Property of a Lady Faire

Book 8: Secret Histories

by Simon R. Green

Genres: Urban Fantasy; Occult & Supernatural; Family Life

Synopsis

New York Times bestselling author Simon R. Green has another Secret History to reveal...

Call me Drood, Eddie Drood. Some know me as Shaman Bond and most simply don’t want to know me at all. For centuries, my family has been keeping the things that lurk on the darker side of existence as far away as possible from humans like you, without you even knowing we’re there.

Unfortunately for us, not everybody appreciates what we Droods do. Recently, I personally managed to survive yet another attempt on my life, but the rest of my relatives weren’t so lucky. My parents are missing in action. My grandfather has been murdered. And the future of my family lies in the iron grasp of the Lady Faire, an incredibly seductive, mysterious, and powerful being.

She possesses an ancient object that can save them. I have to steal it from her. Easy enough to say, difficult—and very, very dangerous—to do...

Release date: June 3, 2014

Publisher: Ace

Print pages: 352

Sample

ALSO BY SIMON R. GREEN

ACE BOOKS

ROC

CHAPTER ONE

I was just breaking out of a Top Security section of the Vatican, after an entirely successful burglary, when a voice spoke my name. I had been padding very quietly down a corridor that wasn’t on any plan, in a building that didn’t officially exist, and the last thing I expected was to hear my name spoken aloud by a voice I was almost sure I recognised. I stopped and looked quickly about me. I was half-way down a long, unlit hallway, heavy with shadows, with not a light on anywhere in the dozen or so adjoining offices. I was completely alone.

I knew that, because I’d gone to great pains and trouble to make sure of it. Because if the Vatican Security Forces ever found a Drood field agent operating anywhere inside the bounds of the holy city, they would quite definitely never forgive me. The Church might have made occasional use of the Droods down the centuries but has never trusted my family an inch. And I think it is only fair to say, vice versa.

The corridor was so dark I could only just make out its far end, but I was positive there wasn’t another soul anywhere near me. The deep shadows lay undisturbed, and it was so quiet all I could hear was my own slow, controlled breathing. And then the Merlin Glass shot up out of my pocket to hang on the air right in front of my face. I didn’t quite jump out of my skin, and I didn’t actually make the strangulated scream I very much wanted to, but I did regard the hand mirror hovering before me with more than usual interest. Because if your very secret mission has just been utterly compromised and is now lying tits up in the gutter, you might as well enjoy it.

The sorcerer Merlin Satanspawn—and yes, I do mean the one you’re thinking of—had made a present of the Glass to my family some fifteen hundred years ago. We’re still trying to decide whether that was a kindly act or not. Ever since the Merlin Glass fell into my hands, not that long ago, it has proved itself to be highly useful, intensely irritating, and constantly surprising. Not least because I can never lay my hand on the operating manual when I need it.

The Glass looks like a perfectly ordinary hand mirror, with a chased silver handle and back. It can show me views of anywhere on Earth, and grow into a dimensional Doorway big enough to take me there. I’d grown used to that. But I wasn’t at all used to seeing my reflection vanish from the mirror and be replaced by the shifty features of the notorious Harry Fabulous.

I grabbed the mirror by its handle and pulled it close to my face. A pale yellow light was spilling out of the Glass from wherever Harry was, and I didn’t want it to attract unnecessary attention. I was almost out of this very secret part of the Vatican, but almost isn’t is. Burglars should not hang around at the scenes of their crimes, not if they want to grow up to be very old burglars—particularly if the local security forces are authorised to use extreme and distressing levels of violence. But Harry Fabulous had got my attention. No one had ever used the mysterious Merlin Glass as a mobile phone before. I hadn’t even known that was possible.

I tried the door handle on the nearest office, and it turned easily in my grasp. I pushed the door open and slipped silently into the darkened room, pulling the door almost but not completely shut after me. Just in case I needed to make a sudden and hurried exit. The pale yellow light from the hand mirror showed me the rough outlines of furniture and filing cabinets, and not much else. I looked into the Merlin Glass and gave Harry Fabulous my best intimidating glare.

“This had better be important, Harry,” I said quietly. “I am rather busy just at the moment. How did you get this number, anyway?”

“Trust me; this is really very important, Eddie,” said Harry, smiling nervously. “And I mean seriously important, with a heaping side order of urgent. As to how I was able to tap into the Merlin Glass, you really don’t want to know. It would only keep you up nights.”

There was no point in pressing Harry. If he wasn’t prepared to give up his source, it was only because he was more scared of whomever he was working for than he was of me. Mind you, Harry Fabulous was scared of a great many people and things, usually with good reason. Harry is a creature of the shadows, or at least those very grey areas where Law and Morality and Good Sense are only passing things. Harry is a master of the illegal deal, the crafty con, and the kind of borderline business agreement you just know you’ll end up regretting later. Harry Fabulous is your go-to guy for all the things you’re not supposed to want, all the things that are supposed to be impossible to get. Whether it’s a drug or a dream, a girl or a grimoire, a memory from yesterday or a promise of tomorrow, Harry has sources. He can get you anything, for the right price.

He’s not much to look at, but then his kind never is. In his business, it’s never a good idea to stand out from the crowd. A shabby man in shabby clothes, with a hard-worn face and unreadable eyes, Harry always said he could run a game on God, and be well out of town before the penny dropped. But then something went horribly wrong for Harry Fabulous, in a secret back room in one of those very private Members Only clubs well off the main drag in the Nightside . . . And now Harry leads a desperate life of penance and atonement, to make up for . . . whatever it was he did. Doing good deeds, for the good of his soul. Before it’s too late. He hustles around, happy to be helpful to all the right people, mediating between people and groups who couldn’t otherwise talk to one another.

Harry Fabulous wouldn’t normally say boo to a Drood, so for him to contact me at all was . . . interesting.

“What do you want, Harry?” I said. “And can’t it wait till I’ve broken out of the Vatican?”

“Not really, no,” said Harry. “I have a client in desperate need of your help. As in right now!”

“Keep your voice down!” I said, glancing quickly out through the crack at the door. The corridor still looked empty, but I wasn’t as convinced of that as I had been. I couldn’t shake off the feeling that something was creeping up on me. And not in a good way.

“What are you doing in the Vatican, Eddie?” said Harry.

“I could tell you,” I said, “but then I’d have to exorcise you.”

“Come on, Eddie, you know me,” said Harry. “I am the soul of discretion. Mostly.”

“I do know you, Harry Fabulous,” I said, “and I would not trust you as far as I could throw a wet camel.”

“Lot of people say that,” Harry said sadly.

“Can we please get on with this? I am rather in the middle of something here . . .”

“Doing what?”

“Something I am entirely sure both my family and all the Powers That Be at the Vatican would not want you to know about.”

“Fair enough,” said Harry. “I currently represent the management of the Wulfshead Club. And no, I don’t have a clue who they are, just like everyone else, so there’s no point in asking me.”

“Then how do you know it’s really them?” I said craftily.

“They were very convincing,” said Harry. “I still get the shakes when I think about it.”

“All right,” I said. “I’ll come straight to the Wulfshead, as soon as I’m outside the Vatican buildings.”

“No!” Harry said quickly. “You can’t! The club’s new privacy shields don’t allow anyone to teleport in. Even the mighty Merlin Glass would bump its nose. I’ll meet you in the alley outside the main London entrance. As soon as you can, Eddie. Please.”

“Give me ten minutes,” I said. “Unless I run into Security . . . then make it fifteen minutes.”

Harry’s face disappeared from the Merlin Glass, replaced by my own reflection. Even in the dim light of the empty office, I thought I looked tired and hard done by. As one of the most secret of the hidden world’s secret agents, I go to a lot of trouble to appear ordinary and anonymous, but people like Harry Fabulous put years on me. I would have preferred for him to hang around just a little longer, to answer a few pointed questions about exactly why I was needed so urgently, but that was probably why he’d disappeared so quickly. I slipped the Merlin Glass back into my pocket and stood still for a moment, thinking.

I knew all about the Wulfshead Club. Everyone in my line of work does. A very private drinking establishment, for very private people. A covert bolt-hole, for those of us who operate in the hidden world. The Good, the Bad, and the In-between are always welcome, as long as they’ve got money to spend. More importantly, it’s neutral ground for those of us who feel the need for somewhere safe and secure to let our hair down. Many of us who work in the supernatural Intelligence community tend to end up there. If only because we all need someone we can talk to, about the things we’ve seen and the things we’ve done, who won’t judge us. The kinds of things only people like us ever get to know about.

The world doesn’t need to know. It would only worry.

There are a great many secret entrances to the Wulfshead Club, in any number of cities, scattered around the world. Though getting in, or out, can be murder. The club’s been around for as long as anyone can remember, in one form or another, but no one knows for sure who owns and runs it. Despite a clientele who make their business digging out answers, the Wulfshead’s management remains determinedly anonymous. And they have never, ever, asked a member of my family for help before. I had to smile. This was just too good to turn down.

My head came up sharply as I heard soft running footsteps outside the office, approaching rapidly from the far end of the corridor. Not good. Not in any way good. I couldn’t use the Merlin Glass to teleport out until I was completely outside the building and back in the official world.

I pulled the door open and slipped back out into the corridor, not making a sound. When you’re a field agent for the Droods, moving unseen and unobserved comes as standard. I glared into the gloom at the far end of the corridor, back the way I’d come, and could just make out a number of dark, indistinct figures heading my way at more than human speed. Charging down the corridor, they shifted their shapes subtly as they moved. I couldn’t hear any bells or sirens; the advancing shapes were doing nothing to raise the alarm. Presumably they intended to bring me down before anyone else found out I was ever there. I had to smile. Being chased by a small army of angry priests and warrior nuns was probably every good Catholic boy’s worst nightmare. Good thing I was raised Church of England.

I ran down the corridor at full pelt, not even trying to be quiet or unobserved any more. My feet hammered on the floor, and my arms pumped at my sides as I made good speed, leaving my pursuers behind. I was still hoping to make my escape without having to fight my way out. I didn’t want to make more of a fuss than was necessary. Scrapping with priests and nuns inside the Vatican, even the parts that don’t officially exist, is never going to be profitable. And I really didn’t want the Vatican Security Forces to even suspect they’d had a Drood in the house. Which was why I hadn’t raised my incredible Drood armour. Just the presence of so much golden strange matter in the holy city would set off every alarm they had and bring everyone running at once.

I risked a glance back over my shoulder. My pursuers were catching up fast, moving so quietly now that their feet didn’t even seem to be brushing the bare wooden floor. I could see robes and wimples, but no faces. Even as I looked, though, the dark shapes changed, flowing like water. Legs and arms lengthened, backs became hunched, and great black membranous wings stretched out, their tips brushing against the corridor walls, beating loudly on the still air. The whole atmosphere in the corridor changed, becoming horrid and oppressive. There was a sudden stench of blood and brimstone. It seemed the rumours were true, after all. The Vatican had contracted out for its most secret security forces, drawing on denizens from the Lower Reaches. The remote activating of the Merlin Glass must have alerted them to my presence.

I was in real trouble now.

I pounded down the corridor, forcing the last bit of speed out of my aching muscles. It had been a long night, and I’m not really built for running. I could hear my breathing coming fast and hard, and my heart was hammering in my chest. I finally reached the door at the far end, skidded to a halt, and rattled the handle. It was locked. Of course it was; it was that kind of night. I grabbed a handy piece of heavy marble statuary from its niche (almost certainly centuries old, and valuable beyond price) and used it to smash the lock. The statue came to pieces in my hand, but the door jumped open. I threw the pieces aside and charged through the opening. I didn’t dare look back. I could hear the flapping of huge wings right behind me, like wet blankets on the air.

Outside, an old-fashioned black iron fire escape clung precariously to the ancient stone wall. I hurried up the steps, heading for the roof. Having to pass through the door one at a time should slow my pursuers down nicely, especially if they stopped to argue over who had precedence. I hauled myself up the shaking metal rungs, making a hell of a racket, grabbing at the railings with both hands to hurry myself along. I made it onto the slanting tile roof and then stopped to get my breath and my bearings.

I could hear heavy things hammering up the fire escape, their combined weight almost pulling the metal stairs away from the side of the building. I didn’t look. I didn’t want to see, didn’t want to know. I could hear angry buzzing voices, only just trying to be human, saying bad things. I went to stand on the very edge of the roof, planting one foot on the iron guttering, and looked out over the view below.

It was a hell of a long drop down to the ground below. Hundreds of feet, at least. But I could see the whole of the holy city stretched out before me, the great white buildings glowing and gleaming in the fierce moonlight. You get to see some of the best views in the world in my job. Though mostly not for very long.

I took out the Merlin Glass, shook it till it was the size of a Door, and then gave it the correct Space Time coordinates and threw it off the edge of the roof. The Glass fell away into the moonlight, an open Door full of the bright lights of London. I took a deep breath and jumped off the roof after it.

I heard a roar of frustrated buzzing voices rush by behind me, but I didn’t look back at the fire escape. Some things you just don’t want to see. I went hurtling down, gathering speed all the time, the ground rushing up to greet me. Cool evening air battered at my face and tugged at my clothes. The fall would be more than enough to kill any ordinary man. Good thing I was a Drood. I subvocalised the activating Words, and the golden armour contained in the torc at my throat rushed out to cover me from head to toe in a moment.

I could hear flapping heavy wings behind me, as dark things launched themselves in pursuit, but I was concentrating on the open Door falling away before me. The added weight of my armour sent me hurtling down faster than ever, and it was the easiest thing in the world to catch up with the falling Merlin Glass and plunge right through it, without even brushing against the sides. The Door slammed shut the moment I was through, cutting off the last angry screams from my pursuers.

•   •   •

And I crashed back to earth in a dark and deserted back alley in London’s old Soho. I hit the ground at appalling speed, but my armoured legs absorbed most of the impact. I stayed where I was for a moment, crouched on one knee in the crater I’d blasted out of the alley floor, getting my breathing back under control. It never ceases to amaze me, all the things I can do in my armour. I muttered the Words, and the golden strange matter flowed back into my torc. I straightened, adjusted my clothing, and grabbed the hand mirror–sized Merlin Glass out of mid-air, where it had been hovering above me. I slipped it carefully back into its hidden pocket, and only then looked around me.

After the bright moonlight of the Vatican, it felt something of a step down to be standing in the grimy amber light of a London street lamp, interrupted now and then by the flickering glare of malfunctioning neon signs. I was back in Soho, all right. For someone whose job description genuinely is globe-trotting secret agent, it’s astonishing how often I end up hanging around in grimy back alleys in the seedier parts of civilisation.

The never-ending roar of London’s traffic blasted by at the far end of the alleyway. All rushing shapes and blaring horns. The alley itself was dark and foul and smelled of appalling things. Quite definitely including fresh urine. Assorted garbage lay in scattered heaps, troubled only by rats with really strong stomachs. The stained brick walls were covered with the usual overlapping graffiti: Dagon Has Risen! Cthulhu Has Bad Dreams. And, more worryingly, Eye Can See You. And there, standing right at the end of the alley, sticking to the shadows because that was where he felt most at home: Harry Fabulous. He stepped forward, just a little, and nodded jerkily, doing his best to look like he was pleased to see me.

“Nice of you to drop in, Eddie. You Droods do love to make an entrance.”

“Stick to what you’re good at; that’s what I always say. Why am I here, Harry?”

“Good of you to get here so quickly,” he said, avoiding the question. “Here, let me show you into the Wulfshead.”

He moved quickly over to the left-hand wall, being very careful where he put his feet, and muttered certain secret Words. A massive silver door appeared in the brick wall, as though the silver had shouldered the brickwork aside for being less important, or less real. The door was big enough to drive an elephant through, and it shone with its own dull light, painting the wall opposite with a shifting, uncertain glow. The solid silver door was deeply carved and etched with a great many threats and warnings, in angelic and demonic script. The Wulfshead Club doesn’t discriminate. There was no bell, no knocker, not even a handle. It isn’t meant to be easy to get in. Harry placed the palm of his left hand flat against the silver, and after a moment that stretched on just a bit longer than was comfortable, the door swung slowly back before him. He snatched his hand back and smiled weakly at me. There were beads of sweat on his face. I wasn’t surprised. If your name isn’t on the approved guest list, the door will bite your hand right off.

Bright, cheerful light spilled out through the door and into the alley. Harry hurried in, and I moved quickly to follow him. It only took me a moment to realise I wasn’t in the Wulfshead. Instead, the door had let us into a small business office. All very basic—just a table and two chairs. No windows, no decorations; a door behind us and another door on the other side of the room. I had a very definite sense of being observed. I turned to look thoughtfully at Harry, and he backed quickly away, holding his hands out before him.

“It’s all right, Eddie! Really! That far door leads into the club proper—I promise you!”

“What are we doing here, Harry?” I said, and he actually flinched away from something in my voice.

“This is one of the private offices used by the club’s management. For when they . . . want to keep an eye on things. It’s just somewhere private, where we can discuss the management’s current . . . problem.”

“And why are you speaking for them, Harry?”

“Because they’re not stupid enough to reveal themselves to a Drood. And because I owe them,” Harry said flatly. His words gave him a certain amount of courage, and he did his best to look at me defiantly. “They didn’t want you in particular, and the Drood family in general, knowing who they are. You’d only take advantage . . . And anyway, if you did know who they were, I’m pretty sure you wouldn’t approve.”

“Wouldn’t surprise me,” I said. “My family doesn’t approve of most people. And nearly always with good reason. So why are the management asking for my help? What could be so bad?”

If anything, Harry seemed even more jumpy now. He looked quickly around him, at the bare walls and the closed doors, and edged a little closer.

“Are you sure you’ve finished your business with the Vatican, Eddie? No loose ends that might turn up to . . . distract you?”

“It’s all done,” I said firmly. “And that is all I am going to say on the matter.”

Harry Fabulous didn’t need to know that I had broken into the Vatican not to steal something but to make them a present. I had taken in with me a single significant volume of forbidden lore, and deposited it in a certain place on a certain shelf, in the Vatican’s Very Secret Library. This particular copy, an almost exact copy of the book already in place there, had been compiled by the Drood Librarian. Just a few small changes, overseen by the family. I replaced one with the other, and took the original out with me. Because there were certain things in the original that we didn’t want the Church to know about. It would only have upset them and kept them up nights. Vatican Security might know someone had been poking around, but they wouldn’t know who, or why. Which added up to a completely successful mission in my book.

Harry still didn’t look at all happy. “I just hope no one saw you arrive out of nowhere.”

“Come on, Harry,” I said. “That was old Soho. One of the few bits they haven’t got around to gentrifying yet. You could set fire to a giant Wicker Man stuffed full of merchant bankers, and no one would give a damn. In fact, they’d probably applaud.”

“I hate to put it this bluntly, but I’m going to because the management insisted,” said Harry. “You can only enter the Wulfshead Club as Shaman Bond. The management can’t allow Eddie Drood to set foot on the premises. Not after what happened the last time he was here. Apparently, it took ages to get all the bloodstains out.”

“Understood,” I said shortly.

The last time I’d had reason to come to the club as a Drood, it had been during the Great Satanic Conspiracy. I’d forced my way in, in my armour, because I didn’t want Shaman Bond associated with what I was about to do. What I had to do. I needed answers to some questions, very urgently, and I didn’t have the time to be patient or reasonable. So I just beat them out of the man. And a few good people who got in the way. I looked thoughtfully at Harry.

“How long has the club’s management known that Shaman Bond is a cover identity for Eddie Drood?”

“I find it best not to ask them questions,” said Harry. “Are you sure you don’t know who they are?”

“I’m sure my family could find out,” I said. “If we ever really wanted to know. But they’re not important enough. For now.”

Harry sighed, and sat down on one of the chairs. He looked tired. I pulled up the other chair, sat down facing him, and then looked at him expectantly.

“There’s trouble at the Wulfshead Club,” said Harry. “We need you—that is, we need Shaman Bond—to ask questions quietly and discreetly, among the club’s clientele. Because secrets are leaking out of the club. Things said in confidence here have started turning up in the outside world. Which is supposed to be impossible. The club management guarantee that whatever happens in the Wulfshead stays in the Wulfshead. You can say anything, do anything, and no one will ever know. That’s why people like you and I come here. But now, secrets are getting out, and often appearing where they can do the most damage to everyone involved.”

“How long has this been going on?” I said. I was honestly shocked. Wulfshead security was supposed to be second to none.

“Almost three weeks now,” said Harry. “The management thought they could handle it themselves at first. But it seems they can’t. So they found me, to find you. They want you to discover exactly how the club’s privacy is being compromised, and why, and who’s behind it. And then they want you to put a stop to it.”

“But why me, of all people?” I said, honestly curious. “I mean, given the mess I made the last time I was here?”

“That was a Drood,” said Harry. “You expect things like that from Droods. The management wants Shaman Bond. Because he is a regular here, and knows everyone. And everyone knows him.”

I frowned. “They think this is an inside job?”

“Has to be,” said Harry. “Someone here is telling tales out of school. We need you to find out who.”

“What do I get out of it?”

“I have been instructed to tell you,” Harry said carefully, “whatever you want. The club’s management agree to owe you a favour. You personally, that is; not your family. There are limits. It will be a personal favour to you, that you can call in at any time.”

“Sounds good to me,” I said cheerfully. “But you do realise I won’t be able to keep this from my family?”

“Understood,” said Harry. “The management merely asks that you be . . . discreet in how much you tell them.”

“Understood,” I said. A thought occurred to me. “If the club’s management is so concerned about what’s going on, why haven’t they called in their own security big guns? The Roaring Boys?”

Harry winced. “Because you don’t use a nuke to crack a walnut. The Roaring Boys . . . do tend to favour a scorched-earth policy. You can do this, Eddie. People will talk to Shaman Bond, where they wouldn’t talk to anyone else. Because they think he’s one of them.”

He got up abruptly, strode over to the opposite door, and pulled it open. Savagely bright lights and disturbingly loud music blasted in from the club beyond. I rose unhurriedly and strolled to the door. Wild drinks and wilder music, just like always. I stepped through the door into the club, then stopped and looked back as I realised Harry Fabulous had stayed in the office.

“You not joining me, Harry?”

“Best not,” he said. “I don’t need the temptation. Can’t afford to risk it these days.”

“What did you do, Harry?” I said.

He smiled briefly. “Let’s just say I met someone who was better at the art of the big con than I was.”

He shut the door firmly in my face, and I moved on, into the Wulfshead Club.

•   •   •

The joint was jumping—loud and colourful and packed with all the usual unusual suspects. People coming and going, along with a few individuals who weren’t in any way people, talking in small groups or muttering in corners or crowding together at the long bar. Winding down after a long day, or night; or gathering the courage of their convictions before they went out to do appalling things in the world. Some were plotting cons, or jobs, or glorious insurrection; others were just letting their hair down in convivial company. Lots of loud, blaring music. Apparently tonight was Let’s Celebrate Sixties Film Music Night. I recognised the theme from the original version of The Italian Job: “We Are the Self-Preservation Society.” A lot of people were singing along.

I strolled easily through the packed crowd, smiling and nodding, and being smiled at and nodded to. Shaman Bond has a carefully cultivated reputation for being part of the Scene: a well-known face, always around, always just turning