Black London 05 - Soul Trade

it.” She leveled her gaze at Pete.“Preston Mayflower was a good man. He was invaluable to us.”
    She went to a painting hanging over the piano, a bland landscape showcasing a few crookedly painted cows, and took it off the wall. Behind it, Pete saw a digital screen, and when Morwenna brought it to life a map of the UK appeared, covered with different symbols and bands of color. “These are all the known trouble spots in the Black,all instances of mages going rogue, hautings or possessions, and uses of black magic. We track areas where the Black and the daylight world mingle, too.”
    “Thin spots,” Pete whispered. The map was so rife with color that it appeared to be diseased, and she shivered looking at it. If ever there was tangible proof things were sliding over the edge into chaos, this was it.
    “Preston was able to locatethem for us,” Morwenna said. “He was a geomancer—he detected unbalanced power in the earth, the Black poisoning the land, that sort of thing.”
    Pete took a seat so her posture wouldn’t give her away. She kept her expression neutral, and thanked her lucky stars that Jack didn’t know any more than he did. He couldn’t trip her up.
    “Preston was in Hereford, scouting out some unrest reported by thelocal mages. We thought it might be a case of a demon summoning gone wrong. But when Preston came back…”
    Morwenna drained her glass and rolled it in her hands. Her cheeks flushed from the drink, and she screwed her eyes shut. “He was different. Before, he was my friend. But something happened to him. He became erratic, and he refused to come back to Manchester. We dispatched another mage, JeremyCrotherton, to bring him back and find out what the Hell was going on, but…”
    She sighed and rubbed her fingers across her temples, carving vicious red indents in the skin. “We think the Prosperians got to Preston. He started threatening to go public, to reveal us to the daylight world, and we haven’t heard from Jeremy since he went to Hereford. Poor Preston,” she said softly. “He didn’t deservethis.”
    Morwenna drew out her mobile and scrolled through her voice messages. “This was the last message from Jeremy,” she said. “You can see why we’re concerned.”
    A hiss of static emanated from Morwenna’s phone, and then a reedy voice came through. “Morwenna, it’s Jeremy. I can’t … I mean, I can’t keep this up for much longer. Preston’s off the rails, he’s…”
    A scraping sound cut off the voice,and then there was a crash and a scream. Jeremy cut back in, panting so heavily Pete almost couldn’t make out the words. “I’m sorry, Morwenna,” he rasped. “I tried, but the soul cage is too strong. This place is too strong. For the love of all you hold dear, don’t send anyone else to—” Jeremy’s voice hitched, and then it was obvious he had dropped his mobile. “What are you doing here? You stayaway from me! You stay—”
    The message cut off with a screech of feedback. Morwenna thumbed her voicemail off and tucked her phone back into her pocket, resuming her defeated posture. “The next time I saw Preston, he was in ruins. Raving, completely mad. The Prospero Society got to him and they twisted him and they made him do things for them.”
    She abruptly sat up and stared at Pete. Pete feltthe gaze penetrate all the way to her core. This was the Morwenna she’d first seen—cold and devoid of feeling. “I know he reached out to you at the train station, Pete. It’s very important that you tell me what the two of you talked about. Preston was not a well man and he’d become paranoid, convinced we were out to harm him.”
    Pete felt the weight of the soul cage in her pocket. If Morwenna knewshe had it, there’d be no chance of her walking away from this. “What you said,” she shrugged. “He told me to stay away from you, and he rambled a bit. I got away as quickly as possible.”
    “And the soul cage that Jeremy talked about,” Morwenna said. Pete could see the vein jumping in her neck. It mirrored Pete’s own heartbeat, and Jack’s. He was sitting perfectly still, wire-strung, ready to runor fight at a moment’s notice.
    Pete met Morwenna’s gaze and didn’t blink. “I don’t know what that is,” she said evenly. “Sounds like a nasty bit of work, though. Preston’s doing?”
    “Just something Jeremy thought might be useful intelligence,” Morwenna said, then sat back. Pete felt as if she might pass out. She looked