Thou shalt not suffer the witch to live.
But now the Templars recruited them …or tried to. You had to make best use of all the weapons available.
Faustus had been living on the streets when they first found him, running con games in the West End. He’d had the worst of it too, straying onto another gang’s patch and fleecing tourists who didn’t know better. Arthur had brought him home, bloody and bruised from a beating that had left him unconscious behind the restaurants of Chinatown.
They’d patched him up, given him a bed to sleep on, and regular meals. He’d devoured her dad’s curries, scooping up bowls of aloo gobi, plates of spinach and lamb and stacks of rotis. Arthur’s Pakistani wife, Billi’s mum, had taught him how to cook real food. Faustus had taken to the training and shown extraordinary potential. Then had come the Ordeal, the test to bring him into the order…
What a clusterfu—
“You leaving?” asked Faustus. “I’ve got things to do. I’m on lunch duty today.” He looked over at his discarded plate. The mouse looked back. “I’ve got to boil up the pasta.”
“Do you even know what day it is?” Billi asked. She looked around the room and spotted a shoebox full of wallets. “Back into old habits, eh?”
“So I’m breaking the Seventh Commandment. Go tell Arthur.” He slumped back onto his mattress. “Just leave.”
“Fancy a curry?” said Billi. “We’ve some leftover from Wednesday.”
Faustus laughed. He shook from head to toe, it was big, hearty and without guile and reminded Billi he wasn’t half the cynic she was. Despite life on the streets there was still something sweet and innocent about Faustus. Eighteen years old, or thereabouts, maybe he still believed in happy endings.
There was a Hamsa, also known as the Hand of Fatima, tattooed right in the middle of his chest. That was new too. He didn’t have the iron hard physique of Ivan, he was slim, but she knew there was a wiry strength in those long limbs and, when he needed to, he moved like a viper.
“You think you can buy me with a meal?” said Faustus, now sitting up and very awake. He glanced down at the folder. “Any kebabs? This place is two hundred percent vegan.”
Gotcha.
Billi stood up. “Food’s at eight.”
***
Billi invited Mo along. Faustus’s time with the Templars had been brief and unpleasant for everyone but he’d got on okay with Mo, and Billi wanted back-up for any awkward silences. She’d called Ivan but it had gone straight to voicemail, again. Was he still pissed? His loss.
She’d jumped when there’d been a knock at the door at eight thirty, better late than never, but it had been Carados bringing the assignments from Gwaine. He ended up staying and helping himself to a large plateful of biryani.
But no Faustus.
Fine. Some jobs you just have to handle yourself.
She knew how to deal with ghosts. She didn’t know why she’d even gone to Faustus in the first place.
So, an hour before midnight, Billi was down on Middle Temple Lane, putting on her gloves. Mo handed her the satchel. “I’ve put in three bottles of Holy Water and a small jar of oil. Blessed by the pope himself so use it sparingly. You sure you don’t want the sword?”
“It won’t come to that, Mo,” she said. “What about the fetters?”
“Packed.” He shook the satchel and the chains rattled within. “I could come with.”
“To deal with a single spook?” Billi zipped up her jacket. She should never have left the folder with Faustus. The guy was a loser, through and through. Still, now she knew, and she wouldn’t be wasting any more time on chasing him.
Billi straddled the bike and settled the helmet on. “Don’t wait up.”
CHAPTER NINE
A lot can happen to a house, left abandoned for a decade.
Getting over the wall was no effort. The mortar had crumbled away and vines penetrated the old brickwork, easy enough for Billi who spent an evening a week at the local climbing wall. Now she stood amongst the knee-high thistles of a wild, over-grown garden, gazing at the derelict FitzRoy mansion.
It was malformed, squat and festering in the moonlight, more resembling a grotesque toad clinging to a rock than a mansion, though traces of its former grandeur remained—the wrought iron balconies, the lofty bay windows—they only further emphasised its descent into senile decrepitude. It wore its withered glory like an old Soho tart, hoping the dim lights and thick plaster of makeup would hide the bitter wrinkles and sunken cheeks.
Her skin tingled. The heavy, ponderous odour of decay, of moist soil, rotting vegetation and mould filtered through her nostrils, rising to dance within her forehead. The musky scent of a fox lurking in the undergrowth caressed the back of her throat. A bird flapped its wings noisily from a nearby tree as the wind rustled the crusty leaves that lay across the uneven, weed-latticed footpath.
Heart barely beating now, a weight lifted out from the centre of her being, along her spirit meridian to pulse warmly behind her eyes.
Where are you hiding, Simon?
All dwellings held a spirit, absorbing the emotions of those that had lived there. They could glow, or they could be filled with bitterness. A fog of despair cloaked the old house, radiating from the void that lay deep within. And something had stirred it into, not life, but some atavistic sentience, a desire to reach out to the world beyond.
The lock on the front door was a hefty industrial-sized block of iron but the door, rotted through, crumpled with a sharp kick. Billi took out her torch and stepped into the main hall.
Moonlight glowed upon the drifting strands of webbing that floated from the open doorframes. The plaster on the walls was cracked and covered in graffiti. She stepped carefully through the litter; empty aerosol cans, discarded takeaway cartons and not a few broken syringes.
Then she heard it. A soft creak.
It was an old building, it would creak. But
