Lifeblood (5 page)

 

 

T
hey fought the blaze through the night and into the dawn, ranks of Darksiders passing buckets of water in human chains. As the fire spread outwards from the Midnight and dragged the rest of the building into its furious embrace, it seemed like a hopeless task. Men had to bellow at one another to make themselves heard above the roar. Flames danced in the sky above the Grand.

Gradually, however, the Darksiders began to get the upper hand. They attached hosepipes to fire hydrants in the street, and sent streams of water into the heart of the blaze. Wounded, the fire pawed at the woodwork and lashed out at anyone foolish enough to get too close. But by the time the bleary sun had risen into the sky, the last flames were being extinguished.

It was far too late for the Midnight, though. The pub was a blackened shell belching smoke rings from its interior. No longer would anyone be able to descend the steps and hide away from the world in the pitch-black. A group of regulars milled around outside, in the dazed hope that somehow it would reopen in a few minutes.

On the pavement on the other side of the street, Jonathan winced as another bolt of pain jarred his skull. He felt dreadful. Being knocked out twice in a matter of hours was clearly not good for him. He rubbed the bump on his head, and looked around as the Grand returned to something like normality.

“I'm surprised anyone bothered to put the fire out,” he said.

“Self preservation, boy.”

Carnegie's clothes were singed, and his face blackened with soot. He was down on his haunches next to Jonathan, the prone bulk of Arthur Blake between them. He paused as a thick cough burst up from his lungs, and then carried on.

“If the Midnight goes up, maybe another building follows – next thing you know, the Grand's burnt down, and so has your house. Fire's everybody's enemy.”

“Even so, I'm surprised.”

“Darksiders might be a bad bunch, but we're not stupid.”

There was a protracted groan, and then Arthur heaved himself up. An ugly bruise was swelling on his temple. “What happened?” he asked groggily.

“We got jumped by a man called Correlli,” replied Carnegie. “He's a hired hand. I've had enough run-ins with him in the past to know that he's one of the toughest characters in the borough. You really don't want to mess with him. Anyway, he torched the place and scarpered. I managed to drag you and the boy out before the place burned down. Nearly got barbecued in the process, mind you.”

“What did he want?”

“Just your standard threat – ‘stay away or else'. I've had hundreds of them. Correlli doesn't come cheap, though. Someone really doesn't want us investigating this case.”

Jonathan frowned, remembering something. “Who's Edwin Rafferty?”

“Eh?”

“You mentioned him back in the Midnight.”

Carnegie scratched vigorously behind his ear. “Oh, right. I asked one of the barmen if he'd noticed anything unusual in the past day or so. The only thing he could think of was that he hadn't seen Rafferty – and apparently it was very rare he
wasn't
in the Midnight. So I thought I'd bring it up with our friend back there, see if it got a reaction. I think we struck lucky.”

“It didn't feel very lucky at the time.” Jonathan rubbed his head.

Carnegie chuckled. “Being a private detective isn't all fun and games, you know.” He turned to Arthur. “Does Rafferty mean what I think it does?”

The reporter nodded.

“Money. And lots of it.”

 

Several hours later, his head still pounding, Jonathan found himself standing in a cramped terraced street in the Lower Fleet, where residents listened through paper-thin walls to their neighbours' bickering and quarrelling. Dirty puddles swamped the cobblestones. The sky was stained with acrid smoke. Edwin Rafferty resided in a particularly grim dwelling underneath a railway bridge, and every few minutes his house winced as a train rattled overhead. The windows were coated in a thick film of grime, while the front door was hanging off its hinges. Even in the depths of the Lower Fleet, the building emanated squalor.

“I don't get it. I thought you said this guy was rich?” Jonathan said.

“His family are,” Arthur replied. “One of the oldest and most disreputable families in Darkside, the Raffertys. Made an absolute fortune from smuggling.”

“What went wrong?”

“Edwin went wrong. He spent more time in pubs than on boats. His family got so sick of him drinking away their fortune that they disinherited him. Shall we go inside?”

Carnegie eyed the open doorway. “Sure. Do you want to knock, or shall I?”

He loped forward and pushed the door, which promptly broke open and landed with a crash on the hallway floor. Carnegie shook his head, and went in.

Entering Edwin Rafferty's house was like stepping inside a giant coffin. There was a musty odour of decay and neglect that hinted at years of joyless solitude. The interior was eerily empty. In the front room, a rocking chair lay still, a glass of murky liquid on the table next to it. There were no other pieces of furniture in the room. The whitewashed walls were coated in grime, but there were no pictures or paintings hanging from them. Carnegie's footsteps echoed on the wooden floorboards.

The story was the same throughout the house. In the kitchen, a rusty tap dribbled water into the sink. The cupboards were bare, and there was no evidence that food had ever been prepared there. Up the stairs there was a bedroom containing just a bed, mirror and washstand. Down the hall, a breeze whipped through the broken window into a completely empty room.

“No wonder he spent all his time in the Midnight,” said Jonathan. “There's not much to do here, is there?”

“Not many leads, either,” Arthur replied.

Carnegie stopped in his tracks and frowned. “There's something that doesn't add up.”

“What?”

“Remember what Rafferty had in his pockets? The front door's hanging off the hinges, and there's nothing in the house. What did he need a key for?”

Arthur's eyes lit up. “He kept something locked up. I bet there's a safe hidden round here somewhere!”

They set to work immediately, exploring every inch of the house, rifling cupboards and turning over furniture. They disturbed flies and spiders and earned a series of high-pitched rebukes from nesting rats, but couldn't find any safe. After an hour of fruitless searching in the kitchen, Jonathan went upstairs and found Carnegie slumped on the broken bed, staring at his reflection in Rafferty's grubby mirror.

“I don't get it,” the wereman said. “There's nothing in this wretched house. Where could he have hidden anything?”

A dispirited figure appeared in the doorway, covered in black powder.

“Anything up the chimney, Arthur?”

The reporter shook his head, and sneezed violently. “Only soot.”

“You've got to hand it to Rafferty. He may not have been much to look at, but he wasn't completely stupid.”

“That's it!” Jonathan cried out.

“What's it?”

“You said Rafferty was a drunk and a slob, right? So he didn't really care about his appearance?”

Carnegie smiled thinly. “You could say that, yes.”

Jonathan turned and looked pointedly at the mirror. “So he wouldn't have been arranging his hair in that?”

“Good thinking, boy.”

The wereman sprang up and went over to the washstand, tracing a finger around the edge of the mirror. Apparently deep in thought, he tore off a long strip of bed linen and wrapped it around a club-like fist.

“You're not going to smash it, are you?” Jonathan inquired. “That's seven years' bad luck, you know.”

Carnegie chuckled. “It can't be any worse than hanging around you, boy. You're a walking bad omen. And anyway, if there's some sort of trigger mechanism, it's cleverer than I am. Now stand back, and cover your eyes.”

His fist flew through the air and crashed into the mirror, which exploded into a thousand shards of glass. Satisfied, the wereman brushed away the final remaining pieces, revealing a plain metal safe behind. He removed the linen from his hand, and gingerly rubbed his knuckles.

“That's going to hurt for a while.” Carnegie turned to Jonathan. “Good work there, boy. You get to unwrap the present. Arthur – you still got the key on you?”

Arthur nodded, and eagerly handed it to Jonathan. The key slipped into the lock and turned with surprising ease. A large bound book was inside. Opening it up, Jonathan was surprised to see each page was filled with rough sketches and drawings of people and famous buildings in Darkside.

“Seems Edwin fancied himself as an artist,” he said.

Laying the sketchbook down on the bed, he gingerly fished around for what was left in the safe. His hand settled on an envelope at the back. Long since opened, it contained a letter written on faded notepaper:

 

21.1.DY106

Brother Spine,

 

I am in desperate need of your assistance. I have become enmeshed in a dire scheme that may well cost me my life. In my hour of need, I am throwing myself on the mercy of the Gentlemen, in the hope that they will help me. Meet me at the club at the usual time tomorrow night,

 

Brother Fleet

 

“This could be anything,” murmured Jonathan. “What are those numbers across the top of the page?”

“The date,” replied Carnegie. “The 21
^st
of January, DarkYear 106.”

Arthur smiled grimly. “I'm not surprised Correlli's threatening us. That's three days before James Ripper was murdered and, by the sounds of it, Edwin was in on the plan.”

 

 

A
n unholy silence reigned over the grounds of Vendetta Heights. Life had fled: no animals sniffed and scurried through the undergrowth, no birds wheeled and flocked over the estate. The onset of winter had drained the colour from the trees: only the hedgerows of the labyrinth in the centre of the garden had managed to cling on to their dark leaves. Bare branches made anguished clenches at grey skies.

Down on the terrace, a group of workmen were inspecting the shattered remnants of a glasshouse. Affected by the unnatural stillness of the atmosphere, they crept around the shattered windowpanes, whispering nervously in one another's ears. The youngest of the group could barely keep still, his head darting this way and that at every imagined noise.

A makeshift canopy had been erected on the patio up by the mansion, from under which two figures watched the men at work. One was a young woman with flaming red hair, who stood attentively by the side of a wicker chair. In the chair sat a pale, blond man, a cane resting across his knee. His eyes burned with hatred. Vendetta: banker, vampire, the richest man in Darkside. When he spoke his voice was ragged.

“Remind me again, Raquella, why you decided to hire these oafs?”

There was a delicate pause as the maid weighed up her response.

“Your reputation precedes you, sir. Finding workmen is not always easy.”

“I'm sure you offered enough of my money to make it an attractive proposition.”

“Most people refused to speak to me – no matter how much I offered them.”

The vampire shifted restlessly in his chair. “I simply can't believe this rabble was all you could find.”

“I did my best, sir,” she replied implacably.

Snarling, Vendetta reached up and grabbed Raquella by the back of the neck, pulling her head down until she was level with his eyeline.

“This is all your fault. The workmen . . . the glasshouse . . . I should have drained you a long time ago. I know what you did. I know you helped the Starling boy. You betrayed me, and now look at me.
Look at me!
”

Raquella forced herself to meet his gaze. The vampire's skin, always pale, had now assumed an utterly lifeless pallor, and his cheeks were hollow. She remembered the night she had discovered him dragging himself up the steps of Vendetta Heights, blood pouring from a wound in his side. During a fight with Jonathan his own knife had been turned upon him. Most blades would have barely scratched him, but Vendetta's knife was coated with a rare substance that prevented his victims passing on any infections through their blood. The overdose of this substance in his bloodstream had left him in agony.

Could a vampire – a creature of the undead – die? Raquella didn't know, but for the next few days Vendetta had come as close to mortality as she had ever seen him. Racked with a fever, he tossed and turned in bed, muttering phrases in a strange language. The slightest sliver of light caused him such pain that his screams echoed down the hallways of his enormous mansion.

Throughout the darkest days of Vendetta's illness, there had only been one person there to look after him. One person who had wiped the perspiration from his skin, tried to feed him food and water, wrenched open the windows when it was safely dark outside and chased the stench of death from the stuffy bedroom. One person who, during one particularly long and painful night, had rolled up her shirtsleeve and pricked her arm with a sewing needle, allowing drops of blood to trickle into Vendetta's grateful mouth.

Raquella didn't know why she hadn't walked out that night and left her master to rot. Maybe she was so used to serving him that she didn't know anything else. In a strange way, did she feel guilty for betraying this brutal, evil man? Whatever the reason, her ministrations were probably the only thing that had stopped him from killing her. For now.

“You're hurting me,” Raquella said, through gritted teeth.

“You want to tell me about pain? I'm a cripple!”

The icy blast of his breath swept her face.

“You're getting stronger each day. It won't be long before you're walking again.”

Vendetta let go of her neck. As she stumbled away from him, a series of hacking coughs rent his body.

“Need . . . to feed. Tell one of the guards to bring me a workman. The young one. He mustn't be able to struggle . . . I'm . . . so very weak. . .”

Smoothing her hair down, Raquella helped her master quietly back inside.

 

As dusk fell an exhausted Vendetta slept. He looked a little better for feeding; a hint of colour had returned to his cheeks. The remaining workmen had fled, and wouldn't be returning. At this rate the glasshouse would never be repaired.

When she was satisfied that he was comfortable, Raquella pulled a heavy coat over her maid's outfit and slipped out of the side door into the gloomy evening. She walked quickly down the driveway, her footsteps crunching on the gravel. A shadowy figure opened the front gates for her: as always, she nodded in thanks, but avoided eye contact.

The wind was rummaging through the huge trees that lined Savage Row. Raquella found the sound strangely comforting. It was nice to be out in the fresh air. Usually she spent her nights in the cramped servants' quarters at Vendetta Heights, but tonight she had promised to visit her family down in the Lower Fleet. At the thought of seeing her parents and her brothers and sisters again, her footsteps instinctively quickened. Raquella would have liked to have saved time by taking a train on the Dark Line, but she was saving every penny. Her wages were the main reason her family could eat but, given Vendetta's current mood, she couldn't be sure how much longer she would be working. Or, for that matter, how much longer she was going to remain alive.

As Raquella headed past a giant mansion belonging to Darkside's most successful gambler, she heard the sound of a pebble skittering across the pavement on the other side of the street. She stopped and turned. A woman dressed in a flowing maroon cloak was standing underneath a streetlamp. Her florescent bright-blue hair shone brilliantly in the soft light.

“Hello, Raquella,” said Marianne. And smiled.

Tensing, the maidservant crossed the street. “Good evening, Marianne. You're getting lax. I heard you.”

“If I had wanted to remain silent, you wouldn't have done. I was merely being polite.” Her eyes glinted. “Wouldn't want to
scare
you.”

Raquella took an involuntary step back, bringing forth a peal of laughter from the bounty hunter.

“Oh, do come on. I merely wanted to pass on a message to one of your friends.”

“Which friend?” Raquella asked suspiciously.

“The little one. Jonathan.”

The maid looked startled. “I-I don't know anyone called Jonathan,” she stammered.

“My dear, if you wanted to keep your friendship a secret, then perhaps you shouldn't have driven down the Grand with him in Vendetta's car. Did you think that no one noticed? Please don't play the innocent with me. You're too clever for that.”

Raquella thought quickly. Having risked her life helping Jonathan take on Vendetta, she had resolved never to see him again. She had to admit to a small twinge of curiosity as to how the Lightsider was getting on, but there was no doubt her master would kill her if he knew she had spoken to Jonathan. Vendetta's patience stretched only so far. On the other hand, Marianne was very sharp, and extremely dangerous. Crossing her wasn't a good idea either.

“What's the message?”

“Firstly, let him know that I forgive him.” She smiled coldly. “His actions hurt me, my reputation, and – worst of all – my pocket. But I am prepared to bury the hatchet, so to speak. There's no money in revenge, and anyway, I doubt that your master will be quite so . . . magnanimous when he recovers. Jonathan's going to be in quite enough trouble as it is.”

Raquella shrugged. “If I run into him I'll pass it on. Anything else?”

“A little bird tells me people have been asking questions about the James Arkel murder. If they happen to get any answers, I want to hear about it.” Marianne smiled. “If I'm prepared to forgive him, it's the very least Jonathan can do for me. Got that?”

She nodded, biting her lip.

“Excellent. Just in time.”

A black carriage came clopping down Savage Row, driven by a giant, elongated figure. As it pulled up alongside them, a small, jittery man leapt out of the cab and held the door open for Marianne. A thought suddenly occurred to Raquella.

“Marianne?”

The bounty hunter inclined her head.

“Why are you doing this?”

Marianne smiled. “I always had a soft spot for the little one,” she replied softly.

And with that, she swept up into the carriage. The small man followed her inside, and in a matter of moments the sounds of the horses had been swallowed up by the gloom. Raquella remained by the streetlamp, a thoughtful expression on her face.

 

It was pitch-black by the time she arrived at her parents' house, and immediately Raquella could tell that something was wrong. Her youngest brother, Daniel, was wandering outside in the street, crying. Raquella scooped him up into her arms.

“Danny? What's wrong?”

The little boy said nothing, merely pressed himself closer against his sister. The front door was ajar. Raquella entered the house slowly, her sense of foreboding growing. The lights were off and the hallway, usually a bright bustling corridor filled with scampering children, was deserted.

“Ma?” she called out. “I found Danny outside. Where are you?”

There was no reply.

“Ma? Pa?”

Downstairs was empty. Raquella climbed the staircase, suddenly fearful of what she might find. At the end of the landing was her parents' cramped bedroom. Pushing the door open, Raquella saw her mother lying out on the bed, head turned to one side, gazing out through the window at the streets beyond. Raquella's brothers and sisters were gathered around her, their faces creased with concern.

“What on Darkside's going on here? Where's Pa?”

There was a pause.

“He's gone,” whispered her mum.

“Gone? Gone where?”

Without tearing her gaze from the window, her mum handed Raquella a note. The maidservant's hands shook as she read it.

 

My Dearest Georgina,

 

I have always feared that this day would come. For years I have been keeping a dreadful secret. Many nights I thought about telling you, but I knew that it would have only put you and the children in danger. Now I know that my hour of reckoning has come, and I must face it alone or place all those I love in unimaginable peril. A life without you is barely a life at all, but I hope that in time I shall be able to return to you, my love. In the meanwhile, take care of one another.

 

Your loving husband,

 

William

 

“I . . . I don't understand,” said Raquella. “What's this secret he's talking about? Where has he gone? What's going on, Ma?”

Georgina didn't reply to her daughter's question.

“Oh, my William,” she whispered. “What have you done?”