City of Halves (6 page)

She thought about it. ‘You know when people say stranger things have happened? Well, right now, I'm not sure they have.'

He laughed. It lit him from within, making him seem younger, and his harsh beauty even more inhuman.

Lily coloured up. ‘Will I . . .' she hesitated, ‘. . . see you again?'

‘You want to?'

She nodded, chipping her toe into the carpet.

He pulled up his hood with his free hand. ‘You'll see me again.' And then he was gone.

Pulling off her jacket and dumping it, Lily opened her computer and turned it on. She began to search the internet for Regan Lupescar. Absolutely nothing.
Well, it's not as if I didn't expect that. ‘Will I see you again?' Great work, Lily. Nothing like looking desperate
. Yet the idea of not seeing him again . . .

She sighed and tried to keep her mind on the job in hand. Searches for the Eldritche brought up myriad pages of folklore, but none of it seemed to relate directly to London Wall. Most of it took her to conspiracy theory sites. She scrolled through a few of the more paranoid forums.
The world is full of nutters
. Lily shook her head. Then she frowned, peering closer to the screen as she read a rambling, disjointed post full of accusations against the government. Accusations that the government knew there were non-humans living in society and that they were being monitored. Why? asked the rant. And what was the agenda? Lily got to the end of it, then, just as she was about to screenshot it, it disappeared.

What?!

For a second she thought the original poster must have deleted it. But then the responses began to disappear, quickly, one after the other. Lily grabbed a screenshot of everything that was left, just in time before the whole thread was eaten from the inside.

Dammit
. She refreshed the browser, but the thread was gone. Rubbing her face, she rested her chin on her hand and glanced towards the window. Full dark had descended. Lily turned her
attention back to the screenshots, her focus sharp.

She didn't know how long she'd been sitting there when she finally looked away from the screen. It was past seven. She sent the last lot of screenshots to the wireless printer in her father's study and checked her email. It was rare she printed anything out, but if things were to continue disappearing in front of her eyes, it seemed sensible to have a hard copy. Putting the laptop on the coffee table, she got up and went through to the bathroom, stripping out of her bloody things and looking at them. In her rush to find out as much as she could about the Eldritche, she'd almost forgotten the huge rips in her clothes, the blood matting everything together. She stood in front of the bathroom mirror, examining her unbroken white skin, still covered in flaking patches of now-black blood. On the right side of her neck, her hair was even stuck to her throat in places. It crackled as she pulled it away. She eyed the pile of clothes on the floor.
And I walked around all day like that and no one even noticed
. She breathed a sigh of relief that she would be changed before her father arrived home.

After her shower, her hair hanging in damp rat-tails around her face, Lily picked up her jeans and went to put them in the machine in the kitchen, then bagged and binned the ruined T-shirts. The towel she had wrapped around herself felt unusually harsh against her skin. Her stomach growled and she realised she was starving.

She ran the tap for a glass of water, finding herself somehow fascinated by the sparkling stream, then shook her head.
What's happening to me? Today is getting weirder and weirder
. Quenching her thirst and throwing the rest of the water down the sink, she
put the glass on the side and walked back to the bedroom, almost bumping into Regan as he walked into the room from the hall.

She jumped back with a squeak. He stood, frozen, staring at her. Then he spun round so his back was to her, putting his hands on his head like a police suspect.

‘When you said I'd see you again, this wasn't what I had in mind,' she said.

‘I just came to ask you something else about your mother,' he said over his shoulder.

Recovered from the surprise, Lily folded her arms. ‘Ask, then.'

‘It can wait until you put some clothes on.'

She tutted. ‘I'm wearing a bath towel with more coverage than ninety per cent of prom dresses. What do you want to know about my mother?'

He linked his fingers behind his head. ‘The circumstances.'

‘Why?'

‘Please get dressed.'

‘Oh I
am
sorry,' Lily said archly. ‘I didn't realise people who tore hearts out for a living were so sensitive.'

He said nothing, his back still to her.

She rolled her eyes. ‘Well, if it won't offend you too much, I have to get past you.'

He sidestepped into the hall. Lily strode past, shaking her head. She glanced over her shoulder at him. His eyes were closed, his hands still on the back of his head.

In her room, she dressed quickly, pulling on more black jeans, a tight long-sleeved T-shirt and a looser short-sleeved one with an almost-rubbed-out Yankees logo. She threaded the
silver disc of her necklace on to a thin piece of black ribbon that had gift-wrapped her computer at Christmas and looped it over her head. Her hair was already curling as it dried in the warmth of the flat – in fact, she realised, the flat seemed much warmer than usual for some reason. She frowned, then shrugged it off, going back out to the kitchen.

Regan was standing by the table, looking at the pictures of her mother.

Lily folded her arms. ‘You can look now. I won't offend you, I don't think.'

He glanced up, looking almost grateful.
Very flattering
.

‘So, what did you want to know about my mother?'

‘I don't know. I just thought . . . it was strange.'

Lily looked at him for a long time. Her stomach rumbled and fizzed in the silence. She glanced down at it in surprise. ‘I'm starving. Want to share a pizza?'

‘I—'

She was already rummaging around inside the freezer drawers. ‘They're really good. Dad gets them from a place in Soho. This one's cheese and tomato with ham on it.' She held up the box. ‘It's pretty spicy.'

He hesitated. ‘If you like.'

She turned and put the oven on, taking the pizza out of its packaging. ‘I'm glad you came back, because I have questions too.' She looked over her shoulder. ‘How did you get in, by the way?'

He cleared his throat. ‘Locked doors aren't really a problem.'

Thinking of all the things she'd had to take in that day, Lily just nodded. ‘Right. As long as you didn't break it. Dad wouldn't like that.'

He looked interested. ‘Your father's a good man?'

Lily binned the box and cellophane. ‘The best.'

‘And you don't remember your mother?'

‘Not at all.' Lily spoke quickly and without emotion. ‘My birth was traumatic. Premature. That's why I'm small, apparently. My mum was given a blood transfusion, even though she told them not to. It made her sick instantly. She disappeared from the hospital that night. No one saw anything – she was gone, that was that. Dad's convinced it was some sort of cover-up, to hide the mistake, but he could never prove anything. That was when he left criminal defence for human rights. It was in all the papers. Dad kept a box of the clippings somewhere.'

Regan's face was suddenly interested. ‘He did? Where?'

Lily shrugged. ‘In his office somewhere.'

‘Can I see it?'

In her father's immaculate, spartan office, Lily went to the cabinet where her father had once shown her the box of her mother's paperwork, telling her to look at it any time she wanted. She hadn't looked at it for years, though; it didn't tell her any of the things she wanted to know. Crouching down, she opened the drawer and pulled out the wooden box containing her mother's papers. She frowned.

‘What is it?'

She reached inside, opening a folder containing yellowed news clippings. She pulled it out, then looked at the thick, typed manuscript beneath. Tugging it out, she looked at it. ‘I don't remember this ever being in here. Dad said the university kept Mum's thesis and put it in the library. I didn't know there were other copies. Maybe he wanted one.'

Regan came to stand by her shoulder. ‘
Inherited genetic
mutations and their potential
,' he read out. Then he looked back in the box.

There, uncovered by Lily's moving the thesis, was the paperwork declaring her mother legally dead. Regan read it without touching the papers. Lily eyed it, but she didn't touch them either. ‘You can do that, after seven years. Dad thought we needed closure.'

‘Did you get it?'

They looked at the paper, the ink blotted.
Has Dad been crying over this?

She didn't answer him. Instead, she put the box back into the cupboard and grabbed the folder of clippings and the thesis. They returned to the kitchen.

Regan looked down at the photographs. ‘You're very alike.'

Lily nodded, dumping the papers on the coffee table. ‘Yep.' She walked over to him. ‘I think it must be hard for Dad sometimes.' When she looked up, he was staring her in that intense way again. ‘What?'

‘Nothing. Just looking.'

‘Weirdo.' Lily went to the fridge and pulled out two cans, handing one to him. ‘You can take your coat off, you know. If you're staying.'

He shrugged out of his long coat. Looking around for somewhere to put it, he looked surprised when Lily took it from him and put it over the back of a chair. ‘What's this made of?' she asked. ‘The material feels strange.'

‘It's fireproof.'

She raised an eyebrow. ‘Fireproof?' Then she shook her head. ‘Don't tell me. All part of the job.' She put the pizza in the oven, then pointed at the sofa. ‘Sit. Be comfortable.'

He sat, looking anything but comfortable. Lily grabbed her laptop and sat down again, across from him. He pulled the papers into his lap, looking at the clippings and the thesis.

‘So, your mother . . . she was a student? Like you?'

‘
Much
more advanced than me.'

‘And she was studying genetics?'

Lily nodded. ‘Like I said, she grew up in a children's home. Never knew her parents. Dad says she was interested in identity.'

‘And she had your blood type?' He drank from the can.

‘Yes. The necklace was my mother's, remember? I have to give my blood all the time, so that it's in storage in case I have an accident or something.' She shook her head, laughing. ‘That's why I was so frightened today. I wish I'd known about you before. Would have saved me years of nurses and needles.'

He smiled, looking down. The wing of his eyebrow and the arc of his downswept lashes were strong and precise. He flicked through the thesis.

‘It's made me feel peculiar all day,' she told him.

‘How?' he asked, without looking at her, eyes still on the paper.

‘Almost high. Like I can feel the threads in my clothes.'

He flicked over another sheet. ‘It'll wear off as your body uses it to finish healing. And no one ever heard anything about your mother again?'

‘No.' She shook her head. ‘My turn to ask questions.'

He waited.

‘What's the Agency?'

His eyes narrowed and his fingers made slight dents in the side of the can. ‘Where did you hear about that?'

‘Online. One of the paranoia forums.'

‘Paranoia forums?' He looked confused.

‘You know, tinfoil-hat wearers.'

He shook his head. Lily sighed and got to her feet with the computer, sitting down next to him. She arranged it on her lap. ‘Here, look. I found this earlier.'

Regan read through the conversation. Lily was acutely aware of his arm against hers, despite the layers of clothing.

‘And anyone can read this? It's just out there?'

‘You'd have to be looking for it pretty specifically. And it's not out there any more. It was deleted as I was looking at it. But we'll get to that. First, tell me what the Agency is.'

‘It's a government department that monitors the Eldritche.'

‘So the government knows about you?'

‘Yes. Has done for a long time. Perhaps always. They watch us pretty closely, as far as we can tell. Not officially – that would involve revealing that we exist– but they're always there, in the background.'

‘So there's a government agency out there, watching out for people like you,' Lily said seriously.

‘Monitoring us. Yes. Surprised?'

Lily shook her head. ‘Not much governments or corporations do surprises me.'

He said nothing.

The oven pipped. Lily jumped up, putting the computer into his lap. He started as if she'd just tipped hot coals on to him. ‘Keep reading. You can click through them there, like this,' she said, showing him.

Sliding the pizza on to a board, she sliced it and grabbed some kitchen paper. Putting the board down on the coffee
table, she clambered back on to the sofa cross-legged and flicked the television on to the news. Images of burning buildings filled the screen, followed by aerial footage of a street rampage as a mob tore apart shops and burnt cars. Lily frowned at the screen.

‘What?' he said.

‘This. Rioting. In Islington.'

Regan watched the screen.

Lily shook her head. ‘I mean,
Islington
.'

He hesitated. ‘And that's weird because . . .?'

‘Wow, you really meant it when you said you don't leave the City. Islington isn't exactly Baghdad.'

‘It's outside the Wall. Why would I go there?'

She didn't answer, switching over to
The Simpsons
. ‘Help yourself,' she said.

‘You first.'

‘I haven't poisoned it.' She folded the squishy end of a slice back on itself and picked it up.