Herbie Brennan - The Faeman Quest

Chalkhill said, ‘So I have to find her before I kill her?’

‘Obviously.’

‘In that case my fee is doubled.’

‘I thought it might be,’ Hairstreak said, but voiced no objection.

Chalkhill said, ‘There’s a time limit?’

‘For having her killed? Of course there’s a time limit. One calendar month from today. But obviously earlier if possible.’

Chalkhill did the calculation in his head. One calendar month from today was Princess Culmella’s sixteenth birthday. So the job had something to do with the Imperial succession. He half wondered if he should ask Hairstreak directly, but decided against it. Probably safer not to know. He took a deep breath. ‘Triple fee for fast jobs.’

‘Agreed,’ Hairstreak said.

Chalkhill chewed thoughtfully at his lower lip. ‘Any special instructions?’

‘Just one,’ said Hairstreak’s head. ‘You must bring her here to kill her.’

Chalkhill blinked. ‘Here? To your Keep?’

‘Exactly.’

It made sense for Hairstreak to want the faeman girl dead, but it made no sense to have her killed in his own home. ‘But if she is killed here, won’t that throw suspicion on to you, Your Lordship?’

‘Let me worry about that,’ His Lordship said. ‘The terms of our contract will be that you find her, bring her here and kill her.’

‘In that case -’ Chalkhill said.

‘I know, I know,’ said Hairstreak irritably. ‘Your fee is quadrupled.’ He got his eyes under control and fixed Chalkhill with a piercing gaze. ‘Can I take it you’re prepared to do the job?’

Chalkhill smiled benignly. ‘Oh, yes, Lord Hairstreak, yes indeed.’

Chalkhill’s personal stealth flyer was marked by a tiny Imperial flag stuck in a flowerpot just a few yards from the side door. Anxious though he was to get away unseen, he could not resist a backwards glance as he walked towards it. Hairstreak’s Keep was a Gothic nightmare of obsidian blocks and granite towers clinging to a cliff edge above an angry sea. Rain lashed down and wind whined perpetually, the result of weather spells that, some said, were so well crafted nobody could turn them off. There were rumours of a curse on the place. It had been owned by Hamearis, Duke of Burgundy, when the demons got him. Soon after Lord Hairstreak took it over, he’d attempted suicide by flinging himself off its battlements.

Chalkhill could not decide whether that had been Hairstreak’s lucky or unlucky day. He was certainly lucky not to be killed, unlucky in that death was what he wanted, lucky that Hamearis had installed safety spells designed to help guests blown off open parapets, unlucky that his suicidal leap caused him to land with his head inside the spell zone while his rain-soaked body smashed itself to a pulp on the surrounding rocks. It was nearly six months before anybody found him – he’d fallen on hard times and dismissed his servants – by which point his body had rotted. The head, however, was perfectly preserved. An admirer bought him his first Body in a Box – the cheap, basic version that supported brain function, but allowed no communication. Hairstreak developed an eye-blink code and set to rebuilding his fortunes. Now, just sixteen years on, he was once again among the richest, most powerful faeries in the Realm, although very few people realised it. And he still harboured ambitions for the throne, to judge by the latest developments.

Chalkhill pulled his vanishing hood over his head, climbed into the invisible flyer and grinned. Ambitions to become the head faerie, you might say.

The rat was coming again. Brimstone could hear it. Could smell it and sense its evil little ratty thoughts. It wanted to kill him, of course. Everything wanted to kill him these days. Especially Dr Philenor.

Brimstone was squatting in the corner of his cell, spotlighted by a ray of watery sunshine streaming through the sole high window. It was his favourite spot, marked by striations and browning bloodstains on the flagstones where he’d once tried to dig his way out with his bare hands. He usually squatted naked, or covered in excrement, but today he was wearing a suit. Today was a special day.

He expanded his senses to discover what else might be threatening him. His mind flowed out into the tangled corridors of the Double Luck Mountain Lunatic Asylum and latched on to the left ear of one of the nurses, a plump attractive little Faerie of the Night, who was currently thinking of buying sardines for her cat when her shift ended. There was a special offer on sardines at a fishmonger she passed on her way home. She could buy four at a saving of thirteen per cent and cut them up for Tiddles, who liked to eat them raw. Four sardines, chopped, would be a very satisfactory supper for Tiddles, and once Tiddles was fed, the nurse could come back in the middle of the night when the asylum was quiet and use her special pass key to get in and murder Brimstone. She was just the same as the other nurses. They all wanted to kill Brimstone. As did that nurse’s cat. And the fishmonger. And the sardines.

There were cockroaches in the walls. He could hear them easily with his heightened senses, clicking and feeding and singing martial songs. They were planning to get him, those cockroaches, just as soon as they’d mustered enough troops. There was an army of cockroaches stationed just inside the walls, not quite big enough to kill him yet, but they were breeding steadily in their special farms, training up young cockroaches for the cockroach army. When there were enough of them, say 3.7 billion cockroaches, they would swarm out of the walls and begin to eat him from the feet up. Cockroaches always ate you starting at the feet, leaving your eyes to the last so you could watch what they were doing right up to the bitter end.

A bluebottle squeezed through a crack in the windowpane and began to buzz lazily around the cell. Almost certainly a spy-fly for the cockroaches, Brimstone thought. Insects stuck together when it came to killing humans. Insects and germs. Dr Philenor was breeding giant germs, of course: things the size of sparrows. He kept them in old handkerchiefs and unleashed them on his enemies. They flew up your nose and made you sick.

The bluebottle buzzed within a yard of Brimstone. He caught it expertly and ate it.

The rat was definitely getting closer and it was not alone! With the astonishing reach of his expanded senses, Brimstone could tell the creature was bringing his wife and children, four hungry little rats, less than half the size of their parents, but with sharp, piranha teeth. It was a family outing, aimed at killing Brimstone.

They were all planning to kill Brimstone – the rats and the spy-flies and the cockroach army and Dr Philenor’s giant germs and the nurses and their cats and the sardines and the fishmongers and anything else that could burrow, fly, squeeze or otherwise gain entry to his padded cell. But Brimstone was not afraid.

He had George to protect him.

There was a scritch-scratch at the door of his cell and for a moment Brimstone wondered if the rat family had circled round in a flanking movement, then realised, as the door swung open, it had to be Orderly Nastes.

‘Are we dressed?’ asked Orderly Nastes as he marched in with his tray. ‘I see we are! Well done, Silas. It’s an important day for us, isn’t it? Do you know why it’s an important day, Silas?’

‘Yes,’ Brimstone muttered, scowling.

‘Of course you do!’ exclaimed Orderly Nastes cheerfully. He was a plump bald man with an unexpected lisp and a drooping moustache, grown in imitation of Dr Philenor. ‘It’s the day we meet up with our Review Board. And that means our Sunday suit, doesn’t it? Because we have to look our best.’ He placed the tray on the floor beside Brimstone. It was set with a mug of medicinal ale, a lump of stale bread and a piece of mouldy cheese.