“And they’re the only monsters left?” I said.
“The only ones we know of,” said Penny. “But really, Eddie, calling in the rogues? The scum we threw out, for being crooks or cowards or subversives? The family isn’t going to like this.”
“We often don’t like the things that are good for us,” I said calmly. “And as with so many other things, where the old Council was concerned, the rogues aren’t necessarily what you were told they were. Some were just troublemakers who insisted on telling the truth. The family needs new advice, new tricks, new ways of looking at things. The rogues can supply that in abundance. I’m also bringing in a few friends from outside, to help out in guest tutorials. Janissary Jane, of course. And I thought maybe the Blue Fairy.”
“Him?” said Penny. “He’s a drunk, a thief, and a lecher! He has no principles, no scruples…and he’s a half elf! You can’t trust him!”
“He’ll fit in perfectly,” I said. “Besides, I hear he’s a new person since his near-death experience.”
“If you’re bringing in your old friends, I want some of mine,” said Molly. “If only so I won’t feel so outnumbered.”
“Okay,” I said. “Who did you have in mind?”
“Subway Sue and Mr. Stab,” said Molly, smiling sweetly.
“Are you crazy?” I said. “A vampire who sucks the good fortune out of people, and the uncaught immortal serial killer of Old London Town? Over my dead body!”
There would probably have been heated words and raised voices at that moment, if all the alarms hadn’t gone off at once. The Hall was under attack.
CHAPTER THREE
Good and Evil; It’s All Relatives
In the old days, when a general alarm sounded the whole family would run to defend the Hall, but we were warriors then. Now everyone ran to the designated shelters, to hide till it was all over. All my fault, of course, for taking away their golden torcs. The Droods weren’t used to feeling human, and vulnerable. So the Sanctity and its adjoining rooms had become the new panic room for the Droods, though of course no one would ever dream of using such a term. But as I came out of the Sanctity, followed by the rest of the Inner Circle, so many of my family were running down the corridor towards me with fear and desperation written clearly in their faces, it disturbed me to realise how easily the spirit of my family could be broken. I was going to have to do something about that, and soon. Strange guarded the Sanctity and the other rooms, its other-dimensional shields protecting the family from any outside attack. The family would be safe there, while I investigated whatever it was that dared attack us. Strange was also responsible for powering all our science- and magic-based defences, and it worried me how quickly we’d become dependent on this new replacement for the destroyed Heart. I didn’t free us from one other-dimensional master just to hand us over to another. No matter how seemingly benevolent. Just one more thing for me to worry about…
Strange had said he could do even more for us, but that would mean bringing more of his substance through into this dimension, and even he had to admit he had no idea exactly what effect so much strange matter might have on the physical laws of our reality. Strange matter wasn’t natural here, and our world didn’t like having it around. Besides, Strange was powerful enough as he was. Trust has always been a difficult thing for me, even before I found out what the Heart really was. So, on behalf of the family, I politely declined Strange’s offer.
Which was why it was now up to me to defend the whole damned family from attack.
The Droods came pouring through the corridors towards the Sanctity, their faces pale and strained. The alarm bells were maddeningly loud, but the Sarjeant-at-Arms still made himself heard over the din, haranguing and bullying the crowds into some kind of order as they filed quickly into the Sanctity. He didn’t need to use much of his trademarked brutality; most of the family were glad to hear an authoritative voice telling them what to do. But then, that’s always been their problem. The Sarjeant scowled at the nervous faces streaming past him and seemed actually ashamed to see the family reduced to such a state. He didn’t look at me, but then, he didn’t have to. I already knew who he blamed.
“I’m going to the War Room,” said Penny, shouting to be heard over the general din. “Someone needs to keep an eye on the big picture. Always the chance this attack was designed to distract us from something really big happening somewhere else.”
“Right!” I said. “Go! Report back when you get a chance.”
But she was already off and running, forcing her way through the tide of approaching Droods by sheer assurance. I’d done well in choosing her. I looked around for Jacob, but he’d disappeared. I turned to the Sarjeant.
“You stay here and keep a lid on things. Molly, Uncle Jack, we need to get to the Ops Room. Find out who or what we’re up against, before we have to go out and face them. Sarjeant, if they should get past us, and get in here…improvise.”
I set off at a steady pace, ploughing through the increasingly packed corridors, and Molly and the Armourer stuck close behind me. There was a growing sense of panic on the air. My first instinct was to armour up, but I couldn’t do that. It would just have upset all the other Droods who didn’t have their armour anymore, because of me.
I felt like shouting, Look, it seemed like a good idea at the time, okay?
“Who do you think is behind this?” said Molly, squeezing in close beside me. “Manifest Destiny, maybe? Could Truman have finally got his act together?”
“Unlikely,” I said. “We’d have heard something.”
“Could be the prime minister,” said the Armourer. “Expressing his displeasure at having his best secret agents sent back to him in boxes.”
“If they’d been able to capture me, then the Hall might have been next,” I said. “But after what I did to his best bright-eyed boys, he’s probably still hiding under his desk and whimpering. No, this could be any of the groups we were just discussing, keen to get their pre-emptive strikes in first. Look, save your breath for running, people. We need to know what we’re getting into before we show our faces outside.”
The Operations Room was way over in the south wing, so we were all seriously short of breath by the time we got there. The halls and passageways were increasingly deserted and abandoned, eerily silent. It was a relief to get to Operations, and hear voices talking in a calm, professional way. The Ops Room is a high-tech centre designed to oversee all the Hall’s defences, from sensors to shields to all our various weapons systems. It took the three of us a few minutes to get through the strict security protocols, and then Molly and the Armourer and I hurried into Operations and the great steel door hissed shut behind us, cutting off the clamour of the alarms. The quiet was a blessed relief, and I took a long, deep breath to steady myself.
I’d never been to Operations before; it was mostly put together after I left home. Unlike the War Room, Operations is a much more modest affair. Just a reasonably sized room packed full of computers and other assorted baffling high tech, tended by a dozen or so technicians, under the head of Operations. There was no hurry or bustle or sense of urgency here; men and women sat calmly at their workstations, doing their jobs efficiently and professionally. These people hadn’t forgotten what it was to be a Drood. They kept their heads in an emergency because that was what had been drilled into them; because decisions made in this Room could affect the safety of the whole family.
Holographic displays snapped on and off in midair, showing rapidly shifting images of the Hall, inside and out, and sweeping views of the grounds and all possible approaches to the Hall. I moved quickly from screen to screen, but I was damned if I could see any sign of an invading force anywhere. The skies were empty, the grounds were uninhabited, and all shields were intact and in place. Something must have set off the alarms, but what? I headed for the centre of Operations, and Molly and the Armourer fell naturally in on either side of me. I was glad to have them there. I was starting to feel well out of my depth. I list
ened carefully to the murmur of voices all around me as the technicians spoke quietly to each other in calm, professional, and utterly baffled voices.
I have rising power levels. All boards are green, all weapons systems on line.
Can anybody see anything? My sensors are clear, right across the board.
Hold it; I’m getting something. A definite Infernal presence.
Infernal? Are you sure?
Hey, it’s not something you can easily confuse with anything else. There’s something from the Pit, right here in our backyard.
Get ready to switch the lawn sprinklers to holy water. And somebody put in a call to all our clerics.
Code Red. I repeat, we have Code Red. Shutting down all unnecessary systems for the duration.
Why weren’t we warned? What happened to those wonderful and very expensive new sensors I spent all last week installing?
Silent as the grave, the lot of them. Whatever’s out there, the sensors can’t see it. Even the gryphons didn’t see this coming.
Who’s got my Jaffa Cakes? You know I can’t function without Jaffa Cakes.
All weapons systems on line and available. Just find me a target and I’ll blow big meaty chunks out of it.
“Over there,” the Armourer said quietly in my ear. “See that large, intense type in the button-down suit? That’s Howard, the new head of Operations. I used to have him down in the Armoury with me, but he didn’t have the patience. But he was a hell of a lot smarter than the average Drood, so we put him here, and within a year he was running the place. Oh look; he’s finally deigned to notice us, and he’s coming over. This should be fun.”
“Didn’t this use to be the old laundry?” I said.
“We contracted that out,” said the Armourer, “to make room for the new up-to-date Operations centre. The old one was constantly having to be upgraded, and was only held together with spit and sealing wax anyway. We’ve spent the last ten years installing the most sophisticated weapon systems this family has ever seen, along with the computers to run them. We could hold off a whole army from here.”
“If we could see them,” I murmured.
The Armourer scowled. “I don’t understand it. The grounds are jam-packed with all kinds of surveillance. A mole couldn’t fart without us knowing all about it. Ah, Howard! Good to see you.”
“Good?” he snapped, slamming to a halt right in front of us. “What’s bloody good about it? I blame you for this, Edwin.”
“Somehow, I had a feeling you might,” I said. “Hello, Howard.”
He sniffed loudly. He was large and blocky, with a red face and a prematurely receding hairline. His hands were clenched into frustrated fists at his sides.
“Hall security has been an utter shambles, ever since you and your girlfriend walked straight through all our best defences,” he said bitterly. “They’re very sensitive. You upset them. Took us weeks to get them calmed down and operating properly again, and now this! Are those more of your friends out there?”
“I very much doubt it,” I said. “And Howard, keep it down to a roar when you speak to me, there’s a good chap. Or I will have Molly turn you into something small and wet and squishy, which I shall then step on.”
“What am I?” said Molly. “Your attack dog?”
“You know you love it,” I said.
“Grrr,” said Molly.
I looked back at Howard. “Let us all keep very calm and professional about this, while we figure out what the hell’s going on.”
Howard sniffed loudly again. “Yes. Well…We’re doing the best with the equipment available to us. You try running a twenty-first-century defence system on a nineteenth-century budget. I told the Matriarch to her face; you get what you pay for.”
I began to like him a little better. “I’ll bet that went down well,” I said.
He smiled slightly for the first time. “I was escorted out of the War Room so fast my feet didn’t even touch the ground. All right, everybody, let’s try the sensors again. Boost the power and plug in all the options; see if we can scare up a useful image or two for our illustrious guests. As long as you understand this is all your fault, Edwin. Whatever happens.”
“Story of my life,” I said.
The head of Operations moved quickly back and forth among his people, encouraging here, cajoling there, getting the best out of them with quiet efficiency. The Hall’s defence systems sprang into life, searching for a target; enough firepower to blow a hole through the moon or blast it right out of orbit. I watched, fascinated, as the holographic displays showed hundreds of guns rising up out of the wide lawns, their long barrels sweeping back and forth as the fire computers struggled to lock on. Sonic weapons, particle beams, nerve gasses, stroboscopic lights, and hallucinogenic mists…And no, we don’t give a damn about the Geneva Conventions. If I’d known about all of this, I’d never have dared to break in Of course, I’d had the Confusulum then, to back me up. Hopefully our mysterious new intruders didn’t.
Howard came back to join us. His face looked even more flushed, and he’d actually unbuttoned his tie. “We’re still having problems getting a clear image of our intruders. We’ve narrowed down the location to somewhere near the lake, not far from the boating sheds, but something in their basic nature is confusing the hell out of the sensors.”
“I heard someone use the word Infernal,” said Molly.
“Yes, well,” said Howard. “That’s always a worrying word to hear, isn’t it? Most of our defences are scientific these days, rather than magical or mystical.”
“Then let me help,” said Molly. “I know a lot about things Infernal.”
She moved over to the nearest workstation, muttering certain unpleasant Words under her breath, and then leant past a startled technician and thrust her left hand and arm through his monitor screen. Her arm ghosted through the screen right up to the elbow, and suddenly the whole Operations Room was full of a bright otherworldly light as Molly’s magic manifested in all the systems at once. Discharging energies sputtered around her like ethereal fireworks. A great surge of power swept through all the workstations as her magic melded with and boosted all the Operations Room systems. And just like that an image appeared on the air before us, showing a crystal clear view of two men standing together beside the lake, right in the middle of the Hall’s extensive grounds. The image zoomed in to give us a close look at their faces.
“You’re welcome,” said Molly.
Two ordinary-looking men, one my age, in his early thirties. Tall, pleasant enough, wire-rimmed glasses. The other was pale, dark-haired, disturbingly handsome. He looked young enough, until you looked into his very dark eyes, and then he seemed a hell of a lot older. Just two men, standing together. No army. No obvious threat. Except they couldn’t have got this far unless they were quite extraordinary people.
Howard leant forward sharply. “That’s it! We’re locked on! Stand by, people, we’re going to hit them with everything we’ve got!”
“No you’re not,” said the Armourer. “We need to talk to them. And besides, it wouldn’t do any good.”
“What?” Howard looked at the Armourer, baffled.
“I know who they are,” said the Armourer. “Or at least, I recognise who one of them is, and what the other one is. The one with the glasses is family.”
“Ah,” said Howard bitterly. “I might have known. Only family could get past family defences.” He peered dubiously at the image. “Can’t say I recognise him.”
“You wouldn’t,” said the Armourer. “He hardly ever comes home. That’s Harry Drood. James’s only legitimate son.”
“And, unfortunately, I recognise the other guy,” I said. “I met him once before, briefly, in the prison cells under Manifest Destiny’s old headquarters. They’d imprisoned him inside a pentacle, and cut out his tongue, just in case. And he was still the most dangerous thing there. He’s a half-breed demon, offspring of a succubus. I left him there to die when I brought Truman’s operation crashing do
wn around his head…I should have killed the unnatural thing when I had the chance.”
“You never had the chance,” said Molly. “Half-breeds like that are very hard to kill. They may look like us, but they all have one foot in the Pit. But what’s he doing here, side by side with a Drood?”
“I don’t know,” I said. “But it’s not going to be anything good. Harry Drood…I’ve heard stories about him.”
“Most of them are true,” said the Armourer. “Harry’s always been one of our best field agents, if a little too independent. Not unlike you, Eddie, in many ways.”
“But why appear out of nowhere like this?” I said. “In the company of a demon?”
“You killed his father,” said the Armourer.
“Yes,” I said. “That’s going to haunt me for the rest of my life, isn’t it?”
“At least now we know how they got in,” said Howard, sounding a little more cheerful. “No mystery anymore. Our defence systems were never designed to recognise something as rare or unnatural as a half-breed hellspawn.”
“All right, Howard,” I said. “Put the Ops Room on standby, but keep all weapons on line. Just in case Harry’s invited some more friends to drop in later. But don’t start anything without express instructions from me. Molly, Uncle Jack, let’s go welcome Harry home.”
“Is it okay if I take my arm out of the computer first?” said Molly.
Molly offered to teleport us right to the lake, but I thought it better we take our time and walk. I didn’t want Harry to think he could panic us into acting precipitously. No, let him wait. The three of us left the Hall and strolled unhurriedly across the wide expanse of open lawns towards the lake. It was a nice summer’s day, warm sunshine and a pleasant breeze. Bright blue sky, with hardly any clouds. And it would have been a pleasant enough walk if I hadn’t had such a bad feeling about the coming encounter.
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