note. It’s important to keep up appearances. “But what could be so important, as to bring you, me, Dead Boy, and Razor Eddie to the same place? Can’t be a coincidence.”
“Coincidences are the universe’s way of arranging things neatly,” said Hadleigh.
“Are you immortal?” I said bluntly.
“Bit early to tell yet,” said Hadleigh. “Whatever this thing is, it had better get a move on. I can’t stop long; I’ve been called in to consult on a case with the London Knights. They actually requested my presence, which is unusual enough that I’ve agreed to go out into London Proper to give them a helping hand.” He fixed me with a cool, considering look. “You know the London Knights. Is it true that King Arthur has returned to them?”
“Yes,” I said.
“Is he everything the legends say?”
“That and more.”
“Interesting,” said Hadleigh. “I wonder what he wants with me . . . But consider this; if Arthur Pendragon is back, can Merlin Satanspawn be far behind?”
“Oh God, I hope not,” I said.
“Leave Her out of this,” Hadleigh said firmly. I can never tell when he’s joking.
“You’re Hadleigh Oblivion, aren’t you?” said Charlotte ap Owen excitedly, waving for her camera-man to catch up with her.
Hadleigh smiled, produced a pale blue rose from out of nowhere, and held it up before Charlotte. He then brought the rose up to his mouth and inhaled steadily. The colour faded out of the petals, and we all watched speechlessly as Hadleigh breathed in the life essence of the flower. One by one, the colourless petals cracked and fell apart, falling in grey sprinkles to the floor. Hadleigh smiled and let the dead stem fall from his hand.
“That’s nothing,” said Dead Boy, passing by. “You should see what I can do with a fart.”
Hadleigh smiled easily at Charlotte, who looked like she wanted to be sick. She backed away into the crowd, taking Dave the camera-man with her. I gave Hadleigh a hard look.
“Studying at the Deep School ruined you.”
“No, it didn’t.”
“Well, something did.”
I went back to mingling. I listened in on a great many conversations because the immortals were too proud to stop talking even though I was there, but I didn’t learn anything important. Most of it was about who was having whom, and what someone else would do when they found out. Typical party chatter. No-one even mentioned the immortality serum I was supposed to be looking for. Short of grabbing people by their lapels and slamming them up against a wall, I didn’t see how I was going to persuade anyone to talk about it. And I don’t do things like that. Not any more.
I bumped into the Lord Orlando, fresh from changing sex again. He’d come dressed in a chequered black- and-white Harlequin outfit, complete with a cute little domino mask and heavy stubble showing through his white face make-up. He was still boring for England, talking loudly and relentlessly at anyone who’d stand still long enough, and name-dropping all the famous people he claimed to have slept with, in one sex or another, down the ages. And still going on about how traumatised he was, from being kidnapped and briefly replaced by the Charnel Chimera, a few years back. I got the impression he was mostly upset that no-one could tell the difference between the bloodthirsty monster and the real thing. I could have said many things there, but didn’t. I must be mellowing.
I pointed him in Bettie Divine’s direction, thus annoying two birds with one stone, and headed towards a couple of people I was actually looking forward to meeting; the Bride, and her current paramour, the latest incarnation of Springheel Jack. The Bride towered over both of us, a good seven feet tall and well fleshed. The Baron Frankenstein had made all his early creations oversized, so he had enough room to fit all the bits in. The Bride’s face was pale and taut, as though stretched by too much plastic surgery, but she’d always looked that way. The Baron might be a creative genius when it came to Life and Death, but his sewing skills left a lot to be desired.
The Bride had huge dark eyes that didn’t blink often enough, a prominent nose, and lips red as sin itself. She would never be described as beautiful, but she was most definitely attractive, in a spooky, scary kind of way. She wore her long black hair piled up in an Amy Winehouse beehive, and she wasn’t bothering to dye out the white streaks any more. Or using make-up to cover the heavy stitching at her neck and wrists. She wore a flouncy white blouse, cut to show off her magnificent cleavage, midnight blue slacks, and knee-length riding boots with silver spurs. Up close, she smelled of attar of roses with a hint of formaldehyde.
She crushed my hand in a powerful grip and smiled broadly. We’d never actually met before, but with reputations like ours, we knew of each other. The Bride had a lot of personality and didn’t mind spreading it around.
“I’m here representing the Spawn of Frankenstein,” she said loudly. “All those dead but definitely not departed creations of the old Baron, bad cess to his soul. I did hear you’d killed him a while back, and I was going to send you a thank-you note; but it turned out to be another other-dimensional duplicate. I hate those. Still, thanks for the effort. It’s the thought that counts.”
“Happy to do it,” I said, flexing my numbed fingers surreptitiously. The Bride was a big girl and didn’t know her own strength. “One less god of the living scalpel has to be a good thing.”
“Do you know my new boy-friend?” said the Bride, draping a more than usually long arm across her companion’s shoulders. “He’s the current inheritor of the Springheel Jack inheritance; but don’t hold that against him.”
We shook hands briefly. I couldn’t help but remember the time when a more than usually virulent Springheel Jack meme had invaded the Nightside through a Timeslip, overwriting everyone it touched and turning them into Springheel Jacks with nothing but bloodshed and slaughter on their minds. Suzie and I had no choice but to go out into the streets, hunt down everyone afflicted, and kill them all. If this Jack knew, he had the grace not to mention it, so I didn’t either.
He was tall and slim, cool and calm, with a dignified bearing. He was handsome enough, in a sinister sort of way. He wore the traditional long black cape, which swept about him like bat-wings, and an old-fashioned top hat. The look came with the incarnation. He wore it well enough. He had a pale face and ice-cold blue eyes, that were a lot older than they should have been. It was the burden of every Springheel Jack to carry all the experiences of his predecessors.
“What brings the new Walker to the Ball of Forever?” he said, in a slightly detached voice. “Are we to take it that you’re immortal?”
“Hardly,” I said. “My title isn’t like yours; I’m just the latest to hold the position. I’m here following a lead in a case, to see where it goes.” I looked thoughtfully at Jack, then at the Bride. “Are either of you immortal, technically speaking?”
“I am both dead and alive!” the Bride said grandly. “Which means I outrank everyone here. Besides, I’d like to see anyone try to throw us out . . .”
“While I am an idea that manifests itself through possessing people,” said Springheel Jack. “So I suppose I am immortal, in a serial sort of way.”
And then everybody at the Ball of Forever stopped talking, and turned their heads to look as news of the latest arrival spread rapidly through the room. I looked around, too, impressed. Even I hadn’t made that much of an impression. A silence fell across the ballroom as King of Skin stood in the doorway, large as life and twice as nasty, swaying on his feet and sniggering to himself, wrapped in all his usual sleazy glory. King of Skin was the only immortal in the Authorities, that quiet background group who run the Nightside, inasmuch as any does or cares to. The group I supposedly now served and took my authority from. King of Skin was potent and powerful, a King in glory when he took his aspect upon him. He could disturb people he hadn’t even met yet. Rumour had it he’d spat on Heaven and Hell because he wouldn’t be bound by anything, even a philosophy. He had the power to undo possibilities and rewrite them in his favour. He could pick out your worst and most private nightmare, simply by looking at you, and make it real. King of Skin was a major-league scumbag, even by Nightside standards; but he could do things for you that no-one else could, or would. So people made a lot of allowances. Lot of that going on, in the Nightside.
Don’t ask what he really looked like; everyone saw what he wanted them to see. Mostly he projected a sleazy glamour of constantly shifting details, real enough to make you extremely uncomfortable on a very basic
