Daemons Are Forever

by Simon R. Green

  The Matriarch sniffed loudly. “The Time Train. I might have known. There are good reasons why we never use the stupid thing. I could have told you it wasn’t dependable, but you didn’t ask anyone, did you? You were so sure you knew better . . . I should have ordered it dismantled years ago, but for this nagging feeling that someday the family might just need it . . .”

  “What happened to you, Grandmother?” I said patiently.

  “I have been kept prisoner in these rooms practically from the day you disappeared. Harry came to see me. He said it was necessary for him to take command of the family in your absence, and I was quite prepared to give him my blessing. You have to understand, Edwin; he said all the right things, promised me all the right things. He made me believe he embodied all the old traditional values of the family. Unlike you . . . But even though he was saying all the things I wanted to hear, I still didn’t entirely trust him. I’ve run this family too long to take anything or anyone at face value.

  “So I had a quiet, very discreet word with the Sarjeant-at-Arms. Just to be sure. The Sarjeant didn’t want to tell me what he knew, but I made him tell me. And that was when I found out the truth about Harry. That he was a deviant, and an abomination! Bedding his own hellspawned half brother! And he dared look me in the eye and tell me he believed in the old family values! I summoned him here and confronted him with what I knew . . . He didn’t try to defend himself. Just sighed and shrugged, and said it didn’t matter. He had control of the family, and he didn’t need me anymore. He locked me in my own rooms, put his own guards at my door. They took care of all my needs, saw that Alistair and I never wanted for anything . . . but nothing I said or promised or threatened would sway them. They were Harry’s creatures. I haven’t spoken to another living soul in over a year.

  “Oh, Harry sees that I’m kept informed about everything that’s happening. I get regular reports, and I’m invited to make useful comments . . . which I do. My duty to the family hasn’t changed. But you have to get me out of here, Edwin! Harry isn’t up to the job. The family is losing this war! You need my expertise and experience!”

  “Yes,” I said. “We do. But I’m back, and I’m running things again, Grandmother. Running them my way. Are you ready to work with me, now?”

  “Of course. I’ve had a lot of time to think about . . . things. You and I are never going to agree on many things, but the needs of the family must come first. And right now, it needs both of us.” She looked back at the still form on the bed. “He won’t miss me. He doesn’t even respond to my voice anymore. Any nurse will do, until he wakes.” She looked back at me. “I haven’t forgiven you, for what you did to him. I never will. But duty comes first. I’ve always known that.”

  “Then I think you and I should go down to the War Room,” I said. “So you can take charge there. You know how to run it far better than I ever could. And they could use some . . . direction.”

  The Matriarch looked at me squarely. “I’ll run the War Room; you run the war. We can discuss . . . other things, after we’ve won the war.”

  I grinned. “Looking forward to it, Grandmother. But let’s be clear with each other. You need me, now that Harry has . . . disappointed you. That’s the real reason you’re going along with all this. You haven’t forgiven me for removing you from power and changing the way the family does things. And I haven’t forgiven you for all those children sacrificed to the Heart down the years. We can work together, and we will, because the family and the world needs us to. But understand, Grandmother; you make one move to undermine my authority, or try and seize control again, and I’ll have you marched straight back here and locked in again. For the duration.”

  She smiled at me, that old, familiar, cold smile. “You see, Edwin, you do understand how this family needs to be run. I’ll make a Drood out of you yet. I agree to all your conditions. For the duration.”

  I shook my head slowly. “Even when I win an argument with you, it feels like I lost. One last question, before we go. It’s becoming increasingly clear that there has to be a long-standing traitor, set deep inside the family. Someone, possibly infected by the Loathly Ones, perhaps even the person responsible for bringing them back here in the first place. Do you have any idea who that might be? Any name come to mind?”

  She stared at me for a long moment. I think she was actually shocked. “A long-term traitor? Unsuspected since World War II? Impossible!”

  “Unfortunately not, Grandmother. Are you sure no one comes to mind?”

  “No. It’s unthinkable . . . But then, so much has happened that I would once have considered unthinkable. I will consult the old family records. See if anything jogs a memory.”

  “Okay. Let’s go. The War Room awaits.”

  “No,” said Martha. And just like that, all her old stern command was back in her voice. “There is still something that must be done immediately, for the good of the family. You must order the expulsion of Harry, and the execution of his hellspawn lover. They cannot be allowed to contaminate the family with their presence any longer.”

  “No,” I said, my voice just as cold and stern as hers. “Harry’s a good field agent, with a lot of experience. We still need him. I won’t declare him rogue just because . . . I mean, come on, Grandmother; we’ve had gay people in the family for ages. You must have noticed.”

  “Of course I’ve noticed! I don’t care that he’s a homosexual! Your generation thinks it invented sex and all its possibilities . . . I don’t give a damn that Harry is gay; I care that he’s taken his half brother as a lover! Incest like that is strictly forbidden in the Droods, Edwin. It has to be, or we would have become dangerously inbred by now. The vitality and vigour of the Drood bloodline must be strictly maintained; that’s why marriages are always so carefully considered and, if need be, disallowed. And above all, to take as his lover a thing from the Pit! I can’t believe that you allowed a hellspawn into the Hall, Edwin!”

  “Roger is James’s son,” I said carefully. “He’s your grandson too, just like Harry and me.”

  “He is a demon, and never to be trusted,” Martha said flatly. “Kill him, Edwin. For the good of the family and the sake of the world.”

  “I’ll think about it,” I said.

  “That’s what I used to say to you, when you were a child, and I had no intention of doing what you wanted,” Martha said dryly.

  “Maybe you’re right,” I said. “I am growing up, after all.”

  We both stood up. The Matriarch stepped forward, and for a moment I thought she was going to shake my hand formally. Instead, she put her hands on my shoulders, squeezed them gently, and smiled at me.

  “Make me proud, Eddie.”

  “I’ll do my best, Grandmother.”

  “I know you will.”

  “Grandmother . . .”

  “Yes, Eddie?”

  “It was you who told the prime minister where and when to find me, when I went back to my old flat, wasn’t it?”

  “Of course, dear. You see; you’re thinking like a Drood leader already.”

  We summoned up a nurse to sit with Alistair, and then the Matriarch and I went down to the War Room. All along the way people stood and stared, and then broke into spontaneous applause. Some even cheered. No one had seen Martha in public for a year and a half, and now here she was walking by my side. Word went swiftly ahead of us, and by the time we’d descended to ground level, crowds were lining all the rooms and corridors to cheer our progress. The Matriarch ignored them all, her back stiff and her head held high, and they loved her for it. Some of the cheers and applause were for me, and I made a point of smiling and nodding, while being very careful not to let it go to my head.

  When we finally strode into the War Room, an almost palpable wave of relief swept through the huge chamber. Men and women stood up at their consoles and workstations to cheer and clap us. A few actually whistled. Martha bowed once to the room, and then made a quick cutting gesture with one hand; and the applause stopped immediately
. I don’t think I could have managed that on the best day I ever had. The Matriarch cracked out a series of brisk commands, her voice sharp and authoritative, and above all calm and businesslike; and soon people were back at work, bent over their various stations with new confidence and enthusiasm. Runners charged back and forth like mad things, gathering the latest information to bring the Matriarch up to date, while others made sure she was supplied with a fresh pot of tea and a new packet of Jaffa Cakes. Sometimes I think this family runs on tea and Jaffa Cakes.

  I stood back and watched. It’s always a pleasure to observe a real professional at work.

  The communications people soon had her in contact with all the world leaders: every government, country, and powerful individual who mattered. Display screens all around the War Room were filled with scowling faces, and translation programmes ran overtime as the Matriarch addressed them all with her usual cool authority. Many of the faces seemed relieved to see her back. Martha strode from screen to screen, speaking to everyone individually, and through a carefully calculated combination of calm reason, sweet talking, basic bullying, and the occasional reminder that she knew where all the bodies were buried, the Matriarch soon had all the most important people in the world falling over themselves to agree to work together on dealing with the Loathly Ones. They committed money, manpower, and military resources, and most importantly, they all agreed to keep the hell out of our way while we did what was necessary. Martha cut them off one by one, and then stretched slowly, luxuriously, like a cat. She seated herself with royal dignity at her command station and smiled briefly at me.

  “And that, Edwin, is why the family has to be in charge. Because we’re the only ones equipped to see the really big picture, and remain independent enough that people will accept our advice as impartial. We can persuade anyone, regardless of politics, on what must be done for the good of all. You can never trust politicians to do the right thing, Edwin, because at heart all they really care about is staying in power. They live in the present; it’s up to us to take the long view.”

  I just smiled, nodded, and said nothing. There would be time for philosophical arguments later, once we’d made sure there would be a later. I hung around just long enough to make sure she had things firmly under control, and then I left the War Room and went down to the Armoury, where Molly was waiting for me.

  I was happy to find the Armoury back to its usual raucous and very dangerous self, complete with bangs, bright lights, and the occasional unfortunate transformation. Happy chaos and mayhem went on around me as I wandered through the Armoury in search of Molly and Uncle Jack. Now that the lab interns had their armour back, they had once again embraced their old daredevil practices, and were clearly back in their usual productive and self-destructive mind-sets.

  In the firing range, half a dozen armoured forms were taking it in turn to test new guns on each other. The armour soaked up all kinds of punishment from projectile guns, curse throwers, and handheld grenade launchers. The noise in the confined space was appalling.

  I still remembered the time the Armourer created a gun that fired miniature black holes. It took six people to wrestle him to the ground and sit on him, and then prize the damned thing out of his hand before he could demonstrate it.

  One young lady was trying out the latest version of a teleportation gun. I stopped to watch. The family’s been trying to get the bugs out of that for years. Basic idea is very simple; you point the gun at something and it disappears. In practice, it tended to backfire a lot, and we lost a lot of interns. This particular intern was chained firmly to a bolt in the floor as she fired her gun at a target dummy. The dummy’s left leg disappeared and it fell over sideways. The intern whooped in triumph, did a little victory dance, and then the leg reappeared, flying straight at her with some force. Wherever the teleport gun had sent the leg, they clearly hadn’t wanted it.

  Someone else was trying to get an invisibility cloak to work, but all it was doing was making the wearer partially transparent, so we could see all his insides working. Beauty really is only skin deep. A large explosion sent half a dozen armoured figures flying through the air. No one looked around. Two of the braver or perhaps more suicidally minded, interns were duelling with atomic nunchaku behind a portable radiation shield. Rather them than me. And one guy with a third eye in the middle of his forehead was flipping urgently through his notes trying to figure out what had gone wrong.

  Business as usual, in the Armoury.

  I found Molly talking with the Armourer at his usual workstation. Or at least, Molly was listening while the Armourer talked. Apparently Uncle Jack was taking it very badly that his test to uncover drones in the family had failed. He broke off to glower at me as I joined them.

  “About time you got back. I warned you; nothing good ever came of messing about with time travel.”

  “I brought you back an energy gun,” I said.

  He sniffed loudly. “I’ve seen it. It’s rubbish. I’ve dreamed up more destructive things during my tea break. And I don’t care what anyone says; my test was perfectly competent!”

  “How did it work?” I said patiently.

  He sniffed again, even more disparagingly. “Oh, like you’d understand, even if I explained it to you in words of one syllable, accompanied by a slide show.”

  “Try me.”

  “It checked, very thoroughly, for the presence of other-dimensional energies in the test subject. Basically, looking for anything that didn’t belong in our reality.”

  I nodded. “Yeah, that should have worked.”

  The Armourer scowled, fiddling absently with an oversized grenade on the table before him, until I took it away from him.

  “We’ll just have to run everyone through the test again,” he said unhappily. “And this time, make allowances for the new torcs! Being other-dimensional things themselves, I should have realised they could be used to hide or distort the results . . .” He shook his head slowly. “I must be getting old. I never used to miss things like that.”

  “You still build the best toys in the world, Uncle Jack,” I assured him.

  He smiled briefly. “So, did you get a chance to try out my new teleport bracelet, this time?”

  “Ah . . .” I said.

  “It’s not fair!” the Armourer said bitterly. “I work every hour God sends, and a few he doesn’t know about, creating weapons and devices for this family, and then no one can be bothered to give them a decent bloody field test!”

  “Look, I’ve been busy, all right?” I said. “There were an awful lot of people trying to kill me in the future.”

  “Good,” said the Armourer.

  “The important thing,” I said quickly, before he could slide into one of his sulks, “is why didn’t Sebastian’s torc protect him from the Loathly One in the first place? Even if it happened before he received his new torc, it should still have detected the infection within him and worked to destroy it. Instead, it seems Sebastian was able to use the torc to hide his infection from your test and the rest of the family.”

  “Don’t look at me,” the Armourer said stiffly. “The family armour has always been a mystery. No one’s ever been too sure exactly how it does all the things it does. The old or the new. The Heart wouldn’t talk about it. Maybe Strange would . . . You should ask him, Eddie.”

  “I already did,” I said. “He wasn’t much help.”

  “Hmmm.” The Armourer leant back in his chair, scowling thoughtfully. “Well, theoretically . . . The infection by a Loathly One is as much mental and spiritual as it is physical. The mind is changed, reprogrammed if you like, and the body adapts to accommodate the changed mind’s needs. The torcs have always protected us from telepathic attack, and demonic possession . . . but this is something else. The Loathly Ones are, after all, merely the three-dimensional protrusions into our reality of much more powerful entities. The Many-Angled Ones, or Hungry Gods, come from a place where the rules of reality are very different . . . perhaps even superior to o
urs. If the Loathly Ones really are from a higher reality, so to speak, their presence might be enough to actually overwrite our natural laws with their own, though of course only in a limited way. You could see each new infection as a beachhead into our reality; every new drone helping to weaken local laws in favour of their own . . . Hmmm. Yes. A very worrying thought, that. But it does give me some new ideas I can add to my test. Now I know what to look for.”

  “We don’t have much time, Uncle Jack,” I said.

  “I know, I know! You always expect me to work miracles to an impossible deadline! It’s a wonder I’ve got any hair left at all. I’d have an ulcer, if I only had the time. You’ll have the new test by the end of the day. Now go away and bother someone else.”

  “Actually,” said Strange, his voice booming suddenly out of somewhere close at hand, “now that I know what to look for, I can perform the test for you.”

  “Jesus, Strange, don’t do that!” I said, as we all jumped. “Have you been listening in again? Even after we had that long chat about human concepts like privacy, good manners and minding your own business so as not to royally piss off everyone else?”

  “But this is important, Eddie, really it is! I promise! I’ve already checked your whole family and its guests, and identified a number of infected drones.”

  “How many?” I said, a sudden premonition sending a chill running through me.

  “Twenty-seven,” said Strange.

  Molly and I looked at each other, and then at the Armourer. He seemed to shrink in on himself. “That can’t be possible,” he said numbly. “I couldn’t have missed that many.”

  “Are you sure, Strange?” I said. “You have to be really sure about this.”

  “It’s not something I can be wrong about,” Strange said sadly. “The other-dimensional impact is really quite distinct. My torcs couldn’t protect you because the Hungry Gods come from a higher reality than mine. They scare me, Eddie. They could eat me up like a party treat.”