Another thing I’ve said before and I’ll say again: there’s something wrong with me. And here’s the proof: I stand there like furniture while everyone else makes a bolt for it. Charlie and one of the goons vanish out of another door. Dinny pushes Billiard Ball out through the window ahead of him. The two jacks split up and go after them. There’s a crash from outside – the sound of shots—
Which leaves just me and the shark. You can tell which is which, because I’m the one who’s still blinking when a small figure, dressed in black, marches into the room.
CHAPTER THREE
Tatty
MARVO STOPS DEAD in her tracks, staring at me. ‘I thought you’d gone,’ she whispers.
After I locked Matthew in the cellar with only a pissed-off demon for company, I realised it was only a matter of time before the Society missed him and started prodding me with sharp objects to see if I knew where he was. They’d already ordered me to make a pilgrimage to Rome, so I got myself seen climbing aboard a train and leaving town.
‘I came back.’ I do my best smile. ‘You’re looking very smart.’
Her days of dressing like a deckchair are gone. Detective Constable Magdalena Marvell is dressed all in black: coat, scarf, trousers and shoes, like she’s making some sort of statement. She was always skinny – even more of a shrimp than I am – but now she’s lost even more weight. With her hair cropped short and bleached, like all the CID wear it, she looks like a small, sad tree after a snowfall.
She’ll never make detective sergeant, by the way, because she’s a tatty. And tatties get used and discarded, not promoted.
‘I came looking for you.’ Her eyes dart around the room, taking it all in. ‘At the monastery.’
‘And?’
Her face has gone blank. ‘You weren’t there.’
Actually, I was. That train I got on? As soon as it was clear of town, I jumped off and sneaked back. I’ve spent most of the time since then hiding out in my studio, which I’ve got wrapped in a cloaking spell. It’s not just invisible: people can’t remember that it was ever there. And if they really try to think about it . . .
Well, Marvo’s clutching her head like it’s about to explode.
It’s dead clever, a cloaking spell. But to tell you the truth, the fun wears off after a while.
‘I’m here now, anyway.’ I raise one hand and make a shape with my fingers – not real magic, by the way; more like hypnotism.
A flicker of light from the stone in my ring darts across Marvo’s eyes. Her face relaxes. Her eyes drift closed . . . and I’m just stooping to pick up the shark and tiptoe out of here when there’s the sound of shots outside and her eyes flutter open.
‘What’s that?’ She’s staring at the shark.
‘My lunch.’
‘Don’t be a prat.’
‘It’s what I do best.’
‘See what I mean?’ She leans over the shark and sniffs – tatties sniff things a lot. Her face wrinkles up. ‘That’s disgusting!’
‘Ginglymostoma cirratum,’ I say. ‘The nurse shark. Fully grown it can reach a length of fourteen feet. It’s a common inshore bottom-dwelling shark, found in tropical waters—’
‘What’s it for?’
‘I’m planning a seafood risotto. What do you think it’s for?’
One of the jacks stumbles back in, mopping sweat from his forehead with a snotty handkerchief. His name’s Carter and he’s close to retirement, if he doesn’t have a heart attack first. ‘Bastards got away,’ he gasps.
‘You don’t say,’ Marvo mutters.
‘Can we get out of here?’ Jacks are scared of the Hole, especially at night.
‘What about Hasnip?’
I assume that’s the other jack. There’s a flash of light from outside, followed, a moment later, by the sound of an explosion.
Carter jumps. ‘Did you hear that?’
Marvo flaps a hand at him. ‘In a minute.’
‘What are you after Dinny for, anyway?’ I ask.
‘For Christ’s sake, Marvell!’ Carter’s at the window, staring anxiously out into the darkness. ‘It’s not safe.’
‘I said, in a minute!’ Marvo turns back to me. ‘The chief thought he might know something.’
‘He knows where to get a shark. Know something about what?’
‘We’ve got this dead kid.’
There’s the sound of running footsteps overhead. Lumps of plaster fall from the ceiling. Carter jams a pair of thick spectacles on his face. He pulls out his revolver and flips the cylinder open.
‘Stupid bleeding tatty!’ he hisses. ‘Get us all killed!’ An empty cartridge case rattles off across the floor. Carter’s eyes are rolling behind his glasses like goldfish in a bowl. He fumbles with a fresh round, moving his head backwards and forwards, struggling to focus—
It’s called the Blur. Medical name, presbyopia.
You’re fine as a kid; you can see everything sharp as a knife.
Around twenty, your eyes start to act up. You can still see stuff in the distance, but your close vision goes to hell and you get these blinding headaches. There’s nothing healers can do about it . . .
By the time they’re twenty-five most people need strong glasses to make out anything less than a room away.
Thirty: those lenses are like goldfish bowls.
The banging overhead is getting louder and Carter’s beginning to panic. He’s dropped his gun and he’s down on his hands and knees fumbling for it.
‘Here.’ Marvo steps across, picks it up and hands it to him.
‘Bloody tatty!’ He holds the gun at arm’s length, eyes screwed up. After a bit more fumbling, he jams the new round into the chamber.
I catch Marvo’s eye. She just shrugs. She doesn’t expect any thanks. Tatties don’t get thanked.
If you’re a grown-up and you’re Blurry, any kid with half a brain can find a dropped gun, thread a needle or read stuff out for you. Tatties, though . . . they’re special. They’re sharp. They can’t just see clearly, they can think – clear and fast. They’ll walk into a room and notice things that anybody else would miss. They’ll spot the connection between two shreds of information that nobody else could’ve seen.
That’s why Marvo’s giving the orders, even though she’s only sixteen.
Uniformed jacks like Carter, they can’t stand tatties.
‘This dead kid,’ I say. ‘The Crypt Boy, right?’
After three weeks locked away in my studio, all I know is what I read in a newspaper that I picked up. The police found some kid’s body stuffed into a secret chamber underneath a derelict church.
‘Nothing to do with Dinny,’ I say. ‘He wouldn’t hurt a kid.’
‘But he’d know people who would.’
I’m about to say that I don’t think so, and that maybe Marvo might like me to look at the body—
When there’s a final, deafening crash overhead, and we all look up in time to see the ceiling cave in and Hasnip come tumbling down in a cloud of shattered wood and plaster.
Like a good mate, Carter breaks his fall.
After that, nobody says anything for a bit. Marvo gets Carter on his feet, and together they pick up Hasnip. I’ve got the shark, wrapped in the sheet. I grab my pentagrams from the mantelpiece, and we’re out of the room, struggling down a shattered staircase. The shark weighs a ton, but I’m holding it over my head because there’s this horde of children hanging over the banister a floor up, yelling and screaming and chucking stuff down at us.
The kids in the Hole – they’d give most demons a run for their money. I see a brick bounce off Marvo’s shoulder, but then we’re over a pile of rubble and out of the building, dashing across the street towards a waiting police van.
The driver’s waving a gun. ‘Come on!’ He fires into the darkness.
The ruins of the old college buildings loom over us like a crumbling wedding cake. Opposite, there’s open ground with a couple of dogs rooting around in the rubbish. Street lights? You must
be joking! Bonfires burning in the distance . . .
We can stand around admiring the scenery another time. Right now, the bricks are still raining down. Glass smashes on the cobbles and a trail of fire roars towards us. As I pull Marvo out of the way, another flaming bottle flies out of the darkness. Carter’s got his arm under his mate’s shoulder and his gun out, firing wildly as a mob of kids swarm out of cover and the entire street is engulfed in flames and oily smoke. The horses scream and rear up, almost throwing the driver off the box.
Out of bullets, Carter throws Hasnip into the back of the van. The shark is finally getting bored with bouncing around on my head. I can’t hold it with just one hand, but as it falls I manage to shove it in Marvo’s direction. She catches it, stumbles backwards and falls inside the van. I trip on the step and land on top of them both. I hear more breaking glass and shooting, and when I look over my shoulder the van door is on fire.
Carter lets off a couple of final rounds, then throws himself on top of the pile. We all roll around on the floor as the van takes off, trailing flames and smoke.
Yeah, you can see why the jacks steer clear of the Hole.
CHAPTER FOUR
Strawberry and Vanilla
‘WHERE’D YOU CRAWL out of?’ The receptionist at the mortuary stares at me over his spectacles. ‘I thought you’d gone.’
‘I missed your welcoming smile.’
‘Smartarse! Anyway, I can’t let you—’
‘I’ll sign him in.’ Marvo’s been clutching her shoulder ever since we ditched Carter and Hasnip at the infirmary. I told her to let a healer look at it, but she said she wasn’t going to risk me getting away. She winces with pain as she grabs the pen and turns the logbook.
‘What happened to you?’ the receptionist asks.
‘Nothing important.’ She’s left a smear of blood across the page.
‘Stupid—’ He breaks off as he finally notices the shark. ‘What’s that?’
‘Evidence.’ Marvo turns away from the desk and just walks into me. ‘Come on.’
I used to work here, until I got fired for getting up too many people’s noses. I lead the way across the lobby and into a corridor.
‘Autopsy room’s that way,’ says Marvo.
I manage to raise the shark in my arms. ‘Can I park this first?’
There are three forensic amphitheatres in the city mortuary and I used to have the run of one of them. Just outside it is my old robing room. At least they haven’t messed with the door: I brush my fingers down the wood; it sighs like maybe it’s missed me and swings open.
I lay the shark on the floor and turn to Marvo. ‘Let’s have a look.’
‘What?’
‘Your shoulder.’
‘I’m fine.’ But she knows she isn’t. She hisses and pulls faces as she wriggles out of her coat and drops onto a stool.
One good thing about my robing room: I’ve got an electric light. It hasn’t been used since I ran off, so the battery’s fully charged, and now that Marvo’s sitting down I can see dark roots where the bleach is growing out of her hair.
It’s a CID thing, the bleach. They seem to think it makes them look special or clever or something. I never thought Marvo would fall for it, and I suspect she only did it to wind me up. Since then, maybe she’s forgotten or just couldn’t be arsed. Maybe she’s depressed. She doesn’t look very happy.
‘So.’ I open a cupboard and grab a porcelain jar. ‘Pleased to see me?’
She frowns. ‘Haven’t decided yet.’
‘Surprised, though.’
‘Not really.’ She nudges the shark with her foot. ‘Something special in mind?’
There sure is, but I don’t want her laughing at me. Not yet, anyway. I change the subject: ‘I thought you’d put in for a transfer.’
‘Changed my mind.’ And before I can ask why: ‘The dead kid – the Crypt Boy – there’s weird stuff . . .’
‘Like what?’ Her grey cotton shirt hasn’t ripped, but there’s a dark patch of blood soaking through it.
‘Sorcery or something,’ she mutters.
‘Yeah,’ I say. ‘But every time there’s something you don’t get, you make this jump – like it’s always sorcery.’
She’s undoing her sleeve button. ‘Try not to rip it this time,’ she mutters.
Me and Marvo . . . we’ve got form, as the jacks say. Every time we meet up, she seems to manage to get herself hurt.
‘You’ll have to take it off,’ I say.
‘Nark off!’
‘Loosen the neck, then.’
She opens a couple of buttons. ‘Gimme that.’ She grabs the jar and sniffs at it.
I grab it back. ‘Has to be me.’
‘A likely story!’
I stick my fingertip in the jar, fish out a dab of goo and hope it hasn’t gone off. ‘Hold still.’ I slide my hand under her blouse.
I’m not just any sorcerer; I’m a forensic sorcerer. OK, so I got the push a while back, but when I touch human skin, I’m used to it being cold and dead.
I think I prefer it that way. Clear signals. I’m trying to pretend that Marvo’s skin isn’t soft and warm. My hand follows the line of her collarbone towards the shoulder—
‘What’s the strap?’
‘Are you stupid?’
I’m actually blushing. ‘I live in a monastery, remember?’ I’m very relieved when my fingertip encounters the sharpness of her shoulder and the sticky wetness of blood.
She hisses with pain. ‘Get on with it!’
‘In the name of Adonai the most high. In the name of Jehovah the most holy!’ I smear the salve around the place, chanting away and making shapes with my free hand.
‘Are you done?’
‘Don’t rush me. In the name of the Lord who healeth the sick.’ I pull my hand out, carefully again. ‘Once a prat,’ I say, ‘always a prat.’ And when she gives me this angry look, I specify: ‘Carter.’
‘Christ!’ She’s glaring down at the shark while she does her buttons up. ‘That thing stinks.’
Can’t argue: the pissy smell is overwhelming. ‘You’re welcome.’ I’m at the basin, washing my hands.
‘It was your fault I got hurt in the first place.’
‘But you’re all right now . . .’
‘Yeah, I’m fine.’ She moves the arm in a circle. Her voice softens. ‘Thanks, Frank.’ She’s on her feet, pulling her coat on.
Moment over: ‘Can we look at this kid now?’
Down a flight of stone steps and along a lamp-lit corridor that gets colder with every step, I put out my hand to open a door.
‘Hang on,’ says Marvo. Her hands are trembling as she pulls a flat, round silver case out of her pocket: her scryer. ‘Gotta call the chief.’
‘Can’t it wait?’
She turns her back on me. She’s got the scryer open and she’s tapping the inside with her fingertips.
‘Hey,’ I call after her. ‘This was your idea.’
She’s walking back the way we came. Doesn’t even look round; just flaps her hand at me and blows on the surface of the mirror inside the lid. ‘Yes, Chief,’ she says into it. ‘I’m at the mortuary.’
Whatever. The door closes behind me with a faint sigh like an old man sitting down. I shiver.
I never come down here if I can avoid it. They call it the children’s ice room, which sounds, I dunno, sort of strawberry and vanilla, you know . . .?
It’s more like a wide corridor than a room. About twenty yards long and five across, with another door at the far end. The floor is flagged stone, slippery with ice. One wall is just dark-red brick. Stretching all the way along the other side is a row of doors, dozens of them, each about three feet square. They’re made of silver, with magic symbols etched into them. Below them, through a metal grille, I can see the ice stacked up.
It’s freezing cold.
Halfway along it opens out into a sort of circle, with a desk in the middle. There’s a sour-looking middle-aged bloke huddled behind it
, with a little kid on a stool beside him. They’re both wrapped up in fur coats, wearing gloves and hats, with silver amulets hanging around their necks. Their breath forms clouds in the air.
You see this combination all over the place. A grown-up because they’re supposed to know what they’re doing. A kid because the grown-up can’t actually see what they’re supposed to know how to do.
The bloke’s got his glasses off and he’s staring up at me. ‘Name?’
Like he doesn’t know.
‘Frank Sampson,’ I say. The kid pulls off one glove and writes in a big ledger.
‘Occupation?’
‘Forensic sorcerer.’ Not strictly true. Like I said, I got fired.
‘Here to see?’
‘Dunno his name. The Crypt Boy . . .?’
The kid opens another ledger and runs his finger down the page. The bloke sticks his glasses back on his nose and squints. They come off again as he gets up and comes round the desk. ‘Over here.’
His official job title is ‘diener’, which is just a fancy word for mortuary attendant. He leads me to the far end of the room and opens one of the metal doors. He puts his amulet to his lips, then grabs two handles and pulls. There’s the rumble of wheels and a steel tray slides out. The body of a child lies on it. A girl aged maybe five or six; a white silk sheet, embroidered with symbols, drawn up to her neck.
‘No!’ Back at the desk, the kid is gesturing madly. ‘Number sixty-seven.’
The diener slides the tray back and slams the door. He opens the compartment to the left. The tray is empty. He turns to the kid. ‘What are you playing at?’ He strides back to the desk and shoves him out of the way. The glasses go back on. He peers and pulls faces as he runs his finger down the ledger.
I shiver as a whisper of icy air blows through the room. I close the door on the empty compartment and open the next. A boy a couple of years older. Curly red hair. Freckles. Half his face smashed in.
The reason the mortuary has a dedicated children’s ice room is because Doughnut City’s got a lot of dead kids. Like I said, apart from tatties and sorcerers, pretty much everybody’s half blind by the time they hit twenty-five. If they’re going to hold down a job where they’ve got to make out anything closer than the other side of the street, they need a kid to do the seeing for them.
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