There were seven people in the room, four men and three women. Two of the men were working at computer consoles, as was one woman. Standard geeks, thought Tamar, who ought to have known better than to make snap judgements like that. Another man, extremely good looking with white blond hair and an air of extreme arrogance, was leaning back casually with his feet on a desk, one hand running through his hair the other hand contained a phone, into which he was talking animatedly. He looked like a stockbroker, but Tamar’s sixth sense said “con man”. She disliked him immediately. Two others, one man and one woman appeared to be soldiers, standing to attention at the opposite door. The last woman was more interesting. She was unquestionably a witch, but not like any witch Tamar had met personally. She was wearing a lab coat for one thing and wore her hair in a tight bun. Her face and hair looked faded like an old photograph from which the original colour had drained. She might have been a redhead once, and her eyes may have been blue, now the hair was sandy and the eyes grey. To the untrained eye she looked a lot like a high school science teacher. She was using the lab equipment to mix a potion or something like it. She looked up and smiled, the only one who did, Tamar smiled back, but she had reservations. These people did not look to her like a field unit. She wondered how any of them would handle an encounter with a werewolf, for example, or a vampire. She was willing to bet that not one of them had ever faced such an encounter. And there were worse things out there. She would rather have Denny at her back in that kind of a situation than any of these people. Especially that blond man, who looked as if he might crease up in a shower of rain; and all of them looked like they would faint at the sight of blood. Even Cindy would have been an improvement.
She gave no sign of what was going through her mind, however.
But The Director seemed to read her thoughts. ‘I can see you’re impressed,’ he said dryly. ‘But I wonder if you have considered that your own erstwhile little band of soldiers do not exactly look like a formidable front line in the fight against evil and yet … they have proved to be just that – with you to lead them.’
Tamar did not answer. ‘Erstwhile?’ she thought. ‘He’s taking a lot for granted isn’t he?’
‘Perhaps I should introduce you,’ he added.
But Tamar had already moved away from him. She stood silently behind the blond man on the phone for a few minutes listening to his subtle blandishments to a girl named Tiffany before suddenly darting forward and cutting the connection.
‘Does anyone ever actually fall for that?’ she asked him.
He grinned up at her. ‘A surprising amount of people,’ he told her. ‘People are gullible, ’specially when you tell them what they want to hear. My name’s Tony Rackham, and you must be Tamar.’ he held out a hand.
‘Tony,’ acknowledged Tamar coldly ignoring the proffered hand. ‘If that’s your real name.’ And, just for a second, Tamar saw his poise slip and a worried look creep into his eyes. However, he masked it quickly with a glib compliment and Tamar allowed herself to smile.
‘Pretty slick aren’t you?’ she said.
The girl in the lab coat hurried forward and held out a hand. ‘Hi, I’m Melissa Cuthbert, my real name,’ she grinned nervously. ‘It’s a great pleasure to meet you.’
A people pleaser, thought Tamar, shaking hands absently.
‘I was just running some tests on …’ Melissa stopped and glanced at The Director uncertainly as he coughed abruptly. ‘Oh,’ she faltered. ‘But I thought …’
‘Miss Black has not yet agreed to join us,’ said The Director firmly. The girl’s face reddened and she blinked rapidly. ‘Oh, but you will, won’t you?’ she asked earnestly. Tamar gave her a noncommittal smile.
‘This is Ray Evans,’ Melissa said, showing Tamar a scruffy looking man in his thirties with long reddish hair and an emaciated appearance, as if he were a zoo exhibit. ‘He’s a genius with computers.’
Ray, Tamar noticed immediately blanked the screen on his computer as she approached. He turned faded blue eyes on her for a split second and gave a disinterested shrug before turning away again. Tamar was fascinated by his skin, which looked parched and yellow, the colour of old newspaper.
‘And this is David Collins,’ continued Melissa. ‘He’s computers too,’ she added but did not explain further.
Exhibit B was younger and tidier, thought Tamar, than Exhibit A. And at least he smiled when he was introduced. But it was an empty smile, and there was no warmth in the dark brown, almost black eyes looking out warily from under a thick shock of dark brown hair that fell almost to his nose in an elaborately dishevelled style.
Tamar disliked him immediately too. ‘I’m doing well,’ she thought ironically.
‘And this is Valerie Byrnehil,’ finished Melissa. Introducing a stark, severe looking woman, with smooth pale skin and light blonde hair, and who would have been quite pretty had her face had more life in it. She turned sea coloured eyes on Tamar and gazed serenely at her as if she wanted to penetrate her soul. ‘Good luck with that,’ thought Tamar who was not at all sure that she even had one.
‘Valerie coordinates the team when we’re in the field,’ explained Melissa.
‘Ah,’ thought Tamar. ‘The Boss. No wonder she doesn’t look happy to see me.’
At that moment, they were interrupted by a loud droning sound followed by a lot of cursing. Tamar turned to see what appeared to be a bumblebee the size of her fist making a noise like a road drill, followed by a man chasing it with a net. ‘Damn the bloody thing, how the hell they keep getting out I’ll never know,’ he said apologetically.
‘They’re Fons,’ said Tamar. ‘You’ll never contain them,’
The man looked interested. ‘They’re what?’ he said.
‘Fons,’ said Tamar. ‘And it isn’t an insect whatever it may look like.’
‘We thought it was some sort of genetically engineered …’
‘No, no,’ Tamar laughed. ‘Fons are mystical creatures, perfectly harmless and not at all interesting. Sometimes the babies are mistaken for queen bees, but they don’t sting and aren’t at all interested in flowers. I’d let them go if I were you. The rest of the tribe will be coming for them, and you don’t want that believe me.’
‘We believe we have the whole – er tribe, did you say?’
‘I doubt it,’ said Tamar. ‘How many have you got?’
‘About a hundred and fifty.’
‘You’re about a million short of a whole tribe then,’ Tamar told him. ‘When they turn up they’ll cause chaos.’
‘I thought you said they were harmless,’ said The Director.
‘Oh they are,’ said Tamar, ‘just not very bright. Can you imagine a million of these things buzzing around the place like so many giant bees? Chaos!’
The Director turned to the man with the net. ‘Let them go,’ he said decisively. ‘Now!’ Tamar nodded.
When the man had hurried off Tamar turned on The Director. ‘What else have you got caged up here?’ she asked severely.
‘Why don’t I show you?’ he said imperturbably. ‘Maybe you can help us with some more identification.’
‘So, what exactly is this place?’ asked Tamar as The Director led her along more corridors. ‘What’s it all about? Is it government?’
‘No.’ The Director was firm. ‘We work for no governments. They work for us. The Agency – we have no other name – is like a “Men in Black” organisation for the supernatural. We assess threats and eliminate them. In absolute secrecy. No one knows we exist.’ He gave Tamar a sideways glance. ‘And yet,’ he continued, ‘despite considerable funding, top flight experts and state of the art equipment we do not possess the impressive track record of a small rag tag group of mavericks, who work apparently off the cuff, when it comes to saving the world from supernatural threats.’ He sighed. ‘We need your help. That’s the top and bottom of it.
‘Of course we had no more idea of your existence than you did of ours until recently. People who do what we do
have to work in secret out of necessity, and you kept your secret effectively for some years until this recent Faerie debacle. Something slipped I should say.’ He looked sideways at Tamar who nodded.
‘Something,’ she said quietly.
‘Of course we were aware of something else working away there in the background. Threats we had anticipated suddenly and inexplicably vanishing. And when you were exposed, we knew we had found you. All we had to do was backtrack events, and we found out a lot more than we ever imagined. So many threats averted that we had known nothing about, things that had never happened because of your interference, things that did happen and then, mysteriously, did not.
‘But the most amazing thing was you,’ he added. ‘I still can’t get used to the idea that you are five thousand years old. It’s incredible. And I’ve seen a few things I can tell you.’
Tamar smiled.
‘What it comes down to is this,’ he resumed. ‘You are now compromised, reporters on the doorstep and so on. We can help. With us, your anonymity will be restored. You will effectively disappear. You can continue to do what you do best which is what we all want.’ he smiled. ‘We might have left you to it had you not been exposed, but under the circumstances …’ he shrugged.
‘If we hadn’t been exposed, you’d never have found out about us,’ Tamar pointed out. ‘It’s not a question of leaving us alone. You’d have had no choice.’
‘A good point,’ The Director agreed. ‘But we did find out, because you were exposed. C’est la vie.’
‘We, on the other hand, have not been exposed. We are in a position to help each other now, do you see?’
Tamar did see. She hated all the publicity that had descended on her lately. The chance to retreat back into obscurity was extraordinarily tempting. And to be able to continue to fight. It all seemed too good to be true. She remembered what Denny was wont to say about that. “If something seems too good to be true – remember the Djinn code. There’s always a catch.” No one knew better than Tamar, that this was true.
‘Denny’ll never go for it.’ She voiced the thought without meaning to.
‘Perhaps he might be persuaded,’ said The Director, ‘when he considers the alternative. Spending the rest of his life in the spotlight – never getting anything useful done. However, you wanted to see our holding pens, here they are.’
The Agents had been waiting in their car when she had returned to the house. Tamar had been furious and had gone and released the dragon from the garage. To her immense satisfaction, it had landed heavily on the car. The Agents had seemed to panic, they scrambled out of the car, and Tamar had decided that they had learned their lesson. She called the dragon off and sent him to the back garden. But Agent Dawber had been …? It was as if he hadn’t known. Hadn’t known about her, or her powers. The look of shock on his face… But he had been in her house! He had seen! And earlier that very day, he must have seen her teleport. Then Agent Rook had dragged him back to the car and taken off, but she could not remember what had happened next.
However, she now had a shrewd idea.
~ Chapter Four ~
In a horrible little motorway café, two strange people sat uncomfortably in the plastic moulded seats and looked at their plates with a mixture of intrigue and horror. This is perhaps not unnatural, and it certainly caused little comment from the other patrons, many of whom were engaged in the same activity.
‘What do you suppose it is Fulk?’ said his mistress poking her plate suspiciously.
‘Err, the menuu, saays it’s caalled aa fuull Englishh breakfaast,’ said Fulk.’
‘Yes, but what is it? What’s this?’ She pointed at the plate.
Fulk leaned forward. ‘Shoe leather?’ he suggested.
‘I’m not hungry,’ she said decisively pushing the plate away.
Fulk hesitated, and then reached forward and scraped the plate onto his own and devoured the lot in one mouthful.
‘I do wish you wouldn’t do that,’ she snapped. ‘It’s so uncouth. People will stare.’ She took a tentative sip of her coffee and a look an agonized indecision came over her face; aware that people were, in fact, staring. The eternal conundrum faced her – to spit or swallow?
She swallowed, to the great disappointment of one youngster at the next table who had taken a bet with himself that she would spray the foul liquid all over her companion’s face and had been looking forward to seeing it.
‘Now, how long have we got Fulk?’ she said, ignoring her empty stomach.
‘AAbout a weeek,’ mumbled Fulk through a mouthful of food.
‘Ah, good. And how long will it take us to be ready?’
Fulk swallowed hastily. ‘AAbout a month Missteress,’ he rapped out and ducked behind a menu.
‘Hmm,’ she said calmly. ‘That should about do it. All right Fulk, let’s get out of here.’ She rose and walked out without a second thought for the bill. The manager went after her angrily but something in her face when he confronted her must have made him change his mind , and he decided instead to go home and have a lie down.
* * *
Denny sank down on his bed – his own bed, no point in sleeping in the spare room now – so, now he knew. Tamar did not want to be found. At least he had not been able to find her, which could only mean that she was hiding from him.
Why? He wondered. Why would she just leave like that? Surely, things had not been that bad. He remembered the lightning slinging. Okay, so pretty bad then, but still … he had a nagging feeling that he was missing something, something important. Maybe, if he relaxed and stopped worrying at it, it would come to him. He lay back and closed his eyes waiting for inspiration to hit him.
* * *
Tamar had been hanging around aimlessly for the last few days. She had been given new quarters and treated with deference. But still, she sensed that if push came to shove, she was a prisoner here. Of course, she would not have been Tamar if she had not already found a way out, but she was hanging fire on that for now.
‘Why?’ she wondered. Was it to find out what was really going on here, or was it that she was not ready to leave this place yet? The truth, she decided, was that she was seriously considering The Director’s offer. But she had not made her mind up yet. The Director, perhaps sensing this, had left her alone since that first day and she had been given free access to the whole complex – more or less. She knew that she would not be given total access or any more information until she said definitively that she would join them and she did not resent this attitude. In fact, she was led to believe that it was as much for her sake as for theirs. That if she knew too much, she would never be allowed to leave. They were not to know that she would find a way out anyway.
She had spent most of her time hanging around with the so-called Alpha team that she was expected to lead (if she decided to stay that was) pumping them for information, about themselves (which they were happy to give) and about The Agency (which they were not). Still she had managed to find out more than they realised, particularly from Tony the con man.
‘Takes one to know one,’ she thought ironically, and she was better at it than he was. She refused to call him Tony, being certain that it was an alias and, as she had said, ‘if I don’t know your real name what shall I call you?’
He demurred, finally admitting that his name was embarrassing, which was tantamount to an admission, so she compromised and referred to him constantly as “Slick”
Slick was easy to pump for information being a talker by trade and, on top of this, almost insupportably arrogant. None the less, despite this, or perhaps because of this, she was beginning to rather like him. He did have a charm of his own, which he used shamelessly, rather like herself.
Melissa was another talker; she chattered on inconsequentially all the time, which Tamar recognized as a defence against actually telling her anything. However, she was a talented witch, Tamar surmised, and only needed experience to be as good as Cindy, maybe even better.
Ray turne
d out to be an amiable slacker (which was what he looked like) a computer geek and severely allergic to soap. There was not much below the surface there, Tamar decided. He spent his time following supernatural trends on the Aethernet, occasionally taking a break to play computer games of unparalleled viciousness and difficulty, and became pro-Tamar very quickly after she repeatedly beat him at “Demon Slayer II” having never played before – and with no intention of ever playing again. She forbore to point out that the demons were very unrealistic, inasmuch as they looked nothing like any of the demons she had previously met.
David was a different story though. Tamar decided he was sly. Outwardly friendly, she sensed that he did not like her at all, or, in fact, anyone at all. David was no hacker; he was a programmer and weapons designer. It took Tamar two days of subtle espionage to discover what she suspected that the rest of the team did not even know; that weapons and computer programs were not all that he designed. She kept her knowledge to herself but resolved to keep an eye on him. She suspected that he was working independently of the team, directly for The Director and that he had been placed on the team to hide his true activities which, when viewed in the abstract, were horrifying.
Valerie was rarely there; she stopped in occasionally to show her face and cadge a coffee, but was not a part of the team’s activities. She monitored the teams when they were out in the field and had direct control (under The Director) of the base including the field agents like Rook and Dawber, handing out assignments etc. but otherwise had little to do with any of them.
Tamar thought she was disposed to resent her own presence but could not find any solid reason for thinking so. On the few occasions that they met, Valerie greeted her with a neutral remark and a bland smile, which was how she treated everyone – except Slick, who often got the favour of a wider smile and a light touch on the shoulder.
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