Ruler of the Realm

by Herbie Brennan

  Pyrgus hadn’t, but he was used to thinking on his feet. ‘Why don’t I go there alone – to Merchant Ogyris’s estate – and see what I can find out? One Faerie of the Light isn’t going to attract any attention. I know where the flowers are and I know my way around the estate …’ The last bit was a sort of a lie, but he’d found his instructions from Gela and the little gate might still be open. Besides, if anybody caught him, he could probably persuade them he’d come to see Gela. With luck they might even contact her before they killed him. He was fairly sure she’d vouch for him, despite what had happened. So long as he wasn’t caught in the act, of course. Merchant Ogyris clearly didn’t want anybody messing with his precious flowers.

  ‘Much too dangerous, deeah,’ said Madame Cardui firmly. ‘Your sister would never forgive me if I let you do it.’

  ‘No, just a minute, Cynthia,’ Fogarty said, frowning. ‘We need to know about those flowers, and he’s right about trying to arrest Ogyris – that really could start the war.’

  ‘We can send one of my operatives,’ Madame Cardui said. ‘Someone trained.’

  ‘But if he’s caught, they’ll know the Imperial Espionage Service is interested,’ Pyrgus said quickly. ‘They’ll get it out of him. Remember my uncle is involved, even if we don’t know how. But if they catch me …’ He hesitated, but had to say it: ‘I can just pretend I’ve come to see Gela.’

  ‘Gela is the trollop of a daughter?’ Madame Cardui asked sweetly.

  ‘She’s not a –’ Pyrgus flared.

  But Mr Fogarty cut across him again. ‘He’s got a point, Cynthia. It’s perfect cover. We can’t afford to make mistakes. Blue’s been kidnapped and we’re teetering on the brink of civil war. Volatile situation. The last thing we need is to make it any worse. Only bit that really worries me is time. We’re caught in a Countdown. Even as Acting Emperor I can’t order the Generals to stand down – only Blue can do that. So we need results fast.’

  ‘I could go straight away,’ Pyrgus said. ‘Now, if you like.’

  ‘Yes,’ Fogarty nodded, ‘it would have to be now.’

  ‘Take Kitterick,’ Madame Cardui said. ‘He’s an excellent bodyguard. Just in case …’

  ‘Yes,’ Fogarty said. ‘Take Kitterick. You can pass him off as your servant.’

  ‘Yes, OK,’ Pyrgus said. He headed for the door, then stopped. ‘Madame Cardui …’ He licked his lips. ‘The business about me seeing Gela …?’

  Madame Cardui looked at him. ‘Yes?’

  ‘You won’t mention it to Nymph, will you?’ Pyrgus said.

  Forty-seven

  As the door closed, Fogarty said, ‘Will you come to my room, Cynthia?’

  ‘Of course, darling,’ Madame Cardui said fondly. ‘Have you taken over the Imperial Suite?’

  Fogarty smiled faintly. ‘No, the robes are as far as it goes. But I decided it was best for me to sleep in the palace until the emergency’s over.’

  ‘The robes suit you,’ Madame Cardui said. Her smile was wide and warm. ‘Emperor Alan has a nice ring to it.’

  Fogarty sniffed. ‘The robes make me look like a prat. But they get people to do what they’re told.’

  The room he’d commandeered was spartan, the sort of chamber usually reserved for unimportant visitors. But at least it was warm. Fogarty pulled the robes over his head and stretched out on the bed. He patted the counterpane beside him.

  Madame Cardui crossed the room slowly and he watched her all the way. Weird where he’d ended up: actually living in another dimension of reality – the sort of thing they used to speculate about when he worked in quantum physics. But no more weird than meeting this marvellous woman. At his age.

  She lay down beside him and reached across to take his hand. For once the gesture didn’t hurt. The rejuvenation treatments had cleared his arthritis completely from all five of the fingers and were already making inroads into the other hand. Some of his liver spots seemed to be fading as well and just that morning when he was combing his few remaining wisps of greying hair, he thought he noticed new growth. Give the wizards long enough and he’d end up looking like Robert Redford.

  ‘You seem pensive,’ Cynthia remarked.

  ‘I was thinking of war,’ Fogarty said.

  ‘What were you thinking of war?’

  ‘The way it seems inevitable,’ Fogarty said, gazing at the ceiling. ‘When I was at school, I had a teacher who told us we should never look on history as a period of peace peppered by outbreaks of war, but rather as a period of war peppered by outbreaks of peace. I think he had something there.’ He rolled on his side so he could look at her. ‘My father was in 14–18.’

  ‘What’s 14–18?’ she asked.

  ‘First World War,’ Fogarty said. ‘First war in my world that was fought by every country on the planet – at least every one that counted. We lost eight million soldiers in that one. Slaughtered as many more civilians. They called it the “War to End Wars”. It ended my father all right – he caught a bullet at the Somme. But it didn’t end war. We did it all over again twenty-one years later. I was in that one.’

  ‘You told me,’ Madame Cardui said, gently stroking his hand.

  Fogarty said thoughtfully, ‘Maybe I’d have enjoyed it more if I’d known I was going to survive. I was afraid all of the time, and exhausted most of the time and in pain a lot of the time after I was wounded. Do you know, it still plays up in wet weather? We destroyed whole cities in that one, whole countries really.’

  ‘We have a spell like that,’ Madame Cardui said quietly. ‘Nobody’s ever dared use it.’

  ‘The thing is,’ Fogarty told her, ‘that wasn’t the war to end wars either. Five years after it finished, we had another war in Asia, a place called Korea. After Korea was finished, we started another close by in Vietnam. Lasted twenty years. After that we had the Afghan War, the Arab–Israeli War, the Iran–Iraq War, two Gulf Wars, the Falklands War, the Angola War and God knows how many other civil wars they hardly bothered telling us about. You can see what my old history teacher meant, can’t you?’

  ‘It hasn’t been quite that bad in the Realm,’ Madame Cardui said. ‘But close.’

  ‘What gets to me,’ Fogarty said, ‘is that when things start to move towards war, nobody seems to be able to stop it. Once you mobilise your soldiers, you always seem to send them to war no matter what.’

  ‘Is that what you think will happen here?’ Madame Cardui asked.

  ‘We’ve mobilised our soldiers,’ Fogarty said. ‘Blue pushed that button when she ordered a Countdown.’

  ‘The Faeries of the Night are mobilising too,’ Madame Cardui said.

  ‘You have intelligence? That’s definite?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘When were you going to tell me?’

  ‘Tonight, when we were alone. I didn’t want to mention it in front of Pyrgus.’

  ‘Too much pressure on him?’

  ‘Something like that.’

  Fogarty rolled on to his back again. ‘I want you to do something for me, Cynthia …’

  ‘Anything, darling.’

  ‘I want you to contact Queen Cleopatra of the Forest Faerie and persuade her to fight on our side.’

  ‘You really think it will come to that?’

  ‘Oh, yes,’ said Fogarty, ‘it will come to that.’

  Forty-eight

  ‘Shall I order an ouklo to transport us, sir?’ asked Kitterick.

  ‘No way!’ Pyrgus said. ‘I want a personal flyer.’

  Forty-nine

  Hairstreak opened the wine and sniffed the cork. ‘Nearly fifty years old. Now it’s the exact colour of blood.’ He looked across at his guest and raised an eyebrow.

  ‘Thank you, Blackie,’ Hamearis said. ‘I usually prefer ale, but I’ll make an exception.’

  The man was an oaf in many ways, but useful. He commanded massive respect among the Faeries of the Night and it was time to get him back on board. Hairstreak poured a generous goblet and pushed it across the table.
He was less generous with his own portion. All negotiations required a clear head if you were sensible, and this, whether Hamearis knew it or not, was a negotiation.

  The wine was superb. Hairstreak savoured it a sip at a time. Hamearis drank his down and pushed the goblet back for more.

  ‘You and I have been through a lot together, Burgundy,’ Hairstreak said as he poured. ‘Enough to weather little disagreements, eh?’ He forced himself to make it bluff and hearty, old soldiers talking of old times.

  ‘No disagreements now, Blackie,’ Hamearis said. ‘Not since that little cow threw our offer back in our faces.’ He watched Hairstreak’s expression closely. ‘If she threw it back in our faces.’

  Hairstreak elected to ignore the implication. ‘An historic opportunity for reconciliation,’ he said smoothly. ‘So tragic it has passed us by.’

  ‘You were less enthusiastic when the matter was first raised, as I recall.’ Hamearis took another enormous draught from his goblet.

  ‘Oh, I grant you I had my doubts. To be frank, Burgundy, I feared my niece might react the way she did – a very stubborn child, very suspicious and just as set against the Faeries of the Night as her father ever was.’

  Hamearis set his wine down on the table. ‘What have you done with her?’ he asked.

  The question was not entirely unexpected. Hairstreak allowed himself the ghost of a smile. ‘Are they saying I abducted her?’

  ‘There’s speculation …’

  Hairstreak held his eye. ‘Let me tell you, here and now as an old friend, I had nothing whatsoever to do with Blue’s disappearance. I did not plan it. I did not engineer it. I have not the slightest idea how it was carried out or where she is now.’ He glanced away, then added, ‘Although my people are working very hard to find out.’

  After a moment Hamearis said, ‘I believe you, Blackie.’ He picked up his wine again. ‘Frankly, I never thought you did it. Not that I don’t think you’re capable, but a cover story like that – she simply vanished. It just isn’t your style.’ He frowned. ‘I’d like to know who did take her, though. What actually happened?’

  ‘She simply vanished,’ Hairstreak said, and smiled. His features sobered and he shrugged. ‘That’s literally how it happened. The boy from the Analogue World tried to take her out. Pelidne tried to stop him. The boy killed Pelidne, then both he and Queen Blue disappeared.’

  ‘He couldn’t have taken her to the Analogue World, could he?’

  ‘I don’t see how,’ Hairstreak said. ‘But I didn’t ask you here to discuss mysteries. Blue is gone. Our proposals have been rejected. We need to plan our strategy.’

  ‘We need to get the Queen back,’ Hamearis said bluntly. ‘There’s a Countdown on.’

  ‘I heard that rumour,’ Hairstreak said easily. ‘I doubt it’s true.’

  ‘It’s true all right,’ Hamearis said. ‘I had it from my intelligence people.’

  Hairstreak looked at him, thunderstruck. ‘Are you sure?’

  ‘Wonder why your spooks didn’t tell you?’

  Hairstreak was wondering the same thing. Heads would roll. Besides which, protocol demanded an active Countdown be reported to all interested parties. Blue should have done it when she put it in place. The Acting Emperor should have confirmed it the moment she went missing. Who was the Acting Emperor anyway? Pyrgus, he supposed – he didn’t really know. He stared at Hamearis in horror. He could scarcely believe the enormity of the betrayal. Or of his own stupidity for not anticipating it. The blunt truth was he’d underestimated Blue. Came of thinking of her as a child.

  ‘How long?’ he asked.

  ‘Three days.’

  ‘From her visit or her disappearance?’

  ‘Same thing, from what I gather.’

  ‘Yes, you’re right.’ Hairstreak stared at him thoughtfully. ‘This changes everything.’

  Hamearis grinned. ‘It certainly changes the timing. What were you up to, Blackie?’

  ‘Up to?’

  Hamearis moved in his chair. ‘Oh, come on – you never favoured the offer of negotiation. You wanted to attack at once while the Faeries of the Light had a child as a leader. So did I –’

  ‘So did you?’ Hairstreak exclaimed. ‘You voted against me in Council!’

  ‘Of course I did,’ Hamearis said easily. ‘You had no backing. But that’s all changed now. What’s your plan?’

  Hairstreak hesitated for a heartbeat, then said, ‘Surprise attack. Catch them off guard.’ He glanced away and added sourly, ‘I didn’t anticipate a Countdown.’

  Hamearis leaned forward. ‘There may be a way to regain the initiative.’

  Hairstreak looked back at him at once. ‘What do you suggest?’

  Burgundy was every inch the seasoned warrior. ‘Decapitate the beast,’ he said. ‘They’ve already lost their child Queen. I say remove the rest of their command structure. Assassinate Prince Pyrgus and any other royal in line for the throne. Kill the head of their Intelligence Service. That old witch has been a thorn in our side for far too long. Kill their Analogue Gatekeeper – what’s his name? Fogarty? Kill your sister Quercusia. She’s mad, but she’s royal blood and could become a rallying point. Once that’s done, the way’s clear to mount a pre-emptive strike on the palace and take out the Generals. With their command structure gone, the Lighters will turn into sheep. We can step in and take over – you can step in and take over. It’s a limited operation, Hairstreak. I can organise it for you – I’ll use the Assassins’ Guild so nothing can be traced back to us. We can manage it easily before the Countdown expires.’

  Hairstreak stared at him for a moment, then said, ‘Do it.’

  Fifty

  The room was a featureless white cube, about eighteen feet across. There were no furnishings, no doors or windows, no curtains or carpeting, although the floor was slightly soft underfoot. She couldn’t see a light source, but there was light, a soft, white illumination that was neither too bright nor too dark. She still had no idea how they got here.

  Henry was squatting on the floor, his back against one wall. His eyes were shut, but she knew he wasn’t asleep.

  ‘You can’t keep me here for ever!’ Blue exclaimed. It would have no effect, but saying something broke the sameness of the place. She was already beginning to lose track of time.

  ‘They’ll come for us soon,’ Henry said, without opening his eyes.

  ‘Who’ll come for us soon?’ Blue demanded, not for the first time.

  Henry didn’t answer. Henry never answered that one. Henry, Blue thought, had gone mad.

  ‘I need a loo!’ she said suddenly.

  ‘The room will absorb waste,’ Henry told her.

  ‘You want me to go in the corner?’ she asked angrily. She was furious with Henry, furious for the way he kidnapped her, furious for the way he was behaving now. There was nothing of the old Henry in him.

  ‘I don’t want you to go at all,’ he said off-handedly. She couldn’t believe the change in him. It was as if he didn’t care. For her or for anything else. He’d been so dominant, so aggressive as they left her uncle’s mansion. But since they arrived here he hadn’t moved.

  ‘I’m hungry!’ Blue told him loudly, hoping for a sensible response.

  ‘There’s no food,’ Henry said. ‘But they’ll come for us soon.’

  Who’ll come for us? Somehow she was afraid to ask the obvious question. She couldn’t believe Henry might be working for Lord Hairstreak – it was unthinkable. But he had to be working for somebody. And they were coming soon.

  Nothing made any sense. If her uncle planned to move against her – planned to kidnap or kill her, let’s not mince words here – why involve Henry at all? Hairstreak already had her in his power. No guards at all at first, and later no better protection than one injured Trinian. He could have –

  She stopped mid-thought. Hairstreak didn’t want it known he’d kidnapped her. He couldn’t do the deed in his own mansion. That was why he involved Henry! It was all so simple.
r />   Blue suddenly realised she was thinking the unthinkable. All the pieces fitted. Henry had betrayed her to her uncle. She looked over at him and felt sick to her stomach. What had Hairstreak offered him?

  She wondered what he’d do if she attacked him. He was stronger than she was – there was a bruise on her arm where he’d gripped it at the mansion – but he didn’t look very alert. Every so often he closed his eyes. He wasn’t asleep. It looked more as if he was concentrating on something, almost listening. But all the same …

  If she waited until his eyes were closed, she could creep up and press the stimlus to the side of his neck. Well, she could. She definitely could. It would be simple. She realised she was arguing with herself. Could she really kill Henry whatever he’d done? Could she –

  The inner argument abruptly deflated like a balloon. She didn’t have the stimlus. She’d decided not to bring it in case her uncle’s security spells detected a weapon.

  Could she overpower Henry without a stimlus? Go for his eyes or strangle him until he passed out? She was being stupid. There was no way she was strong enough, even if she could bring herself to do it. And what would be the point if she did? What would be the point if she even killed him? She didn’t know how she’d got into this creepy room and she didn’t know how to get out of it again. There were no windows, no doors …

  Or were there?

  It occurred to her suddenly that she’d been taking everything at face value. What she saw was a featureless room, but what she saw mightn’t be the way it really was. She remembered the time she’d broken into Brimstone’s lodgings. They hadn’t looked the way they really were until she’d discovered the illusion spell. It could be like that here. An illusion spell might have changed the whole appearance. After all, the light had to be coming from somewhere, so clearly the source was disguised.

  She glanced at Henry. He’d closed his eyes again. Would he sense it if she moved? Only one way to find out. Cautiously she began to feel her way along one wall. Henry didn’t move.