Simon Green - Property of a Lady Faire

“Once this increasingly infuriating mission is over,” I said, “I am going to have a very firm talk with the Merlin Glass. In fact, once everything’s been sorted out, and I have reestablished communications with my family . . . I think I’ll take the Glass down to the Armoury and let the lab assistants play with it. That should frighten it.”

“Shall I try my teleport spell now?” Molly said sweetly.

“How accurate can you be, working blind?” I said. “We don’t want to materialise inside the furniture. Something like that can be very hard to explain.”

“Trust me,” said Molly. “That hardly ever happens. I have an instinct for these things. If I tap into the existing teleport stream and follow that, we should be perfectly safe.”

“Should?”

“Look, do you want the truth, or a comforting lie?”

“Guess.”

“Everything’s going to be fine!” said Molly.

We appeared inside a very small room. So small we were standing face-to-face, surrounded by all kinds of objects pressing in on us.

“We’re inside a broom closet, aren’t we?” I said.

“It was the best I could do!” said Molly. “It was the only enclosed space next to the teleport station.”

“It’s a broom closet!”

“I know! It was either this or the toilets!”

I scrabbled along the wall with my free hand, found the light switch, and turned it on. Flat yellow light from a bare hanging bulb illuminated a space just big enough to contain the two of us and assorted cleaning products. I suppose even a Winter Palace needs janitorial staff. I armoured down, and Molly appeared before me. She smiled at me brightly, gave my hand one last squeeze, and reached for the door. I stopped her quickly.

“Hold it,” I said. “Better check out who’s outside first. Might look a bit odd for the two of us to just walk out of a broom closet.”

“Not at the Lady Faire’s Ball,” said Molly. “I’ll bet there are all kinds of furtive assignations going on here, in all sorts of places.”

“I’ll go first,” I said. “Remember, no magics.”

“Bet I get to the Lazarus Stone before you do,” said Molly.

“Yell if you do,” I said. “And then I’ll race you to the teleport station.”

“What if the station’s locked down?” said Molly. “I got us in here, but there’s no guarantee I can get us back to the real world.”

“One problem at a time,” I said.

I squeezed past her, eased open the broom closet door, and peered cautiously through the gap. All kinds of people were hurrying past, but they all seemed intent on their own business, and didn’t even glance at the broom closet. And after all, why should they? I looked back at Molly.

“Okay, I am out of here. Give me a minute, and then it’s your turn. Try not to kill anyone you don’t absolutely have to, there’s a dear.”

“Teach your grandmother to suck . . .”

I slipped out into the corridor and closed the door firmly behind me.

• • •

The interior of the Winter Palace could have been any first-class, extremely expensive and very elite hotel, anywhere in the world. Lots of wide-open space, richly polished wood, gleaming marble, and deep-pile carpeting. Every conceivable luxury out on display. And well-dressed, very important people hurrying back and forth on their own very important business. No windows anywhere, though. It was comfortably warm, for which I was very grateful. I’d had more than enough of the cold of Ultima Thule. I could feel the last of the bitter chill seeping out of my bones, and out of my soul, as I strode quickly through the wide corridors of the Winter Palace.

I acted as though I belonged there, as though I had every right to be there, so everyone just assumed I did. It helped that as a field agent, I had been trained to have one of those faces that everyone thinks they half recognise. Just a familiar kind of chap, the kind you see every day, everywhere. I smiled and nodded easily to everyone I passed, and they nodded and smiled easily back. Because that was what you did in places like this. Where everyone was bound to be someone, and you were bound to have met them somewhere before . . . It never occurred to any of them that I might be an outsider, or an intruder, because they knew the only way to get in was through the teleport station. And for that, you needed an invitation.

There seemed to be a great many corridors, heading off in every direction. There were any number of signs and helpful directions on the walls, in all kinds of languages, but not one pointing to the Ballroom. Maybe the directions were on the invitation . . . I couldn’t just walk up to the reception desk and ask, without giving myself away. And I couldn’t ask any of the guests. So I walked up and down, and back and forth, peering in through all sorts of doors, until it started to feel like I was walking in circles. I stopped, and looked thoughtfully about me.

In and among the many fine guests, in their formal attire and peacock displays, their designer dresses and fashion abominations, were a lot of people who were quite obviously not guests. They wore formal uniforms, neat and efficient with gleaming buttons, all of them topped with stylised white full-face masks, revealing only the eyes. Security people, hotel staff, all the rank and file you need to keep a place the size of the Winter Palace running smoothly. And all of them coming and going completely unchallenged, because if you were wearing a uniform you must be staff. And no guest would lower himself to notice mere functionaries. I looked the staff over carefully.

It was easy enough to spot the security people, in their sharp white leather uniforms. Something in the way they moved, in the way they held themselves, suggested they were used to taking care of problems. And the blank white masks had distinct possibilities . . . I was reminded for a moment of the masked blood-red men on the Trans-Siberian Express, but these were all quite definitely different people.

I picked one at random, followed him at a cautious distance, and watched closely as he reported to the Head of Security. Who fortunately wore much the same uniform and mask as everyone else. Presumably a style thing. I followed the Head of Security through the bustling corridors, and he didn’t even notice, he was so caught up in his own duties and responsibilities and in looking important. He had a bulky comm unit stuck in one ear, and was constantly talking loudly to somebody about something. I waited, choosing my moment carefully, and when he finally made the mistake of pausing in a deserted side corridor, I eased quietly in behind him and seized the back of his neck in a nerve pinch. His head lolled back, his eyes rolled up, and I caught hold of his collapsing body before it hit the floor. I slung one of his arms across my shoulders, and looked quickly around for somewhere handy to dump him. A well-dressed couple paused at the entrance to the side corridor, looking dubiously at me and the Head of Security. I gave them a cheerful smile.

“I’d give the shellfish a miss, if I were you.”

The couple moved on. I found a convenient cupboard, hauled the door open, and bundled the unconscious Head of Security inside. There was just room enough in the cupboard for me to join him. I closed the door carefully. I was getting really tired of huddling inside small rooms. I changed clothes with the Head of Security, banging my elbows repeatedly in the confined space. Fortunately the Head was a rather larger person than me, so I could get into the uniform without straining. Though I did have to pull his belt right in to keep my trousers up. The stylised face mask peeled off easily, and slapped itself onto my face the moment I brought it close enough. Some kind of static cling deal. I wished briefly for a mirror. The uniform felt like it was flapping about me, and only fitted where it touched. Hopefully people would pay more attention to the uniform than to the man inside it.