Only a Monster (28 page)

Ahead of them, Aaron and Ruth turned into a narrow alley. “Stay in front of me,” Joan warned Tom. The buildings here were built close and sunless. Warehouses and converted factories.

“You need to give me what you found,” Tom said softly.

“What it is?”

“I told you. It's a message.”

Joan shook her head. “I'm going to need to know more than that.”

A muscle jumped in Tom's jaw. That was the only warning Joan had before the sudden burst of violence. In one fast movement, Tom had closed the gap between himself and the others. He threw Ruth and Aaron into a wall with easy strength.

Before Joan could react, Tom was shoving her too. Joan's shoulders hit the wall. After a stunned moment, she dove at him. He pushed her back again, almost casually, with one big hand. Joan was furious with herself. Tom had shown her exactly what he was at the rendezvous, and she'd just—

A car door slammed nearby. Joan froze.

Tom stared at Joan meaningfully, one finger at his lips.
Shhh.
He released his grip on her. She realized then that Tom had pushed her—and himself—into a doorway recess. Aaron and Ruth were in an identical recess opposite. Anyone looking from the street would see an empty alleyway.

Two more car doors slammed. Then footsteps sounded.

Joan risked peering around the recess. About twenty paces away, a woman and two men were walking into the alley from the street. Joan pulled back again, heart thumping. They were all wearing pins with the winged-lion insignia. All three were easily Tom's height, although not quite as muscular in build.

“How much longer?” one of the men said. “We've been patrolling all night.”

“There was a sighting near here,” the woman said.

“There've been sightings all over. You ask me, they've already escaped this time.”

“They were hit by Sai Patel himself. They're still here,” the woman said. “Conrad pulled guards in from all over. Took me out of the Victorian era. If he did that, he needs them found.”

The footsteps got closer. Joan could hardly breathe. In the doorway opposite, Ruth and Aaron looked terrified. The doorways were too shallow to hide any of them completely. If the guards just looked—properly
looked
down the alleyway—they'd see all of them standing there.

“Do you believe the rumors?” the woman said. “Of strange powers used in the archive? Something forbidden.” She lowered her voice. “Something
wrong
.”

“Above my pay grade,” the man said.

“What about that other tip-off, though?” the woman said. “About a half-human girl with a strange power? That can't be a coincidence.”

Joan couldn't breathe at all now. They were talking about
her
.

In the opposite doorway, Ruth's face creased with confusion. She had no idea what the guards were talking about—not about the power and not about the tip-off.

Joan had a suspicion of where the tip-off had come from.
Dorothy Hunt is not a good person
, the innkeeper had said. Joan's gran would never have hurt her. But the woman in the bar . . . Joan remembered how that young version of Gran had looked at her: as if Joan were nothing to her. Horribly and annoyingly, Joan felt tears prickling. She clenched her teeth, forcing them back.

“Wouldn't mind that reward, though,” the man said.

“A favor from Conrad himself,” the woman said. “Imagine that.”

The tips of their long shadows reached Joan's feet. Tom touched Joan's hand to get her attention.
Ready?
he mouthed to her. Joan was almost too tense to nod. Tom gave her a slight smile, trying to be reassuring.
Me first
, he mouthed.

The shadows stayed motionless. The moment seemed to stretch and stretch. If not for Tom's chest rising and falling beside her, Joan would have thought that time itself had frozen again. She began to shake from unused adrenaline. Beside her, Tom's muscles were smooth and ready as though he could have waited all day in that tensed posture.

A sudden loud noise made Joan jump. It sounded like the
squeaky music from an old-fashioned video game.

The woman groaned. “Just because we're in the nineties doesn't mean you need a stupid ringtone,” she complained.

“There was a sighting near Rotherhithe Station.” It was the second man—the one who hadn't spoken yet.

And now, finally, sounds of movement. The shadows began to retreat.

“Were they caught on camera?” the first man said.

“If they'd been caught on any camera, we'd have them already,” the woman said. She sounded impatient.

“Get in,” the taciturn man said. “Conrad wants—” Then the car door slammed shut, and his voice cut off.

Joan waited while the car drove away, the rumbling of it quieting until the alley was silent. Beside her, Tom relaxed, slowly, his body loosening. He'd saved them, Joan thought. He'd protected them from the guards.

Joan couldn't make sense of it. He'd pretended to help them to get into the archive. Then he'd seemed about to betray them. And now he'd saved them instead. He could have turned Joan in—there was even a reward—but he hadn't. Why?

As she turned, she found herself caught in Aaron's direct line of sight. He was still in the doorway, and he was looking at her in the same intense way he had at the watermen's stairs.

Before Joan could say anything to him, Aaron abruptly pushed away from the door. “Come on,” he said. “The safe house is this way.”

The safe house was unexpectedly homey. There were family photos on the hallway walls, the kind only interesting to someone's mum: a little girl dressed as a pirate, her dad kneeling to tie the eye patch; the same girl older and asleep next to a napping cat. A whole-family shot: Mum, Dad, girl, and a new baby.

Joan stopped abruptly in the hallway. Had they broken into someone's actual home? Aaron hadn't had a key. Ruth had had to pick the lock.

Aaron stumbled into her back, and Joan turned just enough to put a finger in front of his lips, not quite touching him. He gave her an incredulous look. Behind him, Tom lifted his head—alert.

They listened. Nothing. No creaking floorboards, no whispered phone conversations with the police. No water running, no fridge buzzing.

A minute passed. Two minutes. Aaron's expression shifted from incredulous to irritated.

“Oh, for heaven's sake,” he said finally, in his normal, superior voice. “There's no one here. It's as I told you. A safe house.”

“Sorry if I didn't want to just blunder in,” Joan said, but her heart wasn't in it. No one was home. The house was too cold, the air too stale. If the family in the photographs had ever lived in this house, they weren't here now.

“How
did
you know about this place exactly?” Ruth asked Aaron.

“It doesn't matter,” Aaron said. That was even less information than he'd given at the watermen's stairs. Again there was a flatness in his tone that brooked no questions.

They trooped in, shoes loud against the floorboards. The hallway opened into a cozy sitting room. Aaron collapsed onto a fat little sofa piled with cushions. Frankie huffed and flopped onto the floor next to him. She seemed as tired as the rest of them. Ruth stopped at a bedroom door, looking longingly at the bed.

“Lie down,” Joan told her. “I'll check the place out.”

The house was simple enough: sitting room, one bedroom, kitchen, bathroom, separate toilet. Joan opened every cupboard big enough to hold a person—flinging them open at first, SWAT-style, and then opening them with more and more sheepishness. So, no one was hiding in the airing cupboard, then.

In the kitchen, animal magnets and postcards covered the fridge—Spain, Cornwall, Wales. Joan plucked off a postcard from Dover.
Wish you were here
floated above the cliffs. She flipped it over. The writing side was blank, the fifty-pence price tag still stuck to the corner. She opened the fridge. Empty and dark.

A little wooden table was nestled into the corner of the room. At first glance, it had seemed battered—as all kitchen tables were. But Joan could see now that the top was unmarked and dusty. Had anyone ever eaten at it? She replaced the postcard and folded her arms around herself. The whole house seemed creepy suddenly. An empty movie set. A furniture display room.

“Hey,” someone said behind her.

Joan jumped and spun around. Tom gave her an apologetic look from the open pantry. “Tea?” He held up a packet of Tetley's, the box almost comically small in his huge hand. He was the picture of harmlessness.

Joan stared at him warily. She still wasn't even sure why she'd let him in here—after what had happened at the watermen's stairs. He'd shown that he was dangerous, and yet . . . She remembered again his intensity of feeling when he'd asked her for the message. But he hadn't hurt her when he could have taken it by force. And then he'd saved them from the guards. And, more than any of that, she kept thinking about the way he'd said those words.
The message was meant for me. . . .

“Why didn't you turn me over to the guards?” she asked him. “It sounds like there's a reward.”

Tom put the tea on the table. “I would die before I'd help the Court,” he said flatly.

Joan searched his face. He'd proved himself an outstanding liar, but she didn't think he was lying now. His mouth had twisted slightly as he'd said
Court
. As if he hated the word.

Joan ran her hand over her face. She had to think, but she
was so tired. She was so bloody tired. She wanted to lie down right here in the kitchen and sleep for days.

“I'll make tea,” Tom said. “And we should eat as well.”

They really needed to talk. But Joan nodded. “All right.”

“How do pork pies and marzipan sound?” Tom said.

“Like heaven,” Joan said seriously, and he nodded, seeming too tired or too tense to smile.

Tom took the pies from his stolen purse. He opened and closed cupboards and drawers, pulling out plates. His bulky body seemed to fill the kitchen, but he moved with surprising nimbleness as he rinsed and filled the kettle.

Joan put the marzipan lions onto a plate. They were just smashed paste now. She found some mugs for the tea. It didn't take long, and when she was finished, she leaned against the fridge door.

She found herself unwilling to shift the mood back into something more dangerous again. But she knew that she had to.

“Who was he?” she asked. Tom stilled, his broad back to her. Without the clattering of plates and cups, the room was suddenly very quiet. “Who was the prisoner in that cell?”

“I told you,” Tom said. “The archive.”

“Who was he to
you
?”

Tom turned finally, but he didn't answer. He had a boxer's body, with big arms and broad shoulders; he was intimidating, even when he was relaxed.

“If he'd been at the palace, would you have brought him back to the rendezvous?” Joan asked.

“No,” Tom said. That should have ended the conversation,
but Joan was pretty sure she understood now.

“That room he was in,” she said. “The bucket. The mattress.”

A muscle jumped in Tom's jaw. “I saw the room.”

“He was a prisoner,” Joan said. “But he left you a message. He knew you were coming.”

She was watching closely enough to see agony cross Tom's face, and then she knew for sure. She'd felt it herself every moment since the massacre. The inability to save someone you loved. “You went there for him, didn't you?” she said. “You went there to rescue him.”

“Yes.” Tom's shoulders rose unsteadily. He was trying to keep his composure. Joan knew that feeling too. She'd barely been keeping it together since her family had died.

She took a deep breath. She felt in her pocket for the plastic square she'd found. She held it out to him. “You were right,” she said. “It was under the desk.”

Tom grasped it at once, closing his fist over it, as though afraid she might take it back.

“What do you think the message will be?” she asked him. “Do you think there'll be something about the
transformatio
?”

“No,” Tom said, almost gently. “The
transformatio
is a myth.” It was what he'd said at the rendezvous, but Joan was sure now he was telling the truth. She felt her stomach drop. “Let's go into the sitting room,” he said.

“The sitting room?”

“We'll need some space to watch.”

Aaron was asleep on the sofa. He looked deceptively angelic like this. His lashes were as long as a girl's. “Aaron,” Joan said softly. She felt bad about waking him. None of them had slept much over the last few days. She touched his shoulder.

He opened his eyes. He blinked and then gave her a heart-meltingly sweet smile. “Hi,” he said. Then he seemed to realize where he was. He grimaced. “Oh.” He sat up, running a hand through his hair. “What time is it?”

“Still morning,” Joan said. “We need to talk. Tom . . .” She looked over at him. Tom was watching her, warily. “Tom's been keeping some things from us.”

“What things?” Ruth said. She was standing in the bedroom doorway. She looked exhausted. Her face was still gray.

Tom hesitated and then uncurled his fingers to reveal the little square of plastic.

“What's that?” Aaron said groggily. He started to frown. “Where did you get that?” He seemed to recognize it. “That's—that's
illegal
. That's incredibly far from its time.”

“I found it in the prison cell,” Joan said. “Tom thinks it's a message . . . from the prisoner.”

Aaron's eyes were narrowing. Joan could see him making connections. The change of plans at the rendezvous. The way Tom had been standing over Joan on the steps.

“His name is Jamie Liu,” Tom said. “He's been a prisoner of the Monster Court for . . . well, I don't know how long, from his perspective. From mine, three years.”

“What exactly is going on?” Ruth said, and she might have
been tired, but her voice was sharp and suspicious. “What do you know?” she said to Tom.

“I think you should play the message,” Joan said to Tom.

Tom pushed the coffee table to one side and rolled up the rug. Joan could feel the tension in the room. Tom's size alone was part of it. His muscled bulk seemed to fill the whole space.

He looked at the corners of the room, the placement of the sofa, as if assessing angles. “Stand back,” he said. He waited for them all to shuffle away. Then he put the plastic square at his feet. The square seemed to shimmer.

A small chessboard appeared, floating in midair. It was the strange type of chess Joan had noticed in the Serpentine Inn: the kind with elephant and sailing-ship pieces instead of bishops and rooks. For some reason, seeing the board made Tom's expression soften. “Just because you beat me that first time,” he murmured.

“It's a game?” Ruth asked.

“It's a password,” Tom said. “One that only two people know.” He placed a white pawn, and then a black one, and then kept going, alternating between white and black, his fingers moving with unhesitating confidence. The pieces clacked against the board just as though they were real. But Tom wasn't quite touching them, Joan saw. And when he tossed aside the first pawn, it vanished like a popped bubble.

He was replaying a game, Joan thought. Recalling every move without effort. Whoever had set this password had known
he would. Joan thought about the drunk idiot he'd seemed to be just a few days ago. The real Tom Hathaway was turning out to be an entirely different person.

Finally, the white king stood alone, surrounded by black. Tom moved a knight into checkmate.

And then the board was gone. For a moment, a number floated in midair: 10.

And when that was gone, Nick was in the room.

“Run!” Joan shouted.

Tom's arm shot out, catching Joan as she tried to flee. “It's okay, it's okay.” He steadied her.

“It's
him
!” Joan screamed at him. “It's the hero!”

“He's not really here,” Tom said. “It's just a recording.”

Nick didn't look like a recording. He looked as real as anything in the room. Joan's heart was pounding. Aaron had tried to run too. His back was pressed against the wall. Ruth was behind the pushed-back sofa. Her eyes were huge, breath coming fast.

Nick looked deceptively unthreatening. He was sitting in a wooden chair. And now that Joan wasn't freaking out, she could see what Tom meant. Nick was young—fourteen, maybe. And he wasn't here in this house. He was in the kitchen of a different house. There was a microwave, a fridge.

Movement in the kitchen became a man, walking toward Nick. He was clearly a monster. Nick was wearing a T-shirt and black jeans. But the monster was dressed for a different century. He wore a suit and a top hat. He removed the hat now, revealing sleek black hair.

He placed the hat carefully on the kitchen counter and stood in front of Nick's chair.

Joan swallowed. “
Run
,” she whispered to the man, even though it was pointless if this was only a recording.

Without warning, the man slapped Nick hard across the face.

Joan gasped. Nick lifted his head slowly. The slap had bloodied his mouth. Joan closed her eyes, not wanting to see what happened next. In a way, having her eyes closed was worse. She remembered how Nick had shoved the sword into Lucien—in and then out. She remembered how he'd hurled the blade into Edmund's chest. She remembered Lucien's blank face.

She remembered Gran, lying dead on the sofa.

There was another sharp crack. Joan's eyes flew open again. She'd expected to see the man dead, but he was still standing over Nick, and now there was more blood—all over Nick's nose and mouth.

“What is this?” Joan could hear the horror in her voice. It didn't make sense. It had taken Nick just seconds to kill Lucien.

Expression cold, the man drove his fist into Nick's jaw. Nick rocked back, just taking it. His arms were bound to the armrests of the chair, Joan realized.

The man struck him again. And now, finally, Nick reacted. “Please,” he whispered. Blood was running down his chin, down his neck. His nose looked broken. “Please, no more. Please—”

“Stop,” a woman's voice said.

The scene froze. Or at least Nick froze, mouth half-open, pleading. The man wasn't frozen. He looked over his shoulder at
someone out of frame. “I can get him there,” he said.