No, reader. Your visit to my era is brief, but I must live through tomorrow, and the next day, and the next of my long penance. Dominic is the seneschal who controls access to that house in Paris which has been my harbor, longer than Cielo de Pájaros. If Bridger were unguarded, for him I would destroy myself, but Bridger has the Major, and the Major defeated even me. As for Carlyle and Sniper, worthy as they are, I will not do them short-term good at the price of sacrificing all my future usefulness. Perhaps I could overpower Dominic, escape for now, but I would have to return someday, and soon, to face his waiting discipline. I do not fear short-term retribution—pain and degradation I accept to save good men. But rebellion against Dominic would forever forfeit my place as a trusted servant at Madame’s. A cell would wait for me the next time I braved her threshold, where forever after I would wait like a tool in its box, ready to be used but impotent to start tasks of my own. I must have the freedom of that house, reader, I must. I can work there, for all the Powers, for Earth—no, not for Earth, for Him, reader, for Him, for Ἄναξ Jehovah. This is the first time that I have shown you my own title for Him, Ἄναξ (Anax). It is Greek, of course. Old Greek. ‘Lord’ is a feeble translation. Think of the trial-weary Trojans, with the smoke of the war fires rising around their walls, year in, year out, and the prophets warn them, soon, soon, soon the day of death and slavery will come to swallow Troy and all her children, yet, in spite of Fate, remaining pious at heart toward that one power that has shown them loyalty and kindness, the grateful Trojans raise their hands in prayer to distant Lord Apollo. Then they use Ἄναξ, and so do I.
Julia stopped me with a soft hand on the back of my neck. “No need to fuss about cleaning up the mess, Dominic, really. If you’re in a rush, take Mycroft and go.”
“Are you sure? This is partly my fault too. I haven’t had a chance to thank you properly yet.”
“Go.” She handed him my tracker. “I have another regular coming in half an hour, I can have them clean it up.”
He thanked her with a last kiss. “I’m going to pay you back for this, I mean it, and for giving me Carlyle Foster. Clear your schedule for … how much of tomorrow can you clear?”
“From noon on if I have to.”
“Clear it all. I’ll send you word where to meet me.”
“What for?”
“Your payment.” He kicked me in the side, gently for him. “Fetch thy hat, stray. We’re leaving.”
I crawled to fetch it from the closet, not daring to rise until he took me by the collar and hauled me to my feet. It was Dominic who first taught me the art of hat-wearing, and gave me the round and shapeless cap that has shielded me from recognition so many times. It was thirteen years ago, almost to the day. I had come to petition his aid in trying to understand Ἄναξ Jehovah. He saw me, with my trembling and my suppliant eyes, and threw his head back, laughing. “Mycroft, thou must have a hat so thou mayest remove it in the presence of thy betters!” He was right. It is a comforting symbol, a way to gesture my submission without alarming people with the antiquated titles ‘master,’ ‘madam,’ ‘sir.’ It is a comfort to have something to fidget with as I stand in obedience before free men. A welcome gift. I thank Dominic for it still, from time to time.
Dominic paused on the threshold, throwing his sword arm around my shoulders like a brother, close and ready to grasp my throat. “Oh, Julia, any advice on interrogating a prisoner you can’t touch?”
Her eyebrows perked. “Can’t touch?”
“I’d squish him.” Dominic’s eyes danced as he looked to me. “What’s a good comparison, Mycroft? Let’s say he has one of those bone diseases so he’ll shatter if you shake him too hard. Mentally he’s a toughie, though. Sleep deprivation’s getting me nowhere slowly.”
Dominic had my tracker still, playing between his fingers like a toy. How long, my mind raced, how long since I had last counted all eleven tiny soldiers?
“If you want fast results, threaten a loved one,” she suggested. “Otherwise theology as usual, or hot wax. Hot wax is almost too gentle.”
He frowned. “Not gentle enough for this little one, but I’ll think of something. Thank you, Pontifex Maxima.” He turned to me. “Come, stray. I’ve a thousand questions for thee. I look forward to seeing thee struggle to get out of answering.”
CHAPTER THE THIRTIETH
DEO EREXIT SADE
Things change here, reader. Or, more aptly, you change, while this world you visit stays the same. I promised I would show the wires beneath the cloth. Eureka smells them, tastes them, itches with them, whatever name we pick for her computer senses. She knows the flights of cars are wrong, that there is one extra pull of gravity, to make us realize Dark Matter is out there changing things. Now you are ready. Kohaku Mardi was always wrong. 33-67; 67-33; 29-71, it will not tip us into war, no matter what the numbers say. Sometimes the magician wheels a house of cards onto his stage, and he shakes, and blows, and threatens, pulls the tablecloth from under it, and it doesn’t fall. Because it never really was a house of cards. It was one long piece of paper, folded and disguised to feign fragility.
“Felix, come away from there,” the Anonymous called. “You’re making Danaë uncomfortable.”
Brillist Institute Headmaster Felix Faust lingered by his favorite feature of the Salon de Sade: a picture window, framed by damask curtains, looking down over the Flesh Pit. “There are two 9-3-3-11-10-4-3-10s topping each other down there,” he said. “That’s the third time I’ve seen that combo, I wonder why that set are so attracted to their own.”
“Come away,” the Anonymous repeated. “You can do research on your own time.” Here the Anonymous, like Faust, wore the costume of the period, lace cuffs and styled wig, his coat a rich green-black over a waistcoat of burgundy-violet silk, almost imperial. He wore a mask, not grotesque or fancy, and certainly not enough to keep one who knew him from recognizing him, just a little black strip around the eyes, a symbol. Many imagine that all Madame’s clients would wear masks, but that badge of honor belongs to the Anonymous alone.
Faust’s eyes, windows of the ever-churning brain which feeds upon his body like a parasite, rolled across to the Anonymous. “Closing the curtain isn’t going to get Bryar ready faster. Neither is you venting your impatience on the rest of us.”
The Anonymous squeezed his cane, as if to strangle its heavy gilded head. “You’re the one who wanted Danaë at this meeting, Felix. The least you can do is be courteous now that they’re here.”
Faust let the curtain fall and turned back to the salon with its ring of couches, amber velvet on ebony frames, perfect against the ivory-tinted rug. “I apologize, Princesse. It’s strange to think you’ve hardly ever been in this room, since you’re always so thoroughly with us in spirit.”
“It’s all right, Felix,” Danaë answered, forcing a smile for the Brillist Institute Headmaster who reigns as teacher, steersman, and lawspeaker over Gordian. But the blush on Danaë’s unhappy cheeks showed that it was not all right, in fact, not until I pulled the curtain closed to seal away the spectacle below.
Here the assembled Powers were as alone as Powers can be, no aides, no bodyguards, no secretaries, the constant watching plague of ‘personnel’ shut out beyond the door beyond the door beyond the door of Madame’s innermost sanctum. Only the most completely trusted servants may attend the nobles in the Salon de Sade: today that meant me. In the car en route to Paris I had … endured, rather than answered, Dominic’s first questions about Bridger. But Dominic knew I would be slow to succumb to either force or guile, so he had dropped me at Madame’s with instructions that I be held until he returned. Then he had vanished once again, like a black and heavy condor, content that no common vulture will dare touch its prey. Since I was on hand, they might as well make use of me.