Alex Verus Novels, Books 1-4 (9780698175952)

by Jacka, Benedict

  “Tea would be great.” I’m used to being alone in the mornings. Looking around at the warm kitchen and the smell of cooking food, it occurred to me that this was really nice. Much better than eating on my own and—

  Suddenly I shook my head. What was I doing? I’d come in resolved to get some answers out of Meredith yet as soon as she’d started talking to me I’d forgotten all about it. “Look,” I said. “Don’t take this the wrong way. But I think it’s about time you explained what’s going on.”

  Meredith was turned away from me so that I couldn’t see her face. She didn’t react visibly. “What do you mean?”

  “I think you’ve got a pretty good idea.”

  Meredith paused a second, then turned and looked at me with those big dark eyes. “What do you want to know?”

  “Let’s start with the basics. Who sent that thing after you and why were you coming to my shop last night?”

  Meredith hesitated. “It’s … Do you mind if we sit down?”

  I sat. Meredith moved things from the counter to the table. I waited, knowing she was going to speak eventually. “I don’t know their names,” she said at last.

  “How did you meet them?”

  “I didn’t! I’ve never met them.”

  “All right,” I said. “Why don’t you start from the beginning? How did you get involved in this?”

  Meredith leant against the counter, her hands wrapped around her arms. She was staring off into the corner and seemed to have forgotten about both me and the food. “It was …” She hesitated. “It was Belthas.”

  “Who’s Belthas?”

  “A Light mage. With the Council.”

  I didn’t recognise the name, but that wasn’t surprising. I know the names of the Junior and Senior Council and a few of the heavy hitters but I’m not well connected enough to know everyone the way Talisid does. “Same cabal?”

  Meredith shook her head. “No. He came to me and wanted my help with something. We’re not partners or anything … Oh, you know.”

  I nodded. A lot of business amongst mages gets done in these kinds of loose arrangements. Sometimes they last, sometimes they go their separate ways once the job’s done, and occasionally they fall apart right in the middle of what they’re supposed to be doing (doesn’t happen often, but when it does it’s usually spectacular). Once you start to pick up a reputation, it’s pretty common for mages to approach you with offers like this. Sometimes it’s genuine and sometimes it’s a con, and it can be tricky to tell which is which. “What did he want?”

  Meredith hesitated again. “I’m not sure—”

  “Come on, Meredith,” I said. “You want my help, this is part of the deal.”

  Meredith looked at me for a second, then turned back to the stove. She switched off the heating ring and the kettle and started putting out the food. I waited, knowing she was making up her mind about what to say.

  “Belthas told me about a group of Dark mages,” Meredith said without looking up. “They were supposed to have gotten their hands on some sort of ritual, something powerful. He wanted to stop them.”

  “What kind of ritual?”

  “I don’t know. He just told me that he wanted me to find out where they were.” Meredith set the plates down on the table with a clink. “I found they were in London and where they were going to be. Belthas and his men went to meet with them to make a deal. Something went wrong. There was a fight. After that, the Dark mages started hunting me. They knew I’d been talking to Belthas.”

  “Why did you come here?”

  “I was scared,” Meredith said quietly. “The other people at the meeting got hurt really badly. Belthas wasn’t answering and … and I came to you. You’ve done this sort of stuff before, haven’t you? With that thing that happened at the British Museum?”

  I picked up my knife and fork and took a bite, chewed, and swallowed. “Don’t believe everything you hear.”

  “But everyone says—”

  I cut across without raising my voice. “And if it were true, it would be covered by Council secrecy and I wouldn’t be allowed to talk about it.”

  “So … you did do all that?”

  I looked at Meredith silently. After a few seconds she dropped her eyes.

  “Meredith, don’t get the wrong idea,” I said. “I’m a diviner. I find things out. I don’t get into fights if I can help it. If you want a bodyguard, you’re in the wrong place.”

  Meredith looked down at the floor. “I haven’t anywhere else to go,” she said. “There isn’t anyone who’ll help me, not without …” She trailed off, staring at the wooden floor, looking very small and vulnerable.

  I suddenly felt a wave of sympathy for Meredith, wanted to help and protect her. I fought it off; I didn’t trust my feelings at the moment. “So you want my help,” I said.

  Meredith nodded, without raising her eyes.

  Damn it. The sensible thing would be to tell Meredith that I was sorry but it wasn’t my problem and turn her out. I didn’t want to get into a fight with a bunch of Dark mages and I didn’t know how much I could trust Meredith or what her real intentions were. I still had the feeling she wasn’t telling me everything.

  But I was pretty sure she was telling the truth about being scared. That construct had been no joke. If I hadn’t been there it would have killed her. And when it came right down to it, I hate turning someone away who’s come to me for help. It’s not that I’m especially selfless or anything, but I know what it’s like to be alone and hunted and afraid. I’ve seen the expression on people’s faces as they decide not to get involved, the look in their eyes as they shut you out, and I hate it. Maybe when it comes down to it, that’s all that matters.

  “All right,” I said. Meredith’s eyes lit up in relief and I raised a hand in warning. “Two conditions. I’m not fighting your battles for you. I’ll do what I can but I’m going to avoid trouble as much as possible. Second, you tell me everything. If I find out you’re keeping anything back, you’re out. Understand?”

  Meredith nodded instantly. “Yes. Thank you. If there’s anything I can do—”

  Her eyes were really distracting. “You can owe me a favour. I think the first thing is to talk with Belthas. I’d like to know what got these Dark mages so upset.”

  “I can try and get through by phone. He’s got a business address in the City.”

  I nodded. “Get in touch and set up a meeting as soon as you can.” I glanced at my watch; it was almost ten o’clock. “Right now I’ve got somewhere to be.”

  Meredith wasn’t completely happy about being separated from me, but once I’d promised she wouldn’t be in danger for a few hours she reluctantly agreed to wait. Settling her down and explaining what she should do took longer than I’d expected and by the time I’d finished I didn’t have time to make it to the Heath on foot.

  I went back up to my roof. Camden had woken up and the air was filled with noise and the rumble of traffic. This time I hopped across to the roof next to mine and kept walking until I was amidst the chimney stacks and ventilators of the block of flats a few buildings down. I use this roof when I don’t want anyone watching or when I’m feeling especially paranoid, both of which happen more often than they probably ought to. I took out a small glass rod from my pocket—a focus—and wove a thread of magic through it, whispering. “Starbreeze. Traveller, watcher, listener, queen of cloud and sky. I call—”

  Something flipped my hair into my eyes and I cut off, turning around with a sigh. “Heard it before, huh?”

  Starbreeze is invisible to sight and to most other senses too. It’s not that she conceals herself, it’s just that she’s made of air, and she looks exactly like what air looks like. To my mage’s sight, though, she looks like a woman drawn in blurry lines of blue-white, ever-shifting. She changes her looks daily but there’s something in her face that’s always the same, something ageless. Starbreeze is an elemental, and she’s immortal and eternal, fast as the wind and as powerful as the sun.r />
  She’s also got the memory of a goldfish. It’s like her mind’s got a storage limit, and for every new thing that comes in, one old thing goes out. Sometimes I think her immortality and her ditziness are connected: she can never age because she can never change. But she’s saved my life at least once and I care about her a lot, though I’d never tell her so.

  Today Starbreeze looked like a woman in a flowing dress with long hair falling to her ankles. She whipped around me in a tight corkscrew. “Where’ve you been?”

  “I’ve been dealing with monsters and assassins and trying to persuade someone not to … You know what, if I explained it you’d forget halfway through.”

  “Forget what?” Starbreeze said brightly.

  “Never mind. Can you take me to Arachne’s lair?”

  Starbreeze came to an abrupt halt, upside down with her head eye level with me, her hair hanging down to the floor. “Present first.”

  “Here you go.” I took a small silver piece of jewellery out of my pocket, a stylised dolphin designed as a brooch. I keep a stack of them in a drawer. “I just—”

  “Ooh!” Starbreeze snatched the dolphin out of my hands and whirled up into the air, tossing the brooch around in delight. “Starbreeze!” I yelled.

  Starbreeze halted, looking down at me from twenty feet up. “Hmm?”

  “Can you take me to Arachne’s lair?”

  Starbreeze’s face cleared. “Oh right.” Before I could blink she’d darted down, turned my body into air, and whisked me up into the sky.

  I love flying with Starbreeze. When I was younger I used to wish I could fly but being carried by an air elemental is better. Starbreeze transforms the bodies of whoever she’s carrying into air, then mixes them with her own form, carrying them along with her. It means you can go as fast as she can, and Starbreeze is fast.

  The city shrank underneath me as Starbreeze rocketed upwards, the buildings and roads becoming a winding grid. London looks sprawled and confusing from above, the twisting, irregular roads making it hard to pick out where you are. I could see the winding shape of the Thames to the south, and the green spaces of Regent’s Park and the Heath ahead and to the left. Starbreeze could have gotten me to Arachne’s lair in ten seconds flat but she was obviously enjoying herself far too much to hurry. She kept climbing until we were on the level of the clouds then started soaring between them, twining her way between the fluffy masses like they were some kind of gigantic obstacle course. Looking down at London spread out below me, I could see the shadows of the clouds dotted across the city, the sun and darkness alternating almost like a chessboard. I was supposed to be at Arachne’s lair, but really, I didn’t mind that much. I relaxed, letting the scenery scroll beneath me.

  There was a flat-topped cloud the size of an aircraft carrier drifting over Crouch End. Starbreeze swung towards it, soared vertically up its bumpy sides, then levelled off over the top, her wake brushing the cloud’s surface as she cruised over it. “Oh!” she said suddenly. “Someone’s asking about you.”

  “Asking about me?” I said. My voice sounds weird when I’m in air form; a sort of buzzy whisper, though Starbreeze seems to understand it easily enough. “Who?”

  Starbreeze brought us up onto a tower reaching up out of the top of the cloud. It gave a panoramic view of London, the city stretching away in all directions. “You!” Starbreeze said. “Cirrus told me a nightwing told him a man asked the nightwing.”

  “About me?”

  “Mm-hm.” Starbreeze frowned. “Wait, the nightwing told me. Maybe a man told Cirrus.” Her frown cleared. “Where are we going?”

  “Just a second. What were they asking about me?”

  “Who?”

  “The men talking to Cirrus.”

  “No, to the nightwing.”

  “And they were talking about me?”

  “They were?”

  I sighed. “Let’s go to Arachne’s lair.”

  “Okay!” Starbreeze whirled me up, did a somersault, and dived straight down into the cloud. There was a second of icy chill as near-freezing vapour rushed past us, then we were diving towards the Heath at what felt like a thousand miles an hour. I had one lightning-fast glimpse of rushing grass, people, and flashing trees, then Starbreeze turned me solid again, dropped me in the ravine, and darted off before I could even say good-bye.

  I checked that no one was watching, found the right spot in the oak roots, waited for Arachne to recognise my voice, and entered the tunnel, my mind focused on what Starbreeze had just told me. Starbreeze hears everything and she probably learns as much of what happens in the mage world as the highest members of the Council—it’s just that she forgets it as fast as she learns it. But the fragment she’d repeated was enough to worry me.

  I’m not ranked amongst the movers and shakers of magical society, and all in all, I like it that way. I’ve found my life is much easier if no one thinks I’m important enough to mess with. Having someone asking about me was disturbing. When mages take a sudden interest in a guy it usually means one of two things: they’re considering an alliance, or they’re planning to get rid of him.

  Luna was waiting for me in Arachne’s living room, twirling a ribbon between her fingers. Arachne was perched over a table to one side, sewing away at something and apparently paying no attention at all. I felt awkward talking to Luna and it seemed she felt awkward too; I think both of us kind of wanted to apologise but didn’t want to raise the subject. It was a relief to focus on training.

  Mages normally take an apprentice who specialises in the same type of magic that they do. The branches of magic are very different; trying to teach a type of magic you can’t use is a lot like trying to teach an instrument you can’t play. But sometimes you just have to live with it, especially if you happen to be landed with one of the more uncommon kinds: If some kid’s just discovered a talent for shapechanging, it’s not exactly practical to wait five or ten years for one of the handful of master shifters to free up his schedule to teach him. In Luna’s case, I wasn’t sure if there even was a mage with her exact talent, and she wasn’t a true mage either, meaning it was me or nobody.

  Unfortunately, I was just as new to the master business as Luna was to being an apprentice, and the teaching methods I’d tried out over the last five months had been kind of hit-and-miss. Most had been ineffective, a few had turned out promising, and two or three had led to really spectacular disasters. But while sweeping up the mess from the last one, it had occurred to me that there might be a way of making use of how Luna’s curse worked on objects. Her curse affects inanimate things as well as living ones; it’s just that it’s a lot weaker against dead material. But as we’d found out the hard way, the more vulnerable an item was to random chance, the more easily the curse seemed able to destroy it. After a bit of research, I tracked down the most unreliable and fragile brand of lightbulb on the market and bought a case of them.

  Which was why Luna was standing in the middle of Arachne’s living room with a lamp in either hand. We’d cleared a section of the room of fabric and furniture, and the brilliant white light cast a rainbow of colour from the clothes hanging all around, the fluorescent bulbs making a faint, persistent buzz. “Do I have to do this?” Luna asked.

  “The better you learn to control your curse, the less likely you’ll hit someone you don’t want to.”

  “I get that part. Why do I have to dance?”

  Luna was perched with her weight on her right foot, the left foot resting lightly with the leg straight, her right-hand lamp held at chest level in front of her and the other down by her side. This was her third session on Latin—the last two weeks had been ballroom—and it had taken me a good hour to get her stance right. It’s a lot harder to correct someone’s posture when you can’t touch them.

  To my mage’s sight, the silver mist of Luna’s curse swirled around her like a malevolent cloud. At her hands, though, the mist was reduced to a thin layer. The two lamps had a few strands of mist clinging to them, but
not many. Luna was holding her curse back, keeping it from reaching the items in her hands. The bulbs were fragile and I’d learnt from experience that a single brush from her curse at full power was enough to burn them out. “Again,” I said. “From the top.”

  Luna rolled her eyes but did as I said. I’d been teaching her a routine, and as I watched she ran through each move in the sequence. The silver mist flickered and swirled, but it stayed clear of her hands and the lamps shone steady and bright. “Good,” I said once she’d stopped. “Now start doing basics and I’ll give you instructions.”

  Luna settled into the basic rhythm, soft-soled shoes quiet on the stone floor. “Wouldn’t it be more useful if I learnt martial arts or something?” she asked after a while.

  “No.”

  “Why not?”

  It was something I’d already thought about and decided against. Given the kind of situations I tend to get into, it would be a useful skill for Luna to know … except she’d be far more likely to end up hurting a friend than an enemy, and quite honestly, her curse is lethal enough already. “What you practice, you use without thinking. The last thing I want is to teach you to hit someone by reflex. Flares.”

  Luna hesitated an instant, then stepped into left and right stretches, one arm holding a lamp low, the other lifted high to the ceiling. “I can’t even dance.”

  “New Yorks,” I said. Luna obeyed reluctantly, turning on the spot in place of the backwards step. “I know dance, so you get to dance. Be grateful it’s Latin and not Morris dancing.”

  “Might as well be,” Luna said under her breath.

  Ballroom dancing was one of the odder skills I picked up as apprentice to Richard. Light and Dark mages are quite traditional at the upper levels and a proper apprentice is supposed to be able to fight a duel, dance a waltz, and know which fork to eat dinner with afterwards. “Fan and hockey stick.”

  Luna hesitated again, trying to remember the complex figure, and this time the silver mist around her hands pressed outward. For just a second the lights flickered, then she stepped into the move and they steadied. She finished with a basic and started the next. “See? It’s not—”