Hex and the City Read online

  “Fortunately, no. It’s currently a health spa and gymnasium, called Health Freaks. The sort of place where corporate young men go to crunch their abs on their lunch-hour, going for the burn and flexing their way towards their first heart attack.”

  “Such a pity,” said Pretty Poison. “I wonder if a trace of the old place still lingers in the air-ducts? In the old days you could get a contact high just from saying the name of the place aloud.”

  “I haven’t thought about the Purple Haze in years,” said Walker. “But then, there’s a lot of things in my past I prefer not to remember.”

  “Don’t look at me like that, Henry. Aren’t you glad to see me again?”

  “No.”

  “But we had such good times together!”

  “You were a succubus. Can you honestly say it meant anything to you? I look at you now, and I have…conflicting emotions.”

  “I made you happy.”

  “You were given to me, as a bribe.”

  “As a gift,” said Pretty Poison. “A succubus, to indulge your every pleasure, your every fantasy. A reward from the Authorities, for work well-done on their behalf. I made you laugh, and cry out in the night, and you never slept as peacefully as you did in my arms.”

  “Beware the Authorities, bearing gifts,” said Walker. His face was still calm, but there was a sharpness in his voice. “You were bait, to draw me in and tie me closer to them. Their usual practice—to ensure their people became used to, even addicted to, the kinds of extreme pleasures only the Authorities and the Nightside could provide. I should have known, even then, that such attractive bait was bound to have a hook concealed in it somewhere.”

  “If I seemed to adore you, in our time together, then I was just doing my job,” said Pretty Poison. “It wasn’t supposed to be real, or taken for real; any more than any other transaction with a sex professional. I thought you understood that. I was yours, to do whatever you wished with, yes; but only for the duration of the contract. You can’t say I wasn’t entirely truthful, when I was first presented to you.”

  “I know,” said Walker. “But I was still devastated when you left. I thought I’d come to matter to you, but you walked out on me without a single backward glance.”

  “Well of course, darling. That was my job. Corrupting mortals and tempting them into sin. I couldn’t take your soul, that was forbidden me by the Authorities: but I was supposed to reduce you to such a state that you’d do anything to have me back again.”

  “I did everything to try and persuade you to stay. I would have done anything for you.”

  “That’s all very flattering, but I had another contract. I was only ever there for sex. You were the one who insisted on bringing love into it.”

  “I was young,” said Walker. “It’s a common misunderstanding, at that age. But I shouldn’t have threatened you.”

  “No, dear, you shouldn’t. I was forced to show you something of my true nature. What I really am.”

  Walker nodded slowly. “Just the glimpse of what I saw gave me nightmares for months. That I had been intimate with such a thing…I scrubbed my skin raw, till it bled…And you cut me a good one with a claw, before you left. I still have the scar.”

  Pretty Poison grinned suddenly. “Want me to kiss it better?”

  “I’d rather you didn’t.” Walker leaned back in his chair and studied her thoughtfully. “I was shocked, horrified, at what I’d actually been sleeping with. I let you go, and did my best never to think about you again. I suppose…you were what first turned me against the attractions and seductions of the Nightside. The bright neon lies and the dirty little secret pleasures. You opened my eyes to what a moral cesspit this place is, and the duplicity of those in charge. The Authorities don’t care about anything except the money, power, and influence the Nightside provides them. And to hell with the poor bastards that get ground underfoot here every day. I decided I had to be…better than that.”

  “And now you run things here?”

  “Only to keep anyone else from doing it. I can’t trust anyone else not to be seduced by the temptations on offer. Someone has to keep a clear head and see this place for what it really is. Someone has to keep the animals in their cages. You made me understand just how…corrupting the Nightside is.”

  “And that’s why you, and the others, performed the Babalon Working?”

  “Yes.” Walker sipped at his tea, taking his time to make it clear he was changing the subject. “Once again—what are you doing here, Sophia? I wasn’t aware demons from Hell got nostalgic over their old victims. Or have the Authorities given you to someone else, someone I should know about?”

  “No,” said Pretty Poison. “I’m with Sinner now.”

  Walker put down his cup and raised an eyebrow.

  “You’re that succubus? Well…I’m impressed. Really. So you’re the demon currently working with John Taylor. You do have a taste for powerful men, don’t you?”

  “I’m with Sinner now,” Pretty Poison said patiently.

  “And only Sinner. Officially, I was sent up out of Hell to corrupt him, break his heart, and blacken his soul, so that the Pit can claim him again. Actually, I volunteered for this mission, to try and understand a love that could survive even in Hell. How anyone could honestly love a Fallen thing like me.”

  “You expect me to believe that?” said Walker. “I know better than anyone that love means nothing to you.”

  “That was then,” said Pretty Poison. “Much has changed since then. After all this time with my Sidney, I’m still just starting to understand how he feels about me. And just possibly, I’m starting to understand what you felt for me, back then. And how badly I hurt you.”

  “I’m married,” said Walker. “Very happily married. Almost twenty-three years now.”

  “I’m glad. What’s her name?”

  “Sheila. We have two boys. Keith is at Oxford, Robert is in the military. Good boys, both of them. I had them raised outside the Nightside. They know nothing about what I really do for a living.”

  “I’m glad, Henry. Really.”

  “So, this Sinner.” Walker’s voice was entirely casual. It would have fooled anyone else. “He really loves you?”

  “Yes. A legendary love, even in Hell.”

  “I loved you.”

  “He loved me even after he saw my true nature. What I really am. My dear Sidney…I’m sorry I hurt you, Henry.”

  Walker drank his tea. “Demons lie. That’s their true nature.”

  “Even demons can change.”

  Walker looked at her coldly. “You expect me to believe that?”

  “I believe it,” said Pretty Poison. “I have to.”

  They sat together for a while, drinking their tea, saying nothing, surrounded by civilised sounds.

  “I know you’ve got people blocking the Gate to the Lord of Thorns’ domain,” Pretty Poison said abruptly.

  “And more people blocking other entrances. Under orders from the Authorities, I take it?”

  “Of course,” said Walker. “But if you can get out to visit me here, I have to assume the others can, too. I’d better talk to my security people, arrange to have the containing wards strengthened. Maybe call in some more specialists. Is that why you’ve come here to see me? To beg for my help?”

  “All the wards and specialists in the Nightside won’t stop us, darling,” Pretty Poison said calmly. “The Lord of Thorns is on our side.”

  Walker actually blinked a few times. “How the hell did you manage that? I didn’t think anyone escaped his judgement.”

  “He believes in us,” said Pretty Poison. “And most especially, he believes in John Taylor. Talk to me about the Authorities, Henry.”

  “Why?”

  “Because. Indulge me.”

  Walker shrugged. “If it’ll get you out of here any quicker…There’s no big mystery about the Authorities, really. They’re just who everyone thinks they are; the city Names, the old, established business families wh
o’ve gained so much wealth, power, and influence from centuries of investment in the Nightside. The people in and behind the Londinium Club, who avoid celebrity and open displays of wealth and power, but pull the strings of those who do. The men behind the scenes, who will do or authorise anything at all, to maintain the status quo that has always benefited them. And I work for them because all the other alternatives are worse. I have investigated other options, down the years, but most people just didn’t want to know. The thought of so much responsibility scared the shit out of them. And the few who were interested turned out to want it for all the wrong reasons. So I turned them in to the Authorities. I’m in charge, inasmuch as anyone is, because I alone have no interest in the temptations and seductions of the Nightside. I know better. I know this place for what it really is.”

  “And what is that?” said Pretty Poison.

  “A freak show. A city of ill repute. All of Humanity’s bad ideas in one place. Which is why the Authorities are the best people to run it. Because they only care about the money it brings them. They might play here, on occasion, indulge passions that would not be allowed in the world outside, but at the end of the day they all go home and leave the Nightside behind them. Just like me.”

  “And you don’t play at all. The only honest man in the Nightside. Or at least, the only moral man. And…perhaps the most scared. Why are you so afraid of the Nightside, Henry?”

  Walker did her the courtesy of considering the question for a moment. “Because…there’s always the chance that someday all the evils and temptations and corruption will break through the Nightside’s boundaries and rush out to seduce the whole world.”

  “Would that really be such a bad thing?” said Pretty Poison. “If everyone knew the truth about how things really operate? If they could all finally see the big picture? If they could see and talk with Powers and Dominations, the Beings and Forces that move behind the scenes of the world…if they knew the score, it might change things for the better.”

  “No,” said Walker. “Things are bad enough in the seemingly sane, cause-and-effect world. If all the fanatics and terrorists, or even the simply ambitious and well-meaning, knew what their options really were, they’d tear the world apart fighting over it.”

  “You weren’t always like this,” said Pretty Poison.

  “So…cynical.”

  And as she and Walker continued to talk in the Willow Tree tea room, she worked a change in the vision the rest of us were watching, to show us the Past.

  Information came subtly to us, along with the new sights, seeping painlessly into our thoughts. We all knew at once that the year was 1967, and that the three young men walking down the Nightside street together, talking and laughing and shoving at each other in sheer good spirits, were Henry Walker and Charles Taylor and Mark Robinson. I recognised Walker first, because his face hadn’t changed that much, but his clothes actually startled me. It seemed that back in his younger days, Henry Walker had been a hell of a dandy and a dedicated follower of fashion. He strode along like a slender peacock, outfitted in dazzlingly bright colours, the best the King’s Road had to offer, complete with narrow oblong sunglasses and a great mane of wavy dark hair. He looked like a young god, too perfect for this material world.

  Mark Robinson, who would one day know both fame and infamy as the Collector, was also easy to spot, if only because he was clearly an Elvis fanatic even then. He had that whole young Elvis thing down pat, even to the greasy black quiff and the practised curl of the upper lip. His black leather jacket had far too many zips and chains, and rattled loudly as he walked. He was never still, packed full of nervous energy, and was always that little bit ahead or behind the other two, talking sixteen to the dozen and bouncing up and down on his feet. His laughter came free and easy, from sheer joi de vivre. He had plans and ambitions, and thought he had his whole future mapped out.

  It took me rather longer to recognise Charles Taylor. My father. I had no photos of him. He threw everything out, or burned it, after my mother left. In the vision, he was younger than I was, and he didn’t look much like me. He didn’t look at all like I expected. Unlike his colourful friends, he wore a smart dark three-piece suit and a tie, short-haired and clean-shaven. He could have been just another anonymous executive, toiling in the big city. But what surprised me most of all was how free and easy he looked, how happy in the company of his friends. That was why I had so much trouble recognising him. Because I’d never seen my father happy before.

  It was 1967, a time of change in the Nightside, just like everywhere else. They were three young men on the way up, men with great futures before them. They were going to change the world.

  They finally entered that most fashionable meeting place, the Hawk’s Wind Bar & Grill. I’d never seen the original place. It burned down (some said self-immolation) in 1970, and now existed as a ghost of itself. A haunted building, with real people as its customers. In the vision it looked much the same, though. A glorious monument to the psychedelic glories of the sixties, complete with rococo Day-Glo neon and Pop-Art posters with colours so bright they practically mugged the eyeballs. Even at a distance, I thought I could still smell the usual aroma of coffee, joss sticks, dodgy cigarettes, and patchouli oil. The Go-Go checked jukebox played all the latest sounds, and the Formica-covered tables were surrounded by all the familiar faces of the period, from the enigmatic Orlando to the Travelling Doctor and his latest companions. Walker and Robinson and Taylor smiled and waved easily to one and all as they entered, but no-one paid them much attention. They weren’t important people, then, these three. The man who would run the Nightside, the man who would collect it, and the man who would damn it.

  Henry, Mark, and Charles commandeered the last remaining table in the far corner, ordered various kinds of coffee from the gum-chewing, white-plastic-clad waitress, then poured over the latest issue of OZ magazine, the special Nightside issue. Charles had just picked up his copy, and Mark grabbed it from him, to check if they’d printed his letter about Elvis being the real shooter of JFK. Walker had already read the issue, of course. He was always the first at everything.

  We all listened as the three young men talked. It seemed they were impatient, for all their good humour. Their inevitable bright future seemed unfairly far off. They were being held back, by entrenched interests and people who weren’t interested in trying anything new—anything that hadn’t been around for decades, and preferably centuries. Fashion was one thing, sin always thrived on the very latest fashions; but no-one at the top wanted to know about institutional change. These three young men were determined to seize power and influence, if necessary, so that they could force through necessary changes. For the greater good of all, of course. They wanted to usher in the Age of Aquarius, and the mind’s true liberation. Everyone young was a dreamer and an idealist in 1967.

  When they’d finished with the magazine, it was time for show-and-tell. Mark was a collector even back then, and had got his hands on something special. He took it out of his shoulder bag, looking quickly about to make sure no-one was watching, then laid his find reverentially on the table before them. Henry and Charles looked dubiously at the cardboard box full of tatty, handwritten pages.

  “All right,” said Walker. “What is it this time? And it had better not be about Roswell again. I am sick to death of Roswell. If anything had really happened there, we’d know about it by now.”

  “You just wait,” Mark said darkly. “I’ll get you proof yet. I know someone who knows someone who claims one guy actually filmed the autopsy on the aliens…Of course, this is the same man who claims we’ll be landing men on the moon in two years, so…”

  “What have you found, Mark?” Charles said patiently.

  “And what good does it do us?”

  “Is it something we can blackmail people with?” Walker said wistfully. “I’ve always wanted to be able to blackmail someone.”

  Mark grinned wolfishly, one hand pressed possessively on the pile of papers
, as though afraid someone might sneak up and steal them. “This, my friends, is the real thing. The mother lode. An unpublished manuscript by the one and only Aleister Crowley—the Magus, the Great Beast, the Most Evil Man in the World. If you believe the newspapers, which mostly I don’t. But Crowley was the real thing, for a time at least, and there have always been those who said his best, or more properly his worst, stuff was never published. This manuscript was apparently put on the market some years back, when Crowley was desperately short of money, but no-one was interested. He was out of favour among the conjuring classes, and the papers were bored with him. Eventually a copy of this manuscript turned up at the International Times, and a sub-editor there passed it on to me, in return for a complete set of Mars Attacks! cards. Unlike most of the fools whose hands the manuscript passed through, I actually read it from end to end, and I am here to tell you, my friends…this is the answer to all our prayers. A direct means to our much desired end.”

  “God, you love the sound of your own voice, “said Henry. “What is it, Mark? Not just another grimoire, I hope.”

  Mark was still grinning widely. “One chapter in this manuscript describes a particularly powerful spell, or Working, that Crowley began but never dared finish. And let us not forget, Crowley dared a lot. He started the Working, to summon and bind to his will a most powerful Being, but abandoned the ritual after catching a glimpse of just what it was he was attempting to summon. Beautiful, terrible, he wrote…and that was all. He ran away from his splendid home on the bank of a Scottish loch, and never returned.”

  “Hold everything,” said Charles. “We’re supposed to attempt something that was too scary and too dangerous for Aleister Crowley? Called by many, not least himself, the Most Evil Man in the World?”

  “Ah,” Mark said smugly, “but we will succeed where he failed, because I have knowledge that Crowley lacked. I recently acquired a sheaf of letters from an ex-friend of Kenneth Anger, in which the writer positively identifies which spirit Crowley was trying to summon, and the means whereby it can be safely controlled. My friends, we have the means to summon up and bind to our will the Transient Being known as Babalon; a physical incarnation of an abstract ideal.”