by Emma Newman
I’ve been gathering evidence for a friend in an environmental group. He’s someone you met when we were at uni: Martin Barclay. I think you bought some gear off him once. Anyway, he and I cooked up a plan which came to fruition shortly after you and I got married: I got a job at Pin PR. His dad knew they were covering up stuff but all of his friends and family were known by CoFerrum Inc so they couldn’t infiltrate. They didn’t know me, so I went in with the plan to uncover some data, get it to Martin and his dad and blow the lid on it all.
The more I found out the deeper I realised the cover-up went. Pin does the PR for CoFerrum and several other major international companies involved in the minerals and metals trade and they’ve been fucking up the planet and the people who work for them for many, many years. In these boxes is enough evidence to cause a scandal and embarrass them into stopping some of it. I just want to carry on a bit longer to see if I can get close to the famous Mr Ferran. He’s the kingpin and he’s bloody hard to get close to, but I think Neugent is one of his lieutenants so I’m hanging on and going as high as I can to nail him. Martin knows I want to play the long game and he’s persuaded his dad to let me do it my way, but when they find out I’ve died they’ll need to know what happened. His contact details are with the instructions. Please follow them so you’re not dragged into this any more than you have to be. CoFerrum is massively powerful and they’ve killed people to keep things quiet in the past. They may have done that to me – I might have just had an accident – obviously I don’t know at the time of writing this.
Sam, I want you to know I love you and I’m sorry I put this before our marriage. I wanted to tell you, so many times, I really did, but I couldn’t. I wouldn’t let myself because I had to believe my own lie day in day out. Does that make sense? I couldn’t open up to you and then pack it all away every morning to go and pretend to be who I needed to be to get this evidence.
You’re probably angry with me and I understand that. You have every right to be. I hoped that once I got everything I needed to nail Ferran I could just come clean with you and we’d work it all out. I guess we don’t have that chance now. Please don’t be angry with Martin, this was all my choice and every time I spoke to him he told me to stop. The only thing I ask is that you make sure this information gets to Martin and his dad so something can be done. I may not have got Ferran, but we could still do them a lot of damage with what I’ve collected here.
I love you. And I know people say this and don’t really mean it but when you’re all right again, go and find someone to love who’ll treat you better than I did. I just want you to be happy, Sam. God knows you deserve it. And I’m sorry.
Leanne xxx
P.S. There was never anything between Neugent and me, in case you were ever worried. He’s an odious little shit and I can’t stand the man.
At the bottom were Martin’s contact details and the whereabouts of an inventory and report on the data in the boxes to pass on to him. Sam went back to the beginning and read it again, then flipped through the pages, seeing letter after letter, filled with the same apologies, the same instructions but a different note about what had been happening in the weeks before the respective letter. There were mentions of birthdays and arguments, reconciliations and the knowledge they were drifting apart. Their marriage’s decline was there on several pieces of paper in front of him and the whole time he’d had no idea why she’d stopped loving him nor why she’d turned into a different woman. She hadn’t, in fact, done either. He had no idea how to feel or how to handle it. So he sat there, staring at the letters and surrounded by boxes, as his mind churned and a headache grew.
Dressed in the mundane clothes provided for her honeymoon, Cathy dashed from the Victoria Art Gallery in central Bath to John Street. She didn’t have much time; Will was at the Tower and she had two hours until dinner. Carter was posted outside her bedroom thinking she’d gone to lie down and there was a risk that someone could check on her at any time. But she couldn’t get so close to finding what Miss Rainer had been up to and not act immediately.
She’d entered the mundane anchor property via the nursery wing and used a Charm of Openings keyed to Bath. She’d ordered it from the Emporium as part of the household order, knowing it wouldn’t draw any attention as she used to live in Aquae Sulis. Many people sent their staff to shop in Bath after they moved away. If questioned she could say it was for sending the footman to buy soap from a particular shop and no one would give it a second thought. She wished she’d thought of it before.
The voucher for the book spa was clutched tight in her hand. The bookshop was tucked in one of the Georgian back streets, not far from the Assembly Rooms, and after a brief stop-off to buy a new mobile phone with cash taken from the household budget, it didn’t take too long to find. She liked it as soon as she walked in. The smell of books made her feel excited and at home all at once. There was a man with blonde hair and blue eyes behind the counter and another man, tall and balding, talking with a woman with long red hair wearing an eclectic mix of mundane and period clothing. For a moment Cathy couldn’t help but stare at her, wondering if she was from one of the Great Families on a day out, but then she realised that one of them would never wear a corset on the outside of her blouse.
“Can I help you?” A woman approached with a friendly smile. Her greying hair framed her face with a tumble of gentle curls.
Cathy held out the voucher. “I have this voucher for a book spa. I don’t really know what it is though.”
“Present, was it?”
“…yes.”
The assistant flipped the voucher over and looked in the top left corner. “Well, you’re talking to the right person. I’m Jane. This way, please.”
She led Cathy through the shop and they passed an old roll-top bath which had been filled and converted into a bookshelf. Cathy decided that it was probably the best bookshop she’d ever been to.
They went up a staircase at the far end of the shop and Cathy was led through the first floor, which was filled with wooden bookshelves and books. The floorboards were uneven with age. They went through one room then through an alcove to a second with a fireplace and two comfy chairs. A door with a stained-glass panel was set in the corner and Jane was heading straight for it.
“We usually do the mundane book spas here,” she said, glancing at the chairs as she pulled a key out of her pocket. “You should try one. I’ll give you a leaflet all about it when you leave, if you like.”
“So I won’t be having the same thing?”
Jane smiled but said nothing. She picked up a glass lantern with a small candle inside and lit it. Cathy watched her turn the key once, unlocking the door, and then she whispered a Charm as she turned the key a second time, opening a Way into the Nether. It was a similar Charm to the one the Shopkeeper had taught her for getting to the Emporium from Mundanus.
“Do you have anything to do with the Emporium of Things in Between and Besides?”
“No, we’re totally independent.”
After checking there were no customers in the room, Jane opened the door and stepped through the familiar haze marking the threshold between Mundanus and the Nether. Cathy followed and found herself in another room that could easily have been part of the mundane bookshop, with walls covered by book-laden shelves. There was a fireplace but the grate was empty and two armchairs. Jane lit two more lanterns and handed the first to Cathy.
“I’ll leave you to browse. Are there any topics in particular you’d like to read about?”
Cathy looked at the books on the nearest shelf and many were familiar – several had been at her flat in Manchester. They were the books Miss Rainer had taught her from: essays on feminism, social-political history and the works of several remarkable men and women. “I don’t suppose you have the collected works of Aphra Behn?” she asked in a moment of nostalgia.
Jane crossed the room and pulled a weighty tome from a shelf. Cathy recognised the edition instantly. “Will you be coming on T
hursday?”
“What for?”
“Miss Rainer didn’t tell you? We haven’t seen her for such a long time. There’s a group of like-minded people who meet on the third Thursday of every month. Just come to the shop at 7 o’clock and ask for me.”
Cathy felt tears spring in her eyes. Miss Rainer had already done the hard work for her; there were people like her in the Nether and they were already meeting and they would have a plan she could get behind.
“I’ll be here.” She took the collected plays from Jane. “I can’t stay for long. I’ll only need five minutes.”
“Just go through the door when you’re ready.”
Cathy sat down after Jane left and flicked to Miss Rainer’s favourite play, The Forced Marriage. It was easy to find the right place; the spine naturally fell open at the page. She remembered the day Miss Rainer had climbed onto the table and said the words out loud, declaring that they were written to be spoken on a stage, not read silently in a classroom. Cathy kicked off her shoes and stood on the nearest chair. “This is for you, Miss Rainer,” she whispered and then read, “‘Love furnish me with powerful arguments: Direct my tongue that my disorder’d sence, May speak my passion more then Eloquence.’”
Her hands tingled as a pulse of magic rippled through the book and the pages flipped over rapidly until they fell open at the end of the play. As she stared at it, a piece of paper slotted between the pages came into view and on it a list of names in Miss Rainer’s handwriting. Cathy would bet her own library that they were people sympathetic to the feminist cause.
Cathy dropped into the chair and pulled the paper out. Scanning the list she saw several were crossed out, names she’d requested files on after seeing them in Miss Rainer’s. They had all had a form inserted at the top of the file filled with obscure abbreviations she’d planned to ask Max to decode at the Agency. Now she was even more determined to find out what they meant.
Charlotte’s name was there but hers was crossed out with a wavy line – perhaps to indicate she was still around but unable to speak her mind. Cathy flipped the page over to find more and the first to leap out at her were Margritte and Bartholomew Tulipa.
“Oh, God,” she whispered. “Fucking Roses.” If it hadn’t been for them and the way they’d manipulated Will, the ideal Duke and Duchess would have the throne and would already be working to change Society. Then she remembered the day, once she’d escaped life in the Nether, she went to Aphra Behn’s grave and laid flowers there. There was a bunch of tulips already there; she could still see the ribbon tied around them, blue against the grey stone. Cathy slapped her forehead with her hand. Why hadn’t she asked Margritte if she’d left them?
She had to go and talk to her. She was the first person she’d met in Londinium – in Society – that she’d genuinely wanted to befriend. There had to be a way to make things right without destroying Will, and the only way to find it was to find Margritte and talk to her. Just the two of them, away from Society, as equals.
14
Margritte woke with an excruciating headache and a sense of total disorientation. She opened her eyes and looked straight into two black discs in a silver oval. It took a moment to realise it was an approximation of a face, only inches away from her own. She cried out and the oval withdrew.
“The patient is awake. Shall I dispose of her?” The voice was male but it didn’t sound like a real person, more like a recording of one heard through an exceptionally high-quality gramophone.
“Benson, for fuck’s sake, Maggie’s my guest, not a kebab wrapper.”
She became aware of something over her face and in a panic pulled off a clear mask that was cupped over her nose and mouth. After a few blinks Margritte could see that the strange pseudo-face was fixed on the metal shape she’d seen before she’d blacked out. It was standing next to Rupert. He came over as she realised she wasn’t in Convocation House but instead on a makeshift bed in the corner of a very plain room. There were no windows, only a large open doorway leading off into a wide corridor lit by electric lamps.
“That’s oxygen,” Rupert said, picking the mask up from where she’d dropped it. It was connected to a large metal cylinder. “You might want to keep it on a bit longer.” She shook her head. “How are you feeling?” He offered her a hand.
She accepted the help in sitting up. The bed felt springy and wobbled as she moved. “Awful. Where are we?”
“In the Stacks.”
“That means nothing to me.”
“Under the University. We’re in the Nether, we’ll be safe here. Take these.” He handed her two round white pills and then fetched her a glass of water from a nearby table.
She frowned at the tablets. “No, thank you.”
“It’s just ibuprofen for your headache.”
She shook her head again. “I just want to go home, thank you.”
He dropped them into a pocket with a shrug. “Soon. I’m just waiting for the Proctors to get something to me.”
The Proctors were the university police. Unlike the mundanes, Margritte knew they were also Arbiters. “Do they have any idea what happened?”
“They’ve found something important but I haven’t seen it yet. Oh, Maggie, meet Benson.”
She stared past him at the metal man. Aside from the two black discs suggesting eyes there was only a rectangular grill where the mouth would be on a man’s face. Its head was shaped like a soup tureen with a large black bowler hat on top. Its body was a large cylinder, the arms and legs thick metal tubes. The legs ended in wheels, the arms in a collection of tools, from a corkscrew and bottle opener to a small saw. There were different tools at the end of each arm but she could only see small parts of them when tucked away out of use.
“Isn’t he great?” Rupert said. “I wanted him to look kind of retro, you know, a homage to those Fifties sci-fi B-movie robots, but also a bit like a Proctor.”
“But… what is he?”
“A robot.” When he saw she didn’t understand the word he added: “An artificial man.”
Margritte was horrified. “But he spoke! Does he have a soul?”
“Christ! No! That would be bloody awful, being trapped inside…” He shuddered and then unclipped something at the back of its arm. Margritte realised the metal was just a cover, like armour. Beneath she could see its arm was made of something clay-like, every inch of it covered with symbols she didn’t recognise. “It’s not really a robot, I’m just yanking your chain. It’s a golem, with bells and whistles. It might sound like they know what they’re saying, but they don’t, it’s all just programmed responses, like a computer. No… that won’t help you understand.” He jerked a thumb at one of the doorways. “Hedges is over there. Say hi, Hedges.”
“Hi.” The voice sounded identical to that which had come from Benson.
Margritte felt nauseous. She was trapped underground with a Sorcerer and armoured golems and, if she wasn’t careful, she could panic. She checked her posture was correct. Going to pieces wasn’t going to achieve anything. “Could I trouble you for a cup of tea?”
“Benson, get us some tea, will you?” The golem rolled out of the room.
“How long was I asleep?”
Rupert sat on the bed next to her, making it creak. “A few hours. Benson picked both of us up and opened a Way to Hedges. You’re officially the first Fae-touched to have been rescued by any of my staff. Congratulations.”
“But how did he open a Way when you couldn’t?”
“It’s all to do with anchors. I was blocked from making contact with anchors in the building but it doesn’t matter for those two; they’re each other’s anchors, so Benson can always find Hedges and vice versa. Even if one of them was drifting in the Nether, nowhere near any reflected buildings, they’d still be able to find the other.”
“What if they were both drifting in the Nether?”
He grinned. “Then I would have majorly fucked up. One of them is always here. Can you walk?”
She stoo
d up and, whilst her head was pounding, she was otherwise all right. “Yes. Are we leaving?”
“Let’s go to my office, it’s more comfortable there. I just kip here if I can’t be arsed to go home.” He offered his arm and she slipped her hand into the crook of his elbow, more out of politeness than anything else.
They walked out of the room and into a corridor lined with books from floor to ceiling as far as she could see, lit at regular intervals by bright lights hanging from the ceiling. “My goodness,” she said. “You meant the Bodleian’s underground book stacks, didn’t you? I thought that was just a myth.”
“That’s what I want everyone to think. There are miles of them under the city, all reflected into the Nether.”
“The books too?”
“Only the good ones.”
Hedges followed them as they walked and there was no sound save the golem’s wheels and the clip of her heels. The books they passed were uniformly bound in leather with dates embossed on the spines. She wondered why he was telling her so much and letting her see the place he slept in. The Sorcerers were famously reclusive – she didn’t even know the name of the Sorcerer of Essex though she’d lived in his domain for over two hundred years – but Rupert seemed more approachable than the majority of people in Society.
“I hope you don’t mind my enquiring, but why did you make Benson and Hedges? Don’t you trust real people?”
“The trouble with human beings is human error,” he replied. “Don’t get me wrong, I think people are great – the clever ones, that is – but that doesn’t mean I’d want to rely on them. Here we are.”
Tucked between two bookcases was a door that he unlocked with a key fished out of his pocket. He flipped a light switch and revealed a room with a huge desk, a few filing cabinets and a sofa. The walls were covered with photographs and paintings of Oxford, and there was a framed Dali.
