Ghost Dance (3 page)

"You've got no fucking idea."

Ian studied Morgan with unsettling thoroughness. "Did you kill anyone?"

Morgan wondered how to respond, but Ian spoke before he could. "Sorry - don't answer that, it's a stupid question."

"It's not. I was a soldier. That's what we're for, isn't it?"

"That's not what I meant."

"But it's true. I killed a lot of people, Ian. A lot. And now I'm back here, and I look around, and all I can think is how nobody understands a fucking thing. If they knew what I knew, if they'd seen what I've seen..."

"You've gotta give it time, man," Ian said. It was probably a phrase he'd heard on
Jeremy Kyle
, Morgan thought. But knowledge wasn't like grief; it didn't fade with the weeks and months. Some things couldn't be unlearnt - hadn't Tomas told him that?

The memory of his dead friend cut like a knife, and for a moment Morgan wanted to tell Ian everything. He wanted to describe the year when he really had been just another squaddie in Afghanistan and the incident which had ended all that, when a round he'd meant for an insurgent had found one of his own lads instead.

He wanted to talk about being recruited by the SIS, training as a sniper, the missions they'd sent him on which they'd been careful never to call assassinations. He wanted to describe what it felt like to see someone's face in the sights of your rifle and know that a second later you were going to put a bullet through it.

Most of all, he wanted to tell Ian about the Hermetic Division. The trip across Europe with Tomas and Anya when all his certainties had been ripped away. He needed to talk about Tomas, who'd died twenty years before and come back for one final mission. And he desperately needed to talk about his father, Nicholson, who told Morgan he'd been born out of death and carried it with him. Nicholson had
created
Morgan to be an agent of evil. And Morgan thought he'd rejected that destiny, but every day since he wondered if he really could.

Morgan wanted to tell Ian all of it. He might not believe, but he'd listen and even saying the words would be a relief. Morgan watched the bubbles rising to the surface of his pint, paler than the gold lager, and knew he never would.

There was a man reflected in the glass. The image was blurry and distorted, but there was no mistaking the ragged cut in his neck. It had probably been made by a broken bottle. Morgan had to suppress the urge to look behind him. He knew the man wasn't really there. But he had been. Once, Morgan was a danger to everyone around him. Someone told him he emitted mortality. That had gone along with his birthright, but it hadn't left him normal. Now he
saw
death.

If Morgan told Ian he might believe, but he'd never understand, not really. And he'd be safer and happier not knowing.

The ringing of his mobile cut through his thoughts. The caller ID told him it was Kate. "Sorry," he told Ian, "I've gotta get that."

Ian shrugged and Morgan thought he was probably relieved at the interruption.

"What?" Morgan snapped into the phone.

"And a very good evening to you too," Kate said.

Morgan moved away from the table, feet sticking slightly to the beer-clogged carpet. "Tell me this isn't you telling me I've got to go to work, and I'll tell you good evening."

He could hear the smile in Kate's voice as she said, "You know me too well. I need you to get yourself over to University College London - that's on Gower Street in the centre of town. Just go to main reception and I'll meet you inside."

"What's the emergency?"

"Why spoil the surprise? I'll see you there, Morgan."

The call cut off before he could ask anything further. He shook his head, sure she was paying him back for his earlier cheek. And it occurred to him that he'd known Kate only two months and Ian more than a decade, but he felt closer to his boss than he ever did to his childhood friend.

Ian looked up from his pint as Morgan approached. "Something happened?"

"Work called. Sorry, man, I've gotta go."

He was halfway to the door when Ian called out, "What you doing now, anyway? You never said."

Morgan hesitated a moment, studying the other man, the smile lines starting to form around his mouth and the wide innocence of his eyes. "No, I didn't," he said finally. "You have a nice life, Ian."

He could feel Ian watching him as he weaved between the tables to reach the door, but he didn't look back.

Night had fallen when an hour and two buses later Morgan reached Gower Street and strode through the front gates with a confidence he didn't feel. The moon was full above the white buildings and the grand central dome of the university, but its light was drowned out by the glare of London.

He didn't spot the cops until he was nearly on top of them, a cluster of uniforms at the foot of the staircase leading inside. "It's closed, mate," one of them said. "Crime scene."

"That's what I'm here about," Morgan guessed.

"Yeah, and who are you?" The policeman scowled beneath his blond crew cut. Morgan saw that he had a Celtic knot tattoo circling his arm to disappear beneath the short sleeve of his shirt.

"He's with me," Kate said, striding down the stairs towards them. "This way, Morgan." Night time erased the wrinkles around her eyes and blurred the silver in her hair so that he could see her as the striking young girl Tomas had fallen in love with, not the weary, middle-aged woman she'd become.

"Crime scene?" he said as they ducked into the foyer. "What crime?"

"Murder."

When they turned left, he saw the body perched upright in a wooden case against one of the walls. It was dressed in an old-fashioned frock coat.

Kate raised an eyebrow as he turned towards it, then smiled. "No, that's not it."

Closer to, Morgan could see she was right. The face was wax, not flesh, the rosy glow of the cheeks painted on. "What is this?" he said. "Fucking Madam Tussauds?"

"Actually, the skeleton
is
real. That's Jeremy Bentham - he was a philosopher. When he died in 1832 he left his body to the University, but his will stipulated that the corpse had to be preserved and displayed. It's supposed to attend annual board meetings, too. Bentham called it his Auto Icon."

She shivered, and Morgan knew she was thinking about Tomas. They turned their backs on the body and walked deeper inside the building, past the public spaces and into a dingy corridor with blue-and-white police tape stretched across one end. Morgan followed Kate as she ducked underneath.

The room beyond was larger than he'd expected, a lecture theatre with a semi-circle of raked seating facing a lectern and a screen. The screen was lit-up, the headline 'Heteronormative Influences in Elizabethan Alchemy' followed by a block of writing which made even less sense. The police appeared to have been and gone, a latex glove and a dusting of fingerprint powder on one of the wooden benches the sole relics of their presence. The insect-whine of a computer fan was the only sound in the room.

The woman's body was sprawled beside the lectern, eyes open but unseeing. She looked almost the same age as Kate, but less pretty. She had the sort of face that inspired affection rather than desire; round-cheeked and friendly.

"Doctor Jane Granger. Cambridge academic due to give a guest lecture at UCL tomorrow," Kate said. "Apparently she was nervous, so she decided to rehearse it. The killer must have known where to find her."

Cause of death wasn't hard to guess. There was a slash across Granger's throat so deep it had cut through her windpipe and into the bones of her spine. They shone white against the red flesh and Morgan had seen enough death to know that was odd. Blood should have masked the wound, but there was none either in the cut or pooling on the floor around her head.

"Can I?" he said, leaning closer.

When Kate nodded he reached out a hand to tip the woman's head. That was when the smell hit him, the stink of scorched flesh. Close to, he could see the burn marks around the cut and the bubbling blisters on the skin of her neck. The tissue around the wound was blackened and smooth - cauterised.

He rocked back on his heels. "What the hell happened?"

"We were hoping you could tell us." She nodded at the back wall of the lecture theatre, where a mirror hung in a chipped frame.

Morgan knew what she was asking and hesitated. There was a part of him that still wanted to deny the hidden world and accept the comforting illusion of normality. "I can't guarantee I'll see something," he said.

She smiled at him. "Just try, Morgan. Granger died violently here - there's a good chance her spirit's hanging around, reliving the moment. Isn't that how it works?"

He shrugged. "Maybe. I still haven't figured it all out."

His knees cracked as he rose. The mirror was thick with dust, reflecting the room through a haze and bleaching the brown of his skin to a faded sepia. He wiped the glass with his sleeve and the picture sprang into sharper focus: his own face framed by geometric circles of seating.

For a long moment that was all he saw. He'd tried forcing it before, clenching his muscles because he didn't know how to tense whatever part of his mind allowed him to do this. It was always useless and he didn't bother this time, relaxing instead and letting his thoughts drift.

As they had before, they drifted to Richard, the man who'd first shown Morgan this could be done - and summoned his long-dead sister on a night train to Berlin. "I only open the door," he'd said. Morgan didn't think Richard had meant it literally, but he'd learnt that in the other world metaphor could be as powerful as truth. He let his eyes lose focus until the glass of the mirror was just a grey blank - then imagined pushing it. He thought how cold the glass would feel under his palm, and he pictured it moving, the creak of hinges.

When the mirror swung open there was darkness beyond. He thought that if he tried hard enough his eyes could pierce it, but he didn't want to know what he'd see. In that moment of fear his mind released the image and the door swung shut, closing with a soft
click
.

The glass was a mirror again and Morgan could see the reflection of a woman - but it wasn't Kate. This woman's cheeks were rounder, her eyes a paler, washed-out blue. Her gaze passed over Morgan without seeing him. She was studying herself, mouth squeezed shut as she applied her lipstick.

Morgan noticed the man behind her at the same time she did. He was watching her in the glass. His hair and eyes were the same dark brown that was almost black and though he was dressed in jeans and a T-shirt, Morgan thought he belonged in uniform. He recognised a soldier when he saw one, the tense shoulders and loose arms, aggression held on only a light leash.

The woman gasped, then turned and smiled. Morgan fought the futile urge to shout a warning. This was her killer and she didn't know it and wouldn't realise until it was too late.

The man took a step towards her. His mouth was moving, but the glass didn't transmit sound and the woman's back was to the mirror now, her expression hidden. Morgan could read the sudden stiffening of her spine, though, and knew that whatever the man had said alarmed her.

But not enough. The man took another step closer and she stood her ground. It was only when he drew his knife that she tried to make a run for it and by then it was too late. The man grabbed a fistful of her hair, bending her head back and resting his blade against the vulnerable skin of her throat. The knife looked like ordinary steel and leather, but where it touched her skin Morgan saw a wisp of smoke curl into the air. He imaged he could hear the sizzle of burning flesh.

Her mouth moved, still soundless, but Morgan knew she was begging the man to let her go. Morgan's jaw clenched as he forced himself not to move.

The man pressed the knife harder against the woman's throat, using the flat of the blade to cause maximum pain with minimal risk of accidental death. His face remained dispassionate. There was no hint that he enjoyed hurting the woman. There was no pleasure in it for him, it was purely about getting results.

White blisters bloomed on her neck, ichor leaking into the hollow of her clavicle. Her lips moved again and Morgan could read them now, "Oh god, oh god, oh god," over and over again. Saliva sprayed from her mouth, droplets speckling and blurring the mirror's surface.

There were flecks of her spittle in the man's eyelashes until he blinked them away. The movements of his mouth were smaller and more controlled, but Morgan could read them too. "Where is it?" he said. "Have you found it?"

She spoke for longer this time, gabbling so Morgan couldn't follow what she was saying. The man cocked his head as he listened, probably assessing her honesty. But the woman was too terrified to lie and her attacker seemed to realise that. He smiled a little. Then he looked back at the woman and the smile died. Morgan closed his eyes as the knife slashed and the woman's mouth stretched wide in its final, silent scream.

When he opened them again the woman's body had slumped out of sight and only the man remained. He was frowning, one deep upright groove in the centre of his forehead as he stared at the mirror. And Morgan knew it could only be a trick of perspective, but in the instant before his image disappeared from the glass, the man seemed to be staring right at him.

CHAPTER TWO

PD was waiting for Alex outside the School of Native American Studies, and for a second she flashed back to their very first meeting. In the seven years since he'd changed very little, only the first hint of crow's feet seaming the skin around his eyes. He must have been a young man new to the Agency when she'd first seen him, but to her 16-year-old eyes he'd seemed ancient.

He nodded a greeting and she raised a lazy hand in response. The classmate walking beside her shot her a questioning look. "Old family friend," she told him, her stock answer. "He and I are going away for a few days - road trip. I'll catch you when I get back."

"Hey, kid," PD said. "Looking for some action?"

She suppressed a smile. "Kid? Really?"

His gaze raked her quickly up and down, frankly appreciative. But when he met her eyes again there was something odd in his. "No, I guess not."