She returned to stitching Cassius’s neck, mending the torn flesh with the same gentle care she showed when sewing on a band patch. Loved her for that.
I turned to Church. “What about you?”
“Oh, heavens,” the big man said, casting a hand over his bald head, “in most of my lives, I was a glorified clerk—once in Parliament and, of late, looking after Henry’s affairs. Suits my sense of propriety. This was after my time in the British Expeditionary Force at Verdun and the Somme.” The Parliament thing made sense. Church’s words always had a kind of weight to them. Felt damned good hearing them used on your behalf,
which he’d done for me more than once.
I pointed at his bag. “You took your satchel?”
Church chuckled. “With some thanaturgic folk, there is no substitute
for hard-copy documentation regarding rights and ownership. I like to be prepared.”
“Am I going to see these patterns in everyone’s shadow, now that I’ve come back?”
Chuey marched back to the table, scratched at his buzz cut, and looked me in the eye. “You’ve said that twice now. What exactly do you mean by youcame back?”
I’d been struggling to make sense of it myself. “Like . . . a near-death experience, I guess. I got shot, same as Henry. Then, I fought my way back to my body. Woke up in the alley, right where they hit me.”
Chuey made the sign of the cross. “Bro, if you’re being straight, that’s pretty metal.”
“Pretty metal?” Cassius frowned, as Lady pulled the thread through his neck. “Do you mean polished metal hand mirrors?”
“No, man.Metal,” Chuey repeated. “It means awesome.” “Metal means awesome?” the centurion asked.
I half smiled. “Like admirable. Noteworthy.”
Cassius shook his head. “Modern English is not intuitive.”
Church gestured to quiet us. “We’re just glad you made it back, Jack.
Right glad, indeed.”
“So, I really am alive?” I asked.
“Very much so,” said Church. “You’re simply . . . more than you were before.” I’d read about people dying and coming back. But this whole second world? “This is insane. I’ve known you both for almost five years. Why didn’t you ever tell me?”
“Not our place,” said Church.
“Henry planned to tell you,” Lady added. “He was just waiting for the right moment.” She finished her stitching. “And speaking of right moments, how did your friend here happen to be available just when you needed him?”
Cassius gently took Lady’s wrist in his massive hand and traced her gold-threaded bracelet with his finger. “For much thesame reason I suspect you and Mr. Church first came to Mr. Wilkinson—to serve a
kinder master.” There was obviously more to Cassius’s story, but neither Lady nor Church pressed him on it. “I do regret the timing of it, though. If only I had come a minute earlier . . .”
Cassius told them what he’d seen and how I’d renewed his bindings. I barely heard any of it, though. I was looking from him to Lady to Church, a hundred questions running through my head. “Henry was a thanatist, then. Which means he could have crawled back to his body, like I did.”
Chuey pulled up a chair, laid the cleaver in front of him on the table, and crossed himself again.
“I pray he has,” said Church. “But whoever did this to him would be expecting as much. And while it would be a violation of thanaturgic law to try to prevent his return, thanaturgic law also prohibits attacking a thanatist in the first place.”
I could still smell Henry’s Bournemouth longleaf. Still see his easy smile. Still feel his hand on my shoulder. Only minutes ago, I’d been singing for him.
“But I believe I know why someone would try and kill Henry.” Church stood and took up his cane. “Would you all please follow me?”
He led us into the venue side of the Iron Horse and to the right side of the chest-high stage. He keyed open a lock and lifted a hatch that I’d always assumed was for side-stage gear storage. It led to a descending wooden stairway.
Church pointed down into the dark. “The Abyssal Steps. The only staircase in London that descends the Strata to all its levels.”
