Ishtar by Biancotti Deborah & Sparks Cat & Warren Kaaron

Author:Biancotti, Deborah & Sparks, Cat & Warren, Kaaron [Biancotti, Deborah]
Language: eng
Format: mobi
Publisher: Gilgamesh Press
Published: 2011-11-13T00:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER FIVE

They drop Chapel at Hyde Park in the centre of town. Before he gets out of the car, he says, “I’ve got another lead for you.”

He gives them a postal address for something he’s come across online, a cult dedicated to ‘confining the powers of the goddess of destruction’. The Lord of Lords, the cult calls itself.

“This is for a post office,” Adrienne says.

“So? Aren’t you the police?” Chapel says.

After he leaves, Adrienne mutters, “What in hell are we meant to do with this?”

Steve shrugs. It’s getting on to dinner time, Adrienne knows. His wife is probably waiting at home.

She sighs. “May as well check it out.”

They’re back near Chinatown, so Adrienne phones in with the address while Steve goes for food. Then they eat hot dumplings with their fingers and wait for the database to cough up a name. Steve keeps glancing at his watch and muttering about calling his wife.

“Belongs to a Mark Davis,” says the voice over the radio.

They’re given an address. Steve drives one-handed, blowing on a pork dumpling while he navigates the traffic.

They cross the bridge into the north of Sydney and pull up outside an art deco one-storey house in Mosman. The man who opens the door looks like he’s just home from an office job. He has brown hair and a bad suit. He’s at that certain age when the body begins to trade muscle for fat.

“Mark Davis?” Steve asks.

Davis eyes them carefully until Adrienne pulls out a badge, then he looks surprised. “Has something happened?”

“What would’ve happened?” Adrienne asks.

Davis goes from surprise to confusion to consternation in a second. “Come in, then.”

Inside the house is neat, too neat, and plain. Like Davis himself.

“We’re here to ask you about the Lord of Lords, Mr. Davis,” says Steve.

“Please, call me Marduk.”

Adrienne hesitates. Great. More nutjobs with crazy names. “Is that your name?”

“It’s my chosen name,” Davis replies.

“Not your legal name?”

Davis raises an eyebrow. “You still think the state has the right to legalise names? You think that’s their call? Plato said—”

“I’m sure he did, Mr. Davis,” Adrienne cuts him off.

Davis sits on his faux-leather couch and glares.

Steve taps away on his phone for a minute. “Marduk. Champion of the gods,” he gives Davis an impressed look. “Nice.”

“Modest, too.” Adrienne takes up a position in the doorway. “What does your organisation do, Mr. Davis?”

“We teach the right of the individual—”

“So you identify with who? Socialist Alliance?”

“Oh, no. We don’t propose to build a relationship with one of the bigger parties—”

“Don’t like playing with the other kids?” Adrienne interrupts.

Davis — Marduk — gives her a soft glare.

“Partnerships between organisations with differing goals,” he says, enunciating each word, “have a habit of falling apart.”

“Like cops and robbers, that sort of thing?” Adrienne says. “I’ve seen that one fall apart. What about you, Steve?”

Steve gives Davis a wink. Davis doesn’t respond. He’s not prepared to buy the good-cop-bad-cop routine, that’s clear.

“Socialism,” says Davis, “frequently aligns itself with atheism. We’re not atheists. Our goals are not the refusal of the gods.

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