A Little Knowledge (2 page)

“Urgh!” Cathy rounded on them. “No! This isn’t the way to do this! The men will automatically disregard anything the women’s court proposes or raises and it will just entrench everyone on opposing sides.”

“Then what do you suggest?” Margritte asked.

“During a discussion I could ask a woman to speak, just like Will invites the gentlemen to share their thoughts on any topic.”

“Oh, no, Cathy,” Charlotte said, appalled. “No lady would dare speak up and you would be left looking a complete fool!”

“We aren’t the only ones who feel this way,” Cathy said, thinking of her sister-in-law, Lucy. “Maybe we should have some faith in them.” She’d wanted to involve Lucy more, but the others had vetoed it most forcefully. The wife of the Marquis of Westminster simply couldn’t be trusted; her husband’s job was to neutralise any threats to the Dukedom and stability of Society. Everything they had done and planned to do could easily be interpreted as such. Hell, threatening the stability of Society was what she wanted to do most.

“It’s too much of a risk,” Charlotte said. “I know you think me cowardly, but I can’t be seen to do anything like that in public. I daren’t risk my husband realising the curse he put on me is broken. Women offering an opinion risk being cursed into silence too.”

“Which is exactly why we need to encourage a separate court,” Margritte said. “To give women the confidence to speak—”

A knock on the door stopped her from saying any more. Cathy listened to the rhythm. “It’s Will,” she said to Margritte, who had already stood, ready to dash to the mirror and make her escape to her hiding place in Jorvic.

Cathy turned the key and admitted Will. Carter, her bodyguard, gave her a polite nod before she closed the door and locked it again.

“Good evening,” Will said with a warm smile. The slight blush that crept across Charlotte’s cheeks didn’t escape Cathy’s notice. If her handsome husband was aware of the effect he had on some women, he never showed it.

Margritte curtsied and returned to her seat as Natasha and Charlotte greeted him politely.

“I trust you’re ready, my love?” Will asked with a smile. There was no hint of their previous argument. Cathy marvelled at how different he was from the other men of Nether Society. Yes, he’d been angry with her, but he hadn’t put an end to these meetings and was still willing to support change. Whether they would ever agree on how to achieve that was another matter.

“We were just discussing a potential court for the women of Londinium,” Cathy said.

“Oh, yes,” Will glanced at Margritte as if he knew of it already. “And are you going to announce it this evening?”

Cathy frowned. “I don’t think it’s a good idea.”

“Why not? Margritte and I discussed it at length earlier this week.”

Will was helping to keep Margritte safely hidden away from his brother. As far as the rest of Oxenford and those in the know in the other Nether cities were concerned, she was still locked in the tower in the reflection of Oxford Castle. They must have discussed it when he delivered the Shadow Charms.

“I think it will be less controversial than your first statement to the court,” Will continued. “I’ve smoothed the feathers you ruffled and made sure no one got the wrong idea.”

“And what idea would that be?” Cathy asked, folding her arms.

“That you want to encourage wives to go behind their husbands’ backs.”

Cathy suspected Margritte had deliberately gone behind
her
back to persuade Will to support the idea before their meeting.

Will misinterpreted her scowl. “Don’t worry. We can discuss the best way for you to announce this court for women in the carriage on the way to the tower. I think if you put it to the room in a certain way, no one will be concerned.”

“Don’t you mean ‘if I tread carefully around the men’s feelings, none of them will try to stop me’?”

Will leaned forwards and kissed her forehead. “Darling, there’s no need to be so prickly about this. It’s just good diplomacy.”

Cathy sucked in a breath, feeling her latent rage rise up at the way he was managing her. So often lately she felt as if Will treated her like a feverish child, one to keep quiet and soothed with a cold compress, lest she work herself up too much. This wasn’t the time to make a scene, though. She had to pace herself and work out a way to bring him round, without showing the others how strained things were between them. Bloody hell, was this what Margritte had meant when she’d said that being Duchess was about presenting an image?

“Now, if you’ll excuse us, ladies,” Will said, “we have a court to prepare for.”

Cathy kissed them each on the cheek. “Be careful,” Natasha whispered in her ear.

Sod being careful
, Cathy thought as she left.
Since when did that achieve anything?

• • •

Max looked out onto the city of Bath as he waited for Rupert, the former Sorcerer of Mercia. The gargoyle was next to him, its paws on the windowsill, the soul chain around its neck clunking against the wood. Max scanned the rooftops and streets, his eyes drawn to the various statues he knew so well and the buildings reflected in the Nether. The trees were swaying in the cold January wind and innocents had their scarves wrapped tight as they hurried from place to place. They had been without protection for over a fortnight now—longer if he included the time since the Bath Chapter had been destroyed—and it wouldn’t be long before the Fae-touched of Aquae Sulis began to suspect that they weren’t being policed as tightly as usual.

“Not sure about this,” the gargoyle’s gravelly voice echoed in the empty room. “A Chapter should be in the Nether. Not Mundanus.”

They were on the top floor of Cambridge House, in the centre of the city. There was a lift, which helped, as it was six stories up, and lots of windows. Aside from an old desk lamp and a waste-paper basket, the huge room was empty. It was a long way from the large building reflected into the Nether with a portcullis, towers, and cloisters that he’d been trained in. That was a bizarre building, created from anchors in several mundane properties, and used to be filled with people. He’d never heard of a Chapter in Mundanus, but everything was different now.

Max leaned against the window frame to take the weight off his aching leg. The damp winter weather seemed to make the old wounds grumble as much as the gargoyle. “The Sorcerer of Albion thinks this is the way forwards. ‘Evolution,’ he called it.”

“Evolution? My stone arse. He hasn’t got a clue about what he’s doing. Hang on. ‘Sorcerer of Albion’? When did Rupert start calling himself that?”

“Three days ago.”

“Not true, though, is it?” The gargoyle fixed its stone eyes on Max. “He’s the last
official
Sorcerer of the Heptarchy, but there’s another sorcerer in Albion.”

The “other sorcerer” was more than that; she was a woman capable of wielding a hybrid magic, somehow merging Fae and sorcerous arts. Rupert still doubted that such a combination was even possible. There was no doubting that she had murdered six Sorcerers, all of the staff in their Chapters, and dozens of Arbiters across the country. As far as Max knew, the only Arbiters left were the most corrupt in England: the Camden Chapter, Kingdom of Essex. He’d watched one of their Arbiters, Faulkner, drink tea whilst an innocent was being Charmed and kidnapped mere metres away. They were a Chapter in name only.

Max thought it likely that the mysterious Sorceress had another Chapter in her pocket somewhere, or some Arbiters left over from another, ready to do her bidding and kill anyone close to springing her plans early. Surely by now her plan had almost reached fruition; she had succeeded in destroying the Chapters that protected innocents across the country, and had murdered the Sorcerers that presided over them, too.

They didn’t even know what the ultimate plan was; they had a theory that the Sorceress was the sister of the former Sorcerer of Essex and that was all. Why she had killed so many was beyond him. The gargoyle had suggested it was for power. The power to do what?

All was not lost, Max reminded himself. Despite the Sorceress’s best efforts, he and the gargoyle had managed to save Rupert, but not his home or the Arbiters and staff in the Chapters under his control throughout Mercia. There had been three, the largest one in Oxford, with minor Chapters in Cirencester and Cheltenham. The Sorceress thought Rupert was dead, which was the only advantage they had. As the gargoyle had pointed out several times over the past two weeks, it wasn’t much of an advantage at all.

The gargoyle made a noise somewhere between a groan and despondent whine, resting its head on the windowsill. With Max’s soul housed inside it, he assumed it was feeling the weight of their situation. The only survivor from Ekstrand’s household was his librarian, Petra. While she was an incredibly capable woman, she still wasn’t over the Sorcerer’s death. There was Rupert—a homeless Sorcerer in hiding—himself, and the gargoyle.

Max was the only Arbiter left with any sense of duty, the only one who still wanted to protect the innocents from the Fae and their puppets.

“And we’re not exactly a shining example,” the gargoyle said, sharing his thoughts. “Corrupted by Titanium, soul walking around in an animated gargoyle, walks with a limp. This country is going to the dogs, no doubt about it.” When Max didn’t reply, it waved its muzzle at his bad leg. “We’re not going to tell the Sorcerer about the Titanium in that gammy leg of yours, are we?”

Max shook his head. “He has enough to work on at the moment. And it hasn’t been a problem so far.”

“So far,” the gargoyle muttered. “Let’s face it. We’re screwed.”

Max didn’t disagree. He’d had plans to establish a new chapter, but never having been involved with the running of his home Chapter, he had very little idea of what was involved. He knew fieldwork, nothing more. Dozens of people used to support his work, giving him briefings on changes in Mundanus, tracking criminal activity so trends could be observed over hundreds of years, and keeping meticulous records on breaches of the Split Worlds Treaty. How could he train someone to do all that?

And there was the simple issue of staff recruitment. The researchers he’d known had been people exposed to Fae magic or rescued from Exilium, those who could no longer be called innocents. They were taken in, debriefed, and trained, he knew that much. But the gulf between knowing the broad strokes of how it worked and the details of finding, caring for, and training such people was beyond him. Even if someone else cared for them in a practical way, Max had no idea what skills the training would need to cover. Only now did he appreciate just how complex a machine the previous Bath Chapter had been. But by the time he had arrived there, the Bath Chapter had existed for a thousand years or so. Surely the beginning had been just as difficult for them?

The lift bell dinged in the hallway just off the office. The gargoyle scampered off to the bathroom as Max went into the hallway, the click of his walking stick echoing with each step.

The doors slid open and Rupert stepped out, a young woman following him. She was in her early twenties, with dark brown hair and eyes. She wore her hair in a messy ponytail and was dressed in jeans, walking boots, and a thick padded jacket. As soon as she stepped out of the lift she dumped her huge rucksack with audible relief.

“Max, you’re here, awesome,” Rupert said, pulling off his gloves and woolly hat. “Bloody cold out there.” He turned to the girl. “Kay, this is Max. He sort of works for me. Max, this is Kay Hyde, from Oxford. She’s our first recruit.”

Kay hung back for a moment, staring at Max, probably trying to work out why he seemed wrong. He was used to this reaction from strangers. Living without a soul tended to make an Arbiter unpleasant to look at and to be around. She lurched forward after a few seconds, as if remembering her manners, and extended her hand to him. He shook it quickly and let go, noting her shudder.

“First recruit? Which family took her? How long ago?”

“Eh?” Rupert looked momentarily confused and then realised what Max was talking about. “Oh! She hasn’t been taken by anyone. I knew her at Oxford. Best brain in the city if you ask me. Got a first at Trinity in English Lit, but let’s face it, any sod can do that.” He smirked at her and she jabbed him in the ribs.

“Piss off! I worked bloody hard for that.”

“And she is the fucking bomb when it comes to riddles, wordplay, and linguistic sneaky sneakster stuff. Near eidetic memory and descended from Edward Hyde, no less.” When Max failed to give any response to that, he added, “Grandfather of Queen Anne and bloody clever bloke to boot.”

Max frowned. “Queen Anne was a puppet of the Tulipas.”

“That’s ancient history,” Rupert said, shrugging off his coat. “No worries on that front.”

Kay went to the doorway into the office space. “Nice. Oh wow, what a great view!”

Max went to Rupert’s side as she went across the room to the window. Max moved round to the other side of the partition separating the area containing the lifts from the main office space, lowering his voice after Rupert had followed him. “Sir, am I to understand she is still innocent?”

“I can’t speak for her universal innocence; we’re just friends, but assuming you mean the Fae or their puppets, yes, she’s never been entangled with them. Oh, tell a lie, she met one visiting Oxford—Freddy Persificola-Viola. What an arsehole he was. She gave him a tour of the city at my request. But nothing dodgy happened. Trust me, I watched every minute she was with him and tested her afterwards too.”

“This is…I don’t understand.”

“I’ve given her a job. She’s fresh out of uni, bright as a button, and quick to learn. We’ve just got to get her up to speed on all the Fae shit and we’re golden.”

“When were you planning to do that?”

“After we’ve got a kettle and mugs. Brain-breaking should only happen over tea, Max, we’re not fucking savages.”

“Should I keep the gargoyle in the bathroom until then?”

Rupert nodded. “Probably a good idea. Just make sure he isn’t in the ladies’ loo. Don’t want her to die of a heart attack when she goes for a slash.” He clapped Max on the shoulder. “Don’t worry, Max m’boy. This is a good thing! Kay’s awesome. We’ll be up and running in no time.”