The Man with the Golden Torc

CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE A Family at War

There was only one way to fatally weaken the family. To break their hold on the world. Take away the power that made them strong, made them untouchable: their glorious golden armour. And the only way to do that was to destroy the source of the armour: the Heart. Only a few days ago I would have found that unthinkable; hell, I’d risked my life to defend the damned thing from outside attack. But step by painful step I had been driven to this place, this moment, forced to turn away from everything I’d been taught and brought up to believe in. All that was left to me now was to destroy the one thing I was raised to revere and protect above all others. The rotten, corrupt, lying Heart of the Droods.

Life’s a bitch sometimes.

I hefted Oath Breaker in my hand. Just a stick, really; a long wooden cane carved with symbols I couldn’t even read. It didn’t look like much, to destroy an invader from another dimension and bring an end to centuries of lies. But as with so many other things where my family was concerned, appearances were deceiving. I only had to glance at Oath Breaker with my Sight to see a power so great, so terrible, I had to look away or it would blast the eyes from my head. Oath Breaker was ancient and awful, made when the world was young specifically to undo things that could not be allowed to exist. There were stories that said Oath Breaker had thrown down cities and continents in its time, and killed old gods so thoroughly that no one even remembered their names anymore.

It occurred to me that by destroying the source of the family’s armour, I might be signing my own death warrant. And that of everyone else in my family. I’d seen Torc Cutter kill my uncle James by severing his collar. It could be that no Drood would survive if I took their armour away. But I’d come too far now to even consider turning back. The family that had bowed down to the Heart’s murderous demands for so long, that had chosen to rule humanity instead of protect it, that had embraced the ruthless aims of Zero Tolerance…was not a family I recognised anymore. All that was left to me was to save the family’s honour or put it out of its misery forever.

And what the hell; I was dying anyway.

At least with the Heart destroyed, there was a chance that all the sacrificed souls trapped inside the massive diamond would be freed at last to pass on to the afterlife denied them for so long. Perhaps they would speak for me at the gates of Heaven or Hell, and ask that I not be judged too harshly for all my crimes and sins. That I had done at least one good thing in my life.

"The only way to use Oath Breaker," I said to Molly, "is up close and personal. That means we have to get into the Sanctity, the most closely guarded chamber in the Hall, and stand before the Heart itself."

"Hold everything," said Molly. "Even assuming we can get there, which I’m not, but just for the sake of argument, isn’t there just the smallest possibility that destroying an alien life-form like the Heart could be extremely bloody dangerous? I mean, you use an unknown weapon like Oath Breaker on an unknown other-dimensional thing like the Heart, and God alone knows what kind of forces and energies might be released. You could blow up the whole house. Hell, you might even blow up the whole country."

"Why think so small?" I said. "We might blow up the whole world. But you know what, Molly? I just don’t care anymore. This is something I have to do, and it’s something I’m going to do. Whatever the cost. You don’t have to come with me if you don’t want to…"

"Oh, screw that," Molly said briskly. "I didn’t come this far to miss out on seeing the Droods’ power broken once and for all. This is what I signed on for, Eddie, and don’t you forget it. To have my revenge on the family who murdered my parents."

"The family killed my parents too," I said. "Though they would never admit it. So I suppose…this is my revenge too."

"Besides," said Molly. "You’d probably mess it up on your own anyway. You need me, Eddie."

I smiled at her. "Thank you," I said. "For everything."

"Wouldn’t have missed it for the world," she said, and smiled back at me.

"We’ve come a long way together," I said. "All those years we wasted, trying to kill each other…"

"Don’t get all sloppy and sentimental on me now, Eddie. We have things to do. Maybe later there will be time for…other things."

"If there is a later."

"Oh, look on the bright side: the odds are your family will kill us long before we get anywhere near the Heart."

We laughed quietly together, and then I took her in my arms and held her close. I couldn’t hold her tightly—it hurt my left side too much—but she understood. She held me like I was the most precious thing in her life, which might crack and break if handled too roughly, and buried her face in my shoulder. We stood like that for some time, and then we made ourselves let go. It was all the time we could allow ourselves. We kissed, quickly, and then we stepped back and took on our professional aspects again. The rogue Drood and the wild witch, determined to do or die and probably both.

"So," said Molly, entirely businesslike again. "Do you know of anymore shortcuts that can take us from here to the Sanctity? Preferably one that doesn’t involve being chased by a whole bunch of hungry spiders with severe glandular problems?"

"Unfortunately, no," I said. "The Sanctity is sealed off from the rest of the Hall by really powerful forces. Partly to protect the Heart from outside attack, and partly to protect the family from the Heart’s various emissions and energies. You can access the Sanctity only by approaching it via the single officially authorised route. Anything else will trigger the Hall’s internal security responses…and we really don’t want to do that. If you thought the defences in the grounds were bad, they’re nothing compared to what’s inside the Hall. Death could be the kindest thing that would happen to us."

"God, you’re depressing to be around sometimes," said Molly. "Surely the official route will be heavily guarded by now?"

"Of course. And don’t call me—"

"Don’t you dare."

"Sorry. Imminent death and danger always brings out my flippant side. No, we’re going to have to fight our way through a whole army of armoured Droods just to get to the Sanctity."

Molly produced Torc Cutter from a hidden pocket in her dress and scowled darkly at the ugly shears. "They’ll probably pack the corridors with cannon fodder. All the inexperienced, expendable Droods. It’s what I’d do. Just how many more of your family are you prepared to see die, Eddie?"

"There’s already been one death in the family too many. There has to be another way…"

Molly waited patiently while I thought fiercely, coming up with plan after plan and turning them all down. The family had had centuries to come up with counters to every possible way of taking the corridors by storm. The corridors…I looked at Molly and grinned suddenly.

"When I’m in the armour, I’m stronger, faster, more powerful. Stronger by far than the fragile world I move in. So why walk along the corridors, going this way and that to reach my destination, when there’s a much quicker way? Why not walk in a straight line to the Sanctity, smashing my way through everything in my path?"

"Sounds like a plan to me," said Molly, her eyes sparkling.

I slipped Oath Breaker through my back belt and armoured up. My Sight showed me the straight line I needed from where I was to where the Sanctity was. I turned to the wood-panelled wall on my left and punched a great jagged hole through the heavy teak. I pulled my golden hand back, and a whole panel came away. I stuck both hands into the gap and tore the wall apart with the armour’s strength. The dense wood ripped and tore as though it was paper. Molly jumped up and down, cheering and clapping her hands together delightedly. I forced my way through the wall and into the room beyond, and Molly hurried through after me.

The room was full of couches and settees and love seats in various periods and styles, all of them pleasantly comfortable and cosy. A perfect place to relax and indulge in quiet contemplation. I strode across the room, kicking the heavy furniture out of my way, headed for the next wall. Molly followed behind, murmuring, "Typical man…" just loudly enough for me to hear. And then the door burst open, and a dozen armoured Droods charged into the room, splintering the door frame as they all tried to squeeze through at once. It was obvious from their haste and clumsiness, as well as the haphazard way they grouped themselves before me, that none of them had any combat experience. Probably just house Droods, pressed into service. Thrown into my path to slow me down until more experienced fighters could get to me here. Poor bastards. Just more innocents sacrificed for the family good. I studied them as they fanned nervously out into a semicircle before me, gleaming and golden, and then just stood there facing me. Clearly none of them wanted to be the one to make the first move.

"Get out of my way," I said, and it wasn’t difficult at all to sound cold and nasty and dangerous.

Give them credit, none of them backed off. One Drood actually managed a step forward. From his voice he was young, but even though he had to be scared shitless his tone was firm and steady.

"We can’t let you pass. You’re rogue. We fight for the honour of the family."

"So do I," I said. "If you only knew. Stand aside. You know you can’t stop me. I’m field trained."

The young Drood didn’t move. "Anything for the family."

I nodded slowly, understanding, acknowledging them all. "Of course. Whatever happens, I’m proud of all of you."

I charged forward and slammed the young Drood out of my way with a single backhand that lifted him up off his feet and sent him flying across the room. The other Droods hesitated, frozen where they were by uncertainty and shock, and then I was in and among them. Even house Droods have to go through basic training when they’re kids, but most never raise a hand in anger in their lives, in armour or out of it. They never stood a chance. I knocked them down and kicked them away, picked them up and threw them this way and that. They couldn’t be hurt inside their armour, but it knocked all the pepper out of them. A few tried to make a fight out of it, coming at me with wildly swinging fists. I picked them up and threw them at walls, and they crashed right through the woodwork. Molly used her magic to collapse the walls on top of them, pinning them down with the weight of the wreckage. They’d dig themselves out eventually, but by then we’d be long gone.

I smashed through the opposite wall and into the next room, and then the next wall and the next room, or the next corridor, on and on, heading always in a straight line through the structure of the Hall. At least the Sanctity was in the central building, and not one of the other wings, or it could have taken me hours. Walls that had stood for centuries fell under my armoured strength and cold, cold anger, and though more Droods came to meet me, in armour and out, and with all kinds of weapons, none of them came close to stopping me.

Occasionally the odds would get a bit heavy, as family members filled a room before me, but still none of them had field experience, and it was child’s play to outthink and outmanoeuvre them. I could have killed so many of them, but I didn’t. It wasn’t necessary. Sometimes I fooled them into fighting each other; one golden form looks much like another. Sometimes I buried them under piles of furniture or wrapped them in precious tapestries they didn’t dare tear. Once Molly stopped an entire crowd by threatening to overturn a glass display case full of delicate china, and a dozen voices cried out in horrified protest.

"Those pieces are irreplaceable!" cried an anguished voice as Molly tilted the case slowly so the china pieces slid jerkily across the shelves.

"They’re priceless! Historical treasures!"

"Then why are you hoarding them for yourselves?" snapped Molly.

"Why aren’t they in a museum so everyone can enjoy them? Back the hell off, or I’ll create a china jigsaw like you’ve never seen!"

"We’re backing, we’re backing!" cried the Droods. "Barbarian! Philistine!"

They all got out of our way in a hurry. Molly and I picked up the display case and carried it across the room, and the Droods scattered before us, crying out piteously for us to be more careful. I smashed a hole in the wall and stepped through, and Molly dragged the case into position to block the hole. We laughed, secure in the knowledge that the Droods would spend ages carefully moving the case aside so as not to risk damaging the contents.

More Droods in the corridor beyond. And these at least had seen some training. They held themselves well, all ten of them, fanning out so as not to bunch up and make an easy target. I didn’t waste time talking to them. I concentrated, applying what I’d learned from James, and grew supernaturally sharp claws on my golden hands. First thing a field agent learns is that any trick is a fair trick if it means you win and they lose. I took them down, one by one, fighting hand to hand, up close and personal. My claws ripped through their armour, and they cried out in shock as well as pain. Their flesh was torn, and they bled inside their armour, and that had never happened before. Some just turned and ran. The rest fell back, scattering, and Molly and I went straight through them.

A few saw Molly as an easier target. They went for her, reaching out with their golden hands, and she laughed in their featureless faces. She conjured up a howling storm wind that bellowed down the narrow corridor, picking them up and carrying them away, tumbling helplessly end over end like discarded toys the whole length of the corridor.

The remaining Droods all tackled me at once, knocking me off balance, and then piling on top of me as I crashed to the floor, trying to pin me down with the sheer weight of armoured bodies. Good tactic. Probably would have worked against anyone who wasn’t field trained and used to thinking around corners. I cracked open the floor beneath us with one sharp blow from a golden elbow, and our combined weight collapsed the floor. A great hole opened up and we all fell through, the other Droods kicking and screaming and grabbing at each other all the way down into the room below. I of course just grabbed the side of the hole with one hand and pulled myself up and out. The Droods below were so inexperienced it probably wouldn’t even occur to them that they could use the armoured power of their legs to jump back up again. Or at least not until Molly and I had already moved on.

The next room was a trap.

I recognised the place the moment I entered it. The room was called Time Out, and it was full of ornate clocks and timepieces from across the centuries, covering all four walls with everything from water clocks to atomic devices. I never did like Time Out; always struck me as a sinister place, when I was young. Full of the ticking of a million mad clocks. In this room time itself could be slowed down, extended. A day could pass in here between the tick and tock of a clock outside. Time Out was originally put together back in the nineteenth century to make possible the observation of certain delicate scientific and magical experiments, but these days it was mostly used by students reviewing and cramming for an imminent exam.

I knew something was wrong before I was halfway across the room. All the heavy ticks and tocks around me had taken on a strange dying fall, and the air was thick as syrup. I looked back at Molly, still stuck in the hole in the wall I’d made, her movements little more than a snail’s pace. There was nothing wrong with her. It was the room. Time was slowing down, trapping me in the room like an insect in amber. Like a prisoner in a cell with invisible, intangible bars. I could cross the room in a few seconds only to find that days had passed outside it, and the whole family waiting to meet me.

I raised my Sight, and the air seemed to shimmer around me, thick with slowly congealing forces. It wasn’t something I could fight with my armour. All its strength and speed meant nothing next to the inexorable power of time. From all around me came the slowing remorseless ticking of the million mad clocks, nailing me down, pinning me in place like an insect on display, transfixed on a spike.

I lashed out at the grandfather clock next to me, and the heavy wooden case exploded under the impact. I ripped out the chains and the pendulum and threw them aside, and the great old clock was silenced. And time’s growing hold on me seemed to hesitate…I grabbed up a seventeenth century carriage clock and crushed it in my golden hand, and cogs and pinwheels flew out of it. Time’s hold slipped away from me just a little. I could feel it. I laughed aloud and rampaged round the room, smashing all the clocks, destroying everything I could lay my hands on, until Molly was suddenly striding across the room towards me, demanding to know what the hell I was doing. She hadn’t noticed anything. I stopped, breathing hard, and looked around me. The room was a mess. And time moved normally on its way, ticking and tocking along as though nothing had happened. I shook my head at Molly and headed for the far wall. No point in trying to explain. There wasn’t enough time.

I smashed through the wall as though it was cardboard and stepped through into the corridor beyond. My feet shot out from under me, and suddenly I was plummeting the length of the hallway, scrabbling frantically for handholds on the walls as they rushed past me. Someone had changed the direction of gravity so that the wall at the far end of the long hallway was now the floor, and the two walls just the sides of a really long drop. I fell all the way to the bottom, tumbling helplessly, until the far wall came flying up towards me like a flyswatter. I tucked myself up into a ball, got my feet underneath me, and used my armoured legs to soak up the impact as I hit.

Luckily, it was a really solid wall. Old stone, thick and sturdy. I hit hard, and the stone cracked from top to bottom, but it held. I took a moment to get my breath back. The hallway stretched endlessly above me, the walls like mountainsides. I could see Molly way above me, looking out of the hole I’d made in the wall, peering anxiously down at me. I yelled at her to stay put. I thought hard as my heart rate slowed reluctantly back to something like normal. The family had to know the fall alone wouldn’t be enough to kill me. This was just another delaying tactic. It was all they had.

I forced myself out of the broken stone wall, damaging it still further, and looked up at Molly. "Stay put! I’ll climb up to you!"

"I could retrieve you with my magic!" she yelled back. "Maybe even undo the gravity inversion!"

She really did look a long way off. Maybe someone was messing about with space here, as well as gravity. Or were they connected anyway? It was a long time since my old science classes.

"No!" I yelled back. "Don’t do anything! Your magic could set off the Hall’s inner defences!"

"You mean this isn’t—"

"Hell, no! This is just some crafty little bugger showing off his lateral thinking."

I punched a hole in the left-hand wall that used to be the floor, carefully pulled my golden hand back out again, and then made another hole. I kept on punching holes until I had enough hand-and footholds to get started, and then I climbed up the wall, heading back to Molly. I picked up speed as I got the hang of it and got a rhythm going, and soon I was scuttling up the wall like a giant spider. ( I winced as the thought occurred to me, and I pushed it firmly away.) I soon reached the hole in the wall where Molly was waiting, and she helped pull me back through. We both looked down at the long drop below us, and the wall opposite.

"Now what?" said Molly.

"When in doubt, use brute force and ignorance," I said. "Climb on my back."

She gave me hard look but finally did so, holding on tightly as I walked back across the room we’d just come through. Then I took a good run up to get some speed going, jumped through the hole and across the gap, and smashed through the far wall into the room opposite. Molly jumped down from me, slapping dust and splinters from her hair and shoulders.

"I don’t want to have to do that again, ever," she said firmly. "Next time, I’ll fly us across."

I looked at her. "I didn’t know you could fly."

"Lot of things you don’t know about me. You should see what I can do with a Ping-Pong ball."

I looked around the room and once again I recognised it. I always thought of the long narrow chamber as the souvenir room. It was crammed full of old trophies and mementos and a whole bunch of basically interesting old stuff that my various ancestors had brought back from their travels around the world. Books and maps, objects and artefacts, and some odd and obscure items that presumably meant something to someone once but whose stories were now lost and forgotten. To a young Drood like me, they were all wonderfully interesting and fascinating, with their hints of a much bigger world outside the Hall. I spent a lot of time here as a child, leafing through the books and playing with the pieces. At least partly because I knew I wasn’t supposed to. I was still fond of a lot of the exhibits, so I was careful not to break anything else as I made my way across the room. I pointed out a few of my favourites to Molly.

"That’s the skull of a vodyanoi from pre-Soviet Russia. Those are genuine Thuggee strangling cords from the Hindu Kush. That lumpy-looking hairy thing is a badly stuffed Chupacabras from Chile. Which if anything smells worse dead than it does when it’s alive. And all the intricate carvings in that cabinet are scrimshaw carved from the bones of a great white whale."

"You should charge admittance to the Hall," said Molly. "You could make a fortune out of the summer trade."

The door ahead of us slammed open and my grandmother Martha Drood, the family Matriarch herself, strode into the room to face me, accompanied as always by her consort, Alistair. I stopped abruptly, facing them, and they stopped where they were, maintaining a cautious distance. Molly moved in close beside me, reassuring and supporting me with her presence. I was glad she was there. Even after all that had happened, after all that I’d discovered…Martha was still the Matriarch, the will and authority of the Droods. And once I would have died rather than fail her.

The Matriarch wasn’t wearing her armour. Of course not. That might have come across as an admission of weakness, and Martha’s arrogance would never allow her to see me as a serious threat. Not even after all I’d done. For a rogue to triumph against the will of the family was unthinkable.

So I armoured down too. Just to show my contempt.

"Hello, Grandmother," I said. "Alistair. How did you know where to find me?"

Alistair smirked. "Intercepting your path wasn’t exactly difficult, Edwin. All we had to do was follow the wreckage and destruction, draw a straight line to the Sanctity, and then get here ahead of you."

"You always were very direct, even as a child," said the Matriarch.

"That’s why I chose this room, for our…little chat. The number of times I had to send someone to drag you out of here because you weren’t where you were supposed to be…You always were such a disappointment to me, Edwin."

Molly looked at me. "It’s your family, Edwin. How do you want to handle this?"

"Very carefully," I said. "My grandmother wouldn’t be in here, facing me without serious backup, unless she was confident she had some really nasty cards to play."

"This is the Drood Matriarch?" said Molly. "Well, colour me impressed. The queen bitch of the family that runs the whole world. Hatchet-faced old cow, isn’t she?"

The Matriarch ignored her, fixing me with her cold gaze. "Where is James?" she said harshly. "What did you do to James?"

"I…killed him, Grandmother," I said.

She cried out briefly then; a lost, devastated sound. She crumpled as though I’d hit her and might have fallen if Alistair hadn’t been there to hold her up. She pressed her face against his chest, eyes squeezed shut to keep the tears from falling. Alistair glared at me over her bent head. I wanted to see her suffer for what she’d done to me, to all of us, even to Uncle James, but in the end it was disturbing and even sad to see such a legendary facade crack and fall apart right in front of me. I’d never seen her show any honest emotion in public before.

"You killed my son," she said finally, pushing herself away from Alistair. "My son…your uncle…He was the best of us! How could you, Edwin?"

"You sent him to his death, Grandmother," I said steadily. "Just like you tried to send me to mine on the motorway. Remember?"

I stepped forward to confront her with all the other things I had to say, but to my surprise Alistair stepped forward to face me, putting himself between his wife and the rogue who threatened her. He stood tall and proud, doing his best to stare me down, and for the first time, he actually looked like a Drood.

"Get out of my way, Alistair," I said.

"No." His voice was high but steady. He had no authority, no power, and he knew it, but in his refusal to remove himself from the line of fire, he had a kind of dignity at last. "I won’t let you hurt her anymore."

"I don’t want to hurt her," I said almost tiredly. "I don’t want to hurt anyone. That’s not why I came back. But I have something important to do and not much time to do it in. Take her out of here, Alistair."

"No. This ends here."

"I have Oath Breaker," I said. "And Molly has Torc Cutter. Even the Gray Fox couldn’t stand against that."

"You used Torc Cutter on your own uncle?" Alistair looked at me with horror. "Dear God; what have you become, Edwin?"

"I don’t know," I said honestly. "Awake, perhaps, to all the lies and betrayals…It’s time to cut the rotten heart out of the family."

"I have a weapon too," Alistair said abruptly, and just like that there was an old-fashioned pistol in his right hand. It would have looked primitive, even pathetic, if I hadn’t recognised it. If I hadn’t known it for what it was. Alistair nodded grimly, seeing the knowledge in my face. Even Martha was shaken out of her grief by the sight of the gun.

"Alistair! Wherever did you get that? You can’t use it! I forbid it!"

"I’ll do whatever I have to to protect you, Martha." Alistair was looking at me, but the gun was trained steadily on Molly. "You stand very still, Edwin. Or I’ll hurt your woman, just as you’ve hurt mine. I know none of you ever really thought of me as one of the family. Never thought I had it in me to fight the good fight like the rest of you. But I love this family and all it stands for, just as I’ve always loved you, Martha. And this is where I prove it."

"Please, Alistair," said Martha, trying for a calm and reasonable voice.

"Put away the gun. Let me handle this."

"How can you love the family?" I said to Alistair. "Knowing what you do about the Heart? About the price we pay to be what we are?"

He frowned, suddenly uncertain. "Martha? What’s he talking about?"

I looked at Martha. "He doesn’t know, does he, Grandmother? You never told him. Never told him why he can’t ever wear the golden torc."

"He’s not part of the council," she said dully. "He never needed to know, so I never told him. It would have been…cruel. You always were too softhearted, Alistair."

"Not here, not now," he said. "Not when he dares to threaten you and the whole family. You do know what this gun is, don’t you, Edwin? Of course you do. Why don’t you tell your little witch friend what it is?"

"Yes, Eddie," said Molly. "You know I hate to be left out of things."

"That…is a Salem Special," I said. "It’s a witch killer. It shoots flames summoned up from Hell itself. Or so the records say. No one’s used the awful thing in centuries." I glared at Alistair. "I can’t believe you’re even thinking of using a Salem Special. You put your soul at risk just by handling it."

"It’ll stop you, and that’s all that matters," he said. He smiled briefly, nervously. "Fight fire with fire, eh? Oh, I know it won’t hurt you, Eddie. You’ll get your armour up in time to protect you. But it’ll do terrible things to your pretty girlfriend…So you’re going to stand very still, Edwin, until the rest of the family get here, take your weapons away, and put you under arrest. Or I’ll burn your woman alive before your eyes."

"Don’t be a fool, Alistair!" snapped the Matriarch, some of her old authority returning. "You’re not a field agent! I protected you from all that!"

"I never asked you to protect me, Martha."

"He’ll kill you!"

"You never did have any faith in me," said Alistair. "But this is where I prove you all wrong. You thought you could stop him with your authority, thought you could intimidate him into just giving up. I never believed that. He was never intimidated by authority in his life. But look at him now. Look at him! Afraid to move a muscle because of me!"

He took his eyes off me to glare at her, and that was all I needed. In the moment when he was distracted, I whipped Oath Breaker out from under my belt, and brought it around in a swift arc. He started to turn back, raising the Salem Special, but the long ironwood staff undid the binding seals on the ancient pistol, and it exploded, all its stored hellfire bursting out at once. Supernaturally bright flames consumed Alistair’s hand and arm, burning the meat down to the bone in seconds. The stench of brimstone and burnt flesh filled the air. Alistair fell back, howling and shrieking. He flapped his arm wildly, as though he could shake off the flames. What remained of his right hand fell away as the hellfire consumed the small connecting bones in his wrist. It fell to the floor, still wrapped around what was left of the Salem Special.

Alistair screamed horribly as the flames leapt up to take hold of his right shoulder. Martha beat at the flames with her bare hands, crying out at the pain but still trying to help. I armoured up and moved quickly forward to smother the flames with my golden hands, but even though the flames couldn’t burn me, I couldn’t beat them out. In the end Molly stepped forward and reeled off some Latin, and all the flames disappeared in a moment. Alistair’s cries fell away to shocked moans, and he sat down suddenly on the floor, looking dully at what little was left of his right arm. Martha sat there with him, holding him in her arms, trying to comfort him. I armoured down and looked at Molly.

"Those were hellfires…How did you—"

"Please," she said. "Remember who you’re talking to."

Alistair’s moans stopped as he finally, mercifully, passed out. Less than half of his upper right arm remained, charred down to the blackened bone. It would have to be removed; it would never heal. Martha rocked him back and forth, crooning to him like a sleeping child. She was crying. I’d never seen her cry before. I tried to feel sorry for Alistair, but this was what he would have done to my Molly if I hadn’t stopped him.

"Martha…" I said.

"Don’t. Don’t pretend you care, you unnatural child."

"So many tears," I said. "For Uncle James, for Alistair. But how many tears would you have shed over my death, Grandmother, if I had died on that motorway? Or if Uncle James had killed me like you ordered? Did you cry over my twin brother when he was sacrificed to the Heart? He was your grandson too. How did you choose between us? Flip a coin, perhaps? Or did you just leave it up to the Heart so you wouldn’t have to feel accountable?"

But she wasn’t listening. All she cared about was her Alistair and what I’d done to him. Molly gently pulled me away.

"We have to go, Eddie. Others will be coming. You know that."

I let her lead the way to the far end of the room. I always thought that in the end the traitor within the family would turn out to be Alistair. Because he never was one of us, really. I wanted it to be him. But in the end…he fought well and valiantly to protect the woman he loved from my anger. I admired him. The poor damned fool. I didn’t need to smash through the far wall. Just opened the door and stepped through into the next room, leaving Martha and Alistair behind.

The next room was huge, all gleaming white tiles on the walls and hygienically clean surfaces packed full of assorted computers and other advanced technology in an hermetically controlled environment. A whole room full of machines just to monitor and regulate conditions inside the Sanctity. They protected the Heart from all outside influences and protected those who lived in the Hall from the various disruptive energies and dangerous forces that emanated from the Heart. Normally there’d be half a hundred technicians scattered across the massive room, carefully tending the equipment and making constant small but necessary changes and adjustments to the Sanctity’s delicate balance…but the place was deserted. Presumably they’d been evacuated once it was clear I was coming here. I threaded my way through the bulky machinery, heading for the door at the other end of the room. Beyond that door lay the Sanctity, and the Heart, and my revenge.

Molly and I were almost there when the door suddenly opened and Matthew and Alexandra stepped through. I stopped abruptly, and Molly moved in close beside me again. Matthew looked sharp and smooth as always, the family’s blue-eyed boy in his immaculate Armani suit. He smiled dazzlingly at me. Alexandra’s smile was cold, and so were her eyes. I nodded briefly to them both, doing my best to look entirely unimpressed.

"Matthew," I said. "I should have known you’d turn up. You never could bear to miss out on anything important. But I honestly can’t say I was expecting to see you again, Alex."

"You of all people should know I don’t give up that easily." Alexandra’s voice was sharp and pointed. "And you really should have expected to see Matty and me here together, at the last. But then you never were very quick at figuring out what was really going on, were you?"

I frowned first at her, then at Matthew. There was something about their smiles, their easy confidence, their air of I know something you don’t know. I’d missed something. And I couldn’t afford to make mistakes, not when I was this close to the Heart and its destruction…What could I have missed? Neither Matthew nor Alexandra was wearing the armour, even though they both had good reason to see me as a threat. Something significant was happening here. I could feel it. They had to be planning something…I risked a quick glance with my Sight. Both Matthew and Alexandra were carrying concealed weapons radiating enormous amounts of power, but so were Molly and I. I checked the room around us. No booby traps, no hidden assassins. Just Matthew and Alexandra, with their cold calculating smiles. I looked straight at Alexandra.

"What did you do to the Armourer, Alex?"

She shrugged easily. "You didn’t really think you could take me out that easily, did you? I maintain a constantly updated protection against all forms of poison. Basic security measure. And he really should have known better than to turn his back on me…But he’d got old and soft, like so many of the family today. We’re going to change all that."

And with that we, the penny finally dropped. "You, and Matthew…you’re part of the Zero Tolerance faction! The hard-core family fanatics who want to change everything! Kill all the bad guys, and to hell with the consequences!"

"Yes," said Matthew. "That’s us. Only we prefer to call ourselves Manifest Destiny."

I must have made a shocked sound. Their smiles widened, and Molly grabbed on to my good arm and hung on tightly. Perhaps she thought I’d attack them. I was too stunned. Matthew and Alexandra laughed at the expressions on our faces.

"Truman only thinks he runs things," Alexandra said lightly. "But he’s just our front, our public face, so the rest of the world won’t realise that the Droods are actually bankrolling and running Manifest Destiny for our own reasons. Won’t realise until it’s far too late."

"But…you fought their troops," I said to Matthew. "I saw you, in London…"

He shrugged. "A necessary deception. And occasionally the troops have to be put in their place. It keeps Truman from getting too uppity if we slap him down hard now and again."

"Working behind the scenes has always been the Drood way," said Alexandra. "Kingmakers rather than kings. Zero Tolerance is the only way forward for the Droods, Eddie. The family’s got very old-fashioned, very set in its ways, and far too complacent. Too content with the way things are in the world…Most of the younger generations follow us now, impatient to change the world for the better instead of risking their lives just to maintain the status quo. And after all, why should they? Look around you. The status quo sucks. It’s time we take the lead, stamp out all the bad guys once and for all, and make a better world for everyone."

"But who gets to decide what’s better?" I said. "The Droods? Manifest Destiny? You?"

"The family will decide," said Matthew. "And who better? We’re the only ones who know what’s really going on in the world."

"I thought you of all people would understand, Eddie," said Alexandra. "You were always the great rebel…the renowned freethinker of the family. You opened my eyes. Showed me there was more to life than just duty and responsibility. After you left, I waited and waited for you to do…something. But you settled for being just another field agent. Such a disappointment."

"Funny, Alex," I said. "That’s just what I was thinking about you. I thought you were smarter than this. Matthew; he’s always been out for himself, but you…You’ve become the very thing this family has always stood against. Just another would-be dictator with delusions of grandeur."

"Oh, they’re not delusions," said Matthew. "Not anymore. We have followers, weapons, and far-reaching plans. It is our time, our destiny. Tomorrow belongs to us."

"The family’s spent far too long at war with the supernatural," Alexandra said briskly. "Spending our lives in their countless secret wars just to maintain their precious status quo. The time has come to put an end to all the wars, by winning once and for all. We will wipe out everything that isn’t human, isn’t natural. No more magics, only dependable, rational science. We’ll make the world a cleaner, simpler place. A human world, where human destiny is controlled only by humans."

"No more magic?" said Molly. "No more miracles, no more winged unicorns, no more dancing on moonbeams or laughter in the wild woods?"

"Oh, we’ll probably keep a few of you around," said Matthew. "As pets."

"With the Drood family in charge," said Molly.

"Of course," said Alexandra. "No more hiding our light in the shadows, doing good from a distance. We’ve earned our time in the spotlight. We’ve been planning this for so long…Only you came so terribly close to derailing everything, Eddie."

"I did?" I said. "How very like me."

"We were the ones who found and reprogrammed the Karma Catechist," said Matthew. "We planned to use his accumulated knowledge in the coming war. Only the process went wrong…He’d been through so many hands, you see, down the years. So many different groups with their different views and aims. I have to tell you, Eddie, the inside of his head was a real mess. So we slipped the poor fellow into Saint Baphomet’s very secretly to be repaired. By certain medical experts sympathetic to the cause of Manifest Destiny."

"And then you came along," said Alexandra. "What were you doing in his room anyway, Eddie? It wasn’t part of your mission. You weren’t even supposed to be on his floor! But you never could be trusted to just do the job…We couldn’t risk what he might have told you about us and our plans. He knew our names, knew everything. And we just knew you wouldn’t go along with what we’d all worked so hard to bring about…So we whispered in the Matriarch’s ear, told her you deliberately murdered the Karma Catechist because you were a part of Manifest Destiny. It really wasn’t that difficult to convince her. You always were the black sheep of the family. A rogue in all but name. We persuaded her that you were a clear and present danger to the family, and Eddie…she signed your death warrant without even hesitating. Terrible old woman."

Matthew grinned broadly. "We always knew the way to power was through her. So we…cultivated her. Fed her paranoia. We might not have been council members, but we were her favourites for years, and she kept nothing from us."

"He never told me anything," I said harshly. "The Karma Catechist. He killed himself first. This…everything that’s happened…it was all completely unnecessary. All for nothing."

Alexandra shrugged. "We gave him the poison tooth and programmed him to use it if he felt at all compromised. Perhaps we shouldn’t have given him such a hair trigger on the thing. But it doesn’t make any difference. You’ve actually been very useful to us, Eddie. You made such a wonderfully visible scapegoat, holding the family’s attention while we quietly put our plans into operation."

"We would have had to destabilise and weaken the family first anyway before we could take control," said Matthew. "But now you’ve done that for us! You’ve demoralised the family, taken out most of their heavy hitters, and destroyed the Matriarch by destroying her beloved Alistair. James is dead, Jack is dead—"

"You killed him? You killed the Armourer?" I said to Alexandra, shocked, and she winced at what she heard in my voice.

"He was in the way," she said. "He should have retired long ago."

"I’ll see you burn in Hell for that," I said, and my voice was cold enough to throw both of them for a moment.

"You always were a sentimental soul," said Alexandra.

"Right now there’s a power vacuum at the heart of the family," said Matthew. "And who better to step into the breach than the Matriarch’s acknowledged favourites? Especially when we have such a large and determined popular following within the family?"

"The council won’t know what’s hit it," said Alexandra. "Until it’s far, far too late."

"Do you know about the Heart?" I said. "The bargain that was made and the price we’re still paying for our armour and our power?"

"Oh, that," said Matthew. "The Matriarch told us all about it long ago. She didn’t believe in keeping secrets from her beloved favourites. It was a bit of an eye-opener, I’ll admit, but as Lexxy said, there’s no room for sentimentality in a family that’s going places. We have a world to put to rights. What are a few lives in the face of that? It’s just…the way things are."

"You can’t take the moral high ground with innocent blood on your hands," I said.

"Watch us," said Alexandra.

"Or not, as you please," said Matthew. "It’s really up to you, Eddie. Surrender to us and serve Manifest Destiny (after a suitable amount of brainwashing and reprogramming, of course), or die right here and now."

I laughed in his face. "The Armourer opened the Armageddon Codex for me. I have Oath Breaker."

Alexandra and Matthew looked at each other sharply, their confidence shaken for the first time. This hadn’t been part of their plan. But they still didn’t believe they could fail after coming this far, and they stared at me haughtily.

"That wooden stick is the mighty and legendary Oath Breaker?" said Matthew. "I don’t think so."

"You wouldn’t have the balls to use Oath Breaker," said Alexandra.

"It’s too big, too powerful, for a little man like you."

"We have weapons," said Matthew. "Real weapons. Terrible weapons! And the will to use them."

Alexandra held up her right hand, and suddenly there was a long scalpel in it, shining supernaturally bright. "This is Dissector, the ultimate scalpel created by the ultimate surgeon, Baron Von Frankenstein. It can cut through anything, neat as you like. It can cut you open and reduce you to your component parts with just a thought. You even touch that nasty old staff, Eddie, and I’ll take your hand off at the wrist. Or maybe I’ll just cut your little witch’s throat."

"You’re really starting to get on my tits," said Molly.

"You always were a vindictive soul, Alex," I said.

"And I have Dominator," said Matthew, more than a little grandly. He snapped his fingers imperiously, and a laurel wreath fashioned from pure silver appeared on his head. "With this, my thoughts become your thoughts, my wishes become your wishes. I’ll enjoy seeing you kneel to me, Eddie."

"Really?" I said. "I always heard your tastes went the other way."

"Surrender or die," Alexandra said sharply. "No more talking. Your precious uncle Jack isn’t here to save you with his Safe Words this time."

Matthew chuckled nastily. A halo of psychic energies was already forming around his head.

I concentrated on Alexandra, trying to reach her with the sincerity in my voice. "Don’t do this, Alex. For old times’ sake…for what we used to be to each other…You mustn’t do this. It’s not worthy of you or the family."

"What do you know about the family?" she said flatly. "You haven’t been a part of it in ten years. I don’t know that you ever were, really. Always had to go your own way, live your own life, leaving the rest of us to struggle on under the yoke…until we found our own way out. And how can you talk about the family being worthy, when you know the secret of the Heart? The deal with the Devil our ancestors made so long ago? We’re not what we thought we were, Eddie. Never were. It was all a lie. Manifest Destiny is the only truth."

"You can’t use forbidden weapons, forbidden methods, to save the world," I said. "You’ll destroy it, trying to make it over into what you want it to be."

"So what?" she said. "What has the world ever done for us except lie to us? Better to die free than to live a lie one day longer. We’re going to make the world make sense, whether it wants to or not, whatever the price. This is our time, our destiny, and nothing can stop us."

"Wrong, as usual," said a familiar voice behind me.

We all looked around sharply, and there behind us was the Armourer, Uncle Jack himself, standing swaying on his own two feet. He wore a simple breastplate of an unfamiliar crimson metal over his lab coat. Caked blood had dried all down one side of his face from a vicious scalp wound on his bald pate. He nodded briefly to me and Molly, and then grinned nastily at Matthew and Alexandra. And as they stood there gaping at him, he spoke two Safe Words in a language I didn’t even recognise, and Dissector vanished from Alexandra’s hand as Dominator vanished from Matthew’s brow. They both jumped, startled, and looked at the Armourer with wide, wild eyes.

"I thought you were dead!" Alexandra said loudly. "Damn you, why aren’t you dead?"

The Armourer sniffed loudly. "I was a field agent for twenty years, remember? I don’t die that easily, girl."

"We have other weapons," said Matthew too loudly. "There’s a whole army on its way here, armed to the teeth!"

"See this breastplate?" said the Armourer. "This is the Juggernaut Jumpsuit. Yes, that one, from the Codex. Bring on your weapons and your army. It won’t do you any good. Eddie, you go on, boy. You’ve got work to do."

"Listen," said Alexandra. "Hear those running feet? That’s our reinforcements. Dozens of them. You can’t stop us all, old man."

And that was when the ghost of old Jacob Drood appeared. Out of his chapel at last, for the first time he looked truly frightening. We all shrank back from him as he manifested on the air before us in a rush of air cold as death itself. He didn’t look like a grumpy old ancestor anymore; he looked like what he was: a dead man hanging on to existence through a terrible act of will. A stark, spectral figure, more a presence than a person, his face was all hollows and shadows, his eyes burning with unearthly fires. Just looking at him froze the blood in my veins and closed a cold hand around my heart. We were in the presence of death now, stark and awful and utterly unrelenting.

Time for me to take a hand, said the ghost of old Jacob, in a harsh and terrible voice that resonated inside my head. This is what I’ve been waiting for all these years. Even though I often forgot for years at a time, still I hung on, just for this. Bring on your army, Matthew and Alexandra, and I will show them all the awful things I’ve learned to do since I died. He looked at me, and I flinched away despite myself. Go to the Heart, Eddie. That’s where all the answers are. And do…what you have to do.

Jacob and the Armourer headed towards Matthew and Alexandra, and they backed quickly away, leaving open the way to the Sanctity’s door. Molly and I hurried forward. A door to our right burst open, and a whole crowd of armoured Droods rushed in. They saw the Armourer and the terrible ghost of old Jacob, and they stumbled to a halt. Molly and I opened the door to the Sanctity and ran through, pulling the door shut behind us.

And as the door closed, the screaming began.