“Well, hell,” said Strange Chloe. “We wouldn’t want to upset them . . .”
“No, we wouldn’t,” I said sternly. “Our best bet lies in sneaking in and out without anyone ever knowing we were there until it’s too late. The Yeomen Warders are all military men, including ex-SAS and combat sorcerers. They don’t choose just anybody to guard England’s treasures. And then there are the magical protections: the proximity mines and the shaped curses. Are you still with us, Jobe, or are you dead?”
“Just resting my eyes,” said Coffin Jobe. “I hope someone is writing all this down. I’ll never remember it all.”
“Nothing on paper!” Big Aus said quickly. “Carry on, Shaman. You’re doing fine.”
“It’s the ghosts we have to worry about,” I said. That got their attention. “These aren’t the usual memories recorded in time, played back to haunt the present. I’m talking about actual spirits, lost souls, damned and bound to this world by terrible magics. All the executed traitors, condemned to defend the Towers of London for all eternity, for their crimes. To serve and protect England as they failed to do in life, until Judgement Day itself, if need be. Some of these ghosts have been around a really long time, and they have grown strange and awful. Nothing like centuries of accumulated guilt and grievance to make you ready to take it out on someone else . . .”
“I can See ghosts,” Coffin Jobe offered quietly. “But that’s all.”
“And I can only fight what I can touch,” said the Dancing Fool, scowling. “No one said anything about ghosts . . .”
“And I can only affect the world of the living,” said Strange Chloe. “That’s it. Game over. The caper is off.”
“Wait, wait,” said Big Aus, flapping his big hands about. “Shaman, tell me you have a suggestion.”
“Of course,” I said. “That’s what you’re paying me for.” I had to be careful here. I was skirting territory and information that Shaman Bond shouldn’t really have access to. “Traitors weren’t executed in the Bloody Tower; they were all killed on Tower Hill, well outside the castle complex. Executions were public matters in those days: public entertainments. The source of power to control the ghosts will be buried deep inside the hill. Probably something very old and very nasty. Nothing we’re equipped to deal with . . . So, if you want to avoid being detected by the ghosts, the best way is . . . not to be there.” I grinned at their confused faces. “I’m pretty sure I can get my hands on a certain very useful item that will hide us all from the ghosts’ view. For a while, anyway. Long enough for us to sneak in, do the dreadful deed, and then get the hell out of there.”
Of course, I didn’t actually need such a device. My torc made me invisible to anyone or anything I wanted to be invisible to, and I was pretty sure I could extend that protection over the others for a while. Or until I found it necessary to drop it . . .
“How long will it take you to acquire this device?” said Big Aus.
“I can have it by tomorrow morning.”
“I just know this is going to cost extra,” said Big Aus. “How much, Shaman?”
I told him, and he winced. It had to be big enough to make sure he’d take the device seriously.
“All right,” he said. “But if it doesn’t work, I’ll take it out of your hide!”
“If it doesn’t work, we’ll all be dead,” I said easily.
“We’ll hit the ravens tomorrow,” Big Aus said forcefully, rubbing his big hands together. “We go in early, like Shaman said. Five a.m. Straight in, do the necessary, and straight out. No messing. And don’t be late getting there, any of you, or we’ll start without you.”
And just like that, we were committed to the crime of the century.
I got there first, of course. To check out the lay of the land and make sure no one else was planning any surprises. You can’t be too careful, in this game. So I was there on the open causeway by Traitor’s Gate at three a.m., two good hours in advance. I stood alone on the great gray flagstones, hidden behind my torc’s glamour, invisible to all. Hopefully including the ghosts. You can never tell with the dead; they follow their own rules. I hunched my shoulders inside my long duster coat and folded my arms tightly to keep out the cold wind blowing steadily off the River Thames.
It was only a short walk from the Tower Hill tube station through mostly empty streets. No one about but the usual revellers, old gods, and self-made monsters on their way to the next party. Things flapping high up in the sky, and voices declaiming long-forgotten languages in ancient tunnels deep under the earth. The usual. I looked the Towers over carefully with my Sight, and the whole place blazed with dazzling arcane energies. Layer upon layer of old magics and deadly protections, such as proximity mines floating unseen in midair, just waiting to hit you with all kinds of nasty medicine if you were dumb enough to approach the Towers with bad thoughts in mind. The shaped curses under the flagstones were harder to spot, lying in wait like trap-door spiders. The huge old walls containing the Towers were solid in more than three dimensions, and the Towers themselves were half-buried under spells like so much crawling ivy. There were bright lights and terrible sounds, and the whole place stank of blood and horror and despair.
That was the ghosts, of course. I couldn’t See them without dropping more of my defences than I was comfortable with, but I could feel them the same way a fish knows when there’s a shark in the water.
I turned my back on the castle complex and stood looking out over the Thames. Old river, dark river, with its own sad secrets. Boats came and went, not meant for everyday eyes. Undines ploughed through choppy waters, darting in and out of dim memories of all the vessels that had travelled up and down the mighty Thames in their day. Everything from Roman triremes to a flower-bedecked barge bearing a young Queen Elizabeth I. She looked over at the Bloody Tower, and I swear for a moment she looked right at me. I bowed to her anyway, just in case, and when I looked up she was smiling at me. A young woman with all her life ahead of her. Dust and less than dust, for centuries now. And then she looked away and was lost in the past again.
There were mists on the water, and lights in buildings like beacons against the dark, and always the sound of distant traffic. I could see Tower Bridge, which so many tourists confuse with London Bridge, and the lights of planes flying low above the city. It was three o’clock in the morning, the hour that tries men’s souls, and I still had two hours to kill. I stamped my feet to drive out the cold and did the
Times’
crossword in my head. Cheating just a bit when necessary.
I watched the sun come up over the city, long strands of crimson bleeding across the dull gray lowering sky. I thought about the ravens. They might not be as important as Big Aus thought, but I couldn’t let anything happen to them. So how far should I let this caper go before I interfered? Pretty far; no way was this just about ravens. Big Aus was planning something more, had to be. Raving republican or not, no one fronts this kind of money just to kill a few birds and embarrass England and the monarchy.
So what was Big Aus up to? There were all kinds of treasures, objects of power and dangerous secrets, tucked safely away in all of the Towers, but they were all very well guarded. Including the Crown Jewels. No one steals what is England’s. Least of all poor old Colonel Blood, who took a long hard time dying only to find that death was no release after all. His spirit was still here, damned to guard the very treasure he tried to steal. Never a good idea to piss off English royalty. They have a nasty sense of humour.
I stuck my hands deep into my coat pockets and let my fingers close over the useful devices the family Armourer had rushed to me just for this operation. I’m a great believer in having a few aces hidden away in useful places. The best defence against other people’s surprises is to have some of your own ready to go at a moment’s notice.
As five o’clock drew nearer, one by one the others appeared out of the early-morning mists to join me as I lowered my torc’s invisibility. Coffin Jobe, peering about him with his sad, preoccupied eyes. The Dancing Fool, big and scowling. Strange Chloe, glaring about her as though the morning cold and gloom was a personal insult. And Big Aus, wearing a very expensive overcoat and grinning broadly.
“It’s cold and damp and dark and bloody cold,” said Strange Chloe, glaring at me like it was all my fault. “I hate being up this early. It’s not natural.”
“Savour your anger, Chloe,” said Big Aus, rubbing his big hands together briskly. “Nurse it in your heart and hold it ready for when it’s needed. I want to see feathers flying in every direction. Are we all ready to go?”
“Why did we have to be here so early?” said the Dancing Fool, his hairy legs shaking visibly beneath his kilt. “Tourists won’t be around for hours yet.”
“Because it’s so much more dramatic!” said Big Aus, still grinning. “If you’re going to commit the crime of the century, you have to do it with style! History expects it of us! Great affairs must be conducted in a great manner. Someday this could all be a major motion picture . . . Besides, ghosts are always at their weakest around the dawn, when the night is busy becoming day. Everyone knows that.”
“I didn’t know that,” said the Dancing Fool. He looked at me. “Did you know that, Shaman?”
“Of course,” I said. “But then, I know everything. Unfortunately . . .”
“I just knew he was going to say that,” Coffin Jobe said quietly. “Didn’t you all know he was going to say that?”
“Unfortunately, this is the Tower of London,” I said. “And these are not your everyday ghosts.” I looked at Big Aus. “Great affairs? Hollywood? Crime of the century? What’s so great about killing a few birds?”
Before anybody could say anything, Coffin Jobe dropped down dead. No warning. His eyes just rolled up in his head, he stopped breathing, and he collapsed, his long body folding up with practiced ease so that he hardly made a sound when he hit the flagstones.
“You prick!” said Strange Chloe.
“He does pick his moments,” the Dancing Fool agreed.
We all gathered around the dead body and looked at each other. The first-aid manual doesn’t cover situations like this. I did wonder whether we should try slapping his cheeks, or calling his name, or pounding on his chest with a fist, but you only had to look at Coffin Jobe to know he was dead and beyond all such encouragements. I’ve buried people who looked less dead than he did. And then Coffin Jobe sucked in a harsh rattling breath, his long arms and legs twitched spasmodically, and his eyes snapped open. He sat up cautiously, shook his head a few times just a bit gingerly, as though he half expected something to rattle, and then he rose to his feet, avoiding all offers of help.
“Wow,” he said, smiling gently. “What a rush . . .”
“You get off on being dead!” said Strange Chloe. “Oh, please, Jobe; teach me how to do that!”
“It isn’t the dying,” he said. “It’s the coming back to life. Oh, yes!” He realised we were all watching him and smiled just a little shamefacedly. “Ah. Sorry about that. So embarrassing.”
“Are you going to do that again?” said Big Aus.
“Almost certainly.”
“I meant, during the job!”
“Oh, no; I shouldn’t think so. I think it’s all based on stress . . . Are we ready to start now? I’m ready to start.”
“Damn right,” said the Dancing Fool, scowling unhappily about him. “I feel naked, standing out here in public. I prefer to work from the shadows. I am one with the shadows and the dark.”
“Never knew an assassin who wasn’t,” I said. “Relax, everyone. You’ve all been covered by my newly acquired device since you got here. No one can see us anymore; not the living, the dead, or the Towers’ defences. We should be able to walk right through them.”
“Should?”
said Strange Chloe. “I really don’t think I am at all comfortable with that word, under the circumstances. I want to hear you being a lot more confident about this before I take one step closer to Traitor’s Gate.”
“We learn by doing,” I said cheerfully.
“And if you’re wrong about this?” said the Dancing Fool.
“Then you get to say
I told you so
in the few seconds before we are all killed suddenly and horribly in violent ways.”
“I’ve never liked your sense of humour, Shaman,” said Coffin Jobe.
“You wound me,” I said. “Come along, children. Destiny awaits. Maybe they’ll get Johnny Depp to play me. The ravens are all inside, tucked up snugly in their lodging house. The Yeomen Warders are on their rounds and at this point are as far from the lodging house as they ever get. Jobe: front and centre. You’re on. Can you See the ghosts?”
He looked mournfully at Traitor’s Gate, his eyes very big behind the heavy lenses. His gaze moved slowly along the great stone wall rising up before us, he started to say something, and then he suddenly fell down dead again. The Dancing Fool swore loudly, Big Aus made a frustrated sound, and Strange Chloe kicked Coffin Jobe in the ribs.
“I don’t believe it!” she said. “He’s done it again!”
“Stop kicking the dead man, Chloe,” said Big Aus. “Major bad karma. It isn’t really his fault, after all.”
Strange Chloe sniffed. “Makes me feel better.”
We gathered around Coffin Jobe’s body again, and waited and waited, but he didn’t come back. We finally did kneel down beside him and tried slapping his cheeks and calling his name, but there was no response. All the colour had dropped out of his face, and his open eyes were fixed and staring. Finally everyone looked at me, because I’m supposed to be the one with all the answers. So, very reluctantly, I pushed my Sight all the way open and Saw ghosts.
They were everywhere, hundreds of them, men and women and even children, walking on the ground and in the air, stumbling and gliding out of Traitor’s Gate, most still carrying the memories of their death wounds on their insubstantial bodies. Some had heads; some didn’t. The horrible trauma of their violent deaths had carried over into how they thought of their bodies. Some were still bleeding from wounds that would never heal, while others bore the torture marks of rack and wheel and fire. Traitors all, condemned to suffer long after their deaths.