The Tomb of Valdemar

by Simon Messingham

  Awake, Huvan! Awake from thy dream! Ariel, weaver of magic, the voice of your Prospero commands you to rise.

  Huvan has spent an eternity here in this dream world, in which, it must be said, Romana played something of a large part. The real world is rough and uncomfortable, the air hissing with flame and spattering heat. He feels like he has slept for twenty-two years and is rising now to his true age, possessed at last of the secret knowledge of the adult.

  The Magus is calling him. Huvan dreamed him too; in fact the whole waking world seems naught but a dream. He opens his eyes to see that vision, that loveliness he would call his own, in the flesh. She seems to be weeping, though she may not be aware of that fact. Her demeanour is as elegant and cold as ever. She is a princess. He feels her arms round his shoulders. The Magus is still calling his name.

  Huvan smiles.

  The Magus flinches, momentarily, under the weight of that smile. He knows the protege has outgrown the master.

  Something has happened to him in his sleep.

  They are dropping down to the tomb, Huvan can see it. He can see as if he is in all places; above in the palace, down in the crypt, outside in the clouds.

  ‘Huvan, my child, you have grown powerful.’ The Magus bows, to him. Rightly so. Romana lets go and gives him room.

  ‘I’ve seen a lot. In my dreams.’ He looks at Romana and recalls some of those dreams. She recoils.

  ‘Don’t worry,’ he says. ‘I remember the palace. I shall not allow its like again.’

  He feels the power, the new thing, coursing through him, ready for him to use. He is the book of spells, the grimoire.

  Now all he needs is the sorcerer. ‘Command me, Magus,’ he says, noting how Neville visibly relaxes at these words. ‘I can do anything.’

  The Magus looks around, licking his lips. He is still unsure.

  Huvan can see his beating heart thumping faster, the glands in his face increasing their sweaty output.

  ‘We must release the Dark One,’ Neville says hesitantly.

  ‘In time. Command me now.’ Huvan starts to feel impatient.

  ‘I want to show off.’

  ‘Huvan,’ says Romana, ‘these impulses you feel. Fight them, for they control you, not you them.’

  ‘Quiet!’ Neville barks, hysteria mounting. Huvan listens with detached amusement.

  ‘Order me, Magus, I am yours,’ he says. ‘For you gave me this power. What is it you wish to know?’

  The magus licks his lips. ‘Tell me something, my boy. For my life, my whole life, I have searched for Valdemar. Am I worthy? Will I be the one to reawaken him?’

  Huvan smiles. He looks at Romana’s worried, mortal face, seeing the alienness in her. He looks back at the magus.

  Images flood his mind, at his summons. Nothing is hidden from him. ‘Of course you will,’ he says. ‘Is that all you wanted to know?’

  The Magus breathes out. Tears well from his eyes. He sobs, a lifetime’s tears pouring out of him. ‘Thank you. Praise to the Dark One.’

  ‘What about the Doctor?’ Romana asks softly. ‘Is he truly dead?’

  A surge of irritation. This Doctor, always this Doctor. You are mine, Romana, there is no room for another. Of course he is dead.

  The words spring to Huvan’s mouth but something is wrong, something blurs his thoughts. For the first time, there is something that is not of him.

  Huvan tries to clear the image in his mind. He sees this Doctor, as he was. In the palace, a past event, with Pelham.

  They are snapping open a glass vial he knows of old... then oddly, they pass beyond his knowledge. Yes, he is gone... but dead?

  A pain enters his new mind. A stinging. He can’t think about this.

  ‘Forget the Doctor. There is no Doctor.’

  Romana slumps back into the padded seat. She too begins to fill with emotion.

  ‘Then,’ she says to herself, ‘then we actually fail...’

  ‘No, Romana. You will live for ever. With me.’

  She shivers, inexplicably as far as he is concerned, and turns upon him a gaze that pierces his new self-confidence.

  Contained in that gaze, there is nothing but pity. She should be triumphant for what he has become. Not pity, not that.

  ‘You poor boy,’ she says sadly. ‘Neville never gave you a chance.’

  ‘A chance?’

  ‘To grow up.’

  Somewhere, deep inside himself, he remembers who he is.

  The boy he once was, before the experiments and the drugs.

  Just a flash, a quick memory of a time simple and uncomplicated. A time when he was happy. The simplicity of that memory throws him off balance. The power does not flow strongly. Its smooth circulation through him shudders and stutters.

  The bathyscape jerks suddenly. Its swing is not as wild as it was. The tomb has taken control of the tiny craft once more. Huvan sees that the Magus has hardly noticed. He has his face in his hands, tears running through his fingers. ‘Do not weep, Magus,’ he says to him. ‘There is still much to be done.’

  Romana stares at him, as if looking through him. He finds he cannot bear her gaze. How he loves her. She will be his.

  ‘Avert your eyes, Romana,’ he says. ‘Lest I remove them for you.’

  A shadow’s line rises through the porthole. They are descending into the pyramid itself. He feels the source of his power close now, almost awake. The dreamer behind the gateway is shuffling in its sleep. Neville has taught him true; Valdemar is great and good and needs him. Soon they will soar through the universe once more, flying on great wings through the cold blackness. The power he has now is nothing, unbelievably there is still more to be his.

  ‘You must remember who you are, Huvan. Keep your individuality or you will be destroyed. What Neville has promised you is a lie. You know this.’ Romana speaks softly, insidiously.

  ‘No!’ And Neville has leapt to his feet, eyes wet with joy. ‘No, Huvan. Together, everything will be ours, all power. All!’

  The bathyscape settles with a bump. And a new insight is gained. Huvan sees the palace, sees what will happen there, is happening there. Fear – an emotion he thought he had left behind. The one being still capable of harming him, the phantom he has feared since he could understand it. ‘We are betrayed,’ he whispers.

  ‘What?’ Neville, caught in mid-flow.

  Again, the smooth rhythm inside Huvan is interrupted. He starts to tremble, clutching at the Magus’s ringed hands. ‘ He is here!’

  ‘Who is here?’ asks Romana.

  ‘Nemesis! The Finder.’

  Neville clasps his hands, tightly. ‘Hopkins? Impossible.’

  ‘I can see his angry face, his skin without hair, his flaming sword. He knows of the palace, knows we are here.’

  ‘How? Nothing was left to chance.’

  Huvan grasps the Magus’s hands, unable to stem the flow of images in his mind. ‘He wants us, wants us... help me, I don’t know what to do.’

  ‘Destroy him, Huvan,’ The Magus is feverish, the black marks of Valdemar clearly visible round his eyes. ‘Kill them all!’

  ‘No, no!’ Romana cries.

  Huvan wills, in the new way that he can. ‘It is done,’ he says softly, not quite sure what it is he has done. He has an image of the palace, corroding and dying, falling from the sky, and nothing more. Somehow, he knows not how, he has done it. He thinks.

  He cannot look at Romana, does not need to see her face.

  He doesn’t understand, every time he tries to impress her he just seems to make everything worse. What more does he need to do? What will win her over? He will have her, but he would rather she came to him voluntarily. He feels it is important for him to win her rather than take her. Why, when the other way is so much easier? He realises he still has a lot to learn.

  ‘Come,’ he says, concentrating on a much easier path. He doesn’t want to think too much any more.

  The hatch levers click and the small doorway opens, a simple trick.


  ‘At last,’ says the Magus, stepping out. ‘At last, the tomb of Valdemar. After all these years, all the work. The time of greatness is almost upon us.’

  He can barely contain his excitement; so human of him despite what he thinks he has become.

  Romana follows him, Huvan behind her. The three of them stand inside the pyramid, the war of Ashkellia’s atmosphere crackling over their heads.

  ‘Yes,’ says Huvan, ‘the tomb of Valdemar.’ He takes a deep breath of the cold, ancient air. ‘Let’s open it.’

  Chapter Thirteen

  It seems worth noting that, despite all appearances to the contrary, Robert Hopkins has managed to retain his firm convictions concerning the cold materialistic nature of the universe. His stubborn existentialism remains intact, despite the horde of zombies that have risen from the dead and are now presently in the process of slaughtering his men.

  He is running now, armour clanking, not entirely certain how he got away from the battening undead. He vaguely recalls giving orders as the robed ghouls descended upon his iron clads, with a savagery of breathtaking dimensions considering they were ripped and hacked-up corpses. These orders consisted, in the main as he remembers, of shouting

  ‘Fight to the last man! Protect your leader! Get me out of here!’ or something he will choose to re-remember in the future.

  Hopkins recalls also the brave Lieutenant Carlin cleverly hacking through the creatures and taunting a few into following him into the empty airlock chamber. Whether he did this deliberately, Hopkins does not know. What he does know is that his cousin’s actions gave him an opportunity to fight his way clear, his shotgun blasting already tattered cadavers into non-existence, and hammer on the controls that opened the bay doors. He remembers Carlin’s horror-struck face as the floor gave way beneath him and he fell, three of the ghouls already fastening onto him, into the clouds.

  Oh, brave Lieutenant Carlin! His sacrifice will be long remembered in the annals of the New Protectorate!

  Turning away, and using his sword to strike down the snarling body hurling itself at him, Hopkins had realised his men were already doomed. They grappled with their attackers on the ground, fighting to the last as the creatures ripped them apart.

  He ran. He thinks he did anyway, it all gets a bit foggy at that point.

  Typically, now that he is out of that bloody piazza, anger has taken over from fear as his dominant emotion. Once more, Neville has outwitted him! He must destroy this decadent; nothing else matters.

  At last, somewhere in the sumptuous living quarters, Hopkins collapses and must catch his breath. With trembling hands and heaving chest, he sheaths his black-stained sword. The shotgun has gone, lost in the melee, but he still has his pistol. He listens for pursuit but hears nothing except distant screaming. The noise does not last long.

  What to do, what to do now? He could make his way back to the ship but then what has he learned? He must find Neville, if he has to fight his way through all the devils this palace can throw at him.

  There is a noise, something that just caught his hearing.

  He cocks his heavy pistol and kneels, scanning the corridor both ways. Didn’t sound like one of those creatures. Already he is rationalising. They weren’t undead at all. Some kind of cyborg, some trick of Neville’s to reanimate dead flesh, programmed to respond to their arrival. Highly original, and lethal, but nothing supernatural about it.

  He hears the sound again. Definitely not the guttural screeching of the ghouls. Something else, something like a voice.

  ‘Hello?’

  Hopkins leaps away from the wall. It, the voice, came from behind him. He suspects more of Neville’s trickery; another trap, this time an assault on the senses. Nothing to be afraid of, it’s just another conjuring trick.

  ‘Hello?’ It comes again.

  The wall isn’t a wall. It’s a door, a door with its ornate golden handle broken off.

  ‘Have you come to rescue us?’ comes the voice. It sounds like a woman.

  Hopkins looks round. Nothing. All is quiet.

  Then the tapping begins, on the other side of the door.

  ‘Help us,’ says the mournful voice, unmistakably female.

  ‘We’ve been locked in here so long.’

  Hopkins takes another look around. Nothing, no sounds, just the empty corridor. Should he respond? Perhaps they know something, whoever the people are behind that door.

  After all, they would undoubtedly have been locked in there by Neville; the handle snapped off to prevent their release.

  Anything to get to that black sorcerer is worth the risk.

  Anything!

  In the end, it is the empty-follicled goose bumps he feels running down his arms that make up his mind for him.

  Despite the massacre and the voices, he will not be swayed by superstition and a lot of bumps and lighting effects. The body is weak, afraid, but the mind controls the body and that is everything he stands for.

  ‘Did Neville put you in there?’ he asks in a whisper. He’s not so stupid as to announce his presence to those things that are presumably looking for him.

  There is a silence, as if whoever is behind the door is not really expecting a reply.

  ‘Hello?’ it says, she says, again.

  ‘Yes, hello,’ Hopkins replies impatiently. ‘Did Neville put you in there?’

  ‘Neville... yes...’ the voice comes slowly, cautiously. ‘Will you free us?’

  Ah. Now. That is the question. He may be desperate but he isn’t stupid.

  ‘Who are you?’ he asks.

  ‘Prisoners, that’s right, prisoners. He betrayed us, tried to kill us, but we were too clever for him, oh yes. Open this door and we will help you.’

  ‘Do you know where he is?’

  ‘Oh yes, open the door, quickly, or he will escape you again.’

  Not really listening, hearing only what he wants to hear, Hopkins draws his sword and begins to hack at the lock.

  The whole process takes longer than he thinks. The door is tough and he doesn’t want to make any more noise than is necessary. He hauls his helmet off to cool himself down.

  Finally, the lock breaks under repeated pounding from the hilt of his sword. With a crack, the door inches its way open.

  The room beyond is dark.

  Hopkins boots the door fully open, dropping his sword and pulling out his pistol. He cannot understand why his breathing should be so jerky, why he feels cold. The will, he steels himself, the will is absolute.

  ‘Come out,’ he shouts, louder than he had intended. ‘I warn you, I am an officer of the New Protectorate under full jurisdictional provenance from the Civil Matriarch herself.

  Any attempt to impede me will result in your immediate execution.’ Somehow, these familiar words in this mad place make him feel much better. ‘Do I make myself clear?’

  ‘Oh very. Our saviour,’ the female voice emerges from the gloom. Or is that two voices? They sound so very much alike.

  He doesn’t have time for this. Forget the mumbo-jumbo, those cyborgs of Neville’s making are surely prowling around looking for him. It’s only a dark room, and the voices sound too weak to put up any resistance. Why is he even standing out here?

  He strides in, gun first. ‘All right, all right, show yourselves.’

  The room is large, and dim but not totally dark. There is fancy Elite furniture lying around in dark, black bundles.

  The stubs of candles flicker weakly. ‘Well?’ he asks, aware but not afraid. He spins around, looking for the source of the voices. ‘Come out.’

  ‘Here we are...’ says the voice. Hopkins squints.

  One of the ornate tables is still standing the right way up. A candle burns at its centre. There is an awful, cold smell he can’t place. Two sacks sit in seats, black cowls draped over their heads. He can just make out thin bony fingers spread over the table-top. ‘Help us,’ says the voice.

  ‘I just want Neville,’ Hopkins says, not venturing too close.


  ‘Give him to me.’

  ‘Neville?’ says one of the bundles. ‘There is no Neville, not any more.’

  ‘What? But you said...’

  ‘Something else he is now, in his own mind,’ says the other bundle, shaking with a terrible, thin chuckle.

  ‘Down in the gateway he is, ready for the Return.’

  ‘Don’t give me riddles,’ Hopkins snaps. ‘Where is he?’

  The sacks continue their amused shuddering. Hopkins glimpses faces as they turn – thin, dreadfully thin, a flash of exposed teeth, flickering yellow in the candlelight.

  ‘Left us here he did, didn’t he, sister?’

  ‘Left us, yes. Something happened.’

  ‘Something happened? What happened?’ asks Hopkins, feeling his voice constricting with a terror he does not want to feel.

  Eyes gleam beneath the cowls. ‘Something to do with time.

  Left us here, for such a long time.’

  ‘So long... so dreadfully long. It’s the boy, you see. We were unkind and the boy, he remembers.’

  Hopkins raises the gun. He begins to back out. These women, these stinking crones, they are of no use to him.

  The sisters start to rise. ‘So long...’ says one. ‘So long.’

  ‘So hungry...’ says the other and Hopkins screams. Long, skeletal arms reach for him. They move with frightening speed, droolish laughter spilling from their salivating mouths. Hopkins fires once and they’re on him, teeth bared.

  ‘No! No!’ he yells, fighting off their cold clutches. He fires again and the bullet passes right through one of the hags, he sees it happen. She staggers and renews her gnawing attack.

  Hopkins feels his legs give away under their furious charge and the rotten robes smother his face. Their sour breath warms his body as they bite into his armour.