Spectred Isle (Green Men #1)(9)

“I have no idea—” Major Peabody began huffily.

Randolph had no time to debate. The force, the thing flowing into a Cock Lane Ghost-shaped hole in people’s minds, had been swirling around since he’d stepped onto the street, and it was becoming aware of him. He’d felt it probing, nudging against his mind in the last few seconds, and now he felt the ear-popping suction as of a tide going out that told him something was gathering to strike.

If this pair of idiots were civilians, he had a responsibility to ensure their safety. If they were in the know, they could look after themselves or take the consequences. Randolph felt very strongly that he’d like to see them both die, and it was the strength of that feeling that gave him the warning of attack.

“Brace,” he said, grabbing both men by the hand, and hissed out the First Line of the Saaamaaa Ritual as the thing descended.

It was malice, pure malignancy, without motive or object or reason. Randolph felt the wash of it despite the protection of the First Line, cramping his chest and tightening his throat with hatred. He saw it on Peabody’s round face, distorted into a cruel parody of his amiably idiotic features, and on Lazenby, his lips drawing back, his eyes narrowing into an animal mask, and he knew he would look much the same.

This thing was hellish strong. He repeated the First Line, putting more of himself behind it and, since he couldn’t use his hands without letting go of the damned fools he was protecting, he scraped a sigil on the pavement with his toe. Once, twice, a third time, and the protection sprang to life, flaring around him like blue fire.

Not to either Lazenby or Peabody’s dull sight, of course. Peabody looked baffled, Lazenby frankly alarmed, and even as Randolph registered the change from hate to concern on his face, he tried to wrench his hand away. It was all Randolph could do to keep a grip.

“Let go!” Lazenby yelped.

“Love to,” Randolph rasped. “I let go, you run. Understand? You run to the end of this street and you don’t stop till you’re out of the line of fire, and whatever you’re doing, you bloody well pack it in. Cross my path again and I’ll make you sorry. Go now and nobody has to get hurt. Clear?”

Lazenby’s brows drew together. He hesitated, a thought obviously dawning, and then spoke much more calmly. “Yes, very clear. I tell you what, old chap, though, why don’t I stay with you for now? Major Peabody will pop off just as you asked, won’t you, sir?”

“What?” said the Major.

“I think this gentleman’s having some bad memories,” Lazenby said, and turned his face away from Randolph to mouth something. “So I’ll stay with him while you find someone who might be able to help, do you see?”

“Oh!” The Major nodded, enlightened. “Of course. You just stay here with Lazenby, you poor fellow, and I’ll fetch a policeman.”

“Will you both sod off,” Randolph said, holding onto what was never very impressive patience by his fingernails.

“I know how it is,” Lazenby said, gentle and reassuring. “But we all need a pal sometimes, even when we don’t feel like it. I’ll stick with you. Don’t worry, old man. You’re safe now.”

Christ alive, Lazenby thought he was a shell-shock case. Of all the times to be kind and considerate instead of taking umbrage and marching off. Randolph could have screamed, or laughed. He did neither, because in the second his attention was occupied, Major Peabody pulled his hand free, walked obliviously through the protective circle with a cry of, “Just a minute, now!”, and set off down the street at a trot. Fast enough to get away unscathed, Randolph hoped.

“For the love of God. How long do we have before that imbecile brings back a policeman?”

“What?”

“Never mind. Oh, what the hell.” Randolph jerked Lazenby closer, a small but ever-curious part of his brain noting how the man’s eyes widened, slapped his free hand against the wall behind him, and let the impressions crowd in. Malice, lust, fear, envy, the usual slurry of human insignificance, but something more behind it. A sense of empty idiocy, as great and vacant as the sky.

“Right,” he said aloud. “Right. I need a—” The oculus fatui turned on him at that moment, and Randolph felt its attention gathering to a point. “Fuck.”

“I beg your pardon?” Lazenby said, with outrage.

“Shut up and let me get on.”

“Certainly not!” Lazenby snapped, but Randolph wasn’t listening. His mind was focused on the thing he had to fight, feeling its nature. It filled a ghost-shaped hole in the street’s belief, that was worryingly clear, but it wasn’t anchored by summoning or purpose or history. For all its power, for all its sneaking, the damn thing didn’t belong here, and that gave him the edge.

“Not in this land, not in this city,” he said aloud, and spoke six of Wayland’s words.

They jarred through his body, clanging in his bones, scorching his eyeballs, hung deafeningly in the air for a fraction of a second that lasted an eternity, and then everything stank of molten metal and the presence was gone. Randolph took a very long breath.

“What the.” Lazenby evidently hadn’t spent enough time in the Army, since he got no further. “What the— What?”

“Lovely meeting you,” Randolph rasped through dry lips, disengaging his hand. He’d left red finger marks on Lazenby’s wrist. “Pleasure. Goodbye.”