The Eighth Court (23 page)

Alex was quite pleased with herself. It had been surprisingly easy to find out which room was Tate’s. A few offers to help here, a bit of assistance there, and with a little gentle prompting, people would chatter away to you about all sorts of things. It had all been so easy. Now she was approaching his room, she could feel her resolve faltering. This had been a great idea when she’d been back in her own space, but outside his door it was a different matter.

All she had to do was talk to him about it. It was probably accidental – he probably didn’t even know he was doing it. All she had to do was fix things between them, and she would be gone – no hurt, no foul. She could be grown up about it, and she was sure he could too. Even so, she stepped lightly, knowing it would do her no good because he would hear her anyway.

She tapped lightly on the door, her stomach squirming into knots. She mustn’t be tongue-tied. She must be confident, assertive and straight. At the same time she prayed there would be no answer. She tapped again louder. No one answered. OK, if he wasn’t there she couldn’t talk to him. She turned away, but then hesitated. What if it wasn’t accidental? What if he had some charm, or talisman that was doing this to her?

Her hand rested on the door handle. What if he was asleep in there? What if he had someone with him? What if it was someone female? That thought was particularly unwelcome. No, Tate wasn’t like Fellstamp. If he was there then she would speak to him. If he wasn’t, then it would be wise to find out what she was up against. As her hand turned the handle, she could hear the heartbeat thumping in her ears. The door opened with a light click.

“Tate? It’s only me, Alex.” The door swung open. “Tate?” The room was empty.

She slipped inside, placing her back against the closed door. She might not have long, and it would not do to get caught in here. The butterflies in her stomach were like an alarm.

She wasn’t sure what she’d been expecting. Something grand and imposing perhaps? Instead there were soft muslin drapes hanging from a wooden rail at the window, filtering the daylight into a soft glow. The furniture was of very dark wood, deeply polished and burnished to a lighter chestnut shine in spots where it had seen long use. There was a half-height wardrobe over a set of drawers against the wall, and a wide chest against the opposite wall over which a long-handled axe was mounted on the wall. The room was dominated by the huge bed. She would avoid the bed.

“Is there something here?” she asked herself softly, wandering around the room, looking for some trace of herself – a lost trinket, a scarf or bangle, something that could be used against her. Beyond the wardrobe was a door to a bathroom. There was a shower that was easily twice as big as hers. Over the rail were soft white towels and on the back of the door was a linen robe which would cover her like a tent. When you were close to him you could forget how big he was. Another unbidden thought came into her head and she left the bathroom more quickly than she’d entered.

Back in the bedroom, she went to the stand by the bed, opening drawers and finding cufflinks and a pen and notepad, along with other small personal items. There was nothing of hers. She went to the chest, opening the lid and finding stacks of clothes, some weapons, clean towels. The chest smelled as he smelled – earthy, scented with something herbal and exotic with the slightest hint of musk. Was it a cologne; an aftershave, perhaps?

She closed the chest and climbed on top of it to run the tips of her fingers along the long handle of the axe, noting how the wood was worn where his grip held it. Then she realised what was doing and snatched her hand away.

“There must be something,” she said. “It can’t be nothing.”

She went to the wardrobe and opened each drawer in turn, finding spare clothing, piles of underwear, and some leather-bound books that looked about a hundred years old. She wondered if one of them was a spell-book, and started leafing through them, only to discover they were history books, full of dates and events that were long since forgotten. There was no book of charms, and no secret diary that would give her a clue to what was going on. She closed the drawers and turned around.

It was a very big bed, but then it would have to be. He was a very big guy. Her hand rested on the quilted coverlet that was carefully turned down. Maybe this was just somewhere he slept? Maybe he had another house somewhere else and that was where he kept his secrets? There was nothing here that made it look like home – no personal clutter, no trinkets or mementos.

A distant noise brought her back to reality. She had failed to find anything but that didn’t mean there wasn’t anything to find. She quickly looked under the wardrobe and beneath the bed, finding not so much as a missing cufflink, or a lost pen. Why was it all so tidy? What was he hiding? She went back around the room, replacing everything just as she’d found it. When she was satisfied that no one would know of her visit, especially Tate, she cracked the door and listened for the sounds of anyone in the corridor outside. When she was sure she was unobserved, she stepped out, closing the door carefully and quietly behind her, and headed back to her side of the house.

“Score one to you,” she muttered to herself, “but the game’s not over yet.”

After a while, Lesley left and then rejoined us, bringing Dave with her. Mullbrook produced a bottle of champagne from which Lesley would only accept the tiniest glass. Dave looked uncomfortable until we explained that he didn’t have to make a speech, at which point he cheered up considerably, kissed Lesley to rowdy cheers from around the table and accepted our toasted congratulations.

I excused myself and took the baby upstairs to his bed, changing him and then spending a while reading stories to him while he settled down. The excitement of the day must have worn him out, because despite his effort to stay awake, his eyes drooped and he was quickly asleep. I continued reading until I was sure he was settled and then pulled the door to his room almost closed. There was something else I wanted to do, while I had a moment alone.

Taking revenge was not something I was generally given to. I didn’t make a habit of bearing grudges – my view was that every grudge had to be carried, and it was you that ended up with the burden. In one case I would make an exception, though.

I placed my hand upon the mirror in my bedroom, and felt for the connection with the stillness behind the mirror. I’d asked Blackbird about mirrors once, and why I seemed to have a particular affinity with them. She didn’t exactly know but speculated that perhaps all mirrors were subtly connected and that my affinity was not with the mirrors themselves, but with the space between them. As I felt the connection grow, I could feel the tension inherent in the connection, and I spoke two words.

“Sam Veldon?”

The surface of the mirror cooled, and around my hand the faintest mist of condensation clouded the surface. To me it felt like dropping a stone into a still pool, waiting for the ripples to return from some distant object. A buzzing emerged from within the mirror, and then a ringing tone. It rang five or six times and then was answered.

“Hello? Who’s this?” There was background noise – a pub perhaps, or a busy restaurant.

I removed my hand without saying anything, withdrawing my intention from the mirror, and the connection faltered and collapsed. That was all I wanted for the moment, so I went back down to the kitchen to rejoin the conversation around the table.

After a while I went back upstairs to check on my son. I reached down into his cot and rested my hand on his forehead, stroking his hair. He sighed softly, content in the sleep of the innocent. Then I went back into the bedroom and used the mirror again. This time there was no mobile phone signal, only the rattle and squeal of a tube train running down the tracks. I waited for a lull in the noise, perhaps when the train slowed for signals or before a station, and then said, “Sam?”

“Huh?” A voice, questioning, as if he were half asleep, or drunk maybe. “Who’s there?”

I took my hand away, and went to find Alex. I found her in her room, alone. “Are you OK?” I asked.

She looked momentarily as if I’d asked her some searching and incisive question, but then she relaxed. “Yeah, I’m OK.”

“Come and join us,” I said. “Mullbrook’s telling stories in the kitchen.”

“I don’t know,” she said. “Maybe I’ll come down in a while.” She sighed as if the weight of the world bore down on her.

“You always say that when you mean no,” I said, echoing her words to me.

She looked at me curiously for a moment, and then relented. “OK,” she said. “Are they good stories?”

“It’s Mullbrook,” I said. “When I left he was telling us how he stopped the cheese being stolen from the fridges by painting it with green food colouring.”

We went together down to the kitchen and Amber had slipped in, standing against the back wall. I smiled at her, but she ignored me, continuing to rest against the wall near the door.

“You can come and sit down,” I said, in low tones.

“On duty,” she said. “But I can listen from here.”

I sat Alex between Blackbird and I, and we were drawn into the storytelling. It had evolved into taking turns, where each would tell a story and then defer to the next. When it came to my turn, I hesitated. “I don’t really have any stories,” I said.

“What about the fishing village?” said Blackbird. “Tell them about Ravensby.” So I told them about Greg, the vicar of Ravensby, and how he’d discovered his calling riding bikes at breakneck speed down the hills of East Yorkshire, and helped me find the missing girls. I missed out exactly what happened on the fishing boat, as perhaps that was a story for a different audience.

Then it was Alex’s turn, and I thought she would be like me and have nothing to say, but almost immediately she began with what had happened at the top of Glastonbury Tor. The way she told it made it vivid for me. She described the universe torn open and laid out above her in such lucid detail that it was like being there. I could feel the piercing cold, hear the crunch of the frozen grass under my feet. It seemed more real when she told it than my memory of it, though I had been there, outside the protective barrier thrown up around the Tor. After she had finished there was silence for a short while. I think everyone felt as I did, in awe of what had she had seen.

Then it was Blackbird’s turn and she told a story of two brothers who fought over the possession of a magical talisman. Each of the brothers thought it was meant for them and no other, and the lengths they went to in order to prevent the other getting it left me wondering how much of the tale was true and how much fiction. She never did say what the nature of the talisman was.

There were more stories, and when it came time to withdraw I was glad to see that Alex was reluctant to retire. It was the first time I’d seen her enjoying company for a while, and it left me hopeful and optimistic. She bade us good night, and went to her room in a better frame of mind than I’d seen her in for some time.

While Blackbird went to check on the baby, I placed my hand on the mirror once more. The connection was quick and easy. I could hear snoring through the mirror, a rhythmic rasp punctuating each breath.

“Sam?” I said.

“Wha–? What is it?” The voice sounded panicky.

I released my hand and let the connection fall away.

“What are you doing?” asked Blackbird from the doorway to the nursery.

“I’m preparing my ground,” I told her.

“Who was that?” she asked.

“An old friend,” I told her. “Someone who owes me a big favour.”

“If he was a friend, why didn’t you speak to him?” she asked.

“It was Sam Veldon,” I said.

“Oh, was it? Perhaps I could speak to him. I have one or two things to say that would set his ears ringing.”

“I have plans for Sam,” I told her. “At the moment he thinks I’m dead, though there is a growing realisation that I might not be. I intend to capitalise on that.”

“Just don’t get shot again,” she warned me. “Next time he might choose to shoot you through the head.”

“I don’t intend to give him that opportunity,” I told her.

My intention was to stay awake for a while and wait until Blackbird slept, but I was more tired than I thought and slipped quickly into a deep sleep. It wasn’t until the baby grizzled in his sleep in the small hours that I came awake again. I padded across into the adjoining room and stroked his hair in the red light from the night-lamp until he slept more peacefully. The more I could persuade him to skip his night-time feeds, the better. No doubt he would wake early and protest his hunger, but that was a fair trade if he would get into the habit of sleeping through.

When I was sure he was asleep again, I slipped into the bathroom, leaving the lights off, and placed my hand on the mirror, whispering into the glass, “Sam?” I felt the glass cool under my hand and heard the characteristic change in background noise as the space on the other side of the mirror opened up. I could feel a presence beyond the glass.

“I know you’re there,” said a voice. “Where are you?”

“Soon,” I whispered softly, almost beyond the level of hearing. The words were swallowed by the mirror as I pulled my hand away and released the connection. I had what I wanted. Sam was awake, waiting for a word, living off nervous energy, wondering what would happen next. I had him where I wanted him. With a smile I went back to bed, and was soon asleep.

The next morning Blackbird was getting ready to visit Grey's Court. She was dressed practically, without the finery of the courts, in a plain skirt and loose top with a woollen coat over the top.

“You don’t need to come, Niall. You can rest, here. It’ll be fine,” she told me.

“I want to come. I want to see what it’s like.”

“If you come, leave your sword here,” she said.

“Why? If I don’t need it, you won’t even know it’s there. I left the baby with Alex a few moments ago. She seemed happy enough to look after him, and it’ll do her good. We won’t be that long, will we?”

She started at me. “If you bring the sword, you’ll draw it. We’re not trying to intimidate anyone, just find out what the situation is and make a decision. It’s as simple as that. There’ll be no fighting.”

“What if it’s not what it appears to be?”

“Nothing’s ever what it appears to be,” she said, “but we’ll deal with that when we come to it. It doesn’t mean we have to start a war.”

I met her gaze, and for once it was her that looked away. “OK, have it your own way, but you don’t start waving it around without my say-so.”

“Yes, Lady,” I agreed.

“And you can stop that as well,” she said.

“Yes, Lady.”

Lesley had been sent ahead with Big Dave in the car, and the plan was to join them in the village near the house and arrive together. Angela met us in the room where the Ways converged. Blackbird had already found a route which would lead us directly to the village, and she led us down the Ways. Angela went after her and I followed them to a clearing in a wood, just outside the village of Rotherfield Greys in Oxfordshire.

We arrived on a cold, clear morning with mist still drifting through the trees like pale shadows and walked to the edge of the woods where the fields were still edged with frost from the clear night. We crossed a field to the road and walked into the village, finding the car waiting in the car park of the
Maltsters Arms
, just on the corner. We climbed into the back, while Lesley stayed in the front with Dave.

“Have you had a look yet?” asked Blackbird.

“We cruised past the house,” said Dave. “It’s set back from the road, but there was no obvious activity. There are a few working farms around it, but it was quiet.”

“There’s something else,” said Lesley.

“Yes?” said Blackbird.

“Grey's Court is advertised as a National Trust property,” said Lesley.

“National Trust?” said Angela.

“It’s open for visitors for at least part of the year,” said Dave. “You don’t think this could all be some kind of weird prank?” he asked.

“I don’t understand,” said Angela.

“I think we have to go and look,” said Blackbird. “Dave, if you would be so kind?”

The car pulled away and travelled through the lanes at a stately pace. We turned down a side road and travelled down a lane with the winter sun striping across the road through the trees. As we approached a sign, Dave slowed so that we could read it.

Grey's Court – National Trust, said the sign. Visitors welcome from March until October. Limited opening at other times.

“It’s not open at the moment,” I pointed out.

“So we’re OK until March,” said Angela, “and then what?”

“I’m sure something can be arranged,” said Blackbird. “Let’s go on and see the house.”

The car followed the lane until Dave slowed at the entrance to the house and turned in, following the drive through more trees until it opened out into a broad meadow through which the drive turned in a long crescent. There was a signpost diverting the public off to a separate car park, but Dave ignored this and drove on to the house.

Leading off the crescent was a gravelled drive circling a raised lawn with flower beds in quadrants. The tightly pruned skeletons of roses were stark against the mulch and straw spread around them. In the summer, with the blooms full and heavy, it would be impressive but in the winter sunlight it looked stark and bare. The house behind them had a terraced garden stepping up to a bold frontage which overlooked the meadows and the woods beyond.

“Not bad for the price of a single white rose,” said Angela.

Dave pulled up at a large front door which was sheltered by a stone porch supported by grey stone columns wound around with tendrils of ivy that spread out like questing fingers across the stone and brick frontage of the house. Everyone got out and stood by the car, looking up at the house as if any moment we expected some crusty old gent to storm out of the house waving a shotgun and demand we left the premises immediately.

Stone mullioned windows looked out over the meadows below three matching gable ends, each with a small square window. Red bricks formed horizontal stripes in the walls, a style characteristic of Tudor buildings, while tall brick chimneys topped each end of the building. It was clear that at some stage someone had decided to add additional features in pale Cotswold stone, which neither matched nor enhanced the original building. In my experience, few structures survived as long as this one had without someone “improving” them. I just hoped it hadn’t been internally modernised by the Victorians.

Blackbird looked around our little group and then said, “Shall we go inside?”

I was first to reach the door, earning a disapproving look from Blackbird. Testing the brass door handle, I found it was locked. Blackbird held up a large bronze key and I stood aside while she inserted it into the keyhole slotted into the heavy oak door. The lock gave a heavy clunk as she turned the key, and the door swung ajar.

There was no sound from within. I stepped forward and said, “Shall we see if there’s anyone home?” She nodded her assent and I pushed the great door back.

Within was an entrance hallway with stairs rising from one side to a gallery above. The floor was stone flags, and the stairway was dark wood, heavily grained and black at the edges. The odour of old stone and wax polish permeated the atmosphere. In the light filtering down from above, I could see there was a door set immediately to the left and double doors to the right under a gallery walkway. Around the doors, the wood had been carved into an elaborate pattern of heart-shaped ivy leaves, echoing the columns at the front.

I pushed the double doors open and entered a great hall with a massive stone fireplace which would not have looked out of place in one of my dreams, the grate dressed with dried flowers in red and gold.

“Hello?” I called. “Anyone here?” My words were swallowed as I walked slowly around the edge of the room. Light flooded in from the front windows, setting the edge of the fireplace, carved with flowers and vines under a stone lintel, into shadowed relief. In the centre of the room was a huge dark wood table set with benches along either side. The inner walls were decorated with rectangular wood panels to shoulder height, and then white plaster to the ceiling cornices. I drew the curtains back from the wall beside the fireplace, allowing daylight from a bay to flood into the room. The stone of the annex was yellower than the grey stone of the windows and the light was warmer as a result. I found myself approving of the change, the warm light lifting the rest of the room.

There were further double doors at the back which led into a large semi-circular space with a glass dome skylight – a garden room. Facing south, it captured the best of the winter sun but the room itself was bare. Through the windows I could see a formal rear garden laid out in ordered rows of carefully cultivated order, like a maze but more symmetrical, with a stone fountain at the centre. I went back past Angela and Blackbird and across the hallway to the other side.

“Hello? Is anyone home?” I called. The words sounded flat and dull in the space. There was a furnished sitting room around another stone fireplace, but again there was no sign of occupation. The cushions were plumped and showed no indication that anyone ever sat in the chairs or on the sofa. The tables were empty, the bookcases complete, with no empty spaces where books had been borrowed to browse and read.

I went through another door, finding a short corridor, and then doors to a kitchen and a storeroom. Everything looked ordered. Even the brooms looked as if they’d never swept the floors. The range cooker was cold, no food in the cupboards, no water in the pots. It looked like a home, but it was only a facsimile. No one actually lived here.

I banged open doors, calling for someone to answer, finding a boot room, complete with clean and completely unworn boots, a washroom with a dry jug and washbowl with a locked rear door.

Retracing my steps, I went quickly up the staircase and around the gallery. There were bedrooms large and small, the biggest with a great bed, curtains drawn back around a mound of covers. The pillows were all neatly placed, the beds carefully made. I found a bathroom, relatively modern compared to the washroom downstairs, and an ancient but serviceable toilet. I couldn’t imagine that the house had been built with indoor plumbing, so I assumed that this, like the additions downstairs, had been added later.

I met Blackbird and Lesley coming upstairs.

“Is there sign of anyone?” Blackbird asked me.

“Nothing,” I said. “No one lives here. There are no personal effects, no shampoo or soap in the bathrooms, no clothes in the wardrobes. It’s empty.”

“That could be to our advantage,” said Lesley, “though it’s a bit spooky. It makes you wonder what happened to everyone.”

I left them exploring the upstairs and went back down, thinking there must be somewhere that people actually spent time, and wondering whether there was a potting shed somewhere with people hiding in it.

I went back past the kitchen, through a maze of passages, into the store and found another door to the back. The door opened onto a different scene. I stood in the doorway, held back by instinct, and surveyed the room. Then I carefully closed the door and went back for the others.

I stood in the hallway and called. “Blackbird? Lesley? You better come and see this.”

Angela appeared from the great hall, Dave behind her. Blackbird and Lesley came downstairs, and I led them though to the room at the back of the house. I opened the door and went inside, standing away from the desks, careful not to disturb anything.

There were two offices, modern in style, built into what must have been an outbuilding. It was warmer than the rest of the house, probably due to better insulation. There were modern desks and office chairs, a couple of desktop computers, a small kitchen area, a notice board with leaflets and notices pinned to it – but no people.

More than that, the area showed signs of recent human presence. There were two coffee mugs on a desk, both part-f with coffee. I touched them and they were stone cold. Under a desk I pointed out a pair of men’s brown shoes that had been placed carefully and left with no sign of the owner. I jogged the mouse on a computer and the screen flashed into life, showing a spreadsheet program that had been left open. On the counter in the kitchen area there was a mug with a dry teabag in it, as if someone had been making tea, and then been called away. There was even milk in the fridge – I sniffed it, finding it on the edge of going sour.

“I thought it was spooky before,” said Lesley.

“Where are they?” I asked Blackbird. “It’s like they just vanished.”

“Maybe there was an emergency,” said Blackbird.

“Or an accident,” said Angela.

“Wouldn’t they come back to use the phone,” I suggested, pointing out the land-line on the desk. “Or just to get their shoes?”

“They might have been called away,” said Dave. “Maybe they all went outside and left the key inside – locked themselves out, maybe.”

“I don’t like it,” said Lesley, shuffling closer to Dave who placed his arm protectively around Lesley’s shoulders.

“What’s that?” asked Blackbird, pointing to the desk in the corner.

I turned to where she motioned and saw a white envelope on the desk. The words,
To the New Occupier
, were written on the envelope in looping script.

I picked up the envelope and passed it to Blackbird. “I guess that means you?” I said.

She smelled the envelope, then weighed it in her hand and shook it gently next to her ear, listening for what was inside. When she was satisfied, she tore one end off the envelope and extracted a piece of white paper, which she read loud.