The Rook

by Daniel O'Malley

  “Thank you,” said one of them.

  It was true, she had to admit. Whatever the other bodies looked like, these two were gorgeous. Thick blond hair, blue eyes, and golden brown tans. In this country? How in God’s name do they manage that? Do their weird genetic powers include the ability to bronze without sunlight? They were clearly twins, but some care had been taken to make them look different from each other. The twin on the right had shorter hair, artfully tousled with gel, while the twin on the left had a more standard haircut, carefully brushed. They wore different suits. One twin sprawled in his chair, and the other sat attentively, although neither of them seemed particularly comfortable. And one was staring at her thoughtfully while the other directed his attention to straightening his pants. She mentally christened them Cool Twin and Tidy Twin.

  It was downright eerie when Myfanwy remembered that there was one mind in those two heads. It was even eerier when she remembered that there were two other bodies wandering around somewhere, controlled by the same mind. Stay calm, she thought, and try not to be freaked out by the fact that you’re talking to a hive mind that freaks out the freaks in the Checquy. And don’t automatically assume that this is the one behind the attack on Thomas. And even if it is, it probably won’t make a move in your office.

  “We only just got back from that operation in Essex,” Cool Twin was saying. “You’re looking, ah, a little different, Myfanwy.”

  “It’s the black eyes,” suggested the other twin.

  “No,” disagreed his brother. “It’s something else.” Myfanwy tried to look enigmatic and probably failed. She watched them shift in the chairs.

  “So, what happened to your eyes?” asked Tidy Twin.

  “Oh, uh, someone tried to mug me,” she said.

  “But you’re all right?” he said.

  “I’m fine,” said Myfanwy. “A bit achy, but fine.”

  “Interesting…,” mused Cool Twin.

  Crap, this isn’t in keeping with the traditional meek and mild Myfanwy Thomas, Myfanwy realized. She thought about trying to appear more traumatized but instead opted for misdirection.

  “So, where are your siblings hanging out nowadays?” she asked. Thomas’s notes hadn’t included photos, and she was keen to see the brother her predecessor had had a crush on.

  “Eliza is leading a team in Aberdeen, chasing down that antler cult,” one of them said dismissively. “Robert is back in our office.”

  “Well, I hope they’re keeping well,” she said pleasantly. This Gestalt is good, she thought. It’s like they really are three brothers and a sister. Myfanwy realized that one of the twins had been speaking and she hadn’t been paying attention. “I’m sorry, what did you just say?”

  “Alex was just explaining that we know they’re fine,” explained Tidy Twin.

  “Ah, of course, of course,” Myfanwy agreed sharply, suddenly irritated with his patronizing tone. “They’re fine. You’re fine. I’m fine. We’re all fine. Can I get you a beverage?” she offered. One ordered coffee and the other ordered orange juice. “Certainly. Ingrid?” The secretary, who must have been listening through the open door, appeared miraculously with a tray. “Thank you.”

  “I understand you came in a little late this morning,” said Cool Twin.

  “Huh?” replied Myfanwy with startling presence of mind.

  “Well, normally you’re the second person in the Rookery, after that assistant of yours,” said Tidy Twin.

  “Yes?” said Myfanwy. What, do these guys keep tabs on my comings and goings? “Well, I… had an appointment.” They regarded her with expectant eyes, and she was suddenly filled with a desire to shake up those proprietary stares. “A gynecologist appointment.” She smiled triumphantly at the twins. “To have my vagina checked,” she added. They nodded in unison and, to her private satisfaction, seemed somewhat disconcerted. Of course, they do have a female body, she remembered, slightly crestfallen. They probably aren’t going to be freaked out at the mention of female matters. “And… it’s still… there. And okay.”

  “That’s… good,” said Tidy Twin.

  “Yes, anyway, let’s get down to business.” Fortunately, Thomas had left an agenda for her meeting with Gestalt, and Myfanwy was able to run down the list—or would have been if she hadn’t moved the meticulous piles around. “Okay, let’s see…” She shuffled through papers.

  “I believe you have some documents for me to sign,” said Cool Twin.

  “Yuh,” she said shortly, finding the stack exactly where she’d left it. “So, um, you need to sign these… things… which I have already signed, I think.” She flipped through them hurriedly and saw the signature of Myfanwy Thomas. “Yes, I have signed them, and now you need to. So, here is a letter to the… Prime Minister… of Great Britain that states that we are aware of nothing he needs to know about.” She passed the documents over to the twins, who began signing them. She watched with fascination as they produced identical signatures simultaneously, one with the left hand, one with the right.

  “You missed this one,” said Tidy Twin, handing her a contract.

  She took it and had a dreadful moment of realization. Crap. Signature. What did Thomas’s signature look like? She’d seen it a minute ago, and Thomas had signed at least one of the letters to her, but she hadn’t really spent much time contemplating its form or shape. In retrospect, that had been a mistake. Oh God. She took a breath and was aware that Tidy Twin was staring at her. She smiled tightly at him, and then signed it. Is that it? It looks familiar. Still, neither twin seemed overly interested in her signature. Nor did either compare the new one with the old ones. “All righty, thanks. I’ll take those and make sure they get to… where they need to go.

  “Now,” Myfanwy continued, “this week’s schedule. Okay, it looks as if I’ve got rather a lot of meetings with accountants about—are you all right?” she asked. Both the twins Gestalt were staring blankly into space. That’s creepy.

  “I’m about to go into the headquarters of the cult,” said the twins in unison. “Do you want commentary?”

  “Uh, sure,” said Myfanwy. “Should I take notes?”

  “Not necessary,” said Gestalt through two mouths. “The teams are equipped with recording material. We’re gathering at the door, and Pawn Kirkman is looking through it. He’s signaling that there are three people on the other side—armed. Cooper, once Meaney brings the door down, launch stun grenades.” Myfanwy looked up in surprise—the twins’ voices had shifted, becoming higher, intent. She realized that she was hearing the voice of their sister giving orders. “I’m giving the countdown: Three! Two! One!” The twins’ left arms jerked slightly, presumably mirroring the motions of their sibling more than two hundred miles away.

  “Meaney has punched down the door, and we’ve drawn back to avoid the concussion. Now we’re in, with five men in front of me. They’ve covered the foyer and—take him! Take him! Okay, a man with antlers is down. Team one, hold the foyer. Teams two and three move in. Keep in mind, people, that we want as few deaths as possible. Immobilize them. Kirkman is scanning surrounding rooms. You four—secure that room. Move forward.”

  For the next forty-five minutes, Myfanwy listened intently as Gestalt led the assault. Soldiers were directed, orders given, cultists restrained or dispatched (depending on the extent of their dedication to the cause). She was treated to a blow-by-blow account as the female Gestalt was surprised by an attack, and her guards were impaled on the prongs of a high priest’s antlers. She watched as the twins’ muscles tensed while their sister kicked and spun and punched, with only sharp, shrill exclamations shooting out of their lips. Finally, after a high-pitched kiYAA!, they settled back, breathing heavily, and explained that Eliza had just broken the neck of the leader of the antler cult, and that the complex was secured.

  “Wow. Great,” said Myfanwy. “Nicely done.”

  “Hmm,” said Tidy Twin absently. “Eliza has blood on her boots.”

  “That’s lovely, Gestalt,” M
yfanwy said, trying to keep her cool. “More coffee? Or more orange juice? No? Perhaps I could have Ingrid fetch you a couple of moist towelettes.”

  Once the twins had left (still somewhat unsteady on their feet), Myfanwy sat for a long time turning things over in her mind. After their commentary on the strike, the twins had had trouble focusing on the rest of the agenda, and they’d agreed to attend to the remaining administrative details later. Watching the satisfaction with which the twins narrated the attack and hearing the play-by-play of their sister’s skill, she’d felt her own muscles tensing. The bruises on her body ached, and she could easily imagine the twins beating her, their eyes coming alive with violence.

  I cannot meet every member of the Court and automatically assume that he or she is the traitor, she decided. It’s entirely possible that Gestalt didn’t order the attack on Thomas and that I spent the entire meeting sweating through my clothes for nothing. But who did give the order? Myfanwy leaned back in her chair and laced her fingers behind her head.

  Too many questions. And I don’t even know everything that Thomas knew. Not yet. But I will.

  She reached for the purple binder.

  The Rooks

  For the first few centuries, the Rooks were the martial leaders of the Checquy. That is to say, they headed all military actions. Traditionally filled by members of the noble class, the position called for an encyclopedic knowledge of tactics and strategy, but little else. If the Pawns were the blade the Checquy swung, then the Rooks were its hilt.

  The old leaders of the Checquy looked upon the Rooks as weapons and nothing more. They were the hounds to be released, and even if they were the heads of the pack, they were still only hounds. In 1702, it was the Rooks who led the four-pronged assault on Brigadoon and burned every structure in the place. Some of its citizens were put to death, and the rest were shipped down to Wales, where they were set to mining lead. The properties of the mines prevented any of those extraordinary people from escaping, and they all perished in captivity. (In the late 1960s, however, an individual claiming to be “the last son of Brigadoon” surfaced and wreaked havoc for years before being subdued and dissected.)

  One notorious Rook, Rupert Chamberlain, was kept chained up in the vaults beneath the White Tower until he was needed, at which point he was transported in a cage to the appropriate location and unleashed upon whatever hapless target the leaders had selected. During his tenure, he devoured the Duke of Northumberland, the ambassadors of France and Italy, an archdeacon, and one of his fellow Rooks.

  Then, in 1788, the situation changed drastically. A massive redistribution of power led to the new status of the Rooks. Rather than being the generals of the Checquy, the Rooks were placed in charge of all domestic affairs. They became the administrative guardians of the United Kingdom. Now if something strange comes up within the British Isles, the Rooks are the ones who deal with it. We are executives, and though we still periodically mete out violence, it is by delegation. We don’t have to get our hands dirty unless we want to. I, for one, prefer to remain in the office, but Rook Gestalt seems to enjoy fieldwork.

  Your main concern will be to master the running and politics of the domestic Checquy forces. You’ll be meeting with and coordinating the teams of Pawns who work in the country and assigning them to various tasks. You will also oversee the management of the Rookery, working closely with Gestalt.

  Oh, that’s going to be fun, Myfanwy thought.

  And you meet regularly with the other members of the Court to coordinate the Checquy’s movements.

  It’s all fairly self-explanatory, really.

  Oh, well, thanks an awful lot, Thomas, Myfanwy thought bitterly. It sounds like I’m the Defense Minister of Ghosts and Goblins, but as long as the job is “all fairly self-explanatory,” I’ve no doubt it will be fine. The country might get overrun by brownies and talking trees, but what the hell—there’s always Australia! Seething, Myfanwy threw down the purple binder and realized that she had been chewing her nails. Great, that’s probably a new habit. I can’t see Rook Thomas, administrator extraordinaire, biting her nails. This must mean that I’m finally developing my own identity. Myfanwy was staring sourly at the portraits of the Rooks and wondering which of the subjects had been chained up in the Tower of London when Ingrid came bustling in.

  “Rook Thomas, I’ve canceled your lunch at Christifaro’s,” she said.

  “Why?” Myfanwy asked in dismay. “That’s the only thing I’ve had to look forward to!”

  “An emergency has emerged, and both you and Rook Gestalt have been summoned to an interrogation,” the secretary replied in an unruffled manner.

  “Oh. Okay.” Myfanwy looked down at her desk, thought for a moment, and then looked up. “Are we getting interrogated, or are we doing the interrogating?” she asked. Ingrid looked a little startled but explained that some poor twerp the Checquy had captured would be interrogated. Apparently, a specific member of the staff would be doing the questioning, and Myfanwy and Gestalt would be there serving in an audience capacity.

  “So I don’t have to do anything?”

  “No, ma’am.”

  “Should I bring anything, do you think?”

  “What, like snacks?” her secretary asked.

  “I’ll bring my notepad,” Myfanwy decided. “And a pen.”

  “They have stenographers there, you realize. And video cameras,” Ingrid pointed out.

  “Yes, I know,” Myfanwy replied tartly. “But I like to take my own notes.”

  “Very good, ma’am.”

  “Yes. Now, would you accompany me to the interrogatory… the interrararium… the interrogation… place? I would value your observations.” After all, she could hardly ask for directions, could she?

  “Certainly, ma’am. After you.” Ingrid swept aside to allow Myfanwy to walk ahead.

  “No, no,” Myfanwy said hurriedly. “After you.”

  “That’s highly irregular, Rook Thomas,” Ingrid observed.

  “Humor me,” Myfanwy answered.

  “As you please.”

  The two women walked briskly down the hallways, and the people ahead of them pressed themselves against the walls so the Rook and her secretary could get by easily. Heavy wooden doors dotted the corridors. Whenever she passed an open doorway, Myfanwy slowed down and snuck a peek. In one room, three men were poring over a map and shouting at one another in hushed voices, like angry librarians. In another, an elderly Pakistani gentleman with a monocle brandished a walking stick under the nose of a short fat man in a caftan. Through another door, there was a room filled with bookshelves. Seated at a massive wooden desk, a man with curly hair was reading intently from a ledger and absentmindedly stroking the head of a large condor that perched proudly on his wrist. He looked up as they passed, and his eyes widened in surprise.

  Finally, they came to a pair of massive iron doors with a metal plate set into them. Ingrid stepped aside and looked at Myfanwy expectantly. Fortunately, Myfanwy vaguely recalled reading something about this. She moved forward and placed both her hands flat against the plate. The metal warmed underneath her palms, and the doors opened slowly, with a sound of grinding gears. Behind those doors was, in a stunning anticlimax, another set of doors, which slid open. A lift.

  They descended for many floors, until it was clear that they were several stories beneath the ground. Neither of them said anything, but Myfanwy took the opportunity to eye her secretary in the mirrored walls. Ingrid was tall, in her late forties, and her auburn hair was immaculately coiffed. She was slim and fit-looking, as if she spent every afternoon playing tennis. She wore a few pieces of discreet gold jewelry, including a wedding ring. Myfanwy breathed in gently through her nose and smelled Ingrid’s good perfume. The business suit she wore was of a light purple, and exquisitely cut.

  Myfanwy looked herself over in the mirror. The hair she had swept back into a clip was coming loose, and her suit (although far more expensive than Ingrid’s) was rumpled. She’d neglected mak
eup entirely, and those damn black eyes lent her the appearance of a raccoon. A raccoon that had gotten hit in the face. After a lifetime of poor nutrition.

  The silence was broken only by the humming of the lift, and it felt conspicuous.

  “So, Ingrid,” Myfanwy said conversationally. “Do you ever get tired of purple?” The secretary turned surprised eyes on her boss, but before she could answer, the doors opened.

  5

  Dear You,

  I’m not bipolar, I’ve just had a bipolar life foisted upon me.

  My personal life consists of my coming home, sitting on my couch with a bowl of popcorn, and combing through long and tedious files.

  My professional life consists of long hours of general executive responsibilities broken up by… well, as an example, this evening at work I had to deal with a visiting Argentine government official who spontaneously manifested the ability to create animals out of ectoplasm. The only problem was that she couldn’t control these animals, and it happened in the middle of the city of Liverpool.

  The first I knew about it was the flashing of my office lights. I’m not entirely certain who arranged to have the lighting in the Rooks’ offices and quarters hooked up to the Panic Lines, but it has taught me to flinch violently when a lightbulb ceases to work. It’s not even necessary, strictly speaking, because if there’s something big happening, my desk phone flashes a red light and rings with a particularly shrill tone, my mobile phone rings with a different shrill tone, and a message pops up on both my computer screens.

  All of which happened tonight.

  I then had details flung at me. Four civilian deaths. Thousands of pounds’ worth of property damage. The Argentine woman seemed to be having a nervous breakdown, and no one could get near her because there was a herd of ghostly green tarucas, jaguars, and llamas surrounding her.

  At that point, my palms became soaking wet, but my mind was absolutely dry. I’m good in a crisis, but it’s not because I’m not afraid. I’m always afraid. I’m so stressed I want to throw up. But I am good in a crisis because I am very, very good at making preparations. I try to cover every angle, to plan for every eventuality.