“One of these days,” I said, as casually as I could, “you’re going to have to trust me enough to tell me exactly where your private forest really is. Or perhaps the more proper question would be when it really is.”
“One of these days,” said Molly just as casually, looking straight ahead. “It isn’t that I don’t trust you, sweetie. It’s just that some secrets aren’t mine to share. I don’t own this place; I just get to visit. I’m a guest here, just like you.”
“Then who does own the wild woods?” I said. “Who do you need to ask, for permission to come here?”
“You see?” said Molly, squeezing my arm against her side companionably. “Questions just lead to more questions, with no guarantee of an answer. Or at least, an answer you could live with.”
“We lead such complicated lives,” I said, after a moment.
“You need to tell me what’s been happening,” Molly said sternly. “What did you talk to your uncle Jack about? And how did we end up as fall guys for the Uncanny massacre?”
I brought her up to date, and not surprisingly she jumped on the one thing that really mattered to her.
“So, no one in all your family knows, any more, who gave the Regent his orders to kill my parents? Or even why?”
“Uncle Jack doesn’t believe so,” I said carefully. “I suppose it’s always possible there could be a record somewhere, tucked away in some vault in the family archives, and I promise we will look later, when this current mess is finally over, but I wouldn’t put any money on it. This is all deniable operations stuff, and the people involved would have been bound to cover their tracks. Destroy all the paper trails, and there’s no incriminating evidence . . .”
“I need to know,” said Molly.
“I know,” I said.
I hadn’t told her about the Merlin Glass. Partly because I didn’t want her distracted from our current mission until my parents were safe again. And partly because I was worried that the Glass might be listening. I didn’t want to put Molly in danger from the Glass. Or from whatever might be lurking inside it.
“I have heard of the Lady Faire,” said Molly. “As a name, and a legend. One of those renowned personages always popping up on the edges of things. Up in Really High Society, where the air isn’t just rarefied, it’s designer, and only the very best and the very worst kind of people get to mingle. I haven’t a clue where she is right now. I’ve never mixed in those kinds of circles, even before I met you and got civilised. It’s not like she and I had anything in common, after all. The Lady Faire used seduction and fascination to destroy her enemies and achieve her ends, whereas I always favoured . . .”
“Destruction?” I said.
“You say the nicest things, sweetie. I never met the Lady Faire because I never got invited to those sorts of parties. I’m a simple girl at heart. I couldn’t even tell you what she looks like . . .”
“I should have asked the Armourer for a photo, before I left,” I said. “I don’t know much more than the legend, myself.”
“There might not be any photos,” said Molly. “If she’s as secretive as everyone says.”
“Oh, there’s bound to be one somewhere,” I said. “My family has files on everyone who is anyone.”
“And yet they’re saying they don’t know where she is right now?”
“I think it’s more . . . they don’t want to know.”
“Ah,” Molly said wisely. “There’s a story there. I can smell it.”
“Wouldn’t surprise me,” I said.
I had told her about Uncle James, but neither of us mentioned him. Of such small concessions and agreements are relationships made.
“The Lady Faire does get around,” said Molly. “According to the stories, barroom gossip, and general character assassination I’ve heard . . . she’s set up shop in every major city on the planet at one time or another. Chasing the Intelligence community from one hotspot to another, like the glamorous little parasite she is. And even to a few dark and disturbing neighbourhoods that aren’t on any official map. The Lady Faire goes where the action is. She was the toast of San Francisco society through most of the Seventies, and Queen of the Night in Bangkok in the Nineties. And you don’t even want to know what she got up to in the Nightside, for almost two years.”
“I know what she got up to in Soho, in the Sixties,” I said. “I was the Drood field agent in London for several years, remember. And they were still telling stories about her conquests and exploits, some fifty years after she left. Most of which I prefer not to believe, for my own peace of mind.”
“Believe them all,” said Molly. “Especially the really bad ones. Because they’re the ones she’s most proud of. I used to be a real party animal, back in the day . . . But the word was and is that no one can party like the Lady Faire.”
I frowned. “She’d been around for quite a while, even before Soho in the Sixties . . . So how old do you suppose she is?”
“She’s one of the Baron Frankenstein’s creations,” said Molly, shrugging. “She could be alive, or dead, or any number of states in between.”
“Fair enough,” I said. “But where do we look for her now? Where can we go where they’d know?”
“The Wulfshead,” said Molly. “They always know the very best gossip. And I could use a drink.”
“Never knew you when you couldn’t,” I said. “But I was just there, remember? They’ve got their own problems, cleaning up after the MI 13 intrusion. I doubt there’ll be many patrons around for a while.”
“Strangefellows!” said Molly, clapping her hands together delightedly. “Everyone goes to Strangefellows!”
“Only because no one else will have them,” I said. “I keep telling you: Droods can’t go into the Nightside. And I’m not letting you go in there alone.”
“Why not?” said Molly, immediately bristling. “I can look after myself!”
“Wouldn’t doubt it for a moment,” I said. “But you are just a little bit too prone to temptation and getting distracted, in the Nightside.”
“Well, yes,” said Molly. “That’s what it’s for . . . But there are a great many powerful and determined people and organisations looking for us right this minute. And the Nightside is the one sanctuary and neutral ground that everybody recognises.”
“I can’t go in as a Drood,” I said. “People would notice. And the whole point of our current situation is that we don’t want to be noticed. By anyone. Not until we’ve got our hands on the Lazarus Stone, and got my parents back safely.”
Molly pouted sulkily. “You could always go in as Shaman Bond.”
“No, I couldn’t,” I said. “They’d know.”
“You’re right,” said Molly. “They would. It’s the Nightside.”
“Wherever we go, someone is bound to recognise one or both of us,” I said. “Shaman Bond’s reputation might be smaller than yours, but it’s just as widespread. And no matter how fast an in and out we make it, word will get back to my family, and they’ll come after us. Along with all the other organisations in our line of work, everyone from the London Knights to the Soulhunters. I’m not sure it’s safe for us to show our faces anywhere.”
Molly smiled, and rested her head against my shoulder. “Takes you back, doesn’t it? To when you and I first got together? On the run from everyone, with the whole world at our backs and at our throats?”
“Only you could get nostalgic about that part of our lives,” I said. “I really hoped we’d put that behind us. I’m not built for running. No, we need a plan. And for that, we need information. And for that we need . . . the OverNet.”