Страница 27 из 54
Polly was suddenly there beside me, elbowing me discreetly in the ribs. I looked round, and she showed me the chaos dice in her hand, before quickly making them disappear about her person. While everyone's attention had been fixed on Tommy's triumph, Polly had got on with the job. Which meant there was now an empty display case on view, and it was well past time Polly and I were leaving. I said as much to Tommy, and he nodded easily.
"Catch you later, brother. I have some serious debauchery to be getting on with."
I had to smile. "What is this wonderful new card skill, that you learned from a book?"
He gri
Polly pulled me away before I could hit him.
I was still trembling and twitching, just a bit, when Polly and I arrived at our next destination: Savage Hettie's Lost and Found. (We Ask No Questions.) Polly's list of ingredients for opening her demon gate called for a Hand of Glory made from a monkey's paw. As if such a thing wasn't dangerous enough as it is, without meddling. Be like walking around with a tactical nuke in your pocket and the pin half-pulled. Savage Hettie specialised in items that were frequently as dangerous to you as they were to your enemies. Mostly because it amused her.
She sat in her chair by the open door, fa
"I don't let just anyone in here, you know," she said, in her harsh East End accent. "And you look dead sneaky, girl. Hiding something, aren't you? Ho yes; I know your sort, girl."
"She's with me," I said flatly. "And you know me, Hettie."
She sniffed again. "I knows your father, you mean. Ho yes. I knew him very well, back in the day."
"Who didn't?" I said, resignedly.
She cackled loudly. "But I knew him intimately, as you might say. I didn't always look like this, you know."
I moved quickly past her, pushing Polly ahead of me, and Hettie's cackling laughter followed me into the dark interior of her shop. There are some mental images you really don't want to dwell on.
Hettie's place was always a mess, on a grand scale. All gloom and shadow and heaps of things, set out apparently at random. No order, no rationale, and absolutely no presentation. Handwritten price tags for everything; and no haggling. Pay Hettie's price or go somewhere else; except if you could have found it anywhere else, you wouldn't have ventured into Savage Hettie's appalling lair. There were shelves and boxes and tottering piles, and you had to dig for what you needed. At your own risk, of course. Touch the wrong thing in the wrong way, and it would have your hand off. Or turn you into a frog, or steal your soul. Browser very much beware; and watch your back at all times. Some of the items in Savage Hettie's Lost and Found had a way of sneaking up on you from behind.
Hettie didn't give a damn. Except to laugh loudly when something really horrible happened.
Polly and I moved gingerly between stacks of magic boxes, enchanted dancing-shoes, and nasty old magazines, careful not to touch anything. There was fabulous and seriously valuable stuff to be found, if a person was not too fussy over little things like provenance, or guarantees. Savage Hettie was a fence as well as a dealer, and didn't care who knew it.
We passed by glass jars labelled Manticore musk, Vampire's teeth (which clattered and ground against the glass if you got too close), and a wine bottle covered in cobwebs marked simply Drink Me You Bastard. I was briefly distracted by a pile of old magazines that I couldn't resist leafing through (once I'd put some gloves on). The private schoolgirls' issue of Oz, International Times with a naked Paul and Linda on the front cover, and a battered copy of Playbeing, with something utterly revolting on the front cover. Polly, though, was not one for distractions. She stalked up and down the narrow aisles, seemingly following her nose, until finally she stopped abruptly before a sealed glass jam-jar. I joined her, and peered over her shoulder. In the jar was a small, withered thing, with half the hair fallen out, the stiff fingers made into candles with delicate little wicks. The stump was blackened, from where it had been sealed shut with a naked flame. I reached for the jar, and the fingers stirred slowly, like spider's legs. I snatched my hand back instinctively. Polly snorted dismissively and picked up the jar without hesitating in the least.
We took it back to Savage Hettie, who shocked me rigid by refusing to take any payment. She reared back in her chair rather than touch the jam-jar, and leered at Polly, the tip of her tongue poking provocatively through the gap in her teeth.
"I know your kind, missie, ho yes I do. Don't want no dealings with you and yours, and I ain't going to risk being beholden to you. Take the nasty thing. Glad to be rid of it." She sniffed loudly, then looked at me. "Surprised to see an Oblivion boy with one of her lot, but I suppose you knows what you're doing. Blinded by a pretty face and bemused by the smell of pussy. Just like your dad."
Polly and I walked quickly away.
"Do you know what she was talking about?" she said, after a while.
"Haven't a clue," I said determinedly.
"Probably just as well," said Polly.
The last two items were easy. Deconsecrated host soaked in virgin's urine and a fine powder made from the crushed wings of wee flower faeries. Women use the strangest things as cosmetics. We found both items at the Mammon Emporium, the Nightside's premiere mall, and Polly made me shoplift them from their shelves while she kept a lookout. We then stalked imperiously out of the mall, and no-one challenged us. I think I was less scared in the mummy's burial chamber.
"You know," I said afterwards, "we could have paid for these."
"Where's the fun in that?" said Polly, and I was honestly lost for an answer.
Not entirely to my surprise, we ended up back on the Street of the Gods, standing before a quiet little church in the Street's equivalent of a backwater. A simple stone structure, with no fancy trimmings and no obvious name. People passed it by without looking, but it must have had something, or some other church or Being would have taken over its location long ago. The door was closed, the windows were dark, and there was no sign of life anywhere.
"Not very inviting," I said, after a while, because you have to say something.
"It isn't here for people," said Polly. Her face was full of an emotion I couldn't read, her eyes blazing.
"Does it have a name?" I said.
"It's old," said Polly. "Names come and go, but the church remains. It is a place of power, and it has been here for a very long time. So long that people have forgotten who it was originally created to venerate and preserve."
"The Lady of the Lake?" I said. "She's here?"
"Help me open the dimensional gate, and you'll see," said Polly.
There were no guards, no protections to get past. The door wasn't even locked, opening easily at Polly's touch. There wasn't actually a sign over the door saying Enter at Your Own Risk, but there might as well have been. I could feel all the hackles rising on the back of my neck as I followed Polly in.