Live and Let Drood: A Secret Histories Novel
Read Live and Let Drood: A Secret Histories Novel Online
Authors: Simon R. Green
ALSO BY SIMON R. GREEN
T
HE
S
ECRET
H
ISTORIES
N
OVELS
The Man with the Golden Torc
Daemons Are Forever
The Spy Who Haunted Me
From Hell with Love
For Heaven’s Eyes Only
T
HE
D
EATHSTALKER
S
ERIES
Twilight of the Empire
Deathstalker
Deathstalker Rebellion
Deathstalker War
Deathstalker Honor
Deathstalker Destiny
Deathstalker Legacy
Deathstalker Return
Deathstalker Coda
T
HE
A
DVENTURES
OF
H
AWK
& F
ISHER
Swords of Haven
Guards of Haven
O
THER
N
OVELS
Blue Moon Rising
Beyond the Blue Moon
Blood and Honor
Down Among the Dead Men
Shadows Fall
Drinking Midnight Wine
A
CE
B
OOKS
T
HE
N
IGHTSIDE
S
ERIES
Something from the Nightside
Agents of Light and Darkness
Nightingale’s Lament
Hex and the City
Paths Not Taken
Sharper Than a Serpent’s Tooth
Hell to Pay
The Unnatural Inquirer
Just Another Judgement Day
The Good, the Bad, and the Uncanny
A Hard Day’s Night
The Bride Wore Black Leather
G
HOST
F
INDERS
N
OVELS
Ghost of a Chance
Ghost of a Smile
A Secret Histories Novel
Simon R. Green
ROC
Published by New American Library, a division of
Penguin Group (USA) Inc., 375 Hudson Street,
New York, New York 10014, USA
Penguin Group (Canada), 90 Eglinton Avenue East, Suite 700, Toronto,
Ontario M4P 2Y3, Canada (a division of Pearson Penguin Canada Inc.)
Penguin Books Ltd., 80 Strand, London WC2R 0RL, England
Penguin Ireland, 25 St. Stephen’s Green, Dublin 2,
Ireland (a division of Penguin Books Ltd.)
Penguin Group (Australia), 250 Camberwell Road, Camberwell, Victoria 3124,
Australia (a division of Pearson Australia Group Pty. Ltd.)
Penguin Books India Pvt. Ltd., 11 Community Centre, Panchsheel Park,
New Delhi - 110 017, India
Penguin Group (NZ), 67 Apollo Drive, Rosedale, Auckland 0632,
New Zealand (a division of Pearson New Zealand Ltd.)
Penguin Books (South Africa) (Pty.) Ltd., 24 Sturdee Avenue,
Rosebank, Johannesburg 2196, South Africa
Penguin Books Ltd., Registered Offices:
80 Strand, London WC2R 0RL, England
First published by Roc, an imprint of New American Library,
a division of Penguin Group (USA) Inc.
First Printing, June 2012
10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
Copyright © Simon R. Green, 2012
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced, scanned, or distributed in any printed or electronic form without permission. Please do not participate in or encourage piracy of copyrighted materials in violation of the author’s rights. Purchase only authorized editions.
REGISTERED TRADEMARK—MARCA REGISTRADA
LIBRARY OF CONGRESS CATALOGING-IN-PUBLICATION DATA:
Green, Simon R., 1955–
Live and let Drood: a secret histories novel/Simon R. Green.
p. cm.
ISBN: 978-1-101-58541-2
1. Drood, Eddie (Fictitious character)—Fiction. I. Title.
PR6107.R44L58 2012
823’.92—dc23 2011045364
Set in ITC New Baskerville
Designed by Elke Sigal
Printed in the United States of America
PUBLISHER’S NOTE
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.
The publisher does not have any control over and does not assume any responsibility for author or third-party Web sites or their content.
ALWAYS LEARNING
PEARSON
Previously in the Secret Histories…
Chapter One: Home Is Where the Heart Breaks
Chapter Two: When the Droods Are Away
Chapter Three: There Are Worse Things Than Mummies in the Undiscovered Tombs of Old Egypt
Chapter Four: When the Seas Give up Their Dead
Chapter Five: Do You Have an Appointment?
Chapter Six: Department of the Unexpected
Chapter Seven: Some Unpleasantness at the Establishment Club
Chapter Eight: Traffic Can Be Murder Sometimes
Chapter Ten: Where the Monsters Are, and a Not Entirely Unexpected Surprise
Chapter Eleven: Home Again, Home Again
I
came home and found someone had murdered my whole family.
Someone is going to pay.
In blood.
Y
ou think you know where your life is going. You think you’ve got everything sorted out. You’ve defeated your enemies, saved the world, made peace with your family and gone on holiday with the woman you love. And then you discover what you should have known all along: that it takes only one bad day to turn your life upside down. That there’s nothing you can have, nothing you’ve earned, nothing you’ve paid for with blood and loss and suffering…that the world can’t take away from you.
I stood before all that remained of my home, Drood Hall, and all I could think of was how it used to look. How it had looked all my life. A huge, sprawling old manor house dating back to the time of the Tudor kings, though much added onto and improved through the centuries. Traditional black-and-white-boarded frontage with heavy leaded-glass windows, proud entrance doors strong enough to hold off an army, and a jutting peaked and gabled roof. Four large wings had been added to accommodate the growing size of the family; it was massive and solid in the old Regency style. So large and solid and…significant, it looked like it could take on the whole world and win.
High above the extensive grounds, the wide roof rose and fell like a great grey-tiled sea, complete with sharp-peaked gables, scowling
gargoyles that doubled as water spouts and ornamental guttering that had probably seemed like a good idea at the time. Add to that a perky little observatory, extensive landing pads for all the family’s more outré flying machines (and, of course, the winged unicorns), and more aliens and antennae than you could shake a gremlin at…and it all added up to one very crowded and very useful roof.
I used to spend a lot of my time up on the roof when I was just a kid, enjoying the various comings and goings and getting in everyone’s way.
All gone now.
The Hall was a burnt-out ruin. Someone had taken it apart with gunfire and explosives and set fire to what remained. Walls were broken and shattered, blackened and charred from smoke and flames. The upper floors had collapsed in on themselves into one great compressed mass of broken stone and rubble and what fragments remained of the roof. The ground floor looked to be more or less intact, but the windows were all blown out, and the great front doors had been blasted right off their heavy hinges. God alone knew what was left inside.
