A thin sound entered my awareness. An alarm clock beeped and beeped, incessantly and I tried to summon the effort to hit the snooze button. My limbs felt like lead and even a small effort was too much. I dearly wished someone would turn the damned thing off. Gradually I became aware of other sounds. There was a rattling rasp, rhythmic and almost regular, which waxed and waned with the pain in my throat and, under that, the low hubbub of activity in a distant room. Aches drifted into focus, my arms, my chest, my legs all throbbed with dull persistence.
Then I remembered. The water, the hammer, the cold. It all came back to me in a wash of recall. I struggled to open my eyes, finding the light blurry. A voice spoke to me. "It's all right, you're safe."
It was an effort to turn my head towards the sound. Her face moved into my field of vision and resolved slowly into focus. Her lips curved upwards slightly and she laid a cool hand on my forehead. "Sleep, Niall. Let your body heal."
Whether through some magic of hers, or simply because I was too weak to hold onto consciousness, I slipped back into dreamless sleep.
When I next awoke, it was quiet and the lights were dim. The beeping noise had gone and my eyes fluttered open to see Blackbird curled in the chair beside my bed, asleep. The chair, the room and the bed told me this was a hospital. There were the small noises, murmurs and rattles percolating through the fabric of the building, telling me it was night. I didn't have the heart to disturb her; she curled around herself with her spiralled curls falling over her face, her hands tucked under her chin. I closed my eyes and let the sound of her breathing lull me back into sleep.
Sunlight woke me next. A bar of white resolved itself into a gap in the curtains as I blinked and stretched, my muscles protesting and joints cracking as I shifted position. I groaned and rolled onto my side away from the brightness. She was resting her chin on her forearms on the side of the bed, watching me, her eyes sparkling green in the light. "Hello," she said.
"Hello." My voice sounded hoarse, even to myself. "What time is it?"
"It's nearly eight o'clock. How do you feel?"
"Sore," I admitted. "Like I've been on wash, rinse, heavy load, intense cycle, with repeat. "
"You're getting better."
It was good to know the aches and twinges accompanying every movement were a sign of improving health.
"What happened? Did we make it? Did Ben finish the knife?"
"It's all handled. Don't fret. You made it across and he finished the knife. It's all taken care of."
"But we have to get it to Claire." I pushed myself up onto one elbow, making my head swim and precipitating a thumping headache.
She leaned over and pressed me gently back down, the weight of her hand outweighing my meagre strength.
"It's being done today, in a few hours. The preparations are all in hand." She smiled. "We did it, Niall. We beat them."
I collapsed back to the bed, confused. "What day is it?"
"It's Tuesday. I thought you were going to sleep all week. Are you hungry?"
My stomach growled in response. "Starving."
"I'll go and see if I can rustle up some food for you." She made to stand, but I caught her hand, despite the tubes taped to my arm. "Stay."
She eased herself down again and I rested my hand on hers. Just the touch of her was a kind of therapy. "I was sure I'd lost you," she said, quietly.
"I had a plan," I told her. I explained how I had planned to slip beneath the water and then use the sixty-first nail to transfer the hammer across beneath the surface of the river and emerge victorious on the other side.
"That would never work. The hammer is iron. It's about as antithetical to magic as you can get." I let her explain what, for her, must have seemed like an elementary mistake, mainly just for the sound of her voice. She was amazed that I been stupid enough to try it.
"Well, how else did you think I was going to cross?" I asked her.
As soon as the words came out, I knew it was a question I should have left unasked. It silenced her and the shadow of it moved behind her eyes like something lurking in the depths. The answer was simple. She hadn't.
I squeezed her hands under mine and she did not look away.
It struck me that she had let me make my decision and been prepared to live with the consequences, but still she had waited, hoping against hope for a miracle. Perhaps I had been granted one.
"What happened in the tunnels?" My memory of it was fragmented and strangely unreal.
"After you went into the water, we waited for what seemed like an age. Raffmir started pressuring for me to call an end and I kept trying to put him off. It was getting to the point where I was going to have to concede when you appeared on the other side. After you pulled yourself up the rungs on the far bank, Solandre lost it completely. She faded into spectral form and reached across the river towards you. Raffmir tried to stop her but she was obsessed. She was going to kill you. I did the only thing I could think of. I pulled the Dead Knife from my pocket and made it as hot as I could and then stabbed her."
"I thought she couldn't be hurt physically."
"I thought so too, but the heat might have hurt her enough to get her attention away from you. "
"And did it?"
"It did more than that. Ben told me that if powders get spread into the air at a certain density, they can ignite. Fire spreads though them like a chain reaction, superheating the air and causing a shock wave. Effectively, she exploded." I tried to take in what she was saying. "What about Raffmir?"
"There was nothing he could do. He was hurt slightly in the explosion; nothing lethal, unfortunately, but by the time he realised what had happened it was all over. His sister had broken the laws of trial and he knew her life was forfeit. He was forced to accept the outcome and the fate of his sister, though he didn't like it. "
"Did he say anything?"
"Very little. He conceded the trial and said he would honour the outcome. Then he said that if the formalities were concluded he would take his leave. He's such a prig. His sister's just been blown to bits and he's discussing formalities. "
"So he left."
"Her ashes either drifted away on the water or blew away on the breeze. He just climbed back up onto the gantry and vanished into the dark. I expect he'll have some explaining to do when he returns to his world, but they will have to honour the outcome as he has. It's our way. "Ben had been thrown into the river by the force of the blast but fortunately for you, he can swim. He climbed up the rungs after you and hauled you up onto the side. He pumped as much water as he could out of your chest and put you into the recovery position. It was all he could do. By that time I'd crossed the river and could take over." The shadow reached her eyes again. "What?" I asked her.
"I made him finish the knife, Niall. I want you to know that. I couldn't carry you out of the tunnels alone, but I made him finish the knife before we carried you up together and called an ambulance." Her eyes were dark and haunted by the decision.
The security we had all fought for was dependent on finishing the knife and restoring the ceremony. Without that, every sacrifice would have been meaningless. "It's OK. I would have done the same. And I'm still here, aren't I? You can't get rid of me that easily." A little of the haunted look dissolved. There was a hint of a smile and I smiled back. She leaned forward and pressed her warm lips to mine in a long languid kiss. I shifted, sending shooting pains down my back and grunted at the pain. She stopped and drew away; worried she had hurt me. "Don't stop," I whispered.
She kissed me again, this time warming me in a way that was completely incompatible with my physical state. When she stopped, her eyes were filled with promises. She squeezed my hand.
"I really should let them know you're awake. The policeman let me stay in here on condition that I promised I would let him know as soon as you woke."
"Policeman?"
"We brought you up out of the tunnels, but I couldn't revive you. Your lungs were still waterlogged and I had no idea how long you could hang on for. Your glamour had completely faded and you looked like you did when I first met you. That worried me more than anything else."
I put my hand to my cheek, feeling the stubble where I was unshaved, knowing my face was my own. "We called an ambulance and Ben told them he'd dragged you out of the Thames from one of the piers. He's a convincing liar when he has to be. The ambulance crew found your wallet and your driving license on the way to the hospital. By the time I'd caught up with you at the hospital, they knew who you were and the police were here waiting for you. There's been an officer on the door ever since."
"Can we slip past them? Get away before they realise I'm awake?"
"Well we could, but I think your daughter might be upset if you did."
"Alex?"
"The police called Katherine and told her you were in hospital. They returned yesterday morning and came to see you while you were still unconscious. Alex was very grown up about it, but you could see she was worried. I don't think you can just vanish without seeing her. "
"But what about the police?"
"If you run now, they'll never leave you in peace." She stood slowly and left me with that thought while she went to tell the officer I was awake and to try and rustle up some food for me. As soon as she'd gone, the officer came into the room, nodded once to me and then stood by the door, looking blank and impersonal. "Am I under arrest?" I asked him.
"Not at the moment, sir. But the senior officer would like to speak with you regarding our enquiries. "
"So I can leave if I want to?"
"I think it would be better if you stayed, sir. There's a doctor coming to check you over and the investigating officer is on his way."
I rested back against the pillow, trying to organise my thoughts ahead of the interview I knew was coming. The doctor arrived before either Blackbird returned or the police arrived. She was a well-groomed, middleaged Asian lady who spoke with a light Birmingham accent.
"I'm Dr Agraval. I've looked after you since you were brought here on Sunday. How are you feeling?" She held a torch up to look into my eyes. "Not bad considering."
She took my hands in hers and turned them over, looking at the palms of my hands which were crisscrossed with a lattice of newly formed scar tissue. "Do you always heal this quickly? "
"Not usually," I answered truthfully.
"Hmm. Any headache or disturbed vision? Do you feel nauseous?"
"If I turn my head too quickly, my head thumps a bit, but apart from that, no."
She felt under my chin and around my neck. "Your glands are swollen."
"Is that bad?"
"Not necessarily. With the amount of water you took in, your immune system has gone into overdrive." She put a temperature probe into my ear and read off the digital display. "Your temperature's within the bounds of normal. Can you open your shirt please?" She held the metal end of her stethoscope in her hand to warm it while I struggled with the unfamiliar buttons of the pyjamas they had provided for me, just as Blackbird returned with a plate of sandwiches.
"I leave you for a moment and you're taking your clothes off for another woman," she remarked casually. The doctor ignored her. I guess she'd heard it all before. We went through the routine of breathing in and out while the doctor pressed the stethoscope to various parts of my chest and then my back. I eyed the plate of sandwiches, my stomach making alarming noises. "There's nothing wrong with your appetite, then?" she said. I shook my head.
"You can have those after I've taken your blood pressure. Eating will affect the result."
She slipped the armband up around my arm and began inflating it while Blackbird removed the cling film and put the cheese sandwiches on the table by my bed. After a few moments the doctor released the arm band and declared open season on the sandwiches. They were plain white bread and plastic cheese, but I wolfed them down. They tasted wonderful.
"Anything else bothering you? There are no broken bones, but sometimes a ligament strain can be just as painful."
"I feel a bit bruised," I told her around a mouthful of sandwich.
"Remarkable. I have patients who take months to make this much progress and you've only been here a couple of days."
"I guess I'm just fortunate I didn't take in much water."
"When they brought you in you were unconscious. Your lungs were full of foul muddy water and you were a hair's breadth from dead. We had to drain your lungs and give you oxygen to keep you alive."
"I'm just lucky, I guess." I exchanged a look with Blackbird.
"Beats me," she stood up and tucked the stethoscope into a pocket of her white coat. "Maybe it's something in the water. Maybe we should be bottling it and selling it as a treatment."
"That might not work," I said, chewing sandwich.
"I've seen stranger things, but not many," she said. "Are you up to talking with the law? They're hopping from foot to foot outside waiting for a shot at you. I told them I would see you first, but frankly there's nothing wrong with you that rest won't cure. I'm more worried about them than you. They look like death warmed up. "
"I suppose I had better see them."
She nodded and stood up. "If you get any dizziness or nausea I want to know immediately. I've written you a prescription for painkillers, so ask the nurse if you need them." She turned to leave. "Can I go home?"
The doctor turned back. "I would prefer to keep you in for observation, but I can't keep you here. See how you feel after you've spoken to the police. You may find you tire pretty quickly. Your system's repairing the damage and you may not have much energy for anything else."
She went to the door and opened it. "You can come in now." She nodded to me and left the door open. Two men entered. The first was short for a policemen, but wide with it. He stepped into the room sideways, more out of habit than need. His mid-brown hair was cut short and his dark jacket looked as if he might have slept in it. The second man looked innocuous next to the forcefulness of his colleague. He regarded the room with a passive expression taking in the bed, the chair, Blackbird and me in one sweep. I suspected that if you asked him in a month's time what was in that room, he would be able to describe it all.
"We would like to talk to you about an incident at your flat last Thursday night," the second man said, without preamble.
"Sure. Come in." They were already in, but I wanted to make the point that this was my room, at least for now. "We would like to speak with you alone, please. Constable, would you take the young lady for a coffee or something. You can take a break. We'll come and find you if we need you."
"Sir." The constable held the door open for Blackbird and they filed out, closing the door quietly after them. The stocky man went to the side table and put down a small handheld tape recorder. He pressed Record. "Recording, one, two, three." He stopped the recorder and rewound it, then pressed play. His voice repeated itself from the machine. He rewound it again and pressed record.
"This is Detective Sergeant Bob Vincent with Detective Inspector Brian Tindall." He looked at his watch and then timed and dated the interview, naming the hospital and the ward. "DI Tindall leading."
He turned and sat in the chair by my bed and took out a notepad. The chair was too reclined for him. He perched on the edge of it, looking uncomfortable. DI Tindall walked up and down in the meagre space at the end of my bed. He stopped and looked at me. "Would you state your name, please, sir, just for the record. "
"Petersen. Niall Petersen. "
"Age? "
"Forty-two. "
"Residence."
"I live at one hundred and forty-five Cromwell Road, South Ealing." DS Vincent noted this in his book. "Mr Petersen, we would like to know what you can tell us about the events of last Thursday night. "
"Very little, I'm afraid." I needed to keep this to a minimum. I knew I would find it hard to lie and that they would probably be able to tell if I did.
"You were discovered running down the street in tracksuit bottoms and a T-shirt at oh-four-seventeen. You were carrying a rucksack."
"As I told your colleagues, I was going away."
"One of my colleagues is dead. He was attacked by a virulent biological agent in your back garden. His face was eaten away to the point where if we didn't know who he was, forensics would have a hard time identifying him. "
"I'm so sorry."
"Sorry? You hear that, Bob? He's sorry." He strode around and leaned over the bed, grabbing a handful of pyjama and hauling me within inches of his face. "He had a wife and a four month-old baby. She isn't even allowed to see the body. Shall I let her know how sorry you are?" He shoved me backwards onto the pillow and stared down at me. He was breathing hard, trying to control his anger.
"There was nothing I could do. I wasn't even in the garden."
"You didn't see what happened."
"No."
"Or hear?"
"Well, I could hear some of it. They were on the radio. But I didn't know-"
"I quote: 'Tell them not to touch it. Tell them!' That was you, wasn't it?" He leaned over me. "Why did you say that if you couldn't see?"
"I didn't know. I was guessing."
"Guessing!" His face was inches from mine and spots of spittle landed on my face. I daren't raise my hand to wipe it away.
"Is that your usual technique for interviewing key witnesses, DI Tindall?"
The voice was new and came from the doorway. Tindall stood slowly, fighting to regain his dignity as the colour in his face faded slowly. He wiped his hands down the front of his jacket and turned to the door. DS Vincent stood up.
"Only I don't remember reading any of that in the procedures manual and I wondered if I had somehow missed that part."
"No, sir," said Tindall.
I registered the uniform of the man standing in the doorway holding an A4-sized white manila envelope and wondered why Tindall was addressing him as "sir". Then I noticed that the uniform was immaculate. The buttons shone, and the shoulders and collar were covered in gold braid. It wasn't a regular constable's uniform.
"I think," said the man, entering the room, "they can hear you in the entrance hall, two floors down. "
"Sorry, sir."
"And it may be that you need some emotional distance from this case."
"I'm fine, sir. Really."
"Nevertheless, I think you should withdraw. "
"Sir? We were just getting somewhere."
"Really? Was that the part where you were leading the witness or the part where you were compromising the integrity of the evidence?"
There was silence. Tindall looked to Vincent for support, but Vincent wouldn't meet his eyes.
The new officer spoke calmly and reasonably. "I think it would be a good idea if you took a long step back from this case and regained some objectivity. I would like your report on my desk at oh-nine-hundred tomorrow. "
"But, sir-"
"I've just come from seeing our dead colleague's family, detective inspector, and I am not in the mood to debate it." DI Tindall's shoulders slumped. "Yes, sir."
"Get moving. DS Vincent will stay to assist me with the interview."
"You, sir?" said Tindall.
"What?"
"It's just that you don't usually take such a direct interest in a case, sir."
"I have a man in the morgue and another on extended leave for compassionate reasons. Two others are in shock and barely holding it together. That makes me four men down. Can you think of a more appropriate time for me to take a direct interest in a case, inspector? "
"No, sir."
"Good. I'll see you in my office at nine sharp with your report."
"Yes, sir." Tindall took one last look at me and then turned away. The new officer pushed the door gently closed behind him. After a moment there was sharp noise that might have been a bark or a muttered expletive. We could all hear the anger in the footsteps gradually fading beyond the door.
The new officer spoke. "DI Tindall leaves the room. Assistant Commissioner Mark Perkins taking over the interview. Do you mind if I sit?" He indicated the edge of the bed. "No, er, help yourself."
I was unsure if this was a reprieve. Was having an assistant commissioner conduct the interview an improvement or simply a sign that things had just become a lot more serious?
He sat on the edge of my bed while DS Vincent sat uncomfortably perched on the bedside chair. "I think it would help if you took us through the events of last Thursday night. From the beginning, please."
I went back to what I had said earlier, rehearsing the events in my head. Perkins hardly spoke, letting me give my own version of the story. I missed out the bit about my glow and using magic to seal the door, but apart from that I told it as it had happened. When we got to the part where they found the thing in my garden, I paused. "Could I have some water?" I asked.
Vincent passed me the water and I took several sips. They didn't prompt me or pressure me to continue, but waited patiently.
"There was something wrong," I told them. "The power was flickering and there was this strange laughter in the garden. It was freaking me out. I told them not to touch it. I tried to warn them, but it was too late. "
"It?"
"I know this is going to sound strange, but it had a man's voice but a woman's sound. Does that make sense?"
"You're not the only one to say that. Why did you warn them not to touch it?" Perkins prompted gently. "Are you kidding? Have you seen the walls of my flat? It wasn't like that before. Whoever was in my flat did that. If they were in my garden then I was staying well away from it."
"Why didn't you warn them earlier," he asked.
"I don't know. They told me it was safe. They said it had gone."
"Does the name Gerald Fontner mean anything to you?"
"No."
"Are you sure?"
"Yes."
He opened the envelope and extracted a photograph.
He handed it to me.
"Do you know this man?"
I studied the picture. The man was almost certainly dead. He was lying on his back amongst garden debris. He wore a suit and looked strangely peaceful. "No. I've never seen him before. "
"Are you sure? Take your time."
"I'm sure I would recognise him if I knew him. I don't."
"This is the man in your garden. His name is Gerald Fontner. He has – had – a wife and two children, lived in Hampstead. Company director for a car dealership. "
"I don't know him."
"What kind of car do you drive, Mr Petersen?"
"I don't. There's no point in having a car in London. There's nowhere to park."
"Do you know why Mr Fontner came to your house that night?"
This was dangerously close to a question I didn't want to answer.
"Maybe that stuff made him crazy."
"Can you think of any reason that Mr Fontner would want to harm you?"
"Maybe he wasn't himself?"
"Do you know what the substance is, on the walls and ceiling of your flat, Mr Petersen?"
"It smelled like some sort of mould." I was dancing around the questions.
"It's mildew. Plain ordinary mildew. We've had it analysed. We had the lab drop everything so we could get early identification of the substance."
"Mildew doesn't do that, does it?" I asked.
"We have a number of theories, Mr Petersen. None of them are very satisfactory. Did you paint your walls with anything unusual?"
"No."
"Have you had any strange substances in your flat?"
"No."
"Was there mildew in it before?"
"No. It was freshly decorated before I moved in. I've only been there a year."
"We have a forensic team looking at your flat. They will find evidence if there have been drugs in the house. Is there anything you want to tell us now? "
"No. I don't use drugs. There's nothing for them to find."
He watched me for a long moment, assessing my reaction. "They tell me that you were dragged from the river, barely alive. How did you come to be in the Thames, Mr Petersen?"
"I don't remember being in the Thames," I told him, schooling my face. The river I had almost drowned in was the Fleet, not the Thames.
"Did someone throw you in?"
"Not that I know of."
"Then what were you doing in the river? "
"Drowning?"
He smiled slightly. "People don't normally go swimming in the Thames. If there is something you have become involved in that's got out of control, then maybe we can help."
"I haven't done anything wrong," I told him. "I haven't broken any law."
"You don't always have to break the law to end up out of your depth, Mr Petersen. The police are here to protect the citizens from harm and to keep the Queen's peace. If you are being threatened or intimidated…? "
"No one is threatening me." They weren't. Not now. "Understand that you can talk to us if there's a problem. We may be able to help. "
"Thanks, but I think I'm OK."
He paused for a moment, thinking, then stood up and picked up the tape deck. "Interview ends at…" He checked his watch and recited the time and date. Then he handed the recorder to DS Vincent.
"If you could get a transcript typed up for me for tomorrow, I can go through it with DI Tindall in the morning."
"Yes, sir."
"And you could find the constable who was keeping an eye on Mr Petersen for us and let him know he can go home."
"You're not going to arrest me then?" I asked.
"The police are not in the habit of prosecuting witnesses, Mr Petersen. We would like you to come down to the station and sign a copy of your statement, but apart from that we won't be needing anything else from you, unless there's something more you would like to tell us? "
"No. There's nothing else."
"Very well." He waited while DS Vincent gathered up his notebook and tape recorder and went in search of the constable.
"Do you play golf, Mr Petersen?"
"Golf? No, why?"
"The head of the CPS plays golf."
"CPS?"
"The Crown Prosecution Service. The people for whom we must gather the evidence and to whom we must make our case. The head of the CPS is responsible for deciding who gets prosecuted and who does not. "
"And he plays golf?"
"Apparently he plays with some of the Queen's Bench Division at the Royal Courts of Justice. I believe you are acquainted with one of the masters there, by the name of Checkland?"
"Yes. We met quite recently." Was this another interview, without the recorder this time?
"I just wanted you to know. If I find out that you were in any way responsible for the death of one of my officers, it won't matter who you know or what favours you are owed. Do I make myself clear?" I took a deep breath. "Yes. I understand."
"Good morning, Mr Petersen." He quietly pulled the door closed behind him.
After a minute or two, Blackbird reappeared. She was not alone.
"Daddy!" Alex threw herself onto the bed, wrapped her arms around my neck and hugged me fiercely. "Careful, darling, he's still not well." Katherine, a few steps behind our daughter, was being Mum. "Sorry, she's been dying to come in here ever since she first heard you'd woken." She tried to ease Alex from around my neck.
She managed to move her from lying on my chest, but my daughter was not going to be parted from me so easily. She lay alongside me, her head on my shoulder, curled into the crook of my arm, her curls tickling my nose as I stroked her hair. Katherine gave up trying to separate her from me when I nodded it was OK. It was better to concede to being hugged than to have her fight to stay. "How are you feeling?" Katherine asked.
"I've been worse," I reassured her, noticing Blackbird slipping out of the room past a man who was standing in the doorway, looking out of place. Tall and bearded, he was caught at the boundary, unwilling to enter, but also unwilling to leave. I looked curiously at Katherine.
"This is Barry," she introduced him. "Barry brought us over in his car."
My Fey hearing found the evasion in that sentence, and the look between Katherine and our daughter confirmed that there was more to this than they were saying. They were terrible at keeping secrets at the best of times.
I nodded to him. "Hi, Barry, you don't have to stand in the doorway. You can come in." He edged into the room, still looking uncomfortable, as if he didn't think he ought to be here.
Katherine took a deep breath. "Niall, you might as well know now. Barry is my fiance, we're getting married." I looked between the two of them, while my daughter hugged me extra tightly as if I might erupt. It took me a moment to realise that a week ago it would have sparked a deep sense of resentment in me, but a lot had changed in the past few days.
"Well, that's great news," I told them. "Congratulations, to you both. Really." Barry smiled at this positive reaction. I offered him the hand that didn't have a drip attached to it and he shook it gently, conscious of my debilitated state.
Katherine was more sceptical about my reaction.
"We've been seeing a lot of each other, but I didn't know how to tell you. Alex here has been sworn to secrecy, haven't you, sweetheart?" She reached over and ruffled her hair.
"Katherine, it's your life. I wish you every happiness together."
"Thanks," she said, and seemed to mean it. "And I'm not the only one with developments on the relationship front. I've met your girlfriend. She seems very nice. What an unusual name."
A moment of panic hit me when I realised I had no idea what name she'd given them. "Is it?" I said lamely. "Yes, I've never come across a Blackbird before, have you?"
"It's kind of a nickname that stuck," I explained.
"Well you've been keeping her quiet, too. Where did you meet her?"
"I met her on the Underground and she insisted on taking me for coffee. We've not been together very long."
"Don't look so embarrassed, Niall. It's good that you've found someone, even if she is a lot younger than you. She's barely left your side, you know, and she's been worried sick about you. We've got to know each other over the past day or so. I like her. "
"So do I."
Reassured that there wasn't going to be a row between her parents, Alex sat up on the bed, taking in the room and its contents.
"Dad, what do these buttons do?" She pointed to a row of buttons on the wall.
"I have no idea, sweetheart. Just don't press any of them."
Katherine interceded. "Barry, would you mind taking Alex and seeing if you can find something for her to drink? I think I saw a water fountain near the door. "
"I don't need a drink. I'm fine," my daughter declared.
"Don't be difficult. You haven't had a drink for at least two hours and you know what you're like. You'll wait until there's no chance of getting one and then declare you're dying of thirst. Go on with you, you can come straight back to your dad once you've drunk it." She reluctantly agreed to go on condition that she could come back and Barry guided her outside. She was comfortable with him and they had clearly spent a lot of time together.
"He's OK, your Barry," I told her as he closed the door behind him. "He's a good man, Niall, a gentle man."
It was a remark I would have taken as critical before, but I took it as another positive sign that I could accept her assessment without inferring it as critical of me. "So, did the situation you were involved in get sorted out? Is that how you ended up in the river?" This was the question she had manoeuvred Alex and Barry out of the room to ask, and I wondered how I could explain the events of the past days without telling her things that would only raise more questions than answers.
"I think it's safe to say it got resolved, Katherine. I don't think there is a threat to you or Alex any more, but it's made me look at my life in a whole new light. Things are going to have to change, that much I do know. In many ways they already have."
"You do seem different," she remarked, "but I still don't understand how you ended up in the river. Did you fall from a bridge? Did someone throw you in? "
"No. It's very complicated and the less you know about it, the better, but you can trust me when I say I had no intention of ending up swimming in the Thames." I could say that in the knowledge that there had never been any possibility of swimming with the hammer slung across my shoulder – besides, I had been in the Fleet, not the Thames.
"I'm not sure I like these secrets, Niall, not when Alex and I are involved."
"You're not involved. I worked very hard to make sure you stayed out of it. And I'm not the only one with secrets, am I?"
"Well I just hope that there's an end to it, whatever it was."
Blackbird appeared, closely followed by a nurse who straightened the bed, took my temperature again and updated the chart on the end of my bed. Then Alex reappeared and I was treated to a full description of her trip abroad, including the aeroplane, the hotel, the city and all she'd seen and done.
The description was more of a monologue than a conversation, though both Katherine and Barry were solicited for opinions on whether something was "awesome" or simply "cool". She asked me about the needle in my arm and then asked whether Blackbird dyed her hair and then she got to wondering whether anything would really happen if she pressed the buttons behind the bed.
Eventually Katherine declared that I must be tired and, despite protestations from Alex that I couldn't be tired as I had only just woken up, she was shepherded out with promises that she could return the next day if I wasn't discharged.
"That," I remarked to Blackbird when they had gone, "is a real incentive to feel better."
"She was worried about you."
"Yes, I know. And I do appreciate her concern. But she's so full of life, sometimes, she wears me down. "
"And she's only one," she reminded me, walking around to sit beside me on the edge of the bed. I grimaced, but then smiled at the thought of what was to come.
"The doctor says the water has cleared from your lungs and with the amount of antibiotics they pumped into you, I shouldn't think you'll get any infection for years."
"I don't think it works like that," I told her.
"Really?" The corner of her lips turned up in that halfsmile and she tilted her head sideways, slightly. "Don't tease. I'm not up to teasing yet."
"Oh? And here was me hoping you might be up to a little more than light teasing in a day or so. "
"I've only just regained consciousness," I reminded her. "Actually you were conscious that night, for a short while. You've recovered really quickly. The doctors are already wondering at your rate of recovery. You were off the oxygen after twelve hours and have been improving ever since."
"Is that your doing?"
"No, water really isn't my thing. It's your body that's changing. Just look at your hands. When they brought you in, they were covered in cuts. They put several stitches into your fingers. That was less than two days ago. Now you would think the scars are months old. Fortunately, the nice lady doctor says some people stick together well, and you're one of them. Still, you've given even her pause for thought."
"Do you think I should play sick for a while?"
"No, I think you should get yourself out of their sight as soon as possible. You don't want to show them any more than you need to. Seriously, if I'd realised you would heal this quickly, I wouldn't have called an ambulance."
"Where else can I go? The flat is still torn apart from Solandre's visit and I doubt the police will let anyone near it until they've completed their forensics. "
"Well, that's the other thing I wanted to talk to you about. I can't go back to being Veronica, other than for a short while to quietly sort out her life and give her an excuse to disappear. I think you know now that going back to your job isn't really a possibility. "
"What am I going to do for money? I have Alex and Katherine to support, and if you're not going back to the university then neither of us has a job."
"What's that?" asked Blackbird. She tensed, suddenly deeply concerned.
A noise came from beyond the door to the corridor outside, like a pendulum tick, slowly increasing in volume. It had a sharp metallic quality and a frequency that matched a steady walking pace. It slowed as it approached my door and Blackbird stood, facing the door, body set. The door opened slowly and a tall gentleman wearing a dark grey jacket over a black T-shirt and charcoal trousers stood in the doorway. His eyes swept the room before he entered, taking in each detail, reminding me of the way the quiet policeman had assessed the room, except he didn't look much like a policeman. He looked like a bouncer.