“I’m not getting paid enough for this,” said one flatly, and the other nodded. “The party’s that way.”
Hawk and Fisher smiled politely, and strolled unhurriedly in the direction the man-at-arms had indicated. Buchan stepped over the butler and went after them.
“You promised me you’d behave,” he said urgently.
“We haven’t killed anyone yet,” said Fisher.
Buchan had a horrible suspicion she wasn’t joking.
A footman in a rather garish frock coat appeared from nowhere, and apparently assuming they were official guests, led them to the main ballroom. Servants, laden with trays of food and wine, swarmed back and forth through the wide corridors. Hawk gradually became aware of a growing clamour up ahead, the sound of hundreds of voices raised in talk and laughter and argument. It grew steadily louder as the footman led them to a pair of huge double doors, and then the sound burst over them like a wave as the footman pushed open the doors. Hawk and Fisher and Buchan stood together in the doorway a moment, taking in the sight and sound of the Quality at their play.
Hundreds of bright young things were packed into the huge ballroom, dressed in their finest. There were all sorts of fashions and costumes, ranging from the ridiculous to the grotesque. Hawk wasn’t surprised. The younger aristocracy always had a taste for the garish. The whole point of elite fashion was to choose clothes that no one but they would be seen dead in. And yet the crowd wasn’t composed of only young people. There were a significant number of older men and women, suggesting that the attractions of the Hellfire Club spread across a larger proportion of the Quality than Hawk had expected. His scowl deepened as he took in some of the more sinister costumes: jaggedly cut leathers and bizarrely dyed furs, metal-studded bracelets and spiked chokers. One striking woman dressed in black rags and tatters carried a live snake wrapped around her bare shoulders.
A band of musicians was playing loudly in the gallery, but no one was dancing. That wasn’t what they’d come for. Hawk tore his gaze away from the Quality and looked around the great ballroom. He’d known smaller parade grounds, and the ceiling was uncomfortably high overhead, much of it lost in shadow. Three huge chandeliers of polished brass and cut glass lit the scene below with hundreds of candles. Hawk looked at them uneasily. They had to weigh half a ton each, and the thick ropes used for lifting and positioning them looked almost fragile by comparison. Hawk decided he’d keep an eye on them. He didn’t trust chandeliers. They always looked unsafe to him.
He noticed that the footman was still with them, waiting to be dismissed. Hawk nodded briskly, at which the footman bowed and left. Buchan watched this thoughtfully. Hawk and Fisher had surprised him with how comfortable they were with servants. As a rule, it was a knack most people didn’t have unless they were born into it. Most people found servants intimidating. Hawk and Fisher didn’t. Of course, there was a simple explanation; Hawk and Fisher weren’t impressed by servants because they weren’t impressed by anything.
Buchan looked out over the ballroom. It was a long time since he’d been welcome here. Almost despite himself, his mind drifted back to his last visit to Hightower Hall. Lord Roderik Hightower had been away on one of his werewolf hunts, and Louis was still in the army then. But Lady Hightower was there, to speak on behalf of the Family. The Hightowers and the Buchans had been friends for generations, but that hadn’t prevented the Lady Hightower from informing him in cool, passionless tones that unless he agreed to end his relationship with the Sisters of Joy, he should consider himself banned from High Society from that moment on. Buchan had said nothing. There was nothing he could say.
You’re a fool, Lady Hightower had said. You have good friends, position and wealth, a promising future in politics, and all the advantages your Family have given you. And you’ve thrown it all away for the sake of those women. You disgust me. Get out.
He had stood there and taken it all in silence, and when she was finished he nodded once, politely, and left. He’d stayed away from High Tory ever since. Now he was back, among familiar sights and sounds once again. He hadn’t realised how much he’d missed it all. He emerged from his reverie, suddenly aware that Hawk was speaking to him.
“We’d better split up,” said Hawk. “We can cover more ground that way, and hopefully we’ll be less conspicuous on our own.”
“Suits me,” said Fisher. “What exactly are we looking for?”
“Beats me,” said Hawk. “Some connection between the Hellfire Club and the God murders. It could be anything. A person, a place, a belief... anything.”
Fisher frowned thoughtfully. “These people, Buchan ... they worship the Darkness, right?”
“Essentially, yes,” said Buchan.
“They try to make deals with it. Offer it things, in return for power.”
“Yes, Captain.”
“Would they go as far as sacrificing people to the Dark?”
Buchan hesitated. “I don’t know. Some might, if they thought they could get away with it.”
“And it’s only a step from killing people to killing Beings,” said Hawk. “If they have already made a deal with the Darkness, and it’s given them enough power to kill Beings ...”
“Then we could be in a lot of trouble here,” said Fisher.
“Nothing changes,” said Hawk. “All right, let’s make a start. Each of you choose a direction, and start walking. Be discreet, but don’t be afraid to ask pointed questions. I’m not leaving here without some answers. Oh, and Isobel; let’s try and avoid Lord Hightower. Right?”
She nodded, and Hawk slipped into the milling crowd, letting the ebb and flow of people take him where it would. Everywhere he looked there were flushed faces and over-bright eyes and strained, brittle laughter. The sense of anticipation was almost overwhelming. And yet without Hawk’s foreknowledge of what the Hellfire Club was about, it would have been easy to see this as just another party. Most of the Quality here were young, half of them barely out of their teens. Partying desperately, squeezing what joy they could out of their lives before the inevitable time when they would have to take on their duties as part of the Families. There were only a few options open to the Quality: For the men it was either politics or the army, for women it was marriage and children. Perhaps that was why they’d formed the Hellfire Club, in search of pleasure and power with no price to pay. Or at least, no price they believed in.
Hawk knew better. No one encounters the Darkness and comes away unscathed. The scars on his face throbbed briefly with remembered pain.
He moved deeper into the crowd. Hundreds of people filled the huge ballroom from wall to wall, but Hawk wasn’t impressed. He’d seen grander gatherings in his time. And the more he looked, the more he became aware of the nervous undercurrent in the party’s mood. The laughter was too sudden and too loud, and the general brittle good cheer wasn’t fooling anyone but themselves. Many of the Quality were drinking like fish, but no one seemed to be drunk. Hawk frowned slightly. It was as though the Quality were trying to nerve themselves up to something. Something frightening ... and dangerous.
Buchan wandered aimlessly through the crowd, looking for familiar faces. Most of them here were too young to remember him, and his shame, but clearly there were some who did. They looked the other way, or turned their backs on him. None of them wanted to talk to him. It wouldn’t be safe. Some of his shame might rub off on them. Buchan grabbed a glass of wine from a passing servant’s tray and drank deeply. Not a bad vintage. A damn sight better than the cheap muck he usually drank.
He hadn’t been aware of how lonely he’d been until he came back here, and realised how much he’d had to give up. All the food and wine and comforts. The security of belonging. Hawk and Fisher might be contemptuous of High Society, but they couldn’t know what it meant, to be a part of it. The Quality were Family and friends and lovers, and more than that. They shared your life from the cradle on. On good days and bad days and empty days, they were always there. They seduced and protected you, love
d you and hated you, and kept you safe from the outside world; made you feel part of a greater whole. It was comforting and reassuring to have the same faces always around you, people who understood you sometimes better than you knew yourself. He hadn’t realised how much he missed it all, and how much there was to miss.
The God Squad was his family now, but they were no substitute for what he’d given up. Tomb was a friendly enough sort, but he had no interest in anything save his magics and his books, and he was too sober by far. The sorcerer meant well, but the God Squad was his life, and nothing else really mattered to him. And Rowan was a pain in the posterior. Spent all her time poring over ancient books and papers, and fllling the house with chemical stinks. He’d tried to talk to her about her theories and beliefs, but most of the time she just answered his questions with grunts and monosyllables. On the few occasions when she condescended to explain something to him, he was damned if he could follow it, for all his expensive education. All he could grasp was that Rowan didn’t believe in anything much but desperately wanted to believe in something. So desperately that there was no room in her life for anything but the search.
Buchan looked slowly around him. It was a long time since he’d considered how much he’d given up for his darling Annette. And though he loved her more than anything else in his life, there were times he hated her too, for what that love had cost him. He pushed the thought firmly aside, and moved on through the crowd of turned backs and averted faces.
Hawk finally spotted a familiar face, and strolled nonchalantly over to join him. Lord Arthur Sinclair was well on his way to being drunk, as usual. The last time Hawk had seen Lord Sinclair, he and Fisher had been clearing up after the Haven elections. Sinclair had stood as a candidate, on the No Tax On Alcohol Party. Also known as the Who’s For A Party Party. He never even looked like winning, but he didn’t let a little thing like that dissuade him from holding a celebration party long before the results came in. It was two days before he sobered up long enough to ask who’d won.
Sinclair was a short, round little man in his mid-thirties, with thinning yellow hair and uncertain blue eyes. He smiled a lot, at nothing in particular, and was rarely without a glass of something in his hand. He was a third son, who’d never expected or been intended to inherit the Family estates. He had no talents, no gifts, no aptitudes, and no interest in anything but parties. His friends thought him a pleasant, harmless little chap. Always ready for a song or a joke or another drink. His Family treated him like dirt for the most part, and tried to pretend he didn’t exist. He had no sense of self-esteem, and no chance to build any. And then his father and both his brothers died in the same battle, and the title and estates fell to him, along with the not inconsiderable Family fortune. His mother died soon after, from a broken heart some said, and he was left all alone. He’d been Lord Sinclair for almost five years, and had spent most of that time trying to drink himself to death, for want of anything better to do.
Hawk approached Sinclair and nodded familiarly to him. Sinclair smiled back. He was used to being treated as a friend by people he didn’t recognise or remember. There’s no one so popular as a drunk with money.
“Good party,” said Hawk.
“Marvelous,” said Sinclair. “Dear Louis never stints on these affairs. Would you like a drink?”
Hawk nodded, and Sinclair poured him a generous glass of pink champagne from one of the bottles in a nearby ice bucket. Hawk sipped at it cautiously, and refrained from pulling a face. Far too sweet for his taste, but that was the Quality for you. With their taste for sugar in everything, it was a wonder they had any teeth left at all.
“So, when does the excitement start?” said Hawk, trying not to sound too vague.
“Soon,” said Sinclair. “Do I know you?”
“We’ve met briefly, in the past.”
Sinclair smiled sadly. “That covers rather a lot of ground, I’m afraid.” He emptied his glass, and filled it again. “You’re new here, aren’t you?”
“That’s right,” said Hawk. “I’m here about the Club. The Hellfire Club.”
“Aren’t we all. My little fancy seems to have caught on. I had no idea it would prove so popular.”
“This was your idea, originally?”
“Indeed. My one and only good idea. Would you like to hear about it? I do so love to talk about it, and everyone else has heard the story by now. You know about me, of course. Everyone does. My parents’ generation never tire of holding me up as a Bad Example. Not that I care. I never wanted to be head of the Family. I was happy with my parties and my poetry. I used to write poetry, you know. Some of it was quite passable. But I don’t do that anymore. I couldn’t see the point. When they all died and left me alone, I couldn’t see the point in anything anymore. I mean, they weren’t always very nice to me, but they were my Family, and one or other of them was always there, making sure I didn’t hurt myself too badly. I do miss them.
“I don’t believe in anything much anymore, but I keep looking. There has to be something; something real to believe in, apart from just chance. Only sometimes, I think there isn’t. I think that rather a lot, actually, but a few drinks usually helps. I tried religion for a while. I really thought I was on to something there. But there were so many religions, and I couldn’t choose between them. They couldn’t all be right, but they all seemed so sure of themselves. I’ve never been sure of anything. Then I met this fellow on the Street of Gods. Marvelous young sorcerer chappie; Bode, his name was. He gave me the idea for the Hellfire Club. He was very interested in the power you could get from tapping the darkness within you. Of course, the idea seems to have got a bit muddled since all these other people got involved in the Club....
“I liked Bode. He was always good company. Bit too intelligent for his own good, but then, that’s sorcerers for you. Had this very intense girlfriend, all sarcasm and deep insights. I was ever so upset when I heard he died just recently.”
He drained his glass, and looked thoughtfully at another bottle in the ice bucket. Hawk’s thoughts were racing furiously. He’d come here looking for a connection between the Hellfire Club and the God murders, but he seemed to have stumbled across a connection to a completely different case. Sinclair must have met Bode while the sorcerer was carrying out his mysterious commission on the Street of Gods. But who was this girlfriend Sinclair met? Hawk frowned as another thought came to him. Given the appearance of the second Dark Man on the Street of Gods, maybe the two cases weren’t separate after all. Maybe everything was connected....
Hawk had just decided he’d better press Sinclair for more details, when someone tapped him hard on the shoulder from behind. He turned round to find himself facing three large and openly menacing members of the Quality. They were all taller than he, and they all looked as though they worked out regularly with heavy weights.
“Can you smell something?” asked the leader of the group loudly. He sniffed at the air and grinned nastily. “I smell a Guard. No mistaking that stench. But what’s a dirty little Guard doing at a private party? A private Quality party?”
“I’m here on official business,” said Hawk, careful to keep his voice calm and unthreatening. It was obvious the three Quality were looking for trouble. Anywhere else he might have obliged them, but not here. The ballroom was full of hundreds of their friends, all of them Quality. They could cripple him or kill him, and nothing would be done. And he daren’t lift a finger to defend himself. You could, under very rare circumstances, arrest a member of the Quality, even put them on trial, but it still had to be kid gloves all the way. The Quality were under no such restrictions. At best, they’d give him a good kicking and put him in hospital, just for the fun of it. He didn’t want to think what they might do to Fisher.
“An official investigation,” said the group’s spokesman. “Did you hear that? Doesn’t it just make you shiver in your boots? I don’t give a damn about your investigation, Captain. No one here does. We don’t have to. This is our place. We don??
?t allow your sort in here. Is that clear?”
Hawk started to reply, and the leader hit him open-handed across the face. Hawk saw the blow coming and rode most of it, but he took a step backwards despite himself. His cheek flared red from the impact, and a thin trickle of blood ran down his chin from a split lip.
“You’re going to have to talk louder, Captain. I can’t hear you if you whisper.”
Hawk smiled suddenly, and a fresh rill of blood ran down from his split lip. The leader of the three Quality hesitated, suddenly uncertain. The Guard’s smile was cold and unpleasant, and far too confident for his liking. He glanced quickly about him to check his two friends were still there. His confidence quickly returned. The Guard wouldn’t dare try anything. The first sign of violence, everyone would turn on him. He opened his mouth to say so, and the Guard’s hand shot forward and fastened onto his trouser belt. The Guard took a good hold, and then twisted it suddenly and jerked upwards. The leader’s voice disappeared as his throat clamped shut. Tears sprang to his eyes as his trouser crotch rammed up into his groin. He tried to stand on tip-toe to ease the pain, but it was all he could do to get his breath. He grabbed desperately at the Guard’s arm, but the thick cords of muscle didn’t give an inch. The Guard twisted again, crushing his groin, and a fresh wave of pain welled up through his belly, sickening him.
Hawk brought his scarred face in very close to the Quality leader’s. “You don’t talk like that to a Guard. Not now, not ever. Is that clear?”
The leader nodded, and tried to force out an answer. Hawk twisted his hold viciously, and the man’s face went white.
“Is that clear?”
The leader nodded frantically, and Hawk let him go. He collapsed into the supporting arms of his friends, who looked just as scared and confused as he did. Hawk fixed each of them in turn with his single cold eye.