The Dragon with the Girl Tattoo Read online

  Copyright

  A Gollancz eBook

  Copyright © Adam Roberts 2010

  All rights reserved.

  The right of Adam Roberts to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted by him in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.

  First published in Great Britain in 2010 by Gollancz

  The Orion Publishing Group Ltd

  Orion House

  5 Upper Saint Martin’s Lane

  London, WC2H 9EA

  An Hachette UK Company

  This eBook first published in 2010 by Gollancz.

  A CIP catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.

  ISBN 978 0 575 10092 3

  This eBook produced by TexTech, India

  All characters and events in this publication are fictitious and any resemblance to real persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental.

  No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system or transmitted in any form or by any means, without the prior permission in writing of the publisher, nor to be otherwise circulated in any form of binding or cover other than that in which it is published without a similar condition, including this condition, being imposed on the subsequent purchaser.

  www.adamroberts.com

  www.orionbooks.co.uk

  ‘Never laugh at live dragons …’ This later became a proverb.

  Antique Ape Saga

  Contents

  Copyright

  Prologue

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Acknowledgments and Dedication

  PROLOGUE

  It happened every year and had done so without fail for three centuries. The parcel arrived, as it always did, and the elderly dragon regarded it with a more than usually grim expression. Believe me, you’ve never seen a face with a grim expression until you’ve seen a dragon face with a grim expression.

  The parcel lay on his desk. He already knew what it contained, and knew the debilitating heart-sinking he would feel when he unwrapped it; but it couldn’t be avoided. First things first. He called a firedrake into his study. ‘Where are we over?’

  ‘Limbchopping,’ the servant replied.

  ‘Of course. Be so good as to leave the island. Fly down to the city, and ask Detective Superintendent Smaug to pay me a visit.’

  The firedrake glanced at the desk, and saw the package. He knew what it contained, just as well as his master, and understood the gravity of his commission. He curled around in mid-air, wings beating a hummingbird rhythm, and flew straight through the main window.

  ‘You’ll find him in the main Police Castle,’ the old dragon called after him, although the firedrake didn’t need telling. It would not be the first time he had summoned the Detective Superintendent to attend the opening of one of these parcels. In mid-air the drake ducked and was gone.

  Leaving the parcel on the desk, Helltrik Vagner went to the window to wait with the sort of patience that comes easy to a being half a millennium old. It was a pleasant afternoon in late summer. Light was slanting in from the empty west, as the sun – that great sphere of whitegold fire – bestowed its superb treasure upon the world with its habitual carelessness. To look down was to observe a great many white bobbly clouds, like Moomins, overlaying the distant landscape. But to look up and west was to see a great stretch of high cirrus, tinted pale tangerine, stretched like a wing of fire around the horizon.

  Shortly, Helltrik watched in silence. He was, as you might expect with a dragon his age, large and gnarly, his once golden scales now going cream-coloured at the edges. Immediately below his window lay the western gardens of the Vagner floating island, Doorbraak. To say that the garden was well-manicured was both true and false. It was true in the sense that every hedge and flowerbed was perfectly trimmed and maintained; but false in the sense that ‘manicure’ is something one does to a hand. This garden was not a hand. It had no fingernails. It was, as I think I have mentioned, a garden. Broad lawns of blond, bristly grass were mowed to a perfect flatness. Ash, willow, elm were planted in rows, and small-leaved limes grew at the edge, overlooking the small wall and the mile-long drop. The trees cast fishnet shadow in the summer light. Smoke from a dozing dragon – another member of the large Vagner clan – spilled over the hedge like poured pollen. And as Helltrik watched this peaceful world, the unwrapped parcel sat on his desk, mutely accusing.

  Soon enough there came the sound of something large in flight, and up over the edge of the island a very large-bellied, impressive-looking dragon appeared. Helltrik’s firedrake was flying by his side, although he hardly needed guiding. He flew straight over the garden, broad wings forcefully massaging the air, and alighted a little heavily on the stone of Helltrik’s personal balcony.

  ‘Sammy,’ said Helltrik. ‘Thanks for coming.’

  Detective Superintendent Smaug came through the balcony door and settled his prodigious rump into an easy chair. He was no longer young, and the exertion of the flight had roughened the edge of his breathing a little. ‘Another one?’ he wheezed.

  ‘I’m afraid so.’

  ‘Same time of year, same thing,’ said Smaug, peering at the parcel. ‘Well – are you going to open it?’

  ‘I suppose I must,’ said Helltrik, heavily. ‘I dread doing so, even though I know what is inside – of course, because I know what is inside.’

  ‘Come on, Trikky,’ said the Detective Superintendent. ‘Let’s get it over with.’

  Vagner took the parcel and, in a few easy gestures, tore its wrapping away. Inside was a narrow strip of leather, a spotted dark purple in colour, more than a metre long and shaped into a chevron at one end.

  The two elderly dragons looked eagerly at it, as if hoping to read its pattern of pale purple mottles. But if such was their intention, they were frustrated. They both sat back, Vagner holding the limp strip in his right foreclaw.

  ‘There’s nothing very distinctive about it, this year,’ said Detective Superintendent Smaug. ‘It’s clearly from a mature beast, though.’

  ‘I’m never quite sure what we’re looking for,’ Vagner admitted, in a weary voice. ‘I mean, when we peruse them like this.’

  ‘Well – distinguishing marks, I suppose,’ said the policedragon. They sat in silence for a while. ‘I almost feel,’ the Detective Superintendent added, ‘as if we should open a bottle of firewater. Drink to it.’

  ‘Drink to it?’

  ‘Oh it’s poor taste, I daresay. But – well, it’s the three hundredth, after all! That’s quite a remarkable statistic: every single year without fail for three entire centuries. You don’t think we should mark the significance of that fact?’

  ‘I’ve never understood the hobgoblin hold whole numbers have over the minds of otherwise sane dragons,’ said Vagner. ‘My father wanted to host the largest party Scandragonia had ever seen when I reached a hundred. But why? It’s no different to reaching the age of ninety-nine, or a hundred and one.’

  ‘Come, come, Trikky,’ said Smaug,
indulgently. ‘You don’t mean that. Three hundred is significant.’

  ‘Its significance,’ said Vagner, a little stiffly, ‘lies only in telling me one thing. That this has been going on for far too long. I have become complacent. It’s time to act. Time to call in outside help, to get to the bottom of this once and for all.’

  Detective Superintendent Smaug shook his equine head briskly. ‘There’s really nothing more the police can do, my friend. We’ve investigated as thoroughly as any police force can. We’ve in-and-outvestigated it. We’ve been all over it. It’s been all over us.’

  ‘I meant, somebody exterior to the police, Sammy.’

  ‘Oh!’ said Smaug. ‘A private investigator? Well, good luck with that.’

  Helltrik sensed his friend’s grumpiness. ‘I’m not saying we can’t share a dram, old boy. What’ll it be? Firewater? Or shall we burn some sack?

  ‘The former, for preference. And I suppose you’d better hand that… that thing over to me. I’ll take it into official police custody, and lay it in the vault with the other two hundred and ninety-nine tongues.’

  Vagner passed the item across. ‘Three hundred dragon tongues,’ he mused, as he busied himself at the drink’s cabinet. ‘All laid out together in a police vault. If only they could talk, eh? Three hundred tongues, and none of them capable of saying a single word.’

  ‘Being ripped from the mouth does tend to diminish the loquacious potential of the tongue,’ said the Detective Superintendent. He took his drink from Vagner’s outstretched claw.

  ‘But who is sending them, eh, Sammy?’ Vagner asked, sitting himself down. ‘Always the same thing, every year without fail. Such a grisly, horrible thing! Why are they sending them? To me?’

  ‘Where are they getting them from, is the question uppermost on my police mind,’ said Smaug. ‘Ripping them out of some poor anonymous dragon’s –bottoms’ he lifted his glass ‘up – mouth. Think of the draconic suffering! Three hundred tongues!’ He drained the firewater, and blew a sharp little red-orange flame.

  ‘I’m still stuck on why,’ said Vagner. ‘Ever since…’

  ‘Now, Trikky, I know what you’re going to say. It’s never been conclusively proved that these tongues have anything to do with… your poor grandniece’s lamentable and mysterious fate.’

  ‘Not conclusively proved?’ Vagner repeated. He drained his own glass, and belched a shining violet-coloured flame. ‘Come come, Sammy. Who can doubt it? Whoever it was murdered my grandniece – and is the same dragon who’s sending me these horrible… tokens. They’re mocking me. Mocking me with their continuing impunity. And, as you say, continuing with their horrible crimes! Mutilating and killing a dragon every year!’

  ‘We’ve no evidence of the killing part.’

  ‘You think there are three hundred live dragons flying about with no tongues in their heads? You don’t think that would be noticed? No, no, he tortures them, kills them, and disposes of their bodies – sinks them in the seas, or something like that. All the loved ones know is that a dragon has vanished. He must be caught, Sammy. We must catch him.’

  ‘Well,’ said Detective Superintendent Smaug, getting up on his hindlegs and tucking the severed dragon tongue away in a pouch slung from a golden belt. ‘Of course the police would like nothing better than to apprehend him. And, as with the others, I’ll make enquiries. But, as with all the others, I’d be amazed if anything comes of it. And as for your grandniece… I’m afraid that case was closed long ago.’

  ‘We’ll see,’ said Vagner. ‘I have somebody in mind. Apparently he’s a genius at the new arts of finding stuff out.’

  ‘Here’s hoping,’ said the Detective Superintendent, stepping from the balcony and into the air. ‘Here’s hoping!’

  Chapter 1

  Käal Morekill Brimstön was widely known as a genius at ‘finding stuff out’. In fact, he was rubbish at finding stuff out. But reputation trumps reality in the card game of life. Provided the card game is one that uses trumps. Like bridge. Or canasta. The two of clubs of Käal’s fame laid on top of the King of Diamonds of his true incompetence. If we have previously agreed that clubs are trumps. If you see what I mean.

  Käal worked for a small but influential Saga, whose central Starkhelm office was kitted out with only the very trendiest Drakea furniture. Come to think of it, I’m not sure canasta uses a trump system. It doesn’t matter. Anyway, the Saga – Köschfagold Saga – specialized in financial news, on the understanding that the proportion of dragonkind interested in money (which is: all of it, give or take) would ensure it a steady readership. It hadn’t worked out that way. But although it was not widely read, the Saga was widely respected. There were Sagas that sold more copies, of course: the celebrity news-based Sptöüägbble Saga, for instance, the literary review Flblloljalblblkklbl Saga, or the cookery-themed Pütunthlobstrëënthpotborkborkbork Saga. But few had the extraordinary reputation for finding things out of Köschfagold. And even fewer had the top-range swivel chairs. And Käal was the star reporter. There were other dragons on staff: the editor, Beargrr, a forceful female with lapis-lazuli coloured spines running down her ample back; and Fyrstarter the deputy editor. But neither of them quite looked the part the way Käal did.

  His scales overlapped as neatly as roof-tiles, and were of a similar brick red and orange-rind colour. He was not young, exactly – his size alone told you that – yet he still had the glamour of youth. His wings, when he stretched them to full length, were entirely free of gaps, holes or tatters. His eyes were so pale they looked almost a white; but a gleaming, handsome sort of white. All these things counted for a good deal in Scandragonia.

  For years he had coasted on these splendid looks, and on the work done by minimum-wage researchers. But then, Köschfagold Saga had run a story on a senior dragon businessman called Wintermute. Wintermute had sued.

  When the raven first arrived at the Saga with the news that they were going to have to defend the story in court, Beargrr had an editorial conversation with Käal. ‘I’ll need to see your notes, records, and all your sources.’

  ‘Right,’ said Käal. ‘What?’

  ‘All your notes,’ she said. ‘So we can ready the court-room defence.’

  Käal shrugged his wings. It took Beargrr several repetitions of her request for her to comprehend that he knew nothing at all about the story that he himself had written.

  ‘But you researched it!’ she kept saying. ‘You must have sources – you must have notes, files, unpublished material.’

  ‘I can barely remember it,’ he said. ‘Was that the one with the red-and-yellow border on the front page?’

  ‘But how can you not know?’ she berated him. ‘You wrote the story!’

  ‘I wrote it,’ said Käal, ingenuously. ‘But that doesn’t mean I researched it. It’s the same as all my stuff. I sent a raven down to the researchers, and they sent all the facts up. I just arranged them in Saga form, putting in all the necessary alliteration and so on.’

  ‘That,’ said Beargrr, ‘is not what a journalist does!’

  At this Käal had looked slightly confused. ‘Are you sure?’ he said. ‘Because I was working on the assumption that it, well, was.’

  ‘Are you kidding me?’

  ‘No.’ He thought about it. ‘Kid as in goat, do you mean? Are you hungry?’

  ‘Kid,’ said Beargrr, in a dull voice, ‘as in: setting up my Saga for financial ruin in an unwinnable court case.’

  Now, the situation between these two dragons was complicated. Beargrr was hamfast with another dragon, a well-respected Swedragenish medical man. But despite that, she had started a relationship with Käal. She had done so because she had found him attractive, but a large part of that attraction had to do with his reputation as a Super Journalist. This, it now seemed, was an unfounded reputation.

  ‘Look,’ he said. ‘Putting raw data into Saga form is not easy. And we’ve always employed researchers – haven’t we? I mean, isn’t that the point of employing research
ers? That they do the research and I write it up?’

  ‘No,’ said Beargrr, looking at her lover with cold eyes. ‘The point of researchers is that they relieve the journalists of tedious or repetitive tasks. But the journalists are still supposed to go out and actually find stuff out.’

  ‘Oh,’ said Käal, looking interested. ‘I did not know that.’

  ‘What do you mean you didn’t know that!’ Beargrr yelled. ‘You’re my star reporter! How can you be a star reporter and not know what a star reporter even does?’

  ‘Well,’ said Käal, mildly. ‘It’s never seemed to be a problem before. You liked the Quetzoacoatlofmanycolours story I filed? That won an award!’ Quetzoacoatlofmanycolours had been a soap merchant. Köschfagold Saga had run a story exposing that his company stock had been involved in a Bubble.

  ‘I assumed you’d gone out and interviewed Quetzoacoatlofmanycolours yourself. I assumed you’d asked about, looking in dustbins, checked the archives of local Sagas, and slowly pieced together the story of the cover-up. Please tell me that you interviewed Quetzoacoatlofmanycolours yourself, asked about, looked in dustbins, checked the archives of local Sagas, and slowly pieced together the story of the cover-up?’

  ‘Nope, I didn’t do any of that.’

  ‘What did you do?’

  ‘Well, I sent a raven down to the researcher’s office, like I always do. There’s a young researcher who’s usually pretty good: still a Salamander, I think. I asked her: what’s up with this Quetzoacoatlofmanycolours geezer? You’d told me to look into him, you see. After a few days she sent all the data back – by raven – and I wrote it up.’

  ‘But you were away for a week!

  ‘I was in the sauna, mostly.’

  ‘I thought you were doing star reporter investigative stuff!’

  ‘No. Just sauna stuff.’

  ‘I can’t believe this!’ Beargrr howled, blowing a bright spire of orange flame straight from the back of her throat. Fire licked and blazed across the office filing cabinet.

  ‘You’re angry!’ said Käal, laughing. Then, the gravity of the situation striking him for the first time, he said it again, without the laugh. ‘You’re angry.’ Then, very sombrely: ‘You’re going to sack me, aren’t you.’