The Devil in green da-1

by Marc Chadbourn

  'You did a good job bringing him in,' Gardener said. 'Couldn't have been easy, the state he was in.'

  'I need somebody to be my conscience,' Mallory replied. 'Was it hard getting Daniels back?'

  'He was in a bit of a bad way… you know.' He pointed to his temple. 'Losing the eye hit him hard. It'd get any of us, wouldn't it? But he's a good bloke, Daniels, for a poof. He's got a good heart. He'd stand by you when times were hard, and that's all you really need in a mate, isn't it?'

  Mallory couldn't disagree. But as he made his way back to his crib, his relief at the four of them surviving was already obscured by his growing worry that unseen events were taking place behind the scenes, with repercussions for all of them.

  Blaine left Mallory alone for the remainder of the day. It gave him time to gain some respite from the dull ache throbbing through his body. He ate a bland lunch of vegetable stew in the refectory and noticed that the portions were all markedly smaller. If they were truly under siege, supplies would have to be conserved. He made no attempt to go to any of the services, relishing his disobedience like a boy skipping school; it was a small victory against the oppressive order, but it made him feel good nonetheless. Instead, he chose to dwell on his growing anger, not only with Blaine, but also with the higher Church authorities that had conspired in making what had been a simple exchange — work for food and board — into a thoroughly unpleasant experience. With enthusiasm, he began to plot ways in which he could get his own back.

  He took supper with Gardener and was surprised to find two weeks had passed since they had set off on their mission, although he had only seemed to spend a few brief hours in the Court of Peaceful Days. It made him feel disoriented.

  One other thing troubled him: the cleric who had wandered into the cathedral that night, setting them on their search for his missing colleague, was now missing himself. Since their last conversation, Gardener had found out that the cleric had spent the night in the infirmary, but in the morning his bed was empty. Common opinion suggested that he had wandered off in a daze, possibly to search for his friend, but the guards at the gate claimed that no one had exited the compound all night. Blaine had punished them anyway. It only confirmed Mallory's fears that they had been set up from the start, but why would such an elaborate plan have been put in motion just to entice a few knights into the danger zone?

  After supper, Gardener invited Mallory to stand watch over the gates so he could see for himself what was happening. The mid-October night held a brittle cold and was suffused with the smell of wood-smoke from home fires. On the walkway running around the inside of the wall, Mallory felt a strange frisson looking out on to a city without a single electric light burning. Only a few flickering candles glowed like fireflies in the night. Yet the ghostly light cast by the full moon when it broke from the cloud cover was brighter and more affecting than any street lamp.

  Duncan, the captain of the guards, was a middle-aged bearded man with a thick Birmingham accent. He met them deferentially as they walked to a position near the gates. His attitude reminded Mallory of the respect with which the knights were treated throughout the cathedral, but particularly amongst the guards who knew exactly what they had to endure under Blaine's leadership.

  'I could swear it's colder in winter since the Fall. Do you remember the snow last Christmas?' Gardener said as they leaned on the top of the wall, looking out across the city. Their breath clouded, and they had their cloaks pulled around them for warmth.

  'That's all we need — a new ice age,' Mallory replied.

  'What time does it start?' Gardener asked Duncan.

  'They're already out there.' Duncan indicated several points along the street, in doorways and deep shadows, but Mallory could see nothing. 'They're like sentries — there all day and night.'

  Mallory couldn't understand how he had got past them; had they let him into the cathedral, and if so, why? Gardener sensed what he was thinking. 'Daniels and me came in too,' he said. 'Don't ask me what's going on. Anybody else that tries to get in or out gets both barrels.'

  'The other things come at various points during the dark hours,' Duncan continued. 'They try to break down the walls… cause a bit of damage, but never manage anything too serious.'

  'That doesn't make any sense,' Mallory said. 'The things we saw out on Salisbury Plain would be in here in no time.'

  'They are kept out by the power of the Lord.' Julian, the bishop's right- hand man had come up behind them. He'd tied his long black hair into a ponytail, but that only served to emphasise the worry and exhaustion in his features. 'Or the power of faith, or whatever you want to call it.'

  'Magic?' Mallory suggested mischievously.

  Julian didn't appear offended. 'Just words,' he said dismissively. 'Different ways of describing the same thing. Whatever you choose, in this new age the power of prayer and ritual has a dramatic and instant effect. Sacred land becomes empowered. Those things can't set foot within the cathedral compound.'

  Mallory thought for a second. 'But why are they trying to get into the cathedral?'

  'Why, they're opposed to everything we do,' Julian replied, as if the answer were obvious.

  'That seems to be the common view.' Mallory made no attempt to hide his plain disregard for this approach.

  Julian appeared momentarily troubled, as if Mallory had given voice to his own doubts, but the precentor brightened when he saw James clambering up the ladder to join them. Mallory had not seen the pleas- ant-natured brother since James' secretive meeting with Julian in the refectory.

  'How goes it?' James said cheerily. He was red-cheeked and clapping his arms against his sides theatrically.

  'Should bloody sell tickets up here,' Gardener muttered.

  'I come up here every night,' James said, 'in the hope that they will finally relent. Their patience must wear thin eventually.'

  Mallory disagreed. 'Believe me, they're like a dog with a bone. They're not going to leave until we find some way to break them. I presume we haven't got a way?'

  'Your commander has outlined several strategies,' Julian began, before dispensing with the PR. 'Nothing that yet looks like a workable solution. But we'll find it, in time.'

  'I love an optimist,' Mallory said.

  'I hear you've been consigned to the library?' Julian commented to James.

  'Ah, yes. You can never have enough guards for dead trees.' James attempted to mask his sarcasm with a smile, but failed miserably. He caught Julian's arm and said supportively and with honest compassion, 'How is the bishop?'

  'Forgive me for speaking disrespectfully, but Cornelius is a determined old bugger. He's not going to shuffle off easily.' Julian's face suggested that the situation was graver than he suggested. 'The vultures are still circling, however.'

  James' eyes flickered towards Mallory. Obviously this was not a subject to be discussed in front of others. 'If we stand firm, we will abide,' he said confidently.

  'Over there.' Gardener pointed down High Street to where shadows were congealing into small shapes, forming lines, ranks. Mallory squinted, not quite sure what he was seeing.

  At first, it could easily have been a trick of the dark and the moonlight, but gradually order appeared out of the chaos of the night. The street was filled from wall to wall with tiny figures, though still too lost to the dark for any details to be visible. They remained there, stock still, for long moments until Mallory was convinced that was the end of the manifestation. But then, with no fanfare, they began to move forwards in uniform step, an army in miniature.

  Their procession was slow but deliberate. It took five minutes before they reached the crepuscular zone of the light cast by the torches blazing along the wall. As they emerged from the gloom, James gripped the wall with both hands and whispered, 'Good Lord!'

  The figures were no bigger than children of five or six, but were obviously fully formed adults. As the light first hit them they appeared burnished gold, but gradually their skin settled on a ghasdy white. From
their spectral faces huge eyes stared, wholly black and too-large, so that they resembled alien insects; they looked like things that had lived below the earth for centuries, only just emerging from the dark. Their outfits were elaborate, part armour, part costumes: breastplates and metal helmets echoing conquistador design, the colour of dull brass; scarlet silk shirts beneath, and red cloaks, epaulettes, clasps, gauntlets, belts; the detail was hallucinogenic. One of them held a standard that reminded Mallory of a Roman legion's. On it was some form of alien writing and an image that appeared to form a circle, although it was difficult to discern detail at that distance.

  Women stood amongst the ranks, too, their expressions as venomous as the males', and children, too. They all carried strange weapons — short swords, spears tipped with unpleasant-looking hooks, nasty daggers and brutal axes. Some pulled carts, while a few rode on miniature horses. It could have been a picture from some child's fairy-tale book if not for the menacing atmosphere that hung over the whole scene, made infinitely more eerie by the silence of their progress. Mallory didn't hear so much as a footfall or a rustle of fabric.

  Within twenty feet of the walls, they rushed forwards, suddenly ferocious, snapping and snarling like wild dogs. Mallory gripped on to the side as the wall and walkway shook. For an instant he thought it was going to go down.

  'The hoards of bloody hell!' Gardener said in a strained voice.

  After the silence, the clattering of the weapons was deafening. Sparks flew where the swords and spears smashed against the wall's iron plates, now scarred from myriad attacks. The knights and clerics watched with thundering hearts for ten minutes and then the army mysteriously and quickly retreated as if some silent fanfare had been blown, melting back into the shadows as though they had never been there.

  'Why do they keep doing that when they know they can't get in!' The anxiety broke Duncan's voice.

  Mallory realised he was clutching the rim of the wall so hard his knuckles ached. It was plain there was no escape for any of them; he looked around and saw it in all their faces, though no one would have dared give voice to it.

  'Is it always like this?' he asked.

  'Nah. Different things on different nights.' Duncan had managed to contain himself and now appeared embarrassed at his emotional outburst. 'In the early days, we had a bunch of bloody loonies on horseback.' His face blanched at the memory. 'Though you'd never seen horses like these, with a pack of dogs running around their feet. They were mean bastards, I tell you.' He caught himself. 'Excuse my language, sirs, but they were.

  They'd come at the gates like all hell, and for a time there I thought they might actually break them down. They left after a while… probably realised they didn't stand a chance. Since then it's been one thing after another. I tell you, some of them I can't bear to look at. It's enough to give you nightmares.' He clutched at a gold crucifix at his throat.

  'What are we going to do?' Mallory mused to himself.

  'We pray for God's guidance, as we always have,' Julian said. 'Life is filled with trials, but with the right approach, we overcome them.'

  Mallory studied Julian surreptitiously. Everything about die cleric gave the impression of a modern man — urbane, intelligent, insightful — so it was odd to hear him using a religious language that was almost medieval.

  'Will we have enough food to see us through the winter?' he asked.

  Julian chewed the inside of his lower lip in contemplation. 'Procedures were put in place the moment we realised we might be in this for the long haul,' he began. His words were so transparent there was no point in Mallory even stating the obvious.

  As they stood there, Mallory felt a strange tingling along his spine that forced him to turn. It was instinct, a feeling of being watched, as inexplicable as anything else they had witnessed that night. The areas around the cathedral buildings were a place of whispers, which even the torches placed along the pathways failed to illuminate. It was impossible to determine any sign of life there, but he was convinced someone stood in the gloom, looking up at him. His heart began to beat faster as an uncontrollable rush of anxiety defeated any attempt to dismiss it as a primitive, irrational reaction to the fears of that night.

  Just when the sensation became almost unbearable, it faded. A moment later, he saw a figure move across one of the illuminated pathways, but it appeared insubstantial, wavering as if seen through a heat haze. Even at that distance, and with the features hidden by a cowl, he recognised it immediately as the brother who had turned and looked at him during compline shortly after his arrival at the cathedral. As then, he was deeply unnerved for no reason he could explain.

  Duncan interrupted his thoughts with a barked warning. A man, weak and staggering, was just passing through the shadows surrounding St Thomas' Church on the other side of Bridge Street. 'Bloody idiot,' Duncan said. 'Don't the locals know not to come around here any more?'

  'That's a knight,' Gardener said at the same instant that they all saw the cross glowing through the gloom.

  'It's Hipgrave.' Mallory recognised the body language despite the rolling gait.

  His confusion at Hipgrave's survival was washed away by the certain knowledge that the captain wouldn't last much longer. Already the shadows behind and around him were beginning to thicken.

  'Poor bastard,' Duncan said.

  Gardener looked down, sickened. 'I can't see this again.'

  Mallory tried to turn away himself, but he was rooted. For a few seconds, he wavered, before cursing, 'Oh, bollocks to it.' He prepared to lever himself over the edge.

  Julian caught his arm. 'You're mad!'

  'It's the job I chose so I've only got myself to blame,' Mallory replied, still wavering himself.

  Gardener gave him a shove so hard he almost rolled over the top. 'Stop gassing about it, then,' he said, joining Mallory on the wall.

  The silent acceptance of their responsibility flashed between them in a glance before they clambered over the top, hanging for a second before dropping to the ground. They hit the road running as fast as they could. Hipgrave was so dazed he hadn't seen them.

  The miniature army was forming thick and fast, seemingly from the very shadows themselves, the gloom twisting and shaping as if it were Plasticine.

  Mallory and Gardener reached Hipgrave together, each taking an arm. Their appearance shocked him from his daze, but he didn't have the strength to speak; his eyes rolled in fear.

  'Don't worry, man,' Gardener said to him. 'We'll have you back in no time.'

  They both saw that was a lie the moment they started to haul Hipgrave towards the gates. The road was already blocked by the pale black-eyed people.

  'I knew I shouldn't have let you talk me into this,' Gardener said.

  'Yeah, an old bloke like you should have more sense.' Mallory looked around; the only way out was through the maze of ancient streets surrounding the cathedral compound. 'This way. We might be able to find somewhere to hole up.'

  'You heard what they said, you stupid bastard. The only reason these fuckers can't get into the cathedral is because it's sacred ground. Anywhere else and they'll be in like shit off a shovel.'

  'Just shut up and run.'

  They each slipped an arm around Hipgrave's back to lift him and ran. As they headed into New Street, Mallory realised what they had to do. 'We need to get through to the camp at Queen Elizabeth Gardens.'

  'Why?' Gardener grunted.

  'Because it's protected, like the cathedral's protected.'

  'How can it be?'

  'It just is.' Mallory glanced back. The army had rounded the corner in pursuit, their eeriness magnified by their silence and speed, their small stature oddly making them even more threatening. They surged along New Street at a run, spreading out to cover the whole road, weapons lowered for use.

  'How do you know?' Gardener pressed. His voice held a note of suspicion.

  'I just do.' Mallory didn't meet his eye.

  They hauled Hipgrave as fast as they could into the ne
arby shopping precinct, taking refuge inside W H Smith's, which had been cleared out by looters. The first floor was pitch black, but they managed to find the door into the staff area and then made their way up to the roof. The army at their heels didn't relent, but Mallory's circuitous route got them to a point where they could make a break for the travellers' camp.

  It was only then that Mallory noticed something that shocked him. 'He's still got both his hands.' Confused, he grabbed Hipgrave's wrists and held them out so Gardener could see.

  'So?'

  'I told you I found a severed hand at Bratton Camp. It had to be one of ours. It wasn't there on the way in, but it was when we came out.'

  Gardener waved him away; he didn't have time for such things. 'Ah, you've got it all wrong-headed.'

  The mystery made Mallory's spine tingle. It hinted at something important just beyond his reach, the difference between life and death, if only he could access it.

  When they crashed across the invisible boundary surrounding the camp, Mallory felt for the first time whatever protective force lay there. Outside, the air was charged with tension; inside, it felt so peaceful that he began to calm almost immediately.

  'We're safe.' Mallory reached out a calming hand, but Gardener knocked it away instinctively. It was only when the pale-skinned people surged around the invisible boundary before retreating back into the night that he began to relax.

  Slowly coming to his senses, Gardener began to take in the unique mood of the camp, the flag with its entwining dragons, the colourfully dressed people cautiously venturing towards them. His face hardened. 'What is this? Bloody travellers?'

  'We're safe,' Mallory repeated, recognising the signs of righteousness rising in Gardener's eyes.

  'They're not Christians, you know.' Gardener raised his sword menacingly towards the approaching travellers. 'A lot of them are pagans… witches…'

  Mallory recognised one of them from the group he brought back with Sophie from the Plain. Scab was unmistakable, with his shock of bright green hair and a T-shirt that bore the manifest colour sense of an LSD user.