“I sent my clone army to the Department of Uncanny, where my very own suborned traitor let them in. You can always find someone . . . and I used one clone’s hands to tear Kayleigh’s Eye out of your grandfather’s chest, Eddie. To make me invulnerable and untouchable. And my clones too, to a lesser degree, because of the spiritual distance . . . or something. Injure and damage them all you like, but they’ll always bounce back. As you’ve no doubt noticed. Aren’t they splendid?” He leaned forward, conspiratorially. “That’s why the masks, of course. Because they’ve all got my face. Bit of a giveaway there . . .”
“Why did you kill everyone at Uncanny?” I said.
He shrugged. “Exuberance? Once you start, you just can’t stop . . .”
“But why were you still in your Cell, when we came to see you?” said Molly.
“She’s talking again,” Laurence said to me. “How do you put up with her?”
“I think she’s posed a perfectly reasonable question,” I said carefully.
“Is it? Oh, very well . . . What was the point in leaving, back then? If I left Cell 13 and didn’t go back, the family would be bound to notice and start looking for me. And I couldn’t afford to be noticed. Not with so many things left undone, or unfinished. Do try to keep up, Molly! It’s all about the Lazarus Stone, you see. From the moment I knew of it, I knew it was what I needed to escape my fate. I waited years for the damned thing to show up. I didn’t know James had given it to the Lady Faire. Because the Grey Fox had such excellent mental shields. Oh yes. He put a lot of hard work into them, because he had so much he needed to hide from his family. Including what really happened to his wife . . . He never told the family who he’d given the Stone to, because he knew they wouldn’t approve. Well, I mean, would you? Unnatural creature . . . Even the Armourer didn’t know, back then. Until he met up with someone in the Nightside, at the oldest bar in the world, and they told him, I think just to see the look on his face. And even then, I didn’t know! Because the Armourer has his own very powerful mental shields. If you think the Grey Fox had secrets, they were nothing to what dear old Jack Drood has hidden away from the family all these years. It’s hard to hide anything from me, you know. Secrets leave holes in the information stream, and it’s amazing what I can deduce, just from the shape of the holes.
“But, finally, the Armourer mentioned the Lazarus Stone, within the hearing of my pet lab tech. Who misheard that the Regent had it. He couldn’t wait to tell me all about it. I knew I had to have the Lazarus Stone, the one thing that could put an end to my endless half life. That’s why I sent my clones to Uncanny, to get the Stone from the Regent. I was heartbroken when it turned out he didn’t have it. And then you and Molly showed up there, and I saw a way to blackmail you into finding where the Stone really was, and getting it for me. And it worked!”
“Hold it,” said Molly. “What happened to this lab assistant you’ve been talking about? Why isn’t he here, with you?”
Laurence sighed loudly, and dropped me a wink. “Women, eh? Always focusing on the one little detail that doesn’t really matter. Very well—once I had my Door, and my clones, and my information on the Lazarus Stone . . . I didn’t need him any more, did I? So now he’s sitting in Cell 13, thinking he’s me, looking like me, so no one in the family will know I’ve left until it’s far too late.”
“At least you didn’t kill him,” I said.
“Why should I?” said Laurence. “I wasn’t in a merciful mood.” He giggled briefly. “And now! It’s time to put an end to all this . . . I have enjoyed making my little speech. I knew I would. Thank you for leading me here, Eddie. I’ll take over now.”
“Wait!” I said. “You’ve got what you want. You don’t need my parents any longer. Please, let them go.”
“Oh, I don’t have your parents, Eddie. I never did.” Laurence grinned broadly. “That was just bluff, so I could motivate and control you.”
A cold hand clenched around my heart, and I looked at him stupidly. “But you must know where they are! You know everything. Tell me!”
He waggled a finger at me. “Don’t shout at me, Eddie,” he said mildly. “I have no idea where your parents might be. Which is just a bit odd, I’ll admit. I should know, shouldn’t I? I can only assume your parents are so very thoroughly lost that no one in the family knows . . . Never mind, Eddie. Don’t be a nuisance! I’m busy.”
He beckoned to the Lady Faire, and when she didn’t come forward quickly enough to suit him, two of the blood-red men grabbed her by the arms and hustled her roughly forward. They forced her into position before Laurence, and held her firmly in place while Laurence looked her over, thoughtfully. He didn’t seem to be at all affected, or impressed, by her presence.
“Don’t waste your dubious charms on me, Lady,” he said finally, almost absently. “I am fully in control of myself. I have to be, when there are so many of me running around at once. And besides, I wouldn’t know what to do with you. That part of me died long ago.”
“Don’t you miss it?” said the Lady Faire.
Laurence surprised me then, by taking the time to consider her question. But in the end, he shook his head firmly.
“No,” he said. “There are many things I do miss, but that isn’t very high on the list.”
“I could make you remember how sweet it was,” said the Lady Faire.
“No thank you,” Laurence said politely. “You have only one thing I want.”
“No wonder I had no effect on your clones,” said the Lady Faire. “They’re all just like you. No one home, inside.”
Laurence laughed in her face, quite suddenly, and it was a nasty, mocking sound. Many of the watching guests stirred, affronted by his contempt for their beloved Lady. Some of them actually started forward, intent on doing something, and the nearest blood-red men clubbed them viciously to the ground. Dark pools of blood spread slowly across the floor. I wanted to do something, and I could feel Molly tensing at my side, but I stopped her with an unobtrusive hand on her arm. This wasn’t the time to start anything.
Laurence glowered at the Lady Faire. “You have only one thing I want. Give me the Lazarus Stone. Now.”
“You didn’t really think I’d bring it with me to the Ball, did you?” said the Lady Faire.
“I know you did,” said Lazarus. “You couldn’t trust it, away from you. Not with so many powerful people here. And besides, I can feel its presence. So hand it over. Or would you rather I have my clones tear your clothes off, until they find it?”
“Anywhen else, I might have enjoyed that,” said the Lady Faire. “But you have a way of taking all the fun out of things. There is such a thing as dignity, I suppose.”
She reached carefully into an unobtrusive pocket on her tuxedo jacket, and brought out a small shiny object. Everyone in the Ballroom leaned forward for a better look. They just couldn’t help themselves. I did too, and was disappointed to discover that the legendary and much-sought-after Lazarus Stone . . . was just a small sphere of unimpressive alien tech. Nothing glamorous or impressive about it. A pockmarked ball of some unfamiliar metal, two or maybe three inches in diameter. Except, the more I looked at it, the more it seemed to me that there was something . . . slippery about it. Something that made the Lazarus Stone strangely hard to look at, hard to pin down in any of its details. As though it had too many spatial dimensions for this world. Perhaps because it had been made by a species with far more than human senses, or less limitation in their thinking. All I knew was that just looking at the Stone made my head hurt.
Laurence reached out an eager hand to take the Lazarus Stone, and the Lady Faire drew back her hand.
“Why do you want the Stone?” she said. “What would you use it for?”
“I will use the Stone to reach back in Time, and grab myself,” said Laurence. “Rescue myself from History, before the awful accident happens. Save myself, so I won’t have to spend all those horrible years being the Drood in Cell 13. Being me.”
“I thoug
ht the Stone could only be used to save people from the point before they died?” said the Lady Faire.
“You people,” said Laurence quietly, contemptuously. “Always so limited in your thinking. And besides, I’m as good as dead anyway, aren’t I? You couldn’t say that I’ve had a life. But I will have.”
“You would undo centuries of History,” said the Lady Faire. “The world as we know it would just disappear!”
“I know,” said Laurence. “And I don’t care. Why should I? When did anyone in the whole world ever care about the Drood in Cell 13? That’s why I keep saying it doesn’t matter. Because nothing does, because I will make it all never happened. All the lives lost, all the lives ruined . . . won’t matter at all. Let the whole world vanish, if that’s what it takes for me to have a real life. Now give me the Lazarus Stone, Lady, or I’ll have my clones take it. And you really won’t like how I’ll have them do it.”
The Lady Faire put forward her hand, offering him the alien tech, and then she opened her hand and let the Stone fall on the floor between them. Laurence sneered at her, and bent forward to pick up the Lazarus Stone. And the Lady Faire kicked him square in the left eye, with the tip of her elegant white boot. A lot of people in the room winced, and some cried out despite themselves as they saw and heard the boot strike home. I was one of them. Laurence fell backwards, crying out abjectly as he clapped both hands to his face. The Lady Faire laughed at him.
“Didn’t see that one coming, did you? I am not predictable!”
But what interested me was that all around the great ice cavern of the Ballroom, all the blood-red men had clapped their hands to their crimson masks. They had felt in their eyes what Laurence had felt in his. Slaved to his will, what he experienced, they experienced. And while Laurence might have Kayleigh’s Eye fused to his chest, like my grandfather the Regent . . . it didn’t protect Laurence as well as it had protected the Regent. My grandfather had been immune to all pain and damage; Laurence just repaired himself. As long as he felt pain, he was vulnerable. And through him the blood-red men . . .
I was just getting ready to jump Laurence, and try out a whole bunch of violent theories, when a glowing form appeared out of nowhere, right in front of Laurence. He lowered his hands, and looked at the ghostly figure through watering eyes. The Phantom Berserker smiled at his erstwhile master, and it was not a good smile.
“Time for me to perform one last act of penance, Laurence Drood. To pay for my betrayal of all those who were so kind to me, at Uncanny. One last act of vengeance, on the one who betrayed me.”
The Phantom Berserker thrust a glowing hand into Laurence’s chest. It plunged in deep, and then materialised just enough for the glowing fingers to close around the glowing amulet. The Phantom Berserker tore Kayleigh’s Eye out of Laurence’s chest, by brute force. The only way it could be taken. Laurence screamed, but the sound was drowned out by the Phantom Berserker’s triumphant laughter. He held the amulet up, so everyone in the Ballroom could see it, still dripping with its previous owner’s blood. And then the ghost just vanished, taking Kayleigh’s Eye with him. There was a long pause. Laurence slowly straightened up, panting harshly. The great wound in his chest was still bleeding heavily. He looked . . . like he couldn’t believe what was happening.
All around the Ballroom, the blood-red men were clutching at their own fresh wounds.
“Well,” I said loudly, “this is interesting, isn’t it? You’re not untouchable any more, Laurence. And neither are your clones. When you get hurt now, you stay hurt. And so do they.” I looked around the Ballroom. “Ladies, gentlemen, others . . . I think it’s time for a little violent revenge. Don’t you?”
Laurence glared around him. “Stay where you are! I still outnumber you!”
“What are numbers?” said a new and very familiar voice, “in the face of retribution?”
The Replicated Meme of Saint Sebastian strode forward, together, all six of them. And something in their natural authority made everyone else fall back to let them pass. They strode forward to join us, Molly and me, Laurence, and the Lady Faire. And then, one by one, they removed their stylised metal masks, and immediately I understood why they’d all seemed so familiar. They weren’t the Replicated Meme at all. They were my uncle Jack, the Armourer; the Sarjeant-at-Arms; William the Librarian; Callan, Head of the War Room; and Capability Maggie, the new Matriarch. And the most powerful telepath in the whole world, joined to us by marriage, Ammonia Vom Acht. Uncle Jack smiled at me cheerfully.
“Stand ready, my boy. The cavalry just arrived.”
“How the hell did you get in here?” It wasn’t much, but it was all I could think to say.
“I still had James’ old invitation,” said the Armourer. “I was able to use that, to track down the Ball’s current location. And then it was easy enough for us to get in, hidden behind the masks of the Replicated Meme of Saint Sebastian. Who were only too willing to give up their current invitation and let us come in their place, after the Sarjeant had a few quiet words with them. Threatening, vicious, brutal words, I’m sure. Sorry we couldn’t let you know, Eddie, but . . . we had to save the element of surprise for just the right moment. You didn’t think we really believed all that nonsense about you being responsible for the killings at Uncanny, did you? You didn’t really think we’d leave you out in the cold again? We know you better than that.”
“We just let the world think we saw you as rogue,” said Capability Maggie. “So we could operate quietly in the background, working out what was really going on, while everyone else was watching you.”
“You did good work against the False Knights, boy,” growled the Sarjeant. “You must have seen me look at you, and let you go?”
“And we brought a little something with us!” William said brightly. “Something to even up the odds!”
“Don’t boast, darling,” said Ammonia. “You’re better than that.”
William nodded quickly. “It’s true. I am.”
“We brought a Door,” said Callan, smiling unpleasantly about him at the blood-red men. “A dimensional Door, to link the Winter Palace to Drood Hall. The Doormouse was most eager to make amends.”
The Armourer snapped his fingers imperiously, and a Door appeared in the middle of the Ballroom. Just an ordinary-looking wooden door, standing tall and wide and upright, and apparently completely unsupported. It swung open and a whole army of Droods in full armour came storming through into the Ballroom. Dozens, hundreds of golden-armoured Droods. More than enough to match the numbers of the blood-red men.
The Lady Faire’s guests fell back, hugging the far walls. They could see a massive clash between two armies about to happen, between golden masks and crimson masks, right in front of them . . . And they really didn’t want to be involved. They knew a grudge fight when they saw one. Laurence glared around him. He straightened up, his hands clenching into fists, and all the blood-red men did the same. And just like that, it was on.
The Droods and the clones slammed together, no quarter asked or given. Laurence tried to snatch the Lazarus Stone away from the Lady Faire, who had it clasped firmly in both her hands. She backed quickly away from him, losing herself in the crowd, and he went after her. I went after him.
Golden fists clubbed down blood-red men, and extended golden swords cut and hacked. The blood-red men fought fiercely, but they had no weapons. They’d never needed them before. And even their unnatural strength was nothing when set against Drood armour. The clones fell in bloody heaps all across the Ballroom, and they did not rise again. Some of them turned on Ammonia Vom Acht, seeing her as an easier target. She just looked at them, and they all fell dead. You don’t mess with the world’s most powerful telepath.
The Droods beat the hell out of the blood-red men, all across the room. I pushed my way through the fighting, ignoring the various struggles. I wasn’t even armoured up. I followed Laurence, until finally he caught up with the Lady Faire again by one of the exits, already blocked by Droods. He wrestled
with her, crying angry tears of frustration as he tried to pry the Lazarus Stone out of her grasp. She fought him off, with a man’s strength. I grabbed Laurence by the shoulder and pulled him away from her. He jerked free, and spun round to face me. He had the red puffy face of an angry, thwarted child.
“It’s over, Laurence,” I said. “Time to go home. I’m sure they’ve still got your old Cell waiting for you.”
“I can’t go back,” he said. “I can’t.”
I sighed, despite myself. “We left you alone too long. So in a sense, we made this rod for our own backs. Time to let the Armourer and his lab assistants have a look at you. We’ve come a long way, since you were first locked up. There must be something we can do for you, by now.”
Laurence shook his head slowly, fixing me with his bright, fierce eyes. “They want me dead. Because I know things. All the awful secrets, all the hidden deals, all the terrible compromises . . . Let me go, Eddie, and I’ll tell you something you need to know. Something the whole family needs to know.”
“Laurence . . .”
“Let me go and I’ll tell you who’s really looking out from inside the Merlin Glass!”
Molly moved in beside me. “You can’t trust him, Eddie. He’d say anything. Kill him.”
“I can’t,” I said. “Not in cold blood.”
“Why not?” said Molly. “He killed your grandfather, and he lied about your parents. He would have messed up the whole world and not given a damn as long as he got what he wanted. And he’d do it again, first chance he got.”
“Yes,” said Laurence, nodding quickly. “Oh yes . . . They can’t hold me in Cell 13 any more. I’ll get out, and I’ll kill you all, kill everyone. You’ll see!”
“Put him out of everyone’s misery,” said Molly.
I could hear the fighting dying down behind me. I looked back, just in time to see the last few blood-red men go down. Laurence was all that was left now. If I was going to do something before my family did, I had to do it quickly. I reached into my pocket and the Merlin Glass leaped eagerly into my hand, snuggling against my fingers. I took out the hand mirror and Laurence looked at me oddly, his head cocked slightly on one side.