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  Alex smirked. ‘Magical? I’m an open-minded guy, I know most people wouldn’t believe me about what I can see, but it’s not magic.’

  ‘Isn’t it?’

  ‘Mine is just a well-developed natural aptitude,’ he said. ‘Empathy.’

  ‘Why do you resist the truth?’

  ‘Resist?’

  Welby pulled the car over to the kerb. They were nowhere near the hotel. ‘What are you doing?’ Alex asked.

  Welby took a bottle of water from the back seat. ‘I want to show you something.’

  He unscrewed the cap and raised his right hand before his chest, palm out, holding the bottle in his left. Alex watched the old man’s hand curiously. Welby gestured subtly with his chin, drawing Alex’s eye to the bottle. A sensation of static rose, coppery, tickling across the skin. The air seemed to swell slightly and he saw subtle shades shifting through the space between himself and Welby. The water shivered. Then it rose in the centre, a finger of clear liquid standing up through the bottleneck against gravity.

  Alex jumped like he’d been stung. Welby curled his fingers slightly and the column of standing water twisted in a graceful spiral, glittering in the light from the dashboard. Welby gestured again and the spiral of water unwound, stood taller, and fell back with a soft splash. Alex stared, his eyes hard.

  ‘You felt it too, didn’t you?’ Patrick Welby said quietly. ‘You didn’t just see it, you felt the magic.’

  Welby was patient as Alex pondered. Some kind of trickery? He had been less than two feet away and watched everything in crystal clarity. He had felt the swell of something in the air between them, the charge of something preternatural occurring. And he knew he had felt it before. Fucking magic? Really?

  Welby screwed the cap onto the bottle. ‘I realise all this is a lot to take in, but you really deserve to know the potential you have. It deserves to be nurtured.’

  Alex pursed his lips. ‘And you want me to look at this book,’ he said.

  ‘You use your vision in a very practical way. I’m aware of my limitations. I think you’ll be able to see what I can’t.’

  ‘What’s so special about this book?’

  ‘There are many in the world that are powerful. The contained knowledge makes any book a magical item. Do you like to read?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Some books are designed to be specifically magical — grimoires that impart arcane knowledge, ancient secrets, dangerous truths that men have killed and died for.’ Welby reached into his jacket and pulled out a small, leatherbound tome. It looked like an extra-thick address book, but for the weathered age of its cover and the edges of its pages. As soon as Alex saw it, he knew it was something infused with more than the leather and paper and twine of its construction. ‘You can feel it, can’t you?’ Welby said. ‘Already you’re learning. Just by knowing there is more to know, you are improving.’

  Alex said nothing. He saw slight shifts in the shades around the small book. If he concentrated, he could see them gently moving up over Welby’s hand, up his arm and sleeve, like questing tendrils of translucent smoke. As if the book not only had some kind of power, but the power itself had a presence. A simple sentience that sought its own experience.

  ‘This is a potent little item,’ Welby said. ‘It contains secrets of the elements, of air, water, earth, fire. It teaches methods of drawing on those elements. There’s some commanding knowledge in here, more than the trickery I just demonstrated.’ He reached out, offering it.

  Alex didn’t move. ‘I’ll take your word for it.’

  ‘You don’t want to see? You don’t want the understanding?’

  He was certainly curious. So much so that he physically ached to open it up and read. But the way the book’s magic slipped and slid around Welby’s hand gave him pause. ‘Can’t you see it?’ he asked tightly.

  ‘The magesign? Does it bother you?’

  ‘Is that what you call it?’

  ‘It has many names. Everything magical gives off ’sign. That’s the name the ancient magi and wise men used. You could call it an aura or energy field or whatever you like.’

  ‘It’s like the way I see people, only so much clearer, more intense.’

  ‘Yes. Arcanes, magical folk, have an aura like a lighthouse on a dark night. The more powerful they become the brighter they shine, so they learn to mask themselves. That’s something you’ll need to do. You shine quite brightly. It’s something I can teach you.’

  Now Alex knew why Welby’s shades seemed obscured. The old man masked himself. ‘It’s creeping around your hand. As if it’s trying to escape and climb up your arm.’

  Welby cocked an eyebrow. ‘Is it?’ He looked down curiously. ‘You truly have a clarity of vision.’ He held out the book again. ‘Really, it’s harmless. Some ’sign can carry dangerous energies, but that would be very obvious, especially to you.’

  Alex took the book. It buzzed between his fingers, the magesign even clearer now he held it, swirling around lazily. But the sensation of sentience had passed. It seemed no more malevolent than the steam from a kettle, a simple by-product of the thing itself. His head ached as he tried to take everything in.

  He flicked open the cover. The page was dense with tiny characters and diagrams, the writing unlike anything he had seen before. ‘This looks like a tough language to learn,’ he said, trying to discern the swirls and ellipses of the text, like a strange kind of Arabic or Sanskrit, complicated and beautiful. He read a line that poetically described the personality of water. With a start he looked up sharply.

  The old man was pleased. ‘It’s an eldritch language. A magical language. Those with talent can learn to read it. I must say I’ve never seen anyone decipher one quite so quickly.’ Welby’s face was alight with an almost childlike joy. ‘You can hang on to that,’ he said through his mirth. ‘A token of my goodwill. It’s worth a fortune and it might teach you some useful skills.’

  Alex closed the book, his heart racing. ‘This isn’t what you wanted me to look at?’

  ‘No, just an example. A way to show you the method of looking. I thought you might need a bit longer to get the idea but your skill is remarkable. What I need your help with is far older and more obscure. It’s about the oldest and most powerful book I’ve ever seen, but I can’t read it. No one I know can. The language is intricate and dense, something only someone with a rare clarity of vision could decipher. Which is why I’ve spent so long seeking someone like you.’ He sat back.

  Alex’s curiosity burned. ‘All right. So you want me to look, and then what? Translate it for you? Do you have it with you?’

  Welby shook his head, becoming serious. ‘No, I don’t. It’s not actually in my possession. It’s owned by … an acquaintance of mine. I’m hoping if I take you there to see it, and if you can read it, that he’ll sell it to me. Perhaps I’ll have to agree to share the information with him, I don’t know. I wanted to find someone capable of reading it first. Will you come with me?’

  ‘Where is it?’

  ‘A small place in London.’

  ‘London?’ Alex laughed. He held out Welby’s gift. ‘Take me to my hotel.’

  Welby’s face fell. He pushed the book back. ‘Please, Alex. Aren’t you fighting soon in London anyway? I overheard you in your dressing room. You’re facing a bit of trouble here right now too. Perhaps a sojourn might be a good idea, till the heat’s off.’

  ‘The heat? This King Scarlet fool is going to continue hounding me. I can’t just run away.’

  ‘That man was prepared to shoot you. To kill you.’

  ‘But he wouldn’t have succeeded.’

  Welby’s eyes narrowed. ‘Are you really so in control of everything around you?’

  ‘Yes, I fucking am. Take me to my hotel.’

  Welby sighed. He pulled away from the kerb and they drove to the Four Seasons without speaking. Alex sensed the old man’s frustration. He felt sorry for him, but not enough to upend his life. Too much had happened tonight,
way too fast, and he had his own problems. He had contacts. He needed to get home, make some calls, sort out this King Scarlet thing.

  They pulled into the driveway of the hotel and Alex recognised two of Scarlet’s goons from previous encounters. They loitered just inside the lobby. ‘Shit!’

  ‘What’s the matter?’

  ‘How did he know where I was staying?’

  ‘This Scarlet fellow?’ Welby asked.

  Alex gestured to the hotel. ‘Two of his men are in there. Maybe more I can’t see.’

  Welby slowed the car to a crawl. ‘He’s not playing games, is he?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘You can stay at my place,’ Welby said. ‘I have a flat here in Sydney.’

  Alex stared through the tall, plate-glass windows, his brow furrowed. ‘My stuff is in my room, my car parked underneath.’

  ‘I daresay they’ve got that covered. He seems to have some influence.’

  ‘Drive into the car park. There’s not much in my room, I was only going to be here overnight. Fuck it. I’ll drive myself home now and sort things out tomorrow.’

  Welby nodded and headed for the garage doors. He used Alex’s room key to access the basement car park and drove down the winding concrete path. As they reached the second level, Alex cursed when he saw his car at the other end, the tyres slashed, lights and windows smashed, ugly scratches scarring every surface. Two men in suits stood nearby.

  Alex slipped out of his seatbelt and dropped into the footwell, curling up out of sight. ‘Keep driving,’ he hissed.

  Welby said nothing. He reached back and pulled a jacket off the back seat and dropped it over Alex. From under its edge Alex watched his face, impassive as he drove by. At the end he turned and the car began travelling up, spiralling back towards street level. ‘We’re clear,’ the old man said.

  Alex sat up into his seat. ‘My car! What the hell is wrong with these people?’

  ‘You must be costing this Scarlet a lot of money. He’s taking things very seriously.’

  ‘Maybe you setting his man on fire hasn’t helped!’

  Welby looked contrite. ‘I’m sorry. I was trying to save you.’

  Alex sighed. ‘I know, I’m sorry. It’s not your fault.’

  ‘You want to go to my flat while you decide what to do?’

  ‘Yes, I suppose so.’ Alex’s fury boiled deep in his gut. ‘Thanks,’ he said through gritted teeth.

  The flat was stylish. ‘Can’t be cheap to keep a place in Double Bay,’ Alex said.

  Welby closed the door, dropped his keys into a bowl on a mahogany bookshelf. ‘I’m very fortunate when it comes to money. Old family fortunes and all that.’

  ‘How long have you lived here?’

  ‘Oh, I don’t live here. I have a few places around the world. I tend to travel a lot. People pay good money to lease places like this for a few days or a week at a time and it gives me somewhere readily available when I need it. They pretty much pay for themselves.’

  Alex made a noise of derision. ‘If you have the money to get them in the first place.’

  ‘Well, yes. But let’s not talk about money. It’s an ugly subject.’

  ‘Fair enough.’

  Welby seemed uncomfortable. Alex let him wallow in it. Given how strange this evening had been already and how freaked out he was by it, he certainly wasn’t about to make things easy for this weirdo. He realised on some level he wasn’t being fair to Welby, but nothing seemed very fair right now.

  Welby cleared his throat nervously. ‘Listen, Alex, I am sorry. I’m aware this whole turn of events must be incredibly unsettling.’

  ‘You could say that.’

  ‘What do you plan to do?’

  ‘It’s late and I’m tired. If you don’t mind me crashing here, I’ll make some calls in the morning. I’ve had enough for now.’

  ‘Not a problem. And please, consider my offer to come to London. I mean it when I say you have much to gain from this. Knowledge is the most valuable thing in the world and I can give you a lot of it.’

  Alex made a wry expression. ‘Knowledge can be a dangerous thing.’

  ‘Of course. I’m going to go to bed now, leave you to think and have some space. That door leads to the guest bedroom. Make yourself at home.’

  ‘All right then.’

  Welby pointed to the pocket of Alex’s olive-green combat surplus jacket. ‘Have a look at that grimoire before you go to sleep. Read about the elements.’

  ‘Maybe I will.’

  ‘Good. Night then.’

  Welby turned and strode across the room, disappearing behind a dark oak door. Alex slumped down on the soft leather sofa. A remote sat on the coffee table and he reached for it, flicked on the oversize television. A few channel skips found a mindless late night American chat show. He watched vacuous Hollywood celebrities trying to convince an equally vacuous audience they really did have causes they believed in. Empty programming that gave him something to stare at while his mind ticked over.

  This situation had become serious, but there was nothing to be done right now. Some calls would hopefully start to put things right. Perhaps he would have to avoid Sydney for a while. There were plenty of other venues. It pissed him off that Scarlet was making his life difficult.

  His thoughts drifted back to Welby’s water trick in the car, the uncanny, beautiful moving sculpture the old man had conjured. It was mind-blowing. Something seemingly simple that obviously wasn’t stage trickery.

  A new part of him had woken up. His ability seemed so much more than he had ever imagined. And the fact he knew, absolutely, positively knew, that he had felt people practising magic before, weighed heavily on his mind. He hadn’t recognised it for what it was. What else did the world have to offer? What else had been concealed under this patina of normality? He remembered his father, sitting with him in a sunny garden. It had been mid-summer, hot and bright. He had been barely in school. This world is an amazing place, son, full of fascinating things. Take a moment once in a while to look around and take it all in. His father spoke a deeper truth than either of them could have realised at the time. The familiar old rock in his gut grew heavy, as it always did when he thought about his parents. It brought with it the usual melancholy and cold rage.

  He pulled his leatherbound book from the pocket of his jacket. Welby was certainly trying to buy his favour. For a long time he held it, watched the drift of magesign around it, gently swirling and twisting, mesmerising. He realised there had been times in the past when he’d seen magesign, only he’d had no idea what it was. And not knowing meant he hadn’t really seen it properly, hadn’t focused on it. The thought made him uncomfortable, made him feel like a fool. Perhaps the world was peppered with people laughing at folks like him, Look at the blind idiots, stumbling through life. But he wasn’t blind any more. A veil had lifted. Now he planned to spend every minute with his eyes wide open.

  He turned to the first page and began to read. It took a moment for the words to become clear, like adjusting a pair of binoculars until the image sharpened, but once through it stayed. He read it as easily as a newspaper. It described the nature of the elemental forces in the world, the physical and magical properties of water, air, fire and earth. It talked of their personalities and how they could be manipulated, conjured, controlled with the fifth element of will. Magic.

  He read for a long time until his eyelids grew heavy and he began to blink long and slow. He was keen to read on, but his tiredness outgunned his resolve. The knowledge seemed to settle deep in his brain, more than words, mere information. He realised the book contained more than the script on the pages. It imparted magic directly to the reader. ‘Fuck me,’ he breathed.

  3

  A sharp, insistent rapping. For a moment he stared at the fancy glass light fitting above and wondered where the hell he was. ‘Alex? Are you awake?’

  Welby’s accent brought everything back into focus. ‘C’m’ in,’ he managed through dry lips.

&nbs
p; The door cracked open and Patrick Welby’s face slipped into the gap, his expression almost comical in its concern. ‘Ah, you’re … er …’

  Alex rubbed his eyes. ‘I’m still here. I must have slept like a log.’ He sat up, stretching muscles that hadn’t moved since he lay down hours before.

  Welby came into the room. ‘I was mildly concerned that you’d slipped away in the night. I can see you’re still tired.’

  ‘Really?’

  ‘Magesign. Remember I told you how the magus has to learn to mask himself? It doesn’t do to wander around like a beacon.’

  ‘Right.’

  ‘Hungry?’

  Alex raised an eyebrow. ‘Bloody starving.’

  ‘Come on, I have eggs boiled and bread in the toaster.’

  Alex sat sipping gratefully at a large espresso, his stomach full of eggs, toast and sweet, fresh tomatoes. ‘You’re looking after me well,’ he said over the rim of his mug.

  ‘I’m still hoping you’ll help.’

  ‘How old are you?’

  Welby looked up from his plate, toast halfway to his lips. He stared deep into Alex’s eyes. Alex maintained his gaze, looked carefully at the play of shades around the Englishman. Something told him Welby was older than he seemed. A lot older. He thought about how much more he might be able to see if he put his mind to it. Welby’s lips curled in a smile. ‘Trying out some new tricks?’ he asked, and pulled his shades in dramatically, like an old-school thespian whipping a voluminous cloak around himself.

  Alex willed his sight to pry under that thick cloak of shades, to see past them all. To his surprise the shades burst open again, laying bare all the colours Welby had to show. Welby’s eyes widened in shock and Alex realised he could see not only past the shades Welby had pulled about himself, but past shades even the poor man could not have known about or controlled. He felt as though he had mentally stripped Welby naked and flayed him as he sat before his breadcrumbs and eggshells. He saw Welby for the age he truly was, saw everything about the Englishman laid bare, wide open, raw. He could see the fibres of the man’s being and he knew everything there was to know. He pulled away his vision, mentally and physically, turning his head. ‘Fucking hell, I’m sorry!’