I sighed. “All right, but I want you to take Anne along for backup. We don’t have any good reason yet to believe that Chalice is a danger, but that doesn’t mean she isn’t.”
“Oh well.” Variam yawned and stretched. “I’m off home. Sounds like tomorrow’ll be interesting.”
The next morning was overcast, white cloud filling the sky all the way to the horizon. It had rained during the night, and the weather forecast promised more to come. Luna had stayed over, and we had breakfast together and discussed plans before I went off to see Caldera.
Caldera lives in Hackney, in a seedy-looking area with a lot of council estates. It’s not quite a dump, but it’s not high-class, either, and I doubt you’d find many other mages living there. Caldera has a flat on the second floor of a converted house; I got inside, climbed the stairs, and knocked.
There was a pause. The door and walls around the flat were warded, and I could feel the latent energy waiting to be used. Then they shifted slightly, and all of a sudden the configuration was less threatening. Caldera opened the door and looked me up and down. “Oh, it’s you.”
Caldera was wearing a baggy T-shirt, tracksuit bottoms, and slippers. It was the first time I’d seen her dressed in something that you couldn’t do heavy manual labour in. “Hi, invalid,” I said, and held up a package. “I brought grapes.”
“Okay, you can stay.”
I handed her the bag and walked in. I’ve only been to Caldera’s flat a couple of times, but I quite like it. It’s messy and comfortable, filled with old bottles and coffee mugs, the kind of place where you feel as though you’re allowed to put your feet up. “Going for the casual look?”
“I’m on sick leave,” Caldera said in distaste. “Can you believe they wanted to keep me in the bloody hospital?”
“Yes. Yes, I can.”
“Oh, and by the way, if you want to get inside, you’re supposed to ring the bell and wait for me to buzz you into the building. Not knock on my door.”
“Sorry.” I dropped into one of the armchairs and grinned at her. “Every time I see a security setup that bad I just have to go through it. I’m doing you a favour, really.”
“You’re a pain in my arse is what you are.”
“You feeling better?”
“Course I’m better. Only reason I’m here is because Rain made it an order.”
I made a noncommittal sort of noise. I’d been watching Caldera since I came in and she didn’t seem to be in pain. Still, as she went to get a bowl and a drink from the kitchen, her movements were more sluggish than usual, and it wasn’t until she returned and dropped into the sofa that I saw her shoulders relax. Caldera’s tough, but whatever healing she’d received had obviously taken a lot out of her. I had the feeling Anne could have done a better job but decided not to say that out loud.
“So the indictment’s set for this afternoon,” Caldera said. “I want you at the War Rooms at noon, okay?”
“What time?”
“Could be any time. Might want to bring something to read.”
“Sounds great. Who’s the indictment for, Chamois?”
“White Rose.”
I blinked. “Seriously?”
“What do you mean?”
“Well,” I said. “Remember Torvald? We put in a request about him the beginning of last week and they still haven’t got back to us. Chamois tries to kill me on CCTV two days ago and there’s no movement on that either. This attack happens less than twelve hours ago, and there’s a Council indictment already.”
“Yeah,” Caldera said dryly. “Kind of a difference there.”
“Look, I haven’t pushed you on who these White Rose people are,” I said. “But if I’m going to an indictment in your place, you don’t think maybe you ought to fill me in?”
Caldera sighed. “Get me a beer from the shelf.”
I looked back at Caldera for a second, then got up, fetched the bottle that she was pointing to, and brought her a glass. Caldera twisted off the cap bare-handed, poured out half of the bottle, waited for the foam to subside, poured out the other half, and took a drink. I sat and waited.
“I guess you do need to know,” Caldera said at last. “But get something clear. This does not get spread around. I know you like to chat with your friends and those magical creatures of yours, but you get caught discussing this, I’m not going to bat for you.”
I nodded.
“All right,” Caldera said. “Let’s start at the beginning. The baseline law for mages is the Concord. Under that are the national laws.”
“Okay,” I said. The Concord is the international set of laws that all mages are required to follow. They’re pretty useless if you’re not a mage yourself, but breaking them is still a fairly big deal, as long as the victim is someone the Council cares about. Underneath that there are the national laws, passed as resolutions by the ruling Councils of each magical nation, and those vary from country to country. They aren’t allowed to conflict with the Concord, and the penalties for breaking them are a lot less serious, but it’s still a good idea to know what they are.
“Now, a bunch of those laws regulate how mages are allowed to deal with other humans,” Caldera said. “There’s the prohibition on slavery, and the laws against harming normals and sensitives and adepts.”
“Uh, yeah, in theory. I’m not sure how much they actually get followed.”
“Light mages and independents follow them most of the time.”
“When it suits them.”
“I said most of the time. Yes, those laws get broken. Yes, we don’t always catch the ones who do it. But the fact that they follow those laws is the big difference between Light mages and Dark ones. How many Light slave traders do you know?”
“Maybe they don’t do it publicly, but that doesn’t mean it doesn’t happen.”
“And do you know for a fact any Light mages who do it? With evidence?”
“You aren’t seriously telling me you don’t believe it ever happens.”
“I’m not a moron, all right?” Caldera said. “Of course it happens. But the laws are there, and they do have an effect. It’s like the speed limit. Yes, everyone knows people break it, but if they get caught breaking it there are consequences. And so they don’t push it too far. You get me?”
I wasn’t particularly happy with having slavery and murder equated with breaking the speed limit, but I knew arguing about it wasn’t going to accomplish much. “I get you.”
“So, if you want to be a Light mage, especially if you want to work with the Council, you have to follow the national laws. You have to play nice. Okay?”
“Okay.”
“A certain fraction of Light mages are not nice.”
“You don’t say.”
“They want to be part of the Council and have all the perks. They also want to get to do all the same kinds of things that Dark mages get to do. They have a problem. White Rose is an organisation that specialises in solving that problem.”
“So White Rose provides a nice discreet brothel service?”
“Okay,” Caldera said. “When I told you they were a brothel, that’s not the whole story. The kind of guys who go to White Rose . . . if they wanted sex they’d just hit up an escort agency. White Rose does the kind of stuff you can’t ask for out in the open.”
I was starting to see where this was going, and I didn’t like it. “You mean kids like Leo.”
“Kids, heavy-duty sadism, snuff scenes. The workers are slaves, obviously. Then you start bringing magic into it. Let’s say you’re a client of White Rose. There’s some new pop singer you’ve got your eye on, you see her in her music videos. You decide you want a piece of that. White Rose is happy to help. They’ll find one of their slaves with a good physical resemblance, maybe get themselves a new one if it’s a special order. Then they’ll get to work. Flesh-sculpting or glamours to make her look the part, mental control to make her act the part. They soften them up first, then do most of the heavy lifting with mind magic. By the time they’re done, the girl thinks she is that person. They can put in other bits too. Make her in love with you, switch her programming so she has to do whatever you tell her, set it up so she goes for your fetish. Whatever you like.”