Tarnished City

by Vic James

  Abi wished, then, that she had called Security – not for Dog, but simply because they might have broken up the crowd, aborted this speech. Because Abi wasn’t sure she could listen to a minute more of it. Jenner hadn’t written a word, she was certain. Perhaps his father had; perhaps even Bouda Matravers. It had her cruel inverted logic. Maybe his mother was using Skill even now to compel him to deliver it.

  ‘He’s kind of gorgeous,’ Abi heard the woman next to her say to her friend. ‘If only he wasn’t the same age as my kid. Oh well, I suppose I could always mother him.’ Her laugh was swollen with innuendo, and Abi hunched wretchedly into her scarf. Weren’t they listening to what he was saying?

  ‘You will be hearing more from my family, in the days to come, about how we intend to improve Britain for everyone. This country has lacked strong leadership for a long time. Now, in my father – in all of us – you have people who — ’

  Which was when something arced over the heads of the gathered spectators and landed, with remarkable accuracy, a few paces in front of Jenner. Abi’s eye caught it as it descended. It was about the same size as a football, tatty and discoloured.

  Someone at the front of the barrier screamed and there was a backward surge of people, opening a space around where the Equals stood.

  It didn’t look like a bomb – though Abi knew that these days, a bomb could look like anything: a parcel, a saucepan, or a child’s school bag. It was round, and rocked to a still on the cobbles.

  Jenner held out his hands, calmingly, just as he did with his horse. A few people were pushing their way backwards, trying to get away. Abi knew she should do the same, not least because Security might cordon off the area and question all those present. But just like everyone else, she wanted to know what was in the bag that Dog – because it had to have been Dog – had thrown.

  Jenner crouched down. Those freckle-dusted features grimaced as he came close to the bag, as if it stank. That must have been the source of Dog’s terrible smell, not the man himself.

  With one hand, Jenner gripped the cloth; with the other, he reached inside. Abi saw him recoil as his fingers found whatever was in there. What he pulled out was a horror.

  A severed human head, the brown hair matted with blood. Where the eyes had been were jellied clots. The lips had been neatly sliced away, the head grinning at its own ghastly fate. Thanks to the lapel mic, everyone present heard Jenner’s appalled whisper.

  ‘Cousin Ragnarr.’

  Security surged forward and swept Jenner, Lady Thalia and the rest of the Equals away to their cars, and Abi turned and pushed through the throng before a cordon went up. She walked as fast as she could while remaining inconspicuous, then jogged up a side street towards Piccadilly, where she lost herself in the crowds.

  Abi was trembling, and made herself sit down on the steps of the Eros statue. All around, neon advertising hoardings flashed distractingly, and her thoughts were equally lurid and confused. What had just happened, there at the Queen’s Chapel?

  Dog had dispatched another Vernay. It was a personal vendetta. But what did it mean that he had launched his grisly trophy at Jenner and his mother? Was it no more than gloating provocation? Or was he now turning his murderous intent towards the Jardines?

  And then there was Jenner’s speech. That had disturbed her more than she cared to admit. It felt like a riddle she needed to solve, but the answer would be nothing good. She bought coffee from one of the plaza’s stalls, to try and sharpen her thoughts, then walked shakily to a bus stop.

  As she turned the key of the Hackney house and pushed at the door, she heard voices. Abi froze halfway. It could be anyone. Had Security tracked her to this address?

  But then a familiar voice said ‘. . . see who it is,’ and Faiers’ head appeared in the hallway. He beckoned Abi in.

  ‘They’ve arrived,’ he said. ‘The first few from the Bore, friends and associates of the ones Bouda rounded up. Twelve prisoners were taken in all, and with what Bouda has planned, these guys are desperate to get their friends back – and cause a bit of trouble along the way. There’s also one incredible surprise.’

  ‘I hope it’s a good one,’ Abi muttered. ‘Because you’ll never guess what’s been going on this morning.’

  ‘The memorial,’ Faiers said. ‘You were there? Ragnarr Vernay’s head? I was just sent a notification via Bouda’s office.’

  ‘Never mind the head,’ said Abi, grimacing. ‘You should have heard the speech.’

  She followed Faiers into the sitting room, where half a dozen men sat talking. They were all ages – though really, their ages were unguessable, because what showed in their faces was the strain of harsh outdoor labour. All had rough, sun-darkened complexions, and their faces were deeply scored with lines.

  Renie was cross-legged on the floor, leaning like a puppy against the shin of a man on the sofa, a compactly built black guy whose face bore the pink shine of a burn. His hand rested lightly on her springy hair.

  ‘Abi!’ she called, waving with one hand, even as she wrapped the other around the man’s calf. The kid looked like she hadn’t slept in the days since Abi had seen her last. Her eyes had a raw, rubbed look about them.

  ‘My uncle Wesley,’ she explained. ‘Ma’s brother.’

  So it really was good news. Except Abi then had to go and ruin it.

  ‘And your brother Mickey – wasn’t he in the Bore, too?’ As Renie turned her face into her uncle’s knee, the reason for her swollen, pink eyes became all too apparent.

  ‘Some bloke fell into a slurry tank last year,’ said Wesley, petting Renie’s hair. ‘And Mickey got sent in after him. Neither of them made it out.

  ‘It was devastating not being able to protect my own sister’s kid. But now I’ve been sent another one. Nothing is going to happen to this precious girl. And I’m not gonna let the Equals destroy another family like they did mine – and yours, ’cause Renie’s told me all about you, Abi Hadley. We’re here to get our friends back. But not just for that. These folks’ rule has gotta end.’

  ‘So I guess it’s time I told you what we’re up against,’ said Faiers, entering the room with a teapot. He set it down and folded his arms, like a doctor readying himself to break bad news.

  ‘Heir Bouda and Chancellor Jardine are reviving an ancient tradition. The prisoners from the Bore will be executed at the first Blood Fair to stain this city in two centuries.’

  Abi’s gorge rose. Jardine was set on twisting the country into his own cruel image. Surely Britain wouldn’t stand for it?

  Then she remembered the crowd that morning. How people had jostled for a view of the Founding Family, and lapped up the awful speech Jenner had been made to deliver.

  The most frightening thing wasn’t that Jardine wanted a Blood Fair, she realized. It was that the people might want it, too.

  20

  Gavar

  ‘Why choose between being either feared or loved?’ Father said, turning his lion’s smile around the table. ‘The perfect authority is both.’

  Gavar doubted Father would know what love was if it sent him a box of pink lingerie on Valentine’s Day. In fact, he thought, looking round the intimate dining room in the Chancellor’s suite at Westminster, they weren’t a very lovable lot. Next to Father sat Gavar’s ice queen wife, Bouda. Opposite Bouda was Silyen, who had turned up an hour earlier by helicopter, saying he’d just been visiting a friend. It was news to Gavar that Silyen had any friends. Mother had greeted Sil frostily. She was wounded that he had missed Aunty Terpy’s memorial, especially given that he’d been with her at Orpen when she died.

  Jenner was probably winning in the popularity stakes right now. Mother had spruced him up since his ennoblement, and the whole ‘grieving nephew’ routine had gone down well – particularly the horrible denouement with Cousin Ragnarr’s head. He sat opposite Gavar, pale and tense, holding himself upright as if practising for his new public role. What was going on in his head, Gavar wondered, thrust into a position beyond his
wildest dreams? It was surprising, now that he thought about it, how little he understood either of his brothers.

  ‘We are known as the Founding Family,’ Father said. ‘Because our ancestors Lycus, Cadmus, Aristide and the rest founded a new Britain. One ruled not by effete and Skilless monarchs, but by the Skilled and strong. However, I believe they made one regrettable error.’

  Across the table, Silyen’s eyebrows twitched.

  ‘They instituted a parliament and a seven-year Chancellorship – understandably, to signal a break with the degenerate tradition of the kings. However, it denied the country the stability of enduring authority. An authority that it sorely needs in these troubled times, when our relationship with the other great powers of the world is in flux. I intend to change this.’

  Father sat back in his chair, that penetrating gaze of his inspecting them one by one to see if his words had sunk in. Gavar knew what he thought he’d heard. He could almost see Father’s fingers wrapped around the arms of the Chancellor’s Chair, gripping tighter and tighter until they could never be prized off.

  Opposite, Jenner looked startled, trying to make sense of it. Silyen was as inscrutable as ever, a smirk just visible behind his tangle of hair. Mother simply nodded; she had given up voicing opposition to Father on anything years ago.

  No, the person most electrified by Father’s pronouncement was the one person who Gavar thought might have heard it in advance: Bouda. She and Father were thick as thieves these days, cloistered for hours plotting new policy and legislation. At least that’s what he presumed they were doing. Were it not for the fact that Bouda had a younger, handsomer version of Father at hand – to wit, Gavar himself – he might have suspected them of carrying on an affair. He wondered if he would care if they were.

  Bouda was frowning. ‘Are you proposing some kind of Chancellorship in perpetuity?’

  ‘I prefer “of indeterminate term”,’ said Father. ‘But yes. And around me, a First Family: all of you. When the people see us as mere politicians, they fail to respect us. Politicians are accountable, replaceable. They exist to serve the people. This was the error of Zelston’s Chancellorship.

  ‘We Equals are not politicians, beholden to the will and mandate of the masses. We are leaders and rulers. Our Skill sets us apart. It is time the commoners remember that – and that we remember it, too.’

  Well. Gavar reached for his wine glass. Opposite, Silyen set up a slow handclap. All eyes turned to him.

  ‘Bravo, Father,’ Sil said. ‘That last bit. I couldn’t agree more, albeit we differ on the details.’

  Gavar eyed his brother narrowly. Something about Silyen felt different tonight, though it was hard to say exactly what. You wouldn’t think it possible for Sil to be any more arrogant than he already was, and yet he somehow radiated self-confidence.

  Could it be his imminent elevation to the lordship of Far Carr? After which, Gavar realized with chagrin, Silyen would outrank him. His little brother’s rise had been breathtakingly swift. And now even Mother and Jenner were getting in on the act, thanks to Aunt Euterpe’s death.

  Aunt Euterpe’s unexpected death, when no one had been with her except Silyen.

  People couldn’t really die of a broken heart, could they?

  Those old suspicions Gavar had harboured of Father and Silyen acting in cahoots came roaring back. Surely the pair of them hadn’t planned all this? Rix’s death in custody could have been Father’s handiwork, delivering Far Carr to Silyen. While Aunty Terpy’s death could have been Sil reciprocating in kind, clearing a path for the last two members of the ‘First Family’ to take a seat in the House of Light.

  But Silyen had genuinely cared for their aunt – hadn’t he?

  Bouda interrupted his thoughts. She looked like a dinner guest gagging on an indigestible meal even as she strove to compliment the chef.

  ‘It is an excellent plan. Our prestige has been dealt a blow by Zelston’s inadequacy. In this climate of unrest, it’s essential that we reassert ourselves by every means at our disposal.

  ‘And an “indeterminate term” is exactly right. We wouldn’t wish to alarm the people – or, more pertinently, our Equals – with notions of a dictatorship, a Chancellor who will never be dislodged.’

  Gavar snorted. Bouda was so painfully transparent. Why didn’t she just say it? She didn’t want Father hogging the Chancellor’s Chair, because she had designs to sit on it herself one day.

  Well, let the pair of them slug it out. Gavar’s interest in the Chancellorship, never strong, was waning by the day. Even the attractions of London were dimming. All he wanted right now was to be back at Kyneston with his daughter.

  Except Father had lost none of his proficiency at spoiling Gavar’s life at every opportunity.

  ‘I have had Aston House reopened,’ he announced. ‘It will become the official residence of the First Family. Your mother has been busy these past weeks ensuring that it will be ready for us to move into following tomorrow’s ceremony. After the investiture of Thalia, Jenner and Silyen we will drive in convoy from the House of Light – accompanied by a Security escort, flags, that sort of flummery. We will then make a public appearance on the balcony. We must let the people see us.

  ‘Furthermore, word has somehow leaked about Meilyr Tresco being stripped of his Skill. That such a thing is possible makes us look weak, never mind that it can be done by only one man, who is one of us. So by way of a corrective, your mother and I will provide a sufficiently showy demonstration of our ability.’

  ‘Aston House?’ Gavar asked. Surely that wasn’t the one he thought it was? The vast, pompous building, all columns and windows, that stood at the end of the Mall. In Gavar’s lifetime it had lain shuttered and sepulchral.

  ‘You know, darling,’ Mother chided him gently. ‘The building the Last King gifted to one of his commoner favourites. After the Revolution his descendants remodelled it into that monstrosity, before realizing their mistake and handing it back to the nation to avoid being bankrupted by the running costs. Not a problem when staffed with slaves, of course, though I’ve had to recruit simply dozens of them.’

  ‘The place has lain empty for decades,’ Father said. ‘It is the perfect symbol of commoner hubris, and the ideal beginning to our new regime.’

  And that, it appeared, was that.

  Which was how, a day later, Gavar came to be sitting beside Bouda, waving asininely as the motorcade turned into the Mall and crawled towards Aston House. The family was in four vehicles, three of them open convertibles: Mother and Father in front, followed by Gavar and Bouda, then Jenner and Silyen. The closed car at the back contained Libby, watched over by Daisy. All four vehicles writhed with coruscations of protective Skill, like the world’s most expensive paint job.

  Ahead rode cavalry in ceremonial uniform, preceded by a marching band, and the Mall was hung with national flags. Their red, white and blue was vivid against the bright sky. At the rate Father was going, the Jardine salamander would soon be worked into the design somewhere.

  Gavar had almost hoped that Father’s exhibitionism would fall flat, but it was as if half of London had turned out to see them. People stood a dozen deep behind temporary barricades. Security officers patrolled up and down, hands ready on the guns at their hips.

  Some in the crowd waved flags, or held banners and signs. An excitable girl jumped up and down at the front of the barriers holding a gaily lettered placard. It read ‘Future Mrs Silyen Jardine’. Gavar rolled his eyes. Good luck with that one. Another sign nearly made him choke – it was a photograph of himself and Bouda on their wedding day, cut into a heart shape and decorated all over with ribbons. Was it for real? He nudged Bouda, who looked as startled as he did before leaning across to direct a gracious wave at the person holding it, who emitted a joyful scream.

  ‘Your father was right,’ she murmured as she pulled back. ‘They love us. How can they? Such sheep.’

  But not all of them did. Here and there, towards the back of the crowd,
the occasional scuffle erupted. One man was yelling obscenities as he was dragged away. Gavar saw Kessler, his recruit from Millmoor Security, barking into his comm set as he identified potential troublemakers. The man was good. An utter brute, but good. He was Bouda’s creature now. One less thing for Gavar to worry about.

  The motorcade pulled up before the gate of the great house. It was a bog-standard wrought-iron affair, underwhelming after the pageantry Mother had woven into everything else.

  Until the gate flared gold, fizzing and glittering. As Gavar watched, gilded vines and flowers unfurled, branched and blossomed. The entire structure glowed like liquid fire.

  The crowd fell silent, watching the spectacle. The vines curved into two high arches. Across them both, snaking shoots met and twined in an intricate architrave. At its centre swelled a glowing orb, like some monstrous fruit. The orb burst in a spray of embers, revealing the familiar oval monogram of the entwined family initials, P and J. The onlookers ooohed and applauded. Even Gavar was impressed, despite himself. He hoped Libby had been able to see clearly from her car at the back, and hadn’t been alarmed.

  How would his daughter fit into this ‘First Family’ of Father’s? Gavar suspected he’d have to pick his battles on that.

  The glowing gates – perhaps their radiance would remain undimmed, a perpetual reminder of the power of those who lived behind them – swung open and the cars rolled forward. Security held the crowds at bay as the vehicles slowed to a halt before the house’s pillared front entrance. Liveried slaves opened the Bentley’s doors, and Gavar went immediately to collect his daughter.

  ‘Was she okay with that?’ he asked Daisy quietly, as he folded Libby’s tiny hand in his and led her to the door. Mother’s instructions had been for them to go straight inside and make their way to the balcony.

  ‘She thought it was fireworks,’ Daisy said, grinning. ‘Your new place is rather grand, isn’t it? Kyneston not posh enough for you any more?’

  Gavar shot her a pained look. ‘Just don’t.’