The Purple Emperor Read online

  ‘What’s the point of being invisible if we just walk up to the desk and ask?’

  The fog cleared a little. Henry stared at her, openmouthed. ‘Invisible?’ he echoed.

  ‘What do you think that cone was for?’

  ‘We can’t be invisible,’ Henry said. ‘I can see you perfectly.’ The perfectly bit wasn’t quite true since his vision was still swimming, but he could certainly see her.

  ‘Well, of course you can see me. I can see you and you can see your hands and I can see my feet because we’re both invisible,’ Blue said in the tone of one talking to an idiot child, ‘and try to keep your voice down—the spell dampens sound, but if you make too much noise they’ll hear you. You might try not to break wind again either—people will wonder where the smell is coming from.’

  ‘I didn’t break wind!’ said Henry hotly. He realised he was speaking loudly and dropped his voice. ‘I didn’t,’ he whispered.

  ‘Well, someone did,’ Blue said dismissively. She lost interest in breaking wind and asked, ‘Where will they be holding Mr Fogarty?’

  ‘I don’t know,’ Henry said a little crossly. The only other time he’d ever been inside a police station was because of a missing tail-light on his bike.

  ‘Well, would it be in the back, or through that door? Or do they have a separate building?’ Blue asked.

  ‘I don’t know!’ Henry said.

  Behind them the door opened and two constables came in gripping the arms of a surly youth in a cracked leather jacket. The sergeant opened up the counter-top without a word and the constables escorted the boy through a door in the back.

  ‘That was a prisoner,’ Blue said. ‘I’m sure that was a prisoner. They must have cells through that door.’

  She might be right, but Henry couldn’t see what good it would do them. The sergeant had closed the counter back down, and even if he hadn’t done, the two constables had shut the door behind them. Invisibility sounded great, but you couldn’t actually go anywhere without making it look as if doors kept opening of their own accord. He started to say something, then stopped as his stomach churned.

  Blue said, ‘Come on!’

  To his utter horror, she skipped forward and vaulted over the counter, landing nimbly—and silently—to one side of the sergeant. He didn’t so much as cast a glance in her direction. ‘Come on,’ she said again, waving encouragingly to Henry.

  Henry’s heart sank. He’d never been much of an athletic type, even when he was feeling well. If he tried to do what Blue’d just done, he was sure to trip up and fall in a heap.

  ‘Henry—’ Blue called impatiently.

  Henry trudged shamefully over to the counter. Nothing ever seemed to go smoothly. He couldn’t vault, but it was unthinkable to let Blue rescue Mr Fogarty on her own. He looked away so he wouldn’t have to meet her eye and cautiously climbed up on to the counter, holding his breath so as to make as little noise as possible. There wasn’t much room and he knew he was going to knock the mug of tea over and he knew Blue must think he was a complete wimp compared to all the athletic boys she fancied, but he didn’t know of any other way to do it safely.

  He was straddling the counter when the sergeant reached out for his tea. Henry flattened himself against the surface and prayed. The phone rang and the sergeant set his mug down to pick it up. The flex trailed over Henry’s invisible bottom, forming a delicate curve, but for the moment the sergeant didn’t seem to notice.

  ‘No, that’s Rosewood Street, isn’t it?’ he said into the phone.

  Henry started to wriggle out from under the flex, but before he could complete the manoeuvre, the sergeant cradled the phone again. Henry slid gratefully over the counter to stand beside Blue, who was looking at him curiously. The woman typing was only a few feet away, the sergeant closer still. Was it really safe to say anything? He decided he’d have to risk it and whispered, ‘What do we do now?’

  ‘Wait and watch,’ Blue said. ‘We’ll slip through the door when everybody’s distracted.’

  It sounded a straightforward game plan, except that the two constables emerged from the back (closing the door firmly behind them). A three-way conversation started about somebody called Jackie Knox. Then the typist said, ‘You boys want a coffee? I’m making one for myself.’ She got up from her desk and suddenly everybody was milling about behind the counter.

  Out of the corner of his eye, Henry could see Blue moving gracefully in what looked like a sinuous dance as she skilfully avoided body contact: she was obviously well used to being invisible. But Henry wasn’t. He dodged and ducked like a rhino and every movement increased the sickness in his stomach.

  The woman finished handing out coffee, thank God, and went back to her desk. A door opened in the waiting area and Mr Fogarty came in with a young uniformed policeman by his side. They walked together to the front door.

  ‘Thank you for your cooperation, sir,’ the young policeman said. ‘Sorry to have troubled you.’

  Mr Fogarty grunted and walked out into the street.

  ‘Did you see that?’ Blue hissed delightedly. ‘They’ve let him go.’

  The phone rang on the counter and the sergeant reached for it again. ‘Nutgrove Station,’ he said pleasantly. Another phone rang, this time beside the woman who was typing. She picked it up while moving the mouse of her computer with her other hand. ‘That’ll be Tom,’ remarked one of the constables behind the counter. The girl covered the mouthpiece and called across to the man who didn’t look like Elvis, ‘Can you come over to the counter a minute, Mr Robson?’ The female half of the old couple said sharply, ‘What about us? Haven’t got all day, you know.’ One of the constables said, ‘It really shouldn’t be much longer, love.’ Blue said urgently, ‘Come on, Henry.’ She swarmed over the counter like a rhesus monkey. The sergeant suddenly exploded, ‘Yuuuck!’ and dropped the phone. He stared down towards the floor, his eyes wide with astonishment. ‘Where did that come from?’ he demanded. The two constables turned to look with a mixture of revulsion and amazement. Henry had thrown up on the sergeant’s trousers. The results were all too visible.

  They steamed a little.

  It was weird the way Mr Fogarty kept looking at a spot above his left ear when they talked, but Henry supposed that’s what happened when somebody couldn’t see you.

  ‘Mistaken identity,’ Mr Fogarty said irritably. ‘Bank clerk picked out somebody else in the identity parade.’

  ‘Why do you think Henry got so sick?’ Blue asked. She was visible again, but Henry had only just started to flicker.

  ‘It’ll be his shirt,’ Mr Fogarty said firmly.

  ‘What’s wrong with my shirt?’ Henry demanded. They were back in Mr Fogarty’s home and the nausea, thankfully, was dying down a little.

  ‘Synthetic fibres,’ Mr Fogarty told him in sepulchral tones. ‘They conflict with the energy the spell cone released. Get a resonance going and you’re sick as a parrot.’

  ‘You mean he’s going to be ill any time he uses magic?’ Blue put in.

  ‘Only if he wears that shirt. Get him to take off all synthetics and try another cone. If I’m right, he should be fine.’

  ‘Just a minute—’ Henry said. It wasn’t just his shirt. His trousers were synthetic too. And he didn’t even want to think about his boxer shorts.

  But Blue mercifully cut in. ‘We’ll have to experiment some other time, Gatekeeper. I think it’s important you and I get back to the Realm as soon as possible.’

  ‘What’s happened?’ Fogarty asked.

  ‘My father’s body has disappeared,’ Blue told him tightly. ‘And there’s a plot to assassinate Pyrgus.’

  Fogarty looked pained. ‘Not another one.’ He took a deep breath and blew it out vigorously. ‘You’re right, we’d better go. You got an open portal?’ When Blue nodded, he glanced across at Henry. ‘You coming?’

  Henry blinked. ‘I’d have to sort stuff out at home first.’ He had to get some dried food to leave for Hodge, but what he really meant w
as that he needed to sort out his mother, figure out an excuse for leaving home for a while.

  Fogarty said, ‘You do that, then join us fast as you can. You can use the transporter I left you.’

  Blue and Mr Fogarty headed for the door, but when they reached it, Mr Fogarty turned back. He took a small box from his pocket and pressed it into Henry’s hand. ‘Just get dressed in natural fibres before you use them.’

  ‘What’s this?’

  Mr Fogarty gave one of his rare grins. ‘Little present for your mother.’

  Seventeen

  There was something wrong with Pyrgus. He was skulking in his quarters when they found him and Fogarty had seen healthier-looking corpses.

  ‘You OK?’ Fogarty asked at once.

  Pyrgus looked at him with dark-rimmed eyes. ‘Yes.’

  ‘Sure?’

  Pyrgus nodded. ‘Yes.’

  Fogarty sniffed. ‘Don’t look it.’

  Blue said, ‘He’s right, Pyrgus—you look awful.’

  Pyrgus shrugged. ‘Didn’t get much sleep last night. Look, can we talk about important things? Have you told the Gatekeeper what’s happening?’

  ‘About our father’s body and the assassination plot? Yes.’

  Pyrgus glanced behind them. ‘Didn’t Henry come with you?’

  ‘He’s following on,’ Fogarty said. ‘Any developments?’

  Pyrgus licked his lips nervously. ‘I questioned the guards. They saw nothing to account for the disappearance of my father—nothing. At one inspection the body was there, at the next it wasn’t.’

  ‘Magic?’ Fogarty asked.

  ‘Don’t see how,’ Blue said. ‘I’ve never heard of any thing that would spirit away a body.’

  ‘Neither have I,’ Pyrgus said. ‘But we’re not wizards, so there could be a spell we don’t know about—maybe something recently developed. I think we should assume it’s something of that sort, some unknown magical intervention, and since there’s nothing we can do about that at the moment, I don’t think we should waste any more time investigating. I think we should wait until whoever did it shows their hand.’

  ‘You think whoever did it might want a ransom for the body?’ Blue said.

  Pyrgus nodded. ‘Probably.’

  He was lying. Fogarty was sure of it. What he didn’t know was why.

  ‘I think we should concentrate on this assassination story,’ Pyrgus said. ‘I hope you don’t mind, Blue—I’ve asked your friend Madame Cardui to brief the Gatekeeper directly.’

  ‘No, of course I don’t mind,’ Blue said. ‘Is she here or do you want Mr Fogarty ’

  ‘She’s waiting in the anteroom. I asked her to join us as soon as Mr Fogarty arrived. I’ll—ah, here she is now.’

  Fogarty turned as the door beside him opened. Something struck him like a thunderbolt.

  Eighteen

  Henry opened the box in his bedroom. Six rust-coloured cones nestled on a bed of cotton wool. He stared at them nervously.

  There was writing on the inside of the lid in the curious faerie script that looked like Arabic. But as he glanced at it, some layered magic must have triggered since the shapes began to re-form into English.

  Henry’s heart leaped. These were the things Mr Fogarty had told him about—the spells that made people forget. Now he didn’t have to make up some stupid story for his mother. All he had to do was use a cone on her and Aisling and he could disappear for as long as he liked without their ever noticing he was gone. They’d remember nothing about him until he came home again. He could join Blue in the Realm and maybe help save Pyrgus for a second time and impress her so much that maybe, just maybe ... Thank you, Mr Fogarty—it was perfect!

  Except it wasn’t quite perfect. He was allergic to magic.

  Henry set the box down carefully on the bedside table and went over to his wardrobe. Stuff avalanched out when he opened the door. He poked through it listlessly, trying to find natural fibres.

  He unbuttoned his synthetic shirt and replaced it with a cotton T-shirt that said BABE MAGNET on the front. It was a present from an aunt who should have known better and it wouldn’t have been Henry’s first choice, but it was all he could find that smelled clean. He stripped off his trousers and boxers and replaced them with cotton Y-fronts and a pair of baggy combat jeans. He’d never worn the jeans before—they were a present from the same Babe Magnet aunt and quite hideous—but at least denim was a natural fabric and he could always change back into something a bit less startling after he’d zapped Mum and Aisling.

  There were voices in the kitchen and when he went in he found his mother and Aisling sitting at the breakfast bar drinking tea. They had their heads close together, but whatever they’d been talking about stopped suddenly when Henry entered.

  ‘Why are you wearing that dreadful T-shirt?’ Aisling asked at once. ‘It’s perfectly vulgar and an insult to women.’ She turned to their mother and said seriously, ‘Make him change it, Mummy.’

  Henry narrowed his eyes, visualised himself, then reached across and cracked a lethe cone beneath his sister’s nose. A swirl of dusty smoke curled round her head. She jerked back in sudden alarm, but then her face went blank.

  His mother was staring at him with a stricken look. ‘Is that a drug?’ she gasped, wide-eyed. Panic set in. ‘It’s amyl nitrite. Good God, Henry, what have you done to your sister?’

  ‘Sorry, Mum,’ Henry murmured. He visualised himself again, then cracked the second cone beneath her nose.

  He had a moment of panic when she went blank too. Aisling was still sitting frozen, her mouth slightly open, her chest unmoving as if she’d stopped breathing. Now his mum had turned into a statue as well. He couldn’t have killed them, could he? He wasn’t used to working magic—in fact this was the first time he’d actually done it himself. Maybe he’d done something wrong.

  He reached out cautiously and touched her arm. ‘Mum … ?’

  She couldn’t be dead. Not even Mr Fogarty would give him a box of cones that killed people.

  Or would he? Mr Fogarty did strange things sometimes.

  Suddenly they wrere talking again, his mother and Aisling, something about Aisling’s ghastly Pony Club. They ignored Henry, as if he wasn’t even in the room. Or as if … as if they’d forgotten him completely.

  Cautiously, Henry began to back out of the kitchen. An unfamiliar feeling was bubbling in his stomach and after a moment he recognised it as joy. He’d done it! He’d worked the magic. He was a forgotten man and that meant he was free! He could go to the Realm. He could see Blue again. He could go to the Realm now!

  He took the stairs two at a time. Mr Fogarty’s portal control was in a shoebox pushed back on the top shelf of his wardrobe, along with the ornamental dagger he’d been given when Pyrgus had made him Iron Prominent, Knight Commander of the Grey Dagger.

  He pulled the shoebox down and opened it. The portal control was no longer there.

  It was Aisling! It had to be Aisling! She was the only one who’d sneak into his room and steal something. His mother was perfectly capable of going through his things—she had no sense of private property except when it came to herself—but she wouldn’t have taken the control: it looked innocent enough for her to think it was something to do with his computer. Besides, if it had been his mother, she’d have found the dagger, and that was still there. It had to be Aisling, little cow!

  Henry stormed down the stairs, but neither his mother nor his sister was in the kitchen now. He turned, heading for her room and bumped into Aisling coming out of the downstairs loo.

  ‘You stole my control!’ he shouted furiously.

  Aisling blinked. ‘Who are you?’ she asked dreamily.

  Nineteen

  Hamearis Lucina, the Duke of Burgundy, was a big man who liked to accentuate his bulk by wearing padded armour and, in the winter, furs. In place of a sword, he habitually carried a war axe with an inlaid silver handle, the sort of weapon that was too heavy for a lesser man to wield.

  The
ferrymen kept giving him curious, furtive glances. He was well known throughout the Realm, and not just in his native Yammeth Cretch, but beyond that he was an individual with presence, a type who oozed charisma as well as strength—characteristics that had helped make him Black Hairstreak’s closest ally. He would have attracted attention even as a complete unknown.

  He stepped off carelessly as the ferry docked on the Imperial Island. Belatedly, one of the sailors moved to help him, then pulled back. They were wondering, he knew, why he travelled without an entourage, but the move was deliberate. Lesser men would have needed a host of followers to impress. Hamearis, on this occasion, was accompanied by a single cloaked and hooded servant. But he knew his message would have all the more impact for that.

  There were no guards on the torchlit pathway that took him to the Purple Palace and he expected none. He had been questioned and searched thoroughly (twice!) on the river bank before being permitted to enter the ferry. He had been allowed to retain his axe, a badge of rank as much as a weapon, only after it had been clipped and sealed to his belt so that he could not draw it easily. But he gained a little satisfaction from the fact that both searches had missed his assassin’s dagger strapped to the inside of his left leg—an elaborate misdirection spell had diverted the attention of the probing hands: the same spell that ensured his cloaked companion was not searched at all. Not that he planned to assassinate anyone today, but it was always nice to know Imperial security could be beaten.

  The path curved, emerged from a screening belt of ornamental trees and the Purple Palace swung into view, illuminated from the base of its walls by enormous, half-buried glowglobes. It was a forbidding building, raised in the old cyclopean style and designed as a massive fortress rather than an aesthetically pleasing residence. The ancient purple stone had weathered almost to black (although he was told it still shone purple in certain lights) and crouched like some great squat beast on the little hilltop in the centre of the island. Hamearis approved. Such a fortress was designed to strike terror into an enemy, and he admired good military psychology wherever he happened to find it.