House of Many Doors

by Ian Richards

  When they emerged again it was sudden and unexpected. In an instant the night became a screaming whirl of wind and rain and hideous witches coming at them from all angles. They tore on at a breathtaking speed, dipping and diving but never seeming to gain any distance from the creatures behind them.

  ‘Why are they after us, Martell?’ Tony shouted. His stomach dipped as they plunged several feet, riding a sudden gust of wind. ‘Who are they working for?’

  ‘No idea, my boy. But whoever it is, I’m in no hurry to meet him. These are Thalaki witches. They’re one of the most dangerous tribes in Europe. How anyone was able to—’

  Before he could get any further an explosion rocked the side of the van, knocking them off to the left. As Martell struggled to regain control Tony looked out of the window to see several balls of light shooting at them through the rain—fizzing globes of green that corkscrewed towards them on spirals of thick white smoke. When they hit, it felt like being struck by a barrage of fireworks. Though Martell did his best to maneuver out of the way the van was sluggish to respond and the witches were gaining ground by the second.

  ‘They’re closing in. They’re trying to take out the engine.’

  ‘Well, don’t let them’ Vanessa shouted back. ‘Honestly, you people …’

  Another blast struck the door. The wing-mirror pinged off and vanished into the rain.

  ‘We have to go down,’ Martell cried.

  ‘That’s what they want,’ Vanessa yelled back. ‘They can’t capture us when we’re doing 100mph through the middle of a thunderstorm, can they? Just keep going. I’ll take care of them.’

  ‘What makes you such an expert?’ Tony said angrily. In answer, Vanessa rolled down the window and let fly with a lightning bolt of her own. It caught the nearest witch flush in the chest. There was an explosion of showering sparks and the creature wheeled away, shrieking. The van sped on through the storm, tossed and buffeted by the wind, pursued by the frenzied scream of the witches. The blasts of light kept coming, shooting through the dark like comets, but between the wind and Martell’s erratic steering none of them managed to hit their target. All they succeeded in doing was filling the sky with explosions of colored light—firework flowers that bloomed with a bang and momentarily painted the surrounding clouds in soft shades of emerald green.

  ‘They’re not giving up. What do we do?’

  ‘Keep going,’ Vanessa said. ‘I’ll take out as many as I can.’

  But the driving rain and unpredictable wind made it hard to aim, and her shots had no more success than the witches.’

  ‘What if we fly lower?’ Martell shouted. ‘We might have more chance of losing them if we can see where we’re going.’

  He guided them downward, the drop so sudden that it felt to Tony like riding a rollercoaster. They emerged beneath the clouds and flew along a wide river seething with rain. Though Tony looked frantically through the back window there was no sign of the witches behind them. The sky offered only brooding darkness: the occasional twitch of lightning.

  ‘I think we’ve lost them.’

  Vanessa shook her head. ‘No. They’re still there. They’re just waiting.’

  For several miles they followed the rush of the river, pressing themselves close to the surface of the water and trying to shake the eerie calmness that accompanied them.

  ‘They want us to think that we’re safe,’ Vanessa continued. ‘They want us back on land, and then they’ll strike.’

  ‘So we just drive on indefinitely?’ Tony said. ‘There must be something we can do.’

  ‘There is.’ It was the first time Martell had spoken in several minutes. His voice was unnervingly calm. ‘The Thalaki are a Bulgarian tribe. They have a rich, bloody history—and part of that history includes a war with the witches of London back in 1742. If my memory serves me correctly, the Thalaki lost. They won most of their battles in England but never managed to overcome Mab, the queen of the London coven. She was too powerful for them.’

  A sudden gust of wind forced the van to dip downwards. The wheels skimmed against the surface of the water. Martell righted their course and continued.

  ‘The point is, when Mab beat the Thalaki she put up enchantments preventing them from ever returning to London again. If those enchantments are still in place today, all we have to do is make it back to the city. They won’t be able to follow us.’

  ‘Yes,’ Vanessa laughed. ‘That would do it. What a wonderfully clever man you are. How on earth did you know something so obscure?’

  Because he’s the Black Magician of Dover Street, Tony thought. He’s an expert on these sorts of things.

  ‘The only question,’ Martell went on, ‘is how far away we are from London. The storm has scrambled my bearings. For all I know we could be going in completely the wrong direction.’

  ‘We need to find a landmark,’ Tony said. He began rummaging at his feet for an atlas. ‘Something we can use to work out where we are.’

  ‘Like that,’ Vanessa said, pointing ahead of them.

  In an instant the riverbanks slipped away and they found themselves skimming across an enormous sprawl of water and rain. The smell of salt and spray was unmistakable.

  ‘The sea,’ Tony cried in dismay.

  ‘Damn it.’ Martell span the wheel and forced the van to turn. The wheels kissed the wave-tops, spraying foam into the air. ‘We were going the wrong way. No wonder they let us run.’

  ‘Wait.’ Vanessa held up her hand for him to stop. The sky seethed with rain and flickers of lightning. Thunder boomed.

  But there was no other movement amongst the clouds.

  The van hovered above the waves, its engine grumbling and its insides rattling.

  ‘They’re watching us,’ she said. ‘Can’t you feel it?’

  And Tony could. It was a horrible, eerie sensation, as if the witches were inside the van with them, listening to their every word. Enjoying the power they held over them. Waiting. Watching. But from where? Why didn’t they just—?

  ‘There.’ The van shot forward, swerving sharply to the right as they raced inland. From a hole in the clouds a great darkness poured forth, a cascade of witches that flew in formation, an immense black snake that flicked its spine and began giving chase along the seafront.

  ‘We have to get back to London,’ Martell said. ‘It’s our only hope.’

  He spun the wheel again, forcing them off at another sharp angle as a stream of firework-like blasts shot past. The Thalaki followed every turn he made, screaming and shooting bolts of energy that finally began to find their target. The first exploded against the driver’s door. The second and third hit the side of the van, denting the metal with the force of sledgehammer blows. Then a fourth struck the undercarriage and smoke began to rise from beneath them.

  They began to descend.

  ‘Martell, no.’

  ‘We have no choice, my boy. One more hit and we’ll fall like a stone.’

  He took them down onto an empty road surrounded by fields of furrowed earth. As the engine continued its grumbling, he eased the van to a stop. In seconds the witches were upon them. They surrounded the van, banging their hands against the windows in triumph. Several crawled up onto the bonnet, keen to see the creatures they had trapped inside.

  ‘We are the Thalaki.’ The first to speak was an ancient crone with a face like a melted candle. ‘We knew you could not run forever. We knew you would sssurender in the end.’ She tapped a blackened nail against the glass. ‘Come out, come out, Black Magician. The massster wants you …’

  ‘Martell’s not going anywhere,’ Tony snapped. ‘Sod off back to your gingerbread house, you old boot. Leave us alone.’

  Laughter. Rain ran down their grinning faces. It dripped from the end of their noses.

  ‘If I come with you,’ Martell said, ‘then you must promise not to hurt the children.’

  More laughter. ‘Black Magician, you come with usss regardless. Your only power is ssstories. We have the power
to ssstrip the flesh from your bonesss. You are in no posssition to make demands of usss.’

  ‘Who are you working for?’ Vanessa yelled at them. ‘Since when were the Thalaki servants?’

  The faces pressed up against the windows hardened. Grins gave way to sneers.

  ‘We ssserve no master. We are the Thalaki. We are sssisters of the moon. We are ridersss of the sssky. We are—’

  ‘Sod this,’ Tony said, slamming his foot onto Martell’s. The accelerator bit the floor. The van lurched into the air, scattering witches like confetti. The speedometer shot from zero to 100mph in seconds.

  ‘Tony, what are you doing?’

  ‘Taking us back to London. I’m not letting them kidnap you, Martell. No chance.’

  Beneath them towns and villages shot by in pulses of twinkling light.

  Through the window at the back of the van Vanessa could already see an army of dark shapes in pursuit. The night shook with screams as they drew closer. There was no logic to their actions now, no interest in capturing their quarry alive. There was only hatred. The desire to see this shuddering metal insect swatted from the sky once and for all.

  ‘They’re gaining on us.’

  ‘It won’t go any faster,’ Martell shouted. ‘You should have let me go with them.’

  In a matter of minutes the witches had drawn level. They were surrounded on all sides. Tony could see the face of one of them right next to his window. An ugly, one-eyed hag whose long white hair danced wildly in the wind.

  She reached towards him, her claw-like hand already beginning to glow luminous green with the prospect of another fireball. A cold emptiness filled his stomach. What had he been thinking? If he had let them take Martell, at least they would still be alive. Now they were about to be blasted out of the rain—murdered—hurled towards the ground in a rusty metal coffin. The hand continued to glow, gaining in intensity. He could feel the energy contained in the blast already beginning to rattle the window. He could see the expression of glee plastered across the creature’s wet face. Then, with a sudden violence, the witch screeched with delight, pulled back her arm and—

  Whoomp.

  She had gone. Disappeared into nothingness.

  Tony glanced back over his shoulder and saw a small, fiery shape falling to earth behind them.

  The same thing happened with the other witches, too.

  Whoomp, whoomp, whoop. One by one they hit a certain point in the air and exploded into flames.

  The boundary, he thought. We’ve reached London.

  Sure enough, far beneath him, he could see the twinkling lights of arterial roads and suburban housing estates. Expansive golf courses, retail parks, nature reserves.

  Behind them the witches that had crossed the city limits fell from the sky like dying moths, each one trailing a cloud of stardust and ash in her wake. The rest of the coven pulled up short and howled with displeasure. The last Tony saw of them was a mass of black shapes hovering in the wet night sky, lit up by lightning, but unable to proceed any further.

  *

  They touched down a few miles south of Beckenham. The road was empty and there were no witnesses to remark upon the strangeness of a battered, smoke-spewing van descending from the heavens and setting a modest course for central London.

  Despite their escape the mood amongst the companions remained somber. Each of them knew just how close they had come to the end. If not for the city limits and a centuries-old enchantment they would have crashed out of the sky completely. Tony’s heart was still pistoning several minutes after they had landed. He felt sick. The drama of the auction house, the pulse-pounding adrenaline of the chase, and the exhaustion of being up so late all combined to leave him washed out. He felt as if his body had taken on so much excitement it would be days before he could rest properly again.

  In the seat next to him Vanessa watched the grey London landscape pass sadly by her window. The streets were cluttered and dirty. They passed takeaways, mini-supermarkets, off-licenses, taxi cab ranks. In the drizzling rain poor old Mrs. London looked like the saddest lady in the world.

  Tony wondered if she was thinking about her life back home. The contrast between the sun-baked warmth of Crete and the graffiti-splashed underpasses of inner-city London was striking to say the least. In the chaos that had accompanied their escape there hadn’t been time to wonder what would happen to her now. Carlos had abandoned her, that much was clear. Tony didn’t think she would go back to her old life with him. But then what would she do? Stay with them in Martell’s Antiques? Set off on her own?

  He watched her reflection in the glass of the window.

  ‘You do realize that I’ve now saved your life twice, chimney sweep’ she said softly. ‘In the same night, no less. If I didn’t know better I’d say you were a bad luck charm.’

  By the time they got to Blackheath both she and Tony were asleep. Martell drove on towards Dover Street as the murky Sunday morning began to form around him. Buildings took on clearer dimensions. A handful of exhausted clubbers exited the basement of a tacky nightclub, their clothes damp with sweat, their loud-without-realizing voices seemingly the only noise in the world beyond the rattle of the car and the drumming of the rain.

  He drove home, and though the witches were far behind them, Martell couldn’t shake the feeling that this was only the beginning.

  PART TWO

  11 - Interlude

  Three visitors came to Marshwood the following morning.

  The first, a crooked hag with one eye bigger than the other, arrived early, when the taste of midnight still lingered in the air and the swirling mists had yet to meet the approaching day. She represented the Thalaki, and though her kind usually embodied menace and aggression, on this occasion she approached the house meekly, unwilling to look at anything but the ground in front of her. The nature of her meeting with the master that morning remained hidden from the house servants, all of whom had work to be getting on with, but later none would recall seeing the witch leave and several would remark upon the curious new paperweight that had appeared in the writing room as if from nowhere.

  The other guests arrived a few hours later. These men—one short, one tall—were shown into the master's study by Thomas Silvertongue, chief servant of the house. Like all the servants at Marshwood, Silvertongue had bright red hair and a physique that spoke of missed meals and malnutrition. He looked as if he lived entirely on rotten vegetables and rainwater.

  ‘Gentlemen, please wait here while I summon the master.’

  Mr. Krook and Mr. Kepler did so. Firefox's study wasn't particularly welcoming, but it had a certain menace both men could appreciate. With its busy bookshelves and cluttered desks the room resembled the lair of a medieval alchemist. It had been packed with books, boxes, primitive laboratory equipment, animal skulls and star charts. It smelt curiously of substances neither man could properly identify.

  Mr. Krook cleared his throat. ‘When do you reckon this place was built then?’ he said.

  Mr. Kepler didn't bother to reply. Trying to attach an origin to a place like this was a waste of time. Words could never capture Marshwood. One might as well try to catch a handful of mist.

  ‘All right,’ Krook grumbled. ‘Bloody hell, I was only making conversation.’

  Elsewhere in the house at that time, in a dark room with no light, a room with stone walls and an earthen floor, a room that stank of death and decay, Firefox stood like a statue, his body taut and electric, his eyes blazing. Words tumbled from his lips. Incantations. Mutterings. Firefox knew this particular spell well. It was a dark, terrible thing, as the cadavers at his feet could attest to, and it required absolute concentration. He continued chanting. The words were ancient, the language long-forgotten. But the sound these words made … a synesthete would vomit such was the poison they contained. Each syllable was a strike of a scorpion’s tail. Each inflection, a dagger drawn across a child’s throat.

  His corpse audience listened in silence. Some of the bodies
were older than others. Their flesh had rotted down to the bone, their eyeballs had rolled back deep into their sockets. They were little more than skeletons. Others were much fresher. Recent murders, they remained frighteningly lifelike. It was only the little details that gave them away. The grey, pallid skin. The rancid stink emanating from deep within their bloated bellies.

  Back in the study, his guests were growing impatient. Mr. Kepler browsed at some of the books on Firefox's desk while Mr. Krook polished the blade of his knife with a black handkerchief.

  Presently, after several minutes, the door swung open and Firefox stormed in.

  Firefox was not his real name, of course. He had gone by many names in his time. Like the house itself, his identity was a shifting, swirling thing. Every aspect of his being existed in a state of flux. Once he had been modestly handsome. Not the kind of man to turn heads, no, but well turned out and thoroughly respectable. His hair had been darker, his cheekbones proud, his smile shy and attractive.

  But Marshwood is a place of transformations. The years change its occupants physically: their hair turns the flaming red of fire, as if ignited by the magic in the air—their faces become leaner and wilder—eyes become electric—skin tightens.

  But there is a mental change, too. Sanity decays. The mind becomes as rotten as the trees outside. In part it is the isolation. It is living in a place where time plays tricks and no two clocks ever keep the same hour. But there is something deeper also. A dark presence that infects all who stay too long. It can be felt in the bones, like spiders crawling under the skin.