Deviance (The London Psychic Book 3)

by J. F. Penn

  But curiosity drove him on. This was the first time anyone had explained his visions as an integral part of him, and now he knew he wasn't alone.

  Blake put his hand on the book and closed his eyes.

  There was no sinking through the layers of memory this time. There was a pure jolt of energy and he gasped with the cold. Blake opened his eyes to find himself standing in freshly fallen snow surrounded by birch trees. The tinkling of a stream pervaded the glade and a light rain fell on his exposed skin. Above the trees he could see mountaintops.

  Blake inhaled deeply. The air was fresh and clean, filling his lungs as a sense of freedom expanded within him. There was nothing of human manufacture in sight, the sounds and smells only spoke of what had been here for millennia.

  There was a crunch in the snow behind him and Blake turned to see Allfrid smiling at him.

  "This is only the beginning," he said. "But I wanted you to see the place I come to be at peace." He looked up to the mountain. "Your father and I climbed that peak as boys. Back then, he understood the power of the place. But he left and when you're far from nature, you lose touch with its strength."

  Blake could hear his own heartbeat in the still of the glade. He could feel the pulse at his neck, his wrists, and he felt a connection to the earth here. He wanted to jump around in the snow, lie back in it and look up at the sky. It was far from the wild, dark places of the New Forest where he had grown up.

  Allfrid cupped his hands around his mouth and called into the woods, a harsh sound, the words as raw as the land they stood in.

  A few minutes later, faces appeared in the trees and figures crept through the wood, darting between the sheltered spaces. There were children amongst the group as well as older people and those Blake's own age.

  One little girl peeked out from a tree close by, catching his eye. She giggled at him and Blake smiled back. He must look odd to them with his dark skin and city clothes. She took a step out into the snow, her hand held out to him in greeting.

  As she came closer, Blake reached out to touch the girl's fingers.

  A whoosh of cold wind swept snow into his face.

  He gasped, opened his eyes, and he was back in the attic flat again. He grabbed the desk with both hands, trying to orient himself into the physical space again.

  Allfrid laughed, shaking his head. "You need training, boy, if you're to use your gift properly."

  "They could see me," Blake said, his voice shaky. "Those people, they could see me and touch me?"

  "Our tribe live with closer ties to outer realms. What you see as a vision, others experience as part of their usual world. You differentiate but that's only because you haven't truly accepted that part of yourself. But every time you read, you take a step towards us. Each time you sink into memory, it also seeps into you. Beware of doing this without the proper training, boy. Come to us and I will show you."

  Allfrid rose to his feet, the Galdrabók in his hands. "Now, I must go and I'm taking this." His head almost touched the ceiling in the tiny flat and he bent a little, the posture of a man who was always leaning over others. "The grimoire belongs with the family – but you are one of us."

  He pulled a map from his pocket and handed it to Blake. It was marked by lines and runes, with a clear red X in a patch of green in northern Sweden. "The glade is marked. If you come to us, we can teach you of your gift and how to use the book." Allfrid looked out of the window, over the rooftops of London. "Or you can stay here, wearing those gloves to hold back the visions, using alcohol to deaden their power, wondering how you fit into the world." He looked down at Blake again. "It's your choice."

  Allfrid turned and walked out of the flat without a backwards glance, leaving Blake sitting on a chair, shaken by the experience of the vision. He heard his uncle's footsteps tramp down the stairs and then the bang of the door onto the street.

  Chapter 25

  Jamie pushed open the door to her tiny office and picked up the mail from the mat, juggling her coffee cup in the other hand. She wanted this space to keep her work separate from her personal life but once again, the two were mingling. Perhaps work was life, she thought. For some people at least. The need to work certainly drove her, and she never wanted to stop. Retirement seemed an outmoded concept from a different time and the day her brain checked out was the day she would stop working. But it was more than the love of the job that kept her going today. After Polly's death, she had lost purpose but there was a glimmer of hope that she might find it again in this community.

  The news from Magda this morning had made Jamie determined to dig into the ownership records of the buildings in the Southwark area. Who would stand to gain from the destruction of the studio apartments and who would want the Kitchen closed? Ed was in a stable condition in hospital, but it seemed like the community was being attacked on all fronts.

  She opened her laptop and began to search the council databases that held the area's property records. There were layers of holding companies but the trail would be there, Jamie was sure of it. She knew how to investigate into the directors and shareholders of companies from her days in the police and it was only a matter of patience to sift through the levels down to the originators. She sipped her coffee as she searched, copying and pasting lists of names, cross-checking against the Companies database that held the legal records for each UK entity.

  After a couple of hours lost in data, Jamie had a broad sense of how many companies were vying for the valuable property in Southwark. Many were registered overseas, but there were names that tied them together. There was a crossover of interest between projects as varied as the Shard construction to Guy's and St Thomas' hospital development and renovation of some of the older warehouses. One name kept coming up: Vera Causa Limited.

  Jamie did a quick search and discovered that the Latin words meant True Cause. She began to delve into what she could find about the company, quickly discovering that the shareholding lay in bearer shares. These were physical stock certificates where the owner didn't have to be registered in any way and dividends were disbursed to whoever held the shares. The setup was designed to hide ownership and legislation was currently being debated that would make it illegal. But for now, the owner of these bearer shares could stay hidden. Jamie frowned, taking a last sip of the now-cold coffee.

  A sudden commotion and banging from the outer offices broke her concentration.

  Jamie emerged from her office to find one of the other tenants shouting at a man in the hallway. The official wore a pinstriped suit, standing with back straight as he taped a notice on the door.

  "My contract clearly says that the lease is six months," the tenant exclaimed, waving paperwork at him.

  The suit handed a document to the gesticulating man.

  "You missed the clause for pest control," he said. "Everyone needs to be out of here within the next two hours and then fumigation will commence. You won't have access for at least a week, but you'll be contacted when the building is available again."

  The tenant continued raging, his protestations useless against immoveable bureaucracy.

  Jamie ducked back inside her tiny office, packing up what little paperwork she had started to accumulate into her backpack. There was a nagging doubt in her mind about the timing of the pests and no evidence of them that she could see.

  Walking downstairs ten minutes later, she stopped to read the notice from the landlord on the way out. The company name at the bottom was one of those that she had tied back to Vera Causa.

  The sun was out as she emerged onto the street. The units were away from the main tourist strip along the Thames, but close enough that she could be amongst people quickly. Jamie appreciated anonymity in the middle of a bustling city. Small communities might protect in some ways, but they also curtailed originality and punished nonconformity. The city allowed all to flourish and anyone could find their niche here, but could it be that Vera Causa was trying to make Southwark compliant in some way? A test case, with the rest
of the city to follow.

  Walking helped her to think, so Jamie emerged onto the riverside near the Anchor pub and turned west. The grey of the Thames was like quicksilver in the sun, the waters high and lapping against the strong pontoons that held it back from the city. Jamie passed a busker in the Southwark Bridge underpass, the jaunty guitar tune bringing a smile to her face. She dropped a couple of coins into his case, nodding a thankyou. The buskers and street entertainment flourished in the city as the sun came out, the summer months bringing tourists from all over the world. And here in Southwark, busking kept artists from the food banks and brought music to the streets. Doubly wonderful, Jamie thought.

  A little further on, she reached the Tate Modern. The old power station with its one tall chimney stood proud on the south bank facing the Millennium Bridge, with the classic dome of St Paul's beyond. But today, the crime scene tape held back curious tourists and the gallery was closed until further notice. Most of the structural damage from the masquerade attack had been at the back of the large Turbine Hall, out of sight from the north view, but Jamie knew what it looked like inside.

  Images from that night flashed through her brain, the dead and the dying, her frantic search for Blake.

  Her breath came fast and she moved to the edge of the pavement, sitting down on a step for a moment as the dizziness passed. A part of her mind witnessed the panic her body felt. Strange, because she had never experienced this in the police, even as part of the homicide team.

  Jamie let the waves of anxiety roll over her as she sat looking out at the ever-shifting waters of the Thames. Perhaps it was precisely because she had no team that she was feeling out of control. She certainly missed having backup and resources. She thought of Missinghall and his enthusiasm, the respect she had earned in the police. Had she been too quick to resign? Could she consider going back?

  Feeling calmer now, Jamie walked back to her little apartment complex. If she couldn't work at the office, she'd have to make a space in the flat because the job was really too private to work in a public coffee shop.

  Her street was tightly packed with close terraced houses, each one up against the next in a racially mixed community. Jamie spotted a few people standing outside her building. She frowned. That was unusual.

  As she approached, she saw the same eviction team that had been at the office building. But this time there were a couple of enforcer types with the suits, gorilla men with thick biceps and heavy foreheads. The crowd of tenants from the building had been joined by several of the other street residents. Some were angry and others shook their heads in resignation.

  "It's temporary," the suited man was saying, his hands held up apologetically. "But you have to be out before midnight. You should be able to get back in within the next week. We'll notify you all."

  "What about compensation?"

  "You can't do this –"

  "My kids need –"

  "Where are we meant to go?"

  "The faster you get out and we can start the fumigation process, the faster you can all get back in."

  Jamie stood on the edge of the crowd. There was no way this was legal, but it would take a lot of energy to fight the powerful corporation that stood behind the eviction notice. It seemed Vera Causa Limited had a long reach, and this definitely felt like it was turning personal. Years in the police had given Jamie a sense when all was not quite as it should be, and she was getting that vibe on overdrive right now. She needed to find out more on Vera Causa, but she couldn't do it here.

  She elbowed her way through the crowd.

  "I'm in Flat 9," she said to the man on the door.

  He grunted and let her through.

  Up in her flat, Jamie grabbed a rucksack and filled it with some clothes, grabbing whatever was clean. Looking around, she realized there wasn't much she actually cared about here. Her life wasn't defined by things anymore, but by memories. She picked up the photo of Polly by her bed, her daughter's laughing face captured in a moment without pain. She smiled. She would have done anything to save Polly, but at least they had experienced happy times together in the short time they had. She wrapped the photo frame in a t-shirt and put it gently in her pack. Vera Causa could take her home and her workplace, but they couldn't take her memories.

  Jamie pulled bedsheets out of the cupboard and spread them over the furniture. She was doubtful that they were actually going to fumigate the place but might as well make it look as if she believed the story.

  It was getting dark when she emerged outside. The gorilla men stood by the gate and they ticked her name off a list as she confirmed her cellphone number.

  "We'll call you as soon as it's all done," one of the men said. "Should be a week at most."

  Jamie didn't bother to reply. She headed down the road away from the flat, back towards the center of Southwark.

  She had a feeling of being untethered, unsure of what to do next. She could just keep walking. She could get on a train and head to the coast, get on a boat and go to France and on through the continent, or even fly somewhere new. She thought of the freedom she felt dancing tango. South America had always been somewhere she'd wanted to visit. Now she was free to go and the opportunities suddenly seemed endless.

  After all, there was no real reason to stay. Was there?

  Blake was damaged, and perhaps she had imagined their connection. Establishing her business was an uphill battle and she was only on the edges of the Southwark community right now. They wouldn't even notice she was gone. The thought was freeing but also slightly disconcerting. Jamie knew her independence had kept her from being immersed in a community when she was caring for Polly, and her life was poorer for it now. But the double eviction seemed like a pretty big sign that she wasn't wanted here.

  Could she commit to this place when everything seemed to point towards leaving?

  Jamie walked down to South Bank and stood looking out at the Thames. The waters ran swiftly towards the ocean, the eddies making patterns in the current. Flotsam and jetsam, pieces of the discarded city, caught on the boats moored in the central channel. They were pinned for a moment, crushed against the metal and then dragged under or whipped around the side by the fast-moving river. Then they drifted on towards the sea.

  Jamie exhaled slowly, then pulled out her phone and dialed.

  Chapter 26

  O answered on the second ring.

  "Jamie, are you OK?"

  Jamie smiled at the caring note in O's voice. She did have friends here, and right now her friends were hurting too.

  "Actually, I've been evicted."

  "What the hell is going on?" O's frustration echoed Jamie's own. "Why don't you come over here? You can kip on the couch, if that's alright. Magda's here too."

  "Thank you," Jamie said. "I'll be there in twenty minutes."

  O's flat was chaotic. Magda stood in the middle of the living area surrounded by the few canvases that hadn't been destroyed in the fire. She held out one of her crow photographs to Jamie, the edges of one corner burned and curled, the black bubbled up beneath the feathers.

  "I think I might have found a new technique," Magda said, her laugh with an edge of mania. She shook her head. "But this is all I have left from ten years in that studio."

  O swept out of the kitchen, a large glass of red wine in either hand.

  "You have your wonderful mind left, my love." She handed one glass to Magda and the other to Jamie. "And you both have my flat. What's not to like?"

  She turned back into the kitchen, emerging with her own large glass and the rest of the bottle.

  Jamie couldn't help but smile at O's optimism. In the face of everything they were going through, it seemed she still saw a positive side.

  O looked at her watch.

  "Quick, turn on the telly. The announcement about the Mayor should be on any minute."

  The familiar sounds of the BBC news jingle filled the flat and they watched in silence as the announcement was made. Even O couldn't summon anything positi
ve to say as they watched Dale Cameron step forward to accept the position.

  Jamie felt a stone settle in the pit of her stomach, a heavy sense of dread. Riding high on a right-wing ticket of cleaning up the city, Cameron's patrician face was all smiles and promises, but part of her knew that he was entwined in some of the darker corners of government.

  "Shit." Magda took a large swig of her wine. "There goes everything we've worked for. That bastard is in the pockets of the building development companies. Southwark will become a rich man's playground now he has a say."

  O stood and downed her wine, then began to open another bottle of red. "Surely he won't have the power to change things so substantially?" she said.

  Jamie sighed. "He has the mandate of being elected on his policies to clean up the streets, so he'll be able to act pretty fast."

  "And with Amanda Masters in hospital …" Magda shook her head. "Maybe we should give up, leave London altogether. We can start again somewhere new. I can find a studio somewhere else."

  O put down her glass and hugged Magda close, her pale arms stark against Magda's dark clothes.

  "Don't say that," O whispered. "If we leave, they will have won. I won't let you go. This is your place, Magda. Your ravens are here, your people are here. Cross Bones needs you." O looked over at Jamie. "Tell her, please."

  Jamie took a sip of her wine.

  "It certainly seems as if we're being pushed out – arson, violence, evictions, all targeted at one part of the community." She frowned. "But if we go, then this area will be poorer for losing its diversity. You two are figureheads, leaders of the community. Tomorrow, we should start organizing for protest, contact the press and start taking control of the story."

  Jamie's voice was stronger than she felt. A few hours ago she had considered leaving herself, and she knew the power that Cameron had on his side. It wouldn't be easy to go up against him.