The Secrets of Life and Death (26 page)

Jack shrugged his hands off and stepped back. ‘Sadie’s got this far. I didn’t save her, she made it through the tunnel all by herself, and she rescued my dog as well.
Again
.’

‘OK. We’ll ask Sadie.’ He followed her back into the study, and Jack stood, with relief, in the comfort of the circle, feeling energy creep back into her.

Sadie was sitting against the desk, the dog slumped over her legs. ‘There were these men. Maggie said they were inquirers, no, inquisitors or something.’

‘Inquisitors?’ Jack slid down to the centre of the circle, leaning against a worn old armchair. There was ragged carpet around the edges of the room, where Felix must have cut it away before drawing the sigils. Jack touched one of the shapes, infusing it with a little energy, although she could feel she had little to spare. ‘You mean, like the Spanish Inquisition? From history?’

The chair she was resting against sagged, as Felix squeezed into it beside her, and she leaned against his warm leg.

‘Actually,’ he said, ‘the Inquisition is alive and well. They investigate heresies and magical phenomena.’

Sadie nudged Jack’s ankle with her foot. ‘He said I’d been denied everlasting life.’

‘He didn’t say he was with the police, though?’ Felix said.

‘No. He said he was going to take me to some hospital.’ Sadie’s forehead was wrinkled as she spoke. ‘He did say he wouldn’t hurt me, he was there to rescue me.’

Felix stood up, taking down a briefcase. ‘Look, Sadie, how about you do an Internet search for Bachmeier and Holtz? That might be a place to start; these men might have been working for them. I’ll make a few calls, see what I can find out about the modern Inquisition.’ Felix handed the laptop down to Sadie. ‘You know you can’t check emails, or go on networking sites. They may be monitored.’

Sadie scowled at him. ‘I know!’ She started tapping on the keys as Jack watched. ‘Elizabeth … Bachmeyer …’ She snorted. ‘Only about one million hits.’

‘Try Bach-M-E-I-E-R,’ Felix suggested, and sat back down.

A lightning sequence of taps later, Sadie searched the screen again. ‘OK … a pharmaceutical company … is that how you say it? Bachmeier and Holtz.’

Felix leaned forward. ‘Maybe the research Bachmeier and Holtz does is into this “borrowed time” phenomenon.’

Jack thought about it. ‘Well, our blood is used for healing spells. I mean, I’m not sure how it works – or even if it does – but I know my blood has been used to help people.’

Felix rested his fingers on Jack’s shoulder. ‘Let’s make the leap, and assume that some people believe it can save seriously ill people. Rich people get cancer, you know. They would pay a lot for a magical cure. What was the name of that actor last year, the one they said was going home to die, the one that ended up in a miraculous remission?’

He stood up, leaving Jack aware of the drift of cold air down her side.

‘Felix … could you put your heating on?’

‘It’s on full already.’ His eyes met hers. ‘You feel frozen to me.’

‘I am.’ She smiled up at him, hugging her knees. ‘Can I borrow a sweater, then? Maybe one for Sadie, too? We weren’t expecting to go out of the house.’

‘Sadie can research this woman, and you can come and choose from my extensive range of knitwear.’ He managed a lopsided smile. The dog walked over to him, and sniffed his hand. ‘At least he’s not growling at me any more.’

‘He’d like you more if you fed him.’ Jack hesitated, seeing Sadie’s enthusiasm for the computer. ‘Sadie – you have to be careful. You can’t contact your family.’

Sadie tossed her hair back, and scowled. ‘I’m not stupid. They would want to take me outside and I’d last – what – three seconds?’ She tapped more keys on the laptop.

Jack followed Felix down a dark hall, the dog’s claws clicking on old tiles, and into a large, modern kitchen at the back.

‘Wow. Glass doors. You must be able to open them right out onto the garden.’ But not very secure, she thought. There were no blinds or curtains, and windows from other houses looked down into the kitchen, as the lights flickered on.

‘It was Marianne’s idea. My wife … well, ex-wife.’ He turned at the sound of a click from what Jack could now see was a cat flap through the wall. ‘Oh, shit. Tycho.’

A second click was followed by the head of a large tabby cat, which slid into the kitchen and froze for a second when it saw the dog. In what felt like slow motion, Jack reached out her hand to connect with Ches’s collar and the cat inflated into a spitting missile, which launched itself at the middle of the kitchen, just stopping short of Ches. Its arched body was side-on to them, to make itself look even bigger.

Felix dived towards the cat as Jack grabbed Ches’s neck but there was a muffled yowl, a bellow from Felix as the cat leapt from his hands towards an island unit, and a yelp from the dog, as a scratch opened up along his snout.

‘I’m sorry. He’s not very good with dogs.’ Felix examined his hands, spotted with puncture wounds that oozed with scarlet beads.

Jack knelt and comforted the dog. She looked at the cat, which sat peering down at them from the top of a kitchen cupboard, only its flattened ears showing any disquiet. A slow growl started from the feline, and Ches whined back.

Felix pulled down a large box, and showed Jack the contents. ‘I know they’re cat biscuits, but they should be all right for him.’

‘Oh, he’ll love them.’ The cat sniffed the air and stopped growling. By the time Felix had turned a large tin of cat food and a big handful of biscuits onto a plate, the cat had deigned to investigate. Ches, wolfing half the meat off the plate before it even rested on the kitchen floor, retreated as the cat advanced. Tycho delicately pawed a portion onto the floor.

Jack nudged the plate closer to the dog so he could eat. ‘I suppose they will work out some sort of truce.’

‘He’s supposed to be at Marianne’s, but he keeps coming back.’

‘So she didn’t move out long ago?’

Felix stroked the cat, who arched his back in response, then hooked another pawful off the dog’s plate. ‘Five months. She’d been in a relationship with Heinrich for quite a while, but they didn’t make it official for some time. I thought if I was patient she would get over it, but it seems not.’

‘That must have been hard. And that’s what you wanted … her to get over it and come back?’ She had to ask the questions, even as she braced herself for the answers.

He sat back on his haunches, eyes level with the kneeling Jack’s, separated by their respective animals. ‘At the time.’

She pushed the plate over for the cat to swipe a few stray biscuits. ‘You loved her.’

‘For a long time. Then … I didn’t any more. But I didn’t know anything better would come along.’ He paused. ‘I hadn’t met you.’

She found she couldn’t meet his eyes, and fussed the dog, now chasing the empty plate around the floor. The cat leaped out of his way onto a stool, and started washing its paws.

‘Jack—’ Before he could finish, Sadie shouted his name, her voice high with excitement or alarm.

Jack followed him into the study. Sadie was hunched over the laptop, her face white in the glow from the screen.

‘I looked up elementals and tornadoes. Look at this.’

She angled the screen towards them, a lurid purple page with the title ‘Freak Weather’, with a photograph of shattered headstones and a damaged tree.

‘Listen to this,’ she read. ‘“In July 1978, in Norwich, England, a woman called Mary Kinley, twenty, was found dead in a funeral chapel in St Mark’s cemetery. Police said unusual weather conditions had caused extensive damage around the churchyard. Local meteor … meteorologist James Bettson said the circular pattern of debris suggested a tornado.” It looks a bit like the cottage.’ She clicked on a button at the side of the page, and Jack leaned in closer to read it.

‘The woman apparently died of blood loss, but none was found at the scene,’ Jack said.

Sadie moved the arrow on the screen to an underlined area. ‘Look, more “vampire tornadoes”.’

Felix interrupted. ‘You do know ninety-nine per cent of the stuff on the Internet is either fraud or pure imagination.’

Another picture loaded, this time of grainy men carrying a coffin. Sadie squinted at the screen. ‘Helen McNamara. Found dead after a storm wrecked a car park in Leicester. “Police dismissed an account from an eyewitness who claimed a tornado had picked Helen up and taken her from three streets away. The inquest has been adjourned.” That was 1996. Look, there’s a comment here saying police found she had been exsanguinated. That’s drained of blood, isn’t it?’

‘Look up the inquest,’ said Jack.

‘No, wait.’ Felix leaned forward to stare at the screen, and Sadie pulled it around so he could see better. ‘Look at the pallbearer. He looks familiar.’ He dug in his pocket for the card he’d been given at the police station.

A young man, maybe in his early twenties, was staring into the camera, his face tense and set. He was tall and thin, his face sculpted by his grief, perhaps.

‘He looks like the man from the Arts and Antiquities squad,’ Felix said.

Sadie pushed the laptop towards him. ‘That man,’ she pointed, ‘was at the cottage. He was the one that kicked the door in, I’m sure.’

Jack chewed her lower lip for a moment. ‘He does look like the man in the pub. So who is he?’

Felix enlarged the news-clipping image, the face becoming less clear as it devolved into dots. The words under it came into focus. ‘“Helen’s coffin was carried by her father, uncles, and brother Stephen.” That’s McNamara.’ He waved the card at them. ‘I met him when I went to talk about the photographs with the police.’

New pictures came up of Helen on the beach, Helen graduating from university. Sadie bowed her head over the screen. ‘There’s something funny about these pictures …’ She scrolled through the images, enlarging them. ‘Look at this dress she’s wearing.’

Jack looked. ‘I can’t see anything odd.’

Sadie brought up another one. ‘Try this blue one, it’s clearer. Look at her top. Look at the pattern.’

Jack stared at the screen, unable to breathe out for a moment as she recognised the symbols printed on the fabric. Then the air escaped in a whoosh. ‘Oh, my God. Helen McNamara was a borrowed timer.’ It was a young face, a blonde girl in her early twenties, laughing at the photographer. Jack caught her breath. It looked like a younger version of the woman who had been in her car.

‘Our studies took us to the lower realms: that is, not the higher angelic kingdom of heaven, not the earthly demesne of men. The lower realms are peopled with goblins and spirits, of the most elemental nature, and forces that run through our lives. They are powerful and dangerous, like hurricanes and infernos.’

Edward Kelley
10 December 1585
Csejte

The count’s hospitality extended to the evening meal, where his captains and brothers-in-arms feasted loudly. But their eyes were often upon Dee, as if they expected him to leap to his feet and ensorcell them at any moment. Lord Miklós ignored us, and was much fêted as guest of honour as befitted the king’s brother.

When our bellies were full, and the shouting had receded a little in the warmth of the wine, Count Nádasdy turned to me. ‘Master Kelley. I had reason to speak to Count Laski. He has great faith in your alchemical experiments.’

‘Indeed, my lord?’ I was wary about speaking of Albert Laski, whose adventuring sometimes crossed the line of honesty, although I had been accused of that myself.

‘He told me he was present when you raised a dead man from a crypt in London.’

I glanced at Dee, whose downcast eyes gleamed with awareness even though he looked half asleep. ‘Doctor Dee will tell the tale better—’

In truth, Laski can’t have seen much, scrabbling at the door as he did for a way out.

‘I would rather hear your version, at this moment.’ The count waved at Dee. ‘Your colleague is older, and my servants tell me he has been ill. Perhaps you would entertain us with the story instead.’

‘Sir?’ I was unsure, but Dee smiled through his beard.

‘Please, do, Edward.’ He settled back in his chair. I caught a movement out of the corner of my eye and, as I walked around the table to address the company, was able to get a better view. The witch, Zsófia, was standing half concealed behind one of the door curtains, just the flash of fox hair making her known to me.

‘My lords.’ I bowed, as one is wont to do in royal courts, when one entertains the gathering. ‘This event took place more than two years since, in the churchyard of Greyfriars Church in London town. It had been a bad year for miasmas and agues, and there were many deaths. In the height of summer there came a fever that took Doctor Dee’s old friend and fellow natural scientist, Sir Gregory Whichall.’ I looked around to make sure the captains could follow my Latin, but they seemed flatteringly attentive. ‘Doctor Dee and Sir Gregory had a pact, my lords, that when one were to die, the other would come back to report on events after death.’

There was a ripple of reaction. A few men murmured to their friends, and I allowed my eyes to range across the back of the hall, to see the flash of a skirt still in the doorway.

I stood tall. ‘Lord Laski, Doctor Dee and myself walked, at midnight, to the chapel where Sir Gregory’s body lay. This is our custom, to stand vigil until the morning. Once there, we dismissed his servant, who kept watch in that place. Truly, he was grateful to be relieved of his morbid and lonely duty. My master and I prayed for the blessing of the Lord upon our work, then Master Dee drew a restraining circle beyond the funeral bier, and Laski and I removed the lid.’

In honesty, my knees had been knocking together, and Sir Gregory’s shrunken features were most horrid. It had been a very hot and humid week, and his stomach was bloated and stinking, blood dribbling down his cheeks from the putrefaction. I went to the door for fresh air, more than inclined to leave, but the graveyard was filled with mists. They swept around the walls like wraiths trying to seize the living.

‘Master Dee spoke the summoning words, but nothing happened,’ I intoned. I waited, for a long moment, watching the nobles, letting the suspense build. I raised my voice to a cry.