An Embittered Witch, page 14
She shook her head.
‘He’s a lawyer, somehow connected to the Kin. A bit of a goof, really. Hugh said he’s not much of a magic practitioner. Anyway, he’s looking for Margaret too, something to do with tying up loose ends with her trust fund.’
Cate nodded. ‘And?’
‘I can use him to find her, I think.’ I laid out my plan, what I had of it. I would somehow call Margaret, with Rob’s help, using the trust fund as an excuse. How I was going to call her, I wasn’t sure, but she would respond to this.
Cate listened closely. ‘A little weak, but better than nothing,’ she said. ‘I’ll need to be present when you do this, in order to subdue her. But no need to tell him that.’
‘How are you going to… subdue her?’
Cate smiled, a tight grimace of her lips, and she patted my hand. ‘Don’t you worry about that. I have it all in hand.’
Apart from the lights behind the bar and the spotlight on the singer, the room was lit only with stripes of LED lights along the walls, the colors changing in a rhythmic pulsing beat to the overly loud music. Purple. Pink. Red, green, blue then purple again, all neon in their intensity and only serving to highlight the unchanging shadows in the corners.
I hesitated at the doorway. Subterfuge didn’t sit well with me, but I had no choice in this. I had to save my own butt. If the Covenanters could get Margaret, then Cate and Johanna together would convince them to leave me out of it. I straightened my shoulders and walked in.
I almost didn’t see Rob, his long legs folded over each other as he waited at the end of the bar, an empty glass in front of him. I wondered how long he’d been waiting. He appeared hypnotized by the wailing woman on the small stage, her metallic dress shooting out rainbows of reflected colors like a human disco ball.
‘Hey.’
His eyes slid toward me and he nodded, then moved his legs so I could take the stool next to him.
I shook my head. ‘Not here. Let’s go outside for a walk or something.’
He looked around the bar. There were very few people there, and none of them were from the Kin Britannica. ‘What’s wrong with here?’
‘Too loud,’ I replied. ‘And the flashing lights give me a headache.’
He accepted this explanation and climbed off the plush stool. I waited till we’d exited the building and had gone past the hotel lobby windows before I paused. The half-melted snow underfoot was refreezing in lumps, making walking treacherous.
The street was as noisy as before, the flow of cars and even bicycles never ending, the press of people on the sidewalks pushing past us. The sharp wind whipped down the snow upon the hooded figures.
‘Not the best evening for a walk,’ he noted. ‘Come on, let’s get out of this crowd.’
He made as if to turn down one of the alleys but I stopped him with a shudder.
‘No, don’t,’ I said, remembering what could lurk in those spaces, in the Hutong alleys. ‘Here, let’s go in here.’
I darted into the closest door that looked like a public place.
‘A whisky bar,’ Rob said with pleasure as we entered through the glass door. Directly ahead of us before the entrance into the bar itself, was a tall glassed-in display case. Tiny spotlights within shone on boxes that fancy whiskies came in, the labels indicating every famous and rare distillery in Scotland.
Inside, the discreetly lit bar stretched the whole length of the deep and narrow room. There were few customers at this early hour. We took a table at the back.
‘And cocktails,’ I noted, taking the large menu in hand.
A server appeared before us silently. His black suit blended into the shadows, but the crisp white shirt glowed in the blacklight coming from somewhere in the room. He smiled, and his teeth shone white too.
‘I’ll take the Macallan,’ Rob told him, almost rubbing his hands in anticipation.
I glanced down at the drinks listed in Chinese figures with English translations below and my eye was caught by some of the ingredients. Metaxa with chocolate? Egg white? Herring?
‘Eh, just a rum and coke for me,’ I muttered, putting the card back on the table.
Rob looked askance. He was about to say something, but then he shrugged and shut his trap.
The waiter brought us our drinks. Rob sipped appreciatively, letting the taste linger on his tongue before he swallowed. Then he cleared his throat.
‘So, Margaret. You’ve changed your mind?’
I nodded as I played the straw against the ice cubes. ‘Yeah, I want to help you find her.’
‘Why the secrecy?’
The glass jumped in my hand and I looked up into his hard gaze. Those blue eyes which were so bright against the snow along the Great Wall were gray like steel in this dim light.
‘No secrecy,’ I said, as if puzzled by his question. ‘You said her trust fund is in danger, and I want to help her.’
‘I said her trust fund contract needs to be tightened in order to protect it from abuse. There’s no need for secrecy there, unless you have reason to believe someone or some organization might be looking to abuse it.’
‘Well, you know, the Kin…’ I shrugged. I took the straw out of my drink and laid it on the napkin, and then took a good long swallow from the glass for courage.
‘Yes, I’m familiar with the Kin, but no, that doesn’t tell me anything. Explain why you don’t want the Kin to know of our meeting.’
Jesus. This guy must be a good lawyer. I wouldn’t want to run against him in court. I had to give him something close to the truth, because I had a feeling those eyes would cut through any bullshit.
I drew a deep breath in as I thought, then let it out. ‘Okay. I’ll be up front with you. You’ve heard of the cursing of Zande and Nachtan?’
He nodded.
‘The Kin suspect that she’s behind them.’
He stared at me for a whole minute. That might not sound like a long time, but it was long enough to be very uncomfortable as the subject under scrutiny. This whole meeting was going wrong. I was supposed to be the one in charge here, using his bureaucratic need to tie up loose ends as a ruse to lure Margaret to justice and to stop her rampage of curses on the greatest witches of our time.
‘And?’ He prompted me to finish. He took another slow sip of his whisky and let it slide down his throat. He was in no hurry.
And he was forcing me to lie to him. I had to squirm out of this any way I could.
‘Why are you so interested in helping Margaret, anyway?’ I wasn’t just dodging his question, I was genuinely interested. ‘Does your law firm handle her trust?’
Rob set his glass down on the table. ‘I’m not a member of a firm,’ he said. ‘You could say Margaret is a client of mine.’
‘Either she is or she isn’t. A client, I mean.’
He nodded in acknowledgement of my point, then lifted his eyes back up to mine. ‘Fair enough. I manage her fund.’
Rob sat across the table, calmly waiting. It was my turn to answer his question now. I took another swallow of my rum and coke, and the ice cubes clinked against my teeth.
‘The Kin think I’m mixed up with her and I have to clear my name.’ I said it in a rush. It was a relief not to lie, even if that was only half the truth.
He pondered this statement. I could almost see him turning it over in his mind, looking for ramifications and possible scenarios. He took his time. I didn’t dare say anything else.
But then he reached his decision. He took one last swallow of whisky to drain the glass, then shook his head.
‘Then no. I respectfully decline your offer to help.’ He stood up as if to go.
‘Wait!’ I couldn’t believe he was bailing out on me. It wasn’t supposed to be this way. ‘But maybe we can clear her name too and, and she won’t come just for me because she’s pissed at me. I need you there with your trust fund issues. That’s the only thing that’ll get her to show her face.’
He shook his head again as he put his arms through his trench coat, that thin inadequate covering from the cold outside. ‘Sounds too much like a plan to capture her,’ he observed as he pulled one glove onto his hand.
‘But she’s guilty!’ I was standing up now in desperation. If I didn’t have Rob, I had no plan to reach Margaret and clear my name. ‘And, and wait.’
He paused before walking away.
‘Her trust fund,’ I said, hating myself even as I spoke the words. I thought of Rob’s shoddy clothing. No man would dress that way if he had the means to buy proper bespoke clothing. ‘It’s not going to be much good to her when the Kin capture her. If the rules are so loose, well, you might be able to let some if it flow your way.’
His eyes widened as the meaning of my words sunk in. I had surprised myself too. The Kin ways were rubbing off on me. That was my only excuse.
He rubbed his chin with his gloved hand, and shook his head. ‘You really don’t get it, do you?’
I stared at him, willing him not to turn his back, not to leave me in the morass of my own self-hatred of that moment. Give me a chance to regain my self-respect, I silently begged him.
‘I vowed years ago not to have anything to do with the Kin or organized magic,’ he said. ‘And I’m the heir to Lady Margaret’s father’s estate. I would no sooner steal from my own family than I would be mixed up any further with Kin like you.’
He looked down and pulled the other glove on. ‘I thought you were different,’ he continued softly, then looked back up at me. ‘I really thought you weren’t part of them. I was wrong.’
And with that, he left. Leaving me with the bill, I noted with the part of my brain that wasn’t sinking in despair.
Oh, yes, he was definitely Margaret’s kin.
Twenty-Four
I nursed my grudge against that wretched excuse for a lawyer, holding it close to my heart and reliving every awful moment of that meeting. I fumed to myself, having no other audience until much later that evening when Hugh returned to our room.
‘Still up?’ He was sweaty and his hair had the kind of dishevelment he only got when returning from a run. He was wearing Lycra.
‘Were you jogging in Beijing? In this weather?’
‘No, we, uh, I was at the gym. The hotel gym,’ he said. ‘Really feeling the lack of exercise, you know. And all the feasting. I’m becoming a bit of a porker. My suits won’t be fitting me soon.’
He jovially pinched his flat belly, then busied himself removing his damp clothing as he prepared for a shower. He hadn’t yet met my eye.
‘You said we.’ My voice was flat. ‘Who was we?’
‘Ah,’ he said, as if I’d said something brilliant. ‘Yes, Win was there. We met there at the gym.’ The bathroom door shut behind him and I soon heard the water running.
I turned off the bedside lamp and lay back against the pillows. So that’s how it was. He and Win accidentally meeting at the gym? Getting all sweaty together. I closed my eyes and looked inside, trying to gauge how I felt.
First and foremost, I hated Cate for pointing out her suspicions about Hugh and Win. Well, I hated her for all sorts of reasons, but that one was standing out right at that moment. I probably wouldn’t have given it a thought if she hadn’t brought it up.
And Hugh. Had he tried to cover up the fact that he’d been with Win at the gym? They had been spending a lot of time together, but only over the past few days. I shook my head. Ridiculous.
Win wouldn’t dare, would she? Pretending to be my friend so suddenly once she found out about me and Hugh. She was competitive, that girl. No, I couldn’t even think about it all.
Because. I squeezed my eyes further shut as if to block out the thought which crept up, the thought I was really avoiding. Because I found myself not really bothered. Not as bothered as I should have been.
Because I was too busy hating myself. I saw Dara Martin De Teilharde again through Rob’s eyes as if he’d been holding up a mirror, and I didn’t like what that girl had become. Not a pretty sight.
I sighed and turned over to stare at the open curtains. The lights of Beijing were just a distant glow from our twenty-first floor room. Win thought I had everything. A sponsor in the Kin to help me up the ladder of ambition, a guy who was equally poised. We were going to be the power couple of the Kin. Yet all this was so false.
All my victories were hollow. All my success was brought about by Cate, my father’s hated ex-wife. Cate, who was holding me hostage.
And now I had to find a way to entice Margaret into Cate’s clutches in order to save this sorry ass of mine. Which might not even be worth saving, except that I was innocent of her crimes, and I was going to fight to save me anyway I could.
Hugh was in the shower for a long time. I lay there, listening to the water play off his body, and tried not to think about anything anymore.
When I heard him finally come back to the room and ready himself for bed, I stayed with my back to him and pretended to be asleep. He didn’t try to wake me up.
In the last moments of drifting off, a realization dawned on me, one that strangely enough relaxed me enough to fall the last step. I’d been stung far more by Rob’s dismissal of me than the possible affair between Hugh and Win.
I had to change my plans. Rob wasn’t on board to help me lure Margaret into the clutches of justice, and after last evening’s meeting, I found I no longer had the heart in me for the hunt. His opinion of me had shaken me to the core, and I needed space and time to let them sink in.
Now that Cate was sure I’d been convinced to assist her with Margaret, Win was no longer assigned to dog my every footstep. She was free to help Hugh with translations. I had no idea how Cate was keeping herself busy during the days, and I had every intention to avoid her.
Sipping my morning coffee, I opened the sheers on the window and stared out, past the city with its never ending humanity and noise and volume, and I let my eyes rise up. Up past the bustle and smog, past the buildings, to the mountains beyond the city. Our hotel room faced to the west, not the north, so I didn’t see any of the watch towers we’d visited the other day.
The mountains in this view were free of human structures, at least from this distance. They rose in their majestic ruggedness, even in the winter the dark green of fir trees was visible above the city skyline of towers. Solid in their peacefulness, they’d been there forever, watching empires rise and fall.
I was seized with a sudden longing to be surrounded by the wilderness in those hills. How far away were they? From up here, it looked like the main road ran straight toward them. Was there a bus, or could I take a taxi?
I had no jobs to occupy me with the delegation. No one really cared what I did or if I was present. I wasn’t needed, I realized bitterly, to the Kin.
‘I’m taking a sight-seeing day,’ I said without turning around.
Hugh was behind me, I could see his reflection in the glass. ‘There are lots of tours, and so much to see,’ he agreed as he leaned forward in the mirror to knot his tie. ’Check at the front desk, they’ll arrange something for you. We’ll be going to the Forbidden City this evening, but there are the botanical Gardens and the huge museum.’
I had no desire to see the rest of the city. My experience with the Hutong had been all bad enough and I didn’t want to risk another run-in with a Lijiang Alley kind of place.
At the front desk, I requested a map of the forested, western area of the city, a packed lunch, and a taxi. I was all set.
The cab ride was long, at least a half hour through the endless traffic of cars and bicycles and mopeds and trucks. How could so many people exist in one place? With my driver’s limited English and my printed map of the area, I managed to convey to him my destination.
And then suddenly, we were there, at the foot of the mountain. It was a residential area, full of apartment buildings on small lanes, all nestled into the base of the rise. He stopped right at the end, where the mountain began, too steep for any architecture to perch on it. He pointed to a series of stone steps almost hidden in the trees, telling me in Chinese to take these.
It was a long way up, and I knew I couldn’t even see the summit from where I stood. A hell of a higher climb than even Signal Hill back home. Well, this was it. No way to go but up.
I walked up those steps for an hour or more, the air growing more crisp and clean every time I paused for a breath. As I rose, I felt freer as if I was losing the chains I’d been adding to myself, weighing me down. The chains of ambition, forged by my own actions, from every choice I’d ever made, all of this fell off me as I walked and let my mind be free in the mountain air.
There were no other people here. No other footprints in the half-melted snow on these stone steps, amazing considering the throngs on the roads below. And when I reached the summit, or near enough, I found myself on a road, more of a laneway really, a lonely path that wound around the hills and trees, with hardly a house in sight.
Cars had passed by earlier, I could see from the tire marks in the freshly fallen snow which blanketed everything in a quilt of silence. But apart from these few signs of humanity, I was alone. Just me and the birds in the trees.
As I walked, I contemplated what a strange thing this was, my decision to arrive here. I’d had no destination aside from needing to be surrounded by wilderness. Besides packing a lunch, I’d had no preparation, hadn’t even arranged for a ride home.
Yet, around the next bend, I found my destination.
The road hugged the base of the next rise of hills, and in a quiet corner, almost invisible in the snow, there was a tiny temple, or shrine. It was a simple structure, hardly bigger than a bus shelter. The roof was arched stone, and inside it held only an altar. The snow hadn’t entered this enclosed space, and I could see the remains of candles and incense on it.
I looked up past the roadside shrine and saw ruins rising into the mountain above me, built right into the rock by the looks of them. Intrigued, I followed what must be the path, my footprints crunching through the pristine snow.
