Phoebe Harkness Omnibus

by James Fahy

  “Ye-es,” I said dubiously, like a child untrusting of a street magician. “Car-bomb, perhaps you heard? Almost got blown up. Didn’t though. Just took a few Oxford cobbles to the hip and leg.” I smiled wearily. “I’ve had an interesting few days. Why do you mention it?”

  He looked at me as though it was a stupid question. “Because I’m concerned, of course,” he said. “There’s a killer out there after all. And you do seem to always be in the centre of these things, Doctor Harkness.”

  “Natural gift,” I said dryly. I saw an opportunity to steer the conversation away from my various body parts and this vampire’s apparent connection to them. There be dragons. “About this killer, it’s why we’re here actually. I’ve been doing some work with Cabal and the Tribals…”

  “Yes, I heard about your promotion. Congratulations,” he deadpanned, and sipped his wine.

  “…And Sofia is here as their spokesperson.” I ignored his comment, indicated the sullen woman sitting with folded arms by my side. “She seems to think you might have some idea what’s going on?”

  “She seems to think…” The vampire stared at Sofia with caution, “…that her boss would not come here himself. Kane is no friend to me, nor I to him. So instead the coward sends his lackey, and offers you into the mix to what, sweeten the deal? Soften me up? Is that it?”

  “Kane has other, more important things to do than sit in your girly powdered whorehouse sipping wine, vampire,” Sofia spat. “I am here to find what you can tell. Humans are dead, and my people too are missing.”

  I had no idea Allesandro had any history with Kane. Sofia clearly knew more than I did. I looked between the two of them carefully.

  “And why would he imagine, if I did have any information, that I would share it with him?” the vampire said to her. “I owe Kane nothing except pain. Is the good doctor here to encourage us all to play nicely together like good little GOs?” His eyes slid over to mine. “Cabal ambassador or not, it’s not likely. My people will not lower themselves to be involved with petty land squabbles with the skinchangers. Not even as a favour to you.”

  “Allesandro, if you know anything, it’s important,” I said. “You say you’re concerned for me with a killer out there? Well, I’m concerned too. We both here have people to worry about, humans and Tribal. People are dead, others are missing.” And that’s not even starting on the diseased corpse or the schizo ex-Cabal thief, I thought.

  “You think you are alone in this?” he said. He shook his head, eyes closed. “Two of my own are also missing. You will not have known this, of course, because unlike shifters we do not bark our every complaint from the rooftop like yapping dogs. My people have dignity. We deal with things privately. ”

  “Vampires are missing too?” I leaned forward in my seat. This was new information already.

  He considered me for a second before answering. I wondered if he actually trusted me. Eventually he sighed softly. “Two of my clan.” He looked at Sofia. “We are aware of the recent…incidents in Portmeadow. Three deaths, although the Cabal have done well to hide that fact from most of the good people of the city. As Cabal do, bless their little jackboots. We, however, notice what happens in our city. To be perfectly frank, we suspected Tribal involvement. The deaths were…messy.”

  Sofia leaned back and folded her arms defensively.

  “So naturally we looked into matters ourselves,” the vampire continued. “I knew two of the deceased humans, to some extent at least.” He leaned towards me. “I have an interest in finding out who killed them and why. The members of my clan whom I sent to investigate these deaths never returned.” He sighed in frustration. “They are still missing.”

  “The same happened with the two Tribal trackers that Kane sent to investigate,” I said. “They just disappeared.” I frowned, thinking. “I’m sorry, did you say you knew two of the murdered people?”

  “Well, we already know that he knew one of them,” Sofia interjected impatiently. “Amanda Bishop, the grovelling Helsing. It is why we are here after all.”

  Allesandro set his glass down on a table by the chair.

  “Indeed, Amanda was a regular here, and at Sanctum, and any other number of establishments under my umbrella. She was a good client. Not too…unstable, like some of the humans we get. She was bright and articulate. I believe she just liked to let off steam from time to time.”

  “How well did you know her?” I asked lightly. “Ever help her with the steam valve personally?” I had poked fun at Allesandro’s near-prostitute status before. It usually touched a nerve, and I felt like he’d had the upper hand so far. No harm in levelling the field.

  He glared at me.

  “Not that well,” he said slowly. “She had her own favourites. One of them is amongst those who disappeared. He actually volunteered to investigate the deaths. He had grown rather fond of her, in his way. Rather sweet.”

  He stood and walked to a tall set of drawers, and rifled within, a little frustrated by his lacy cuffs which got in his way.

  “Who else did you know?” Sofia asked, as he returned, holding several sheets of paper which he handed wordlessly to me. “You said you knew two of the murdered humans.”

  “Edward Knight,” he said. “The older gent. Messiest of the three deaths, if you ask me. Although I didn’t know him nearly as well as Amanda. He had come to me recently for information regarding a dissertation he was commissioned to work on for a private client. You must be aware I assume, if you have done your homework, and I cannot imagine that Cabal have not, that he had worked for some time as an archivist at the Ashmolean Museum?” He tapped the photographs in my hand. “Here, my missing vampires,” he said.

  I looked at the pictures. They were standard mugshots, no doubt employee records for the club, photos to be attached to ID badges. One of the vampires, an angular-faced male, had long white dreadlocks. My blood went cold as soon as I saw it.

  “I’ve seen him before,” I whispered. I glanced at the other photo, but the man, apart from being a vampire, was fairly nondescript. “Maybe both of them, but this one…” I tapped the photograph. “I’m sure. Almost sure.”

  Allesandro leaned forward and held my wrist. “Where? When?”

  I looked up at him, and Sofia, who had also leaned forward with interest.

  “The car-bomb,” I said. “When it exploded, before I could get to the car. No one agrees with me, everyone is saying there was only the driver in the car, but I swear there were two other people, in the back, asleep. One had long white dreadlocks.” I waggled the picture, as though it were proof of my sanity. “It’s not that common a look in New Oxford. I think your missing vampire, maybe both of them, were in the car when it exploded.”

  “So your Cabal people,” Sofia said, leaning back with obvious satisfaction. “They lied to you.”

  “Possibly not,” Allesandro interjected, staring at the floor as he processed what I’d just told him. We both looked to him.

  “Vampires don’t burn like humans do,” he explained. “Humans are all meat and fatty, spluttering tissue. If my men were indeed in this car which exploded, there would be no remains.” He shook his head. “No bones, no tissue. Full daylight or fire, if hot and consistent enough, immolation results only in ashes.”

  “Oh,” I observed intelligently. “But what would they be doing there in the first place? And we’re still no closer to finding out who set the bomb itself. Do we think it’s the murderer?”

  “We also have not found my missing people,” Sofia said. “When we burn, we leave a corpse. None have been discovered.” She made it clear by her tone that she considered leaving bodily remains as the more natural and correct thing to do when burning to death.

  “You are certain you saw them?” Allesandro asked me. He looked pained. These were his clan after all. Vampire clans are largely families, and some have been together for centuries, at their cores. I hesitated.

  “I don’t know,” I said, frustrated. “I saw other things that
day which I know were not there.” You holding a dragonfruit in broad daylight, I wanted to add but didn’t. “I’m…on some medication. I think it could be compromising my observation skills somewhat. But I think so.” I sighed, frustrated with myself. “That’s the best I can say.”

  Sofia stood up and began pacing the room, although with her aggressive body language I was tempted to call it stalking.

  “If they are dead, they are dead,” she said carelessly. “Like our Tribal trackers they went on the trail of this killer of humans and now they are gone. We need to return to the human victims. The old man who has died,” she said. “The second victim, museum curator. You say he came to you for advice? Is that usual, vampire? He was no Helsing, was he? What did a dusty old human professor want with your kind?”

  Allesandro spread his arms out along the back of his chair and glared up at her, head cocked to one side. “Not everyone I do business with is a Helsing, little puppy,” he said. “Edward Knight, before he retired, and before his involvement with the museum, was a rather vocal supporter of GO rights. He spoke out in print for my kind and yours. He was a true believer in tolerance and equality. He interviewed the previous Clan Master several times. Professor Knight wanted to show the human world that we are not all monsters.”

  “Ironic really,” I said, dropping the photos of the presumably dead vampires gently onto the table top, “…that said clan master turned out to be a sociopathic doomsday cultist bent on ending the world.”

  “Quite,” Allesandro said. He regarded his nails thoughtfully. “Gio was not perhaps the best example of us.” Sofia clucked her tongue and chuckled.

  “Of course, dear Edward’s days of writing are far behind him now,” the vampire said. “He worked at the museum later in life, as I said, dealing with the translation of some of the city’s most ancient scripts, what was saved in the wars at least. He built quite the reputation as an authority on the matter.”

  “So far,” Sofia said, turning and leaning against the wall, “…the only link we have between two of these three dead people…is you, vampire.” The accusation did not go unnoticed. Allesandro didn’t deign to reply.

  “What did he want your advice on?” she pressed.

  Allesandro glanced at me for a second, then back to her. “He wanted some insight on ancient vampire literature, help with something of that sort. I’m afraid I had very little time for him. I had only recently become Clan Master, and my attentions were elsewhere. My predecessor, Gio, left quite the administrative mess for me to clean up.”

  As he said this to Sofia, his voice, disembodied, in my ear: “I will share what I know with you, dear Doctor, but not with this feral creature. There are many ancient texts he could have referred to, is there nothing more you can give me?”

  It always made me feel a little dizzy when he did that.

  I drained the last of my drink. “I’m afraid that’s not much to go on,” I said. “If there’s one thing Oxford is famous for, it’s old books. We have one of the most impressive libraries of ancient texts remaining in the world. We have no way of guessing what this Professor Knight was working on. Was it a museum project?”

  The vampire shook his head. “He said it was for a private client. He didn’t say who, more’s the pity. He seemed quite agitated. I would have found out more, of course, but he never attended the follow up meeting I arranged with him. He was dead by then. Had I known he’d be mauled to shreds I would have pressed him for more details at the time.”

  I swallowed hard and placed my empty glass on the table. We were getting nowhere, grasping at straws, all of us, and all we were pulling up were more questions. I decided it was time I lay my cards on the table.

  “I shouldn’t tell this to either of you,” I said heavily. “It’s highly classified Cabal business, and my boss would eviscerate me if she knew I was sharing any such information with anyone, but I don’t see what else to do. We’re running out of options.”

  I had both of their full attention. Sofia folded her arms and looked at me expectantly. Allesandro leaned forward in his chair, white hands clasped, and his ridiculous lace cuffs dangling.

  I told them about the body. The faceless corpse. How, where and when we found it, the post mortem, and most importantly, the disease it was incubating. A disease which seemed to ignore healthy humans and animals but which was almost certainly fatal to the Pale. They listened with interest, neither interrupting, to their credit.

  When I was done I sat back and looked at them both expectantly. “Any thoughts?” I asked eventually, feeling as though I were in some surreal spitball reading group.

  “Well…this is a first,” Sofia said musingly. “Cabal do not usually share information. I may have judged you too harshly, Doctor Harkness.”

  “I’m not Cabal,” I said. “Not really anyhow. Blue Lab is funded and governed by them, but then almost everything is. My research at Blue Lab is mine. I may have taken up this new diplomatic role, for all the good I’m doing with it, but at heart I’m a scientist, and scientists don’t hoard information, they share it. They can’t help but share it.”

  “Why with us?” Allesandro asked, peering at me with interest with his remarkable eyes.

  “Because…I trust you,” I told him. “God help me, I’ve no idea why, you’re the shadiest person I know and I never know what you’re really thinking. But you saved my life more than once, that counts for something, and I have few enough people to trust right now.”

  “I’m honoured,” he smiled wryly, making me fleetingly want to punch him in the face.

  “Don’t be,” I said. “I’m not fooling myself, Allesandro. I know you used me to attain your goal.” I indicated the regal chamber. “To become the Clan Master, with your Marquis de Sade office. Keeping me alive to thwart Gio until I killed him and paved the way for your glory.”

  He didn’t deny it. “You used me too,” he said softly. “I don’t recall you refusing my help.”

  “I was trying not to die at the time,” I countered.

  “I may have used you, but do you really believe that’s all it was,” he asked.

  Sofia sighed theatrically. “This is very touching, and perhaps I should dim the lights and play the violin for the two of you while I hold back my vomit, but I am beginning to feel quite the gooseberry here,” she snarled. “You trust me too suddenly?”

  “I trust Kane, I think,” I said to her. I had no real basis for this. But I’ve learned to go with my gut. “His intentions anyway. You’re practically a part of him, it’s how a pack works, right?” I shrugged. “Look, the reason I’ve told you both this top secret information is simply that that this disease could have dire implications for either of you.” To Allesandro I said, “You know what the Pale are made from. Our own guardian angels, gone horribly wrong? The GO blood which flows through them was taken from the world’s most powerful vampire, Tassoni. Your charmless old boss taught me that, in between trying to kill me, the mental son of a bitch. They’re made of-”

  “Us,” he agreed. “If this virus of yours kills them, it may kill me. That’s what you’re saying?” He smiled warmly up at the Tribal. “And you too, darling. Our kinds are not so different, no matter how much we like to deny it.”

  Neither could shed any light on the mysterious body however, or how it might be tied to the other events. The bomb, the serial killer, the kidnappings.

  “Nothing else unusual lately?” the vampire asked me.

  I laughed. “You need more than this? No, except an incident with an ex-Cabal member earlier today, but that, I’m afraid, is staying within Cabal lockdown, at least for now. I’ve no idea how or if it ties in with anything else.”

  I rubbed my eyes. It must be 3 AM by now, and it had been one of the longest nights of my life so far. I just wanted to go home, check my messages, feed Brad the rat, and sleep, like normal people.

  “Oh, that was it,” I joked. “Some lunatic left me an answerphone message the other day muttering about bacon. As if the
entire world hasn’t gone mental enough, now I’m having anonymous chefs calling to give me cooking advice.”

  I felt Allesandro tense next to me, and stopped laughing, looking at him curiously.

  “What is it?” I asked.

  He shook his head. “Nothing, I’m sorry I don’t have more information to help you with. If I think of anything I’ll be in touch.” He clapped his hands, and as if on cue, the doors opened and the lissome Elise entered. She must have been waiting right outside the door, probably listening.

  As we walked to the doors, Allesandro spoke in his tingly silent whisper once more.

  “Bacon. Something makes sense now. I know what Edward Knight was researching. I will help you, Doctor. But I will not share my information with the shifters, least of all Kane’s brood. Meet me at sundown tomorrow, on the bridge where you found this body.”

  I tried not to stare at him as he ushered us out, smiling coolly, Sofia oblivious to our inner exchange.

  “Do give your Kane my warmest regards,” he said to her. “My vampires may be dead and burned to dust, who knows. Perhaps you can still find your stray mongrels, if they indeed are not responsible for the recent slaughters. Tell him to remember the Magyar in Kosovo. What fun we had there.”

  “I will give no regards from you. I am not your messenger, vampire,” she replied, swishing out of his chamber without a backward glance, her red pony tail bobbing. “You want a message to Kane, send your little bride to be.” She flicked a hand dismissively at Elise as she passed. “Kane would like a new chew toy, although there is precious little meat on the wasted creature. Perhaps he could pick his teeth with her bones.”

  I gave Allesandro an apologetic look. Honestly, this diplomacy business was a pain in the arse. It was like chaperoning unruly children.

  “Feisty one you have there,” he said as I left. “Hope she’s housebroken, for your sake, Doctor.”

  I felt a pang of glee at Elise’s appalled face as I closed the door behind me, and managed to like the abrasive Sofia just a tiny bit more than before.