The Naming of the Beasts

I weighed my options for a few moments. I’d already said too much in front of Etheridge. Damaged as he was, he still owed his allegiance to Jenna-Jane, and I had to assume he was going to report back to her. I wasn’t ready to trust Trudie either, come to that - at least, not all the way - but probably I needed to tell her at least something about what was going down on the Juliet front. ‘Let’s take the air,’ I suggested, looking pointedly at her alone.

Trudie hesitated, then nodded. Turning to Etheridge, she gave him a notepad and a pen. ‘Start writing down the names of the streets, Victor,’ she told him. ‘When I come back we’ll start checking them out with Google maps.’

We went to Paddington Basin, which runs right behind St Mary’s. Part of the basin had been drained a few months back, and the council had erected a sculpture of a giant plug and plughole to raise the morale of local residents while their picturesque canal was a plain of stinking mud. This was where we fetched up, sitting out in front of a pavement café that hadn’t opened for lunch yet.

After extorting a promise from Trudie not to pass any of what I was about to say on to Jenna-Jane, I told her about the bizarre glitches in Juliet’s behaviour, including the beating she’d administered to Susan and the threat she’d made to me. I mentioned the ward I’d found in Juliet’s garden, too, but only in passing because it was part of a wider pattern whose meaning seemed to lie elsewhere. Trudie heard me out in silence, then as soon as I’d finished she started in with the questions.

‘Isn’t this creature savage by her very nature?’ she demanded. ‘Why is any of this a surprise?’

‘It’s a surprise because it goes against everything that Juliet has done since she decided to stay on Earth,’ I explained patiently. ‘She knows damn well that she can only live here as long as she manages to stay on the wagon. If she starts to eat people, even just on special occasions, every exorcist in London is going to come looking for her. And good as she is, sooner or later someone is bound to sneak up on her blind side and finish the job.’

Trudie didn’t look convinced. ‘But what would that do?’ she asked with a shrug. ‘It might just send her back to Hell. She’d be free to rise again whenever she wanted.’

I stared her down. ‘Is that what you think exorcism is?’

‘I don’t know, Castor. And neither do you.’

‘But we know that demons avoid it strenuously. Desperately, even. It’s got to be more than a cab ride home.’

There was a silence. A waiter unlocked the front door of the café, obviously thinking we were his first customers of the day. Not being in the mood for coffee, tea, or any other drink that wasn’t at least 30 per cent proof, I got up and moved on. Trudie followed.

‘Can I see the wards you found?’ she asked.

‘I’ve got a photo of it on my phone,’ I said. ‘I’ll send it on to you.’

‘What about you, Castor? What’s your next move?’

‘I’m going to Macedonia to meet what’s left of Rafi’s family. How about you?’

‘I’ll work over the map with Victor. See if it gives us any clues to where Asmodeus is hiding.’

‘And then when I come back we’re going to make a second raid on Super-Self.’

Trudie rolled her eyes. ‘That’ll be fun.’

‘Working for Jenna-Jane is like being in the army,’ I said. ‘Every day is a holiday.’

‘Send me those pictures before you go,’ Trudie said.

‘Sure.’ I turned to face her. Might as well have this out now as later. ‘But these are the standard terms and conditions, ’ I told her. ‘We don’t share any of this with either your former or your current employer unless I say we do.’

After the barest moment of hesitation, Trudie nodded. ‘Agreed.’

‘And anything new you come up with, you run it by me before you go to Jenna-Jane.’

Another pause. ‘If you agree to do the same thing,’ Trudie said. ‘Share whatever you find in Macedonia with me. And pass me anything you get from Nicholas Heath.’

That came as something of a shock. ‘How did you know I’d seen Nicky?’ I demanded, tensing involuntarily.

Trudie smiled, a little smugly. ‘I researched you very thoroughly when I worked for the Anathemata,’ she said. ‘You’re too set in your ways, Castor. Got your habits. Your superstitions and foibles. Your prime directives. Heath is one of them.’

‘I’m still alive,’ I reminded her.

‘Yeah,’ she agreed. ‘That’s another.’

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