‘Close, room door,’ Alberich said, and it slammed shut with another squelch of splattered silverfish, leaving the three of them alone together.
Irene felt the compulsion of her own oath like a noose around her neck. ‘My parents gave me the name of Ray,’ she said, quickly choosing her words, before it could force out even more detail. The phrasing was more convoluted than it might have been, but it was true enough. ‘I don’t know their birth names, so I can’t give you a family name.’
‘Ray.’ Alberich looked as if he was about to laugh. ‘And did they call you their little ray of sunshine?’
Actually, yes, they had. Irene raised her brows. ‘Is that relevant?’
‘Not particularly, but I have always been a curious man.’ His hand didn’t move, and the knife at Vale’s throat stayed steady. ‘Why don’t you know their birth names?’
There was no way she was telling him they were Librarians too. And now she’d answered, she wasn’t bound and could lie as much as she wanted. ‘They always kept secrets from me,’ she invented. ‘I’m answering your question as best I can.’
Alberich narrowed his eyes, and she suspected with a chill that he didn’t believe her. ‘Relevant questions, then. What precisely has been going on?’
She hadn’t expected that one. ‘Er, in what sort of detail?’
‘There have been far too many people interfering in what might otherwise have been a perfectly straightforward extraction. Believe me, Ray –’
She knew he saw her twitch when he used her name. She couldn’t help it. She hadn’t heard anyone use it to her for years. It was a childhood name and she wasn’t a child any longer.
– ‘I didn’t ask for any of this,’ he went on smoothly. ‘I would much rather have simply taken the book and left. No mess. No fuss. So I’m asking you, in a perfectly reasonable way, to stand up straight, stop stammering, and give me a full report. Imagine I’m one of your superiors.’
He could have been one of her superiors too. It was easy to imagine. They were diverse enough – such as Coppelia with her clockwork limbs or Kostchei with his thousand-yard gaze. But all had the same air of authority that Alberich was displaying. Other than that and the rumours, she knew nothing about him. She didn’t even know what he looked like. And he terrified her.
‘Under the circumstances—’ Vale put in.
‘Remember that I can and will freeze your vocal cords too,’ Alberich said. ‘And your lungs. Unless you want to explain events yourself? In which case, Ray here becomes worthless . . .’
‘I believe Miss Winters can handle this,’ Vale said. ‘I will only interrupt if I have something important to add.’
He was probably used to coping while people held knives at his throat, Irene reflected savagely. ‘Allow me,’ she put in. ‘I believe that the main factor here was that Wyndham knew too much.’
‘Quite a claim, given how much Vale seems to know of Library business,’ Alberich said pleasantly.
Irene decided to ignore that as she wondered how long Kai would take. And would she know when he’d finished? She needed to spin this out as long as possible, weave all her guesswork into a convincing narrative, and pray that Alberich would accept it. ‘Wyndham had connections with the Fae,’ she started confidently, ‘but he also knew that Dominic Aubrey was a Librarian and, as such, opposed to the Fae. Wyndham knew the book was significant to Silver and thought that he could use it as a bargaining chip to gain something in return. Or he might have been taking some sort of complicated revenge. It was one of those Fae relationships. He decided to make sure that the book was somewhere safe while he negotiated. So he sent it under cover of another parcel to the Natural History Museum.’ Could she persuade Alberich to go there to look for it? ‘And then he was murdered.’
‘Oh yes,’ Alberich said. ‘I arranged his killing. My agents didn’t find the book while they were there, but that would be because Belphegor got there first. The Iron Brotherhood were extremely useful. Vampire-killing assassins, automata to send after you, and other things too. It seemed the easiest way for me to get hold of the book. I didn’t feel like dealing with Silver or the other local Fae. Some of my allies have issues with certain factions. But I won’t bore you with the details. I entered this alternate, took control of the Iron Brotherhood, found the locally stationed Librarian, questioned him, and assumed his skin. Simple enough. Speaking of that, do you still have it?’
Irene abruptly wanted to be sick. She’d maintained some control during werewolf attacks, zeppelin near-crashes and silverfish fatalities, but this was different. Questioned him. Assumed his skin. ‘It was you, wasn’t it? The first time?’
He understood her question, ill-formed as it was. ‘Oh yes. I was the one who met you and your student when you first came through. To be honest, you’ve been rather a surprise to me.’