The Apocalypse Codex by Charles Stross Read Free Book Online

finger on the doorbell and, with an expression of grim determination not obviously warranted by such a trivial action, pushes it.
    Somewhere behind the glossy black door, a bell jangles. Lockhart relaxes his finger on the button after a second, then glances up at the discreet black golf ball of the camera above the door. A few seconds later he hears footsteps approaching. Then the door opens.
    “Good afternoon.” The man who opens the door is in his late twenties, with shaven head and a slacker goatee; however, he wears a suit so funereal in cut that he could be taken for an undertaker, if undertakers wore black open-necked shirts with their weeds. “Ah, Mr. Lockhart? I believe Ms. Hazard is expecting you. If you’d care to follow me, sir? I’m sure she’ll only be a minute.”
    Lockhart follows the butler across a tiled hallway and through a side door that leads into a parlor at the front of the house. There are side tables, armchairs, and a sofa, the latter items recently re-upholstered but clearly dating to an earlier century. The butler leaves him; as he turns to go, Gerald notes with interest the earring, the tattoos on the back of his neck, and the cut of his jacket, tailored to draw attention away from his broad, heavily muscled shoulders. Ms. Hazard does not employ household staff solely as an affectation of personal wealth. Lockhart makes a mental note to have the fellow’s background checked. It’s always useful to have a little extra leverage.
    Somewhat closer to three minutes later, the parlor door opens. “Good afternoon,” Lockhart says, rising reflexively. “And thank you for making time to see me at such short notice.”
    “It is a pleasure, as always.” Persephone beams as she steps closer. Her diction is very slightly stilted, with the echo of an Italian accent lending it a musical trill: her elocution tutor is clearly first-rate. “How are you, Gerald? And how are the children?”
    The witch wears an understated gray wool dress with black tights and kitten heels; with her hair pulled tightly back and minimal makeup, she exudes a gamine charm. She moves fluidly, as if only loosely bound by gravity. Lockhart thinks she carries herself like a dancer; but he notices the hardened skin on the backs of her hands—deftly obscured by a smudge of concealer across her knuckles—and the loose sleeves that conceal her shoulders and upper arms. The Nutcracker ballet, for Karate and Krav Maga, perhaps.
    “Polly is fine,” Lockhart says gravely. “Darren is recovering from a bug he brought back from play group, and we’re watching in case Nicky comes down with it too—”
    They make small talk for a few minutes as Persephone listens, nodding. To an ill-informed observer she could be a thirty-year-old ballet dancer who has married a man with serious money, a man of the very highest rank—seats in the country and the House of Lords, on a first-name basis with minor royalty, reserved place at Eton for the firstborn male issue, that sort of thing. And Lockhart might simply be a family friend, a senior civil servant of the old school, filling her in on the gossip.
    Of course, appearances are deceptive: their official relationship is that of a controller and the intelligence officer they direct. But they keep up appearances in semi-private, to ingrain the habit, lest their paths should meet in public.
    After a while, Lockhart runs out of pleasantries to spin around his family life. “But enough of that,” he signals. “I’m wasting your time.”
    “Oh, hardly.” She half-smiles, then reaches for a device resembling a TV remote control. “All right, we can talk now. Within the usual limits.” A thin mosquito-whine from the windows behind her hints at the presence of transducers in the frames, designed to defeat laser mikes or other snooping devices.
    “Good.” Lockhart pulls a notepad and pen from his jacket pocket. “Did you have anything to add to the agenda…?”
    “Not at this time.” She