The Bride Wore Black Leather

money. In fact, I could use quite a lot of it.”
    “Never knew you when you couldn’t,” I said. “I’ll let you know.”
    He shrugged, and went back to stuffing his face with elephant. I wandered off into the crowd again.
    Where I met Mistress Mayhem, a tall, lithe, blue-skinned beauty, with a massive frizz of black hair that fell all the way down her back to her very slender waist. Descended, at a great many removes, from the Indian death goddess Kali, she was currently wearing an outfit from the film
Avatar
, cut to show off as much dark blue flesh as possible. She offered me some glowing green snuff from a chased silver snuff-box, and when I politely declined, she filled both her nostrils with enough of the stuff to blow a normal person’s head right off. She sneezed briefly, in a very ladylike way, and tucked the snuff-box back into her cleavage.
    We’d worked a few cases together, and she’d tried to have me killed a few times. Business as usual, in the Nightside.
    “Weren’t you going out with Jimmy Thunder, last time I saw you?” I said to make conversation.
    “Oh, him! The Norse God for Hire,” said Mayhem. “We are currently not speaking. And anyway, he’s banned from the Ball of Forever for excessive smiting last year. Just as well; he can lower the tone of any gathering simply by being a part of it.”
    My next encounter was with Hadleigh Oblivion. He appeared before me, emerging from the crowd with casual grace, smiling easily, as though he knew something I didn’t. Which, given who and what he was, was probably true. Hadleigh knew a great many things other people didn’t know and wouldn’t want to. He was perhaps the most powerful, and certainly the most influential, of the legendary Oblivion brothers. Tommy Oblivion was the Existential Detective, specialising in cases that may or may not have actually happened. Larry Oblivion was the Dead Detective, the Post-Mortem Private Eye. And Hadleigh . . . was a product of the Deep School, and the current Detective Inspectre, only called in on cases where reality itself was under threat. He was wearing his usual long, black leather coat, dark as a scrap of the night, all the better to show off his stark white face and his mane of jet-black hair. He also had sinister dark eyes and a downright unnerving smile. Hadleigh always gave the impression that wherever he was, that was where he was supposed to be.
    I made a point of nodding easily to him, conspicuously unimpressed. You can’t let people like that know they’ve got to you, or they’ll walk all over you.
    “Something’s going to happen here,” Hadleigh announced, quite casually. “I can feel it in the air, like a thunder-storm drawing closer. I take it you feel it, too?”
    “Oh yes,” I said. “Something like that.” I didn’t feel like mentioning the Anonymous Gentleman’s warning note. It’s important to keep up appearances. “But what could be so important, as to bring you, me, Dead Boy, and Razor Eddie to the same place? Can’t be a coincidence.”
    “Coincidences are the universe’s way of arranging things neatly,” said Hadleigh.
    “Are you immortal?” I said bluntly.
    “Bit early to tell yet,” said Hadleigh. “Whatever this thing is, it had better get a move on. I can’t stop long; I’ve been called in to consult on a case with the London Knights. They actually requested my presence, which is unusual enough that I’ve agreed to go out into London Proper to give them a helping hand.” He fixed me with a cool, considering look. “You know the London Knights. Is it true that King Arthur has returned to them?”
    “Yes,” I said.
    “Is he everything the legends say?”
    “That and more.”
    “Interesting,” said Hadleigh. “I wonder what he wants with me . . . But consider this; if Arthur Pendragon is back, can Merlin Satanspawn be far behind?”
    “Oh God, I hope not,” I said.
    “Leave Her out of this,” Hadleigh said firmly. I can never tell when he’s joking.
    “You’re Hadleigh Oblivion, aren’t you?” said Charlotte ap Owen excitedly, waving for her camera-man to catch up with her.
    Hadleigh smiled, produced a pale blue rose from out of nowhere, and held it up before Charlotte. He then brought the rose up to his mouth and inhaled steadily. The colour faded out of the petals, and we all watched speechlessly as Hadleigh breathed in the life essence of the flower. One by one, the colourless petals cracked and fell apart, falling in