The Queen of sinister

Despair washed up from the grassy plain on the back of a hundred thousand whispers. Mahalia, Matt and Jack did their best to keep its insidious flow at bay — humming, chattering, staring deep into each other's eyes — but at some level they were still tainted.

'They're not going to let us leave, are they?' Jack said dismally. He glanced back across the massed ranks as if he hoped they'd all been magicked away while his gaze was averted. 'We should have known it would turn out like this. We never stood a chance.'

Matt's face was filled with the realisation of their failure. He looked back at the Plain of Cairns and then over the Lament-Brood. 'He's right — it's all over. We can't go back, and if we go forward we'll be wiped out in seconds… and any minute now they're going to come and get us.' He bowed his head, attempting to come to terms with his impending death. Taking a deep breath, he looked up and forced a smile. 'No point crying about it. This is it.'

'Then we should go out in style,' Mahalia stressed. 'I don't want to be forgotten. I don't want to be some nameless loser, or if people do remember me, I don't want them calling me some selfish, spoilt little girl. I want everyone to remember me like the Culture talked about those five who stood up against the gods when they came back. They're like some myth now… like King Arthur and his knights or something. That's what I want.' She bit her lip hard, holding back her emotions so that she could appear defiant.

Matt shrugged. 'I don't think there's going to be anybody reporting back-'

'You don't know! Maybe the Void or whatever you want to call it will see us taking a stand here and think, If all the human race is like that, I don't stand a chance. I'm going back where I came from…'

Matt grinned, then shook his head dismissively.

'Don't laugh! You don't know. Sometimes when you do things, they take on a life of their own. Actions have energy.' She waved him away and went to cross the rise to the downward slope.

Matt caught her arm. 'You're right — we need to do this together. It's Roarke's Drift time.' He looked from Mahalia to Jack. 'You'd better say your goodbyes.'

His words brought home to them the awful truth of what was about to happen. Jack and Mahalia fell into each other's arms with a desperation that brought tears to their eyes. Their kisses were just as hard and before they pulled apart they whispered into each other's ears the promise of what might have been.

Once Mahalia broke away, she instantly became unemotional, didn't even cast another look at Jack. 'OK,' she said. 'Let's do it.'

Before they began, she hurried back to Crowther. 'Professor, you helped us on the Plain of Cairns and we're eternally grateful for that — you saved our lives. But we need you again. And this is even worse. If there's anything you can do… anything…' There was no response, but Mahalia was convinced that he had heard her. Against all her natural reservations, she threw her arms around his neck and hugged him, just briefly, before returning to the others.

'All set?' Matt asked, as if they were going for a stroll.

As they moved down the rise, the whispering grew more intense and the urge to lie down and give up became overwhelming. 'Fight it for as long as you can,' Matt said. He glanced over at Jack. 'You're going to do the business?'

'As much as I can. Till I burn out — or blow the universe to kingdom come.'

Facing the Lament-Brood, they were struck by the eeriness of the scene. The Whisperers stood like statues, facing the four of them, with only the rusding sound of their despairing voices to indicate that they were alive. There was a sea of them, all monsters that had once had living shapes but were now twisted and broken, with bones protruding, skulls gleaming, unnatural but perversely improved, turned into killing machines. The purple mist blew back and forth in a light breeze, leaking from the orifices and the ruptures in their bodies. And as the mist hid and revealed and hid again, Matt had the impression that there was only one beast waiting for them, a massive organism with one mind and one terrible purpose.

Mahalia saw the weapons — the swords and spears and axes — and wondered how long the four of them would last: three minutes? One? Thirty seconds?

She expected Matt to give a signal, but he just pulled out the scimitar he had brought from the Court of Soul's Ease and charged down the slope. She followed, her Fomorii blade rusted and bloodstained, ready to take as many of them with her as she could manage.

Jack was at her side, but then he flexed himself and let out a small burst of the white light he kept coiled within him. It wasn't the full destructive force she had witnessed at the entrance to the Court of the Dreaming Song, but it was enough to blast five of the Lament-Brood into pieces. He was trying to eke his power out before he was struck down by the debilitating exhaustion it always left in its wake. The old, familiar Mahalia wished he would go for broke and take out the whole of Existence; she didn't want to think of it going on without her.

And then they were at the foot of the slope and into the first rank of Whisperers. Matt took a head off at the shoulders, then brought his sword down sharply to cleave another skull from temple to chin. The Lament-Brood didn't wait to be attacked. They surged forward, wielding their weapons like automata. The only thing that saved Matt from being overwhelmed was that the Whisperers were packed so tightly they could barely swing their swords.

Matt parried, ducked, tried to counter-attack, but they already had him on the back foot. Though she fought wildly herself, Mahalia was aware of what a good fighter he was, striking and defending with all the skills of a professional.

The thought was gone in an instant as the sickening whispering rose up around her and the purple mist washed into her mouth and nostrils. All she could see was a wall of bodies pressing against her. She put her weight behind her sword and drove it into a belly; the cruelty of the Fomorii design allowed the serrated edge to rip through the skin and entrails with ease. She pulled it out, soaking herself in a spout of cold blood, and rammed it up into a bared throat.

Two were down, yet already her arms were ringing from the force of her attack and her muscles stung. She wasn't strong enough to keep it up for long. She wished she'd trained more, not been so arrogant, thought ahead, but she'd always considered that in the event of any crisis she'd be away, leaving some other sucker to stand and fight. Her concentration slipped and one of the Lament- Brood broke through to ram a spear towards her chest. Jack came in from nowhere, deflecting the weapon with his arm before releasing a concentrated blast of his explosive power that reduced the attacker to atoms. Mahalia was half-aware that Jack's eyes were smoking as if a mighty fire raged within him.

Time stretched out for ever, every second packed with cut and parry, ducking and striking, feeling every ache and pain, every scratch racked up on their bodies. But they had made hardly any inroad into the ranks.

And then an enormous roaring rose up behind them, like a jet taking off. Mahalia had a half-impression of something scarlet and gold rushing past her shoulder and then a fifty-foot square of Lament-Brood exploded ahead of them, showering body parts over a wide area and smelling like a bonfire at a landfill.

The shockwave knocked her on to her back. When her head had stopped ringing, she looked back to see Crowther striding from the slope on to the plain. From her perspective, it looked as if he had grown in size, was still growing, filling with a terrible power. Walls of light shimmered off the silver mask — red, blue, green, yellow. Things formed in the air all around him, seemingly out of the very air itself. She saw a rose fold in on itself, becoming a spectral face in agony, becoming a hawk; and nearby, a lizard, more haunting faces in various stages of torment, lightning, cloud-forms, fire. The emotional aspect of the mask made him even more terrible, and it seemed that every step shook the ground.

A Whisperer who ventured too close was taken apart, the skin, muscles, organs, bones all unpeeling to scatter on the ground. And Crowther didn't even give him an instant's attention. Mahalia rolled away to get out of his path. He strode by, another blast of energy roaring out to devastate another section of the army. The Lament-Brood were rooted, not really understanding what they were facing. For a second, Mahalia entertained the fantasy that they might win; that Crowther could just keep walking right up to the House ofPain, blasting anything that came near him, with Mahalia, Jack and Matt hurrying in his gore-soaked wake.

But two things made her realise this would never happen. As Crowther marched on, a bolt of scarlet lightning roared from his head, twisted and crackled in the air and then rushed towards Matt. It was only his battle- heightened reactions that allowed him to throw himself out of the way at the last instant, and even then the blast threw him head over heels, the soles of his boots smoking with heat from the explosion. Crowther could no longer control the mask.

The second thing happened at the same time. The Lament-Brood regrouped and drove forward. With the luxury of the space around her, Mahalia had a better view across the plain, and there, in the midst of it all, she was overwhelmed by the weight of numbers ranged against them. A hundred thousand didn't do it justice; it was just a number. The Lament-Brood reached to hell and back. Even Crowther, with all his elemental fury, could not get through them.

And so they battled, for fifteen minutes or more, with Crowther laying waste to vast numbers of the Lament- Brood, but with more always flooding in to take their place. Mahalia, Matt and Jack took up the rear, preventing any of the Whisperers from coming up on Crowther's blind-side, but with eerie prescience he was always aware of any attack at his back, and picked off the warriors with unceasing accuracy. Mahalia, Matt and Jack hacked and slashed, and occasionally danced out of the way of the mask's wild blasts. Some came too close for comfort, and they were all soon sporting burn marks on arms or face. The Lament- Brood replaced each fallen warrior almost instantly. The intense background noise of the constant whispering reached out with its infection of despair. On more than one occasion, Jack's sword-arm began to drop and Mahalia had to knock it back up.

It was Matt, always on guard, never missing anything, who saw the movement along the rise. He kept glancing up as he fought, unable to give it his full attention, so he couldn't be quite sure if he was seeing what he thought he was seeing. Eventually he couldn't deny it.

'I think,' he shouted breathlessly, 'we've got help.' Caitlin was the first to crest the rise. With eyes that could pick out a grain of sand a mile distant, she instantly took in Mahalia, Matt and Jack battling in the sea of swarming bodies. It was difficult to miss Crowther, who appeared, to her eyes, to be enveloped in a scarlet mist.

The vast army of the Lament-Brood had only given her a few seconds' pause — she had expected some kind of defence to prevent a frontal assault on the House of Pain, and so she had come prepared.

She felt the others appear at her back. The warriors of the Djazeem numbered no more than five hundred, but Caitlin knew the Lament-Brood would find them as difficult to fight as the desert sand. She hoped it would give them enough of an advantage.

Oddly, in that moment, her thoughts turned to Matt. She realised how close she had grown to him before she had been flung out into Birmingham and how much she had missed him. It was coupled with a dull sense of anger now that she was close to finding out who had murdered Carlton. She was convinced she knew who it was, and there would be a terrible price to pay. When she tried to picture Carlton's face, she saw only Liam's, driving the thump of blood in her head.

As if falling from a lofty peak, Caitlin plummeted into the wind-blasted Ice-Field at the back of her head and the Morrigan rushed forth. Everywhere was red. The thunder of war drums was all around. She moved forward.

She'd loosed all the arrows in her quiver in rapid fire before she was halfway down the rise. Every one had hit its target, carving out a small opening in the ranks of the Lament-Brood. They were all facing away from her, their attention focused on Crowther and the others.

As she sprinted past the first victims, Caitlin plucked up a spear and used it to pole vault over the heads of the first Whisperers. As she came down, she whipped the spear around, taking out eyes, ramming it into faces, hacking at anything in range.

Bodies fell under her. She was a blur of violence, discarding the spear and snatching up a sword when that became the best option, spraying herself with gore, moving so quickly she opened up a space around her.

And then, as the Djazeem army attacked, she drove forward, and she was terrible to behold, an engine of destruction cutting a swathe through the ranks of the Lament-Brood. Never in the history of the Far Lands had so many fallen before one Fragile Creature. Nothing could deter her. She was too quick, too brutal, darting, ducking, leaping on to shoulders and then using them as a springboard to drive forward. She turned acrobatic loops, but the sword never stopped slashing and she never tired.

The warriors of the Djazeem formed a phalanx, driving in behind her. As much as the Lament-Brood attacked, they could do nothing to deter the new army. Swords and spears hit hard but found nothing but sand. Occasionally one would catch a glancing blow on the tiny figure buried within the armour, but it would shift its position instantly to find a safer haven in a boot, or a leg. They were still only few in number, but the Lament- Brood had been wrong-footed enough for Caitlin to claim a slight advantage. Her ferocity spiralled to new heights. The Morrigan ripped through the ranks, spraying body parts all around, her eyes blazing, her hair a furious mane. Crows came from nowhere and surrounded her, pecking at eyes, feeding on the bodies even before they knew they were dead.

Such was her fury that the Lament-Brood fell back from her; not because they were scared, for they had no conscious thought processes, but because they couldn't comprehend what was coming at them. It looked like a Fragile Creature, but it was destruction incarnate; nothing could stand in its way. Mahalia was stunned when she saw Caitlin approaching. At first she didn't quite believe it, and then her guilt struck hard, but their situation was too desperate for her to dwell on it. Yet when she saw the full force of Caitlin's viciousness, she was scared; she couldn't understand how the gentle woman she had known previously could now act with such monstrous brutality; and what would she do when she came on Mahalia?

Matt, too, was shocked, but when he saw how quickly Caitlin was cutting through the Lament-Brood, he fought with renewed purpose. Whatever had happened to her, it meant they had a chance. When the Morrigan reached Crowther, Caitlin surfaced.

'Professor! If you can hear me, don't attack randomly!' she yelled over the ringing cacophony of battle. 'Focus the mask on blasting a tight tunnel across the plain!'

Crowther didn't appear to hear. Energy lashed back and forth, sound and fury condensed into a storm that could blow the world apart. But then the display ended with a suddenness that left an eerie silence.

Even the Lament-Brood paused, trying to comprehend what was happening. Purple mist blew back and forth. The world hung still. And then Crowther convulsed and a beam of pure white light burst out of the mask, smashing through the Lament-Brood, shearing bodies in half, disintegrating everything in its path. It stretched right up to the gates of the House of Pain.

'Run!' Caitlin yelled.

Matt led the way along the charred path, with Mahalia and Jack following close behind and Caitlin close to them. Crowther brought up the rear, and if anyone had thought to look they would have seen that he was floating half an inch off the ground.

The path was lined by walls of burned Lament-Brood, their broken, dismembered bodies fused together. The burned-meat smell was sickening. On the far side of each wall, the Lament-Brood reeled. They struggled to comprehend what was happening, then pressed hard against the walls of their dead comrades, but they didn't have the intelligence to try to climb over.

Adrenalin drove Matt and the others on. As they ran, the House of Pain rose up before them, growing clearer and more defined the closer they got to it. It was as black as volcanic rock, but its design was like no building they had ever seen before. It loomed over the plain like a giant spider, with twisted leglike extensions reaching out through the air. There were curves and spikes, what looked like a carapace, but no straight lines. It gave the impression that it had crawled there from whatever foul place it had originated in, then settled, waiting to suck up anything that crept into its vicinity. And perhaps it had.

It was enormous. As Matt ran into its chilling shadow, he estimated it was at least five miles high. The atmosphere surrounding it was dense and sickening, infused with dread.

And as they ran closer to it, images flashed unbidden into their minds: scenes of torture, the worst acts of inhumanity, death on a universal scale, pain and suffering that never ended. Tears sprang to Mahalia's eyes. Matt thought he was going to vomit. Jack continued apace; he had been through such things all his life. Finally, the plain gave way to black granite boulders that reached up to the foundations. Breathlessly, they clambered up them, but before they had got far, Caitlin leaped with astonishing agility, passing the others by. They couldn't understand why she was so eager to overtake them until they heard a thundering cry bouncing off the rocks all around.

It was the sound of the half-reptilian, half-horse mount carrying the leader of the Lament-Brood effortlessly across the boulders from the plain beyond the wall of bodies. Of all the Whisperers, he was the only one who bore the fire of intelligence; it flickered in his eyes, was evident in every aspect of his movement. He carried a sword in one hand and a spear in the other as he bore down on them.

As Caitlin approached, the Whisperer hurled his spear. Caitlin dodged it easily, but it would have plunged through Mahalia's chest had Jack not thrown himself to knock her out of the way. Caitlin didn't slow in her attack; wielding her sword with both hands, she flew at the enemy.

The mount reared up, its fierce jaws torn wide to reveal rows of sharp teeth, like a fish from the deep. It attempted to trample her with hooves that raised golden sparks from the granite, but Caitlin was too quick, easily evading it to try to stab at a soft spot beneath its neck.

Their dance went on for five minutes before Caitlin finally found her opening. With both hands, she rammed the sword into the beast's throat. Hot, black blood gushed out and the mount's cry became almost human, high and pained. It floundered around with the sword still protruding from it.

Its rider fought to control it for a few seconds before leaping clear just as it crashed to the boulders, thrashing in its death throes. The leader of the Lament-Brood maintained perfect poise on landing, both hands coming to the sword as he moved in to attack. Caitlin was defenceless. Without thinking, Mahalia stepped forward and threw her Fomorii sword. Caitlin caught it with one hand without looking and instantly launched into the fight. She parried, struck, parried again. Their skill was so great, the others could barely see the movements of the swords, hearing only the reverberations of their clashes.

They battled for five minutes, but Caitlin's face remained impassive throughout, as though she were in some trance state, immersed in a work of art rather than a fight to the death. As the crows flapped around them in a black cloud, it became apparent to the others that she wouldn't be beaten; probably could never be beaten. Battle was her life, bloodshed her reason; she existed at the point between life and death, where both were experienced to their extremes.

And finally she ducked the Whisperer's strike, swung her sword with two hands and took off his head at the neck. It bounced down the boulders as the body crashed to the ground. Purple mist swept out of it, enveloping them all before being blown away across the battlefield.

Caitlin turned to the others, drenched from head to toe in blood and looking like hell itself. She waved for them to follow her before leaping up the boulders towards a flat area in front of a door resembling a gaping mouth.

Mahalia's anguished call made Caitlin turn back. Crowther was slumped on his knees on the rocks, the Lament-Brood leader's spear rammed through his body. The front of his overcoat was already soaked in blood. The distressing sight drove the Morrigan back and brought Caitlin as close as she could be to control. Awkwardly, she clambered back down to where Mahalia, Jack and Matt were attempting to aid the professor. His head had lolled forward on to his chest; the mask's power had retreated inside it.

Jack went to pull the spear out, but Matt cautioned him. 'You might do more damage,' he said.

The warriors of the Djazeem had followed the five of them along the tunnel of bodies and had now fanned out around the base of the rock on which the House of Pain stood.

'Let's get him up to the top,' Caitlin said.

They lifted the professor over the boulders to the flat surface, where they propped him against a rock. Matt pulled Caitlin to one side, searching her face to see if there was still any sign of the woman he had known. Satisfied that there was, he said, 'He's dying. There's nothing we can do.'

After all the suffering she had seen, Caitlin felt drained of emotion. She looked back at the billowing purple mist and replied, 'We can't take the risk of staying here with him.'

'I know.'

'I don't want to leave him to die alone.'

'He's probably not aware of anything in that mask. It's pretty much taken him over.'

Mahalia sensed what they were discussing and came over. 'I'll stay with him.'

Caitlin eyed her coldly; she could feel the Morrigan stirring at the back of her head, the frantic fluttering of black wings.

Mahalia saw what was happening in Caitlin's face and said, 'I've done bad things, I know, but this isn't the time to punish me. You can do that later, after he's gone.'

Without acknowledging Mahalia, Caitlin nodded to Matt and set off back over the boulders. 'What's going on between you two?' Matt asked the girl. Mahalia waved him away and turned back to Crowther, the only thing on her mind now.

'I'll stay as well,' Jack said when she returned.

'No. We need you.' The tone in Matt's voice suggested there would be no argument.

'Go on,' Mahalia said. 'I'll be here when you're done.' They both knew it was a lie. They hugged and kissed briefly, almost blase, so that they could pretend it wasn't going to be the last time, and then Jack hurried off with Matt in pursuit of Caitlin. As Caitlin approached the door, the familiar smell of burned iron drifted into her nostrils and lightning bolts crackled through the air. The knight with the boar's-head helmet stood to one side of the entrance, pointing with his sword for her to enter the House of Pain. Now Caitlin could see the truth: he belonged in some way to that awful power and everything he had done had been to draw her there. She considered attacking him, hacking open that ghoulish boar's head, but it was pointless; she should save her rage for what lay within.

'Enter, Caitlin Shepherd. Your destiny awaits you.' His voice seethed with the same lightning energy.

As she passed, she pointed her sword at his throat; he didn't flinch.

'What did you do that for?' Matt asked as they moved into the shadows beneath the porch of gleaming obsidian that overhung the door.

Caitlin looked from Matt to the knight. 'You can't see him?'

Matt stared at her blankly.

Her own personal demon. Without a backwards glance, she plunged through the area of shadows, into the House of Pain. Mary's footsteps echoed hollowly as she ventured across the large tiled entrance hall of the Roman Baths. The foliage that swamped the outside of the building covered the external windows and made the interior very dark, but once her eyes had adjusted she could see the ticket desks and beyond them the doors through to the baths themselves.

Mary's heart beat wildly. She knew something was here, but she had no idea what it was. Arthur Lee could feel it, too; the cat pressed tightly against her calves, his fur prickling.

Cautiously, she walked through the next set of doors into blazing sunshine. There was a walkway running around a square, open area. Peering over the edge, Mary could see the green water of the ancient stone-lined baths on the floor below.

The atmosphere of sanctity she had felt the moment she entered the town was even more potent here. It was almost alive, breathing. With her footsteps echoing in the still air, she moved along the walkway until she came to some steps.

They brought her out next to the pool where Romans had bathed nearly two thousand years before. The echoes were even louder there, rippling out across the water and bouncing off the stone that had been uncovered during the excavations in the earlier part of the twentieth century. Much of the original baths remained, and it wasn't difficult to imagine life going on there all those years ago.

But the Romans had only been one of many peoples who had used the naturally warm, mineral-heavy water. From the earliest days it had been a place of pilgrimage, as though the water flowed from the next world to this one, carrying with it some of the flavour of the beyond.

The tranquillity that lay across the baths was seductive. Mary knelt on the edge and dipped her fingers into the water. It was warm and oddly soothing, yet as the ripples ran out, the water appeared to take on an odd viscous quality. At first, Mary had been able to see the stone flags on the bottom, not far below the surface, but now it looked as if the water went down for ever.

The change to the water was hypnotic and Mary found herself peering into the dim depths to see what was happening. There was movement. Someone was in there, immeasurably deep, swimming. Back and forth the figure went, coming up tirelessly, rolling over like a dolphin, the skin gleaming white, the hair long and grey.

Finally it stopped just a few inches beneath the surface and rolled on to its back so that it could peer up at her. Mary found herself looking into her own face. The shock made her pull back, but the swimming Mary remained at peace, her eyes big and wide.

'Who are you?' Mary asked.

The lips of the Swimming Mary moved and somehow her lilting voice sounded above the water level. 'I am you.'

Mary steadied herself; the sensation of looking into her own face was weird, but there was no sense of threat. She had the strangest feeling that the water wasn't water at all, rather that it was a window between two worlds.

'We are the same,' the Swimming Mary continued. 'All things are joined.'

'Is the Goddess here?' Mary asked.

There was a long pause before her double replied. 'If you wish to enter Her presence, you must first prove yourself worthy.'

'How do I do that?'

'Follow the path. All will be revealed.'

Her other self, whatever she really was, didn't swim away; she simply floated down and down until she disappeared into the dark-green depths. Mary stood up, her knees cracking, and when she looked back into the pool the stone bottom was once again visible. The sense of a connection with the otherworldly stayed with her as she searched around for some kind of path. As she looked around, thin blue veins rose up in the stone flags leading around the outside of the pool. It was a clear enough marker and she followed it, her cat trailing behind.

The blue veins led her into an adjoining room, another bath, this one in a more ruinous state. The room was enclosed and it was cool and dark after the warmth of the sun. It took a couple of seconds for Mary's eyes to adjust and then she was startled to realise that someone was standing as silently as a statue in the gloom in one corner.

'Hello?' she said tentatively. She tried to pierce the shadows to see who stood within.

After a moment, he or she took a step forward, not far enough for Mary to get a clear view; an overhanging light fitting, now obsolete, still cast the head in shadow.

Mary was gripped by it. In a trick of the faint light filtering through, it appeared as though its long hair was moving with a life of its own. Only when the figure prepared to take a second step did she realise that the hair was moving — and that in fact it wasn't hair at all, too thick, too sinuous.

Cold ran through her as tales from her childhood classrooms came rushing back, of gods and demi-gods, and quests and monsters. She knew she should run or feel her limbs grow as heavy as the ancient stone that lay all around, but then she would never get to the Goddess and all her travelling would have been in vain.

The figure took another step, slowly, as if testing her knowledge of its identity. Mary quickly turned her back, plucking up Arthur Lee and holding his head so that he couldn't see, either.

'You know me, then.' The voice had a faint sibilance; it sounded simultaneously male and female, both and neither.

'I think…' Mary's voice was so shaky that she stopped speaking so as not to reveal her fear.

A faint sound, like steam escaping from a pipe, grew louder as the stranger approached. A shudder ran through Mary: the figure was now a mere foot behind her back. If she turned now…

'You know what will happen if you see my face?'

'Yes.'

'The Greeks knew me, though I do not belong to them. Perseus saw only one aspect. The Celts knew me, thought me a man, though they were only concerned with my role as servant to Sulis. But I did not belong to them either. I am part of something greater… the power that resides in this place. I am the Servant. Do you understand?'

Mary nodded, terrified that the Servant would try to edge round one side or the other to catch her unawares.

'If you wish to know my being, consider this: my hair, rolling like the waves of the sea, but also stretching out like the rays of the sun. There are wings on the sides of my head. And then stone, always cold, hard stone. Water, fire, air, earth. That is what I am — a part of everything. And that is what I serve. Do you understand?' This time the Servant's voice was harder and Mary trembled at the sound of it.

'You will take my hand and I will lead you. You must close your eyes, for you know what will happen if you see my face. I could lead you to your death, to a pit down which you will fall, shattering every bone. Know that this is a trial, not a trick. Everything that seems at stake is at stake. If you fail the price will be high: your death. No one will mourn. For if the trial is not extreme, success in it means nothing.'

Mary forced her voice to remain calm. 'I understand.'

'Good. Then take my hand. Your life will belong to me completely. Live or die, it will be my choice. And you must trust me, utterly. If you pull away… if your eyes open even the tiniest amount to see your way…'

'I know, I know!' Mary clamped her eyes shut and stuck out a hand. 'Go on, then.' Cool, hard fingers slid into hers; they felt almost scaly to the touch. She whispered a quiet prayer to the Goddess and then followed when gently tugged, already tripping over the minute ridges on the stone flags, her sense of balance precarious.

Mary had no idea where she was taken. She kept her eyes so tightly closed that the muscles all around them hurt and trembled. The chill hand pulled her along steadily. After the cool of the shadowy bathhouse she felt the warmth of the sun on her face and presumed that the Servant had taken her back outside, but the air smelled different, and she had the strangest sensation that she was no longer in the baths at all. That made her even more hesitant, for she couldn't begin to picture her position, or guess at what lay ahead.

At times she gasped, fearing that she was about to stumble when her foot caught against an obstacle, that her eyes would crack open instinctively on impact. And there was one terrible moment when she felt as if she was walking along the edge of an immense drop; wind currents plucked at her from the side and from below, and vertigo rushed up inside her dizzyingly. She had no idea how she stopped herself from tumbling, even if it was only an illusion; the Servant didn't slow down for an instant. She could only do what was asked of her: trust implicidy. The frightening trial appeared to go on for hours, though it was probably only ten minutes, and then, eerily, she could no longer feel the fingers in hers. She grasped the air, unsure if she had accidentally let go, but could find the hand nowhere, nor could she sense the Servant in the vicinity. Her first thought was that it was another part of the trial, to tempt her to look and find the Servant there, staring into her face. For five full minutes she waited, occasionally reaching out, and finally she decided that the Servant had indeed gone. She opened her eyes cautiously, looking at the ground first, and found with near-euphoric relief that she was standing alone near one of the tourist displays in a subterranean corridor. Nearby she could hear rushing water and there was steam in the air: the spring itself, she guessed.

She set off in the direction of the water only to find her way blocked. A wall of what appeared to be streaming water lay across the entire width of the corridor, but when Mary tried to walk through it, it felt as if she was walking into stone.

She stepped back, puzzled, and only then did she see two masks hanging on a nearby wall. One was completely featureless, though with a feminine shape. The other was a startlingly lifelike representation of her own face. It was deeply unsettling to see it there, as if her quest to Bath had been some fait accompli decided by the Higher Powers.

After pondering what it all meant for a moment, she decided it must be another part of the trial. She was expected to choose one of the masks, and then, perhaps, the way would be opened. It seemed so obvious as to be facile. She took down the mask of her own face, which creepily felt as if it was made of real skin.

She paused just before she pressed it into place. It was too easy. What was the point of it? If it was a trial, it had to call on something in her character, surely. She sat down against the foot of the wall and placed the mask face down on the floor next to her. Arthur Lee sniffed at it curiously, then came to settle in her lap. She stroked him while she thought.

What was the meaning of the first test? she wondered. She turned it over in her mind for a little while, and decided it had to be faith. She had just put her trust, and her life, completely in the hands of the Higher Power. And she had clearly passed that test.

But this one? She eyed the blank mask, then stood up and took it down. It was cold and unlifelike to the touch. She glanced between the two masks, and remembered the Servant's warning about the price that would be paid.

Finally she thought she had it. She steeled herself and pressed the blank mask to her face. It fit perfectly, and was cool and soothing against her skin. Two things happened at once: she heard the streaming wall of water dry up and disappear, and there was a loud pock near her feet.

She removed the mask and looked down to see with horror two spikes protruding from the inside of the mask of her face, just where her eyes would have been if she had been wearing it. She steadied herself against the wall, dizzy at how close she had come.

The blank mask, she decided, was symbolic of her acceptance of a lack of identity, or humility in the presence of the Goddess. Faith and humility — two things she would need in the hidden sanctum.

Now extremely cautious about what other trials might lie ahead, she rehung the blank mask on the wall and moved along the corridor. It sloped downwards, illustrated scenes from the history of the baths decorating the walls.

As she rounded a corner, she caught her breath when she was confronted by a figure. At first she thought it was the Servant, but this figure was short and hunched, wearing rough grey robes and a hood that plunged all features into deepest shadow. In fact, from Mary's perspective it looked as if there was no face in the hood at all.

'Two trials have you passed,' said the hooded figure, an old woman from the sound of her voice. She held up two gnarled fingers. 'This third is final, and the most important. One simple question. Answer wisely and you shall pass. The wrong answer will condemn you to death, and worse, damnation: the ultimate fate. Your spirit will never pass to the Grey Lands. Here in this place you will remain, forced to live out what might have been and never can.'

Mary took a deep breath, knowing it was too late to back out. One simple question didn't sound like much, but Mary knew it would undoubtedly be the hardest of all the trials: the final hurdle. 'Go on,' she said anxiously.

'As you wish. What is the darkest secret in your heart?'

Mary brought herself up sharp, all the potential pitfalls lining up before her. Of all her secrets, how could she possibly know which was the darkest?

The hooded woman appeared to read her thoughts. She wagged her finger in caution. 'No little secret will do. No second-darkest secret. But you know, in your heart of hearts, what is the worst — one you have never dared tell anyone else for fear they would hate you. One you have never dared admit to yourself. Choose wisely.'

Mary closed her eyes and thought. Behind the panic, she realised she did know; and she had never been able to face up to it.

'Speak.'

'I can't.'

'Then die.' Mary gave a juddering sigh as she struggled to contain her emotion, and then, with cracking voice, she let it rise for the first time. 'My mother was dying. We hadn't got on for a long while. I was a little rebel, always saying and doing things I knew would annoy her. If I had sex with a boy — even a one-night stand at a party — I'd tell her, just to shock her. Or if I took drugs. It was the sixties. We all used to do things like that back then… at least, that's the excuse I've always told myself. It is an excuse. We're all responsible for our own actions. We can never blame anyone else for anything.' She was talking to herself, but it sounded as if someone else was speaking about a person she didn't know.'I look back on myself as I was then and I hate myself. I thought I was so sophisticated, so clever… cleverer than my parents. They didn't know anything about this whole new world we were carving out for ourselves back then. How naive. How fucking naive and callous! I thought I was so smart, but I was more stupid than anyone!'

She wiped her nose with the back of her hand. Her eyes had filled with tears, but she wasn't looking at the hooded woman. Her vision was turned in on that time, sundrenched and long buried. 'I'd walked out a while before, telling my mother I didn't need her holding me back any more. The woman who raised me and sacrificed everything for me! I didn't need her! And she called… she told me she was dying.' Her words choked in her throat; she didn't think she could continue.

'You must speak it all!' the hooded woman prompted.

Mary calmed herself, but it felt as if there was a rock in her chest. 'I told her I was going away with this boy. She said it was urgent. I told her not to be so dramatic… she was always being a drama queen. I said I was going away and I'd call her when I got back. We went off to some free festival, took lots of drugs, had lots of sex, and then I came back and I still didn't call her. The secret? I hadn't forgotten. I just didn't want to deal with all that death stuff. A bummer. I was having too much of a good time to be brought down. And I wouldn't miss her — I mean, we didn't get on at all!'

She stared into the middle distance, watching the dreadful scene play out before her. 'I remember where I was when I got the call that she had died. I was in my flat, high on acid, listening to Love play "Alone Again Or" with some boy whose name I didn't know. And I laughed. I laughed and laughed and hung up the phone and told him I was free.'

Mary covered her face for a long minute.

'What I did back then broke me. It turned me into a different person. That was the price I paid for my actions. I did miss her. I missed her more and more with each passing year, and if I could go back and make amends I'd give up everything, even my life. But I can't, so I have to live with it, knowing I'm a terrible person, knowing what I lost by being so stupid and selfish and cruel… and worthless. I missed a few hours with a person who loved me in a way I would never be loved again, someone who sacrificed everything, who devoted her whole life to raising me. And that's the most valuable thing in the world… the Holy Grail… and I threw it away. I deserve every terrible thing that's ever happened to me. I deserve to be lonely and unloved in my old age.' She drew herself up to her full height and looked into the shadows of the old woman's hood. 'That's my darkest secret. And now I've admitted it I don't care if I live or die. I don't care if you condemn me to some eternal damnation. Could it be any worse than my life now? I don't think so.'

The hooded woman remained silent for a full minute, her head turned towards Mary, swaying a little from side to side. Then she said in a voice so gentle it was shocking, 'Welcome, sister. You have proved yourself to be a true and good person, filled with faith and humility, able to shine the light of truth into the darkest part of her heart. You have no secrets before what lies ahead. And she loves you, as your mother loved you. And she will care for you.'

Tears sprang to Mary's eyes. She felt like a child, unable to control herself, not knowing what she really wanted any more.

'Come, sister,' the hooded woman said, drifting slowly backwards down the corridor without any visible contact with the floor. 'You are filled with pain. Your journey has been long and your spirit is weary. Now is the time to rest. All is open to you.'

She gestured down the corridor. The sound of the spring was louder now, and Mary could feel the sticky heat in the air from the hot water forced up from deep beneath the ground. As she looked ahead, she could see a faint blue light. The corridor was fading away, and a warmer and more enticing place was appearing. Mary blinked away the tears and walked towards it.