The electric lighting was almost painfully bright to make sure no one could hide in the shadows. Or sneak in by using them as doorways. Glowing force shields and shimmering magical screens opened and closed before and behind the three of them as they descended, triggered by the presence of Drood DNA. Molly Metcalf got a free pass because she was Molly Metcalf, and even automated security systems had enough sense not to annoy her. Goblins sat on guard in comfortable alcoves in the wall: squat ugly things with bodies no bigger than a football, and long, spindly arms and legs. They didn’t look particularly dangerous, but Eddie once saw them run down and eat a werewolf, and you don’t forget things like that. The goblins kept themselves busy with crosswords, and weren’t at all averse to begging plaintively for help with the harder clues.
At the bottom of the stairs, more heavy steel doors opened onto the massive vault that held the War Room. A gorgon was sitting just inside the door, wrapped in great leathery wings like an enveloping cloak. Its hooded head was hanging down, as though it was sleeping, but Eddie was pretty sure it wasn’t.
“What is she doing here?” said Molly.
“Penance,” said the Sarjeant-at-Arms. “For sins against the family.”
“You mean she’s a prisoner?”
“It volunteered,” said the Sarjeant.
Molly gave him a hard look. “What do you mean, it? I thought all gorgons were female?”
“Not in any way that would make sense to us,” said Eddie. “Gorgons are pan-sexual creatures with unlimited orientation.”
“What?” said Molly.
“Exactly,” said Eddie.
They moved on. The gorgon didn’t stir. Though Eddie was almost sure he could hear something very like giggling.
A vast auditorium carved out of the solid rock underneath Drood Hall, the War Room’s walls were covered with state-of-the-art display screens, showing every country in the world. Coloured lights blinked everywhere, indicating matters of interest to the Droods. A green light meant a successfully completed mission, problem taken care of. A blue light stood for a person of particular interest or worrying capabilities. Purple for a major cock-up, meaning more help was urgently required; while potential trouble spots glowed amber. High-level threats were red. The countries of the world looked like so many Christmas trees, sparkling with lights. There was an awful lot of amber and red.
Men and women sat in long rows, concentrating on the information in front of them. Farseers with scrying balls, murmuring into hands-free headsets, sat next to technicians hunched over computer monitors. Together they covered the work of hundreds of Droods across the world. Some were field agents, protecting the innocent by doing things to the guilty, while others made up the support teams, supplying the field agents with whatever they needed and keeping them hidden from the worldly authorities. Still more stuck to the shadows, gathering useful information. It takes a lot of hard work to keep the world safe, without the world’s noticing what it is they’re being kept safe from.
A steady buzz of low voices filled the War Room, almost like being in church. Once again there was no sense of panic or even urgency, just hard-working men and women doing what they’d been trained to do. The War Room ran on strict discipline. And lots of hot, sweet tea and Jaffa cakes.
Messengers hurried in and out, bearing new information, vital updates, and the latest orders or queries from the Matriarch. The messages piled up on the main mission desk, where Callan, Head of the War Room, greeted them all with the same deep scowl. The Droods believed in writing things down, partly because you can’t hack paper but also because it’s so much easier to destroy. Does a secret still exist when there’s no evidence left to support it? Having to ponder questions like that was just one of the many reasons why Eddie preferred not to come home.
Callan glowered at the three new arrivals, then gestured curtly for them to join him. The Head of the War Room was overweight, harried, and in the kind of bad mood you only got through years of hard practice and harbouring grudges. His broad, perspiring face was topped with thinning blond hair, and he had the kind of look that suggested you shouldn’t get too close in case he tried to bite you. He started talking before the three of them had even reached the mission desk.
“Yes, I know why you’re here, Sarjeant, and I’m not interested. I don’t care, and you can’t make me. I am up to my lower lip in bad news, and the tide is coming in. With sharks in it. The Nightside’s sudden and entirely unanticipated expansion caught everyone in the world off guard, and they’re all not at all happy about it. Even we didn’t get any warning, despite our so-called information-gathering people. And don’t even get me started on our precogs. We haven’t had a decent psychic in the family for generations.” He glared around him at the massive display screens. “No one heard anything! Not a clue, not a whisper, and you can take it from me that there will be a great many questions asked about that.”
“Breathe, Callan,” said Eddie, not unkindly.
“And as if things weren’t bad enough, the Sarjeant’s brought you and the wicked witch of the woods down here to bother me. Don’t touch anything! Don’t get too close to anything. What do you want from me, Cedric?”
“Tell them what’s happening,” said the Sarjeant-at-Arms, entirely unmoved by anything he’d heard.
Callan sniffed loudly and sat back in his chair, which groaned as his weight shifted.
“All the secret groups and organisations across the world, good and bad and everything in between, which covers a hell of a lot of ground, have gone batshit mental because the Nightside has overflowed its long-established boundaries. That wasn’t supposed to happen. It isn’t supposed to be possible. All of these groups are tearing their hair out, and each other’s, trying to figure out what it means, while sending their own operatives out into the field in search of answers. Which, of course, complicates things even further. But as far as we can tell, no one knows what’s really going on or why this totally unprecedented change happened in the first place. And the why is far more important than the what.”
“Have any of our field agents turned up anything useful?” said Eddie.
“The Matriarch has tasked some of our most experienced agents to approach people who usually know things and persuade them it might be a really good idea to tell us everything they know,” said Callan. “It was made clear to these agents that they shouldn’t take no, I don’t know, or please stop hitting me as acceptable answers.” He gestured at the screens. “Conrad is in Uganda, Kathleen is in Peru, Bernard is in Australia, and Luther is in Los Angeles. We haven’t heard back from any of them yet.”
“Why are they spread so wide?” said Molly, looking at the flashing lights in a way she hoped indicated she knew what she was looking at.
“We’re working on the assumption that whoever is behind this isn’t any of the usual unusual suspects,” said Callan. “We make it a point to keep every major bad guy and weird organisation under constant surveillance, so we know it isn’t any of them. We’re searching for someone or something we don’t know about. We cover the whole world, so some things are bound to fall through the cracks. We can only do what we can do.” He stopped to glare at a new messenger as he dumped a whole pile of papers on the mission desk. “You’re not making any friends here!” Callan said dangerously, and the messenger fled. Callan reluctantly turned his attention back to Eddie and Molly. “Look, why don’t you go talk to the Matriarch? She must know you two have returned by now. Why did you bring them down here to annoy me, Cedric?”
“Because Eddie needs to know what you know,” said the Sarjeant. “Tell him, Callan.”
“Tell me what?” said Eddie, immediately suspicious. “What am I not being told for my own good, this time?”
“Yeah,” said Molly. “What he said, only louder.”
Callan looked quickly around, to make sure everyone else was concentrating on their work, and when he did finally s
peak, he lowered his voice significantly, so that the others were obliged to lean in close.
“It looks to me like the Matriarch is getting ready to commit the family to open aggression against whoever turns out to be responsible for the Nightside changing its boundaries. She believes the whole world is under threat from the long night. And from everything I’m seeing and hearing, I’m not sure I disagree. But you have to understand, we’re not talking about the Matriarch’s authorising some quiet assassination, or even a mass attack on some subterranean organisation; she’s getting ready to launch a pre-emptive strike with all the resources of the family behind it.”
“You’re talking about starting a war . . .” said Eddie.
“Can she do that?” said Molly.
“Of course,” said the Sarjeant. “She’s the Matriarch.”
“Let’s hope it doesn’t come to that,” said Callan. “When the Droods go to war, it makes a lot of mess, and the cleaning up afterwards can take decades. Sometimes we have to go to great lengths to keep things out of the history books, and that always leaves gaps. Gaps are bad. They raise questions.”
“How long before the Matriarch makes her decision?” said Eddie.
“God knows,” said Callan. “She’s only held off this long because we haven’t identified a target yet.”
“And you don’t approve,” said Molly.
“Not unless it proves necessary,” said Callan. “Such measures can be easy enough to start but a hell of a lot harder to stop.”
“And if it should prove necessary?” said Molly, when it became clear Eddie was thinking too hard to raise the question himself.
“Then it’s Anything, for the family,” said Callan. “If you’re going to fight a war, fight to win. Now get the hell out of my War Room, all of you. I have some important paper shuffling to be getting on with.”
He leaned forward over his mission desk and gave the most recent report his full attention, so he wouldn’t have to look at them any more. Because he didn’t know what else to say. The Sarjeant-at-Arms gathered up Eddie and Molly with his eyes and led them back to the steel doors. The gorgon was still sitting in place, head down. She wasn’t laughing any more.
“I needed you to see how things are,” said the Sarjeant. “The position we’re in and the position we could be in.”
“You’re not usually this underhanded, Cedric,” said Eddie. “Or this subtle.”
“Yes, I am,” said the Sarjeant. “I just never let you see it before. Things are bad now, but they could get a lot worse.”
“What do you expect me to do about it?” said Eddie.
“Help the Matriarch make the right decision,” said the Sarjeant.
“Which is?” said Molly.
“I don’t know,” said the Sarjeant. “Or I’d be helping her make it. All I can see are bad choices and worse consequences.”
“So naturally, you thought of me,” said Eddie.
“Of course,” said the Sarjeant.
* * *
• • •
They climbed the long stairs back up to the Hall, paused to get their breath back, then headed for the Sanctity. Walking in silence, not even looking at each other, occupied with their own thoughts. It wasn’t until they started down the long corridor that gave onto the Sanctity that Eddie finally raised his voice.
“Given that the Matriarch has gone back to holding her Council meetings in the Sanctity, can I assume the really stupid argument between her and Ethel is finally at an end?”
“You’d have to ask them that,” said the Sarjeant. “But they are working together now, for the duration. Nothing like a world-threatening crisis to bring people together. Even if one of them isn’t people.”
Two Droods in their armour guarded the huge double doors to the Sanctity. They stood on either side of the doors like gleaming golden statues, their armour moulded into fierce martial attitudes, all spikes and thorns and demonic face masks. It wasn’t the stylings that spooked Eddie; it was that he didn’t expect to see fully armoured Droods inside the Hall. The one place where the family was supposed to feel safe and secure and protected. What kind of threat was the Matriarch afraid of that she felt the need for armoured guards? He glanced at the Sarjeant-at-Arms, but he was staring straight ahead, saying nothing. So Eddie just increased his pace a little, to take the lead. He needed to get to the Matriarch and hear what she had to say. So he’d know what to say.
The armoured guards didn’t even wait to be asked; they already had the doors open by the time Eddie reached them and stepped quickly back out of the way to let Eddie and Molly and the Sarjeant pass. Eddie gave them both a hard look. Demonic-faced Droods weren’t supposed to impress that easily. Once inside the Sanctity, Eddie was quietly pleased to see that the full advisory Council had turned out to attend the Matriarch. It didn’t necessarily mean that she had any intention of following their advice, but it did suggest she was prepared to listen to them.
The Matriarch was sitting bolt upright in a sensible chair behind a simple table, right in the middle of the great open chamber. The table was covered with phones and lap-tops, and a few pieces of comm tech Eddie immediately recognised as being of alien origin. But even though lights were flickering insistently on most of her devices, demanding her attention, the Matriarch ignored all of them to fix her gaze on Eddie.
He met her gaze steadily as he crossed the chamber. Molly had already slipped in beside him, supporting him with her presence, while the Sarjeant-at-Arms had dropped back a little. Distancing himself, for public purposes. Eddie wasn’t impressed by the huge and awe-inspiring setting. He’d been here before, trying to figure out how to save the world from some dire threat, with a quite literal dead-line hanging over everyone. The trick was to focus on what was in front of you and not let yourself be distracted by personalities or politics. Or an increasing need to punch certain people in the head until they stopped arguing with you and talked sense. The Matriarch gave Eddie a wintry smile as he finally crashed to a halt before her, and he gave her his best unimpressed look in return.
She’d started out as Capability Maggie, in charge of looking after the Drood grounds and gardens. She’d loved her job, and only reluctantly gave it up to take charge of the family after the old Matriarch was murdered. She did seem to be growing into the job, and in recent times had become just as decisive, cunning, and convinced she knew better than anyone else as any of her predecessors. Though Eddie had heard gossip that she was just the same as when she only had the gardeners and groundsmen to boss around. She was wearing a dark blue power suit of almost brutal style and impact, and her determinedly serious face was topped with a blonde buzz cut. Short and stocky, the Matriarch always acted like she was ready to walk through walls to get what she wanted.
Eddie and Molly stood together in the narrow aisle between the wooden seats set out for the Council. Nothing too comfortable, of course, to make sure nobody nodded off during the longer meetings. The Matriarch nodded to Eddie and ignored Molly, indicating with a wave of her hand the empty seats set out before her. Eddie took out a handkerchief and dusted one of the seats thoroughly before he sat down. Molly dropped into the seat beside him, crossed her legs and folded her arms, and fixed the Matriarch with a stare that dared her to start something. The Sarjeant-at-Arms took up his usual position standing at the Matriarch’s shoulder. Her guardian, her right hand, and occasionally her personal attack dog.
Eddie deliberately turned his gaze away from the Matriarch and looked around the Sanctity. The vast, open chamber was the physical and spiritual heart of Drood Hall, the place where policy was decided and the fates of countries and individuals were settled, to ensure the world went on turning as it should. Eddie would have been more impressed by that if he hadn’t run the family himself for a time and known just how close to the wind the family could sail, on occasion. He looked thoughtfully at the Council members, sitting patiently on th
eir uncomfortable chairs.
William the Librarian looked passably turned-out, for a change, in a heavy tweed suit, a clean white shirt, and a peach cravat held in place by a diamond pin. His bushy grey hair had been brushed and beaten into submission, and he’d shaved recently. He was still wearing fluffy white bunny slippers, with fierce pink eyes that seemed to follow you around the room. His mouth was firm and his eyes were clear, but there was still a worrying air of vagueness about him, as though his current state was only a temporary aberration, and he might slip back into his usual confused condition at any moment. William was a first-class Librarian, but that was mostly because he got along with books a lot better than he did with people. Still, there was no denying he’d come a long way from the broken man Eddie had found in the Happy Daze Asylum for the Criminally Insane, where William had been hiding from his family. With good reason.
William realised Eddie was looking at him and smiled uncertainly. “Hello, Eddie. And Molly! Well, well . . . What are you two doing here?”
“We’re here for the same reason you are,” said Eddie.
“Oh good . . .” said William. “Then you can tell me why I’m here. I’m never going to get the Index to the Old Library finished if people keep interrupting me. The current Index isn’t worth the vellum it’s written on . . .”
The woman sitting at his side leaned in close. “It’s the Nightside, dear. You remember.”
“Oh! Yes!” William nodded briskly. “Well remembered, dear. Don’t know what I’d do without you.”
William’s wife, and the real reason he’d improved so much in recent years, was Ammonia Vom Acht, widely believed to be the most powerful telepath in the world. She’d spent a lot of time inside William’s head, putting things back in order. She had a face like a bull-dog licking piss off a thistle, with a temperament to match. Short and dumpy in a baggy grey suit, she made an imposing and even frightening figure. Ammonia could not only make you believe you were a chicken, but get a really good price for your eggs. She and William were devoted to each other, even though they practically defined the phrase What do they see in each other?
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