Casino Infernale

by Simon R. Green

  Even as he spoke, machines or something that looked very like machines began to rise up out of the floor all around us. Utterly silent, with no discernable moving parts, formed from some strange kind of translucent metal, with an odd bluish tinge. Molly and I moved quickly to stand back-to-back. Just on general principles. The machines didn’t seem to be doing anything, but the Armourer seemed pleased to see them.

  “Will you two please behave?” he said testily. “I’ll tell you when it’s time to panic. Think of these things as the welcoming committee. I’d love to take one of them back with me to study, but the Tombs won’t let anything go.”

  A single column of glowing crystal rose up out of the floor, right beside me. A small flat grey thing sat on the flat top of the column. It looked like a grey credit card, with no markings of any kind. I stood very still, and considered the object.

  “Uncle Jack?” I said carefully. “What does this mean? What am I supposed to do?”

  “Haven’t a clue,” he said, watching with great interest. Though I noticed he wasn’t moving a single step closer. “This has never happened before. . . .”

  The farther end of the crystal column tilted up, so that the grey card started to slide towards me, and in the end I had to grab it or let it fall to the floor. It felt flat and very smooth, and subtly cold to the touch. The moment I had it, the column sank back into the floor again.

  “All right, take the bloody thing,” said the Armourer. “Clearly the Tombs want you to have it. Never mind that I’ve hosted three Summits here, and it’s never offered me anything. I’m not sulking at all.”

  Molly leaned in close for a better look. I offered her the grey card, but she declined. “Maybe it’s a Get out of jail free card. I’ve always wanted one of those.”

  “Become a Drood,” I said. “We have diplomatic immunity.”

  “This has never happened before,” the Armourer said thoughtfully. “But then, you’ve never been here before, Eddie. Maybe you are special, after all.”

  “Don’t,” said Molly. “He’s hard enough to live with as it is.”

  “Put the thing somewhere safe,” said the Armourer. “And for God’s sake don’t lose it. I’ll take a closer look at it when we get back.”

  I slipped the grey card carefully into my pocket, and on into the pocket dimension I keep there. For strange and valuable items, or things that might go off bang unexpectedly. Because you never know when you might have a use for such a thing. Although, a part of me was whispering Beware of Martians bearing gifts . . .

  A table rose up out of the floor. A quite ordinary table: flat surface and four legs, some thirty feet long and ten wide. Made of the same crystal stuff as the floor. A set of human-sized, human-scaled chairs rose up next, around the table. They didn’t look the least bit comfortable, but they were clearly intended to be used by beings of human proportions. I looked at the Armourer.

  “Are you doing this?”

  “No. This is what always happens at Summit Meetings. Whether one of our ancestors first arranged this, or whether the Tombs worked it out for themselves, I have no idea. Hmmm, that’s interesting.”

  “What?” Molly said immediately. “What’s interesting? Should I be worried yet? Guess what—too late . . .”

  “I count nine chairs,” said the Armourer. “And I was given to understand that only five others would be joining us, representing five organisations.”

  I gave him a hard look. “How does this room know how many places to set at table? Are we being watched? Are there computers here, or something?”

  “Almost certainly something,” said the Armourer. “Just go with the flow, that’s my advice.”

  Another machine appeared, at the end of the table. Just a clear glass container, on top of another crystal column. No obvious controls or clues as to what it was supposed to do. The Armourer made a happy, satisfied sound; and I had to fight down the urge to dive for cover. Whenever my uncle Jack makes that kind of noise in his Armoury, it usually means something extraordinarily destructive is about to happen.

  “About time!” said the Armourer, beaming happily on the new arrival. “I’ve been feeling a bit peckish.”

  “What is it?” said Molly, moving right up to the glass container and staring at it closely. Mention of food always draws her forward, like a moth to a flame.

  “A machine to produce food and drink for Summit guests,” the Armourer said happily. “Human food, mind, not Martian. Don’t ask me how it does it, but this can supply anything you could ever want. Go on! Ask it!”

  “You ask,” I said. “We’ll watch.”

  “I really have trained you awfully well, haven’t I?” said the Armourer. He addressed the empty container with a clear carrying voice. “I’ll have a Provencal truffle with grated Stilton; Siberian caviar on dry toast fingers; and a glass of pink champagne. Shaken, not stirred.”

  Two plates of food and a champagne glass appeared inside the glass container. The top disappeared, and the Armourer reached in and helped himself. He set them down on the table, and tucked in cheerfully.

  “God, I miss being a field agent. And having unlimited expenses.”

  I moved forward and addressed the thing. “Beef madras curry, with pilau rice. And a bottle of Beck’s.”

  And there it all was. Along with plain functional cutlery, made from the bluish metal. I took the steaming curry to the table, and sat down. The bottle was ice cold. I tried a mouthful of food, followed by a mouthful of drink, and had to struggle to hold back delighted ecstatic sounds. Best I’d ever tasted. I studied the bottle carefully. The label gave every indication of being genuine. Maybe it was some kind of transporter, beaming things up from Earth . . . though the power involved would be almost inconceivable.

  Molly confronted the glass container with the gleam of battle in her eye. “I want a beefburger, twelve ounces, medium rare, with cheese and onion and bacon, and a fried egg on top.”

  The burger appeared. It was a work of art; a thing of beauty and a joy forever. Molly grabbed it and bit into it, and grease ran down her chin as her eyes squeezed shut. She didn’t even try to hold back the loud ecstatic noises. We all sat at the table, engrossed in our food. When we were finished, we all looked thoughtfully at the glass container. We were all thinking of second helpings, but no one wanted to go first and seem like a pig.

  “How the hell does it do that?” said Molly.

  “I have no idea,” said the Armourer. “And I’m getting really tired of saying that. I’ve been trying to duplicate the thing in my lab for years, with only very limited success.”

  “How does it get everything so right, from such a basic description?” I said.

  “I think something in the Tombs reads our minds,” said the Armourer.

  Molly glared about her suspiciously.

  A viewscreen suddenly appeared, six foot by three, floating in mid-air above the table. It showed a view of the open red plain that we’d just crossed to get to the Tombs. The detail was so sharp I could see the trail our footprints had left.

  “Ah!” said the Armourer, wiping his mouth on his sleeve. “This means our guests are about to arrive. Pay attention. You might learn something useful. The Summit Meeting, also known as the Consultation, has been going on, off and on, for centuries. It has outlasted many of the secret groups and organisations who originally founded it. So it’s always interesting to see who actually turns up. No one ever wants to refuse the honour, but circumstances sometimes take their toll. When the call goes out, everyone who can attends. If only to make sure they don’t get left out of having their say in whatever’s decided.”

  Quite suddenly without benefit of dimensional Door, secret Gate, or any obvious means of transportation, a figure was walking across the red plain. Plodding steadily towards the city in a heavy suit of plate steel armour. Resolutely medieval in style, with boots and gauntlets, stylis
ed greaves and main-gauches, and a great blocky steel helmet with a coloured feather sticking up: blue, with purple trimmings. The knight in armour wore a great sword on one hip, and a bloody big axe on the other. It was hard to judge scale at such a distance, but he gave every indication of being a really big fellow. He left a trail of deep footprints behind him, punched into the plain by the sheer weight of his armour.

  “Sir Parsifal, representing the London Knights,” said the Armourer. “I recognise the plume. An interesting choice, for a representative.”

  “You know him?” said Molly.

  “Let’s say, of him,” said the Armourer. “Brave and true, honest as the day is long, arrogant and stuck-up and a real pain in the arse to work with.”

  “How can you be so sure, if you haven’t actually met him?” I said.

  “Because that sums up all the London Knights,” the Armourer said flatly. “Think they’re so big time, just because they’ve been around almost as long as we have. They’ve been even more insufferable, just lately, ever since King Arthur returned to lead them again. Haven’t got a dragon, though, have you, Parsifal? We’ve got a dragon!”

  My gaze was jerked back to the floating viewscreen, as something dark and indistinct came hurtling down through the swirling atmosphere. Sir Parsifal didn’t even pause to look. Even when the something slammed down into the red plain not fifty feet away, hard enough to raise great clouds of red dust. The clouds slowly settled, revealing a single human shape kneeling in the centre of a new crater. He was wearing what looked like some kind of steampunk spacesuit. Without waiting to be asked, the viewscreen obligingly closed in for a better look. The atmosphere suit had clearly been based on an old-fashioned diving suit, complete with a bulbous metal helmet, and weights attached here and there to compensate for the lesser gravity. Modern scuba oxygen cylinders had been strapped on to his back, while his chest boasted a large Union Jack flag. The figure slowly straightened up, got its bearings, and headed purposefully for the great cliff face.

  “All right,” said Molly. “I’ll bite. What the hell is that tatty museum piece doing here?”

  “That,” said the Armourer, “is almost certainly the representative from the Carnacki Institute. They’ve been around for ages, and they never throw anything away.”

  “The Ghost Finders?” I said. “What business have they got at a Summit like this?”

  “I have to wonder whether that might be their boss, inside that suit,” said the Armourer. “Catherine Latimer . . . She and Crow Lee were something of an item, back in the day. Her insight on the nature of the Inheritance would be invaluable. But, she’s a bit too old and too fragile to handle a landing like that. Must be one of her field agents. And don’t be so snotty, Eddie! The Institute does valuable work.”

  “Okay,” I said. “Now explain the spacesuit.”

  “From the original manned moon landing, back in Victorian times,” said the Armourer. “We’re not the only ones with a secret history.”

  “You just made that up!” said Molly.

  “I wish,” said the Armourer.

  The view in the viewscreen shifted suddenly, whipping sideways across the great red plain at staggering speed, and then slammed to a halt to show a Door opening. It looked a lot more modern than ours, while still entirely basic and ordinary. A tall dark figure stepped through it, and the Door immediately slammed shut behind him, and disappeared. The figure looked around, taking his time. Molly and I looked at each other, sighed heavily, and shook our heads regretfully. We knew this one, by reputation. Everyone did.

  Dead Boy was seventeen. He’d been seventeen some thirty years now, ever since he was mugged and murdered in the Nightside. And then came back from the dead to avenge his murder. He made a deal with Someone he still won’t talk about, but he should have paid more attention to the small print. Because there was nothing in the compact he made about getting to lie down again afterwards. So now Dead Boy goes on and on, trapped in his body; a returned soul possessing his own corpse.

  Tall and adolescent thin, he wore a deep purple greatcoat over black leather trousers, and scuffed calfskin boots. He wore a black rose on his lapel, and a large floppy hat crammed down on dark curly hair. He stood alone on the Mars surface, unprotected and unaffected by the local conditions because he was, after all, dead. He stared about him in an open, touristy way, and then jumped up and down a few times, to test the gravity. He looked like he was giggling. He strode off across the red plain, kicking red dust this way and that with happy abandon.

  “Oh, hell,” said the Armourer. “All the people the Nightside Authorities could have sent, and they chose Dead Boy? Why couldn’t they have sent their new Walker, John Taylor?”

  “Because he’s on honeymoon,” said Molly. “He married Shotgun Suzie, just recently. I read it in Heat magazine.” I looked at her, and she shrugged self-consciously. “The Nightside edition. I’m a subscriber. Look, do I make comments when you watch Testosterone Gear?”

  “I like Top Gear,” I said. “It makes me feel manly.”

  “Pay attention, children,” said the Armourer. “Someone else is arriving.”

  A bright light flared, out on the Martian plain, and suddenly . . . a four-foot-tall teddy bear was standing there, looking around him with great interest. He was wearing his famous blue tunic and trousers, and his big red scarf. He smiled at everything, and his bright intelligent eyes were full of wonder and delight. Every child’s good friend, and companion in adventure, in the far off Golden Lands. Bruin Bear. From those wonderful stories we all read when we were young. I understand he’s out of fashion and out of print, these days.

  Kids today don’t know what they’re missing.

  And there at Bruin Bear’s side, his constant friend and companion, the Sea Goat. Tall and angular in his blue-grey trench-coat, human enough in shape, but topped with a large blocky goat’s head, complete with long curving horns. He . . . didn’t look particularly pleased to be on Mars.

  Dead Boy went over to join them, and they were soon having a cheerful conversation. The lack of air didn’t seem to bother any of them. Because he was dead, and they were fictional. Bruin Bear and the Sea Goat resided at Shadows Fall these days, a small town in the back of beyond where legends go to die when the world stops believing in them. An elephant’s graveyard for the supernatural.

  The Ghost Finder in his antiquated atmosphere suit came over to join them, and patted Bruin Bear fondly on the head. The Bear let him because he was, after all, everyone’s friend. The Sea Goat gave the Ghost Finder a cold unwavering glare that clearly said Don’t even think about it . . . and then they all walked on together, heading for the city in the cliff. None of them made any attempt to catch up with Sir Parsifal.

  “Oh, bloody hell,” said the Armourer. “Not Bruin Bear and the Sea Goat . . . I was sure Shadows Fall was going to send Old Father Time. Okay . . . hide everything valuable, including the cutlery; don’t promise the Sea Goat anything; and if he starts any trouble, just hit him over the head with something solid. Don’t worry, you can’t hurt him; he’s fictional.”

  And then, finally, the last arrival. A strange contraption appeared out of nowhere, some distance away from the others. A great cage of twisted silver bars, throwing off multicoloured sparks like a fireworks display. The cage shook and shuddered, like it might fly apart at any moment, and then abruptly settled down. The lights blinked off, and there, standing in the middle of the cage, was a tall Asian young lady, looking very formal and intimidating. She held herself like a Royal on a state visit, as though she was slumming just by being there. The silver cage disappeared, leaving her standing alone on the Martian surface, surrounded by a shimmering force shield. She was wearing a pink leather cat-suit, topped with a pink pillbox hat, over neatly trimmed black hair. She strode purposefully forward across the red plain, ignoring the others completely.

  “Now, what is that little bitch doing
here?” said Molly.

  “You know her?” I said.

  “Natasha Chang? Hell, yes. She still owes me money. She’s a field agent for the Crowley Project. . . . Oh come on, Eddie, you must have heard of them! Nasty people, doing nasty things, always for a profit. Natasha is a Project field agent. A supernatural terrorist, serial nightclubber, rampant despoiler of fit young men who should know better, and eater of souls. And no, I am not even a little bit exaggerating. She eats ghosts, and digests their memories. I worked with her, a few times. On . . . matters of mutual interest.”

  “My girlfriend has a past,” I said solemnly. “The horror, the horror . . . What’s this Natasha Chang doing here?”

  “The Crowley Project was originally founded by Crow Lee,” said the Armourer. “The gaps in your background knowledge never cease to amaze me, Eddie. The Project kicked him out, eventually, so they could go their own unpleasant way . . . but they still know more about Crow Lee than anyone else. They kept him under constant surveillance, probably in self-defence. Which is why they have a seat at the table today. Because if anyone knows for sure what the Crow Lee Inheritance actually is, it’s them.”

  “This is going to be a very noisy meeting, isn’t it?” I said.

  “Oh, you have no idea,” said the Armourer. “We’ll probably have to clean blood and hair off the walls before we can leave.”

  • • •

  It took them all a while to arrive and assemble in the oversized entrance hall of the Martian Tombs. Sir Parsifal was the first, of course. The door in the cliff face didn’t even wait for him to touch it, just slid rapidly upwards to get out of his way as he strode heavily forward. I sort of got the impression that if it hadn’t, he would have walked right through it. There’s no doubt the London Knights are the good guys, but they do like to think of themselves as the biggest dog on the block.

  Sir Parsifal slammed to a halt at the foot of the long table, and studied us silently through the Y-shaped slit in the front of his helmet. His eyes were cold and grey and unyielding. He dismissed Molly and me immediately, and gave all his attention to the Armourer, who bowed politely. The Knight inclined his head slightly, and then removed his helmet to reveal a hard-faced man in his early thirties, with a blunt square head, a bald pate, and no eyebrows. His mouth was set in a thin straight line.