by Jon Robinson
Alyn stood taller, raising his hands as though he was conducting an orchestra, feeling a subtle energy rising from his body. The chandelier broke from the ceiling, and plummeted on top of the gang, crushing three instantly. Two men were knocked unconscious, and the leader was sent crashing to the floor with a shattered shoulder and was trapped beneath the light.
Pyra looked up. ‘Whoa,’ she said, turning between the fallen chandelier and the boy. ‘Alyn, what did you –’
‘I don’t know,’ he murmured, looking at his hands. I don’t know.
Seconds later the doors banged open and two members of the Guild entered, fighting through the flood of fleeing guests.
‘Over there,’ Pyra panted, pointing at the unconscious teenagers.
The pair ran inside, hopping over the flames, and picked up the limp bodies.
‘Don’t forget Julian!’ Elsa cried, hopping from one foot to the next, not knowing what to do with herself.
Pyra knelt and hooked Ryan over her shoulders, battling her way slowly across the ballroom. ‘Let’s go,’ she said, and grabbed Elsa’s hand.
63
‘Wonder if Pyra managed to get the others out of there?’ Anton murmured, slowing at some traffic lights.
‘I haven’t heard from her,’ said Luthan, gazing out of the window. ‘She said she’d call …’ He removed his phone from his pocket and checked the screen.
‘So what’s the plan now?’ asked Anton, gesturing with his eyes at the unconscious Stephen.
‘I’ll think of something.’ Luthan reached over and touched the fox mask. Then something dawned on him. ‘No,’ he spat.
‘What’s wrong?’
Luthan pulled apart the tuxedo. There was no sign of the spilled wine. He tore the fox mask aside. Beneath it was not Stephen, but a freckly, skinny boy with curly blond hair.
‘He’s tricked us,’ Luthan growled.
64
Stephen, who had been hiding patiently in a toilet cubicle for the past half hour, was staring at the empty, devastated ballroom while sirens wailed in the distance. Blythe and Antonia stood beside him, wordless.
Broken glass and plaster littered the floor; tables were upturned and splintered. The lines of fire had died down to little more than a trickle of flame, but the room smelled of ash and dust. In the centre of the ballroom several of Stephen’s mercenaries lay either dead, unconscious or injured beneath the enormous brass chandelier.
‘Please!’ cried the only conscious man pinned beneath the chandelier. ‘I – I can’t move … please help me …’
Stephen was about to speak but noticed Emmanuel standing by the doors. ‘Thank you for the warning,’ Stephen said with a smile. ‘A shame it had to end like this!’
Emmanuel looked over his shoulder as a defeated, rain-soaked Felix staggered past him into the room.
‘You all think you’re so clever, don’t you?’ he snarled.
‘Ah,’ Stephen replied, clasping his hands behind his back. ‘I was wondering when you might show up. You’re looking a little doddery, old man. Would you like a seat?’
Felix ignored Stephen and looked at Blythe and Antonia. ‘Cowards,’ he said. ‘The pair of you. Nothing but cowards.’
‘Cowards who still have a place in the Pledge. Cowards who still have their fortunes!’ Blythe stated.
Felix peered behind them at Emmanuel. ‘And as for you … you were supposed to be on my side. You’re nothing but a liar … a manipulator … a snake.’
‘Careful, Felix,’ Emmanuel said.
Felix turned to Stephen. ‘You’re a fool if you think you can trust him,’ he said, pointing at Emmanuel. ‘He will play you off, one against the other … He will destroy you all.’
‘Have you finished insulting my adviser?’ said Stephen wearily. ‘Apologies, Felix, but I have things to do.’
Stephen turned and walked towards the doors, followed by Antonia and Blythe. Felix reached inside his pocket and removed a mobile phone. ‘I had high hopes for the Pledge,’ he said. ‘But there was always something in the back of my mind nagging at me … something telling me not to trust you … any of you. That’s why I set up a little … insurance policy along the way.’
Stephen watched Felix with a raised, impatient eyebrow.
‘Every meeting,’ Felix said. ‘Every conversation. Every single shadow that each of us, including myself, has cast over the past couple of years, I recorded.’ He held the phone up. ‘Everything. There’s enough material for you all to be locked up for the rest of your lives. Material that will destroy you.’
‘And destroy you too, James,’ Antonia concluded.
‘And destroy me, Antonia. Yes. But it’s a sacrifice I’m willing to make. After all, I’m already there, aren’t I?’
Stephen smirked. ‘He’s bluffing. The old fool doesn’t have a leg to stand on.’
Felix clicked a button on his phone and pressed the speakerphone.
‘That data,’ Felix said. ‘Do you have it to hand right now?’
‘Yes, sir,’ said the voice on the other end of the phone. ‘All hundred gigs. Do you want me to do as we said?’
Stephen, for the first time, showed surprise at hearing this.
Felix grinned. He began laughing, relishing the concern that was spread across the faces of the new Pledge.
‘Sir,’ said the man. ‘All you have to do is say the word and it’ll be public within a minute. Just as you requested …’
‘Felix,’ said Stephen, stepping towards him. ‘Think about this very carefully …’
Felix backed away, laughing. He held the phone higher in the air.
‘Felix!’ yelled Blythe. ‘If you say one word, I swear I’ll throttle you with my own bloody hands …’
‘Sir? What do you want me to do?’
‘James,’ Antonia pleaded. ‘I have a family to think about …’
‘James,’ Stephen repeated more softly, advancing gently. ‘Don’t do it. Semper ad meliora. Towards better things …’
Felix, shoulders shaking with laughter, lowered his mouth to the phone.
Until that point, Emmanuel had been serenely watching the scene unfold. He closed his eyes, raised a hand in the air, gradually unfolding his fingertips towards Felix.
Felix opened his mouth to give his assistant the order, but spluttered. He clutched his chest and the phone fell from his hand, landing on a tangled tablecloth.
Emmanuel walked towards him. Felix dropped to his knees, wheezing and grabbing at his shirt. His face had turned pale and sweat was pouring from his forehead.
‘I … I can’t breathe,’ Felix whispered. ‘My chest … Please help me.’
Emmanuel clenched his fingers into a fist and Felix gave a sharp, sudden gasp and lay still. His blue eyes were wet and frightened and his mouth hung open.
Emmanuel reached down and picked up the phone. ‘I’ve changed my mind,’ he said. ‘Destroy it. All of it.’
‘Yes … sir,’ said the voice on the other end after a pause. ‘At once.’
‘So you have the Ability as well,’ Stephen said as Emmanuel walked past.
‘For someone who thinks they’re so brilliant, I’m surprised you hadn’t already guessed.’ Emmanuel looked at the group of bewildered faces and quietly left.
65
Alyn had been hiding behind a fallen table. He waited for the Pledge to leave and hurried across the floor. Unmoving in the centre of the room was James Felix.
‘Mr Felix!’ Alyn shouted, rushing over to him. He ducked down, patting the side of his face and trying to stir him into consciousness. When he realized it wasn’t working, Alyn interlocked his fingers on Felix’s chest. He began pressing vigorously, willing him to splutter awake in a fit of coughs, like he had seen in countless films. He gave Felix one last futile push and closed his eyes, shaking his head.
Alyn brushed his hair out of his eyes and looked at the broken chandelier and the men beneath who were also motionless. They’d been crushed. Did I really do that? Alyn tho
ught, and wondered if he should be feeling some kind of emotion, but there was nothing at all except a blanket of numbness. He quickly averted his eyes from the chandelier and back to Felix when he noticed something sticking out of Felix’s pocket. Alyn reached inside and removed it.
A brass key. Alyn turned it back and forth. It was about twenty centimetres in length with a decorative handle. I wonder what this is for?
Alyn examined the handle, which looked like it was screwed on. He unscrewed it and peered inside the shaft of the key and found a piece of tightly rolled paper. He turned the key upside down, tapped it a few times and the scroll of paper fell to the floor. Alyn picked it up and unrolled it.
51.51
What does that mean? He turned the paper over a few times, hoping to find some further clue.
It was a few moments before Alyn became aware that a fire engine and ambulance had arrived outside the opera house. He shoved the key and the piece of paper into his pocket and hurried from the ballroom.
66
Morning light was falling through the windows of the tower block. ‘I feel like I’ve got the worst hangover in the world,’ said Ryan, rolling on to his side.
‘You’re too young to know what a hangover feels like,’ Pyra said. ‘Aren’t you, Ryan?’
‘Yeah. Of course.’ He sat up, rubbing his eyes. ‘I remember the opera house … I remember the ballroom …’
‘You don’t remember your starring role on stage then?’
Ryan flopped back against the pillow. ‘Crap. I forgot about that. So where are the others?’ he asked, wanting to change the subject. ‘Where’s Jes? Is she OK?’
‘She’s fine. They’re all fine. Elsa’s the only one of you who remained standing.’
‘Because she’s so small, no one could hit her.’
‘Excuses, excuses,’ Pyra said. ‘Come on. They’re all waiting.’
Ryan stumbled out of bed and followed the corridor, passing the locked room. He paused, thinking he could hear a weak groaning coming from inside.
‘Hello?’ Ryan said, and waited for a response. Eventually he shrugged it off and went into the dining area.
‘Whoa, déjà vu,’ he said, noticing them all sitting round the table with Luthan, Anton and Pyra. Several other members of the Guild were stood at the far end of the room, including the two men who had helped save them from the fire last night.
‘What did you just say?’ asked Luthan.
‘Nothing,’ Ryan grumbled. ‘Just – nothing. Jeez.’ Can’t say anything without you lot jumping down my throat.
He sat on a chair, next to a sleepy-looking Jes. Elsa was bouncing up and down excitedly. ‘Hey, Ryan, want to see –’
‘A magic trick? Already told you I don’t like magic tricks. You know that.’
‘I was about to ask if you wanted to see the paper, weirdo.’ She thrust a newspaper towards him. ‘Look.’
‘Country’s former richest man dies in ballroom blaze,’ he read. ‘Felix is dead?’
‘Yep. They’re saying he had a heart attack after he set the ballroom on fire.’
‘No security footage then?’
Anton shook his head. ‘I’ll bet the Pledge had a hand in that.’
‘Which suits us perfectly,’ Luthan added. ‘Otherwise Pyra and myself might be facing a kidnapping charge.’
Ryan threw the newspaper back at Elsa. ‘So you managed to get that Stephen guy then? Where is he?’
‘We got the wrong man,’ said Luthan. ‘The little sneak sussed something was going on and gave his mask to someone else. The Pledge may be minus Felix, but Nover is still out there, and he’s the dangerous one. The project is still running.’
‘So what now?’ Jes asked.
‘You can stay here with us,’ Luthan said, ‘all of you. We train you – properly – so you can join us. And help us defeat them. If that’s what you want.’
‘I’m not interested in learning the Ability,’ said Julian, who was sitting on a chair by himself. It was the first thing he had said all morning. ‘I don’t want it. I don’t need it. You know what the real ability is? Intelligence. Versatility. Planning.’
Pyra studied him with some interest before saying, ‘Why did you come back, Julian?’
‘So I could help you defeat the Pledge,’ he said, steepling his fingers. ‘And I still might, unless of course they don’t convince me otherwise.’ He gave the faintest smile to show that he was joking and turned back to the window.
Luthan got up, walked over to Pyra and leant down to her ear. ‘Can I speak to you about something? In private?’
She nodded, and followed him out of the room. When they were out of earshot, Luthan said, ‘You didn’t tell me what happened to those mercenaries.’
‘Yeah I did – a chandelier fell on them.’
‘But something, or someone, caused it to fall. You know as well as I do something like that is beyond any of our powers. Who was responsible?’
‘Alyn.’
Luthan scratched his chin. ‘You think he’s been manipulated? He could be a powerful asset.’
‘He’s not some tool that you can just use, Luthan. He’s a person. A sixteen-year-old.’
‘Of course,’ Luthan said with a smile. ‘But a weapon too. We need to find him as soon as possible. If we’re going to succeed, we need him on our side.’
‘And Henry?’
‘Without Stephen as our bargaining chip, Henry will have to sit tight in Nowhere for now. He was aware of the risks when he chose to go there.’
‘In other words, you don’t have a plan.’
‘Not yet,’ Luthan replied. ‘But I didn’t spend twenty years in the military for nothing.’
‘The kids did well last night, though,’ said Pyra. ‘Maybe we should cut them some slack.’
Luthan considered this. ‘Perhaps,’ he said, ‘but for now, they have one more test ahead of them.’
67
Susannah waited for Stephen at the prison gates. He wore a designer hooded anorak and a scarf that covered the lower part of his face.
‘My visitor,’ Susannah said to the guard, who nodded and stepped aside. The pair went through the gates and trudged across the deserted exercise yard.
‘Oh yes, the air feels different here,’ Stephen said, extending his hand, as though checking for rain. ‘Don’t you feel that, Ms Dion?’ He began gently moving his fingers, as if he was strumming an invisible harp.
They soon reached her office, which was piled high with cinema reels, cardboard boxes and a projector balanced precariously on a tower of hardback books.
Stephen sat and pulled his hood back. ‘Felix may have taken a more relaxed view of the project but now I’m in charge of the Pledge and I run things differently. I understand that since the project started, you’ve been doing three, somewhat minor, manipulations per week …’
Susannah nodded. ‘Not including the extra work I’ve been doing for you to bring down Felix’s business.’
Ignoring this, Stephen plucked a notepad and a pen from inside his coat. ‘Give me a standard week. As an example.’
‘The planned terrorist threats. We showed the subjects a spliced image of a bomb malfunctioning and –’
‘And it worked. The attack didn’t go as planned.’
‘Yes, sir.’
Stephen jotted something down, licked his finger and turned the page. ‘And what else?’
‘We’ve been gradually boosting the economy each week –’
‘Yes,’ he said with a sigh, scribbling something else. ‘And what else?’
‘Foreign relations,’ she said. ‘You know the deal with the –’
‘What else?’
‘The Mayor’s speech at City Hall. The protestors were threatening to cause a scene. We were able to harness the Ability to quieten things down a bit.’
Stephen considered making a note, but instead snapped his pen closed and slotted his notebook back inside his coat.
‘It’s nothing short of a miracle th
at Felix got to where he did, and lasted as long as he did,’ he said. ‘Stopping parliamentary riots? If anything, I’m all for them! Should things take a turn for the worse, it’ll just be one less interfering politician!’ He got up from his chair. ‘Running a country is like running a business. I’m now the most successful businessman in the country, so it’s only fair that I run the country too.’
‘I see,’ Susannah said uncomfortably.
‘And all this talk about “boosting the economy” – what are you really doing? Adding another zero on to some hideous little economist’s spreadsheet? Nonsense! The problem with the country, as I see it, is that there are simply too many people fighting over too few resources. And what happens? People keep breeding, and breeding …’
Stephen sat on Susannah’s desk and clasped his hands together. ‘Not that you’d know anything about it, Ms Dion, but when a business suffers we usually start by making redundancies. By cutting staff. That is precisely what we need to do for the sake of the country. With fewer people we have more resources, more jobs. More potential for growth. There’s always plenty of room in utopia!’
‘You want me to harness the children’s Ability to … remove some of the population?’
‘Yes,’ he said, giggling. ‘That is exactly what I want you to do!’
‘That would be mass murder!’ Susannah said, aghast.
Ignoring her, Stephen said, ‘There are, what, seventy million in the country? Let’s start with around a third of that. Twenty million!’ he squealed. ‘It could be a virus, some weather-related thing, I don’t care. I’m sure it wouldn’t be hard to think of something …’
Susannah shook her head. ‘No, Stephen. I can’t do this.’ She stood but Stephen grabbed her arm.
‘Mummy and Daddy have always given me everything I want. I’m used to getting my own way, and no one interferes with that … not the Pledge, not Felix, and not you, Ms Dion!’
‘No, Stephen,’ she said. ‘This is murder.’
‘It’s for the greater good! Don’t you understand, woman?’ He shook her. ‘If you don’t do this for me, I’ll see to it that the first head to roll is yours!’