The Fall of the House of Cabal

by Jonathan L. Howard

  He did not hesitate to set his foot upon the top step, even though the strong and tried sense of self-preservation that had kept him alive through a hundred circumstances that would reasonably be expected to kill him was warning him, screaming at him that this was a trap that he would not leave unscathed.

  Cabal felt the forebodings burst into a dazzling flare of baleful premonition as he took the second step down. Then he took the third. Then the fourth, and the fifth, and so descended into the realm of Nemesis.

  * * *

  The Nemesis Witch, the Queen of Witches, the Red Queen, Lady Misericorde, Lady Ninuka: so many names for one woman. And there she was, waiting for him.

  The underground crypt was dry and small, and there was only one corpse there. One end of the chamber was scattered with old household bric-a-brac and faggots of firewood; the other end, accessed through an open arch and up a couple of steps, was clean and empty but for a grave-sized hole dug into the dusty, dry clay. By the grave half sat, half lay Lady Ninuka. She wore something different from her brief appearance as the Nemesis Witch, now gowned in a simple dress the colour of funereal wrappings, grey, white, and a dull cream. It was folded decorously across her legs so that not even an ankle was exposed. She herself looked more purely like Ninuka than earlier, and this Cabal took to be a sure indication that she truly was nothing more than a figment. She was pale and dreadful. She did not smile the smile of an arch-villain when he stood before her. She did not even look at him. She held a bunch of flowers taken from some memorial tribute, and dropped withered petals into the grave, one after another.

  ‘Are you truly the spirit of Nemesis?’ asked Cabal. ‘I would almost be disappointed if this all turned out to be some scheme of Ninuka’s and you are her beneath cadaverous make-up.’

  The spirit ignored him. Petals fluttered down.

  ‘Then let us assume that you are not Ninuka.’ He spoke to break the silence as much as anything. It weighed upon him. It confined him. ‘Let us say that you are something else, either sent to warn me or destroy me, although a warning would be preferable.’

  At this her gaze rose to meet his, and he thought he saw some awful thought signed upon her brow, but then she looked pensively aside, and the momentary sympathy was lost.

  Nemesis finished plucking every petal from the dead rose stem in her hand, regarded the bare, thorned stick with equanimity, and then dropped it into the grave. She took another rose and started to strip its flower bare.

  Johannes Cabal was a remarkably able man in many respects, yet his failings, too, were manifold and equally of note. One such, and one that never worked in his favour yet out of which he seemed incapable of growing, was his remarkable proclivity for growing angry with supernatural entities that could likely render him into ashes, or tear his skeleton from his flesh while he still briefly lived, or slice him thinner than a year’s supply of Parma ham in the twinkling of an eye. It was in no sense a survival trait, and yet it endured in his personality.

  ‘When you have quite finished with the deflowering of other people’s funerary offerings, perhaps you could answer me? I have travelled a long way to be here, I have travelled with a devil to do so. Which is less unappealing than it sounds, but there’s a principle at stake here. I have endured hardships, difficulties, and reversals to find myself in this—and I don’t use such a pejorative term lightly—pantomime of a synthetic milieu. You think I don’t know what this tomb is? What it represents? Exactly who lies in that grave you are so assiduously filling with garden rubbish?’

  Nemesis ignored him still. Cabal felt moved to express just what he had been through and his vast disappointment at how things were turning out.

  ‘There were giant ants!’

  She said nothing, and he had the grace to feel ashamed.

  ‘This must all be for a reason, surely?’ He spoke as he climbed the two steps between the halves of the lower crypt. ‘Even the most abstruse oracles must speak sooner or later. What am I to take away from this, assuming I can even find a way out of this strange lich field? What am I to deduce from looking into the grave of my…’

  And here he looked down into the hole, and was silent for a long moment.

  ‘Self,’ he finished.

  Beneath withered petals and broken rose stems lay the corpse of Johannes Cabal, necromancer. He looked down upon himself with mixed feelings. Presently, the corpse opened an eye and looked up at him.

  ‘Cheer up,’ it told him. ‘This is just a synthetic milieu.’

  * * *

  Cabal found Miss Smith and Zarenyia some little time later; the former seemed characteristically thoughtful, the latter uncharacteristically so.

  ‘Did you find her, too?’ asked Miss Smith.

  ‘I did. It was … enlightening, I think.’

  ‘I am immortal,’ said Zarenyia suddenly and with emphasis. ‘At least as far as ageing goes. Not indestructible, but immortal if all else remains equal. And yet…’ She seemed almost pained at failing to grasp a comprehension that gambolled just beyond her grasp. ‘And yet, life is too short. Darlings, I know I’m a devil and everything, but I’ve never actually thought of myself as evil. I’ve put up with the label all this time, but I’m not sure that I care for it now. I want something more.’

  ‘I have unfinished business,’ said Miss Smith. ‘There’s always unfinished business, but … this, I can’t stay in the Dreamlands.’

  Cabal spoke gently. ‘Hardly your decision to make.’

  ‘There must be a way. We’re necromancers, damn it.’

  Cabal nodded. ‘I thought this place was a trap. In a sense it is, but there are subtleties here, too. I believe we may now move on. And I really do hope that Miss Barrow and my brother are weathering events at least as well as we. Heavens help them otherwise.’

  The Second Way: LEONIE BARROW, GREAT DETECTIVE

  One moment they were at the prophesied place on the outskirts of Constantinople; the next they most certainly weren’t.

  ‘So,’ said Horst, taking in their abruptly altered surroundings, ‘this is the fabled kingdom of Prester John, is it? It’s a bit more … industrial than I’d imagined. Is it usual to have a deep-cast mine in the middle of a city?’

  They were in an unprepossessing urban street, illuminated by gaslights running down either side, one side faced with a long row of small terraced houses of the ‘two up, two down’ variety, net curtains hanging like cataracts in the blank, dark eyes of their windows. The red brickwork barely showed through the grime of ten thousand chimneys, yet the glass of the windows was clean, the paintwork maintained, and the doorsteps assiduously scrubbed. The phrase ‘poor but proud’ could not help but occur to the disinterested viewer.

  The opposite side of the street was marked by a brick wall some ten feet in height, and looming beyond it were the lift works of two deep-cast mineshafts, the distinctive asymmetric triangle of the structures and the great wheels of the cable runners some fifty feet from the ground more suited to a Welsh valley or a Northern hillside. Behind the buildings was the lowering bulk of a spoil heap, the leavings of the coal extraction process.

  ‘I’ll be blunt,’ continued Horst. ‘It’s less mystical than I hoped. There, I said it.’

  ‘You had your mysticism and fabled kingdom just before we got here.’ Miss Barrow was far less judgemental about their new surroundings and far more intrigued. ‘All that business with the bored man on the throne with the tusks? You recall? No, that was just an overture. This is the real point of our journey.’

  ‘If you say so.’ Horst stuck his hands in his pockets. ‘Don’t really see what the idea of the magical shenanigans dumping us by a town-centre coal mining operation is, though.’

  ‘I think that may be the point.’

  ‘The point?’

  ‘The point is we have to find the point.’

  Horst sighed and his breath coalesced in the chill air of the night. ‘I was rather hoping for something a bit more adventuresome. Bandits. Pirates.’ He thoug
ht on for a moment. ‘Giant ants,’ he concluded.

  ‘Adventures are where you find them. Ah. We have company.’

  Horst followed her line of sight and saw a police constable of serious demeanour strolling slowly towards them with the steady pace of justice unavoidable. He was wondering how they would explain away their light summer clothes chosen for the Turkish climate when he abruptly realised Miss Barrow was wearing heavy autumnal clothes and, with a shock, that so was he. Miss Barrow examined her gloved hand with only moderate surprise before glancing back at him to check that, yes, he, too, had noticed the change in their circumstances.

  ‘Evening, ma’am,’ said the constable as he reached them, ‘sir.’ He touched the brim of his helmet, but that was the limit of his courtesy as he regarded them with undiluted suspicion.

  ‘Good evening, Constable,’ said Miss Barrow. ‘A chill one, at that.’

  ‘It is that. Got lost, have you?’ This to Horst. ‘Long way from the south side here.’

  ‘I suppose we must have. Well, you know how it is; you get talking and the next thing you know, you’ve wandered miles.’ Horst said it with the easy duplicity of a man whose success with women was equalled by his competence at not having seven shades beaten out of him by their attendant fathers, brothers, and occasionally husbands.

  ‘Just so, sir.’ The constable had apparently been lied to by better than Horst, which was injurious to the pride of them both. He glanced sideways at Miss Barrow and, remarkably, his brow raised with apparent recognition. ‘I … might I enquire your name, ma’am?’

  Less inured to casual duplicity than Horst, Miss Leonie Barrow blithely supplied it. The result was magical.

  ‘Miss Barrow!’ said he, worthy in serge. ‘I thought I knew you!’ He glanced around the dark houses and nodded. ‘Of course. You’ll be on the job, won’t you?’

  Leonie was at quite the loss. Horst glowered on her behalf. ‘What are you implying?’

  His chivalric wrath was both unnecessary and unnoticed, for the policeman said, ‘On a case, of course.’

  ‘A case?’ Leonie Barrow considered the words, and the sense of ‘rightness’ they carried clustered about her on the instant like a cloud of supportive butterflies.

  ‘A case?’ She looked at the constable and the look of respect she found there. Not simply the respect any police officer should show an innocent member of the public but rather a professional respect, an earned respect.

  ‘A case…’ On what felt momentarily like impulse but what she realised even during its commission was a grounded and logical suspicion, she opened the reticule that hung upon her arm and looked within. There she found a small but very practical semi-automatic pistol and a business card case. This she opened, took a moment to enjoy the thrill of what she was already sure she would find there, then withdrew a card and handed it to the constable.

  Horst, all confusion and frowns and the more adorable for them, shuffled quietly around that he might read the card over the officer’s shoulder.

  MISS LEONIE BARROW M.PHIL OXON CANTAB FORENSIC & SECURITY CONSULTANT PRIVATE DETECTIVE

  ‘Yes,’ she said, her smile confident and open. ‘Yes, we are on a case.’

  * * *

  It transpired that they were soon to be on another. The constable informed them that Inspector Lament of the Yard required her presence at her earliest convenience. If she could get in touch as soon as possible, he might have need of her proven powers of deduction. She could also bring along her assistant, Horst Cabal, if she must. To this end, the constable accompanied them to the nearest police telephone box to call in.

  ‘Assistant?’ Horst was filled with as much outrage as he could manage without making a scene, expressed as a high-pitched whisper. ‘How have events conspired to make me your assistant?’

  ‘You have a problem being subordinate to a woman?’ said Leonie.

  ‘Not if they’re clever, and Johannes seems to think you are.’

  That brought Leonie to a dead halt. ‘He said that?’

  Horst thought about it to make sure he was definitely talking about the same woman. ‘Yes. I’m sure he meant you.’ He waved her on to keep up with the policeman. Once they were under way once more, he continued, ‘But that’s not what I mean. I mean the way he said “assistant.” There was a distinct subtext of “comedy sidekick” about it. I’m not sure I care for that.’

  ‘I’m sure you imagined it,’ Leonie reassured him while equally sure that he had not. Then she cut off any further utterances of hurt on his part by saying, ‘A detective, though. Isn’t it wonderful? Just like Sherlock Holmes.’

  ‘Prettier than Sherlock Holmes,’ said Horst, the reflexive gallant. ‘The trouble is, I think they’re expecting you to do some detecting.’

  She glanced at him from the corner of her eye. ‘And?’

  ‘And you’re not. A detective, that is. What are we going to do when they present you with some terrifically complicated case and there isn’t a handy butler to point at?’

  ‘What do you think I’m going to do?’

  ‘How should I know? I’m not a detective.’

  ‘No, you’re not.’

  ‘Wait…’ Horst’s tone was warning. ‘Wait a minute. You cannot seriously be suggesting…’

  ‘We are going to look at the case. And then I am going to solve it. Don’t you understand, Horst? That’s what this place is. It’s a test. It’s cobbled something together from the real world that touches on what we do, and now we’re going to be tested upon how well we do it.’

  ‘Have you ever actually done any real detective work before?’

  ‘A little. With your brother along, but a little. And I’ve done a great deal of studying. Have a little faith in me, would you?’

  Horst grimaced. ‘And what’s my role in all this?’

  ‘You are my faithful assistant, apparently.’ This failed to pour any oil on troubled waters. Leonie wondered if said oil was perhaps flammable. It was worth the experiment, so she carelessly and with malice aforethought added, ‘And the comedy sidekick.’

  Horst began to express outrage at such presumption, but then saw Miss Barrow’s smile, and his wrath was punctured. He smiled back, albeit a little dejectedly. ‘What if we can’t crack the case?’

  She had not considered that, but at the instant she did the ramifications became apparent. Somewhere at the end of this was something wonderful, too wonderful to simply be given away or allow second attempts. ‘We’ll probably be kicked out of here and never permitted to return.’

  ‘Oh, dear. That’ll be tough to explain to Johannes. He’ll have to have a shot. If we mess it up.’

  ‘I don’t think he’ll have that option, to be honest.’ She looked around at the city about them. ‘This quest of his isn’t simply about collecting the clues. I’m beginning to see that now.’

  ‘It isn’t? I was guaranteed a simple few weeks of clue gathering, dumping them in triumph at Johannes’s feet, and then wandering off while he makes sense of them. What makes you think it’s not going to work that way?’

  ‘Because this is where I want to be, Horst. Doing what my dad did, if not quite by the same methods. Solving crimes. Setting things right. Making things better. This is tailor-made for me. I don’t think this place even existed until I agreed to help your brother. The dice are already cast. There’s no going back now. I’m the Great Detective, you’re the light relief, and there’s a crime to solve.’

  * * *

  They reached the police telephone box a few paces behind the constable, who had already unlocked the small door in the large blue box’s side to reach the phone that lay there.

  ‘We have to keep the handset locked away in this neighbourhood; elsewise the kids’ll cut the wire, the little buggers.’ He blushed. ‘Begging your pardon, ma’am.’

  To cover his confusion over such saucy language, he made a great show of calling the police switchboard and thence being redirected to the office of Lament of the Yard.

 
‘I have Miss Leonie Barrow for you, sir,’ he said with the air of a herald announcing the arrival of an empress before passing the handset to Leonie.

  From Horst’s perspective the telephone conversation was brief and wilfully enigmatic. Miss Barrow performed a few very serious nods, said, ‘I see, Inspector’ twice and, ‘Yes’ four times, and made some notes in a small black book that she produced from her pocket as if she knew exactly how this Platonic ideal of her carried such things. Then, infuriatingly, she said, ‘Interesting’ in such a way to indicate that it really was terribly interesting and curiosity fairly made Horst squirm.

  Then she concluded the call with brusque efficiency and demanded of the constable, ‘Where might we find a cab in this area at this hour?’

  The constable indulged in a chortle. ‘Nowhere, ma’am. Nobody around here can afford a taxi. But the station’s not far from here, and we can send you over to wherever the inspector needs you in the area car. Where would that be, ma’am?’

  * * *

  The Alhambra Theatre was a grand venue, of that there was no doubt. A large structure in a far more prosperous section of the city than the terraces by the mines, the theatre faced onto a grand thoroughfare of Roman pretention. The theatre itself would not have disgraced Imperial Rome. A vast portico of pale stone in the neoclassical style, of a scale to make the Glyptothek of Munich seem like a pup tent, topped by a frieze in which Shakespearian characters rubbed shoulders with Euterpe, Calliope, tragic Melpomene, and comedic Thalia.

  ‘That,’ said Horst as they stepped from the police car, ‘is quite a large theatre.’ He smiled at Leonie. ‘That was understatement. I’ve been practising it. Actually, that theatre is absolutely huge. I’ve never seen the like. You could put the Bible on here and have all the characters onstage for the encore, including the five thousand with their fish sandwiches.’