Magnus screamed something foul and threw herself at Suzie. The two women slammed together, and Wulfsbane sheared clean through the golden blade. The broken piece fell to clatter on the floor, while Wulfsbane came sweeping around in a vicious arc that would have taken Magnus’ head off if she hadn’t thrown herself desperately to one side. Her armour’s speed was still faster than Suzie’s reflexes. Magnus hit the floor hard, soaked up the impact in a roll, and was quickly back on her feet again. The broken piece of her sword leapt up to rejoin her armour, and her sword reformed itself.
While Magnus was concentrating on that, Suzie went after Ioreth. He saw her coming and tried to crawl away, but he could barely move. It wasn’t just the pain; Wulfsbane had put something in his wound. He could feel it, eating away at his insides. Suzie quickly caught up with Ioreth, and drew back her sword for the killing thrust. Ioreth rolled over onto his back, so at least he could look his death in the face.
And that was when Bettie Divine appeared out of nowhere, to stand between Suzie and Ioreth. Suzie hesitated, and Bettie hit her with a face full of unholy Mace. Suzie stumbled backwards, tears streaming down her cheeks from puffed-up eyes. She swept her sword back and forth to keep her enemies at bay, but Bettie only had eyes for Ioreth. She knelt beside him, her face slack with shock as she took in the terrible wound in his gut.
“Oh, sweetie . . . What has she done to you?”
“I didn’t know you could teleport,” said Ioreth, trying to smile for her.
“A girl doesn’t tell everything on a first date. What can I do?”
“Know any good healing spells?”
“Not really my line, darling.”
“Then we’re both out of luck,” said Ioreth. “Hold my hand, Bettie. I think I’m dying.”
“There must be something I can do!” said Bettie. Tears dripped from her face onto his as she leaned over him.
“Get me home,” said Ioreth. “Back to Drood Hall. I don’t want to die here.”
Bettie took hold of both his hands, and they disappeared.
Magnus attacked Suzie while she was still trying to knuckle the Mace out of her eyes, but Wulfsbane seemed to have eyes of its own, moving always to intercept Magnus’ blows and block her attacks. Magnus knew better than to try to meet Wulfsbane full on, for fear her blade would shatter again on the Infernal Device, so she constantly changed her angle of attack, using her armour’s strength and speed to try to power her sword past Wulfsbane’s defences. She cut Suzie again and again, and the bounty-hunter’s blood fell to the floor. Magnus smiled coldly behind her featureless golden mask.
For you, Ioreth.
And then Magnus hesitated, as she heard an engine approaching. It seemed to be coming from somewhere inside the mall. She backed away from Suzie and looked around just in time to see John Taylor come racing down the corridor on a motor-cycle. She turned to face him, and John aimed the bike straight at her. He waited until the last moment, then threw himself off the bike. He hit the ground rolling and was back on his feet in time to see the motor-cycle crash into Magnus. The bike exploded, and they both disappeared in a cloud of flames and black smoke.
John started toward Suzie, then stopped as Magnus walked out of the smoke and flames, entirely unharmed, and headed straight for him. His hands started towards his pockets, but he knew he didn’t have anything that could get past a Drood’s armour. So he called on his gift again, to find a way out; and a vision came to him of a shop full of clocks, and one timepiece in particular. He sprinted in the direction his vision showed him. And Magnus left Suzie to go after him.
* * *
• • •
John pounded down the corridor, with Magnus right behind him, her armoured feet thundering on the floor. She was catching up fast. He forced himself to run faster, gasping for breath, and finally plunged through the open door of a deserted shop. It was packed full of all kinds of clocks, and John looked desperately around for the one he needed. Magnus appeared in the doorway, blocking off the light with her armoured form. And then John saw it: the Stop Watch, set out on display. He grabbed hold of the Watch and turned to face Magnus as she advanced on him, no longer hurrying now he had nowhere left to run. She held up her golden sword, and blood dripped thickly from the blade. A slow anger moved through John, as he realised he was looking at Suzie’s blood.
He hit the button on the Stop Watch, and Time stopped, for Magnus. She froze in place, a golden statue caught between one moment and the next by the power of the Watch. John sat down hard on a nearby chair, his heart racing, and took a moment to get his breathing back under control. That had been close. He put the Stop Watch in his pocket, for later, and forced himself back onto his feet. He walked up to Magnus, put one hand on her face, and gave her a good hard shove. She toppled over backwards and landed with a satisfyingly loud crash. John stepped over her and left the shop in search of Suzie.
* * *
• • •
She came stumbling down the corridor towards him, her teeth clenched against the pain that hammered through her with every step. Wulfsbane was back in its scabbard, and she held her broken arm to her side with her good hand. Sweat dripped off her face, and she could only just see out of her puffed-up eyes. Whatever the demon had sprayed her with was vicious stuff. John called out to her, and she turned her head slowly to look at him. John stopped abruptly, as he saw there was nothing in her face to show she recognised him. She let go of her broken arm and drew Wulfsbane. The long blade glowed horribly yellow, like a corpse-fire on a cairn. John called out to Suzie, and she ran straight at him.
The Infernal Device shot forward, in a blow that would have punched right through John if he hadn’t dived to one side at the last moment. Suzie cut and hacked at him, and he kept ducking and dodging, calling out her name and his, but she didn’t react at all. So John chose his moment carefully, took a packet of pepper out of his pocket, and dashed the whole contents into her face. She stopped dead, her abused eyes squeezed shut; and then she sneezed explosively. And the sheer violence of it shocked her awake. She forced her eyes open to look at John, then at Wulfsbane in her hand. She threw the sword away from her, and it clattered loudly on the floor, as though reproaching her.
“John?” said Suzie. “I almost . . . I’m sorry. I didn’t know you. The sword got inside my head.”
She stumbled and almost fell, but John was there to catch her and hold her up. He was careful of her left arm, but she still cried out as he touched her. He helped her lean back against the nearest wall, then checked her out as gently as he could.
“Your arm is broken in three places,” he said finally. “And your whole left rib-cage is a mess. What happened to you?”
“I thought I could take two Droods,” said Suzie. She smiled bloodily. “Came pretty close.”
“You need a hospital,” said John.
She looked at him sharply. “The baby?”
“Seems fine,” John said quickly. “But we need to get you properly looked at. Just in case.”
“We don’t have time for that,” said Suzie.
She fished in her jacket pocket with her good hand and brought out a pulsing grey blob. John looked at it dubiously, and Suzie managed another small smile.
“Medical-repair blob. Black-market Drood rip-off. The Gun Shoppes of Usher don’t just sell guns.”
She pressed the blob carefully in between her left arm and her ribs, and the blob swelled up until it covered the whole of her left arm and side in a gently pulsing cocoon. Suzie sighed with relief as the pain shut off. The cocoon wrinkled, then shrivelled, and finally detached itself from Suzie and fell to the floor, all used up. Suzie flexed her arm and slapped her ribs and smiled at John.
“All done,” she said. “Droods aren’t the only ones with the best toys. Speaking of which, where’s the one I didn’t kill?”
“She’s taking a timeout,” said John.
“Show me,” said Suzie.
“You can kill her later,” John said patiently. “Trust me, she isn’t going anywhere. We need to get to the Londinium Club. I got a message from Alex; two high-ranking Droods are on their way there, looking for the Authorities. If we could take two major Droods captive, that should give us some real bargaining power.”
“Sounds like a plan to me,” said Suzie. She looked at Wulfsbane, lying on the floor some distance away.
“Leave it,” said John. “You don’t need it.”
“I’d have been killed without that sword,” said Suzie. “And we haven’t a hope in hell of stopping the Drood invasion without it.”
“That sword nearly made you kill me,” said John.
“Don’t take it personally,” said Suzie. “Wulfsbane wants to kill everyone.”
“But if it can overpower you . . .”
“Then I’ll just have to be stronger,” said Suzie.
She strode over to the Infernal Device and picked it up, grimacing as she felt its presence in her head again. Like a soft voice whispering constantly in her ear. She slammed the sword back into its scabbard, and the voice retreated.
John Taylor and Suzie Shooter left the Mammon Emporium together and went looking for Droods.
* * *
• • •
The Drood advance had been forced almost to a halt by the sheer pressure of Nightside resistance. They couldn’t kill people fast enough to make any progress. They were winning all the battles, but the Nightsiders were throwing everything they had at the Droods, and some of it was working.
They blew up their own buildings, so the wreckage would bury Droods. It didn’t take the Droods long to dig themselves out, entirely unharmed, but it did take them out of the fight. And clearing the blockage slowed them down. People threw increasingly strange things at the Droods, trying to find something that would get past their armour. Guns didn’t work, and magics discharged harmlessly on the air, so the Nightsiders turned to more lateral thinking. They set up invisible dimensional doorways all along the street, so that Droods who passed unknowingly through them ended up back at the start again. People teleported in and out, sticking around just long enough to try out a new weapon, watch the result, then disappear to report back. The hit-and-run tactics might not be hurting the Droods, but they were holding the Droods’ attention and slowing them down even more.
Big flying creatures soared overhead and crapped on the Droods. Some of it was radioactive. Fizzing fluorescent fairies dive-bombed the Droods with sparkling clouds of pixie dust that made all their luck turn bad. It couldn’t affect the Drood armour, which had learned and adapted after the Garden of Delights, but the dust still worked on their surroundings. The ground cracked open under Drood feet, sending them stumbling this way and that, or melted into quicksand that swallowed Droods up.
Some Droods became confused as to who the enemy was and attacked one another. Some became horribly ill and had to pull the armour back from their faces so they could vomit, while others became so turned-around they just sat down on the street and refused to move until someone they trusted could tell them where the hell they were.
The Sarjeant summoned guns into his hands and used the flying fairies for target practice. But even a full-on hit did little more than throw the nasty creatures around, and they swooped back and forth over his head, giggling happily and calling him awful names in fluty, high-pitched voices. The Sarjeant had to settle for holding their attention and keeping them from dive-bombing anyone else.
An earthquake generator cracked the street open from end to end, and Droods fell through to find all kinds of subterranean monsters waiting for them. Huge, segmented things, with armoured bodies and limbs like bludgeons. The Droods tore them apart with their golden hands, happy to have something solid and uncomplicated to fight.
The Matriarch finally ordered a retreat, over-ruling the Sarjeant’s objections.
“We must keep going, Matriarch! We have to keep up the momentum!”
“We’re not going anywhere, Sarjeant! We need to pull back and regroup. The family is exhausting itself on fights that don’t matter. At this rate, they’ll be worn-out long before we get to the real threats.”
The Sarjeant looked at the crowds blocking the street ahead and nodded reluctantly. The Droods were fighting fiercely, but their armour could only do so much for them.
“You’re right,” he said. “This is just a distraction.”
He called for the Droods to break off, and they quickly retreated to take up defensive positions at the other end of the street. The Nightsiders held their ground, wary of pursuing their enemy in case it was a trap. The Matriarch called Conrad over to join her. He’d been fighting at the front, and his armour was soaked in blood. It streamed down the slick golden surface and left a bloody trail behind him. The Matriarch, the Sarjeant, and Conrad move off to one side and pulled their golden masks back, so they could see one another’s faces as they talked.
“I value your long experience in the field, Conrad,” said the Matriarch. “These tactics aren’t working. What am I doing wrong?”
“Stop trying to hit the crowds head-on,” Conrad said immediately. “Break the family up into smaller groups and advance on several fronts at once. The resistance will have to break into smaller groups to stop us, and we can overpower them more easily.”
The Matriarch nodded. “See to it, Sarjeant. No, wait a moment; have either of you seen Ioreth or Magnus? They should have caught up with us by now.”
“We don’t have time to worry about a missing Librarian,” said the Sarjeant. “And Magnus can look after herself.”
“I was wondering what had happened to Howard and Callan,” said Conrad. “If they ever got to the Londinium Club, and the Authorities.”
“If they had negotiated a surrender, I think we would have heard about it by now,” said the Sarjeant.
“Would we?” said Conrad. “Our communications are getting worse.”
“This is just another distraction,” the Sarjeant said forcefully. “Matriarch, you need to give me full command over all military matters. Only I have the knowledge and experience to win this war. It’s your job to set policy, mine to see it is carried out.”
The Matriarch didn’t answer for a moment, thinking it through. Things had not gone as she had anticipated.
“We came here to conquer these people,” she said finally. “Not slaughter them. This isn’t what I wanted.”
“They’re not giving us any choice,” said the Sarjeant. “They’d kill all of us if they could.”
“We’re in danger of forgetting the object of this mission,” Conrad said carefully. “Control of the Nightside; not its destruction.”
“I never expected these people to put up such a fight,” said the Matriarch. “Or be so good at it.” She scowled at the Sarjeant. “You said they’d be soft and decadent!”
“Well,” said the Sarjeant. “I was right about the decadent. Have you looked in some of these shop-windows?”
“We need reinforcements,” said the Matriarch. “People who understand how to fight Nightsiders.”
“Who can we ask for help?” said Conrad. “You already tried calling a summit, and no one wanted to know.”
“They told us to go to Hell,” said the Sarjeant.
“Things are different now,” said the Matriarch. “They thought they could pressure us into calling off the invasion by withholding their support; but now we’ve committed ourselves to this war . . . They either help us or watch us fall. We have to try again.”
“How?” said the Sarjeant. “Conrad is right; our communications have been failing us ever since we entered the long night.”
“We could always try in there,” said Conrad.
They looked to where he was pointing. On the other side of the street was a shop called Happy Talk, its window crammed
full of all kinds of comm tech. The Matriarch clapped her hands delightedly.
“Well spotted, Conrad! Lead the way.”
The shop-door turned out to be locked, so the Sarjeant kicked it in. The door was blasted right off its hinges and flew half-way across the shop. Inside, all kinds of weird communications gear had been set out on display. A conch-shell with an antenna, the ghost of an early telephone, and a television set with severed rabbit ears piled on top.
“For better reception,” Conrad explained.
And then they all stopped as they saw something they hadn’t expected to see. They advanced slowly on the glass display-case in the centre of the shop, inside of which was a silver-backed hand-mirror. The sign on the case said: The legendary Merlin Glass, sent back through Time from the Thirtieth Century. Serious offers only. Do not attempt to touch if you like having fingers or your soul securely attached.
The three Droods looked at the Merlin Glass, then at each other.
“Is that even possible?” the Matriarch said finally. “Could this really be a future version of our Merlin Glass?”