Alex Verus Novels, Books 1-4 (9780698175952)

by Jacka, Benedict

  The van was going at maybe thirty miles an hour, but I didn’t even stop to think. I jumped off and for one terrifying moment I was free-falling at what felt like fatal speed. The ray hit while I was in midair, and I had a fleeting glimpse of the whole side of the van evaporating into dust, looking like some crazy sort of engineering diagram as the cross-section of the vehicle opened to the night. It slewed sideways and began to crash, and then I hit the road.

  It hurt. Rolling, bumping, tumbling, feeling pain in every part of my body before fetching up against a parked car with a final thud. I was half dazed but I knew that I was still in Rachel’s line of sight and I managed to stagger to my feet and start running again just as the front half of the car disintegrated in a dust cloud behind me. A second later I was under an awning and out of Rachel’s vision; there was an alley to the right and before she could get in sight of me again I sprinted down it.

  I ran and kept on running. I didn’t even think about turning to fight—it would be like trying to fight a tidal wave. If Rachel got a straight shot at me for even a second, she would snuff my life out like a candle in a storm. But no matter how powerful her disintegration magic was, it still needed a direct line of sight. As long as there was something between us she couldn’t hit me, and as long as I kept running fast enough it would stay that way. I kept turning corners, angling south towards Holborn, cutting across roads and through parks, always feeling Rachel behind me in my future sight. The sounds of the city were muted in the early morning, and the few people I passed turned to stare as I raced by. I hope none of them tried to stop Rachel; I didn’t have time to look and see.

  I don’t know how long that chase went on; it felt like hours but was probably only minutes. I could so easily have died that night and in my mind I did, seeing future after future where Rachel’s rays struck me, my world vanishing in a green flash and a moment of terrible agony and darkness. But I survived, and looking back on it now, I think what saved me wasn’t my magic but my legs. Rachel’s water magic is very, very good at destroying things, but one thing it doesn’t give is mobility. She can gate, but trying to gate on top of a sprinting man is like trying to swat a housefly with a hammer. Rachel had to catch me before she could kill me and I could run harder and longer than she could. I kept weaving through the streets, switching directions randomly, always looking ahead.

  I finally stopped running somewhere around Covent Garden. A theatre’s back door made a black gap in the wall, and I ducked inside it, my breath coming in ragged gasps. My mist cloak blended with the shadows, hiding my trembling. I was invisible . . . but that hadn’t stopped Rachel so far. I couldn’t see any trace of her in the futures ahead, but that didn’t reassure me; she’d found me in Elsewhere and jumped to me in the flesh. How had that even been possible? I couldn’t see any danger, but I didn’t want to stop. The rules that I’d thought would protect me hadn’t worked and even hiding didn’t feel safe anymore. The only thing I could think to do was to keep moving and I set off into the darkness.

  I walked all through the night. I had a destination in mind to begin with but somewhere along the way I got lost and my sleep-fogged brain couldn’t think clearly enough to come up with a new one. I kept moving and searching, looking for danger, finding nothing but afraid to stop and rest. The stars wheeled overhead, the summer constellations dipping below the horizon, and the people I passed in the night became faceless blurs, threats to be avoided.

  By the time the sky started to lighten in the east I was too tired to keep going. I was afraid to stop moving and afraid to sleep, but my limbs felt like lead and I was starting to get the weird light-headed feeling that comes with sleep deprivation. Going to Elsewhere doesn’t refresh you in the way that true sleep does; your body rests, but your mind doesn’t. The constant stress was draining my energy reserves and I was reaching my limits.

  I didn’t know where in London I was anymore; I had the vague feeling I was south of the river but I’d gotten lost after crossing Waterloo Bridge. I’d passed hotels, but I didn’t want to use them; hotels had people, and people were dangerous. Instead I searched the short-term futures as I walked, looking for somewhere empty.

  There was an old building down a narrow back street in the shadow of a red-and-brown tower block. It had been a pub once, but the sign was faded and the windows boarded up. Someone had smashed one of the boards around the back, and I used it to climb in. The ground floor was covered in bottles and plastic bags and old needles and rotting food, and it stank of piss and decay. I found a way up to the second-floor rooms; they were bare planks but at least they didn’t stink as badly. There were signs someone else had used the place—a lice-ridden mattress and some food wrappers—but it was empty now and that was all I cared about. I curled up in a corner and tried to rest.

  It took me a long time. Even though I was exhausted, I couldn’t fall asleep; every time I was beginning to drift a noise would jerk me back to wakefulness, searching the future for danger. As long as I stayed awake I could keep watch, but as soon as I fell asleep again I wouldn’t be able to protect myself. Fear isn’t new to me, but I couldn’t remember the last time I’d felt this kind of paranoia. Rachel shouldn’t have been able to find me. I’d been in a random room in a random hotel wearing my mist cloak, and everything I knew told me that I should have been safe. But I hadn’t been, and now I didn’t feel as though I was safe anywhere. The mist cloak felt warm and comfortable around me, softening the bare planks, but I couldn’t stop my mind worrying over what could happen next. The last two times I’d gone to sleep I’d woken up to near-death. I didn’t want to do it again.

  But I’m not Anne and I can’t switch off feeling tired. In the end, exhaustion won out.

  * * *

  Ididn’t sleep well.

  I used to have nightmares about my time in Richard’s mansion. Over the last year they’ve been getting better but sometimes they come back, and this was one of those times. I had dreams of being chased, running with leaden limbs but never being able to get away. I knew the people after me wanted revenge for what I’d done and the worst part was that I knew I deserved it. From time to time I’d drift half awake, vaguely aware that I should be watching for something, but I was too tired to remember what.

  And then the nightmares passed and I was in a peaceful dream. I was in my shop, minding the counter. Luna was upstairs and there were customers passing through, and for the first time in days I felt safe.

  Then I looked to one side and saw Shireen standing there, and suddenly I didn’t feel safe anymore. I threw up my hands. “No! Not again!”

  “It’s okay,” Shireen said.

  “I’m through with this! You hear me? Variam told me, right at the start. He asked what someone as crazy as Rachel would do if she found me sneaking around in her head. I shouldn’t have tried to spy on Rachel in the first place. It was fucking insane and I nearly died for it. I’m not doing it again, Shireen, you hear me? I’m done!”

  Shireen didn’t look upset. She stepped over the rope to the magic items section and picked up a wand, turning it over in her hands. “I was shielding you while you were in her memories,” she said without looking. “I’ve had a lot of time to practice with Elsewhere. I was trying to hide your presence so she wouldn’t see you. Rachel must have become suspicious. I’m sorry.”

  “You don’t think you could have warned me about that BEFORE?”

  “I know.”

  “Jesus.” I looked away. The customers were still in the shop, their conversation a gentle background murmur. Outside was the strange white glow of Elsewhere; at some point we’d left my dreams. I knew that I could go back if I wanted—Shireen couldn’t actually keep me in Elsewhere against my will—but I didn’t. There were things I wanted to know, and this time I knew the right questions to ask. “I know what you are now,” I said. “You told me when we first met, didn’t you? You told me you were a shadow. I didn’t know what you meant, but I sh
ould have figured it out from the start. Harvesting steals someone’s magic, but your magic’s part of you, isn’t it? You can’t take one without the other. When Rachel Harvested you, she wasn’t just taking your magic, she was taking you. And you’ve been living inside her head.”

  Shireen was silent for a while. “At first I didn’t know what had happened,” she said at last. “I thought I’d died and gone to . . . I don’t know. The next life, maybe. I felt wrong, like there were bits of me missing. And there were new memories. I could remember things I’d done with Rachel, except when I remembered them I was looking at me, from the outside. And then I started to see other things. The present as well as the past. I could see what Rachel saw.” Shireen looked up at me. “And finally I found I could talk to her.”

  I stared at Shireen. “She can see you, can’t she?”

  Shireen nodded.

  I covered my eyes. “Jesus.” I remembered my reunion with Rachel last year. She’d been talking to thin air, speaking to someone who didn’t answer. Now I knew who she’d been talking to. “So all these years she’s had you looking over her shoulder?” I shook my head. “She murdered her best friend and now she’s got her ghost following her around. No wonder she’s crazy . . .”

  “It’s . . . worse than that,” Shireen said.

  I stared at her. “How?”

  “You saw something in Rachel’s memories, didn’t you?” Shireen said. “Something they couldn’t see.”

  “That thing . . .” I remembered the spindly, inhuman form and had to hold back a shiver. “It’s real?”

  “It’s real.”

  “What is it?”

  “Do you know what it feels like, being Harvested?” Shireen asked.

  I shook my head.

  “It feels like your soul’s being ripped away.” Shireen’s eyes were distant. “You can’t move and you can’t scream, but you can feel every bit of it. It takes minutes but it feels like years. I knew what was happening to me, and I knew it was Rachel who was doing it. And I hated her for it. She was my oldest friend and she was killing me, and I wanted her to suffer, hurt her as much as she was hurting me . . .” Shireen fell silent for a moment, staring past me. “There’s a vulnerability to Harvesting. When you open yourself to take in the person whose magic you’re absorbing, you open yourself to . . . other things. I called out, and something came. It passed into Rachel. I don’t know what it is and I don’t think it has a name. I know it doesn’t talk. I don’t think it can do anything to me. But it can do things to her.”

  We stood in silence for a little while. “Are you really Shireen?” I said at last. “Or are you some sort of copy?”

  “I don’t know,” Shireen said simply, and somehow she sounded very sad. “I can remember my life, but it’s patchy. Like old plaster flaking off a wall. Sometimes Rachel’s memories feel more real than mine. Maybe the real Shireen died and she’s gone away and I’m just an echo. Or maybe I am still Shireen, and I won’t die until Rachel does . . .” She looked up at me. “How would I know?”

  I sighed, my anger draining away. “I guess you wouldn’t, would you?” I thought for a minute. “What happened after Rachel killed you?”

  “At first Rachel was preparing for Tobruk to come back,” Shireen said. “She wanted to be Richard’s Chosen and she was going to fight him for it, kill him if she had to.”

  “But Tobruk never came.”

  “And in the end she figured out why. She didn’t believe it at first, but after they found the body even she couldn’t pretend. In a way the two of you were on the same side back then, though she didn’t see it like that . . . And then it was time for Richard to leave. And they brought out Catherine.”

  I felt a sick sensation in the pit of my stomach. “Did Richard kill her?”

  Shireen shook her head.

  “Then is she—?”

  “Rachel did,” Shireen said, looking at me steadily. “You remember the room that was being built at the end of the catacombs? That was what it was designed for. Catherine begged and pleaded but Rachel didn’t listen. She did the ritual and it worked just like Richard said. It drained the life from Catherine’s body and opened a gate, just for a few seconds. Richard went through it. The last thing he told her was to watch for his return.”

  I stared down at the floor, feeling numb and hollow. So this was how it all ended. A part of me wanted to argue, tell Shireen that she must have made a mistake—but hadn’t I always known deep down that this was what must have happened? How likely was it that Catherine could have gotten away and survived for all these years without me or her brother or anyone else ever knowing? Will had been right after all. I had killed Catherine by capturing her—it had just taken a while for her to die. “Why did Rachel do it?” I said.

  “Because she didn’t have any choice,” Shireen said with a sigh. “That was how she saw it. She’d wanted to be Richard’s Chosen, and she wanted it so badly she killed me for it. Once she’d done that . . . If she stopped being his apprentice and walked away, it would all have been for nothing. She would have killed me for nothing. It was like . . . as long as he was giving the orders, she could pretend it wasn’t really her fault. He gave her an excuse.”

  “That’s bullshit! She always had a choice; she could have stopped!”

  Shireen looked past me. When she spoke, her voice sounded different, as though she were reciting.

  For mine own good,

  All causes shall give way: I am in blood

  Stepp’d in so far that, should I wade no more,

  Returning were as tedious as go o’er . . .

  I stared at her. “Where’s that from?”

  “A play I once saw,” Shireen said. She looked at me. “Do you know why Rachel hates you so much?”

  I shook my head.

  “Because you did go back. You stopped being Richard’s apprentice and started a new life. Every time Rachel looks at you she knows that she could have done it all differently, that she did have a choice. And she hates you for it because deep down there’s a bit of her that wishes she’d done the same thing. You’re a living reminder of the one thing in her past that she’s most ashamed of and that no one could ever forgive, and the worst part is that she knows she didn’t have to do it and that it was all her own fault.”

  “And then there’s you,” I said quietly. “She thought once she killed you it’d all be over, but she has to see you every day and be reminded of what she’s done. And on top of that she’s got this horror from God-knows-where in her head as well.” I shook my head. “Jesus.”

  Shireen nodded and we stood for a while in silence. “All right,” I said at last. “What do you want, Shireen? You said that after I’d seen all of this, there was something you were going to ask from me. What is it?”

  “I want you to help Rachel,” Shireen said. “Redeem her.”

  I stared at Shireen. “You have got to be kidding me.”

  Shireen shook her head.

  “You want me to do what? Save her soul?”

  “Something like that.”

  “I thought you didn’t believe in that stuff?”

  “When you’ve been a disembodied soul in someone else’s body for ten years it changes your attitudes a bit.”

  “She killed you!”

  “I still love her,” Shireen said simply. “She was my best friend and I never stopped caring about her, even after everything. I know what she did but you haven’t seen how much she’s suffered for it. Besides, if anyone’s got the right to decide whether she deserves to be forgiven, don’t you think it should be me?”

  I couldn’t think of anything to say to that. “Will you help me?” Shireen asked.

  “Shireen . . .” I dropped into my chair and covered my eyes, resting my head in one hand. “What do you expect me to do? You said it yourself, she hates me. And that was before she saw me spyin
g on her. Now she’s moved me up to ‘kill on sight.’”

  “I don’t think she’ll try to kill you,” Shireen said. “Not again.”

  I stared at Shireen. “Are you serious?”

  “She’s never actually tried to kill you before,” Shireen said. “Not really. The only reason she did this time was . . . well, she lost control a bit.”

  “A bit?”

  Shireen clasped her hands and gave me a hopeful look. “I’m pretty sure I can talk her around for next time.”

  “Have you considered,” I said carefully, “that hanging around in Rachel’s head for ten years might have messed up your standards a little?”

  “Maybe,” Shireen said. “But this is what I want. I’m not changing my mind on this one, Alex. If you want me to keep helping you, this is the price.”

  I looked at Shireen for a long time. “You know there’s no guarantee she’s going to listen to me,” I said at last. “Or anyone. If she makes a decision I can’t stop her.”

  “I know.”

  I stayed silent for a little while then shook my head. “I can’t promise anything,” I said at last. “Not yet. I understand why you want this, but . . . Look, tell me something. How the hell did Rachel find me?”

  “She’s always been able to,” Shireen said. “Didn’t you notice?”

  I started to answer, then stopped. When I’d seen Rachel last year at the British Museum I’d been in the shadows wearing my mist cloak. Rachel’s two companions, Cinder and Khazad, hadn’t noticed a thing . . . but Rachel had. She hadn’t found me but it had been close, and every time since then that I’d spied on her the same thing had happened. “Why?” I said.

  “Do you remember the first time you went to Elsewhere?” Shireen said. “The very first time?”

  “Yeah.” It had been Richard who’d shown us how to do it. The four of us had travelled there together—me, Shireen, Tobruk, and Rachel. It had been a memorable trip.