“Well, you can always Photoshop them out. . . .”
* * *
After a bewildered Bartho left with his collection of cameras, Hexe and I retired to the kitchen. “So why did Canterbury give you the day off?” he asked. “Was there an accident at work?”
Before I could answer, I heard an odd clattering sound from upstairs, as if someone were walking around in wooden shoes. “What’s that noise?” I frowned.
“That’s the new boarder,” Hexe explained.
I raised an eyebrow in surprise as I glanced up at the ceiling. “That was quick! You didn’t even have time to put up a flier at Strega Nona!”
“We were lucky. I got a call from Giles Gruff, right after you left this morning. He said a lady friend of his was in a tight spot. . . .”
“Why am I not surprised?” I said sarcastically. Giles was the leader of the satyr community and Golgotham’s most notorious bon vivant and rarely seen without a comely nymph on both arms.
“Sorry about all the noise while I was traipsing about upstairs—I left my mufflers in my work locker.”
I turned in the direction of the unfamiliar voice and saw an attractive young faun standing in the kitchen doorway. She had almond-shaped eyes with luxurious auburn curls that accented the small horn buds jutting from her forehead, and from the waist down she had the hind legs and tail of a goat. She was dressed in a long-sleeved red shirt with a black vest emblazoned with a stylized tongue of flame over her heart along with the initials GFD embroidered in gold thread—the traditional uniform of a Golgotham firefighter.
“You must be Tate; it’s a pleasure to meet you,” the faun said. “My uncle speaks very highly of you. I’m Octavia.” She then flashed Hexe a heartfelt smile. “Thank you, Serenity. I appreciate you allowing me to move in on such short notice. It was something of a surprise, coming home after my shift to find an eviction notice tacked to my door.”
“It’s no problem at all,” he replied. “Any friend of Giles is a friend of mine.”
“I assure you both that you needn’t worry about me partying to all hours,” Octavia said solemnly. “We fauns are far more domesticated than our satyr brethren—save for Uncle Giles, of course.”
“Let me guess—you had an apartment in the Machen Arms, didn’t you?” I asked.
“You must have seen the headlines the other day,” the faun said with a humorless laugh. “I had a one-bedroom apartment there for the last five years,” she explained, her tone becoming bitter. “My lease came up for renewal yesterday, and suddenly my rent skyrocketed from seven hundred dollars to five thousand a month, literally overnight! Can you believe that minotaur shit?”
“I’m afraid I can,” I sighed. “Ronald Chess has been playing the exact same game in the rest of Manhattan for over thirty years now. He buys up older, rent-controlled prewar apartment buildings and then, when the leases come up for renewal, he jacks the rent up through the roof. Once the previous tenants are evicted, he slaps granite countertops on everything and slops a new coat of paint on the walls and turns it condo.”
“I can’t believe a Golgothamite would agree to sell out to such a character,” Hexe scowled. “Who was your old landlord?”
Octavia shrugged her shoulders. “Some company called Golden Egg Realty. All I did was drop off a rent check every month to the leasing agent who managed the property.”
“When will you be settled in?” Hexe asked.
“I’ll be moved in by tonight. I’m putting most of my belongings into storage until I can find a large enough place. As it is, you won’t be seeing that much of me, anyway,” she explained. “I work five days on, five days off, so I spend more time at the firehouse than I do at home. Speaking of which, I better fetch my spare set of mufflers from my work locker so I don’t ruin these lovely hardwood floors of yours!” With that, the firefighter turned on her hooves and clattered away.
Once I was certain Octavia had left the house, I turned to face Hexe. “You asked me why Canterbury sent me home—it’s because I saw Boss Marz at the Fly Market this morning. He was reminding everybody who runs the waterfront in Golgotham. He wanted to make an example to the others, so he sicced his familiar on some poor wretch. It was horrible.”
Hexe’s smile vanished like breath on a mirror. “Did he see you?”
“Yes,” I said quietly, shuddering as I replayed the moment over in my head.
“Did he say anything to you?”
“No, he just smirked and gave me this little wave,” I replied, unable to suppress a grimace of disgust. “I was so shook up, Canterbury sent me home for the day.”
“I thought I heard something interesting going on,” Scratch snarled, leaping from the kitchen floor to his usual perch atop the refrigerator. “I can’t believe that asshole has the balls to show his face again in Golgotham!”
“You mean Marz?” I asked.
“Phfft! Screw Marz!” the familiar spat in disgust. “I’m talking about that jumped-up organ-grinder’s monkey! I kicked Bonzo’s baboon-butt so hard he teleported back home rather than risk getting killed in this dimension. Now that’s what I call a wuss!”
Chapter 5
Whoever coined the term “absence makes the heart grow fonder” clearly had never met Boss Marz. Over the next few days the Maladanti quickly picked up from where they had left off, collecting “tribute” from the businesses along the waterfront and the brothels and cabarets of Duivel Street.
The return of the Maladanti was not felt just by the citizens of Golgotham; the twunts who had come to know the red-light district only during the crime cartel’s eclipse were swiftly and roughly schooled as to what was considered proper decorum in the gentlemen’s clubs under their “protection.”
I kept waiting for the other shoe to drop, but it never did. After that creepy little smile he gave me at the Fly Market, I was convinced Marz had something villainous planned for us. But no one left a decapitated goat’s head on our doorstep or attempted to curse me. I guess Boss Marz was simply too busy trying to reestablish his hold on Golgotham to waste time and energy on personal revenge.
Still, despite the Maladanti’s apparent disinterest in us, Scratch continued his nightly patrols, and I never took off the protective glad eye amulet Hexe created for me. Better safe than sorry. I’ll admit I was initially anxious, but after enduring jealous ex-girlfriends trying to curse me, being attacked by soulless homunculi, and having my arm broken by a demon, I had built up a pretty thick skin, and once several days had gone by and the crime lord had yet to make a move, I decided I had better things to do than worry about what Boss Marz’s evil plan might be.
So I put on my welder’s helmet and fired up my torch and threw myself headlong into my work. The Maladanti be damned, I had a project to finish and I wasn’t going to let a bunch of spellslinging goons in bad suits screw with my deadline. For the next month, Canterbury and I put in long, arduous hours every day of the week. I came home so exhausted I could barely take off my clothes before crawling into bed.
We finished the installation at the end of March, less than a week before the Jubilee. Even replicated in reduced scale, it still took three brawny Clydesdale-sized centaurs and six ipotane drovers to load and haul the crates containing the clockwork dragon to its new home. On the day of the delivery Canterbury led the convoy from the shop, hitched to a cart containing our welding equipment and other tools, while I rode shotgun with Fabio, the head drover.
The Museum of Supernatural History, located on the corner of Nassau Street and Maiden Lane, towers ominously over the surrounding buildings like some ancient temple dedicated to a long-forgotten god. It is set atop a thirteen-hundred-foot-square granite-clad concrete platform that covers an entire city block. A fifty-foot-wide, three-hundred-step staircase leads to a pair of huge bronze doors embossed with scenes depicting such ancient heroes as Chiron, Pan, and Arum. To the right of the stairs are six forty-foot-tall marble statues of Kymerans, male and female, in historical dress, while on the left are
arrayed six rampant jade battle-dragons.
However, as majestic and awe-inspiring as its public face may be, we were essentially tradesmen making a delivery, and the museum’s loading dock, accessed via a subterranean deck, proved no different from that of any other skyscraper in New York.
“Stay put and keep an eye on the gear,” Canterbury instructed as he unhitched himself from the equipment cart. “I’ll go find the Curator.”
“No need, Master Canterbury,” said an elderly, but firm female voice. “I am already here.” A Kymeran woman with long cornflower blue hair woven into an elaborate double-drape French braid emerged from the shadows at the far end of the receiving platform. She wore a floor-length satin jacket the color of celadon pottery, with wide, stiff sleeves and a Mandarin collar, and about her neck was hung the badge of her office: a jade dragon with its tail in its mouth.
“I take it this is the installation?” the Curator asked, pointing to the crates the drovers were loading onto the dock.
“Yes, milady,” Canterbury replied, with a ritual bow of his head. “The larger box contains the body, while the others hold the wings, head and tail. It shouldn’t take more than six hours for it to be assembled.”
The Curator turned her pale gray gaze upon me. “I see your apprentice is human. That is most interesting. Please follow me to the exhibit hall.” Without further explanation, she turned her back to us and began to walk away, forcing us to hurry after her as she headed into a warren of rooms filled with warehoused exhibits. Everywhere I looked the past and present seemed to be colliding in a jumble of dust, rust, and flaking paint, as a small army of restorers cleaned and rehabbed artifacts that dated back before the pyramids of Giza.
Eventually we came to a large freight elevator. As we drew near, a sloe-eyed sphinx stepped forward, blocking our path. Like most of her kind, the human-headed lioness wore a golden vulture cap atop her jet-black head and a bejeweled pectoral about her neck. When she spoke, her voice was deceptively beautiful.
“Wood, wire, iron or stone,
Inside of me are treasures sown.
Some say I’d be a seat on high
For those unable to decide.
I cannot be opened by lock or hinge,
And protect all things that lie within. What am I?”
“You’re a garden fence,” the Curator replied without pause.
The sphinx smiled, displaying a fearsome double row of very sharp teeth, and then bowed her head, moving aside. As we passed by, the Curator ran her hand down the length of the monster’s spine, and in response the sphinx made a purring noise and arched her back like a house cat.
“Please forgive the extra security measures,” the Curator said, “but we have recently suffered a theft.”
Canterbury raised an eyebrow. “Was anything of value taken?”
“All our exhibits are of historical value,” the Curator replied as the freight elevator’s accordion gate opened on its own, revealing a car the size of a studio apartment. Upon entering, the gate trundled shut behind us, as if closed by spectral hands. “But, luckily, that which was taken is not completely irreplaceable.”
A few moments later we arrived on the second floor of the museum, which was currently closed to the public. As we walked toward the main exhibit halls, Canterbury’s hooves echoed loudly in the darkened hallway. The centaur grimaced and came to a halt.
“Give me a moment to muffle my shoes,” he said, digging into the satchel he wore slung about his shoulder. “I’m making a hell of a racket and I don’t want to scuff up your floors.”
As we waited for my master to reshoe himself, I peered into a gallery off the main hall that bore a sign that read, in both Kymeran and English: THE LOST KINGDOM. The far wall was covered by a mural depicting a city of towering glass spires, about which flew brightly colored dragons bearing riders dressed in ornate suits of armor like the one I had seen at Lady Syra’s penthouse, all of which was dwarfed by the terrifyingly huge tidal wave bearing down upon it. Scattered about the gallery were sealed display cases mounted on artfully lit plinths, inside of which were shards of pottery, bits of jewelry, and other tattered fragments that were all that remained of a civilization that drowned when mankind was picking its collective nits.
As I was studying the exhibits, I caught the scent of figs and dried roses and turned to find the Curator standing behind me. “There are artifacts in this section that date back fifty thousand years,” she said, speaking in a hushed voice. “It’s amazing anything was left at all, considering the survivors fled with nothing more than the clothes on their backs and what little they could gather in their arms.”
“What’s that?” I asked, pointing to an exhibit behind velvet ropes. Inside the display case was an opalescent vessel the size and shape of an amphora that contained a viscous pinkish-purple liquid that sluggishly churned to and fro, like a captive octopus hiding in a jar.
“That is our most precious exhibit,” the Curator replied proudly. “It is the only living glass left in the world. Our ancestors used it to build their cities, much like the ancient Egyptians used mud and straw to build the pyramids.”
“That stuff is glass?” I frowned. “It looks more like the goop inside a lava lamp.”
“That’s because living glass is, indeed, alive,” she replied. “It’s a boneless, amorphous creature, not unlike a jellyfish. It thrives on magic, much the same way plants feed on carbon dioxide. Although it possesses no intellect, living glass is highly sensitive to the thoughts of those around it. Once tamed and sculpted, it takes on the appearance of its namesake, but has the strength of tempered steel.
“Back when Kymera was in full flower, there was a class of wizards, known as artifices, who specialized in domesticating and sculpting living glass. But when the tsunami struck, it wiped out the breeding tanks, along with those who tended them. The only artifex to escape the destruction of Kymera was the Lady Ursa, consort to the Witch King, Lord Arum. She brought this very same container of living glass with her when she fled Kymera. She planned to reestablish the species, but died before she could do so. There has not been another artifex since. It is considered a lost talent, drowned along with the shining spires it once raised.”
At the far end of the gallery was an archway leading, according to the signage, to the Hall of Arum, which was twice the size of the first gallery, and included life-sized dioramas. I stared in fascination at a wax dummy with long hair as blue as a peacock’s breast and golden eyes that seemed to possess an eerie luminosity. The mannequin was dressed in elaborately embroidered robes and seated on a golden throne shaped like a rampant dragon, its bejeweled wings spread wide to either side. On the wax figure’s head sat a diadem resembling a pair of dragons, one jet black, the other gold, entwined from tail to snout so that they faced one another, holding a fire opal the size of an egg balanced between their gaping jaws.
Behind the throne was a detailed three-dimensional landscape showing the building of a great city high atop a mountain. Architects could be seen in the background, consulting their schematics as surveyors hovered overhead on winged dragons. Meanwhile, an armored guard sat astride a bearded, wingless dragon, keeping an eye on the brace of Cro-Magnons dragging a mammoth block of stone up the steep hillside.
I glanced down at the placard mounted at the foot of the diorama, which read, Lord Arum, Savior of the Kymeran people and founder of the city-state of Dragon Arum, located in what is now known as the Carpathian Mountains, circa 50,000 B.C.E. (Before Common Era). The likeness of Lord Arum is modeled on his death mask.
There came a dull thumping sound behind me, and I turned to see Canterbury enter the gallery, his hooves now safely muffled by rubber cuffs. “I see you’re checking out your boyfriend’s family tree,” he commented dryly.
The Curator gave me a speculative look, as if sizing me up for a display case, then motioned for us to follow her. “Come this way, please.”
As we entered yet another exhibition hall, this one called the Hall
of Sufferance, we paused in front of yet another diorama, this one depicting a Kymeran with a forked cerulean beard holding a platinum scepter entwined by a golden and a black winged dragon. Arrayed before him were representatives of all the major supernatural races found in Golgotham, each of them wearing a crown. These royal figures were forever frozen in an attitude of ritual obeisance, with either their heads lowered or knees bent.
The plaque attached to the diorama read: In the Year 1036 C.E. (Common Era), Lord Vexe accepted the fealty of King Chiron IX of the Centauri, King Omester XII of the Satyrisci, King Koukakala of the Leipreachán, Lord Tasson of the Dwarves, and Queen Tallemaja of the Huldrefolk, thereby granting their peoples eternal protection and asylum within his kingdom.
A polite cough from the Curator drew my attention away from the tableaux. “This is where the exhibit will be installed,” she said, motioning to a large alcove off the main gallery. “This section is dedicated specifically to the Dragon Rebellion and will feature a re-creation of the battle between Lord Bexe and his brother, General Vlad.” She pointed toward the ceiling. “As you can see, Vlad’s mount is already in place.”
I looked up and gave an involuntary gasp at the sight of a fierce black dragon, its wings spread wide and claws extended, directly over my head. It was easily twenty feet long, from snout to tail, with a wingspan to match. Once my heart slowed back down, I was able to marvel at its workmanship. The attention to detail, from its glowing red eyes and razor-sharp teeth to the barb at the end of its tail, was amazing. The thought of the skies having once been filled with such glorious monsters was both awe inspiring and terrifying.
“Nice work,” Canterbury admitted grudgingly. “Who fabricated it for you?”
“It’s actually a piece of taxidermy,” the Curator explained casually. “It’s a juvenile, of course. There’s no way we could display an adult battle-dragon indoors, much less two of them.”
“Speaking of which—what’s keeping those damned drovers?” Canterbury scowled as he fished his pocket watch from his waistcoat. “They should have been here by now!” He tapped the Bluetooth headset in his right ear. “Fabio! You better not be taking a break on my dime—and no, I don’t care what the Union has to say about it. If you and your team want to get paid, get your horses’ asses up here.”
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