Elizabeth closed her eyes and nodded deeply. “I do.”
“And you don’t think I was really in danger? He was just trying to scare me?”
Elizabeth placed an old-fashioned mobile before her, one that still had numbered buttons. “Take this. If he tries to take it beyond scaring, and you ever feel you’re genuinely in danger, you can use it to contact me directly. I can have you extracted within twenty minutes.”
“Right,” said Alison, reenergized, as she worried the phone into her hip pocket.
“Use it to report in, as well. Every evening. Every detail of Diablerie’s movements. To me alone.”
Alison nodded rapidly. “I can do that. I can do that.”
“I’ll let you know when we have a new assignment for Diablerie.”
“Okay.”
“What did you think of the secondary school?” asked Elizabeth, throwing the question out like a spear to the leg as the younger woman turned to leave.
Alison slowly turned back, tightening her grip on the seat of her chair. “Well, um.”
“It must have come as a surprise, after having only seen the primary school,” prompted Elizabeth, keeping her tone entirely emotionless.
“Yes! Yes, it was. A surprise. Er. It seemed . . . efficient.”
Elizabeth’s stare dialed up the intensity a few notches. Alison was starting to feel like an ant under a magnifying glass on a hot summer’s day. “You didn’t think it was oppressive?”
“Maybe a bit,” said Alison, so quietly that she wasn’t doing much more than shaping the consonants with her mouth.
Elizabeth softened. It was like watching the victim of a gorgon transmute back to flesh from stone. “I agree.”
“I—you do?”
“One hundred years ago, the Ministry’s policy was to round up and slaughter everyone who carried the taint,” said Elizabeth, eyes glazing over sadly. “The schools were only introduced around the 1920s. When I first became Master Apprentice, employing tainted ones as senior Sword agents was unheard of. Since then, I have successfully integrated them and reduced the average length of their stay in the secondary school from fourteen months to eight.”
“But why do they have to go there at all?”
Elizabeth’s glare came out again, and Alison shrank. “The taint must be suppressed. It’s a manifestation of the Ancients’ will. It cannot be allowed to destroy our way of life.”
“Right . . .”
“The point is, the Ministry is set in its ways. There is plenty of room for modernization, and I have spent the last decade moving things in that direction. But it cannot be done at the expense of stability. Change can only come slowly, carefully. Otherwise, everything could collapse around our ears. Do you understand?”
Alison opened her mouth to say what she assumed Elizabeth wanted to hear but was silenced by the crash of a door slamming against stone. Both women looked over in time to see Richard Danvers hurl himself into the antechamber at a full sprint, with sweat patches under his armpits resembling outline maps of war-torn African nations.
He skittered to a halt at Elizabeth’s desk, then thrust his brand-new tablet forward like Perseus presenting his mirrored shield. “You need to see this,” he gasped, before inhaling a huge lungful of air. “Right. Now.”
“If you’re just joining us, here is the breaking news,” said a newsreader’s voice coming from the tablet’s tinny speaker. “A procession of what can only be described as creatures made from living slime is making its way down Marsham Street in London . . .”
Elizabeth stared. “Ah.”
15
“We can go live now to our helicopter over Marsham Street . . . Peter, can you tell us anything about what we’re seeing here?”
“I certainly can, Pippa. You can see the—the—slime creatures arranged into a sort of rank and marching south along Marsham Street. If marching is a word that can apply here.”
“Can you tell us where the creatures came from, Peter?”
“Yes, Pippa, there are witness reports stating that they emerged from the Thames near the Palace of Westminster just after daybreak, but we are also hearing reports that they may have been spotted throughout the country on a number of occasions during the last couple of weeks. The police have shut down the roads to motorists, and, uh, are generally doing a wonderful job at keeping order . . .”
“Peter, is this some kind of alien invasion?”
“Ah, I think the general consensus at this point is that this is not an invasion, Pippa.”
“And what is that based on, Peter?”
“Well, Pippa, I think partly this consensus is based on the fact that the creatures have gone out of their way to avoid creating violence or confrontation during this, ah, demonstration, but largely I believe it comes from the man walking at the head of the procession, because he’s wearing a sandwich board bearing the words this is not an invasion in block capitals.”
“Yes, I think we can see the man now. He definitely seems to be leading the slime creatures. Could he be their owner or their controller, Peter?”
“I think the consensus is that he isn’t, Pippa. That’s what the next part of the sandwich board deals with. It says that he is not the leader or a prisoner of the creatures; he is helping them of his own free will to get to the Home Office and request refugee status.”
“Do we have any clues as to the identity of the man, Peter?”
“Yes, Pippa, we do, yes. Sources have identified him as one Henry Wollstone, the main source being, er, the signature at the bottom of his sandwich board. You know what, perhaps we could zoom the camera in so you can read it for yourself, Pippa. Yes, you can see him very clearly there, now. We are currently attempting to narrow down which of the many Henry Wollstones in Britain he is, but we don’t have anything concrete just yet; as you can see, he does have a very generic face.”
“Peter, can we believe everything the sandwich board says at this stage?”
“I’ll be honest with you, Pippa—it’s certainly possible that we can’t, but if we can’t, then that does rather throw a spanner in the works, vis-à-vis our understanding of the situation out here.”
The clip ended, and Pippa Morment swiveled on her stool to address the camera, putting on her television face: questioning and curious, but with all the nation’s healthy skepticism embodied in her slightly raised eyebrow. “That was a clip from our coverage of the fluidic demonstration this morning,” she said. “Joining us now in the studio are Henry Wollstone, home secretary Serena Smith, and representative of the fluidic people, Shgshthx.”
There was a brief chorus of hellos, one male, one female, one sounding like it was bubbling through frog spawn.
“If I could turn to you first, Shgshthx.” She addressed the mound of gray slime sitting in the plastic paddling pool that was the only thing the runner had been able to find at short notice. “What is it that you and your people want, exactly, here in our world?”
“We wish to become pwoductive members wof society,” gurgled Shgshthx, as Henry unconsciously mouthed along with the words he had suggested. “We can eat all or wubbish and do not wequire homes so we can weduce or caw-bon foot-pwint and have no im-pact on the ongoing how-sing cwy-sis. We excwete onwy a mixture of gases that have no long-term negative effect on the en-vy-won-ment . . .”
“Can I just ask, Shgshthx, how you learned to speak English?” said Pippa, recrossing her legs interestedly.
“We surf or inter-net.”
“The fluidics have the ability to make limited changes to their chemical composition at will,” interjected Henry. The BBC had provided him with a modern suit to replace his weathered traveling gear, but he hadn’t been able to tidy up his hair, so he looked like a trendy fashion journalist. “Apparently they found a way to turn themselves into sort of organic Wi-Fi adapters and were able to do a lot of research before they, ah, revealed themselves. To me.”
“Yes,” confirmed Shgshthx, forming a smiley face. “We wuv Oo-Tube.”
>
“Henry, you have been acting as a liaison and adviser for the fluidics,” said Pippa, smartly switching rails with barely a jump. “I understand the demonstration this morning was largely designed and organized by you?”
“Y-yes,” said Henry, shifting in his seat. “Obviously the last thing we wanted to be was disruptive, but my thinking was, Shgshthx and his people are so unique, and so alien to our conventional understanding of sentient life, that people just wouldn’t have believed it if we didn’t go as public as possible. I thought it would mean they couldn’t be swept under the rug by the government.”
“Serena Smith, any response to that?” prompted Pippa, rotating smoothly to address the third guest.
“Well, I think that’s a rather paranoid line of thinking. I’m sure conventional channels would have been perfectly adequate,” said the home secretary. “We are presently assessing what obligations, if any, the British government has towards its citizens that originate from alternative dimensions . . .”
“Sorry, if I could just pick you up on that first point there,” said Henry, holding up a finger like a schoolboy who isn’t one hundred percent certain he has the correct answer. “The whole reason Shgshthx and his people did so much research before appearing was that they have attempted to enter our world in the past and were apparently always very swiftly killed by human beings.”
“Well . . .” began Smith.
“What’s more, on the way down to London, I encountered a man who seemed to be fully aware of the fluidics’ existence and announced his intention to slaughter them.” He let the shocked silence percolate for a second before giving it the chaser. “He told me that he worked for the government.”
“I can assure you, I have absolutely no knowledge of this,” said Smith automatically. “If there is some rogue branch of the civil service committing such monstrous acts, it will be addressed with absolute top priority.”
“Can you tell us any more about this man and who he worked for, Mr. Wollstone?” asked Pippa.
“He said he was part of something called the Ministry of Occultism . . .”
In the cafeteria of the secret catacombs beneath Westminster Abbey, where a dense throng of monks and office workers were clustered around the communal television, Victor Casin leaned back. “Well,” he said. “It was nice while it lasted.”
16
There was a strange atmosphere in the Ministry headquarters the next morning. Everyone was staying in their office and pretending to work, so the halls were as quiet as the tomb they had so much else in common with. Alison was reminded of the day she left the primary school, except people were avoiding eye contact with everyone else, not just her.
Diablerie wasn’t called into action every single day, and no one seemed to know where he went in between assignments, so Alison had ended up assisting Elizabeth anyway. There hadn’t been any official declaration of this; Elizabeth had simply instructed her to go to Richard Danvers’s office to pick up the Hand of Merlin’s agenda, and that had decided the matter.
Alison hesitated as the open door to the Swordkeeper’s office—the first door after the sword archway—came into view. There was no need to be nervous, she told herself. Danvers was a professional. All she had to do was be professional straight back.
She stopped beside the door to draw in and release a deep breath, then stepped into the doorway, knocking on the frame. This proved unnecessary, as Danvers had not been working but sitting at his desk staring into space.
He said nothing, but he didn’t need to. His gaze was heavy with meaning as it slowly focused on her. What cruel purpose inflicts you on my little island of peace?
“Er, Ms. Lawrence needs the agenda for the Hand of Merlin meeting today,” said Alison, hand still curled in the act of knocking.
Danvers held the slightly affronted look for a second, then his gaze dropped as his hand came up and pushed a single piece of paper across the desk. “Here, if she thinks it’s worth it. Only one issue anyone’s talking about today.”
“Okay,” said Alison, reaching for the page.
“Do me a favor, just for safety’s sake—try not to look at it.”
Alison gave a little good-natured laugh, which abruptly stopped when Richard didn’t join in. “Um. Mr. Danvers,” she said. “I feel like what happened might have given you a bad impression of me. Can I just say how truly sorry I am and—”
Richard pinched his eyes and waved a dismissive hand. “Alison, listen. I know it must have been a huge thing to you, but I honestly have far too much to think about to stay angry about it. Just . . . do two good jobs for every one you foul up. That’s all anyone can . . .” His brow furrowed. “Do you hear that?”
Alison strained her ears. There was a gentle tapping sound coming from nearby, which, upon analysis, could also have been an extremely violent banging muffled by distance.
Wordlessly, Danvers was on his feet and out the door, following the sound. Alison wondered if following closely behind like a puppy would enforce her reputation for mindless instruction following and ultimately decided to compromise by trailing a conservative four or five feet.
The banging was coming from the top of the entrance stairway, and in the time it took for Danvers and Alison to reach the main hall, the noise only grew louder and more violent. A number of monks and other Ministry staff members had already drifted over to investigate, including Adam and Victor.
“What is that?” asked Danvers, squinting up the steps.
“Someone’s banging on the secret door,” observed Victor, hands in pockets.
“Do you think we should let them in?” asked Adam.
Victor snorted. “It’d kinda undermine the point of a secret door, wouldn’t it?”
“Look, we knew something like this was going to happen,” said Adam.
“Yeah, we know the planet’s gonna explode eventually—doesn’t mean we should all set ourselves on fire now.”
The banging abruptly stopped, but that only raised the tension. It was a stop that signaled a change of tactics rather than an end to the incident. Sure enough, a minute’s wary silence was broken by the clacking of Elizabeth Lawrence’s walking stick, and the congregation parted like the Red Sea as she entered the scene.
“Let him in,” she said, grimly. She was clutching her smartphone.
The monk with the best reflexes obediently broke from the crowd to dash up the stairway, hitching up the bottom of his robe. The others watched as he ascended past the slight curve that took him out of sight, and the banging began again with renewed impatience.
Eventually the banging ceased, and moments later the monk reappeared, stiffly descending the stairway with head bowed like an admonished husband. He was swiftly overtaken by another man, briskly descending the stairs two at a time.
He was dressed in the same outfit as Richard Danvers, rumpled shirtsleeves and tie, but was filling it to bursting with the physique of an urban gym dweller. His neck was thicker than his face, with fat red veins extruding over his collar, and his hair was a light dusting of flame-orange bristles. He stomped into the middle of the throng with such confidence that those nearest unconsciously took a step back.
“All right, boys?” he said in a raucous South London accent, clasping his hands with glee. He looked one of the monks up and down. “And girls. So this is the Ministry of Cultists, is it? Wow, I love what you’ve done with this place.”
“Occultism,” said Elizabeth, stepping forward. “Are you from Downing Street?”
The newcomer bowed low and gave a simpering smile. “Oh, I’m so sorry, where are my manners? Sean Anderson, policy adviser to the cabinet.” He offered a hand that nobody took. “I’ve heard all about this place. You in charge, are you?”
“I’m the Master Apprentice. The Hand of Merlin are in charge.”
“That’s right! You know, I’ve heard that the Friends of Gandalf will be meeting in the next few minutes. I’d love it if I could sit in and see them in action. That’d just be a dr
eam come true.”
Elizabeth shifted her weight. “The meetings of the Hand of Merlin have been held in absolute secrecy since records began—”
Anderson leaned in, his face darkening. The veins on his neck turned the color of a freshly cooked lobster. “I’m here on direct orders from the prime minister, which I’m pretty sure outranks whatever authority you think you’ve got, so why don’t you get me a coffee before I call on the massive quantities of shit I’ve got all loaded up and ready to bring down on your little clubhouse?”
Elizabeth held his gaze. “Alison. Make coffee.”
Alison decided, of her own free will, to make coffee.
17
“The Hand will speak,” announced the spokesman of the Hand of Merlin. “We will continue to observe the activities of the shoggoths within the public eye, and the Master Apprentice will act according to her discretion as developments occur. The Hand has spoken. The Master Apprentice is dismissed.”
“I return now to the world of Men, refreshed from the fount of your inestimable wisdom,” recited Elizabeth. A gong sounded, and the meeting was over.
She had expected the worst from Anderson, but he had taken up position just inside the door as soon as they had entered, and despite a few unrestrained sniggering sounds throughout the initial exchange of phrases, he had been mysteriously silent.
When she turned around to leave the meeting hall, she discovered why. He wasn’t there. He had snuck out and left the grand entrance doors ajar.
She found him in the antechamber, sitting on her chair with the seat tilted back and his thick ankles crossed on top of her desk. He gave her a smile that was isolated to his mouth, the rest of his face wanting nothing to do with it, and loudly slow clapped as she approached. “Bra-vo,” he said. “Lovely bit of amateur dramatics. Sit.”
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