“I’m fine,” said Rowan. “I just need a rest, that’s all.”
Her voice was flat and strained, and they could all see the effort it took her just to speak. Tomb cleared his throat uncertainly.
“Rowan, I really think we’d all be a lot happier if you’d let us call in a doctor, just to have a look at you....” “How many more times do I have to tell you?” snapped Rowan. Her anger produced two fiery red spots on her cheeks, but her face remained dull and impassive, as though the facial muscles were simply too tired to respond. “I don’t need a doctor, I don’t need fussing over, and most of all I don’t need you crawling around me all the time. Why won’t you all just leave me in peace?”
There was an awkward pause, and then Buchan rose unhurriedly from his chair. “Come on, Tomb. Let’s raid the kitchen and see what we can find there. I don’t know about you, but I’m starving. It’s typical we had to have our busiest day in months on the one day in the week our servants have off.”
Tomb nodded without looking at him, and the two men left the drawing room, Buchan pulling the door firmly shut behind them. Hawk and Fisher looked at each other.
“I hate to press you on this, lady Rowan,” said Hawk firmly, “but if there is something seriously wrong with you, we need to know about it. Things are going from bad to worse out there on the Street, and we have to know if we can depend on you in a crisis.”
Rowan shifted tiredly in her chair. “Yes. I suppose you do. And it would feel so good to talk about it to someone. But you have to swear not to tell Buchan and Tomb. Especially Tomb.” She looked at Hawk and Fisher in turn, fixing them with her piercing eyes in her weary face, and waiting until they’d both nodded in agreement. “I have cancer. It’s well-established and very advanced, and there’s nothing that can be done about it. I thought for a long time I could cure it myself, with my knowledge of potions. By the time I discovered I couldn’t, it was too late. It’s spread too far for alchemy to do any good now. I’ve talked to experts. There are spells that might work, but I don’t have that kind of money. I’ve got a month or so left; maybe a little more.
“You mustn’t tell Tomb. It would upset him. He hasn’t the power to cure me himself, and the dear fool would bankrupt himself trying to raise the money to buy a cure. It’s better that he doesn’t know.”
“But surely ... one of the Gods could do something,” said Fisher uncertainly. “I mean, they do miracles. Don’t they?”
“I used to think that,” said Rowan. “But if I’ve learned anything here, it’s that there are no Gods on the Street of Gods. I looked really hard, trying to find just one, but all I found were supernatural Beings with no love for the God Squad.”
She broke off as the door opened, and Tomb and Buchan came in bearing trays of cold food. For various reasons no one had much to say while they ate, so the meal passed for the most part in silence. Rowan just picked at her food, pushing it back and forth on her plate, and finally she put it to one side and quietly announced she was going back to bed and didn’t want to be disturbed. Everyone nodded, and Tomb wished her good night. She left the room without answering, shutting the door firmly behind her. The others finished their food, and sat for a while in silence, thinking their separate thoughts.
“You mustn’t mind Rowan,” said Tomb finally, to Hawk and Fisher. “It’s just her way. She’ll be a lot better once she’s had a little rest.”
“Sure,” said Hawk. “We understand.”
“Now, if you’ll excuse me, I have to be going out again.” Tomb pushed his empty plate to one side and stood up.
“Already?” said Fisher. “We only just finished putting down that riot and clearing up after the Hellfire Club. What else is there that needs doing?”
Tomb smiled. “Nothing for you to worry about, Captain. This is just some old personal business that I have to attend to. I won’t be long. I’ll see you again, later.”
He nodded generally to them all, and left. The door was still closing when Buchan got to his feet.
“Afraid I must be off as well. Tomb isn’t the only one who’s had to neglect his personal life of late. I’ll be back in an hour or two. If you have to go out as well, don’t worry about Rowan. There are wards around the house to keep her safe and alert Tomb if she needs anything. Now I really must be going.”
And as quickly as that, he was gone. Hawk and Fisher looked at each other. “I’ll follow Tomb,” said Hawk. “You follow Buchan. Right?”
“Right,” said Fisher. “There are too many secrets around here for my liking. You know, those have to be two of the flimsiest excuses I’ve ever heard.”
“I get the feeling they’re both under pressure,” said Hawk. “And I don’t just mean the trouble on the Street. They probably intended to go out a lot earlier, but got sidetracked by the riot and the Hellfire Club. Right. They’ve had enough time to get a good start by now. Let’s go.”
They got to their feet and hurried out into the corridor. Hawk spotted one of Tomb’s long hooded robes hanging on a wall hook, and slipped it on instead of his own distinctive Guard’s cloak. With the hood pulled well forward, he looked like just another priest. He glanced at Fisher.
“Maybe you should try a disguise, too.”
Fisher shook her head. “Six-foot muscular blond women tend to stand out in a crowd, no matter what they’re wearing. I’ll just have to be careful, that’s all. It’s dark out, so as long as I keep well back and stick to the shadows, I should be all right. I’ll meet you two hours from now at the Dead Dog tavern. Our usual booth. Sound good to you?”
“Great,” said Hawk. “Maybe now we’ll get a break on this case, and find a motive that makes sense. The way things are going, I’d settle for a motive that doesn’t make sense. Now let’s move it, before we lose them.”
Hawk had no trouble locating Tomb. The sorcerer was striding down the Street of Gods at a pace that kept threatening to break into a run. People saw the scowl on his face and got out of his way fast. Hawk strode along after him, not even trying to be inconspicuous. Even at this late hour of the evening there were crowds of priests and acolytes and worshippers bustling back and forth, getting on with the business of life that the riot had only briefly interrupted. Hawk was just another robed figure among many. Not that Tomb would have noticed anyway. He shouldered his way through the crowd with utter indifference to the snarls and curses this earned him, apparently entirely preoccupied with wherever he was going. Hawk had been banking on that. If Tomb even suspected he was being followed, he would undoubtedly have any number of spells to deal with the situation, few if any of them pleasant.
Tomb strode on, ignoring the manifestations that haunted the sidewalks and alleyways. Hawk did his best to do the same, but was momentarily thrown when an acolyte in a cheap crimson robe stepped directly in front of him to beg for a blessing. Hawk put a hand on the acolyte’s shaven head, muttered something about peace and joy and brotherhood, and hurried after Tomb, hoping fervently that he hadn’t inadvertently invoked a nearby Being by accident. You had to be careful what you said on the Street of Gods. You could never be sure who was listening.
He followed Tomb down into the low-rent section of the Street of Gods, where the twisting back streets and alleyways turned in upon themselves, offering sanctuary to Beings and beliefs who had fallen on hard times. A last harbour for forgotten Gods and fading philosophies. Hawk hung well back as Tomb approached a nondescript, weather beaten door set into a dirty white wall. The sorcerer produced a heavy iron key from a hidden pocket and unlocked the large iron padlock. The door creaked open under his hand, and he disappeared inside, pulling the door shut behind him.
Hawk quickly took up a position in a shadowed doorway overlooking the street, in case this was only a way stop and the sorcerer might reappear unexpectedly. Long moments passed. No one moved in the narrow back street. Hawk bit his lip, scowling thoughtfully. What the hell was Tomb doing here? It couldn’t be anything illegal; the sorcerer had made no attempt to disguise his appearance. But wh
at was so important to Tomb that it could drag him down here at this time of the night, when he was clearly already exhausted from coping with the riot? Hawk left his hiding place and padded silently over to the shabby door. He listened carefully, but everything seemed quiet within. He tried the door handle and raised an eyebrow as it turned easily under his hand, and the door swung open. Hawk froze as the door hinges creaked softly, but no one came to investigate. He slipped inside and eased the door shut behind him.
The narrow hallway was lit by a single lamp on the wall. Hawk tested the glass with his fingertips. It was barely warm. Tomb must have lit the, lamp when he came in, which suggested there was no one here but the sorcerer. The walls were bare wood. They might have been waxed or polished a long time ago, but now there was only a thick coating of dust on the dull surfaces. Whatever this place was, no one had lived in it for a long time. There were no doors leading off the hallway. Hawk followed it to its end, where it turned a sharp corner and became a long narrow stairway leading down into darkness. Hawk scowled at the bottomless gloom, and then reached for the stub of candle and box of matches he kept in his cloak pocket for emergencies. His fingers scrabbled futilely against rough cloth for a long moment before he remembered he was wearing one of Tomb’s robes instead of his Guard’s cloak. He cursed under his breath, and padded back down the hall to fetch the lamp.
The stairway didn’t look nearly so menacing in the lamplight, but even so he still hesitated at the top of the stairs. When all was said and done, following a sorcerer into an unknown situation was never a Good Idea. There could well be a magical bodyguard or booby trap waiting for him at the foot of the stairs. The suppressor stone might protect him ... but it was still in Fisher’s pocket. Hawk shook his head quickly, and drew his axe. He’d faced sorcerers before with nothing but cold steel in his hand, and he was damned if he’d let his nerves get the better of him now.
He descended slowly into the dark, lamp in one hand, axe in the other, ears straining for any sound down below. The walls were bare stone, rough and crumbling and splotched here and there with clumps of lichen. What the hell was Tomb doing in a dump like this? It couldn’t be anything commonplace or innocent, or he’d have said where he was going. Since he hadn’t, that meant Tomb either wouldn’t or couldn’t explain. Hawk didn’t like secrets. Particularly when they left him in the dark in the middle of a murder enquiry. The stairs ended at a simple wooden door, standing slightly ajar. Light shone round its edges. Hawk stayed put on the bottom step and chewed his bottom lip thoughtfully. He seemed to have spent an awful lot of time hovering outside ominous-looking doors recently, and none of them had led him anywhere pleasant. He hefted his axe, took a deep breath and let it go, and kicked the door open.
“Come in, Captain Hawk,” said Tomb. “I’ve been waiting for you.”
The sorcerer was sitting on a plain wooden stool, a few yards beyond the doorway. Above and around him loomed a bare stone cavern, maybe twenty feet high and almost as wide. A pale blue light flickered around the sorcerer, gleaming brightly on metallic traces in the rock. There was no one else there, only the sorcerer Tomb. Hawk stayed put in the doorway, looking around him. There had to be someone else there. Tomb couldn’t have come all this way just to sit in a cave by himself.
“How long have you known I was here?” he asked finally, careful to keep his voice calm and relaxed.
“Quite some time, Captain. I wouldn’t be much of a sorcerer if I didn’t know when I was being spied on, now would I? Don’t worry; I’m not angry. In your position, I’d probably have done the same. Probably. I like the robe, by the way. It suits you.”
“Tomb, what are you doing here?”
“It’s rather difficult to put into words, Captain. But if you’ll stop skulking in the shadows and come and join me, I’ll do my best to explain.”
Hawk mentally tossed a coin, shrugged, and stepped forward. He might as well, he wasn’t learning anything useful where he was. The moment he crossed the threshold, the Presence washed over him like a wave. It filled the cavern; a vast, implacable but utterly intangible Presence. It was like nothing but itself; a living entity with no physical existence, but so real that Hawk could almost feel its heartbeat against his skin. He looked wonderingly at Tomb, who smiled faintly.
“Le Bel Inconnu; the Fair Unknown. It was worshipped as a God long ago, in another place. My family served as its priests for generations. But we are both far from home now, this God and I. It seems I am the last of my line, and when Le Bel Inconnu discovered it was dying, it had no one else to turn to but me.”
“Dying?” said Hawk. “How can a God die? It doesn’t even have a body!”
“Things are never that simple, Hawk. Especially not here, on the Street of Gods. There is a time for everything, a beginning and an end for all that exists. Le Bel Inconnu was once a great Being, and knew the worship of millions. Now it is almost completely forgotten, nothing more than an obscure footnote in some of the order histories. It has no followers and no priests. It came here to die, Hawk, to fade quietly away into the nothing it came from, and go to whatever afterlife Gods go to. I spend what time with it I can, and never know from one day to the next whether it will still be here the next time I call.”
“But why all the secrecy?” said Hawk.
Tomb sighed tiredly. “No member of the Deity Division is allowed to worship a God, Captain Hawk. Religion and faith are not for us. It’s the law. How else could the Beings on the Street respect our judgements, and be bound by them, unless they could be sure we showed no favour to any of them? But I can’t abandon Le Bel Inconnu. No one should have to go into the dark alone, with no one to care or even know they’ve gone. But if word of my vigil were to get out, I’d have to leave the God Squad. I don’t want that. I’ve given my life to the Squad. Before I took over, it was a mess. No one took it seriously, least of all the Beings. I changed all that. Made the Squad a power to be reckoned with. The Street of Gods had known almost ten years of peace ... until the God murders began.” He looked unflinchingly at Hawk. “Are you going to report this, Captain Hawk?”
Hawk looked about him, feeling the Presence beat on the air like the fluttering wings of a dying bird. He shook his head slowly. “There’s nothing to tell, Tomb: Nothing to do with the case I’m working on. I’ll see you later.”
He turned away from the sorcerer and his God, and made his way back through the darkness to the life and bustle of the Street of Gods.
Fisher followed Buchan through the crowded Street, elbowing aside people who momentarily blocked her view of the man she was following. No one objected out loud. Even on the Street of Gods, people knew about Captain Fisher. She was careful to stay well back, but Buchan showed no signs of caring if he was being followed. The man was deathly tired; Fisher could see it in the way he walked, the way he held his head too carefully erect. But even so, nobody bothered him. They knew about Buchan’s reputation, too.
Buchan, with Fisher still a discreet distance behind him, made his way along the Street, passing through the usual crowd of priests and worshippers. Riot or no riot, business went on as usual on the Street of Gods. From time to time people called out greetings to Buchan, some clearly false and some as clearly not, but he answered them all with the same preoccupied nod and wave of the hand. A few people looked as though they might call out to Fisher, but she glared at them until they changed their minds.
After a while, she began to realise Buchan was heading into the high-rent section of the Street of Gods. The churches and temples became richer and more ornate, works of art in their own right, and there was a much better class of worshippers, most of whom seemed scandalised at Fisher’s presence in their midst. Fisher glared at them all impartially. Buchan finally stopped outside one of the more modest buildings. It was three storeys high, with rococo carvings and elegant wrought iron. The building had an anonymous air to it, as though it was a place for those who were just passing through, not staying. The kind of temporary residence popular
among people on the way up or on the way down. The management didn’t care which, as long as it got cash in advance.
Buchan produced a key and unlocked the front door. He stepped inside, and shut the door firmly behind him. Fisher scowled. What was Buchan doing in a place like this? She hesitated a moment, not sure what to do next. Hawk was the one who usually tailed people. She couldn’t just barge in and start asking questions about Buchan. He wasn’t supposed to know he was being followed. She frowned. She couldn’t just hang about outside the place, either. People would notice. She made her way round the side of the building and down a narrow alleyway she hoped would lead to a back entrance. Maybe she could sneak in that way and find some low-level staff she could intimidate into providing some answers. Fisher always preferred the direct approach.
She hurried down the alleyway, keeping to the shadows when she remembered, rounded the corner, and sighed with relief as she took in the back of the building. It didn’t look nearly as impressive as the front, with uneven paint-work and a filthy back yard. Judging by the smell, the drains weren’t working too well either. There was one back door, strictly functional and clearly a servants’ and tradesmen’s entrance. Fisher started toward it, only to stop dead as the door suddenly swung open. She darted behind a pile of stacked crates, crouched down, and watched with interest as a hunched and furtive figure pushed the door shut. He was wearing, a torn and ratty-looking cloak with the hood pulled forward, but from her angle Fisher could see the face clearly. It was Buchan. He reached up to pull the hood even further forward, looked quickly around him, and then hurried along the alley and out onto the Street.
Fisher grinned broadly, and stayed where she was a moment to give him a good start. Buchan was definitely up to something. Where could he be going, that he couldn’t afford to be recognised? Buchan was known and welcomed pretty much everywhere outside of High Society. She slipped out from behind the crates, ran silently down the alley, and emerged on the Street just in time to see him walking unhurriedly away. He was so confident in his disguise he didn’t even bother to look behind him. Fisher stayed well back anyway, just in case. She was beginning to get the hang of following people.
Swords of Haven: The Adventures of Hawk & Fisher Page 56
