Alan sent the Prince a curt message: Meet me. Grabbed a car and took the corners too fast. He arrived at the flat to find Richard already there, looking dishevelled. Alan wouldn’t have been surprised to learn that Richard had been in the midst of an assignation when he’d received Alan’s text – it might, perhaps, have stung on some other day, that Richard would bring someone else to the flat Alan had arranged for them. None of that mattered now.
‘Alan!’
‘Richard.’ The formal name, putting Richard on notice.
‘I’ve had word from the palace doctor. Sissel will be fine, though it will take some time for her recovery, of course.’
‘Fine?’ Alan replied angrily. ‘We’ve terrorized the child. Do you understand what she has just experienced? Her life was in grave danger. Sissel could have easily died in that chaos …’
The Prince frowned. ‘You’re exaggerating – she slept through the whole thing. And the mess that this operation turned into is your fault, not mine!’ Richard’s voice grew louder. ‘You said we could trust these men!’ He took a breath, visibly calming himself. ‘In the end, Alan, the important thing is that you kept Sissel safe.’
Alan sputtered, ‘Me? What do you think I did? How is thinking very fast supposed to compete with guns and teleportation – oh, never mind. That’s not the point.’
The Prince tilted his head, raising a shaggy golden eyebrow. ‘What is your point, then?’
‘I should never have gone along with this absurd plan,’ Alan snapped. ‘And now the country is being ripped apart, jokers assaulted across London! The police adding to the chaos and hatred!’ Exactly what he had hoped to prevent, now created by his own hand. The misery of it made his gut churn; he had to force back the urge to vomit. ‘We have to come forward, admit that we were behind it.’ He was pacing circles in the small room, like a trapped beast in its cage.
‘Are you mad?’ Richard said, his eyes gone wide. ‘What do you think it would do, if a prince of England admitted to kidnapping a royal child? You think you’re seeing chaos now – we’d have civil war, blood running in the streets!’
Outside the flat’s open windows, great swoops of black birds filled the sky. If only Alan could fling himself out of the window and join them, fly far, far away from all of this. ‘I’ll do it myself, then. We can’t let the violence against jokers continue, Richard!’
It had been Alan’s mistake, all of it, and now good men were dead because of his foolishness. He’d let his cock lead him around. That, and some confused notion that Richard would be a better king than Henry – that wasn’t Alan Turing’s job to decide, was it? He should never have allowed Richard to talk him into this. ‘I’ll tell them it was all me. I’ll keep you out of it completely, I swear.’ Sebastian would never understand, but Sebastian would be better off without him.
Richard said, ‘I forbid it.’
Alan’s head snapped up. ‘What?’
Richard stepped closer, took Alan’s chin in his hand. ‘I forbid it. I need you – England needs you. Working in Silver Helix, doing your damned job. With Noel in charge, clearly working for my brother, God knows what’s coming next. You have to keep your head down, your eyes open, work out what they’re planning.’
‘But—’ He’d been so clear, so sure that he finally knew the right thing to do.
‘Alan.’ Richard’s voice had gone low, caressing. ‘You are the only person who can protect England right now. Are you really willing to take your piece off the board?’
Alan’s heart seemed to slow to a crawl. The clock on the mantel ticked, but each beat took an infinity. A million futures spun out in front of him – too many to calculate. The wrong push on the pendulum could shatter the clock, send fragments flying everywhere.
‘Alan? What are you going to do?’
He pulled his chin out of Richard’s hand, stepped back, trying to get enough distance from the Prince that he could think. ‘I don’t know.’
The image was everywhere before the authorities had time to ban it. In the papers. On social media. On TV screens in darkened pubs where normally only sports were shown. It was a single photograph, but there was no hiding it, no hiding it at all. The stolen princess had been found. The girl whose absence had inspired police raids and massive nightlong vigils all across the nation, and in Norway too, lay bleeding on a cot somewhere.
The poor thing looked terrible. And worse. So much worse. The scum who took her – everybody knew it was the jokers, everybody! Except for those who knew it was Prince Richard or the King or the foreigners – well, the monsters, had ripped a jagged cut right across her cheek. In the photo, half the child’s face was literally hanging off.
The time for vigils was over. Only blood would pay for this now.
Tuesday
March 10th
ALAN HAD FIVE SCREENS set up in his library now. Three of them monitored various local news channels, with the fourth bringing in a feed from overseas. Sometimes one could be too close to see the problem clearly; ugliness could grow under one’s very nose. All of those screens showed growing violence against jokers – and again, they cut to anti-joker graffiti, the destruction of property, physical attacks. Blood on the screen. The last screen was feeding him data – a host of financial information. Richard had convinced him to hold off on confessing to the public about Sissel’s kidnapping – but only while Alan gathered more information. He needed data. He couldn’t think clearly without it.
‘More tea, Alan?’ Sebastian hovered in the doorway to the library, a mug at the ready.
Alan barely glanced at him before turning back to the screens. ‘Sebastian, please. I asked you to leave me alone this morning.’
‘Sorry, sorry.’ The door slammed shut behind him, and Alan felt a twinge of regret. Though Alan had pledged to be a better husband, it was hard to keep that in the forefront of his mind when there were such urgent matters afoot. He’d raked up the damned leaf mould, hadn’t he? And he’d stopped having sex with Richard. Not that Sebastian knew that.
What if Adelbert weren’t the true heir? It would mean he’d sent Noel to kill a man for nothing. He’d ordered the kill with the best of intentions, for national defence. Yet guilt stabbed through Alan. Could that have been another terrible mistake? Maybe there was something wrong with him: computers did break down eventually, after all. Maybe Alan Turing had become obsolescent.
Alan had to talk to Noel; he needed absolute proof that Adelbert was Elizabeth’s son. The press would demand proof, and the government would too. Anyone he brought forward would have to be able to withstand a firestorm. Even with his own metal skin, Alan wasn’t sure he’d make it through what was coming unsinged. But he couldn’t worry about that now. Whatever the consequences, he had to make amends for all his past mistakes.
Alan hurried out of the room, headed into the kitchen. The tea was still sitting on the counter, his mug still warm: he gulped it down. The great English restorative, and he needed its power now; Alan couldn’t remember a time when he’d felt more shaken, not even that time he’d been assaulted in the park, beaten bloody by a group of men who thought his activities somehow impugned their manhood. 1958? 1963? He couldn’t remember, and that was almost more frightening than anything else.
Sebastian opened the back door and stepped into the kitchen, letting in a gust of cold air. Forever in that summer house; the man practically lived out there.
‘Ah, Sebastian.’ Alan managed a forced smile. ‘I’m sorry I snapped at you earlier. Is this the new blend? It’s wonderful. I’ll take some in to Richard, shall I?’ Maybe he could start mending things here. Start at home, and the rest would follow.
His husband smiled. ‘Yes, that’d be lovely.’ He reached out to the counter, collected a paper bag and handed it to Alan. ‘Here’s a batch, all made up. I’ve been waiting for the right moment.’
‘I’m sure he’ll appreciate it.’ Alan leaned forward to give Sebastian a quick peck on the cheek, but his husband turned at the last minute so that
lips met lips, and the kiss turned more intense, more passionate, than any they’d shared in quite some time. Ah yes, Alan had been on the right path before, choosing to invest in what he had once held so dear. This much was clear, at least.
He broke off the kiss reluctantly. ‘I’d best be off.’ He hesitated, then said, ‘I know things have been busy, but I’ll be able to fill you in on everything soon. We just need to get past this current crisis.’ His husband would understand, surely.
‘I understand,’ Sebastian said. ‘Goodbye, dear.’ He reached up and fondly touched his fingers to Alan’s cheek, and then went back out through the kitchen door. For a moment, Alan wanted nothing more than to chuck it all in and join Sebastian in the summer house, amid the tropical plants and flowers. Their own little romantic holiday.
He was just tired. No time for that now; when all this was done, he’d take Sebastian on a proper holiday – to Greece perhaps, or maybe even Sri Lanka. They’d always planned to visit there some day.
Right now, Alan had to talk to Noel.
Edwards was new to him. It was just past eight, and they were meeting at MI5’s headquarters. Noel had Singh with him since the Lion knew the woman and could advise him. As they entered she was saying, ‘The Fists are going to respond. They won’t have a choice.’
‘Damn the Met,’ said a man from MI6.
‘Why are you blaming the Met? It’s the blasted jokers who kidnapped the Princess!’ snapped a man from military intelligence.
Noel cleared his throat. ‘Pardon me, but we have information that indicates it was not the knaves.’
‘Then who the hell was it?’ Sarah Edwards demanded.
‘We’re running that down,’ Noel said. Finding a convenient scapegoat. He moved to the coffee pot and poured himself a cup. His phone vibrated and he took a surreptitious look. It was Turing. NEED TO MEET. The all caps indicated Turing’s urgency.
Noel texted back. Damn it Turing. In charge now. Not your dog to fetch and carry. Also busy.
IT’S IMPORTANT, PLEASE.
At the Peacock Statue. Noon.
Noel slipped his phone back into his pocket just as a man with the bearing of a former military officer came up next to him.
‘To be fair to the Met, they claim some of what happened was not due to their actions. Firecrackers and whatnot, and a damned grenade. Bet that was the IRA,’ said the man as he returned to the table.
‘That’s similar to what the Army reported,’ said a man who had the demeanour of a bank clerk.
‘I’m telling you they have a bloody ace,’ gritted a man in uniform with a grotesque scar beneath his nose. ‘We need to go in there and—’
‘We need to do nothing,’ Noel snapped. ‘I’ve had word from the Home Secretary that she has an intermediary between herself and the Fists. There will be no retaliation.’
‘Who is this intermediary?’ Edwards demanded.
Noel gave her a limpid look. ‘I’ll show you mine if you’ll show me yours—’
‘Bloody aces,’ muttered the Scar.
Noel continued. ‘But allow me to assure you she’s someone we can trust. And they will tell me if the situation is about to change.’
The meeting dragged on for another twenty minutes. Noel could sense Singh’s impatience and curiosity as they stepped out of the building. Overhead a flock of crows arrowed into a smaller quarrel of sparrows who blew apart like the fragments of a grenade.
‘So who is this go-between?’ the Lion asked.
‘Constance.’
‘How the hell …? Green Man …? How the hell?’ he repeated.
Noel shrugged. ‘It’s Constance.’
Rain and wind rattled the windows of the warehouse. Joker guards on the roof shivered and dripped, holding onto their hats instead of watching the street. But no attack was coming. Badb knew that much and knew too that the Twisted Fists had far more to fear from the inside: spies and informers; selfishness and ignorance; and above all these others, ambition.
She flicked her attention back inside where Seizer held the floor, daring to wave his fist at the Green Man. In the past, his impertinence might have spread anger. His upper-class vowels would make lips curl and fists clench. But now, at the back of the crowd, a woman wearing an exoskeleton gazed at him adoringly. Others bowed heads and Blue Jeans, a notorious heckler, kept his mouth zipped shut – literally. His metal rivet eyes he cast down in what could only be respect.
Seizer may have been a fool, but his voice was resonant. ‘We must stand up for our people! We must fight for those who cannot!’ Minute by minute, he grew in confidence.
Badb allowed her body to sag against the back wall. She had work to do.
She flicked to a classroom where Loyalist fugitives from Belfast unpacked a crate of guns for their amateur but enthusiastic brethren in Britain First. ‘See here, lads.’ A balaclava muffled the speaker’s voice. ‘These here will clear them jokers right out of the city. They declared war on our king when they took his granddaughter from us.’
‘How’d we know it was the freaks?’ asked one of the more thoughtful thugs.
‘Oh.’ Blue eyes glinted through holes in the wool. ‘I have evidence to show yez.’ And he had too. Badb herself had commissioned it. Hackers working out of Macedonia were flooding the internet with videos of twisted creatures manhandling the figure of a young girl. It didn’t matter that her hair was the wrong colour; that she was too tall. People would believe anything about jokers, so long as it was bad.
Out on the rainy streets, two men pissing in an alleyway shared their disgust in the hearing of a crow. ‘An ordinary bloke spends his life pretendin’ not to be disgusted. He even works next to the monstrous fuckers and then, they go doin’ a thing like this? To our princess? Throwin’ all our tolerance back in our face.’
‘Send ’em to the moon,’ said his companion, shaking himself off. ‘Where we don’t have to look at ’em.’
Noon. Which gave Alan three hours to kill, and he had spent them walking. The Buckingham Palace gardens were perfect for walking, even in the steady rain that had begun to fall mid-morning. The rain was, in fact, perfectly suited to his mood, as Alan strode down the long pathways, not quite breaking into a run. It wouldn’t be dignified or prudent for a member of the Silver Helix to run in the palace grounds, people would get worried. Not that there wasn’t plenty to be worried about. Still, he kept his pace to a very brisk walk, and managed to cover quite a bit of the grounds with that. If he walked fast enough, Alan Turing could almost not think about just how angry he was at Richard.
Richard had put him in this position, had played upon his loyalty, his devotion to king and country. Alan had made his own decisions in the end: he was a grown man, and a hundred and eight years old was certainly grown. But if Richard cared for him at all, he would never have asked Alan to chart such a questionable course. And if Richard could treat his nearest and dearest with such callous disregard, how could Alan trust him with an entire country? A country that Alan had fought for, had bled for, had almost died for, over and over again.
For eighty long years Alan Turing had been England’s champion – at least, that was how he had always thought of himself. A quiet champion, misunderstood and disregarded, but still steadfast, honourable. When had Alan started to compromise his own honour? When he sent a sixteen-year-old to commit assassination? There were younger soldiers in the war, of course, but there was a difference between a soldier on the battlefield and a knife in the night.
Alan could ask Noel where he’d gone wrong. Maybe Noel would know. Noel would certainly have an opinion.
His swift pacing eventually brought him to the part of the garden he’d probably been subconsciously avoiding: the grounds that fell beneath Margaret’s window. Sebastian had been so hurt that Alan had never come to visit them. His husband’s work, his art. He turned the corner and there it was: the new hedge-maze, intricate and lovely. Alan had no heart for puzzles today, though.
He turned away, walked a little furt
her to an older part of the garden, an area that Sebastian had allowed to go a little wild. Let the French and Italians have their formal gardens: a proper Englishman would always love a wild wood best. And here were flowers, at last: a flood of snowdrops cascading through a pleasant wood.
It would be sun-dappled on another day, with birds chirping merrily above; today, the birds clung to the branches and cast baleful glances in his direction. Still, the effect was glorious, a river of white flowers bursting forth, as if to say oh, yes, spring is here, come at last! And beneath the trees, those pink-and-white perennials bloomed, heads nodding down – what had Sebastian called them? Alan asked the question, and his brain tossed the answer back: hellebores. For this, it could be useful, reliable. For this.
Alan stood there a moment more, drinking it in, memorizing every aspect. Tonight he would go home; whatever else happened with crown and country today, tonight he would tell his husband how much he’d enjoyed his garden.
But it was full day now, and England needed him. He rendezvoused with Noel by the large stone peacock, not the most felicitous statue on the grounds, but certainly distinctive, and since it stood in the midst of a large grassy sward, impossible for eavesdroppers to come near. Noel was quite clever sometimes.
Noel snapped, ‘I’m busy, Turing, running the Silver Helix, and on that little assignment you gave me. If you want me to get anything done, you can’t be dragging me in for meetings every five minutes.’
‘It’s not as if it takes you any time to get here.’
Noel laughed shortly. ‘Well, there is that. So what’s this about?’
‘I need you to stand down. That matter with Adelbert – let it be, for now.’
Noel frowned. ‘You’re going to have to give me a reason, you know.’
Turing hesitated, but hadn’t he just been thinking that he should talk to Noel more? Maybe that was the problem, maybe he’d been keeping things too much to himself, in his own tangled head. ‘I’m not sure Richard is our man.’
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