling manners. We can use the time to determine what exactly happened to the Chapter; it may well give us more to take to the Moot about what the Camden Chapter has been up to. Besides, there’s no guarantee the loss of the Chapter and the corruption in London are connected. Just because they appear to be doesn’t mean they are. It could be that an experiment went catastrophically wrong and killed everyone in the cloister.”