Tears of the Furies (A Novel of the Menagerie) (3 page)

The only reason that Yannis had even a moment to notice any
of these things was that at first his eyes could not make sense of the things
that he saw in that room. His mind simply did not comprehend. Two of the
tables, it appeared, had been given over to some strange artistic impulse. Seated
in chairs were a trio of granite statues, intricately carved, startlingly
realistic. There were cracks in the stone. One had a finger broken off and it
lay on the floor. Another had a real coffee cup raised to its lips.

Yannis frowned, shaking his head, confused by this oddity. What
sort of attraction did the owners of this place think this would have for their
guests.

It was a matter of a second or two, only, while these
thoughts capered in his brain. Then he frowned, deeply.

Where’s the body? Where is the murder that brought me
here?

Next to the sideboard was another statue, this one of a
young girl, perhaps ten or eleven. It had broken into half a dozen pieces, but
mentally he rebuilt it, picturing what it would have looked like before it had
broken, standing up.

It would have appeared to be reaching for something with its
right hand. In its left it clutched an orange.

A fresh orange.

Understanding dawned on him. These
were
his bodies. The
murders. Niko Keramikous must have seen it in his eyes, for the younger
detective nodded in confirmation, unable to speak the words, his revulsion plain
on his face.

Yannis’s stomach churned. He thought he’d seen everything.

"Niko. Go and get the owner. I want to speak with him."

Keramikous sped from the room and closed the door behind
him. Yannis cursed under his breath, the filthiest words he could dredge from
his mind. He turned his back on the murdered family, on their stone faces, and
reached into his pocket. The sweat on his back and under his arms was worse
now, in spite of the breeze from the courtyard.

He withdrew his cellular phone and glanced around the room. There
was too much sunlight in here. In a corner there was another door, and he
opened it to find a closet used to store extra chairs. There were shelves of
plates and glasses and silverware, but there was just enough room for him to
step inside. He closed the door behind him, cloaking himself in near total
darkness . . . in shadows. And he dialed a number.

Yannis Papathansiou had been on the job a long time and had
seen much of what lay within and beyond the surface of this ancient city. The
Athens police wouldn’t have the first clue how to deal with something like
this. But he knew someone who would.

Every shadow was a doorway. Not just anyone could walk
through one, of course. To most people — humans in particular — shadows
were simple things, patches of darkness created when an obstacle came between
the available light and any surface upon which it might shine. A woman walking
her dog in the park on a sunny day would cast a shadow upon the ground. So
would her dog. A jacket hung on the end of a child’s bed might block enough of
the illumination from her nightlight to throw a strange shadow upon the wall or
ceiling. Yes, there were shadows everywhere. Beneath every bed and in every
closet. On the far side of every tree. Under benches and buses and just around
the corner of every building.

And every one . . . every single one . . . a doorway.

Beyond those doorways there existed an entire world, a
gray-black warren of pathways and tunnels, an interconnected maze that seemed
infinite and yet turned in upon itself again and again. There were vast empty
spaces in the midst of that shadow world, dark and barren places. The footing
was uncertain, and the darkness seemed to breathe and to be very aware of those
who walked within it. No one stayed in the shadows for very long.

Humans gazed at the shadows and shivered. They perceived the
splashes of darkness with trepidation, their unconsciousness, the ancient,
shared memory of their species reminding them that anything might emerge from
the darkness, which was a place of the unknown, a dangerous place from which,
once upon a time, many things might have escaped. Most of them were extinct,
now. There might be a Norse
svartalf
or two still roaming the darkness,
and if any of the tengu awoke, it was possible they would seek refuge there. But
for the most part, the shadows were the domain of hobgoblins now.

And there weren’t that many of
them
left, either.

All of which suited Squire just fine. He liked a party as
much as the next ‘goblin, but when he was working, he liked it quiet. Plenty of
space to move around in, nothing to disturb him, and time to think.

Hobgoblins had an innate ability to navigate the darkness. He
could dive into a pool of shadows in England as though it were water, and
emerge from beneath a baby carriage in Los Angeles moments later. Many of the
ancient races of the world had died out or were in danger of doing so. His own
kind was not thriving, but they survived. To Squire’s mind, this was because
they were simply better at running away from trouble than any other creatures
in existence.

Squire didn’t like to run away. Not normally, in any case. He
was more a lover than a fighter, but that didn’t make him a coward. Fortunately,
he spent most of his time around beings who were fighters. So aside from the
occasional, unavoidable scrap, he could concentrate on the lovin’.

Well, that and the weapons.

One of the things about hanging around with fighters, and
being employed by one, was that they needed weapons. Mr. Doyle had an
unparalleled collection of weapons from every culture in the world, not to
mention many from realms beyond it, and from every era in history. Some were
museum quality and beautiful, others were ugly and efficient. When the muses
called to him, Squire would forge new weapons of his own design. All of them
needed caring for, and that was one of Squire’s many duties in the household of
Arthur Conan Doyle.

Driver. Valet. Weaponsmith. Armorer. His name was his
occupation. He was Doyle’s squire. And he loved his work.

Now, in his workshop in a lost corner of the shadow world,
with the darkness pulsing around him, shifting and breathing, the gnarled
little hobgoblin worked at the grindstone, pumping it with a foot pedal. The
blade shrieked against the stone, and fiery sparks sprayed from the metal. The
sound unnerved most people, like nails on a chalkboard, but Squire loved it. It
was music to him.

He bared rows of tiny shark teeth in a satisfied smile as he
held the weapon up, examining it in the illumination cast from the flames of
his forge. The shadows did their best to swallow all light in this place, but
the furnace of his forge was enchanted, and would have burned at the bottom of
the ocean. The weapon was double-bladed . . . little more than a double blade,
really. He had combined the concept of the ancient punching blade, katar, with
the more Medieval double-headed battle-axe. The warrior grasped a handle in the
middle of the two razor-sharp, rounded blades and thus could swing a cutting
edge in any direction. The blades themselves were an iron-and-silver alloy that
would have been impossible, save that his employer was an accomplished
alchemist.

Iron was poison and pain to witches and the Fey. Silver was
death to many of the creatures of the night. A good weapon. Squire was proud of
it.

In the light of the forge’s blaze he could see his
reflection in the blade. His tiny eyes flickered in the firelight. There was a
blemish in the metal, and the leathery brown flesh of his forehead wrinkled in
consternation. He reached out a yellowed, cracked nail to scrape at it, to
investigate, and then he chuckled softly with a rattle in his throat from too
many cigars. It was merely a cut on his face, reflected in the pure mirror of
the blade.

Squire drew his thumb along the edge, barely touching, but
it cut him like a whisper, drawing a thin line of blood from his flesh.

He nodded to himself in satisfaction. A job well done. Now
he only needed to fashion the leather sheath such a weapon would require. It
was not complete without it, for the dual blade was too dangerous to carry
unsheathed.

But the leather would wait.

Squire set the weapon on the wooden worktable where he kept
most of his tools, and stretched. He had been crouched over the forge, and then
the anvil, and at last the grindstone. His back hurt like a son of a bitch, but
it was worth it just looking at the beauty he had made. He sucked his injured
thumb, but there was pleasure in it. To him it was only right that the first
blood the weapon should draw would be his own.

"What am I going to call you?" he said aloud,
brows knitting as he studied the weapon. The perfect symmetry of the twin
blades impressed him. It was a nasty piece of work.

Twins,
he thought.

"Gemini." That was the perfect name. It was a
Gemini blade.

The hobgoblin patted the pockets of his coat and felt the
reassuring bulk of his cigar case. He fished it out, spilling old candy bar
wrappers into the shadows, then removed a cigar and set the case on the table. With
great pleasure he bit the end off of the cigar and clenched it in his teeth,
then went to the forge and leaned in, plunging the tip into the blazing
furnace. The heat from the fire baked the skin of his face, but he was used to
that. Hobgoblins had no particular fear of flames. Of burning to death, yeah. They
weren’t stupid. But not of fire. A little scorching wasn’t going to do much
damage to one of his kind.

With a sigh of pleasure he puffed on the cigar and glanced
around at the shadow chamber. There were no walls, really, and yet the workshop
did exist in a sort of void within the world of darkness. Black mist churned
and pulsed all around, but there were openings in that breathing shadow,
pathways that would take him anywhere he needed to go. Once upon a time, Squire
had been like other hobgoblins . . . daunted by the constant feeling that the
shadows were aware of him, that the darkness sensed his every move and thought.
It still unnerved him at times, but he had come to know this place, and there
was no danger in it. Not for hobgoblins. Not unless other things roamed the
shadows.

When that happened, he closed his workshop up and fled back
to the world of light.

But at times like this, with a job well done and a fresh
cigar in his hand, Squire could relax. He took several more puffs on his cigar
and blew a cloud of noxious smoke into the shadows.

At peace.

A soft, electronic melody broke the silence of the shadows. The
tune was The Beatles’ "Penny Lane." It was Squire’s ringtone.

He reached into another pocket in his coat — it had
more pockets than was possible — and answered. "Squire."

He listened to the voice on the other end, cursing a couple
of times. "Yeah. Yeah, of course. No, that can’t be good. You just sit
tight there, spanky. Someone’ll be in touch."

Mr. Doyle strode along Hanover Street in Boston’s North End,
enjoying the warm summer day. Once upon a time the neighborhood had been
subject to a constant drone of noise from the elevated interstate that ran
through Boston’s heart. But the city had done something extraordinary, burying
the highway underground. It was quiet, now, in the North End. Or as quiet as
the neighborhood would ever be.

The North End was a warren of curving streets, lined with
churches, apartments, bakeries, and restaurants. Early in Boston’s history it
had become the haven of the city’s Italian immigrants, and it still reflected
the best of that cultural influx. The spring and summer seemed a parade of
festivals honoring the Italians’ favorite saints, carnivals of food and music. This
was a corner of the city — of the nation — that still enjoyed
simple pleasures.

The summer breeze swept off the ocean and blew through the
narrow streets, picking up the wonderful aromas from the markets and the pastry
shops. Mr. Doyle could not help himself, and he paused to peruse the small
menus posted in front of several restaurants as he made his way along the
street. Frank Sinatra’s voice whispered through one propped-open door, Andrea
Bocelli through another.

The sidewalks were busy with people out strolling, deciding
on lunch, or making their way to the Old North Church to appreciate the history
of the place. Like so many of Boston’s treasures, the church was tucked away
far from anything else, beyond even the limits of the touristy areas of the
North End. Parts of that neighborhood did not share the appeal of its main
streets. Beyond Prince and Hanover, there were other smaller, narrower roads
where there were no expensive signs, no festival banners, no outdoor music. The
shops on those backstreets catered only to local people. The faces of the
buildings were in desperate need of sandblasting and refurbishing, and the
windows were often cluttered with handmade signs.

Mr. Doyle left the brighter, more colorful heart of the
North End and slipped into a gray side street with the sureness of one who had
walked this way many times. He passed a shoe repair shop, a small butcher’s, a
used appliance store, and an antiquarian bookstore that looked tiny from a peek
through the front window, but was unimaginably enormous within. Impossibly
large, some might have said.

Ah, well. People had so little imagination. And other than
the locals — who had a strong enough sense of community never to remark
on anything odd — the only people who went into the bookstore knew what
they were looking for, and that only a special kind of shop would be able to
acquire it for them.

He inhaled deeply. The salt of the ocean was strong on the
breeze. It had been a beautiful walk down here from Beacon Hill. It was June,
the solstice imminent. The days were long, and the air shimmered with the heat
of the sun. During the workweek there were mostly professionals about, but this
was Saturday, and so he had passed many women in pretty summer dresses. It was
the sort of day that inspired that kind of thing. On his walk back, he thought he
might stop and buy a lemonade from one of the street vendors in front of the
aquarium.