by K. E. Mills
Not since she was a baby had he seen her so upset. “Come on, Bibs-that’s not true and you know it,” he said gently. “Sir Alec’s right. If we can handle this situation discreetly we should. We must. My God, can you imagine the uproar in parliament if what’s happened here got out? And it wouldn’t stay a secret, either. News like this would spread around the world. And mass panic would only make it easier for the other Gerald to come in here and take over.”
“Maybe, but you don’t know that’s what he’s planning, Monk,” Bibbie objected. “The-the other you didn’t even know his Gerald was going to kidnap our Gerald.”
“No,” he said, after a moment. “But if he’d had the time, he would’ve figured it out.” He managed a small, painful smile. “He was pretty smart, you know. Okay, not as smart as me but-”
“Oh, Monk,” said Bibbie, and slapped his chest. Suddenly her eyes were full of tears. “Monk… you died.”
“No, no, no, Bibs,” he said, and held her tight. “ He died. And that’s not the same thing.”
She pulled back. “You don’t believe that.”
He didn’t have time to work out what he did or didn’t believe. “Bibs, please,” he said, catching hold of her small, cold hands. “It may only be a theory but we have to assume it’s fact. If we don’t he could win. I can’t let that happen.”
“But Monk-” Blinking back her tears she tugged her hands free of his grasp. “You’re not a spy, you’re a theoretical thaumaturgist. You aren’t trained for this.”
“Trust me, Bibs, I know.” Then he pointed to the body on the bed. “But the moment he crossed from his world into ours, that was it. None of us stood a chance of not getting involved.”
She looked at him with enormous eyes. “No. I don’t accept that. Let Sir Alec send one of his janitors. This is their business, not yours.”
“Oh, Bibs…” He tucked a strand of her glorious golden hair behind her ear. “I wish I could. I wish it was that easy. But even if I could doppler hex one of Sir Alec’s people into me, I can’t doppler my thaumic signature and the rest of it, can I? I’m the only Monk Markham we’ve got. That other Gerald will accept no substitutes.”
Her face crumpling, his little sister flung her arms around his neck and burst into tears. “Promise me you’ll come back, Monk,” she sobbed. “Because if you don’t come back that means I’m stuck with Aylesbury and if I’m stuck with Aylesbury I won’t care if that horrible other Gerald takes over the world! I might even help him just to end the pain!”
“Oh, Bibbie,” he said, voice breaking, and held her tight again. From the corner of his eye he caught Melissande staring at them, vulnerable in a way he wasn’t used to seeing. As for Sir Alec, he was frowning. He nodded. I know, I know. Gently he disentangled himself. “Here’s an idea, Bibs. Why don’t you and Mel go see where Reg’s got to? Do something irritating so she can scold you. That always cheers her up.”
Sniffing, almost laughing, Bibbie gave him a half-hearted slap. “Cheeky bugger.”
“I do my best.” He shifted around. “Melissande…”
Like magic, her Royal Highness returned. “Don’t worry, Monk,” she said, formidably composed. “We’ll hold the fort here. And if things don’t go the way we want them to, over there, well-that other Gerald Dunwoody will be in for a nasty surprise. Forewarned is forearmed, after all. I can promise you, we’ll be waiting for him.”
He felt his heart thud. Bloody hell. I love her. “I know you will, Mel.”
The bedroom door closed behind the girls, and it was just him and Sir Alec and the body on the bed. Sir Alec put the hexed book on the dresser, beside the hexed box, his movements restrained and deliberate. Whatever he was feeling he was keeping it to himself.
“So, Mr. Markham,” he said. “We reach the point of no return. You understand the risks of what we’re about to attempt?”
His mouth was dry. He swallowed. “If you mean do I realize I could fry my brain like an egg, then yes. I understand.”
Sir Alec crossed the carpet to the bed then clasped his hands in front of him like a meek civil servant. “You can still decline. We both know I’m in no position to insist.”
No, Sir Alec really wasn’t. His position, to put it mildly, was professionally precarious. And how did it feel, knowing his future rested in the hands of a wizard young enough to be his son, who’d never been one for slavishly following the rules?
Bloody awful, I’ll bet.
“I don’t know how to do this,” he said, wishing he could sit down. Wishing he couldn’t feel a tremble in his knees. “I don’t think it’s ever been done. Has it?”
Sir Alec raised an eyebrow. “No, it hasn’t. Or rather, to the best of my knowledge it hasn’t. And if it has, then it’s certainly never been documented. Not that I’ve seen. But I’m sure we’ll work it out, Mr. Markham. Rumor has it you’re a genius-and how often does rumor lie?”
Bloody hell, he was a sarky bastard. How did Gerald stand it? “Are you sure it doesn’t matter that the shadbolt’s on a-a corpse?”
A breath, a whisper, of a mordant chuckle. “Sure? Not at all. But I’m moderately optimistic. After all, Mr. Markham, it is a fresh corpse. Well. Fresh- ish. Not decomposing, at any rate-so that’s all to the good.”
He’d like to kiss whoever had recovered the dead Monk with the sheet-even if it had been Sir Alec. It was a very thoughtful gesture. He never wanted to look at that empty face again. “And you’re sure there’s enough left of the shadbolt to transfer?”
Another soft snort of dry amusement. “No.”
Saint Snodgrass save him, he was starting to feel sick. “But you have transferred a shadbolt before?”
“I have,” Sir Alec said, after a long hesitation. “From one living subject to another. And if I had the choice I wouldn’t do it again.”
“And what if even a rumored genius like me can’t cobble together what’s missing well enough to fool the other Gerald?”
“In that case, Mr. Markham, your little vacation will most likely take an interesting turn.”
Well, that was encouraging. “So-this incant you’ve got shoved down-” Hesitating, he reconsidered his choice of words. “Up your sleeve. The one that lets a wizard disguise his own thaumic signature as somebody else’s. Is that-y’know-legal?”
Sir Alec held his gaze steadily. “Your point, Mr. Markham?”
“Blimey,” he breathed, awestruck. “Sir Alec, you’re a fraud. You’re no more a rah-rah team player than I am. Does Uncle Ralph know the truth about you?”
“Your uncle, Mr. Markham, knows precisely what he needs to know.”
He grimaced. “In other words, my uncle’s a bloody good politician.”
“And a good man,” said Sir Alec coolly. “Who cares deeply for his country and will do what he deems necessary to see it kept safe.” A small, wintry smile. “As will I. And you. Which, to my astonishment, places all three of us on the same team.”
“Apparently,” he said. “Just let me get my smelling salts, would you?”
Another cold smile. “Sarcasm I can live without, Mr. Markham. Now I suggest that we start with you learning the dubious incant I have shoved-where was it again? Oh, yes. Up my sleeve.” He pulled a folded piece of paper from his pocket. “Close enough.”
He took the incant and read it quickly. Deceptively simple, it had to be one of the most dangerous pieces of wizardry he’d ever come across. Blimey. Compared to this my bloody portal opener’s a kiddy’s toy. He glanced up.
“Right. Got it. Now what?”
Sir Alec gave him what Reg liked to call an old-fashioned look, crossed to the wardrobe and took out two of Gerald’s shirts. “Now, Mr. Markham, we see if rumor is, in fact, fact.” Choosing at random, he turned one shirt from white cotton into green, then tossed him both garments. “Match that.”
Feeling faintly ridiculous, Monk closed his eyes and sank himself into the ether. Sir Alec’s thaumic signature was piquant, like a freshly cut lime. Strong. Even intimidating.
Interestingly it reminded him of Gerald’s. Not in power, of course, because nobody was as powerful as Gerald. But in its complexity and subtle shadings there was a definite resemblance.
So maybe Gerald was born to be a janitor and it was only ever a question of how he got there.
A provocative notion. One he looked forward to dissecting with his best friend, over a beer. Soon.
“Mr. Markham…”
Bloody hell. “Right, right,” he muttered, and summoned the masking incant to mind. Tightened his fingers around the hexed shirt, closed his eyes, and focused on the fabric’s altered thaumic signature. The trick was in the balance between the two incants: the easy-peasy color change hex and the quicksilver slippery incant that would fool another wizard into thinking Sir Alec had hexed both shirts. They had to trigger simultaneously or the masking element wouldn’t take.
Tweak this one here… nudge that one there… a little push… some more pull…
As the shirt changed color he felt the masking incant click into place as though a key had turned in a difficult lock. Surging through him, a sense of release. An odd, shivering quiver in his potentia. He opened his eyes and looked at the shirt. It was now the same shade of green as the other one. The only difference between them was the badly reattached top button on the one he’d hexed. He doubted Sir Alec had noticed.
He jumbled both shirts behind his back, then tossed them to Gerald’s superior. “Which one was yours? Can you tell?”
“No,” said Sir Alec, after a considering pause, and smiled. “Well done.”
Stupidly, he felt a warm rush at the compliment-and on its heels, resentment. He made it a point never to get carried away by praise. Anyway, why should he care what this cool, self-contained and ruthless bastard thought of him?
Because he’s a wizard whose respect is worth having. Because I get the feeling he’s done things that mean I get to breathe free air. Because-because Well. Just because.
And then he remembered what the other Monk had helped the other Gerald do to their Sir Alec.
“Mr. Markham?”
He shook his head, bile burning his throat. “It’s nothing. I’m fine. All right, so what’s next?”
In Sir Alec’s gray eyes, a hint of sympathy. “Next, Mr. Markham, we get you fitted with a shadbolt.”
And once more his mouth sucked horribly dry. I swear, when this is over I am never leaving my lab again. “I’m ready.”
“I doubt it,” said Sir Alec. “Nevertheless. If I might have your assistance?”
“To do what?” he said warily.
Sir Alec looked at him as though he were dim. “Rearrange the body. You need to be in close proximity to the original bearer of the shadbolt, and I need access to both of you to effect the transfer.”
“Wait-you want me to share a bed with my own corpse?”
And that earned him another look, even less patient. “Yes, Mr. Markham. Since under the circumstances it seems unlikely you’ll be able to sit side by side.”
Bloody hell, Dunnywood. The things I do for you…
He helped Sir Alec wrangle the other Monk’s body until it was lying in reverse on one side of the bed, then gritted his teeth and arranged himself beside it, his head where his feet should go. He kept his gaze pinned to the ceiling and tried to pretend he was somewhere-anywhere-else. Outwardly composed, Sir Alec knelt at the foot of the bed. But underneath his self-contained exterior there was anxiety. Definitely some doubt. And that wasn’t something to fill a wizard with confidence-even if said wizard was rumored to have genius-like qualities.
“Right,” said Sir Alec. “Deep breath, Mr. Markham, and remain as relaxed as you can.”
At first he felt nothing except Sir Alec’s hand on his head, lightly pressing. But then, after a few moments, he felt a stirring in the ether. A low, ominous tremble that raised his thaumaturgic hackles. His skin goosebumped again, unpleasantly. His teeth jittered on edge. He could feel the body, too close beside him, begin its own discomfiting shudder. A tainted tang in the back of his throat promised worse to come.
“Steady, now, steady,” Sir Alec murmured. “Lower those defenses, Mr. Markham. Don’t fight what’s happening. Almost there… almost there…”
Oh, hell. Oh, bloody hell. This is going to hurt.
The skill required to lift the shadbolt off the dead Monk and place it on him was shocking. The pain of its attachment was a hundred times worse. He heard himself scream as its thaumic claws sank into his etheretic aura. Even damaged, the shadbolt knew its job. Frantically scraping at his face he rolled off the bed and hit the floor hard. The temptation to bash his head on the carpeted floorboards overtook him. But it didn’t change anything. The shadbolt wouldn’t let go.
Bibbie-Bibbie-no wonder you screamed.
Cursing, Sir Alec scrambled beside him. “Mr. Markham, stop it. Monk, that’s enough! ”
With his hands imprisoned and a knee planted on his chest, he stared up at Sir Alec. “I can’t-this won’t work-I can’t-please, God, get it off! ”
“Give it a moment,” said Sir Alec. His eyes were pitiless now. “Give it a moment, Mr. Markham. You can do this. You’re strong enough. If the other one stood it, then so by God can you.”
The other one. The other Monk, who’d borne this for months. The shamed thought helped him steady his breathing. Helped him not to howl again, but instead sit up like a sane man.
“Bloody hell,” he said, shuddering. “It’s like-I’m being watched.”
“And so you are, in a manner of speaking,” said Sir Alec. “But we don’t have time for a shadbolt tutorial. Take a good look at the thing, Mr. Markham. Can you see the gaps? Can you fill them in sufficiently so that our target’s suspicions won’t be aroused?”
Our target. The other Gerald. The man he wants me to kill. “I don’t know,” he said, feeling so sick. “I’ll try.”
He tried and succeeded, more or less, but the effort gave him a nosebleed and stirred his headache to skull-exploding point. The other Monk hadn’t been able to stop himself from examining and identifying the incants used to imprison him. Thaumaturgical curiosity, both Monks’ besetting sin-and praise Saint Snodgrass for it. And he’d managed to retrieve enough of those memories so that now he could cobble together the damaged shadbolt. Mask his hasty thaumaturgy with Gerald’s familiar signature, which he then muddled and muddied to look more like the other Gerald’s.
Bloody hell, this is rough, mate. You’d better be able to help me fix it when I finally track you down.
“That’s it,” he said at last, panting. “That’s the best I can do.”
“Then let’s hope your best is sufficient,” said Sir Alec. “Right. On your feet. It’s nearly time to go.”
He let Sir Alec help him up. Needed the assistance, though he’d never admit it. “Where’s the portal opener? Do you have it?”
Sir Alec nodded. “But first you need to complete your transformation.”
It took him a moment to twig. But when he did-“Oh-no. No, I’ll hex my own clothes to look like his. I am not dressing up in a dead man’s underpants! He’s dead, Sir Alec. Dying-it’s messy.”
“I’ll see to the… details,” said Sir Alec, obdurate. “But there’s a detectable etheretic variation at the thaumic sublevel of his clothing, Mr. Markham. It’s as good as a dimensional fingerprint for anyone who thinks to look. You can’t fake it in your own clothing, so quickly-strip off.”
“If there’s an imprint in the clothing, doesn’t that mean there’s an imprint in him, too?”
“Yes,” said Sir Alec. “But if the clothing is genuine, then-”
“Then that might be enough to discourage a deeper look,” he said, and sighed.
Wonderful. Bloody brilliant. For all our sakes you’d better be right.
Hating Sir Alec, he did as he was told as Sir Alec, without ceremony, divested the corpse of its clothes. Cleaned them with casual competence then handed them over.
When he was dressed again, his flesh shrinking
and crawling, he held out his hand. “The portal opener?”
Sir Alec pulled the small, innocent-looking stone from a pocket. “You’re clear on how this works?”
“Yes.”
“And you remember where he was when he operated it? Where it will return you to, and what you’re supposed to be doing there?”
“Yes. I remember. You’re sure it’ll be the same time there as it is here?”
“As sure as I can be.” Sir Alec hesitated, then handed him the portal. “So. Mr. Markham. The moment of truth. Are you confident you can do this? The enemy wears your friend’s face.”
I don’t know… I don’t know… “Yes. I can do it.”
“Good. Then go.”
He made himself look at the dead, naked man on the bed, who’d given his life to save two worlds.
“I don’t-I can’t-” He took a deep, steadying breath. “The girls. I can’t-will you tell them I’ll see them soon? Please?”
Sir Alec nodded, very proper, very formal. No unseemly emotions on display. “Of course. Good luck.”
He activated the portal opener. Watched in wonder as a patch of air in the bedroom began to shimmer, sparkling with blue and red lights. Shivering, he felt the ether twist in answer. The patch widened-widened-nearly big enough-almost Oh, God. Oh, Gerald. I’m not ready for this.
The portal opened in a silent flash of cobalt and crimson. Sweating, trembling, he started towards it. He could feel the wild thaumic currents churning in his blood. But as he took his first step towards the unknown a feathered whirlwind hurtled into the bedroom through the forgotten open window, shrieking.
“Are you out of your mind, sunshine? You aren’t going anywhere without me!”
Reg.
Oh, bloody hell.
But before he could grab her… the portal swallowed them both alive.
CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
Abandoned in Government House’s swanky Cabinet dining room, Gerald stared at the ornate clock on the wall. Just over five hours had passed since he’d first opened his eyes in this place. Five of the worst hours of his life-which was an alarming commentary on the state of his life, these days.