Sweetclover found himself lowering his sword and mutely nodding. Was he bewitched? Had she cast a glamour upon him?
‘No,’ said Quil, as if reading his thoughts. ‘I have not put a spell on you. You’re just the kind of guy who’d rather help a stranger than run her through with a big sword. Now, I’ve stabilised my condition. Could you help me carry me down … no, that’s confusing you, isn’t it? Please help me carry this poor woman – who is obviously not me – downstairs.’
Quil grabbed the woman’s ankles and looked up at Sweetclover expectantly.
Sweetclover didn’t know what to do. His head was swimming. ‘I, um …’ was all he could manage.
‘Come on, Hank, time’s short,’ said Quil impatiently.
‘My name is not Hank,’ he said, still trying to retain some measure of dignity. ‘It is Lord Sweetclover.’
‘Your first name is not Lord. It’s Henry. And where I come from, Henry is Hank. But right now this lady is dying and unless you want to try and explain a dead body as well as a missing scullery maid, then you’d better help me get her downstairs.’
Not really knowing why he was doing it, Sweetclover dropped the sword and reached forward, grabbing the prone woman by the wrists.
‘One, two, three, hup,’ said Quil. On her mark they lifted the woman into the air and began to negotiate their way down the small, narrow staircase.
‘Why are we taking her into the undercroft?’ he asked as he walked off the bottom step. ‘If she is ill, she would be better in a bedchamber, where she can be attended to.’
Quil did not answer, merely steered them through the first chamber into a second. Sweetclover did not like to come down here. The house, built by his father, had been completed the year before he was born. Sweetclover had grown up here, but it had not been a warm or comforting place. The huge structure had taken years to settle and dry, so the home of his childhood had been alive with creaks and moans, sharp cracks and soft architectural sighs.
He had never felt quite at ease within its walls, his young mind full of ghostly imaginings. To him, it seemed a haunted place. His father had dismissed his boy’s superstitious fears.
‘This is a new house,’ he would say. ‘It has not yet had the opportunity to accumulate ghosts.’
Then he would add, ‘Unless it’s your mother. And I doubt she had the gumption to come back and haunt us.’
Sweetclover’s father had never forgiven his wife for dying in childbirth. In his eyes it had proved that she lacked backbone, a deficit he often pointed out in his only child.
But as uncomfortable as the house made Sweetclover, it was nothing compared to the fears the undercroft provoked. It had been off-limits to him throughout his childhood. Used to store provisions of all sorts, it was not considered a safe place for a child as fond of running into, jumping off and bouncing around amongst things as he was. But one day, when he was six years old, a careless servant had neglected to lock the door and he had slipped down the stairs into the subterranean chambers with a single candle.
He had not been down here since that day, when he had run, screaming, out of the darkness.
‘Through here,’ said Quil briskly. Sweetclover, still amazed both that he was being bossed around and that he was acquiescing, did as he was bid.
They carried the prone woman through an arch into one of the long vaulted chambers that ran the length of the east wing. As they left behind the last of the illumination that bled through from the stairwell, Quil loudly said, ‘Lights.’
Sweetclover cried out in alarm as the chamber was flooded with bright white light. He managed not to drop the woman, but he stopped dead and squinted, his retinas seared by the sudden shock.
‘What sorcery is this?’ he asked, fearfully.
‘Damn,’ swore Quil, almost to herself. ‘Sorry, sorry. I keep forgetting you don’t know this stuff yet. Um, look, this is going to be very weird for you, but I promise I will explain later. There is nothing infernal about my magics.’ She said the phrase in an oddly stilted way, as if the sentence construction felt odd on her tongue.
‘All magic is the work of the devil,’ he replied.
‘Then you’re really going to hate this next bit,’ replied Quil. ‘Door.’
A strange noise began to emanate from the far wall. It started as a low hum that made the dirt on the floor jump about, then it rose in pitch and volume until a loud squealing filled the air.
‘Banshees,’ said Sweetclover, but still he held the woman tight by the wrists. The simple fact was that he was afraid to hurt her if he dropped her. His care for a wounded innocent overrode his fear.
‘I know that noise,’ he said, as it faded back into a hum. ‘When I was a child, I came down here once. I heard it then.’
Quil nodded. ‘Yeah, sorry about that. Gave you quite a fright, didn’t I?’
‘You? Impossible. This was twenty-five years past,’ replied Sweetclover, but he could hear the fear in his voice.
‘No, that was me. Sorry.’ Quil shrugged apologetically. ‘Had to get the lab installed while your dad was building this place. Took me months. The amount of money and time I spent bribing the builders, making sure your dad and you were out of the way when the main construction went on. Worth it, though. Popped back a few years later to check the work was all done properly, there you were creeping around, heard me open the door, caught a glimpse of me, ran off like you’d seen a ghost.’
Sweetclover searched his memory for the vision of the ghost he had seen in the undercroft as a child. In his mind she was a formless grey thing, surrounded by light.
A patch of stonework in the far wall wobbled and vanished, revealing a large oak door. Above the door was a bright light source that shone into his eyes.
And yes, looking at Quil, silhouetted against that light, he had a flash of memory, a single image clear and crisp, not fuzzed by years of half-remembrance and nightmare. It was her, in outline, turning to look at him as he dropped his candle and made to run.
‘Lay her down,’ said Quil. Sweetclover did so.
With the woman lying on the floor between them, her chest barely rising as her shallow breathing seemed to fade yet further, Quil used a large key to unlock the door.
She turned back, reached down to grab the woman’s heels and looked up at Sweetclover expectantly. He stood for a second, trying to decide whether to run for his life. Eventually he bent down and took the woman’s wrists, knowing that his curiosity about the door was overwhelming his good sense.
They lifted her again and Quil led them into an antechamber that he had never known existed.
The ceiling and walls were the same as the undercroft outside, but there were the strange sources of light placed on the wall at regular intervals, illuminating the room in a way that Sweetclover had never seen before. It lacked the soft warmth of flame-light; instead it was sharp, harsh and cold. It did not seem to him to be a welcoming sort of light.
The chamber was long and wide. Sweetclover estimated that it must run some way out into the grounds, extending far beyond the walls of the house.
It was filled with strange cabinets and tables covered in instruments and apparatus that spoke to him of alchemy.
Quil led them to a bed and together they laid the stricken woman, still unconscious, upon it.
‘Thanks, Hank,’ said Quil, and then she ushered him away from the bed and began to work. He stood watching as she took tubes and wires from the various cabinets that ringed the bed, and connected them to the woman. She flicked and touched the cabinets and one by one they began to glow and hum, displaying strange signs and pictures that he could not interpret.
Quil worked quickly and efficiently. Although Sweetclover had no idea what she was doing, it was clear to him that she was well practised in her dark arts.
She cut away the clothes, working gently around those areas where they were burned into the woman’s flesh; she placed a kind of mask across the woman’s face and connected it to another softly humming ca
binet. Eventually Quil stepped back from the bed and turned to face him. Her posture spoke of tiredness, but her impassive stone face betrayed nothing.
‘She’ll be fine for now,’ said Quil. ‘I could do with a sit-down and big glass of wine and then, I promise, I’ll try and explain all of this to you.’ She gestured to the huge chamber and its baffling contents.
Sweetclover considered her for a long moment, and then said, ‘Very well. But be warned, if you try to bewitch me, I shall vanquish you.’
‘Oh, Hank, I have every intention of bewitching you. And I do so love to be vanquished.’ He couldn’t see her face, but he would have sworn that she was smiling as she walked past him and out the door.
As he watched her go he noticed, for the first time, how alluring her womanly figure actually was.
He followed behind her, trying to choose between the hundred different emotions fighting to dictate his actions. He was certain of only one thing – his life would never be the same again.
Part Three
The Battle of Sweetclover Hall
21
‘Hmmm, musty,’ said Jana with fake relish as Kaz shone the lamp around the cool, damp undercroft. He had to stoop so his head didn’t brush against the low ceiling. They stood in a small chamber which marked the intersection of three long barrel vaults which stretched away into darkness; one straight ahead, one to their left, another to the right. Each vault was packed to the brim with barrels and wooden chests, leaving only narrow aisles through which the three of them could pass. Standing in the chamber, they had a choice of three directions.
‘Eeny, meeny, miny, mo …’ began Kaz, but Jana strode off straight ahead without waiting for him to finish.
Dora hung at his shoulder. ‘What was that rhyme you were reciting?’ she asked.
Kaz shook his head at Jana’s impatience, and started after her. ‘It’s a counting rhyme,’ he explained as they walked. ‘You use it to help make difficult choices. Like if you have three ways to go, you …’ Kaz became aware that he was talking to thin air. He turned to see Dora standing behind him, her head cocked to one side as if listening intently. Dora held up her hand for Kaz to stop walking.
‘Hey, Jana, wait,’ said Kaz. Jana stopped and turned back to join him, tutting at the delay.
‘Can you hear that?’ asked Dora.
Kaz could hear nothing. He glanced at Jana, who shrugged.
‘It is like the strange humming sound I heard in the central labratree in the future,’ explained Dora.
Jana listened again. ‘Ha,’ she said. ‘I’m so used to the constant background hum of electrical stuff, I didn’t notice it.’
‘To me, it does not sound natural, and it is not a sound this undercroft should be making,’ said Dora firmly.
‘Generator?’ asked Kaz, but Jana shook her head.
‘No, something else,’ she said. ‘It seems to be coming from underneath us.’
Kaz knelt down and placed his palm flat on the floor. There was an unmistakable vibration, soft and distant. ‘There is something down there.’
‘That proves it, then,’ said Jana. ‘Whoever was controlling those blue-faced heavies in Pendarn, and that drone, must be based in this house.’
‘The woman whose touch sent me across the time bridge?’ asked Dora.
Kaz nodded as he stood up. ‘Quil,’ he said. ‘So now we’re here, what do we do?’
‘Dora, I think you should go and find your mother. There are some steps up ahead.’ Jana pointed to where she had been heading moments earlier. ‘See what she can tell us. She lives here, she must know something. We’ll explore down here.’
Dora did not need telling twice. She eagerly pushed passed Kaz and Jana, hurrying for the steps.
‘But be careful,’ said Jana, to her back. ‘Meet back here in an hour.’
‘I will,’ said Dora as she climbed the steps without a backward glance. A few moments after she vanished from view Kaz heard the creak of a door opening and closing as she entered the house above.
‘What are we going to do?’ he asked, happy to be able to slip back into his native Polish now that he and Jana were alone.
‘We’re going to open that door,’ said Jana, grinning wildly and pointing to a wall.
Kaz stared at the blank wall, then back at Jana. ‘Huh?’
‘Look right,’ said Jana.
Kaz did so, and saw the undercroft stretching off into darkness, piled high with barrels on both sides, leaving only a narrow aisle down the middle. ‘What am I looking for?’ he asked.
‘Now look ahead,’ said Jana.
Kaz turned, his patience wearing thin. Same thing – corridor, barrels, steps in the distance.
‘Now look left.’
And sure enough, there was a break in the barrels, leaving a roughly door-sized section of wall exposed for no apparent reason.
‘That,’ said Jana, both smug and excited, ‘is a secret door.’
‘Secret door?’
‘I know! Isn’t that great!’
Kaz rolled his eyes. In an instant Jana had switched again, from calm leader to overexcited teenager. ‘I could spend a lifetime hanging out with you and still have no clue what you’re going to say next,’ he said, shaking his head in amazement.
Jana batted her eyelashes, put on a sultry voice, and said, ‘Sounds like the beginning of a beautiful friendship.’
Kaz couldn’t formulate a sensible response. What he wanted to say was ‘please make your mind up – either be analytical or overexcited, distant or flirty – but please please please stop switching from one to the other every few minutes’. What he ended up saying was, ‘You’re doing my head in, you are.’ Which was some way short of the mark, but would do for now.
‘What can I say?’ Jana shrugged, her eyes sparkling with amusement. ‘I’m a complicated dame.’
‘Door. Secret one.’
‘Right.’ Jana nodded. It seemed to Kaz that she made a conscious decision to switch back to business mode and as she did so her posture, body language and facial expression changed instantly. It was as if she became someone entirely different. For the first time it occurred to him that maybe, just maybe, this girl wasn’t entirely healthy in the head. Her behaviour posed too many questions for him to be entirely relaxed around her.
She stood staring at the door for a long minute as Kaz waited impatiently for her to do or say something. But she just stood and stared at the wall, as if she was going to make it turn into a door by force of will. After a while he said, ‘Well?’
‘I’m cycling through the spectrum; give me a moment,’ said Jana.
‘So, what, you can see ultraviolet and stuff?’
‘The eye-mods can do all sorts of things. Zoom in to microscopic level, night vision, infrared and some more exotic stuff. They can override the visual cortex entirely if you want. Close your eyes and watch a movie in your head. If we ever end up in my time, I’ll treat you to a set.’
Kaz was not sure that he particularly wanted to be able to watch films in his mind, but he didn’t say so.
‘Ah-ha,’ said Jana. ‘Hologram.’
She stepped forward and pushed her arm through the stones. Kaz gasped as her hand disappeared. She pulled it back instantly and then turned to him.
‘OK,’ she said. ‘So there’s probably some kind of password or gesture control to switch off the hologram. Luckily, we don’t need that.’
‘What do you …’ but he didn’t get a chance to finish his question, as Jana grabbed his hand and dragged him through the hologram after her. He flinched and raised his free arm to protect his face as he was pulled towards and then through a wall of not-really solid rock. He was relieved he managed not to yell.
The world went blurry and indistinct as he walked through the hologram, then snapped into sharp focus as he found himself standing in a doorway. In front of them was a heavy oak door, dotted with metal studs that held a criss-cross pattern of iron bands in place. It looked very solid, but it stood ajar. Beyond
the door Kaz could see a large chamber. It had stone walls and a brick vault ceiling like the section of undercroft they had just left, but this new area was illuminated by light bulbs strung along the wall at regular intervals. He could not see much more through the half-open door, especially with Jana standing in front of him.
‘Am I going to ask the obvious question, or are you?’ said Kaz.
‘Be my guest,’ replied Jana, peering around the door to see what lay beyond.
‘Who leaves a big secure door lying open?’
‘Someone who doesn’t think anyone can see it because of the hologram,’ said Jana, slowly, as if talking to an idiot.
‘In which case, why make it such a strong door?’ said Kaz.
Jana turned back and glared at him for a moment before admitting that maybe he had a point. ‘You think this is an invitation?’ she asked.
‘Or a trap,’ he replied. ‘For someone who can see through holograms.’
Jana shrugged impatiently. ‘Or maybe someone just forgot to close it,’ she said as she pushed through the doorway.
Kaz turned the lamp off, stashed it in the backpack again, and followed Jana. ‘If I get mind-probed again,’ he said as he caught up with her, ‘I am blaming you.’
The chamber was wider and taller than the tunnels they had just left, so he was able to walk without stooping. He examined one of the light bulbs that were strung along the wall. It was a large glass ball with a zigzag vertical filament inside, intricate and beautiful; old-fashioned by his time, but insanely futuristic in 1645. The bulbs were strung together by a line of cable which hung off hooks in the wall. It was a strange mix of old and new technology. When he surveyed the rest of the room the sense of things being cobbled together grew stronger. Near the far wall stood a row of large wooden chests, entirely in keeping with 1645, but in the centre of the room stood a table with a Mac computer on it – not the shiny smooth white products of his time, but an old, beige box with a rainbow Apple logo on the side. The monitor, however, was something way beyond the machine it served – an oblong sheet of light which hung in the air above the desk, displaying an old screensaver of a starscape. The table was solid oak, the kind of thing Kaz would have expected to find if he ventured upstairs into the hall proper, but the chair was one of those wooden standing chairs that you loop your legs into and kind of perch on. The design was from the future, but when he examined it more closely he could see that it was freshly made and had what looked like hand-turned wooden features, presumably put there by a seventeenth-century carpenter working to a plan that had no right existing yet, unable to grasp the concept of minimalist interior decoration and believing that any round piece of wood should be shaped into something elegant.
TimeBomb: The TimeBomb Trilogy: Book 1 Page 19
