Live and Let Drood: A Secret Histories Novel (30 page)

“I know of thirty-seven other rogues scattered across the world,” said the Regent. I sat up straight in my chair.

“Thirty-seven?” I said, not even trying to hide my disbelief. “I never knew there were that many still alive, running loose in the world!”

“I told you,” said the Regent, smiling easily. “It’s my job to know everything and anything that matters. Because you never know when it might come in handy…Can’t hold out much hope for contacting most of them. Too busy with their own little schemes, which my people are, of course, keeping a careful eye on…And I really don’t see
how Crow Lee could have suborned any of them without my agents knowing.”

“You didn’t know about Miss Mitchell,” said Molly. “And she was right under your nose.”

“True,” said the Regent. “Very true. I’ll have my people reach out to the rogues, Eddie, but…”

“Yes,” I said. “But.”

“Some of them might talk to my people, where they wouldn’t talk to you,” said the Regent. “And I’ll approach the more cautious ones through a series of cutouts, so they won’t know who’s asking. Might learn something useful…Anything else I can do for you while you’re here?”

“Yes,” Molly said bluntly. “Do you know where my sisters are?”

The Regent blinked a few times at the sudden turn in the conversation, but he recovered quickly. “Isabella and Louisa? Can’t you just contact them yourself?”

“Normally, yes,” said Molly. “We’re very close. But for the moment they’ve both got their auras turned off.”

The Regent looked at me. “Does that mean anything to you?”

“Not a thing,” I said. “And I know better than to ask.”

“Oh, good,” said the Regent. “It’s not just me, then.” He looked at Molly. “The last I heard, which I’ll admit is some time back, because it’s never easy keeping up with any of the infamous Metcalf sisters…Isabella was busy investigating an ancient set of stone catacombs deep underneath the Sahara Desert, while Louisa had brought something interesting back from her investigation of the Martian Tombs.”

“Really?” I said.

“As far as we can tell, yes,” said the Regent. “If you ever find out how she got there and back, please tell me. We’d really love to know. It seems she took whatever it was she found down to the Black Heir Headquarters, down in Cornwall. They specialise in the study of things left behind after alien contact: bodies, tech, altered people…the usual. Louisa wanted her big find studied by the big man himself, Professor Nightshade. A very impressive mind, by all accounts. Haven’t heard
anything about Louisa since. I can put in a request for information direct from Uncanny to Black Heir, but they’ve never been big on sharing. If Louisa brought them something important or valuable enough, they’d never even admit they’d seen her. She could be sitting right there in their office when the call came in, and they’d still deny they’d even heard of her.”

“And Louisa would just go along,” said Molly, nodding grimly. “She’d think it was funny.…”

The Regent looked at her thoughtfully. “To be honest, my dear, if your sisters don’t want you to know where they are, there’s probably a good reason for it. Good for them, anyway.”

“Are you getting worried about them?” I said to Molly.

“Just a bit,” she said, frowning. “This isn’t like them. We never avoid each other just because we’re doing something we think the others wouldn’t approve of. Hell, usually we’d insist on bragging about it, just to make it clear we won’t be told what to do.”

“Do you want to take off on your own?” I said quietly. “Go look for them, make sure they’re okay? I don’t mind.”

“No,” Molly said immediately. “That’s sweet of you, Eddie, but I won’t leave you. Not when you’ve so many enemies around you. You need someone close you can depend on.”

She didn’t look at the Regent when she said that, but I knew what she meant. Molly has never trusted anyone in the family except me. And maybe Uncle Jack. I looked at the Regent, who was politely pretending he hadn’t understood anything he’d just heard.

“How long do you think Crow Lee has been planning these attacks against the Droods?” I said.

“He’s always been one for taking the long view,” the Regent said judiciously. “Miss Mitchell being a very good example. How long did he invest in turning her, just for the one day when she might be useful? God alone knows how long he’s waited for the whole Drood family to be vulnerable.…”

“So it is possible…that he could have made contact with the Original Traitor,” I said. “Who could have sold the family out for any
number of reasons that made sense only to him…Uncle Jack told me it was the Matriarch before Martha, Sarah, who gave the order to let the Loathly Ones into our reality, to support the Allies in World War Two. Thus setting things up for the Hungry Gods invasion farther down the line…And that she only did that because she was strongly advised to. By someone close to her…”

“Sarah was responsible for a lot of bad decisions in her time as Matriarch,” said the Regent. “And it was her dying so suddenly and unexpectedly that made my Martha the Matriarch at such an unusually young age.”

Molly leaned forward, suddenly fascinated. “How, exactly, did Sarah die? You said an accident, earlier. What kind of accident?”

“She fell down some stairs,” said the Regent. And then he stopped abruptly and we all looked at one another. The Regent looked genuinely upset. “There was no one around. She just fell. She was found dead at the foot of a flight of stairs. Broke her neck. Even Drood armour can’t protect you from accidents if they’re sudden enough. As far as I know, it never occurred to anyone to check if her death was anything other than an unfortunate accident. But now I have to wonder…”

“If her neck was broken before she fell,” I said. “How far does all this go back?”

“It’s getting so you can’t trust anyone,” said Molly.

“The Original Traitor is supposed to have killed other Droods and taken over their identities, in the Past,” I said.

“Like an Immortal?” the Regent said immediately.

“Except that this is one Drood being replaced by another,” I said. “I have to ask, Grandfather: Did you have any Shadow or Uncanny agents inside the Hall just before it disappeared? People inside the family who reported to you?”

“No,” said the Regent.

“But then, you would say that. Wouldn’t you?” said Molly.

“You’ve already admitted you had contact with Uncle James and Uncle Jack,” I said. “So you could keep an eye on me.”

The Regent grinned at me, entirely unabashed. “Good to see you’re
paying attention, Eddie. There are…certain high-up individuals within the family, who are still willing to talk to me. But only from a distance, and only on personal matters. No one in the family would share family secrets with a rogue Drood. No matter who I used to be.”

“Can you assist us against Crow Lee?” I said bluntly.

“Not officially,” said the Regent. “Uncanny can’t be seen to move openly against such a…man of substance. Not while he’s still connected to so many important people in the government. And especially not when there’s a Funding Review in the wind.”

“That’s what happens when you get in bed with the Establishment,” Molly said sweetly. “Someone always gets screwed.…”

“You have to give some to get some,” the Regent said vaguely. “Can’t afford to rock the boat just at the moment. But I’m certainly not going to get in your way. And I can tell you where to find him. He’s currently taking his ease just down the road at his Very Private, Very Members Only club. The Establishment Club. He also has a country manor house down in Surrey. I can provide you with a map. And directions. And full details on all the hidden traps and pitfalls surrounding his extensive private grounds. Once you’re inside, I’m afraid you’re on your own. I’ve been trying to get one of my agents inside for years without success. I can’t be seen to assist you publicly, Eddie, but I can cheer you on from the sidelines.”

“He’s just down the road?” said Molly. “The Most Evil Man in the World is just hanging out at his club?”

“Do you by any chance have an armoury here?” I asked the Regent.

He grinned broadly. “Funny you should ask…”

The Armoury of the Department of the Uncanny turned out to be the complete opposite of what I was used to at Drood Hall. It was small, tidy, compact, with a place for everything and everything in its place. It was more of a storeroom and repository than a research lab. There were all kinds of weapons stacked on shelves, including a few things even I didn’t recognise, and I’ve been around. Just a couple of basic workstations, complete with state-of-the-art computers and assorted scattered
technology presided over by Uncanny’s very own Armourer. No lab rats, no assistants; just one man and his tech in charge of providing Uncanny’s agents with everything they needed to make a proper nuisance of themselves, as the Regent liked to put it.

“This is Patrick,” he said. “Best weapons master Uncanny’s ever had.”

Patrick smiled briefly. “You’re only saying that because it’s true. Would this be a good time to mention the raise in budget I was promised?”

“You can mention it,” the Regent said generously.

Patrick was a calm, middle-aged man. Completely bald, but boasting a bushy salt-and-pepper beard. He had sleepy eyes and an easy smile, but there was still a definite presence to the man when he stepped forward to greet Molly and me. The Regent said Patrick had been one of his Special Agents once, and I had no trouble believing that. There was something about Patrick, for all his ease and calm, that suggested he could still be very dangerous if the need should arise. He wore a basic lab coat that reminded me immediately of Uncle Jack, probably because some things are just constants, wherever you go. Though Patrick was wearing a heavy pullover under his coat, complete with high roll-neck collar. No accounting for taste.

“Are you on your own down here?” said Molly, looking around her with larcenous interest. I made a point of standing right next to her, to make sure no unauthorised weapons went walkabout under her sticky fingers.

“Uncanny is still basically an information-gathering organisation,” said the Regent. “We watch and listen and make many notes. Correlation is our life. Weapons are what we use only when everything’s gone wrong in a hurry. We prefer to err on the sneaky side whenever possible. Right, Patrick?”

“If you say so, your bossness,” said Patrick. “But when things do go pear shaped, I am here to ensure that our people are in a position to Do Unto Others in a sudden and violent way, before the others can do unto them. Don’t touch that!”

Molly snatched her hand back from an innocent-looking crystal
thing, and tried to look innocent. The Regent looked reproachfully at Patrick.

“You promised me you’d got the bugs out of that. We’re still cleaning up the mess from last time.”

“I have!” said Patrick. “But then, there’s bugs and then there’s bugs.…” He smiled easily at Molly and pushed the crystal thing well out of her reach. “Not much money in the budget for research these days. But I do like to potter around, see if I can improvise something useful and horribly destructive out of the various interesting things our agents pick up in the field and bring back with them. I swear, if it weren’t for their basic light-fingeredness, we’d have nothing but empty shelves on these walls.…”

“We don’t have anything like the Droods’ budget,” the Regent agreed. “We have to scrimp and save and make do.”

“And steal anything that isn’t actually nailed down,” said Patrick.

“You’d fit right in here, Molly,” I said solemnly.

“One more word and I’ll smooth out your balls with Botox while you sleep,” said Molly.

Patrick smiled. The Regent looked pained.

“I’m sorry,” I said to Patrick. “We really should have introduced ourselves. I’m Eddie Drood, and this…”

“Oh, I know who you are,” said Patrick. “Both of you.”

“You do?” said Molly.

“Of course,” said Patrick, his dark eyes twinkling cheerfully. “Everyone in our line of work knows all about the redoubtable Eddie Drood and the infamous Molly Metcalf. Your exploits are already the stuff of legend.”

Molly looked at me. “How is it you get to be redoubtable, but I’m always infamous?”

“Sounds right to me,” I said.

“These two incredibly brave young people are about to go up against Unholy Crow Lee,” said the Regent. “What can you offer them, Patrick, to make the job a little less suicidal? In an unofficial, off-the-books and totally deniable way, of course.”

“Crow Lee? Really?” said Patrick. His smiled broadly, and just like that he seemed as dangerous as I’d suspected he could be. It felt like being trapped in an enclosed space with a huge grizzly bear who’d just woken up from hibernation with fresh meat very much on his mind. Patrick turned away abruptly and moved purposefully along his shelves, pickings things up and putting them down again. “Well…No point in trying a heads-on attack. Not with the size of the private army he’s gathered about himself. No…You need to go the sneaky route, come at him in unexpected ways. Lateral thinking and all that. Personally, I’d recommend giving up on the whole idea and taking a nice vacation somewhere really far away. You can’t get more lateral than that. But you wouldn’t do that, redoubtable and infamous as you are.…Don’t touch that!”

I took my hand carefully away from a crystal thing sitting on a pile of papers. “Sorry,” I said. “I thought it was a paperweight.”

“It’s
designed
to look like a paperweight,” Patrick said darkly. “Here—try this. It’s a skeleton key made from real human bone. And, no, you don’t get to ask whose. This useful little item can open any lock, mechanical, magical or electronic.”

“The Drood Armourer gave me one of these once,” I said, accepting the yellowed bone thing gingerly.

“I know!” said Patrick. “Who do you think I stole the idea from? Now, this…is a hearing aid. Just stick this little beauty in your ear, and you’ll be able to listen in on any conversation from any distance. Even in other rooms and in other languages! I’m still working on the immediate-translation tech, but if it doesn’t kick in, you can always read the subtitles.”

He turned to Molly and offered her a pair of spangly glitterball earrings. She hefted the ugly items on her palm and looked dubiously at Patrick.