I was so stuck on where to turn for help that I considered trying to contact the Dominari, but I didn't consider it for very long. For one thing I wanted as little to do with the mobsters as possible, and for another I didn't want to think about what sort of price they might charge for their assistance this time. But in the end the reason I decided against contacting the Dominari was a purely practical one: they'd be just as likely to want to collect the bounty on me as anyone else in the city. As I'd learned from Gnasher the Dominari was nothing if not all business and five hundred thousand darkgems would make a nice profit for simply – pardon the expression – ratting me out to Quillion.
What I needed was someone who not only was tuned in to what was happening in Nekropolis on a daily basis but who wasn't someone I consulted very often. Someone who kept a low profile – so low that no one would even realize he was an information source.
Then it came to me and a slow grin spread across my face. Maybe – just maybe – I wasn't beaten yet.
I grabbed Shrike's hand and gave it a quick shake.
"Thanks again for everything, but Devona and I have to get moving."
"You've got an idea," Devona said with a smile. It wasn't a question and she didn't seem surprised in the least. Is it any wonder I love her?
"I do. I think it's time we paid a visit to the House of Mysterious Secrets."
"This is some kind of joke, right?"
Devona stood on the sidewalk, hands on her hips, head cocked at an appraising angle. I stood next to her, hands in the pockets of my new (Bogdan's old) coat. When Devona had procured my disguise she'd had no idea what crime I'd been arrested for, so she hadn't brought me any gloves. But since Edrigu's mark on my hand was what we used to call a 'distinguishing feature' back when I was a cop, I figured I should keep that hand concealed as often as possible.
We stood outside a large manor house surrounded by a high wrought iron fence with nasty looking spikes on the tips of the bars. We were still in the Sprawl, not far from the Grotesquerie, and the gamey smell of zoo animals hung thick in the air. I could tell because Devona kept wrinkling her nose.
The manor was constructed entirely out of black wood and brick and its grounds were overgrown with weeds and decorative shrubs that had long ago been left to grow wild. The shutters – black, of course – hung askew on their hinges, the windows were dirt-smeared and cracked and the entire structure listed slightly to the right, as if the manor were perpetually on the verge of collapse. Ravens perched everywhere – on the chimney, the roof, the fence… twenty-nine at my count. A low lying fog-like mist clung to the ground, the whitish vapors roiling slowly as if they possessed some sort of sinister life.
"The only thing missing is a miniature storm cloud hanging overhead discharging the occasional lightning bolt," Devona added. "It's the stereotypical haunted house. It's more than a cliche – it's a cliche of a cliche!"
"That's the whole point," I said. "In Nekropolis a place like this is as unremarkable as a ranch house in a suburban neighborhood back on Earth. It's the perfect disguise."
"Disguise for what?" Devona asked suspiciously.
I just smiled. "You'll see."
I walked up to the main gate. It wasn't locked and it swung open easily at my touch. But even though the gate's motion was as smooth as if it had just been oiled, a creaking groan that sounded almost human filled the air. Once the gate was all open I turned to Devona and gave her a courtly bow, or at least a reasonable version thereof.
"After you, milady."
Devona gave me a look that said she wasn't in the mood to play and walked through. I followed and the gate swung shut behind us of its own accord. Devona didn't even bother looking back over her shoulder at it.
"Cute," she said sarcastically.
We disturbed the layer of ground mist as we walked, but it closed right up behind us, leaving no evidence of our passage. We found the front walk by accident more than anything else and we continued along it until we reached the porch. The ravens roosting on the property made no sound as we approached, but they kept their beady eyed gazes upon us as if they were trying to determine whether we were up to no good.
A quartet of cracked stone columns held up the roof over the porch and spiders had spun elaborate webs between them. Something was caught in one of the webs and I took a closer look.
"Help meeeeeee!" came a tiny voice.
I reached out and with a thumb and forefinger carefully plucked the human headed fly from the webbing.
"Get on back to the Foundry, you slacker," I said.
I flicked the human headed fly off my fingersand his wings began to buzz. He circled our heads a couple times before straightening his course and making a beeline – or rather a flyline – in the general direction of the Boneyard.
"A little guy like that needs to be extra careful when he decides to take a flight on the wild side," I said.
I stepped up to the large front door – black, naturally – took hold of the thick iron ring knocker, lifted it, and let it fall once, twice, three times, then I stepped back to wait.
"Let me guess," Devona said. "The door will creak open and a scary-looking butler will poke his head out and say, 'Good eve-hu-ning' in a sepulchral tone."
"Exactly what does a sepulchral tone sound like anyway?" I asked.
The door opened then, and true to Devona's guess, it did so with a creaking sound. But instead of a scary butler an ordinary human man stood there. He was tall, in his early to mid-thirties, with a round face, thinning straight black hair, glasses and a neatly trimmed black mustache. He wore a navy-blue polo shirt, jeans and running shoes.
"Can I help you?" he said, speaking in a pleasant deep voice that was sonorous rather than sepulchral. He paused, frowned as he gave me a closer look, then he smiled.
"Matt!" I didn't recognize you in your new get-up." He turned to Devona. "And you must be Devona." His frown returned. "Funny, I thought you had blonde hair."
"She normally does," I said. "We're traveling in disguise right now."
The man nodded. "Of course. I should've realized." He opened the door wider and stepped back. "Come on in. My House of Mysterious Secrets is your House of Mysterious Secrets."
He smiled as his joke while Devona and I walked past him. Once we were inside he closed the door and entered a code on an electronic keypad on the wall next to it. There was the sound of locks engaging and I knew the manor's impressive security system was now activated.
Devona had of course seen the keypad and had no doubt noticed how out of place it was with the manor's outside appearance. But that was nothing compared to the place's inside. We now stood within a pleasant looking foyer more suited to an upper middleclass house on Earth than a haunted mansion in Nekropolis.
Devona turned to me with a questioning look.
"Allow me to introduce you to the master of this forbidding edifice," I said. "The enigmatic and eldritch being known only by the sinister appellation of… David Zelasco!"
David gave Devona a smile.
"Hi."
David led us through his tastefully furnished home to a workroom toward the back of the manor. It was a large room with long tables lining the walls, a dozen computer monitors with keyboards resting on top of them. With the exception of a half empty liter bottle of soda and a crinkled bag of nacho chips near one of the monitors, the tables were clear and free of clutter. It looked like a normal enough office space, except each of the monitors had a raven perching on top of it, the birds standing motionless, connected to the monitors by wires plugged into the backs of their heads. Images flashed across the monitor screens in fast-motion, scenes from all five of Nekropolis's Dominions.