The Devil

The spies weaved through the deserted streets back towards the jumble of stews and inns near the quayside. The night-time drunken revelry had started up again. Shouts and singing and the calls of women rang over the rooftops. Carpenter demanded directions from a whore pissing in the street and within moments they were picking their way among rat-infested rubbish heaps in pitch-black alleys where the eaves almost closed over their heads.

Moll Higgins’s rooming house squatted on the edge of the dockside squalor. It was the perfect hideaway for the Irish spy and her charge, Will thought: close enough to reach the ship speedily, but far enough away from the bustle of the port to maintain a degree of anonymity. It was a tall house of four storeys, leaning in a precarious manner down the slope as if it were about to skid towards the water. Spice-smelling merchants’ stores jammed hard against it.

Will looked up at the dingy whitewashed walls. Most of the small windows were dark, but a candle flickered in one on the second floor and another in the roof. The storm rolled around the town, throwing off spears of lightning and clashes of thunder. The wind tugged at his hair, slamming shutters and unlatched doors.

Beside him, Launceston and Carpenter were watching the rooftops for any sign of the Unseelie Court. Strangewayes stood a few paces down the slope, watching for an attack at their backs.

‘They are here,’ Carpenter said in a flat, low voice. Blood dripped from his nose, and Will could feel the familiar knot in the pit of his stomach as his senses rebelled against the alien presences that drew near. Across the roofs, grey shapes began to flicker against the night sky, circling, like wolves.

‘No time to lose now,’ he whispered, drawing his rapier. He felt comforted by the weight of the steel in his hand. ‘In and out with Dee. Cut down any who stand in our way.’

‘And that includes the Irish woman?’ Carpenter asked with a pointed stare.

Will hesitated for only the briefest moment. ‘If she stands in our way.’ Meg will not sacrifice her life for even a treasure like Dee, he thought; he hoped.

The moon chose that instant to break through the roiling clouds, and as Will glanced up one last time he glimpsed a sight that chilled his blood. With arms and legs spread out, grey figures crawled across the tiles and down vertiginous walls like spiders, drawing in upon the rooming house from all directions.

‘I wish I had a fire to burn out this infestation,’ Launceston hummed, ‘even if it took down all Liverpool.’

Will snatched open the door that backed on to the alley and led the way into a small scullery that smelled of lamb fat and cheap beer. Dirty cooking pots from that evening’s meal were stacked on a trestle to one side. Instantly, the spy recognized an unnatural feeling to the house. A chill hung in the air and intermittent tremors ran through the walls and floor under the old, dry rushes.

‘What is wrong here?’ Strangewayes hissed as he darted in behind the others and closed the door. He drew the bolt with a resonant clank.

Will sifted through his impressions for some clue to whatever was unnerving him. His face hardened, his eyes flickering around for any sign of threat. Raising his arm, he flicked his fingers forward and his men followed him without question, into a silent, cold kitchen and then into a hallway that smelled of damp. Everywhere was dark. A passage ran alongside a flight of ramshackle stairs. Though the gale whistled around the eaves, inside the house was so still it seemed devoid of life. Will felt troubled by the quiet — any rooming house was filled with a symphony of creaks, footsteps, snores and conversation for most hours of the day — and he could see from Carpenter’s darting eyes that his companion felt the same.

‘We go up,’ he said.

The first board protested like a wheezing old man. They all halted, listening. When no response came, they continued to climb.

Halfway up the first flight, a throaty laugh rolled out just above them, low and resonant. Behind him, Will felt his men bristle, their rapiers at the ready. Will’s eyes narrowed. He searched the dark at the top of the stairs for any sign of movement, and listened for a soft tread on the boards. After a moment of quiet, someone began to hum an old sea-song, a man’s deep voice, the melody punctuated by another laugh.

The four spies looked at each other, curious.

Will bounded up the remaining steps and rounded on to the second flight. A man in a dirty undershirt and stained breeches slumped halfway up the rise, his head against the wall. His greasy brown hair hung lankly around his unshaven face, but his eyes had rolled back so only the whites were visible. He waved one hand in front of his face as if in time to music, and then hummed the sea-song once more.

‘Has he lost his wits?’ Carpenter whispered. ‘The Unseelie Court have already ventured within?’

‘If not yet, then soon while we waste our time here gabbling,’ Will hissed. He dropped low in front of the man’s face until he smelled the ale-reeking breath. ‘An Irish woman and an old man,’ he demanded. ‘Where are they?’

After a moment the man appeared to hear and raised one finger. ‘The third,’ he said. As Will made to push by, the man grabbed his arm and whispered, ‘The eyes are afire. Say your prayers.’ Will shook him off and looked up the stairs into the dark.

At the top of the second flight, he heard a clatter on the roof high overhead. Movement flashed past the small window beside him. A crash echoed from the cobbles below; a tile had been dislodged. He raised his eyes, listening, then signalled to the other men with his eyes that the Enemy had reached the rooming house.

‘They go down as we climb up,’ Launceston said without a hint of fear, ‘and where in the middle shall we meet?’

At the top of the third flight, Will found a plump, pink-faced woman crumpled on the floor beside a younger man with the marks of the pox on his cheeks: Moll Higgins, perhaps, and the man another lodger. Both lived, but spittle drooled from the corners of their mouths and they looked right through him when he shook them.

‘What has happened here? These are all fit for Bedlam,’ Strangewayes whispered. He knelt beside the woman and took her hand.

Will had no answer. The Unseelie Court still sought entry; this was the work of another. He wondered what terrible thing had happened here to drive the wits from the occupants. In the silence, dread seemed to drift down the stairs like the unnatural fog along the river.

Mistress Higgins and her lodger began to convulse, crying out in a language that no one recognized. As he climbed the stairs, Will frowned, forcing himself not to look back. Launceston held up a hand to bring them to a halt, but Will had already felt it: a cool draught sweeping down the stairs, smelling of the smoky night air. A window had slid open. The boards overhead creaked.

Catching a glimpse of uncertainty in Strangewayes’ eyes, Will whispered, ‘If we walk away and leave Dee to the Enemy, all will be lost; for England, for us. There will be no coming back for a second chance. We must do what we can, though our lives be forfeit.’

On the third floor, they searched the first two rooms, small and cramped, with beds that had not been slept in. The third was larger, but also empty. ‘This is the place,’ Will whispered, recognizing Meg’s crimson taffeta dress hanging over the end of an unmade bed. While Carpenter crouched to peer underneath, Strangewayes moved to the window and glanced out. He shook his head: the Irish woman and her prisoner could not have escaped over the nearby rooftops.

Another creak echoed above them. Will imagined grey figures prowling around the darkened top floor. Soon those things would begin to descend. He stilled his thoughts and looked around. Ropes that had clearly been used to restrain the astrologer were coiled in one corner with a blue silk gag on top. The rushes had been brushed aside and a circle had been chalked on the floor with mysterious signs scrawled around the perimeter. Had Meg allowed Dee to cast a spell, he wondered? Surely she would not have taken such a risk. But there was a fat candle, half burned, and the sweet scent of incense hung in the air.

His gaze fell upon the obsidian mirror, lying on its side beside Meg’s bag. Such an object of power would never have been discarded so easily. He pushed past Carpenter to snatch up the looking glass. It was insignificant enough; few would have given it a second glance. But as he stared into the surface, cold prickled down his spine. He felt the weight of a presence looking back at him. Before he could dismiss the sensation, the glass misted, and a face began to form in the depths. A part of him wanted to hurl the mirror away, but he felt strangely gripped by what was revealing itself. And then the face formed and the shock jolted him.

It was Jenny, his Jenny, staring at him with wide, frightened eyes.

Carpenter jerked up, half raising his rapier in concern, but Will was caught in the grip of that vision. No illusion, this. So many years had passed since he had seen her, and yet it was Jenny as he remembered her, from