Page 43 of Quiver of Cobras
His answer was quiet. ‘Is there any choice?’ He turned and looked at me, meeting my eyes. Almost. ‘Can you do it? Can you steal Rubus’s ring?’
‘Of course!’ I snapped, though I had no earthly idea how I’d manage it.
‘Then we take the first step towards the deal. We can still walk away at a later date. If there’s the faintest hint that we can’t trust Mendax fully, we keep the sphere to ourselves. If he keeps to his side of the bargain then, if nothing else, we might be able to break the truce so that we can remove Rubus from the equation. That’ll buy us time, if nothing else.’
‘You say that like we have nothing to lose.’
Morgan put his hands into his pockets. His eyes were half-closed so his expression was shuttered. ‘It will be incredibly dangerous. You don’t have to do it, Maddy. We can get the ring from Rubus without you risking yourself.’
His tone of voice told me that he knew his words were a lie. ‘I don’t think we can,’ I said quietly. I sighed. ‘I’ll do my best.’ I squared my shoulders. ‘I’ll do better than my best. I’ll get the damned ring. You keep thinking of ways to destroy the stupid sphere or hide it away for the rest of eternity. I’ll call you when I have the ring.’
‘Thank you.’ Then, almost inaudibly, he added, ‘You’re a much better person than you give yourself credit for.’
‘I’m a murderer, Morgan. I’m exactly the evil bitch you believed me to be.’
I couldn’t stay there any longer. I couldn’t stand there knowing that he could barely look at me. And the growing sympathy in Finn’s expression was becoming almost too much to cope with. Along with Morgan, I’d killed his brother, Winn, and I’d not been able to stop Rubus killing his other brother. I had no right to Finn’s pity.
‘Can you deal with clearing up here?’ I asked. The pair of them nodded. ‘Good.’ I sniffed. ‘I’m off. I’m dressed up to the nines and it’s about time I found a suitable club to dance away the rest of the night. I’ll speak to you both soon.’
I paused for a moment, waiting for Morgan to ask me to stay because I’d already promised to spend the night with him. I’d refuse, of course, but it would be nice to be asked. All he did, however, was turn away and head for the security room.
Finn actually looked concerned. I looked away. Yeah. Time to go.
***
I’d been lying about the dancing part, obviously, but I did require several stiff drinks if I was going to get any sleep. I trudged back down the hill to the main road where I could hopefully grab a taxi back to the city before finding a pub with late opening hours.
I muttered to myself all the time. Why had Charrie come to this place? Why had I killed him? Was it because the bogle had the sphere and I’d wanted to stop him from either using it himself or handing it over to Rubus to use? Or was it that I’d simply wanted to kill him for kicks? Were there others whose lives I’d snuffed out?
A mental image of Rubus casually thrusting a knife into Jinn’s throat flashed into my mind. Despite my obvious shortcomings, there had been nothing about that act which had titillated me. Quite the opposite. But if I’d been pure evil before the amnesia then I had to be pure evil now; a bump on the head and a bout of forgetfulness wouldn’t change my personality.
I kicked irritably at a fallen branch. Unfortunately, the ground underneath was muddier and more slippery than I’d realised and I skidded, arms flailing and legs flying out from underneath me, before landing flat on my back in true slapstick fashion.
I lay where I was for a moment, even though I could feel the damp, squelchy mud plastering the bare skin at my neck and snaking its way down the back of my corset like it had a mind of its own. Then I spread-eagled my body and moved my arms and legs. Mud angel. Maybe I could no longer believe any part of me was a superhero but I could well believe I was a dirty angel. A dirty angel with blood on her hands.
I sighed and stopped what I was doing. I could internalise my problems and fret all I wanted but I couldn’t change the past, whatever it was. Charrie would still be dead and I’d still have killed him. I could only focus on the future and the way forward.
With that thought in mind, I pushed myself up to a sitting position, hoping for a low-lying tree branch that I could use to heave myself up. That was when I spotted the small chest lying against the pile of rocks only a few metres away. Huh.
I was no longer naïve enough to believe this was a coincidence. Artemesia had surmised that the magic bound into my amnesia was causing my subconscious self to seek ways to reassert my memory and rebalance the scales. My previous experiences had certainly borne that out. But I was no longer so sure that I wanted my memory back. I was looking to the future, I reminded myself. Not the past.
I already had a pretty good idea what was inside the chest and I was highly tempted to leave it where it was without checking – magical memory malarkey be damned. But I was the Madhatter. Nothing scared or intimidated me. Shadows ran from me; monsters quaked at the very mention of my name. I was no namby-pamby minion. No, I was graceful strength personified.
A strange scuttling sound reached my ears. I frowned, squinting to see where it was coming from. A moment later, a tiny spider made its way up over the side of the chest and I screamed. Very loudly. I jerked backwards, recoiling with such violence that the mud around me spattered upwards, flicking a spray of smelly gloop across my face and torso.
I wiped off the worst of it and eyed the chest suspiciously. The spider had vanished. That made me more nervous than if it were still looking at me with its creepy multiple eyes. I swung my head round, scanning the forest gloom as if I expected the eight-legged beast, which had to be at least the size of my thumbnail, to attack me with an army of its hairy buddies. I couldn’t see anything; I couldn’t hear anything either.
Scowling to myself, I reached for the chest again, waving my hands at it first just in case any more spiders were lurking around it. Then I flipped open the lid. The damned arachnid had put me on edge so I wasn’t even pleased that my educated guess about the contents had been confirmed. I already knew I was highly intelligent; what I didn’t know was where the arsebadgering spider had gone.
Still wary – as well I should have been – I dipped the tip of my index finger into the pile of sparkly dust and lifted it up to my face to examine it more closely. As far as I understood, Carduus made this crap in his lab. I wondered whether the sparkles were a side effect of whatever potions and magic spells he used or whether he put them in because he liked a bit of bling.
I stuck out my tongue, allowing myself the tiniest lick. A second later, I spat. Aniseed again. Of all the flavours in the world, why would you choose aniseed? I supposed the taste didn’t really matter, given that pixie dust was designed to be snorted, but really! I shook my head, bemused, and closed the lid of the chest. Then I yanked myself awkwardly to my feet, stuffed the chest under my arm and continued walking.
Chapter Eleven
It took longer than I’d hoped to get back into the city although it was still barely gone midnight by the time I limped out of the taxi. One of Rubus’s Fey henchmen was standing outside the hideout. His eyes flicked in my direction and I blew him a kiss, but he didn’t react. Shrugging, I turned and walked in the opposite direction, heading for the nearest open pub.
The first one I came across displayed a curling, yellowed poster for a local band aptly named ‘Mud In Your Eye’. I shrugged and entered.
