Iron & Velvet (Kate Kane, Paranormal Investigator #1)

by Alexis Hall

  I pulled the bin liners off my sword and started walking.

  I soon lost all track of time and space. I wandered through mazes built of bare twigs, moss, bits of barbed wire, and clods of disintegrated toilet paper. Sometimes I thought I was going round in circles, and sometimes I wished I was. Occasionally I was back in the sewer system, or at least something that looked a lot like it. Once, I came upon a moss-smothered sundial standing in a small courtyard. It seemed a bit pointless. There’s no time in Faerie, and there was nothing to cast a shadow. I scraped the face clean. It was divided into eight sections, and instead of numbers there were words: attraction, worship, passion, rejection, fealty, death, valour, consummation. I suppose that was about as weird as you’d expect from a crazy faery lord.

  I pressed on and finally found myself in a stone cloister that was half-swallowed by Victorian brickwork. The floor was slick with sewer water trickling from rusty pipes. The cloister overlooked a quadrangle of dead grass and filthy gravel. In the middle was a sunken fountain full of stagnant sewage, shattered pipework, and broken bits of statue.

  I jumped down into the courtyard, but as I approached the fountain, a mass of heaving, rat-covered flesh burst out of the ruined pipes in a shower of shattered stone and sewer water.

  The shock of the explosion knocked me off my feet, jerking the sword from my hand and sending it spinning across the floor.

  Well, fuck.

  It was a fountain, not a toilet, but I was pretty sure this was how Alice the plumber had died. I’m not a big fan of dying in general, but I really didn’t fancy getting eaten alive.

  The Rat Knight squeezed himself into a vaguely human shape and scrambled towards me on all fours, hundreds of squeaking, gnashing mouths thrusting out from his twisting flesh. If this thing got hold of me, I’d be a pile of chewed bones in seconds. I pushed myself away from him, hands and feet slipping on the slimy flagstones as I tried to get up. But his fingers closed round my ankle and started dragging me back. I could see broken rat bodies struggling under his skin, forcing their way to the surface to feed. On me.

  I lifted my free leg and brought my boot heel down as hard as I could on his hand. There was a crunch of tiny bones and a pathetic squealing, and I yanked myself free and rolled to my feet. My sword was on the wrong side of the thing that was trying to eat me, but I managed to grab a piece of ancient lead piping. At least it was a weapon I knew how to use.

  The Rat Knight rose to face me, a membranous fusion of rat bits peeling back to reveal something like human features. Rows of beady little eyes burst across his cheeks before being sucked back in. I think he was trying to smile at me.

  I usually have a pretty high squick threshold, but this guy really pushed my kill it with fire buttons.

  He seemed to be trying to say something, but instead of a tongue, a live rodent thrashed about inside his mouth, and all he could do was make an incoherent groaning sound.

  I raised my pipe and made the bring it gesture. He came at me, frenzied rat mouths bulging out of his outstretched hands, and I smacked him upside the head with all my sadly mortal strength. It basically felt—and sounded—like smacking a hammer into a bag of rats. His head split open to reveal a soupy mess of mangled rat bodies that were immediately and messily devoured by a new set of mouths that squirmed up from inside the creature’s skull. If I didn’t have my imminent death to worry about, I’d have been seriously grossed out.

  While the knight was busy eating himself, I managed to circle halfway round towards my sword. But then he was after me again. I tried to beat him back with my pipe, but this time he caught the blow on his forearm. The arm was mashed to a pulp, but the Rat Knight kept coming, pushing through my guard and trying to overwhelm me with sheer momentum. I threw myself aside at the last second, but he piled on top of me, biting and scratching. I brought my feet together, kicked up, and tried to shove him away from me.

  If I’d had my mother’s strength, I’d have flung him across the room. Instead, he went about five feet, and then came straight back at me. I flailed desperately, and my fingers closed round the hilt of the sword. With no time to think or plan anything clever, I stabbed wildly as the Rat Knight rushed over me, hundreds of tiny mouths and claws shredding my clothes and ripping at my skin in a frenzy. He’d run straight onto the blade, but it still took the longest few seconds of my life for the fucker to notice I’d killed him. He slumped on top of me, glassy eyes and rat corpses patchworking his flesh. If anything, I’d made him even squickier. I made sure he was definitely dead, rolled the body aside, and stood up, pulling my blade free.

  Knackered but uneaten, I sat down on the wreckage of the fountain to catch my breath and clean rat gunge off the sword.

  Okay, note to self: beware of exploding fountains, and don’t drop your only weapon.

  Part of me wondered what had happened to everyone else, but there was no point speculating. This was a faery realm, and I’d find them when I found them. If I found them.

  I left the cloisters, and I was back in the maze. Eventually I came to a delicate arched bridge over a sluggish stream, where a willow trailed its decaying branches in the water. The handrails turned out not to be an option, as they were wound around with barbed wire and briars. I edged onto the bridge, and it shifted slightly under my weight, shaking flakes of rust loose into the water.

  I wasn’t that keen on trapping myself on a narrow strip of rickety metal, but I was even less keen on sloshing through the water, and there’s never any point in going back on yourself in a faery realm. I was about halfway across when a fly landed on the back of my hand.

  Perhaps I was being paranoid.

  I quickened my pace, and the bridge creaked ominously.

  A few steps further, and the air grew thick with flies, which crawled over my skin and tangled in my hair. They gathered together in front of me and poured themselves into the shape of a man. He was tall and slender, pale faced and dark haired, with sharp cheekbones and a pointy chin. He was wearing ragged chainmail and carrying a spear. And his eyes were black hollows swarming with flies that gathered in the air around him and trailed down his cheeks like tears.

  I guess I wasn’t being paranoid.

  I took a few steps backwards because I really didn’t want to fight a nutter with a spear on a narrow bridge. But then, glancing over my shoulder, I saw that the last knight had appeared behind me and blocked my retreat. Rot and mildew covered his body, and bones poked through his skin at the joints. He’d brought a rusty shield and a barbed wire flail to the Let’s Kill Kate party.

  This had just got interesting.

  By which I meant fuck.

  No seriously. Fuck. I was out of my league. I could take one unarmed man full of rats, but without my mother’s power, I had no chance against two guys with weapons they knew how to use.

  I tightened my grip on my sword, a weapon I didn’t know how to use. A few coils of silver mist rose from the murky surface of the river, and for a moment, I thought I felt a hand on my shoulder. Then, without thinking, I stepped towards the Fly Knight, bearing aside his point with my blade and putting myself inside his guard. I seized the haft of his spear with my free hand and took another step forwards, driving my pommel into his face. He burst into a cloud of flies and I whirled round, bringing my sword up in a hanging guard just in time to catch the Rot Knight’s flail in mid-flight. Its tails narrowly missed my face, wrapping round my sword instead. I snapped my arm back to free my blade, and the Rot Knight came forwards and smashed his shield into me.

  I staggered back, winded, and found the floor wasn’t where I expected it to be. Tumbling down the stairs, I landed in a heap at the foot of the bridge. The Fly Knight reappeared, spear in hand, and was about to shish kebab me when a rush of smoke and shadows came out of nowhere and threw him off. Kauri materialised and offered an exquisitely manicured hand to help me up.

  “Honey, you look like you’ve been dragged through a sewer.”

  “No shit.”

  �
��I wish.”

  The Rot Knight was slowly coming down the bridge towards us while the Fly Knight had recovered and was readying his spear again. Things were looking way better than they had a minute ago. Sure, I was still in an underground faery realm being attacked by medieval dickheads, but at least I had company.

  Kauri put his back to mine. “Okay, I’ll take Pretty Fly For a White Guy and you take Tall, Dark, and Deliquescing.”

  He bamfed forwards, tendrils of darkness unfurling from his hands, and I turned to face the Rot Knight, falling easily into a guard. Nim had said the sword wanted to be used, but I hadn’t expected to go all I Know Kung Fu. Right now I wasn’t complaining, but I knew how this went. One minute, you’re using skills you don’t remember learning, and the next you’re getting arrested for crimes you don’t remember committing.

  The Rot Knight advanced, swinging the flail in wide, slashing arcs. Parrying hadn’t gone so well the last time, and I didn’t really have an opening to attack him, so I fell back, waiting for an opportunity. The trouble was, he could come forwards faster than I could go backwards, and I was running out of options that didn’t involve getting my face ripped off with barbed wire.

  He brought his arm back for another attack, and I realised I had a very very narrow window when the flail was going the other way and his elbow was sticking out. But by the time I’d noticed, it was too late to take advantage, and I was forced to dodge awkwardly out of the way. He readied a fresh attack and, trying not to think about what would happen if I fucked this up, I went for it. I lunged forwards, bringing my sword down on his exposed forearm.

  It was a bit like cutting into a mouldy orange. The skin split open and a rotting, pulpy mush oozed out. I pegged it backwards because the flail was still moving, but as the knight came round for yet another attack, the skin peeled away from his arm like stringy cheese, taking the weapon and most of his hand with it. Win. Before I could catch my breath, he came rushing at me, slicing his shield horizontally at my head. I leaned out of the way and the edge of the shield whistled past, too close for comfort. The force of the blow pulled the knight off balance, leaving him open, and I hacked into his exposed, mould-mottled ribs. The side of his chest crumpled inwards, and he crumbled slowly to his knees.

  Monster Fighting Rule Number Twelve: Never Assume It’s Dead.

  I brought my sword round and smacked the knight over the head with it. His skull sploodged into a mess of mould and goo.

  Monster Fighting Rule Number Thirteen: No, Really, Never Assume It’s Dead.

  I stomped him into dust and kicked what was left into the river.

  Kauri was still struggling with the Fly Knight. He had strength and speed, but the other guy could, well, turn into flies.

  “Hold still, you buzzing shit,” Kauri yelled, swiping ineffectively at the swarm of insects. “New plan, please.”

  “Take my hand.” I coughed as flies pressed into my nose and mouth.

  I pulled him after me up the riverbank and into the maze. A billowing cloud of flies streamed after us.

  “This isn’t really a plan, is it?” complained Kauri, as we ran helter-skelter through a series of twisty little passages.

  “Got a better one?”

  “Only if you know where to find a really big spider.”

  “Not at this time of night.”

  We kept going.

  “Not being funny,” said Kauri, “but why are we holding hands?”

  “Faery realm. It’ll separate us if we let it.”

  “So that’s what happened to the others. I thought they’d just fucked off and left me.”

  We burst out of a tunnel into some kind of statue garden. Four great arches like the one I’d first seen, all lined by corridors of dead trees, surrounding a central plaza of dead grass and dead roses. Ashriel was slumped against one of the statues, breathing heavily, his shirt soaked with blood.

  “Incoming,” I yelled, as we ran towards him.

  The air grew heavy with flies, and suddenly the Fly Knight was in front of me with his spear raised. I damn near ran straight into it.

  Here likes Kate Kane. Should have looked where she was fucking going. Beloved daughter. Sorely missed.

  I brought my sword across just in time to knock the point of his spear away. I aimed a swipe at him, but he dissolved into flies. Again. Fucker.

  “Get down!” shouted Ashriel.

  I threw myself to the ground as a gout of sickly green fire roared overhead. Charred fly corpses rained down on me like confetti from a wedding in Hell. I got up just in time to see Ashriel falling over.

  Kauri stepped out of a swirl of shadows and caught him. “Honey, you are so fucked.”

  Ashriel gestured weakly. “Next time I’ll let you get eaten.”

  “Are you going to be okay?” I asked.

  “Probably pushed my luck with the hellfire.”

  “Well, take a moment.”

  “Is that safe?” Kauri glanced round nervously.

  I shrugged. “I think we’re a long way past safe.”

  We propped Ashriel up against one of the plinths, and I did my best to put his bandages back in place.

  He lifted his brows. “You shouldn’t put me on a pedestal, Kate.”

  “Oh, shut up.”

  Kauri tilted his head to look at the sculptures. “Is that the guy we’re here to kill?”

  We were on the edge of a circle of eight marble statues, still surprisingly clean and intact. They did, indeed, show the King of the Court of Love in his better days, complete with ankle-length hair, sweeping wings, and sculpted man-titty. He seemed to be making a sequence of dramatic gestures to a random woman that the artist hadn’t bothered to carve in any detail. In one, he was kneeling at her feet, in another he was lying on a bed of roses bleeding from the heart. In yet another, he turned away from her weeping. In the last, he had her pinned underneath him, and there was no doubt what was going on there. I added that to the long list of reasons why Faerie was fucked up.

  “Yep.”

  “What sort of person decorates his home with statues of himself?”

  “Faeries. Ultimate narcissists.”

  Suddenly a crossbow bolt whistled past my ear and embedded itself in Kauri’s heart.

  “Fu—” he said, and keeled over.

  I whirled round to see dark figures stepping out from the archways.

  Ashriel rolled off the plinth and landed in a heap on the floor. “Great,” he sighed. “Just what we need. Killer zombie nuns.”

  I ducked down behind the pedestal as another crossbow bolt zinged past me. Oh, this wasn’t good. I peeped round the edge. They had us surrounded. A pallid woman in a tattered habit stood in each of the four archways. They were packing some serious medieval firepower and they had us in a kill zone. I had to pick my next move very carefully, because I had this funny attachment to my lungs. Why hadn’t Nim given me an enchanted shotgun?

  “Bugger,” observed Ashriel.

  Across the garden, the two nuns who’d already fired were reloading. And I was, as usual, low on options.

  “Cover me.” I crept round the statue, trying to keep it between me and as many nuns as possible. “I’m going in.”

  He hauled himself up and lobbed a weak burst of hellfire at the nearest nun. It distracted her just long enough for me to charge and I barrelled into her, swiping frantically with my sword. I didn’t want to think about how close I came to getting a crossbow bolt in the chest, and there was still another nun behind me who hadn’t fired. I circled round and under the arch, and turned to face Sister Zombie. As long as I could keep her between me and the others, I’d probably be okay.

  She dropped the crossbow, and, liking those odds, I attacked. I slashed at her head, but she darted forwards and caught my wrist with her forearm. She was pretty quick for a dead woman. I glanced down just in time to see a blade shoot out of her sleeve. I had to get me one of those, but first I had to stop it going through my liver. I brought my other hand round and push
ed her back. She spun away from me.

  We faced off. Mine was bigger, but I was pretty sure she could use hers better. I aimed a quick cut at her wrist, but she danced away, trying to draw me back into the courtyard where her undead mates could shoot me full of holes. They’d converged in the middle of the room, crossbows reloaded and ready.

  Well, this was it. I was trapped. I couldn’t go forwards without getting shot, and I couldn’t run away without leaving Kauri and Ashriel to get killed by ninja zombie nuns. And, for that matter, if I killed the nun in front of me, I’d just make it really easy for the three others to take me out.

  “Can we talk about this?”

  I took the silence that followed as a pretty definite no.

  Here lies—

  There was a snarl, and a blur of sandy-coloured fur. Henry came racing in from one of the corridors and piled into the three nuns, pinning one to the ground, and catching another between his jaws and flinging her against a statue.

  I rushed Sister Zombie, driving her back with a furious series of cuts, until I pinned her against a plinth. I went for her arm, and she dodged sideways, so I turned my hand and struck the other way, catching her across the side of the face. She fell, and Henry brought down the last of the others before padding over towards me. He shifted fluidly into his human form. “I was worried something had happened to you.”

  I maintained scrupulous eye contact. “It did,” I said, “but I staked it.”

  “Should I ask?”

  “Best not.”

  And speaking of staking, I ran over to Kauri. I yanked the bolt out of the poor bugger’s chest, and he snapped upright like Uma Thurman in Pulp Fiction.

  “Well, that was annoying. Stupid bloody professional vampire hunters.”

  “Tell me about it.” Ashriel was slumped on the floor, looking even worse than he had two minutes ago.

  “You did run right into them,” said Henry chidingly. “What were you thinking?”