Soul Trade (12 page)

Pete was learning quickly that she preferred the sort of bastard who let you know flat out they hated you. Morwenna’s hot and cold act was going to give her a heart attack.

“Just hold up here,” Jack said. “Your whole purpose was for us to be fucking bait?”

“Think of it as an opportunity to do some good,” Morwenna said. “An actual insider would be far too dangerous—the Prospero Society clearly has no trouble reaching inside a mage’s mind. But you and Pete can go to Hereford, find Jeremy, and figure out who the Prosperians’ agent is. It’s the best way.”

“It’s a shit
way!” Jack exclaimed. “Why should we do your bloody grunt work?”

“Because you don’t have a choice,” Morwenna said. “And neither do we. For the good of everyone in the Black who doesn’t want to see the world swallowed whole by something like Nergal, you’ll do as I say.”

Pete’s first impulse was to tell Morwenna to bend over and cram it straight up her own arse, but logic dictated the woman was
right. Even if they could fight their way out of here, she and Jack already had too many enemies. They didn’t need a group as powerful as the Prometheans wanting a piece of their hides as well.

“Jack,” she said. “Let it be. She’s right.” She went and sat next to him, putting a hand on his knee, and favored Morwenna with the sort of look she usually reserved for the killers and rapists she ran
across on the murder squad. “If you try and fuck me over, and more importantly if you harm one hair on Jack or our daughter’s head, there is going to be such fire rained down on you it will make the end of the world look like a chuch fete by comparison. You reading me, Morwenna?”

“The Prospero Society won’t be able to resist the two of you,” Morwenna said without missing a beat. “This isn’t a
game, a tug of war, any longer. This is stock your pantry and batten down the hatches before the war comes to your doorstep.”

“So what, we swan around Hereford until a creepy bloke in a long coat makes overtures?” Pete said.

“Oh, didn’t I mention?” Morwenna said. “You’ll be among old friends in Hereford, Pete. When Jeremy arrived he found the place has become something of a mecca for those buffeted
by the Black—ordinary folks who’ve seen things they don’t understand. It’s like they’ve got their own little social club, right there among the weekend Wiccans and those nutters who hunt the Loch Ness monster.”

Pete felt an uncomfortable frisson of regret crawl up her spine. “I don’t follow you,” she said.

“There were quite a few traumatized families after the Algernon Treadwell business back
in London, I heard,” Morwenna said.

Pete tensed her hand on Jack’s leg until he grunted in pain, and she felt the words grit out of her as if she’d swallowed a handful of stones. “What are you saying, Morwenna?”

“The children you saved—or failed to save—are in the village in Hereford where we last heard from Jeremy,” Morwenna said. “He found it quite peculiar, so many survivors of a spirit attack
in one place, but I imagine for you it’ll be like a reunion.”

“You knew,” Pete spat. She wanted to slap Morwenna in the face. Jack was holding her in place now as her body vibrated with fury. “You knew this whole time that I’d run into those people.”

“Consider it added incentive,” Morwenna said. “We have no inkling what Preston found in Hereford, but it was bad enough to spread like a virus
through the community and utterly corrupt him. So if you want to save those innocent babes, I suggest you get moving.”

“I’ll do it,” Pete told her, standing. “Because I know when I’m beaten, and you’ve left me no choice. But don’t think we’re friends after this.”

“I have enough friends,” said Morwenna, also standing and smoothing her skirt. “What I need are allies.” The fleeting moment of vulnerability
was gone and she gripped Pete’s hand, her fingers like warm iron bands around Pete’s small bones.

“You’ve got them,” Pete said, squeezing back, not wanting to be the first one to let go. “By dint of being a devious bitch.”

“Welcome to the fold,” Morwenna said with a thin, razor-sharp smile. “You’re a Promethean now.”

11.

Jack stayed quiet until the Prometheans had deposited them, their mobiles and IDs, and their luggage on the sidewalk, and he glowered as the cab wound back toward the train station. Pete sighed as they pulled to the curb and the taxi driver waved away her cash. “It’s taken care of, luv.”

“You going to pout much longer?” she asked Jack.

Jack’s lip curled. “This is a little beyond pouting.”

“Look,” Pete said. “By rights, I should be the one in a snit. She tricked me, and she’s a damned liar. At least we’re out of there.”

“Yeah, and thank Christ and his fleet of rowboats for that,” Jack said. His whole frame twitched, unease evident with every breath. He looked like he had in the bad old days, when he was looking for his next fix of either magic or heroin. Pete felt the uncomfortable
sensation of memories that she’d rather stayed drowned breaking the surface.

“I’m sorry,” Pete said softly, hefting her suitcase. She felt uncomfortable looking back at the spot where Preston had died. Was what Morwenna said true? Had he been dipping into black magic that drove him crazy?

Or would the Prometheans would have done worse to her if they’d found the soul cage? “I’m sorry, Jack,”
she said again. “I was trying to do what wouldn’t get us killed or put on yet another hit list. Forgive me if I’m not sufficiently guns a-blazing for your taste.”

“Petunia, it is not just you anymore!” Jack burst out, his voice echoing off the broken brick fronts of the nearby flats. “It’s me, and it’s Lily, too. You call me irresponsible, but you’ve never once thought about yourself in all this.
You have an obligation to stay in one piece now. We need you.” He gripped her by the hands, harder than Morwenna ever had, so hard she inhaled a sharp breath. “
I
need you.”

Pete looked at her boots, willing her tears not to spill. “I know, Jack. I’m doing this
for
you.” She looked at him. “How much longer do you think either of us can avoid the Hag? What will happen to Lily then?”

Jack wasn’t
given to demonstrations, so Pete was surprised when he wrapped his arms around her hard enough to drive the air from her lungs. She returned the gesture, patting his back, hands caressing the rough leather. “I’d never let that happen,” he muttered against Pete’s neck. “I’d never let her hurt you.”

“Jack,” Pete sighed. She drew back at arm’s length. “You can’t promise that. I can’t promise that
nothing will happen to me during this little stunt Morwenna cooked up, but I
can
promise that if I don’t do it, eventually things
will
go past the point of no return, and that’ll be in. End reel, roll credits. And seeing as I like things the way they are, I’m going to do my damndest to make sure the Morrigan never gets her Hell on earth.” She squeezed Jack’s hand. “I’m not afraid. Not of this.
I’m more afraid you won’t be with me.”

Jack looked at the floor sighed heavily. “’Course I will,” he said. “You’re the only person I stick me neck out for. You know that. Anyone else would be shite out of luck.”

“You’re so romantic,” Pete said.

“That’s me,” Jack agreed, pulling her close again. “Man of the fuckin’ year.”

The loudspeaker was blatting that their train was about to depart, so
Pete bought two rushed and hideously expensive tickets from the machine and jogged onboard with Jack. Once she’d sat, the last thing Morwenna had said really hit her, almost pressing her physically into her seat.

It had been a long time since the Treadwell case—not in years, but certainly in experience. She hadn’t kept in contact with the families of any of the children Algernon Treadwell had
drained of soul and feeling to sustain his spirit, and she’d gotten the distinct feeling they wanted it that way.

Now, though, she was going in blind, and she didn’t like it. She brought her mobile to life, flipping through numbers to find the only name from her days on the Met still in her directory. Though it was long after his shift ended, he answered on the second ring.

“This better be the
world endin’, Pete.”

“Isn’t it always, Ollie?” Pete said, steadied a bit at the sound of his thick Yorkshire accent. Ollie was from a time when none of it—ghosts, demons, the collateral damage of people like the children Treadwell had fed on—existed for her. Just the usual atrocities, wrought by and on plain old humans.

Ollie Heath groused, and she heard bedsprings creak. “Why do I know you’re
interrupting my beauty sleep for some illegal errand that’ll probably get me sacked?” he said.

“Because you know me too well,” Pete told him. “Look, Ollie, I don’t have a lot of time. I need you to track down a bloke for me. And then an address.”

Ollie sighed. One day, Pete knew, she was going to run out of credit, and he’d shut her account. She hoped not soon, though. She genuinely liked Ollie.
He was a good copper and a decent bloke. Asking him to do something that could get him sacked wasn’t exactly fun for Pete, but she needed real information, not the carefully edited load of shit Morwenna had fed her back in Manchester.

“Right,” Ollie said. “Got a pen. Go ahead.”

Pete rattled off Jeremy Crotherton’s name and the details of his last known sighting. “An accident report, a John Doe
turning up in a couple of pieces—according to his, uh, friends, he just vanished.” She chewed on her lip, trying to keep the emotion out of her voice. Ollie wouldn’t help her if he thought anything was hinky about this request. “And I need to find an address for Margaret Smythe.”

Ollie sucked in a breath. “That kid what you helped out back in the day? What d’you need her for?”

“It’s important,
Ollie,” Pete told him, her gut clenching with unease. If Margaret was in harm’s way, Pete had to do something. Warn her somehow.

“’Course it is,” Ollie said. “Even if it wasn’t, you know I’d do it. Call you back when I find something.”

He rang off, and Pete pressed her forehead against the cool train window as the twilight land sped by in a blur of fog, shadow and bursts of light. She wanted
a fag, so badly she could already taste the harsh, dry filter paper on her tongue. Wanted a drink, wanted to scream. Wanted to go home.

But none of those things would help in the moment. Nothing she could do until she knew what she was really getting into.

“You know, I could throttle that bloody Wendy,” Jack said, snapping her out of the vast circle of rage and self pity in which she’d found
herself rotating. “Everything we’ve been through, and she flips on me for a few quid and pat on the head from some bitch in a nice suit.”

“Old school friends are usually cunts,” Pete agreed. “I met with a girl I did A-levels with when I was engaged to Terry, and she spent the whole time trying to get me to invest in a pyramid scheme.”

Jack shook his head, mouth forming a bitter line. “Wendy
and me was more than that. I saved her life, you know.”

Pete decided she was so glad they weren’t talking about where they were going, or the mess they were in, that she’d discuss Wendy until the cow came home, propped up its feet, and turned on the telly. “I didn’t,” she said. “She wasn’t exactly eager to chat with me, for obvious reasons.”

“That you don’t look like you were hit with a lorry
full of bad decisions and aging poorly?” Jack snorted.

Pete laughed and fetched him a soft punch on his arm. “You’re a terrible slag. She wasn’t that bad.”

“She used to be me only real friend,” Jack said, abruptly sombering again. “After me da fucked off for the last time, Mum was in and out with a different man every week. Wendy used to make these fuck-awful beans on toast and steal lager from
the downstairs neighbor, and we’d sit up in her room and have dinner because our parents were all too stoned to feed us.”

Pete stayed quiet, glad that the vise grip of Manchester’s Black had eased a bit and she could feel the thrum of power again, rather than drowning in it, as the train raced into the country.

“My da was a degenerate scum-coated wanker,” Jack said. “But Wendy’s was true horror.
Put her head through a wall because he didn’t like her wearing makeup. Came for our usual beans and chatter, found her on the stoop looking like fucking
Carrie.
I took her to this old tip of a warehouse where me and my mates hung about, and just sat and talked with her all night, about shite I’ve never told anyone before or since. Just making sure she didn’t go to sleep. Walked her home at dawn
because she ordered me to, even though I would’ve rather eaten nails then take her back there.”

Pete put her head on Jack’s shoulder, much as she imagined Wendy would have. She felt the spark of his talent against hers. There was a time when they had to be careful not even to touch skin to skin, because her talent would drink his down. At least they’d solved that problem.

Jack stroked her hair
once, absently. His eyes were miles and decades away. “I wanted to kick the shit out of her da, but he was friends with my mum’s Kevin, and it would’ve gone bad for her mum besides if I’d interfered.”

“You did the best you could,” Pete said quietly. “You were just a kid, Jack.”

“I always told myself I’d be better,” he said, vicious against her ear. “That I wouldn’t fuck about with a bunch of
whores or drink or beat my kids. That I’d be a rock, not a voice you hear on the wind or a tosser who comes around on your birthday, throws money at you and then fucks off again so some other bastard can beat seven shades of Hell out of you and keep your mum so stoned she doesn’t even know it’s happening. I told myself I’d be better.” He gave a shuddery breath, and Pete knew if she looked up she’d
see his wet eyes, so she didn’t. Jack would never open up again if she witnessed that. “But I’m not,” he whispered, voice thick. “I’m shit.”

Pete slipped an arm across his chest, so close and warm they might have been at home in bed. “You’re a good man,” she said. “You’re a good man who makes shit choices. That’s different than being shit.” She slotted her fingers into the shallow spaces in between
Jack’s ribs, spaces she’d memorized night after night and longed for when she’d been away. “Lily is going to remember you as that man. None of what came before matters to her, so that’s all that should matter to you.”