I definitely wasn’t alone. There were dim, dark shapes moving in the mists around me, circling unhurriedly like sharks hoping for the taste of blood in the water. There were faraway voices, like the echoes of old friends and enemies talking in forgotten rooms, and a constant sense of something important about to happen. I stood still, refusing to be tempted or intimidated into unwise action, while slow heavy footsteps sounded all around me and dark shapes drifted in and out of focus as though struggling to become firm and fixed. In a flux fog, the harsh and solid places of the world become soft and malleable, and all kinds of things become possible. I stood my ground, holding my calm before me like a shield. Make a sudden move in a flux fog, and you could end up someone else before you knew it.
Besides, I still wasn’t entirely sure where I’d arrived. I’d given the Merlin Glass the exact coordinates for Alexander King’s retreat at Place Gloria, but all I knew for certain was that it was somewhere in the Swiss mountains. For all I knew, there could be one hell of a long drop in any direction.
And then a great wind blew up out of nowhere, a soundless blast of bitter cold air that blew all the fog away in a moment, and just like that I was standing on a deserted helicopter landing pad on the top of an artificially levelled-off mountain. The pale yellow marking lines were faded and broken, and the slumping half-rotten control tower clearly hadn’t been used in years. There were five other people on the landing pad with me, as far away as they could get and not actually fall off the mountain. None of them appeared immediately dangerous, so I struck a nonchalant pose and looked around me, taking in the view.
I was high enough up to take my breath away in more ways than one. Place Gloria was set right in the heart of the Swiss Alps, and the long broken-backed range of mountain ridges stretched away in every direction. Snow-covered peaks lay below me to every side, each with their own collars of drifting clouds under a sky so blue and pure it almost hurt to look at. The air was thin and bitter cold, burning in my lungs as I tried for deeper breaths.
I was standing on top of the world, a long way from anywhere at all.
The sound of approaching footsteps turned my head around, and I growled deep in my throat as I recognised who it was. He must have seen the cold rage in my face, but he didn’t slow his approach. The Blue Fairy might have been many things, but he never lacked for balls. He stopped a polite and safe distance away and waited to see what I would do. He looked . . . watchful but not especially worried. I did consider killing him, right there, on general principles, but it seemed likely we were both here as guests of Alexander King, personally selected for his great game, and I couldn’t afford to upset the legendary Independent Agent. Besides, it wouldn’t look good, to be seen to lose control so easily, so early on in the proceedings. There would be other times. I fixed the Blue Fairy with a cold stare and bowed my head to him very slightly.
“That’s better,” said the Blue Fairy in an infuriatingly calm and drawling voice. “Let us all play at being civilised, for the time being at least. No squabbling, no accusing, no fighting in the playground. This contest is too important to all of us to risk being thrown out for bad behaviour.”
“You’d know all about bad behaviour,” I said, and there was something in my voice that made him flinch and actually fall back a step. “You betrayed my trust. Stole a torc. Spat in the face of my family. There will be a reckoning, Blue. But . . . not yet. There will be time for many things, once I’ve kicked your nasty arse right out of the game.”
He tried to smile haughtily, but his heart wasn’t in it. I looked him over. The Blue Fairy looked a lot better than the last few times I’d seen him. He looked healthier, even younger, and while he still looked every one of his years, he carried them more easily. He’d lost some weight, his back was straight, and there was a new confidence about him. He was dressed in the height of Elizabethan fashion, all tights and padded jerkin and silk ruff. The ruff had been pulled low, to show off the stolen torc around his throat. The new style presumably came from his time at the Fae Court. The elves still affected the fashions of old England from when they’d last walked our earth. Partly because they’re stubborn, partly because they like to pretend humanity hadn’t changed since those days. Made it easier for them to look down on us. The Blue Fairy also wore a ceremonial breastplate of silver and brass, chased and pointed and curlicued to within an inch of its life and no doubt crawling with defensive magics and protections. I had to smile. Blue might think he was protected, but his armour was no match for mine.
Still, he looked . . . proud, arrogant, aristocratic. Very . . . elven.
“Being a thief and a traitor seems to agree with you,” I said finally. “You’re looking well, Blue. I’m pleased. Really. After all, where’s the fun in kicking the crap out of a sick old man?”
“How unkind,” said the Blue Fairy, fixing me with his best supercilious stare. “And I’m not a man; not anymore. I have put aside my humanity and embraced my elven heritage. It’s taken me many years to realise, but I was never cut out to be a man. To be just a man. I feel much more . . . me, as an elf.”
“We took you in,” I said. “Made you our guest in the Hall. Gave you a place among us, gave you a home and a purpose, respect and friends. And right in the middle of our war against the Hungry Gods, with the fate of the whole world in the balance . . . you stole a torc from us and ran away.”
“If you’re going to be an elf,” the Blue Fairy said easily, “go all the way. Or what’s the point?” He raised his left hand and ran the fingertips caressingly along the golden torc around his throat. “You should have told me, Eddie. You should have told me how the torc can make you feel . . . I never felt so alive. Like there’s nothing I can’t do.”
“You always were a sucker for a new drug, a new addiction,” I said. “Enjoy it while you can, Blue. I’ll take it back when I’m ready.” I considered him thoughtfully for a long moment, and he stirred uncomfortably under my gaze. I smiled. “What secrets did Alexander King offer you to sucker you into his game? Something you could use to protect you from the fury of the Droods?”
“I’m not alone anymore,” the Blue Fairy said defiantly. “I don’t need protecting. I have allies, support, and backing you wouldn’t believe.”
“Oh, please,” I said. “You really think the Fae Court will stand up for a taboo half-breed like you if the Drood family says,
It’s him, or you
?”
Give him credit, he actually managed a smile. “I’m not here to represent the Fae Court,” he said. “My allies are older and more powerful. I do not bend the knee to Titania and Oberon. I serve Queen Mab.”
I shuddered then, and it had nothing to do with the chill wind sweeping across the abandoned helicopter pad. Mab was an old name, and not a good one. If the long-exiled original Queen of Faerie was back, there would be fire and blood, death and destruction, and perhaps more than one world would be thrown down into horror and despair . . .
“You poor damned fool,” I said to the Blue Fairy, meaning it. “You never could resist backing an outsider, could you?”
He sneered at me, his face cold and inhuman. “Be afraid, Drood. Be very afraid. Now that Queen Mab has taken back the Ivory Throne from Titania and Oberon, she will lead the elves to a new destiny. We’re coming home, Eddie. All of us, all the elves that ever were, returning in power and glory to save the world from the savages who’ve ruined and spoiled it. We will trample humanity underfoot and stamp them back into the dirt they crawled out of.” He smiled suddenly, and it was not a human smile. “And just maybe, when we come, we’ll all be wearing torcs.”
This time, there was something in his voice that stopped me cold. But never let them know they’ve got you on the ropes. So I just stared calmly back at him and changed the subject.
“This is supposed to be a contest to find the greatest spy in the world,” I said. “Featuring the six greatest field agents operating today. So—and don’t take this the wrong way, Blue—what the hell are you doing here?”
“The young always forget that the old were young once,” said the Blue Fairy. “You only ever knew me as a broken old man, brought low by his own weaknesses, so you just assumed I’d always been like that. But back when I was your age, Eddie, I was a name to be reckoned with. I worked for anyone, for any cause, took on all the major players of the day with just my wits and a few craftily purloined weapons, and made them all cry like babies.”
“So what happened?” I said.
“What always happens. I got old, and I got slow,” said the Blue Fairy. His voice was dispassionate; he might have been talking about someone else. “I lost more cases than I won. I started leaning on the booze and the drugs to keep me sharp, to make me feel like I used to feel . . . It’s easy to fall off the edge, you know. All it takes is one really bad day and a disaster so bad you can’t lie to yourself anymore.” He looked at me almost pityingly. “I was just like you, Eddie. At the top of my game, convinced I had the world by the throat. It’s a long way to fall, and you wouldn’t believe how much it hurts when you hit the bottom. That’s your future, Eddie. That’s what you’ve got to look forward to.” He smiled suddenly. “But I have been given a second chance. The torc has made me young and sharp and alive again. I’m the player I used to be, the greatest field agent of my time.
“And what use is your youthful confidence in the face of all my years of experience? I’m back, Eddie, and I’m going to run circles around all of you.”
“That’s the torc speaking,” I said. But I wasn’t entirely sure.
We both looked around sharply as one of the other figures came striding across the landing pad to join us. She stopped a cautious distance away, looked us both over, and smiled widely.
“Hi,” she said. “I’m Honey Lake. CIA. Don’t everyone cheer at once.”
She had presence, give her that. Honey Lake was tall, Amazonian, with a splendid figure, dark coffee skin, and closely cropped hair. She wore a tight-fitting pure white jumpsuit under a long white fur coat and thigh-high white leather boots. I was sensing a theme. She had strong pleasant features, with high cheekbones, a broad grin, and merry eyes. Her sheer physical presence was almost overwhelming, like being caught in the headlights of an oncoming car. I’d have been impressed, if I believed in being impressed, which mostly I don’t. The best agents go unnoticed, walking unseen through the world; standing out in a crowd just makes you a better target. I let my gaze drift over her, making it clear I wasn’t dazzled, and just happened to notice that she had enough heavy gold rings on the fingers of her left hand to double as a knuckle-duster. She also wore a silver charm hanging on a chain around her neck, bearing the sign of the Eye of the Pyramid. As I looked at the charm, the Eye winked at me.
Honey Lake was studying me just as openly, grinning like a child who’s just been given a new toy to play with.
“Wow,” she said. “A Drood! Colour me impressed . . . so that’s what a torc looks like. I’d always thought it would be more . . . impressive. Still, an actual Drood! Not often we get to meet one of you face-to-face.”
“We prefer to keep to the background,” I said. I stepped forward and offered her my hand, and she shook it briefly with a firm grasp. Up close, she smelled of musk and perfume and gunpowder. Not an unpleasant combination.
The Blue Fairy cleared his throat meaningfully. “Hi. I’m—”
“Oh, I know who you are,” said Honey, not taking her eyes off me.
“I’m Eddie Drood,” I said. I was starting to feel just a bit uncomfortable. Honey was doing everything but hit me over the head with her sexuality. Which was probably the point; it’s an old trick, to keep a man off balance. “So,” I said as casually as I could manage, “you’re CIA? Might have known the Company would insist on a presence here.”
“Oh, I was chosen,” said Honey. “Personally selected by the Independent Agent himself. And I’m only sort of CIA.”
I had to raise an eyebrow at that. “Only sort of?”
“You know how it is, Eddie. We’re like an onion; no matter how many layers you peel away, there’s always one more underneath. I work for one of those departments within departments that don’t officially exist. Our remit is to protect the United States from all threats of an . . . unusual nature. By all means necessary.”
“Does that include the Droods?” I said.
“Of course! We don’t trust anyone who isn’t one hundred percent American. Hell, we don’t even trust most of the people who work for the CIA. On really bad days, I don’t trust anyone but myself.” She smiled brightly. “I love the smell of paranoia in the morning. It’s so . . . bracing.” She turned abruptly to look at the Blue Fairy, who was standing stiffly to one side like the guest at a party no one wants to talk to. “I didn’t know the Droods had a half-breed elf lurking in their woodpile.”
“We don’t,” I said. “He stole his torc.”
Honey Lake raised an elegant eyebrow. “And you let him live?”
“It’s . . . complicated,” I said.
“Oh,” she said. “It’s like that, is it?”
“You tell me,” I said. “You’re CIA. You know everything.”
She laughed. “If we did, we wouldn’t need field agents. It really is fascinating to meet you, Eddie. In the flesh, so to speak. Normally we only get to see Droods in action, from a distance, wrapped up in your amazing armour. And then only if we’re very lucky. You’re the urban legends of the espionage field. Often talked about, rarely glimpsed, never sticking around to accept praise or answer questions.
Who was that masked man?
we cry, and never a response. The CIA has massive files on you Droods, but we don’t trust anything that’s in them. You wouldn’t believe some of the stories we hear about you.”
“Believe them all,” I said solemnly. “Especially the really weird ones.”
“I met the Gray Fox once,” said Honey. “In a bombed-out bar in Beirut. Such a gentleman. Stole the courier I was escorting right out from under my nose.”