Destroyer of Worlds

by Mark Chadbourn

Without a second thought, Shavi leaped onto the vine, wrapped his legs and arms around it and shimmied across. It swung wildly with his exertions, the wind threatening to tear him off. Fighting to maintain her concentration, Laura held the vine together, but in the bitter cold the leaves were already blackening as fast as they had grown and the strand began to unravel and die. Through the wall of snow, Laura glimpsed Shavi scrambling onto the shattered edge of the next section of bridge. Grinning, he gave her the thumbs-up before the snow obscured him.

  Sagging back with a gasp, Laura let the vine fall away. The strain was already telling on her, but she was determined not to let them down. Ignoring the rocks falling around her, she placed another seed in the crack and grew it quickly. ‘Go on, old man - you’re next,’ she said. ‘I just hope your arthritic joints hold out.’

  ‘If I fall, let it be known she did it on purpose,’ Tom said to Miller.

  With surprising agility, he shimmied across the vine and disappeared into the blizzard. When Laura felt the vine grow less taut, she let it fall away.

  ‘Your turn, Miller,’ she said.

  ‘I’ll carry Virginia. She can wrap her arms and legs around me.’

  ‘It’ll be too much for you.’

  ‘Laura, she’ll never make it on her own.’

  The girl kept glancing at the dizzying drop, her face as white as the snow. Laura’s heart went out to her. ‘Okay,’ she said hesitantly. ‘I’ll try to make the vine stronger. Just . . . just be quick.’

  But before she could use the third seed, a cry rang out. The Iron Slaughterman had struck Ruth a glancing blow, propelling her into the mountainside where she slumped, unconscious. Her injury had distracted both Church and Veitch. Laura called out as the great sword hurtled towards Veitch and while her warning came in time for him to take one brief step back, the blade still ripped across his chest, releasing a spurt of blood. Veitch staggered backwards into the snow.

  ‘Miller, you’re going to have to heal him,’ Laura shouted.

  The Iron Slaughterman drove Church back against the wall where Veitch lay. When the giant sword pounded into the rock near where his head had been, the resultant explosion of shards of stone laid him flat.

  Despite the threat, Miller scrambled towards Church and Veitch, but the Iron Slaughterman rounded on him instantly.

  ‘This is it,’ Laura gasped.

  So fast was the attack on the Iron Slaughterman that Laura barely saw it. A second or two had passed before she realised he was battling furiously with a pair of Fomorii, their oily black shapes snapping and changing, claws and spikes and horns tearing through the Iron Slaughterman’s defences before they clung onto him, their snapping jaws darting. His arm fell away, and in his frenzy to throw off the Fomorii, he careered to the edge, and over, taking both beasts with him.

  As Miller ran to help Veitch, Laura scrambled to the edge, but the Iron Slaughterman had already been lost in the swirling blizzard.

  ‘I hope you were expecting me.’

  Laura whirled at the familiar voice. Hunter sauntered up jauntily, Jack creeping out from the top of the stairs behind him. For once, Laura gave in to honest emotion and threw her arms around Hunter, kissing him passionately on the edge of the precipice, oblivious to the drop, the cold, the wind.

  ‘I take it from that greeting that you weren’t expecting me,’ Hunter said with a grin. Behind him, a soft blue glow rose up as Miller healed Veitch, who was unconscious from the shock of his wound and the blood loss.

  ‘You’re always full of surprises,’ she said.

  ‘Here’s another one: I’ve got my own giant. He’s roaming around in the hall down there. Turns out he can control those shape-shifting things.’ His grin was swaggering, but his eyes told of a deeper emotion that made her ache. ‘So, did you miss me?’ he asked.

  ‘I’m sorry,’ she said.

  He pulled back, puzzled. ‘For what?’

  Laura placed her hands firmly on his chest and pushed. For only the briefest moment she had to bear the searing look of betrayal in his face before Hunter went over the edge and was lost to the snowstorm.

  ‘Laura!’ His face torn with horror, Miller raced towards her. ‘What have you done?’

  With a flourish, Laura flicked one of the seeds into the air. Green shoots burst from it, rippling and extending rapidly until they lashed around Miller, holding him fast. Laura grabbed the other end of the vine and yanked him towards her. Aghast, he tried to force out a question that would make sense of her devastating actions, but she elbowed him sharply in the face, and as he reeled in a daze, she propelled him over the edge after Hunter.

  Jack and Virginia were rooted and though they struggled briefly, she was too strong and too determined.

  Church and Ruth came round as Laura returned from the edge of the terrace. Dazed, they struggled to their feet, not yet noticing who was missing. Laura helped Veitch up, his wound already healed, thanks to Miller. Although still weak, the Pendragon Spirit would soon have him back to full strength.

  ‘Church, it’s terrible,’ Laura said when she saw the questions start to surface in his face. ‘That bastard with the sword . . .’ She choked back a sob. ‘He killed Hunter. And . . . and he took Miller, Jack and Virginia over the edge with him.’ Tears streamed down her face.

  The others stared in abject shock until Ruth stepped forwards to comfort Laura with a hug.

  ‘Hunter? Shit.’ Veitch looked to Church, who already understood the implications.

  ‘Not just Hunter. We’ve lost the Two Keys, and our way into the Enemy Fortress,’ Church said. ‘It’s all over.’

  7

  In the timeless Grim Lands, only seconds had passed. Mallory and Caitlin watched as the flamboyant Callow did a little jig on top of the tomb.

  ‘You’ve got a lot of energy for a dead man,’ Mallory said.

  ‘Ah, but then I am not like others you will find in this dismal place. When I walked the world, I was filled with more life than any of the grey, workaday drudges I encountered on their morose treks into the coffin they called the office. I drank deeply of the heady cup of life! I imbibed all there was to offer. And more!’

  Mallory and Caitlin exchanged a glance, but if Callow noticed, he didn’t appear to care.

  ‘And then it was all so cruelly snatched away!’ Callow added.

  ‘I’m betting one or two others here would say the same thing,’ Mallory said.

  ‘No! I was not meant to die. It was an error of cosmic proportions. And if proof you need, it is the simple fact that I am still here.’

  Caitlin eyed him curiously. ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘I am not allowed to continue. The Grey Lands is simply a waiting room. The vast majority of shades you find here are in the process of moving on. To where, I do not know. Heaven? Hell? Why this is hell, nor am I out of it. Perhaps back into the innocent foetus, with all the possibilities once again lying ahead, to do right, or wrong, learn, or not, and find their way . . . where? Back here!’

  Mallory began to grow weary of Callow’s chatter and prepared to head off. Callow instantly read the signs and leaped in front of him.

  ‘Some of the shades get trapped here, true, for reasons I have not yet discerned. But you can tell their type instantly. Consumed by bitterness, infected with despair, none of them exhibit the joy you see here in my humble form. No, I am a true anomaly - neither dead nor alive. Caught in a web not of my own making, and no one prepared to throw up their arms and admit to their mistake.’

  ‘We can’t waste time here,’ Caitlin said with irritation.

  ‘Take me with you!’ Callow pleaded, grabbing hold of Mallory’s jacket.

  Prising him off, Mallory said, ‘Nice story, but I’m pretty sure you’re meant to be here, and I wouldn’t want to get on the wrong side of whoever sets the rules in this place.’

  ‘Please!’ Callow started to cry. ‘You don’t know what it’s like here!’

  ‘Mallory,’ Caitlin pressed. When she held up the Wayfinder to
examine the direction of the blue flame, Callow stopped crying instantly and his eyes narrowed.

  Mallory noticed the sudden change in his demeanour and asked, ‘What’s wrong?’

  ‘That lantern. I have seen it before. In the possession of my very good friends.’ Callow slyly watched Mallory’s interest grow. ‘The remarkable, the astonishing Jack Churchill. And Ruth Gallagher. And the lovely Laura. Shavi. And the other one.’

  ‘You know Church and the others?’ Caitlin asked.

  ‘We were travelling partners for a time, during that age of upheaval, that Age of Misrule. Oh, how they mourned my passing! Oh, how they would celebrate joyously if I returned to the land of the quick!’

  The resonant creak of the cemetery gate echoed through the mist. Callow started, and ran to the edge of a mausoleum to peer uneasily into the grey, where he plucked at the fraying sleeve of his jacket. Mallory and Caitlin left him there and tried to pick a path through the cluttered mass of monuments to the dead, but within a moment he had joined them again.

  ‘Let me guide you,’ he said. ‘You’ll never find your way through this sprawling city of the departed without my help. There are many hidden dangers, and sometimes a slight detour could save you a limb or a life. You really would not want to be permanent residents here.’

  From behind them came the dull sound of something dry and scratchy being drawn across stone. ‘Who’s there?’ Mallory asked.

  ‘I saw no one. I would not expect the dead to be passing through here at this time; unless, of course, they have learned of your arrival. Then it would be a time to beware. They are jealous of the living, and their bitterness drives them to extremes. And unpleasantness.’

  ‘Bring him along,’ Caitlin said. ‘It won’t hurt.’

  ‘All right. But any sign of deceit and you’ll wish you’d stayed in your tomb,’ Mallory said bluntly. ‘And don’t get any ideas about coming back with us. This is a short-term deal through this God-forsaken place.’

  ‘Of course, of course,’ Callow said slyly, ‘but once we are firm friends on the road of life . . . or death . . . who knows?’

  ‘I know,’ Mallory said firmly. ‘Move.’

  With a bow, Callow swung one arm out flamboyantly to guide them on their way. They were soon lost amongst the mausoleums and grave markers and leaning, ivy-covered statues, and though Callow whistled jauntily a few yards ahead of them, they were left uneasy by the constant morbidity of their surroundings.

  ‘Is this what death is,’ Caitlin asked, ‘one never-changing bleak landscape that goes on for ever?’ Hugging her arms around her, she fought off the creeping desolation imposed by their surroundings.

  ‘Don’t start asking me about the afterlife,’ Mallory said. ‘I never used to think there was one. For me, life itself was enough of a purgatory.’

  ‘You too?’

  ‘I didn’t use to think that. I was arrogant. Everything was just a big sweet-store where I could pick and choose until I grew fat. Then life slaps you around the face and shows you what it’s really like.’ He caught himself. ‘Now I sound like a pathetic, self-pitying loser. I don’t really believe that. There’s a lot of good. It’s just that once you’ve experienced the worst there is, it’s impossible to see the world in that totally innocent way any more.’

  ‘But we still have hope, don’t we? That’s what keeps us going. It would have been so easy to give in when Grant and Liam died, but if I had I’d never have met you.’ It was Caitlin’s turn to catch herself, afraid she’d said too much. She added hastily, ‘What happened to you?’

  ‘In my arrogance, I attracted the attention of a particularly nasty bunch of people. I thought I could control them, beat them, until I realised there are people in this world who are capable of harder, more terrible things than you can ever dream, and if you come up against them, you can’t match them. You always lose. They gave me a choice that no person should ever have to make. I killed someone, and it destroyed me. I couldn’t live with it. And then I tried to kill myself.’ He paused. ‘I did kill myself. Don’t ask me how I ended up here. Maybe there are just a whole load of successive lives. You die in one, you get bumped up to the next.’

  ‘But there’s a reason you came here,’ Caitlin pressed. ‘If you hadn’t killed yourself, you wouldn’t have been here to try to save this world and we’d have lost long ago. Out of that awful thing, something good is happening.’

  ‘It’d be nice to believe that.’ Mallory clearly did not believe. ‘But it still sounds naïve to me.’

  ‘It’s like Shavi kept saying - the pattern, the hidden pattern,’ she said. ‘It’s all too complex, so everything seems random and punctuated with all these bleak, horrible events, but the big picture . . . it could be something beyond our dreams.’

  ‘I can see the pattern here. You’ve been sent to make sure I don’t turn into a miserable, grumpy old git that the children throw stones at in the street.’

  ‘It’s mutual, Mallory.’

  With a sudden urgency, he caught her arm. ‘There’s someone here.’ He tried to pinpoint the direction of the noise he had heard, but with the deadened sound of the cemetery, it was impossible. Oblivious, Callow punctuated his progress with bursts of whistling.

  Caitlin became darker, her posture more aggressive. The Morrigan drew forwards.

  A faint rasp away to his left. Mallory turned, sword drawn, but there was nothing to see. Then a whisper of movement ahead, just beyond the visibility the mist allowed him.

  Circling, he thought. Looking for an opening.

  Though they were both on their guard, neither were prepared for the silent figure rising up beside a tomb they had just passed. The Hortha gripped Caitlin across the mouth with a twisted blackthorn hand, spun her around and extended the index finger of its right hand to drive it between her eyes and into her brain.

  With a muffled snarl, Caitlin drove her axe down into the Hortha’s thigh. Dry blackthorn shattered as the blade almost severed the limb. As the Hortha lurched to one side, his attack was thrown off-balance, and the finger-spear tore open the flesh along the side of her temple.

  Wriggling free, Caitlin flipped back to land on her feet, axe ready to attack, pausing only to watch with disgust as the Hortha raised its finger to drop a minute amount of her blood into its paper mouth.

  The axe crashed into the Hortha’s torso, but as soon as Caitlin withdrew it, the blackthorn was already growing back into place with a snap and a pop.

  ‘I taste your thoughts,’ it said. ‘There is nowhere to run now.’

  Caitlin and Mallory attacked together, but the Hortha evaded them with a speed that made it a blur. It used the folding mist to hide itself before coming at them rapidly from another direction. They cut off chunks here and there, a hand, half a leg, but it regrew just as quickly, and their sense of futility mounted with their unease.

  Hailing them from the cover of a mausoleum, Callow beckoned frantically. Mallory signalled to Caitlin with his eyes, and when the Hortha withdrew into the mist, they both ran.

  ‘We’re just wasting our time,’ Mallory said breathlessly as they moved away through the cemetery. ‘We’re never going to stop him like that.’

  ‘How did he follow us here from the temple?’ Caitlin said. ‘We left no trail.’

  ‘No time for that now,’ Callow said. ‘The great Lord gave us brains to use in situations like this. Brute strength is all well and good, but it pales behind the advantages of the grey matter, used well and wisely.’

  He led them on a fast, winding path through the grave markers until he came to a mausoleum that had been marked with a red cross on the door.

  ‘What’s so special about this one?’ Mallory asked.

  ‘These are all houses of the dead,’ Callow replied, ‘but some are home to worse things than the dearly departed. Once I open the door, venture no further than the light reaches into the dark. Stand on either side of the door, and when your friend enters, emerge victorious!’

  At first Mallor
y wasn’t convinced, but when he read the repressed fear in Callow’s face as he wrenched the stone door open, he stepped in with Caitlin right behind.

  Callow had been right. The light died unnaturally quickly and sound was deadened close to the source. Beyond the few inches of grey illumination around the doorway, the darkness swam like oil. It had dimension, and texture, and gave off a quality that made them feel dread.

  As they stood on either side of the door looking into the dark, their skin prickled and they had the unmistakable sense of something looking back at them. Their fears were confirmed when a faint voice whispered, ‘Closer.’ There was nothing inherently threatening in the tone, but it chilled them nonetheless.

  The Hortha was in the mausoleum before they realised, moving low like an animal, rapidly searching the dark depths. Caitlin planted her axe in its back to disable it while they both darted out. Callow slammed the door shut the moment they were in the light.