“That’s not the way back to the station, Haken,” I murmured. I waited for a few minutes more just in case he reappeared, then headed for Westminster.
I caught the Jubilee line and then the London Overground, alighting at Hampstead Heath. By the time I stepped off the train and walked into the Heath itself, it was night. The sky was overcast, thick clouds blocking out both starlight and moonlight, leaving the Heath pitch-black. A cold wind blew as I walked deeper into the park, whipping at my clothes and filling the night with the sound of rustling leaves. There was no way to see and hardly any way to hear. Most people avoid the Heath on nights like this, and for good reason.
But I’m not most people, and a night like this suits me just fine. With my divination I can navigate in pitch-darkness as though it were broad daylight, and against the vast emptiness of the park, the few wandering people stood out like searchlights. As I strode through the night, the wind gusting through my hair, I felt my spirits rise. The War Rooms had been tense, claustrophobic. Out here, alone in the cold and the blackness, I felt at home.
I didn’t hurry making my way to Arachne’s cave. When I finally stepped down into the ravine, I took a moment out of the wind, then stepped to the overhanging tree, touched two fingers to a root that was quite invisible in the darkness, and spoke into thin air. “It’s me.”
Arachne answered instantly. “Alex! Come right in. Everyone’s waiting.”
With a soft rumble the earth parted, revealing a yawning cavern. I stepped through and the earth and roots wove themselves shut behind me.
Arachne’s cavern felt warm and peaceful compared to the park outside. Globe lights cast a soft glow over the rocky cave, picking out the rainbow colours of the clothes draped over the sofas. Arachne was crouched at the far end. She’s a giant spider who looks almost exactly like a blue-and-black tarantula that’s been scaled up to ten feet tall, and she’s probably the nicest magical creature you’ll ever meet, assuming she’d let you in her lair in the first place, which isn’t all that likely. Nowadays my little group of friends are all on Arachne’s guest list, but it took them a while. Arachne’s got her own reasons to be cautious of mages, and it’s lucky for me that she isn’t the type to judge all by the actions of a few.
And speaking of my friends, they were all there: Luna, waving from a sofa; Variam, leaning back near to her with his arms spread out; Anne, cross-legged in a chair of her own. “Hey, sleepyhead,” Luna said as I walked up to them. “What kept you?”
“Don’t even start,” I told her. “However bad you think your day was, mine was worse.”
“Our day wasn’t that bad,” Anne said.
“Don’t tell him that!”
I smiled, then dropped into one of the sofas and shut my eyes with a sigh. I spend so much of my time looking ahead, watching for danger. Arachne’s cave is one of only a handful of places where I don’t have to do that. Behind the webs and the wards, I’m protected, and for once I can turn off my precognition and just relax. It’s good to have somewhere you feel safe, even if it’s only for a little while.
“So who wants to go first?” Variam said.
“Oh, go on,” Luna said. “I know you’ve been itching to tell us.”
“Alex?” Variam said. “You awake?”
“Just a little tired.” I opened my eyes. “I’m listening.”
Variam didn’t need any more encouragement. “Okay,” he began. He looked as though he’d just arrived, although he was wearing his street clothes: some masters keep their apprentices to a formal dress code, but Landis isn’t one of them. “We got a notice this morning that the Order of the Shield might be getting deployed, so we spent all day getting ready. First thing I did was look up the Order files on White Rose. Apparently the one from White Rose that the Council are thinking about going after is this woman called Vihaela.”
I searched back and remembered what Talisid told me. “The leader of White Rose is a guy called Marannis. Vihaela’s his second, right?”
“Kind of,” Variam said. “From what I heard it’s Vihaela who mostly runs everything. Some people are saying it looks like she’s going to take over. Anyway, she’s the one everyone’s scared of.”
“And she’s a Dark mage, right?” I said. I thought for a second and shook my head. “Don’t really know anything about her.”
“I do,” Anne said.
We all looked at her in surprise. “Not in a good way,” Anne said. “When mages want to tell horror stories about life mages, she’s one of the names they use.”
“Records have her listed as a death mage,” Variam said.
“They’re not as far apart as you’d think.”
“What kind of horror stories?” Luna asked.
“She’s a torturer,” Variam said. “The one who breaks down the White Rose slaves before they get handed over to the mind mages. If the reports are true, that was how she got into White Rose in the first place. Apparently even though she pretty much runs the organisation, she still deals with the new slaves herself. It’s hard to find out about her because there are hardly any witnesses. Most of the people she gets her hands on never get away, and the few the Council find are too afraid to talk. Even if they’re miles away, they’re so terrified of her coming after them that they don’t even want to say her name. The only full account we’ve got is from some girl who used to be one of the brothel slaves. She said that Vihaela ran White Rose on a points system. If you did something to make a customer unhappy, you lost points. At the end of the month, whoever had the lowest points got transferred to her lab. They didn’t come back.”
“The stories are that Vihaela’s supposed to use them for experiments.” Anne shook her head. “I don’t know if they’re true. I want to believe that it’s just other mages trying to justify being afraid of life mages, but . . .”
“How do you know this stuff?” I said curiously. “Is this common knowledge in the apprentice program, or . . . ?”
“First I’ve heard of it,” Luna said.
“It’s not,” Anne said. She didn’t meet our eyes. “I’d rather not talk about it.”
“I’m afraid that Anne’s stories aren’t exaggerations,” Arachne said. She’d been sitting quietly, working away on a complicated pattern of green and blue thread as she listened; now she spoke, her voice clicking gently. “From what I’ve heard, if anything, they understate the case.”
“Have the Council tried to do anything about her?” I asked.
“No one’ll agree to give evidence against her in court,” Variam said. “Apparently she goes out of her way to hunt down anyone who tries to spread stories.”
“Lovely,” I said. “Well, she sounds absolutely horrific. I really hope I don’t run into her.”
“There’s more,” Variam said. “She’s connected to some high-up people with the Council. Guess whose name comes up linked to her?”
“Please don’t say Levistus.”
“Nirvathis.”
“Great,” I muttered. This just keeps getting better and better.
“Wasn’t he Rayfield’s master?” Luna said. “The one who started all this . . . ?”
“Nirvathis does what Levistus tells him,” I said. I frowned. “And Leo was meeting his apprentice at Pudding Mill Lane . . .” It sounded as though it must have been Vihaela who’d sent him there, or someone working for her. Leo had been carrying that little focus . . . What had been on it?
“This is really confusing,” Luna said. “Who’s on which side?”
“There aren’t just two sides,” I said. “More like four. How did things go with Chalice?”
Luna glanced at Anne, then turned back to me. “Good, I think.”
“I’m guessing there wasn’t any trouble.”
Luna shook her head. “Nothing like that. Though . . . I got the feeling she might have known that we’d been preparing for it.”
“Chalice isn’t stupid,” I said. Even from our brief meeting, that was something I was sure of. “She knows we’ve got reasons not to trust her. She’d have expected you to bring backup.”