The Bride Wore Black Leather

TEN Truths and Consequences

St. Jude’s is still the only real church in the Nightside, tucked away in an area where nobody goes and a hell of a long way from the Street of the Gods. Because St Jude’s is the real deal. It’s only an old, cold, stone structure, built so long ago no-one remembers when, with featureless grey walls, unmarked by time or weather or the designs of man. No tower, no bell, no crucifix on display, a few slit windows, here and there, and one narrow doorway. St Jude’s isn’t meant to be easy to find or easy to enter. This is a church where you can talk directly with your god, and expect to be heard. And, more worryingly, answered. Dreams can come true, and miracles can happen. So be very careful what you ask for.

I had Cathy park the MINI Cooper some distance away from the church, and after she’d locked it up and armed the defences, we left the car where it was and made our way slowly, and carefully, and hopefully very quietly, down the long, narrow street that led to the church. St. Jude’s stood grim and alone in the moonlight. There was no-one else about, and even the ever-present roar of traffic seemed faded and far-away. As though we had come to a whole new place, where everyone kept their heads down to avoid being noticed. It’s one thing to pray to God when you’re in trouble; it’s quite another to have Him take a personal interest in you.

St. Jude’s stood alone because it liked it that way. It existed in its own small and very private world, and always had.

“You really think the Sun King won’t hear us coming?” said Cathy. “It’s so quiet here you could hear a mouse thinking about farting.”

“Why make it easy for him?” I said. “I’ve reached the stage where I’ll take any advantage I can get my hands on.”

Cathy gave me a sideways look. “You really believe all this living-god crap, boss?”

“I don’t know,” I said. “I’ve met powers and dominations in my time, and any number of gods and demons, but the Sun King . . . is something else. When he says he wants to change the world, he’s not being metaphorical. Look how easily he turned the whole of the Nightside against me. Even my mother couldn’t do that during the Lilith War; and she’s a Biblical Myth.”

Even as we drew near St. Jude’s, keeping alert for any sound or sight of the Sun King, I was still keeping a careful watch on Cathy. If she was going to betray me, this would be the perfect time and place. I didn’t want to believe that, didn’t even want to think that; but after Suzie . . . I didn’t know what to believe any more. But all the way up the narrow road, right up to the church itself, Cathy said nothing, did nothing but stick close by my side, ready for anything. I felt ashamed to have doubted her. She always was a better person than me.

We stopped a few yards short and looked the place over. St. Jude’s looked solid and implacable, as always, ancient and immovable, something you could trust and believe in. Not for mercy or compassion, or even justice; St, Jude’s stood for the truth. Because St. Jude’s was the one true thing in an ever-changing world.

“What the hell are you suddenly smiling at?” said Cathy. “If there’s anything funny here, I missed it. This whole location is creeping me out, big-time.”

“St. Jude’s,” I said. “Patron saint of lost causes. How appropriate.”

“You’re weird, boss.”

Strange lights blazed through the slit windows of the old church, stark, unrelenting lights that cut through the surrounding gloom like knives. More of the fierce light shone from the open door; pushing back the night like the glare from an open furnace. You only had to look at the light to know it wasn’t of this world. This was light from Outside, light seen from the other side.

“The Lord of Thorns has got to be here. Hasn’t he?” said Cathy, uneasily. “There’s no way he’d allow anyone to misuse the church.”

“I am sort of depending on his being here,” I admitted. “He’s one of the biggest guns I know, in the powers business. But look at the place. I can’t see the Lord of Thorns putting up with this . . . But then, I can’t see the Sun King being powerful enough to drive the Lord of Thorns out, either.”

“So how powerful is the Sun King, boss?”

“He’s as powerful as the Entities from Beyond need him to be,” I said. “And they . . . are starting to worry me.”

“The Lord of Thorns has always worried me,” said Cathy. “He represents all the aspects of God most people don’t want to think about. I’ve never been too sure what he really is, or what he’s really for.”

“I have had long conversations with him, on that very point,” I said. “And I have to say I’m no wiser. I need him to be on my side, one more time. Because I’m running out of options.” I looked at the light streaming out of the slit windows and shuddered briefly, as though something had pissed on my grave. “I don’t want to believe the Sun King can go head to head with the Lord of Thorns. If the Entities from Beyond can slap him down, we are all in deep doo-doo.”

“You can say shit, boss,” said Cathy. “It’s all right. I’m all grown-up.”

And then the Sun King popped his head out of the open front door and smiled engagingly at us.

“You can stop muttering and sneaking about. I’ve known you were there for ages. Come on in! The Entities weren’t sure you’d get here after all the crap I rained down on you, but no, I said, John Taylor will be here, for the finale. Because you really are a stubborn little soul, aren’t you, John?”

“Oh he is,” said Cathy. “Really. You have no idea.”

The Sun King looked at her doubtfully. “And this is . . . ?”

“Cathy,” I said. “She works with me.”

The Sun King shrugged, beckoned for us to enter St. Jude’s, and disappeared back inside the church. And after only a moment’s hesitation, I led the way in after him. Unarmed and unprepared, but doing my best to look cocky and confident because you never let the opposition know they’ve got you worried. The light at the doorway was sharp, even sinister, and painfully bright. Light with all the warmth and goodness taken out of it. I screwed up my eyes and strode straight into the light, doing my best to look like I knew what I was doing.

I made a point of stopping just inside the church, to let my vision clear. I couldn’t afford to seem weak or helpless. Cathy stayed close beside me, as I looked unhurriedly round the church, taking my time. The interior hadn’t changed, but then it never does. Two rows of blocky wooden pews, with a narrow central aisle leading down to the great slab of ancient stone at the far end, covered in a cloth of white samite. A simple altar, for a simple church. No statues, no stained-glass windows, not even a pulpit. Nothing but the essentials. Nothing to distract you from what you came here for. Faith and worship at their most basic and brutal. There were rows of candles to every side, none of them lit. There was only the awful light, which seemed to come from everywhere and nowhere. Light from Outside; from where the Entities from Beyond were.

The Sun King was lounging lazily against the altar; smiling happily, even arrogantly. The smile of a man who knows he’s already won and is waiting for you to notice, so he can indulge in a little quiet preening and gloating. His Coat of Vivid Colours looked over-bright and even gaudy in the new light. Or perhaps it always had, and I needed to see it in its proper setting to realise. The Sun King pushed his tinted granny glasses down his nose, so he could peer at me over the top of them. His eyes were full of childish mischief and a terrible certainty.

“All the time and trouble it took you, to get here,” he said. “And all of it for nothing. You even found time to pick up a girl side-kick! I am impressed. But there’s nothing you can do to stop me now, or even slow me down. It’s all going to happen right here, in this most ancient of places, where the Nightside had its beginnings.”

“I know,” I said. “I was there, when it happened.”

The Sun King looked at me uncertainly, then shrugged. “You do get around, don’t you, Mr. Taylor? It doesn’t matter. I will raise the sun, and the dawn will come, and the longest night in the world will finally come to an end.”

“Girl side-kick? You arrogant little tosser! You don’t mess with my boss!”

Cathy had a very large pistol in her hand, aimed right at the Sun King’s chest. I grabbed her arm and pulled it down, then wrestled with Cathy till I was sure she wasn’t going to try that again. She stopped fighting me, breathing hard, and glared at me. I glared right back at her.

“Why not, boss? Give me one reason why not?”

“You really think a bullet is going to stop him? Or the Entities behind him? He could turn you inside out just by looking at you! Where did you get hold of a gun, anyway? No, don’t tell me, I don’t want to know.”

“Suzie gave it to me.”

“Of course she did. Please, Cathy, as a personal favour to me, put the gun away. Before he decides to do something amusing to it. Or you.”

Cathy snarled but made the gun disappear somewhere about her person again. I had to lean on the nearest pew for a moment. Even the brief struggle with Cathy had taken a lot out of me. There wasn’t a lot left in me to draw on. Cold sweat beaded my face, and my legs were trembling. I could barely feel the rough ancient wood of the pew, under my hands.

“Not looking too good there, John,” the Sun King said cheerfully. “In fact, I’d have to say you were looking pretty shit. Been having a hard time, have you? Getting near the bottom of the barrel? I knew there was a reason why I had the Entities mess you up and drive you round the Nightside like a mad thing. Killing you would have been far too kind. I wanted you to catch up with me and be here for my final triumph. Because it’s never enough to break your opponents; they have to admit they’ve been beaten.”

“That’ll be the day,” I said. I pushed myself upright and turned away from the pew, with an effort I hoped wasn’t too obvious. I met the Sun King’s gaze steadily.

“You made it as difficult as you could, but I’m still here. And I will stop you.”

“How did it feel, John?” said the Sun King. “Having to kill your old friend, Julien Advent?”

I heard Cathy’s breath catch in her throat. “You killed him, John? You really did kill him?”

“I need you to trust me, Cathy,” I said, not looking round. “I have no right to ask it of you, but . . .”

“Of course you do. You risked your life to save me. Nothing else matters. You can fill me in on the details later.”

“Yes. I promise I’ll tell you everything, later.” I took a step towards the Sun King. “I did what I had to do. I’ve always been able to do the hard, necessary thing.”

“Yes, but how did it feel, John? Did it break your heart? Well, now you know how I feel. The world, the future that I gave my heart and soul to, betrayed me by not becoming what it was supposed to.”

“Wallow in self-pity on your own time,” I said. “Where’s the Lord of Thorns?”

The Sun King shrugged easily. “I had the Entities lure him away, with urgent news. Though I can’t believe anyone his age still believes in angels. Only room for one living god in this church, and that’s me.”

“But why here?” said Cathy bluntly. “Come on; you know you want to tell us. Your sort always likes to make speeches and justify yourself.”

“Girl side-kicks should be seen and not heard,” said the Sun King. “If they like having their tongues attached. But she’s right, John; I always have loved addressing an audience. Those were my happiest days, preaching in Haight-Ashbury. So why St. Jude’s? Because this particular place was here before the Nightside was here. A holy place, where Heaven touched Earth, briefly, and made a connection. This location was sacred long before someone built a church here, and made it Christian with a saint’s name. Think of St. Jude’s as a conduit, where here meets the hereafter. Where reality itself can be overwritten, by a greater power.

“I will call on the Aquarians, and they will fill me with their power, in this place where miracles happen and dreams come true. I will bring the sun here, and let the sun shine in, and it will shed its natural light over this unnatural darkness and make it what it should always have been. Sunnyside! Let us all hail the Age of Aquarius, and the soul’s true liberation! All things shall be made well, all hurts healed, and good things will happen every day.”

“You can’t do that,” I said.

He glared at me, irritated at being interrupted in midflow. “Oh, I think you’ll find I can. I must. I have to save the world. From itself, if need be.”

“You don’t understand!” I said. “You’ve never understood how important the Nightside is, just as it is! We are the last-ditch defence, against things like the Aquarians, or whatever they really are. What the good guys can’t do, we will. The Nightside is here to do whatever needs doing, to defend Humanity, and the world. Your Aquarian masters need you to destroy us, so they can invade our reality. You must see that! They’re not Entities, they’re Enemies!”

At the end I was shouting at him, but he didn’t flinch. None of it touched him. He smiled coldly, condescendingly.

“You’re so desperate now you’d say anything, anything at all to stop me, wouldn’t you? Well, tough. Here comes the Sun.”

At that moment, the shotgun blast hit him square in the chest, punching him right off his feet, and backwards over the stone altar. Blood flew on the air, and the Sun King hit the floor behind the altar. He hit it hard, and didn’t move again. And while the sound of the shotgun blast was still ringing on the close air of the church, I turned to look; and there was Shotgun Suzie, my Suzie, standing behind me. Smoke still rising from both barrels of her pump-action shotgun. She stood tall and proud in her black motorcycle leathers, my blonde-haired Valkyrie. She smiled at me.

“You didn’t really think I’d leave you to do all this on your own, did you?”

“I thought you’d never get here,” I said. Because I had to say something.

Suzie racked new shells into place and strode forward to join me, tilting the gun up and back to rest on her leather-clad shoulder. I made myself stand very still. Hope was a small and fragile thing in my heart, and I didn’t want to do anything to disturb it.

“I knew someone would be listening in on my phone,” she said, in her cool, calm voice. “It’s what I would have done. So I said what they expected me to say. And once everyone knew I was pursuing you for the bounty on your head, most of the other would-be bounty hunters quietly dropped out of the race. Rather than go up against me. I’ve been trailing you at a distance for ages, taking out anyone who looked like getting too close. You’ve no idea how many times I’ve saved your life, tonight. You didn’t even notice, did you? All caught up in the thrill of the chase. You always did need me to watch your back. And now here we are, at the end of the trail. Together again.” She cocked her head slightly to one side. “You’re being very quiet, John. You didn’t really think I’d turned against you, did you?”

“Of course not,” I lied.

Suzie looked at me, for a long moment. “It must have been very hard for you, out there on your own. All your friends turned against you. I’m glad you found Cathy.”

“More like I found him!” Cathy said cheerfully. “So you never wanted the bounty on John’s head?”

“There’s only ever been one bounty, as far as I was concerned,” said Suzie. “And that was on the Sun King. No-one messes with my man and gets away with it.”

“You are a very frightening person,” said Cathy. “Don’t know what he sees in you.”

But they were both smiling. They never doubted me for a moment. They were always better people than me.

We all stopped, and looked around, as we heard sounds of movement from behind the altar. And there was the Sun King, rising to his feet, brushing himself down in a fussy sort of way. He turned to face us and smiled, completely unharmed. His Coat of Vivid Colours had no bullet-holes in it, and no blood-stains. His gaze was very cold.

“I can’t believe he’s getting up again,” said Suzie. “I must be losing my touch.”

She stepped forward and shot him in the face with both barrels, at point-blank range. The sound was deafening, and smoke filled the air. But when it cleared, he was still standing there, untouched. He smiled at Suzie, showing his teeth, defying her. I’d always suspected that with the power of the Entities behind him, no mortal weapon could stop the Sun King. Suzie lowered her shotgun, not even bothering to rack fresh shells. Oddly, she didn’t seem that upset. She looked at me and surprised me with a quick wink.

“Good thing I brought a few friends along,” said Suzie.

Razor Eddie and Dead Boy strode into St. Jude’s as though they’d been waiting at the door all along, ready for their cue. Which they probably had been, though only Suzie could have persuaded them to go along with such a plan. (Because Razor Eddie doesn’t take orders, and Dead Boy always wants to be the first into any dangerous situation.) Razor Eddie looked uneasily about him. As far as I knew, he’d never seen the inside of St. Jude’s before. He might be the Punk God of the Straight Razor, but he was in the presence of a greater power now, and he knew it. He nodded brusquely to me.

“I would have beaten you in the cemetery if something hadn’t been messing with my head. Not my fault if my heart wasn’t really in it.” He smiled at me for a moment, then turned to glare at the Sun King. “As for you, when I decide to kill John Taylor, it will be my idea and no-one else’s.”

“Can’t take you anywhere,” said Dead Boy. He pushed in beside Eddie and smiled ruefully at me. “We would have been here sooner, but it took me a while to put myself back together again. Did you have to take me apart quite so thoroughly? You know I’ve never been any good at sewing. Still, I’m sure you’ll be relieved to know that you didn’t damage my car in the least.”

“Are you both clear in your minds towards me now?” I said, smiling despite myself. “Are we all friends again?”

“Move on,” said Razor Eddie. “I wasn’t myself.” It was as close to an apology as he could get.

“Being dead means never having to say you’re sorry,” Dead Boy said solemnly. “It was Suzie here that did it. Having her around was enough to break the influence. She is a very . . . single-minded person, and very attached to you, in her own endearing and really quite scary way.”

Razor Eddie nodded. “She intimidated the influence right out of me. Nothing like having a shotgun shoved up your nose to concentrate the mind wonderfully.”

“You have such friends, John,” said the Sun King. “You should be very proud of them.”

Larry and Tommy Oblivion came strutting in, to join the party. Tommy was grinning broadly, and Larry looked as pleasant as his dead face and dour personality would permit.

“Once the Library broke the Sun King’s influence over us, it never got a proper grip again,” said Tommy happily. “And then we joined up with Suzie and these two bad boys, and came here.” He glared at the Sun King and stuck out his tongue at him.

“And it did help,” said Larry, “When we were presented with proof that Julien Advent wasn’t dead after all.”

Footsteps approached the church from outside, and I spun round to face the door; a sudden wild pleading hope filling my heart to bursting. And through the door came Dr. Benway and Julien Advent. I staggered and almost fell as the strength went out of my legs, and I had to grab onto a nearby pew to hold myself up. Julien smiled at me; and in that smile was all the understanding and forgiveness in the world. I ran to him, and hugged him, and held on to him like a drowning man who’s finally been offered an outstretched hand. He patted me on the back as I held him to me, and I didn’t need to see his face to know he was looking extremely embarrassed. Neither of us has ever been the touchy-feely kind. But right then I didn’t care. I finally let him go and stepped back to look him over. He looked fine.

“No,” he said, smiling. “I’m not dead. I never was.” He looked at the Sun King, and his smile was strangely understanding. “You could have let me die, but you didn’t. Because you couldn’t bring yourself to kill me. Despite everything, despite your masters’ orders, you couldn’t do something you knew was wrong.”

“No,” said the Sun King. “How could I kill my oldest friend? But I needed John Taylor distracted, and the whole Nightside outraged enough to want him dead, so I went with the thing that would have upset me most.” He looked at me. “All an illusion, John. You only thought you killed him. I put him in a coma and tucked him away in Ward 12A. Seemed appropriate. And then I convinced everyone else to see things my way. You keep thinking of me as the villain, John, but I’m really not. I only do what I have to do, for the greater good.” He looked at Julien. “You were quite definitely in a coma. How . . . ?”

“Shouldn’t have put me in Ward 12A,” said Julien. “You and your sense of humour . . . Dr. Benway spotted me the moment she made her next rounds. She woke me up, and we went out into the Nightside together and joined up with these good people.”

“Suzie broke the influence, but it kept creeping back,” said Dead Boy. “Until they came along. Hard to believe someone is dead when they’re standing right in front of you insisting that they’re not. I mean, I know dead; and he isn’t.”

“Suzie brought us here,” said Razor Eddie. “So we could make amends for being . . . mistaken.”

“And so we could kick the Sun King’s arse,” said Larry Oblivion. “The Nightside may be a spiritual cesspit, but it’s our spiritual cesspit.”

“You old romantic, you,” said Tommy.

The Sun King wasn’t paying any attention to us. He only had eyes for Dr. Benway. He studied the old woman, with her grey hair and lined face, still wearing her white doctor’s coat, and his smile was a very gentle thing indeed.

“So, after all these years . . . Princess Starshine has returned to join her Sun King,” he said. “You always were my touchstone, Emily. You were the one I wanted to make a better world for. When I finally came out of the White Tower, and you weren’t there . . . When I found out I’d lost you, and the life we should have had together . . . It was like I’d lost everything that mattered. All I had left, was the Dream. It’s all I’ve got left now. I will bring about a better world. Because I am the good guy here, and I will not be stopped.”

“I keep telling you,” I said. “In the Nightside, it’s not enough just to be the good guy. To fight the real bad guys, like your Aquarian masters, you need fighters, monsters, outcasts, like us.”

“No!” said the Sun King. “I have given my life to this! I saw the Dream, in the Summer of Love, and it was a real thing! It should have happened; it would have happened if I’d still been here! Well, I’m here now, and I will make up for my absence; and all of you together aren’t enough to stop me! I will do this! I will! You aren’t enough!”

“Just as well I’m here, then,” said the Lord of Thorns.

We all looked round again. The Lord of Thorns didn’t walk through the doorway; he was suddenly there, with us, a cold, forbidding presence in his long, grey robes, long, grey hair and beard, leaning on a heavy wooden staff. Looking like one of those Old Testament prophets who never did believe in sugar-coating God’s words. He smiled upon the Sun King, and it was not a good smile.

“Did you really think you could lure me from this sacred place with your petty stratagems?” he said, his voice as unyielding as the ancient, grey, stone walls of St. Jude’s. “I have been here all along, watching and waiting. For this moment.”

“You can’t stop me!” shouted the Sun King. His face was flushed red, his eyes puffy as though he wanted to cry tears of sheer frustration, and there was something of the thwarted, petulant child in his voice. “Even all of you together don’t have the power to stand against me! All those long years I spent in the White Tower, learning terrible wisdoms at my masters’ feet, all to gain the power I needed, to do this thing! To do this one, necessary, thing!”

“It’s not your power,” I said. “It never was. You have nothing except for what the Entities let you have. To do their work. If you could only see who and what they really are, you’d throw that power back in their faces.”

“What?” said the Sun King. “I don’t understand. What are you talking about? Why would I do such a thing?”

“Because you’re the good guy,” I said. “And they’re not.”

And I raised my gift one last time and reached out with my mind, to find the Entities from Beyond, the Aquarians, or whatever the hell they really were. It took everything I had left, every last bit of hoarded strength. Blood coursed down my face, from my eyes and my nose. It ran from my ears, and spilled from my slack lips. I could feel things bleeding and breaking inside me, important things. I’d pushed myself and my gift further than I ever had before. Too far. No coming back from this. But after everything I’d done, after my lack of faith in those who’d loved me most, how could I not? It needed doing, so I did it. That’s always been my job. My legs started to buckle, and Cathy and Suzie moved quickly in on either side to hold me up. They were both speaking to me, saying urgent things, but I couldn’t hear them. I pushed past all the pain, refusing to be beaten by my own weakness, and concentrated on my gift. And I found my way to the Entities from Beyond and the world where they lived.

And once I’d done that, the greater power in St. Jude’s rose and bound all of us, everyone in the church, together; and used us as a focus to open a door between the Nightside and the other place. I couldn’t have done it on my own, but I wasn’t alone. My good friends were with me. In St. Jude’s, where prayers are answered, and miracles can happen.

The gateway lay before us, a great circle cut in the air itself, through which the other reality could be seen. Don’t ask me where it was. Outside; that’s all I can tell you. Not simply another world but another reality. A harsh light blasted into the church through the gateway, thick and foul and somehow spoiled. Far worse than the few drops of light that had spilled through before, pulled through by the Sun King’s presence. This was an alien light, from an alien place, never meant for human eyes. And through that light, that gateway, I could see the other place, so alien as to be almost beyond human comprehension. Think of a whole world, a whole universe, made up of insects crawling over a ball of dung, forever and ever. That’s as close as I can some to describing what I saw there.

The Sun King cried out, in horror and disgust, as the Entities took him over and spoke through him.

“Yes. This is what we are. This is what we do. We use up worlds, consuming them entirely. And then we move on, to the next. Because we’re always hungry. This world, this reality, is all used up. We need . . . a new ball of dung. Your world. Your reality. So we made this man into a weapon, to open the door for us. To let our light shine over the Nightside and make it our feeding ground. And after we are done here . . . your world is such a fine, rich, fecund place. Who knows how long we can make it last? A population like yours will feed us for generations. We are not the Entities from Beyond. We are not Aquarians. If you must have a name for us . . . call us Shiva Rising.”

The Sun King took off his tinted glasses with a trembling hand and let them drop to the floor, so he could look at us clearly. I’d never seen such misery in a man’s eyes.

“Send them away,” I said, through numb, unfeeling lips. “You brought them in; only you can send them back.”

“But then . . . I wouldn’t be the Sun King any more,” he said, in his own voice. “Only ordinary, everyday Harry Webb.”

Dr. Benway moved forward to stand with me, holding the Sun King’s gaze with her own. “That was enough for both of us, once.”

“Harry Webb was my friend,” said Julien Advent, moving forward on my other side. “I’ve missed him. I could always depend on him, to do the right thing.”

“I was a drug addict, before I met you,” said the Sun King. “I thought . . . I’d found something better. But it was just another kind of addiction. Still, I know how to fight that.”

Shiva Rising’s voice filled the whole church, too huge a thing to be channelled through one man.

You cannot stop us! You cannot reject us, Sun King! We made you! We own you!

“Is that true, Harry?” said Dr. Benway.

The Sun King slowly turned his head to look at me. “I was wrong. I only saw what I wanted to see. But I . . . am still the good guy. So kill me, John Taylor. Do the hard but necessary thing. Break the link, and drive the Entities out of here. Save the world; because I can’t.”

“Haven’t you learned anything yet?” I said. “It’s easy to make amends by dying for a cause. Do the hard thing; live for what you believe in. Defy the Entities by deciding who you are for yourself. You invited them in; you can kick them out.”

“But I’m not strong enough!” said the Sun King.

“Good thing you’re not alone then,” said the Lord of Thorns. “And that this . . . is St. Jude’s.”

The Sun King smiled slowly. “I am the last one who remembers the Dream. The Summer of Love. The beautiful people. The love generation.” He turned and looked back into the gateway, at the Entities who had never been what he thought they were. He looked right into the terrible light, and he didn’t flinch. “I am the Sun King; and I am not what you made me, or intended me to be. In that wonderful summer of ’67, I was the most wonderful thing in it. And I still hold within me the love from that time, and the light. Take it.”

The power rose in St. Jude’s again, older than the church, older than Christianity, older than we could hope to comprehend. But still, something kind, something that cares for us. It bound us all together, and together we called up the love and the light from that distant summer, and threw it at Shiva Rising like a weapon. And the sun shone down. For the first time in centuries, sunlight came to the Nightside, and filled the Church of St. Jude’s, a pure white light, stamping out the sour and awful light that had spilled in from the Other side. It poured through the gateway, into the other place, and the Entities couldn’t stand it. They screamed. They pulled back from the Sun King, from the light and the love of the Summer of Love, and slammed the door shut forever, to protect themselves.

Sealed up in that dark and terrible place, to feed on each other, until there were none of them left.

The Light snapped off and was gone. But all the candles in St. Jude’s were lit, glowing cheerfully away. Where the Sun King had been, now stood an ordinary-looking young man in a T-shirt and jeans. Harry Webb. And walking slowly towards him, a beautiful young woman in a doctor’s white coat, who had once been called Princess Starshine. Because the power in St. Jude’s might be harsh and sometimes even brutal in its demand for the truth, but it also knew mercy and compassion. I knew that, because I felt really good. Totally relaxed, all my hurts gone, complete and ready for anything. I stretched slowly and laughed easily. And then Cathy and Suzie went to clean the blood off my face with handkerchiefs and spit; and I hugged them both to me.

Julien Advent nodded easily to Harry Webb, as though this was something that happened to him every day. “Good to have you back, my old friend. You did the right thing in the end; as I always knew you would. What will you do now?”

“I still believe in the Dream,” said Harry. “So I suppose it’s up to me to convince everyone else. One day, one step, at a time. Try to shed a little light in the Nightside. With a little help from my friends . . . Hello, Emily. It’s been a while.”

“You should never have left me behind,” said the young Dr. Benway. “See what trouble you get into, without me?”

“I think we could all use a nice little sit-down and a chat, and a beverage of something pleasant,” said Julien. “I suggest we adjourn to the Hawk’s Wind Bar & Grille. It’s bound to be back by now. There are all kinds of useful contacts you can make there, Harry, including some old friends you might recognise.”

“All right!” I said. “That’s it! Everybody out! I have a wedding to prepare for.”

“Damn right,” said Suzie Shooter.