So she was on nobody’s side, remained just the thing that took away children, and she took steps never to be revealed, which meant the parents seldom realized. Hers were the children that got lost in the cracks of the city. She was on no side until, returning one day, as she often did, to her mistress’ house — which had come to be called, to Mora’s great pleasure, Boleyn Castle — to take more soil from its grounds, she saw a group of men outside it, kicking a ball. That also gave Mora great pleasure, because it would have angered the King mightily to see the game he had forbidden being played over one of his properties. They weren’t playing at archery now! She therefore stayed in shadow and let those men live, and made sure always to seek out her sacrifices far away.
As the years passed, what the men did there grew and grew. One day they stuck in the ground a flag with an image of a castle on it, which was now to be their emblem. The spot where they played became known as ‘the Boleyn Ground’, and when they built a stadium for spectators, it had big towers standing outside it. Mora had long since started to attend these matches, hidden at first, and then later in disguise and having paid money. She was increasingly tempted to support them with her craft, and to ensure they were always victorious, but she managed to resist that urge. In truth, she didn’t want to diminish the joy at genuinely winning and, yes, also the sorrow of losing. They became increasingly bound together, occupants of the same soil, and the team’s victories were also Mora’s. When wireless became commonplace, she saw those around her in the stands listening to it, so she stole a set for herself, and started to listen to the commentaries, and eventually to other things that told her stories about the old world. She switched it off rather than hear of the new. The new was what limited her and bricked her in. The cat even started to talk with the voice of the radio, but still only told her the news she wanted to hear.
She hated witnessing the team’s defeats, hated the loud celebrations of the filthy scum that scored against them. So every now and then, but taking care not to do it too often, she would send the worst of those shits to Hell early. She became well known to a few of the spectators, and in time had stories told about her.
It was only a few years ago that Mora started to have a distant feeling that something around her was changing. The secret tides of London were moving almost imperceptibly in some new direction; only one as sensitive as she was might have noticed. One autumn morning she was gathering soil near the stadium when she realized that someone who should not be there was watching her. She turned, ready to send a force slapping against him from her palm, but then realized immediately how little such a tiny reflex would mean to him. He was smartly dressed, having the stuff of kings about him, yes, but he was common too. So he was either both of those things she hated, or neither. But he was smiling all over his face, and that made her choose neither. He was smiling about her, which was something Mora was only used to, sometimes, on her beloved terraces. He told her she had made a contribution to what he called his stocks, and that he applauded her. And he did applaud, and every clap of his hands sent joy flooding through her, and she realized who he was. And finally she knew that here was the creature that, with her visions of Hell, she had long suspected existed. He told her there was a possibility that soon, because of all they were doing to contain and limit London, the descendants of those men in fine gloves, who were always meddling, would stop her from being able to reach her beloved ground.
Mora was horrified. He asked her whether she would owe him service if he removed, as he was planning to do, those who might block her from the Boleyn Ground. She told him with certainty she would. He told her that a man who’d made him good sacrifice had just, at his suggestion, bought the season-ticket seat next to hers. She was to work for him for ten years, and then stop, and the work would serve a higher purpose than it seemed to. He licked his palm and held it up; Mora saw a streak of blood there. Hesitantly, but aware that she was in the presence of, for the first time in centuries, a power that could harm her, a power that asked very little and was being civil, Mora kissed the palm offered to her and tasted blood like water and ashes.
And then he was gone, and Mora found herself weeping, shedding black tears that scorched her face and marked her beloved soil. Because she had now met the power of another king, and, just like that, he had reminded her how she was a victim.
But she did what she was told, and she met with the man Rob Toshack. She even told her name to him, so that he might know it. She found that, despite her anger and hatred at her own weakness, they had much in common, that this was easy work indeed, and that she could therefore remain herself. And so she let herself forget that she was merely a victim. Except at somewhere close to her heart, where she always remembered. ‘She wasn’t a witch,’ she would still insist. But now she didn’t know whether she referred to her mistress or herself.
TWENTY-THREE
As the cat came to the end of its story, Ross felt a terrible fury inside her. ‘That doesn’t excuse her,’ she began. ‘That doesn’t. .!’
But looking at the faces of the listening coppers, she realized that none of them thought so either, and she turned away. The ridiculous voice of that cat, talking so nicely about Toshack and the sacrifice of her dad. . She wanted to hurt it for how it agreed with her.
While the cat ate a second tin of food, Sefton followed the others to the Ops Board. ‘It’s not just that she’s only got special powers in London ’cos of the soil,’ he said, ‘but she can’t bloody leave!’ He amended the board to reflect that, but felt frustrated rather than triumphant. With her everywhere around, it was more like they were stuck in here along with her.
‘And we heard about the old law again. But they were got rid of not long ago,’ observed Quill, making a new addition to the list of concepts.
‘And. .’ said Costain, reaching out with a marker for the photofit of the smiling man, ready to write a new name underneath.
Sefton grabbed his arm and stopped him. ‘We don’t know if she’s right. Putting the name up there would be suggesting we knew. We don’t do theology.’
Costain glared at him, but finally put the pen down.
Ross spoke up then, sounding angry at both of them. ‘Listen, if we can only manage to nick her, and we can convince a judge that it’s against the public interest for her to be kept in the city, and we can then get her sent somewhere else to be detained before trial. . I’d like to find out what happens to her as that prison van heads up the M1. That’d be one solution to Objective seven on the Ops Board: bring to trial or destroy.’