Nightside 11 - A Hard Days Knight

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    This is an original publication of The Berkley Publishing Group.

    This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental. The publisher does not have any control over and does not assume any responsibility for author or third-party websites or their content.

    Copyright © 2011 by Simon R. Green.

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    Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

    eISBN : 978-1-101-47523-2
    1. Taylor, John (Fictitious character)—Fiction. 2. Private investigators—England—London—
Fiction. 3. Knights and knighthood—Fiction. 4. London (England)—Fiction. I. Title.
PR6107.R44H37 2011
823’.92—dc22
2010037673

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Things you need to know:
1. The Nightside is the dark, secret, brooding heart of London, hidden away from the rest of the world, where magic is realer than you can bear, where lives and souls and everything else you can think of are always up for sale, and all your worst dreams go walking openly in borrowed flesh. It’s always dark in the Nightside, always three o’clock in the morning, the hour that tries men’s souls. Hot neon burns over rain-slick streets, bars and clubs never close, and gods and monsters go walking hand in hand. You can find anything you ever dreamed of in the Nightside; but watch your back. It might find you first.
2. I’m John Taylor, private investigator. I wear a white trench coat, but don’t let that fool you. I don’t do divorce work, and I wouldn’t know a clue if I fell over it. I do, however, have a special gift that means I can find anyone or anything, no matter how carefully they’ve hidden themselves. I do my best to find the truth for my clients; but in my experience, the truth won’t make you happy, and it won’t set you free. Walk the streets of the Nightside, and you’ll hear a lot of bad things about me. Most of them are true. I stay in the Nightside because I belong here. With all the other monsters.
3. Walker is dead. The one and only Voice of the Authorities, the man in charge of the Nightside, inasmuch as anyone was or could be ... The only man who could make us all play nicely together is dead. I killed him. I had good reason, but he’s still just as dead. So I have to be Walker now. Take over his role and act as representative for the new Authorities. The punishment must always fit the crime.
4. Something very old and very powerful has come to the Nightside. That ancient and legendary sword, Excalibur. It isn’t what you think it is, and it never was. Puck told me that; but everyone knows you can never trust an elf. They always lie—except when a truth can hurt you more.
5. And, last of all ... When I finally got home, after killing Walker, wanting only to slump exhausted into a chair and nurse my bitter soul ... I found a long, sword-shaped parcel waiting for me on my kitchen table. Some days, you just can’t get a break.

ONE
    It Came in the Post
    I stood in my kitchen, already so tired and used up I