Dark Age

by Mark Huckerby

  “She seems a bit down in the dumps, that’s all. Might have cheered her up.”

  “She wouldn’t have wanted to come… Would she?”

  “Maybe not, boss. But a girl likes to be asked all the same.”

  Great. Now on top of everything else, Alfie was worried that Hayley was sitting back at the Keep fuming that he hadn’t invited her to the party.

  Brian continued, “Well, I’m not going to be your date, so are you going, or…?”

  Alfie took the hint, grabbed Ellie’s present and got out of the car. He had not spent much time at Windsor since that dreadful autumn several years ago when his parents were splitting up. His mother had brought them here to try to shield them from the fallout. It was far enough out of London to avoid the crowds, and Alfie used to love staying for the weekend. He, his brother and his sister had the run of the lavish State Apartments and the acres of grounds. The “castle” was actually more like a small town, and there was always some undiscovered tower or hidden room to explore. But that holiday the royal divorce story was in the news every single day, so even here there was no hiding from it. Then, before Alfie knew it, his mum was gone, they were back living with their dad at the palace and he soon realized the only people he could really depend on were his brother and sister. He wondered if even that was true any more.

  At the entrance Alfie greeted the staff, some of whom had known him since he was a baby, then made his way past the colourful flags of the Knights of the Garter – the mysterious order who had used Windsor as their base during the reign of Edward the Third, seven hundred years ago. As he approached the Upper Ward, he could already hear music thumping somewhere inside. A depressed-looking butler was hiding outside, playing on his phone. When he saw the young king approaching, he scrambled to attention. “Sorry, Majesty!”

  Alfie waved as he went in. “Don’t worry, I’d rather stay out here too!”

  Princess Eleanor’s party was being held in the Grand Reception Hall, a venue so festooned with gold – from the finely sculpted Rococo ceiling to the glittering chandeliers and elegant, priceless furniture – that you really needed a good pair of shades to take it all in without getting a headache. More used to hosting ambassadors and foreign royalty clad in bow ties and ballgowns, tonight it would be stuffed with hundreds of dancing young teenagers. Alfie had braced himself for that, but what he hadn’t expected to see the second he walked in was the hideous face of the Black Dragon bearing down on him.

  “WHOA!”

  Alfie stumbled backwards, knocking a tray of pink lemonades out of a footman’s hand with an almighty crash. Everyone in the ballroom turned to look. Which is when Alfie realized that there were in fact about ten Black Dragons there, along with a half dozen Defenders and many other famous heroes and villains. Fancy dress. He’d forgotten, naturally. Because remembering something crucial that could help avoid public humiliation was just not something Alfie was any good at.

  “Nice entrance, Alf. What are you going to do for an encore, stick your face in my birthday cake?” Ellie scowled at him, arms folded. She was wearing sports whites with a golden foil trophy plate pinned to her chest.

  Alfie took a breath and composed himself. “Sorry. But if you’re giving out prizes, that Black Dragon costume over there is seriously good. Who are you supposed to be?”

  “Kate Robertson, of course,” she tutted. “The tennis player? She just made it to the quarter-finals at Wimbledon. Wow, what do you do all day?”

  “Search me,” Alfie shrugged. “Oh, yeah, happy birthday.”

  He retrieved the present from the sticky debris on the floor and handed it over. Ellie hefted it, smiling.

  “No. Way.” She ripped the wrapping paper off and eagerly inspected the top-of-the-range Bianca Chandon skateboard. “Alfie, just when I think you’ll always be a complete idiot, you go and impress me— Oh.”

  She stopped, looking at something on the underside of the skateboard. She flipped it over to show Alfie the engraved gold plaque stuck to the underside.

  “Presented to His Majesty, King Alfred II by the Government of the United States of America, on the occasion of his coronation,” read Alfie, his heart sinking. “Didn’t notice that. The thing is, I kept falling off, so I figured it might be more your sort of thing.”

  “It is. But you’re still an idiot,” said Ellie, hopping on to the board and weaving her way off through the crowd. “Have a great party!”

  A gaggle of girls was looking over at Alfie and giggling. Typical, thought Alfie, no one fancied me before I was king, but now—

  Then he realized what they were actually laughing at was the “God Save The King” ringtone coming from his pocket. Hayley liked to programme it into his phone as a joke whenever his back was turned. Embarrassed, he retreated to a quiet corner and hurried to answer it. “Hello?”

  “Hi, honey! Sounds like you’re at the party already?” said Queen Tamara’s voice at the other end of the line.

  “Mum! You just missed Ellie. I’ll see if I can find her,” said Alfie, scanning the crowded room for his sister in vain.

  “Don’t sweat it, Alf, she’s having fun. I just wanted to check you’ve been taking care of yourself. Saw some crazy stuff happening over there on the news.”

  Alfie knew what she meant. Last time he had seen her, just after the coronation, she had made it clear that she thought her phone was bugged. He was pretty sure she knew he was the Defender now too. This was her way of asking how his fight against the Vikings was going.

  “Yeah, I’m fine, thanks. The new job’s keeping me busy. You know, meeting new people, shaking a lot of hands, the usual.” Beating up undead Vikings, wrestling devil dogs…

  “Good. I’m so proud of you, Alfie. And I’m sorry I couldn’t stay longer. The ranch takes up so much of my time. But I’d love to see you soon and catch up properly.”

  His mum had flown straight back to the United States after the coronation. She wasn’t the sort of woman who was easily intimidated, but Alfie sensed she was scared to spend any more time on British soil.

  “I’ll talk to LC, see if I can arrange a trip,” said Alfie.

  “That would be awesome. I’ll make up the spare bed. Hey, tell that brother of yours to answer his phone when you see him, OK?”

  As it happened, Alfie saw Richard much sooner than he expected. Alfie had spent an awkward hour at the party, trying to talk to Ellie’s friends and not make a prat of himself again. Now he was relieved to be outside, waiting for Brian to bring the car round, when Richard stepped out of the shadows.

  “Evening, Alfie.”

  “Rich!”

  Alfie went to hug his brother, but Richard backed off. He looked pale and sweaty.

  “What’s wrong? I’ve been calling you.”

  “Flu,” rasped Richard.

  That explained how ill he looked. But Alfie could tell there was more to it. There was something his brother wasn’t telling him.

  “Listen, I don’t know what’s been going on with us,” said Alfie, “but I’m your brother, you can talk to me. If it’s something I’ve done—”

  Richard laughed a hoarse laugh. “You still have no idea, do you?”

  Alfie was confused. This wasn’t the Richard he knew, there was a darkness hanging over his face that he’d never seen before. “No idea about what?”

  Richard’s shook his head and turned away from Alfie, towards the house. “I’m just here to see Ellie.”

  But Alfie chased after him and grabbed his shoulder. “Tell me!”

  Richard lashed out an arm, cracking Alfie hard on the side of the face. He fell down, stunned. His brother stood over him, angrier than Alfie had ever seen him before. “Why did you have to change your mind? Why didn’t you just stay away like you were supposed to? This is your fault! Everything that’s going to happen. It’s all on YOU, Alfie!”

  Alfie was confused. What did he mean? What was going to happen? But before he could catch his breath, Richard had stalked off into the castle
. Alfie was still in a daze when the car arrived and Brian jumped out. He helped Alfie back to his feet and inspected the bruise on his cheek.

  “Who did this to you?” Brian asked, scanning the area on high alert.

  “I honestly don’t know,” replied Alfie.

  Hayley made herself a cup of tea, keeping one eye on the huddle of Yeoman Warders talking at the table. The Keep’s Mess Hall was at the other end of a long, stone corridor from the Map Room and consisted of a rickety old kitchen that hadn’t been updated since 1942 and always smelled of soup, and several large oak tables, stained black with age. Generations of Yeoman Warders had scratched their names into them: J ALGAR, 1972; HERBERT WYATT, 1921; S THEOBALD, 1878. The tables were so crisscrossed with signatures it would take you a year to read them all. Hayley liked to hunt for the oldest date she could find while she ate her dinner, tracing her fingers over the names and wondering who they were and what they were like. The oldest she had found so far was the elaborate signature of some guy called JOSIAH MOTT, 1702. But that was before one of the beefeaters had pointed out that the underside of the tables were also carved with names. They’d just flipped over the table tops when they had run out of room all those years ago.

  But tonight Hayley didn’t want to play hunt the ancient name. Tonight she was waiting for the Yeoman Warders’ shift to change so she could sneak into Brian’s room. Ever since she had seen him creeping out through the sally port tunnel and then overheard him talking on the royal train – “I don’t like going behind the king’s back!” – Hayley had become more and more convinced he was up to something. She didn’t like the idea of their friend being untrustworthy any more than Alfie had when she’d made the mistake of raising it without any evidence, but she just knew something was off about Brian at the moment. Weirdly, it reminded her of when her gran was in the early stages of her illness back at their old flat. At first it was small things Hayley noticed: Gran forgetting what she’d come into a room for or mixing up her words. Then gradually it all added up to something terrible. She didn’t think Brian was sick, but something was going on and she was going to find out what.

  “Didn’t fancy the shindig at Windsor tonight, Hales?” Brenda deposited her plate next to Hayley and took a seat.

  Oh no, she must be part of the new shift, ready to take over when the old one comes in, thought Hayley. Slipping away unnoticed was going to be much harder now.

  She smiled at the beefeater, trying to act normal. “Ellie’s party? Nah. Not sure how I’d explain what I was doing there with all those posh kids.”

  “No need,” said Brenda, with her mouth full. “Fancy dress. You could’ve worn a superhero mask, incognito like.”

  “Oh. Not really my sort of thing, anyway,” Hayley lied.

  She would have loved to have gone, just to see Alfie try to dance again. His moves at Glastonbury were so bad they were almost good.

  “Besides, Alfie didn’t invite me,” she added.

  “Would’ve been nice if he’d asked though, eh?”

  Brenda’s eyes twinkled. She liked to tease Hayley about her and Alfie getting together one day. Hayley wondered if Alfie hadn’t invited her on purpose. Was he still angry with her about suspecting Brian?

  The old shift of Yeoman Warders bustled in from the Map Room, all guffaws and yawns. They’d been busy for the past two hours monitoring the giant map and dealing with nervous Burgh Keepers from all over the country phoning in reports about Vikings. Most of them were false alarms, but it was taking its toll on everyone.

  As the beefeaters joined the dinner queue, Hayley told Brenda she was going to have an early night, and slipped out. As soon as she was out of sight, Hayley sprinted down the corridor into the deserted Map Room. She knew that there was always a short gap between shifts – the beefeaters hated to leave any food on their plates – and she would have just enough time to search Brian’s room for any evidence of what he was up to. She probably wouldn’t find anything, but she had to try.

  A growl from the sofa made her jump, but it was just Herne chasing a footman in his sleep. The shaggy dog opened an eye, yawned and went back to his dream. Crossing her fingers that there wouldn’t be a general alarm that would bring everyone running back into the Map Room, Hayley checked her watch. She would give herself three minutes.

  GO!

  She twisted the door handle to Brian’s room and pushed. Locked. Hayley’s heart sank. Of course it was. But as she removed her hand the door opened – it had just been a bit stiff. Hayley slipped inside.

  Brian’s room was sparse and well-ordered. Hayley didn’t know which army regiment Brian used to serve in, but he’d clearly had tidiness drilled into him. There was a desk and pair of ancient swords crossed over on one wall above a neatly made bed. A medieval suit of armour stood in one corner. Brian’s official title was the King’s Armourer, after all, Hayley reminded herself. But it was kind of creepy having the metal figure looming over her and Hayley was suddenly paranoid that there could be a little spy camera monitoring the room from the helmet’s eye slits. Panicked, she flipped up the visor. Nothing inside. Just dust and cobwebs. Brian’s cleaning regime clearly didn’t extend in here. A phone suddenly started ringing in the Map Room and Hayley froze, her breath shortening. Would someone come in and answer it? She strained her ears. No voices. After a while it stopped.

  What am I doing? Hayley thought as she swept her eyes across the desk. This is crazy. Still, she had to know. One minute left. The drawers of Brian’s desk were full of alphabetized files and folders and even the pencils were standing to attention in little rows. There was nothing out of the ordinary here. But then she saw it, a scrap of paper with a long phone number on it. It stood out because it so obviously didn’t belong in the neat drawer; it was crumpled, like someone had been folding and refolding it, checking they still had it on them. Maybe this was the number of the person Brian had been talking to on the train. Hayley took a deep breath and started to memorize the number, but before she could finish it, she heard voices in the Map Room.

  Busted.

  Shame washed over her. There was no way out of Brian’s quarters back into the Map Room without the Yeoman Warders seeing her. And there was no chance she could talk her way out of it either. They’d see her disloyalty plain as day and, in one stupid second, the months spent gaining their trust would vanish. What would the Lord Chamberlain say? What would Brenda think of her? She felt sick imagining what it would be like.

  I’m just looking out for Alfie, Hayley thought, miserable, when something caught her eye. Behind the suit of armour there was a door. Old, studded with black nails and strapped with bands of iron. It was worth a try. Hayley squeezed behind the armour and prayed the door wasn’t locked. With a whine of hinges that made Hayley wince, it opened, and a blast of cold, stale air bellowed out like it had been trapped there for centuries, waiting to escape. Stone steps led down, lit by dim, old-fashioned bulbs. She had no idea where the steps led, but she had no choice. Hayley stepped through and closed the door as softly as she could behind her.

  The further she descended, the colder it became. And there was something else here: magic. Hayley could sense it, the same prickle of electricity that she got standing near Alfie when he transformed into the Defender. A goosebumpy, hairs-on-the-back-of-your-neck-standing-up feeling. Just as she was beginning to wonder if this was a shortcut to the centre of the earth, the steps ended and she found herself in a huge, circular room with heavy oak doors spaced evenly around it. How many doors Hayley couldn’t say. A hundred? More? But what really got her attention was something in the middle of the room. Hanging down from the ceiling was a thick silver chain and at the end of it, the biggest bunch of keys she’d ever seen, as large as a beach ball. The keys were glowing faintly with swirling blue, magical light that radiated out in transparent beams to each of the doors.

  “Mistress! What cheer?”

  Hayley jumped. The voice had come from behind the door closest to her. Hayley noticed that the door
had a tiny barred window set into it.

  “How do you do, pretty lady? Methinks you are lost, no?” The voice was sing-song, airy. “Come hither. Come, come! I shall not bite.”

  Wary, Hayley approached the door the voice was coming from, trying to peer inside through the small window, but it was pitch black beyond. “Are you a beefeater?”

  A high chuckle rattled from the dark. “Nay, but I did serve my gracious sovereign in times past.”

  Hayley looked around, nervous. “What is this place?”

  “A gathering of the great and good. Or rather the great and not-so-good.” Another light chuckle, like a songbird twittering. “Pray thee my rare beauty, find my key and unlock my door?”

  Hayley felt light-headed. She looked at the beam of swirling light stretching from the door back to the great bunch of keys. Somehow she could tell which key the beguiling voice meant, a rusted iron one. She could probably reach up and get it—

  A hand fell on Hayley’s shoulder and she cried out, spinning around. “No, no, no!”

  An old Yeoman Warder – one she had never seen before – was directly behind her. His uniform was tattered and dirty, and his long face was creased like leather. His grey hair was straggly and long. All in all he looked like a tramp who’d put on a beefeater’s uniform by mistake. He pulled Hayley away from the keys.

  “Unhand her!” the voice on the other side of the door tittered.

  “Put a sock in it, Blood,” the beefeater said and thumped on the door before turning back to Hayley. “Sweet talk you into anything, that one.” He looked her up and down. “You’re that girl, ain’t ya?”

  “I’m Hayley,” she said, her mind starting to clear.

  The old Yeoman sneered. “You might be His Majesty’s special little friend, but you can’t just wander around the dungeons willy-nilly.”

  Dungeons. Of course, that’s where she was. And the beefeater in charge down here was the Yeoman Jailer. Hayley shook off his hand. “I got lost. Sorry.”

  “As I foretold,” Blood, whoever he was, twittered from his cell.