Property of a Lady Faire (A Secret Histories Novel) (17 page)

“How can we not know?” I said. “Given that we keep such a close eye on all the Major Players?”

“I think the family prefers to keep its distance,” said the Armourer. “As long as she stays semi-retired, we don’t care where she is. And she never was as important, or significant, as her legend liked to make out. But it does mean you’ll have to locate the venue for the Ball yourself, Eddie. And you can’t go after her as a Drood. We can’t be seen to be openly connected with her.”

“Even though I’m currently a rogue and a mass murderer?”

“Perhaps especially because of that.”

“All right,” I said. “I can’t involve the Droods in what I’m doing anyway. I’ll just have to do this as Shaman Bond.”

I stopped, and looked at him thoughtfully.

“While I’m here . . . I need to talk to you about the Merlin Glass. It’s started . . . doing things. Acting independently . . .”

“Ah,” said the Armourer, “I was afraid of that.”

“You were? Then why didn’t you warn me!”

“I did,” said the Armourer. “Never trust a gift from Merlin Satanspawn. The clue is in the name, after all . . . I believe there is some kind of living thing, trapped or perhaps lurking, inside the Glass. Sometimes you can just catch a glimpse of it moving, somewhere in the background of your reflection. I wonder whether it might be some last trace of Merlin himself, trying for a comeback . . .

“And of course, what you have now is a combination of the original broken Glass and the duplicate Glass you found in the Other Hall. Merged together in a way I fully admit I don’t understand at all. God alone knows what the Other Merlin might have hidden in his Glass.”

He sighed heavily, seeming suddenly that much older, and tireder.

“This is why I wanted you to give the Merlin Glass back. So I could run some exhaustive tests on it. I don’t think it’s safe to handle any more. If it ever was.”

“You can have it back,” I said. “After I’ve finished this mission.”

And then we both looked round sharply. A lot of people outside the Armoury were heading our way.

“Your assistants must have figured out the dragon was just an illusion,” I said. “I was hoping we’d have more time . . . I’d better get out of here.”

“I can’t help you, Eddie,” said the Armourer, as we both rose to our feet. “Can’t even give you any new toys for your mission.”

“Where did you send the dragon?” I said. “Molly went to join it.”

“Just out into the grounds,” said the Armourer. “Give my best to the Lady Faire when you find her. See if she remembers me. Or James.”

I opened up the Merlin Glass, and was gone.

CHAPTER SIX

False Knight on the Road

I
’d told the Merlin Glass to take me straight to Molly, and I can’t say I was completely surprised when I stepped through the Glass into an area of almost entirely devastated Drood grounds. A great circle of scorched and blackened grass stood before a copse of trees, all of which were on fire. The heat from the flames was enough to stop me in my tracks, while a thick cloud of black smoke boiled up into the sky from what had been a favoured picnicking spot for young Droods. All around the scorched grass, the wide-open lawn was pockmarked with impact craters, heavy-duty bullet holes, and signs of extensive use of high explosives. All the usual local wildlife was conspicuous by its absence. Except for the wild witch herself, Molly Metcalf, standing quietly and demurely to one side. She smiled innocently at me.

“Can’t take you anywhere,” I growled.

“Wasn’t my fault!” she said immediately. “This was all done by the lab assistants doing their level best to take out a dragon that wasn’t really there, with enough firepower to win a war. They can be very enthusiastic, those lab assistants. Especially when they’ve got all kinds of guns and a really big target.”

“Why didn’t you just drop the illusion, once you were safely out of the Armoury?” I said.

She shrugged. “I wanted to buy you some time. And the lab assistants were having so much fun . . .”

I shook my head slowly. “Capability Maggie is not going to be pleased.”

“You made that name up!” said Molly.

“I wish,” I said. “She’s in charge of looking after the Drood grounds. Or at least she was; she’s just been made the new Matriarch of all the Droods.”

“All right,” said Molly. “Now your family has another Matriarch I’m not going to listen to.”

“Could you at least put out the trees?” I said. “As a sign of goodwill, and a personal favour to me?”

“Oh well,” said Molly. “If you’re asking nicely . . .”

She glared at the burning copse, and all the flames snapped off in a moment, revealing the dead, spiky remains of half-consumed trees. The copse now looked, if anything, rather worse. Molly saw the look on my face, and heaved her best martyred sigh. She gestured broadly with one hand, and all the charred bark jumped off the trees, falling to the ground like so much soot, revealing fresh new growth underneath. The elm trees jerked and swayed in an unfelt breeze, twisting and stretching themselves back to full size again. New leaves flourished everywhere.

The huge circle of scorched grass jumped into the air, and by the time it had reseated itself in the earth, everything was a vibrant shade of green again. The blast holes and exploded craters healed in a moment, with nothing left to show they had ever been there. And a whole bunch of new flowers burst up out of the earth, like so many Technicolor exclamation points.

The last few vestiges of black smoke drifted away on the breeze. Birds started singing again.

“You see?” said Molly. “I’m not just here for the bad things in life.”

“Thank you,” I said. “I’m sure that will go a long way towards helping with your current status in my family.”

She looked at me. “My current status? I thought this was all about you?”

“Unfortunately, as it turns out, not,” I said. “They’ve put you back on the supernatural terrorist list.”

Molly smirked, actually flattered. “Been a long time since I thought of myself as that. Happy days . . . All right, what am I supposed to have done now? And it had better be something particularly stylish and impressive, or I’ll walk right back in there and demand to know why they thought it was me. I mean, I have my standards.”

“We’re supposed to have murdered everyone at the Department of Uncanny,” I said. “Including my grandfather, the Regent of Shadows.”

Molly stared at me for a long moment. “Who the hell thinks
that
? I have only ever killed people who needed killing! Everyone knows that.”

“Pretty much everyone in our line of work believes we’re guilty,” I said. “Very definitely including my family. So I think we should get the hell out of Dodge. Right now.”

“Fine by me,” Molly said immediately. “You should never come home, Eddie. This place has always been bad for you. Let’s go back to my forest. No one can track us there, and we can talk freely without fear of anyone listening in.”

I looked back at the Merlin Glass, still floating on the air in full Door mode. The opening was full of quietly buzzing static, as it waited for new instructions. I looked at it for a long moment, before subvocalising the coordinates for Molly’s wild woods. I wasn’t entirely confident about trusting Molly to the Glass, after everything the Armourer had said, but it didn’t seem I had much of a choice. The Glass was the only real option I had for staying ahead of my enemies. My many enemies. I could have asked Molly to teleport us, but I didn’t like to. That kind of spell was a major drain on her magical reserves, and I was pretty sure we were going to need those in the not-too-distant future. So I waited for the woods to appear on the other side of the Glass, and then strode quickly through, with Molly right behind me.

• • •

It was good to be back in the wild woods again. The moment I stood among the huge and ancient trees, I felt half my cares just slip away, like a weight I no longer needed to carry. I stood a little taller, and breathed more easily. Tall and vast and heavy with foliage, the great trees spread away in all directions, as far as the eye could see . . . and farther. The primordial forest, of Olde Englande. From when life was new and free, and we all lived in the woods because there was nowhere else.

The air was heavy with rich and pungent scents, of earth and grass, leaves and flowers and other living things. A low wind gusted through the trees, carrying the songs of all sorts of birds, only some of which I recognised. Creatures large and small moved in the shadows among the trees, going about their business, entirely unconcerned with human visitors but preferring to keep their distance nonetheless. Just as well. They usually made rude remarks when they saw it was me. The forest wildlife was very protective when it came to Molly.

The Merlin Glass quickly shrank back down to hand-mirror size the moment Molly and I had passed through. As though it was limited by the old magics working in the wild woods. Or perhaps it just wanted to be put away and not thought about for a while. Until it was needed again. Looking back, it surprised me how quickly I’d become . . . not dependent upon the Glass, but certainly used to it. I don’t normally like relying on devices, even the Armourer’s ingenious little toys. Better to depend on your wits in the field; they’re less likely to let you down at a critical juncture. But the Glass was just so useful . . . I should have distrusted it long before this. Unless it was somehow influencing me. I tucked the hand mirror away in my pocket. It felt like storing a live grenade . . . that was just waiting for the right moment to go off.

Molly slipped her arm through mine and we strolled along together, through the tall trees. There were no open paths, as such, but Molly always knew which way to go, and the heavy vegetation seemed to just lean back out of the way, to let her pass. The trees’ branches bent ponderously together overhead, forming a thick, dark canopy, through which golden shafts of sunlight dropped down like shimmering spotlights. Birdsong rose up on either side of us, close and sweet and tuneful. A breeze caressed my face, filling my head with restful scents and a pleasant sense of languor. I could feel the day-long tension seeping slowly out of my muscles. It occurred to me then that it was always summer here in the wild woods, no matter what time or season it might be anywhere else in the world. Whenever Molly brought me here, it was always summer.

“One of these days,” I said, as casually as I could, “you’re going to have to trust me enough to tell me exactly where your private forest really is. Or perhaps the more proper question would be
when
it really is.”

“One of these days,” said Molly just as casually, looking straight ahead. “It isn’t that I don’t trust you, sweetie. It’s just that some secrets aren’t mine to share. I don’t own this place; I just get to visit. I’m a guest here, just like you.”

“Then who does own the wild woods?” I said. “Who do you need to ask, for permission to come here?”

“You see?” said Molly, squeezing my arm against her side companionably. “Questions just lead to more questions, with no guarantee of an answer. Or at least, an answer you could live with.”

“We lead such complicated lives,” I said, after a moment.

“You need to tell me what’s been happening,” Molly said sternly. “What did you talk to your uncle Jack about? And how did we end up as fall guys for the Uncanny massacre?”

I brought her up to date, and not surprisingly she jumped on the one thing that really mattered to her.

“So, no one in all your family knows, any more, who gave the Regent his orders to kill my parents? Or even why?”

“Uncle Jack doesn’t believe so,” I said carefully. “I suppose it’s always possible there could be a record somewhere, tucked away in some vault in the family archives, and I promise we will look later, when this current mess is finally over, but I wouldn’t put any money on it. This is all deniable operations stuff, and the people involved would have been bound to cover their tracks. Destroy all the paper trails, and there’s no incriminating evidence . . .”

“I need to know,” said Molly.

“I know,” I said.

I hadn’t told her about the Merlin Glass. Partly because I didn’t want her distracted from our current mission until my parents were safe again. And partly because I was worried that the Glass might be listening. I didn’t want to put Molly in danger from the Glass. Or from whatever might be lurking inside it.

“I have heard of the Lady Faire,” said Molly. “As a name, and a legend. One of those renowned personages always popping up on the edges of things. Up in Really High Society, where the air isn’t just rarefied, it’s designer, and only the very best and the very worst kind of people get to mingle. I haven’t a clue where she is right now. I’ve never mixed in those kinds of circles, even before I met you and got civilised. It’s not like she and I had anything in common, after all. The Lady Faire used seduction and fascination to destroy her enemies and achieve her ends, whereas I always favoured . . .”

“Destruction?” I said.

“You say the nicest things, sweetie. I never met the Lady Faire because I never got invited to those sorts of parties. I’m a simple girl at heart. I couldn’t even tell you what she looks like . . .”

“I should have asked the Armourer for a photo, before I left,” I said. “I don’t know much more than the legend, myself.”

“There might not be any photos,” said Molly. “If she’s as secretive as everyone says.”

“Oh, there’s bound to be one somewhere,” I said. “My family has files on everyone who is anyone.”

“And yet they’re saying they don’t know where she is right now?”

“I think it’s more . . . they don’t want to know.”

“Ah,” Molly said wisely. “There’s a story there. I can smell it.”

“Wouldn’t surprise me,” I said.

I had told her about Uncle James, but neither of us mentioned him. Of such small concessions and agreements are relationships made.

“The Lady Faire does get around,” said Molly. “According to the stories, barroom gossip, and general character assassination I’ve heard . . . she’s set up shop in every major city on the planet at one time or another. Chasing the Intelligence community from one hotspot to another, like the glamorous little parasite she is. And even to a few dark and disturbing neighbourhoods that aren’t on any official map. The Lady Faire goes where the action is. She was the toast of San Francisco society through most of the Seventies, and Queen of the Night in Bangkok in the Nineties. And you don’t even want to know what she got up to in the Nightside, for almost two years.”