'My mother is an admirer of your work, Dr Romellier,' Aubrey said after he made introductions, to which the ornithologist responded coolly.
'She should be.' He crossed his arms on his broad chest. He stood with his back to his desk, keeping himself between his work and visitors. 'I am a genius.'
No false modesty here, Aubrey thought.
'D'you mind if we have a seat, doctor?' George asked, looking around.
'Yes. I didn't invite you here.'
George was startled, but Aubrey cut in before his friend could argue. 'My mother is keen to get a copy of your monograph on flightless birds of the southern oceans.'
'My monograph?' Dr Romellier cocked his head. 'That's what you're here for?'
Aubrey decided flattery was probably the most useful approach, especially with a self-declared genius. 'Of course. My mother feels your ground-breaking work deserves the widest audience possible.'
Dr Romellier studied Aubrey for some time, in silence. Aubrey felt as if he were being sized up for dissection. 'It is as I thought, then.'
Caroline and George looked at Aubrey. He shrugged, minutely. 'Dr Romellier? On another matter, we need to ask for your help.'
'My help?' Dr Romellier smiled a little, but Aubrey was concerned at the wintriness of that smile. 'What is it you want?'
'We need to get to the airship hangar.'
'The place with all the noise?'
'You haven't been there?'
'Not recently. They said they wanted my help to design ships with more lift.' He scowled. 'The fools. I could have created a profile that would save them money and make their airships the most dynamic in the world. I discard them, now. I will leave, soon, and go where I am appreciated.' He glared at the wall closest the hangar.
Caroline cleared her throat.
'Dr Romellier, if you help us, we can help you.'
'How can you help me?'
'You want to go where you are appreciated. I happen to know that Lady Fitzwilliam is equipping an expedition to the Arctic and is looking for expert colleagues.'
Aubrey stared. This was news to him.
'Lady Fitzwilliam,' Dr Romellier repeated.
'We're seeing her this weekend, you know,' Caroline said.
Aubrey saw where Caroline was leading. He chimed in. 'We could talk to her, if you like, if you're interested in being part of her expedition. Or I could introduce you and you could ask her yourself.'
'So, if I get you into this hangar, you'll introduce me to your mother.'
'Gladly.'
Dr Romellier studied Aubrey again, in the same clinical manner as before. He nodded, once, like an axe chopping. 'I'll take you straightaway.'
'Steady on, old chap,' George said. 'Don't you want to know what's going on?'
'Politics, I imagine,' Dr Romellier said. 'Parlour games for the rich and idle. I have more important things to think about.'
'Hear that, Aubrey?' George said. '"Parlour games for the rich and idle".'
Aubrey ignored this. 'We're grateful, Dr Romellier.'
Dr Romellier took them to the gap between his hut and the next. Wedged there was a dogcart, low, twowheeled, with battered wooden panels.
The ornithologist dragged a tarpaulin out of the cart. 'Here. Lie down. I'll get you in.'
Aubrey eyed the cart, then Dr Romellier. 'Do you often use this?'
'Often enough,' the ornithologist said. 'As you saw, I have many deliveries. Those in charge here say they can't spare anyone to help me, so I help myself. Get in, get in.'
Aubrey climbed into the back of the cart with Caroline and George. With some awkwardness, they managed to arrange themselves.
Dr Romellier inspected them. 'Don't make a sound.' He drew the tarpaulin.
The heavy cloth smelled of paint. Aubrey concentrated on taking shallow breaths as the cart jolted and began to move. It rumbled along easily enough, but he was glad that the journey was only a short one as every stone and every bump seemed to be magnified by the lack of springs. He could hear Dr Romellier's heavy breathing and the noises of the hangar growing louder and louder.
In the dim light under the tarpaulin he gave George and Caroline the thumbs up just as the cart swung around and bumped once, hard. From the smoother rolling, Aubrey guessed that they'd reached the concrete apron in front of the hangar. The noise intensified again, with great whooshing sounds overlapping with the hiss and pungent smell of welding. Chains were rattling in the near distance, with men shouting over the top of loud grinding.
The cart juddered over metal grates and past something that hummed with the relentless sound of an electrical motor. Aubrey heard a door roll shut and then they were in relative quiet.
The tarpaulin was dragged back. Aubrey blinked in the harsh, actinic light. Three men were standing next to Dr Romellier. Two held revolvers. The other was Gabriel, the leader of the Sons of Victor.
Dr Romellier scowled at Gabriel. 'Dr Tremaine was right,' he said in Gallian, 'these thieves came to steal my monograph.'
Gabriel slapped the ornithologist on the back and grinned. 'Don't worry. We'll take care of them.'
Aubrey heard Gabriel's threat, but only distantly. He was still stunned at what Dr Romellier had said.
Dr Tremaine. He's mixed up in all this!
Aubrey feverishly began to rethink all his suppositions and assumptions about the events of the past few weeks – but this time factoring in the malevolent involvement of the ex-Sorcerer Royal of Albion.
Things were much, much worse than he'd thought.
GABRIEL SAT ON A WOODEN CHAIR, HUNCHED OVER, ELBOWS on his knees. His cold eyes examined them.
They were in an office in one enclosed corner of the vast space of the hangar. Through the slatted blinds on the windows, Aubrey could make out the beginnings of a new dirigible where the previous one had been destroyed.
The furniture in the office seemed as if it was intended to send the message that this was a no-nonsense facility. The desk, the shelves, the cabinets were all made of grey metal. The only wooden item of furniture was Gabriel's chair.
Aubrey spent some time kicking himself for dragging his friends into danger like this, then quickly moved onto trying to think of a way out. He could kick himself some more later – if they managed to escape.
Aubrey was aware of the two gunmen standing behind their chairs, and he was sure they weren't there for moral support. He opened his mouth and Gabriel pointed a finger, interrupting him. 'If you begin a spell,' he said in Albionish, 'Leon will hit you very hard. Then he will gag you with a filthy cloth.'
'No,' Aubrey said and he mentally tore up his first plan, 'no magic. I just want to know why we've suddenly become enemies. We've proved that we're friends to Marchmaine.'
'And friends to Holmland. You've been seen with von Stralick.'
'The diplomat?'
'Do not play the fool with me. We all know he is a spy.'
'So? Lutetia is always full of spies.'
'The situation has changed.'
'The political situation?'
'It is on a slippery slope now. No-one can stop the government from falling.' He stood. 'Guard them,' he said to his two men.
'Wait,' Aubrey said in Gallian. He gestured at the men behind him. 'Have you told them what's going on? I think they deserve to know that they're going to be turned into wild beasts.'
One of the men behind him shifted and spoke, his voice deep but uncertain. 'Gabriel?'
Gabriel narrowed his eyes. 'Do not listen to him, Leon,' he said in Gallian. 'He knows nothing.'
Aubrey continued in Gallian, giving the guards every opportunity to hear. 'How many men have been transformed so far? Ten? More? I'd think you'd be running out of volunteers by now, which would mean you're not telling the poor souls what they're in for.'
Aubrey felt it then – a ponderous magical pulse. He flinched at the raw power, and even the brick dust in his pocket, inert though it had become, trembled. The others in the small room also seemed to feel something f
or they all blinked and looked around uncertainly.
An eerie silence fell in the hangar outside. To Aubrey it was like those odd moments in a crowded room where, inexplicably, everyone stops talking at once.
Then an ear-splitting roar split the silence apart.
Gabriel made for the door. 'Do not let them escape!' he barked over his shoulder.
The roaring was huge and bestial, and came from the road outside the hangar. As it grew, it seemed to spawn a chorus of terrified shouts. Then the scream of tearing sheetmetal added to the pandemonium. Running figures flitted past the slatted blinds.
For the guards' benefit, Aubrey continued to speak in Gallian, raising his voice over the noise. 'It sounds as if they've lost another guard,' he said to Caroline.
She answered in the same language, raising an eyebrow to show she understood. 'It's awful what's happened to them. I don't know how their commanders could do it.'
George knew that something was afoot. He nodded vigorously, doing his best to help.
The guard behind Aubrey clipped him with a meaty hand. 'Tell us what is happening.'
Aubrey rubbed the back of his head. 'You haven't been told? That is very poor.'
Glass shattered nearby and the ground shook, but the corrugated iron outer wall held solid. Aubrey hoped that the guards' imagination would create something much worse than the reality – whatever that was.
'I will see what is happening,' one of the guards said.
'Don't, Leon. We must wait for Gabriel.'
The conversation between the two guards frustrated Aubrey. He couldn't turn around to see their faces, to judge their mood. Their voices were edgy and uncertain, though, and he hoped to be able to turn that to his advantage.
Leon apparently wasn't impressed by his comrade's point of view. 'I'm tired of Gabriel. He's grown too sure of himself. I wonder about his commitment to Marchmaine.'
'But Gabriel is the leader of the Sons of Victor! How can you doubt his loyalty?'
Aubrey decided that Leon was rather more cynical than his comrade. Silently, he cheered him on.
'Where did Gabriel come from?' Leon asked. 'He claims he was born and raised in Chrétien, but I never knew him and I spent my life there before joining the movement.'
Through the glass, Aubrey could see that panic was rife in the hangar. Men armed with rifles were running toward the angry roaring. A lorry raced through an open door, almost colliding with four men who were carrying a large girder. As good a time as any, Aubrey thought. He caught Caroline and George's attention. He nodded very, very slightly and eased himself around in his chair, ready to leap at the arguing guards.
One guard – tall, beefy, perfect for the job – shifted and pointed his revolver directly at Aubrey. A distant part of his brain found it interesting to note that it was a Holmland military pistol, an Albers Special. He'd heard it was a very efficient firearm and, staring right into the huge barrel, he was willing to accept this without any further proof.
'Do not do anything,' Leon said in thickly accented Albionish.
'You speak Albionish!' George said.
Leon sneered. 'Do not think I am stupid, just because I am a guard.'
While Aubrey would normally have enjoyed pursuing the discussion of stereotypes and assumptions, it was at that moment that gunfire sounded from outside the hangar. Immediately the roaring on the other side of the corrugated iron rose to a furious bellowing. The ground shook, then, with a deafening crash, the wall bulged as something huge slammed into it. The metal table and cabinet against the wall were hurled across the room.
Aubrey dived to one side and felt the metal table whistle past his head. He hit the floor to see that Leon and the other guard weren't so lucky. Standing as they were, the table struck them squarely, followed by the cabinet.
Caroline dragged him to his feet. 'Are they all right?' he asked.
George quickly inspected them. 'They're breathing. Some blood, not much.'
'What's happening?' Caroline asked, but Aubrey didn't have to answer. The wall boomed again, but this time it gave way, screeching and splitting open under the impact. A clawed foot the size of a cow thrust into the office. It was scaled and a dull, muddy green-brown. Aubrey clapped his hands over his ears as they were assaulted by more frenzied bellowing that rocked the whole office. The foot jerked, stuck in the split metal, shaking the entire wall as if it were made of paper. Then it withdrew, nearly dragging the side of the building with it.
Aubrey, George and Caroline stood staring through the gap and the mountainous shape that was moving away from them. Twenty feet or more tall, it stalked on two tree-trunk legs, swinging a massive tail like a club. Gunfire only seemed to annoy it. It moved like an avalanche toward its attackers, pursuing men who wisely decided that fleeing was the best course of action.
Stunned, Aubrey was glad to see that the creature wasn't interested in them. The size of the monster!
'Another ancient Lutetian animal?' Caroline said. 'A dinosaur?'
He let out a long breath he hadn't realised he'd been holding. A creature from the very dawn of time, a king of beasts, to be sure. To think that it had once been a man. 'It means that the Heart of Gold must be near.'
'In the hands of another poor unfortunate by now,' George said. He picked his way over scattered papers until he could peer out of the hole in the wall. 'If we want to leave, this would be a good time.'
George stepped through. Aubrey followed Caroline. His jacket snagged on a splinter of metal and it tore when he tugged it away. His heart was still racing, and this time he thought it had good reason.
Outside, he paused. The strong, magical beat that signalled that the Heart of Gold was close rolled over him. Without realising it, he swayed. 'Over there.' He pointed across the road to a workshop. The large double doors were rolled back and Aubrey could see three lorries parked inside.
The dinosaur was stalking with murderous intent in the direction of the airfield. Panicked masses of men were streaming across the tarmac, and the sounds of small arms fire was continuous. The sole dirigible had been floating close to the ground, having been fuelled and provisioned ready to take the Heart of Gold to Marchmaine, Aubrey surmised. Now, it was endeavouring to pull away, despite its lines still being anchored. In the middle of the confusion, enough discipline remained that the lines were being systematically loosed, while the engines of the airship were firing up to assist its ascent.
Aubrey readied himself to lead the way and dash across the road to the workshop, but before he could take a step, a titanic blast erupted in the hangar behind him. Aubrey was flung to the ground. He lay there, for a moment, his ears ringing, and watched as the air was replaced with a cloud of dust and smoke. George and Caroline had been by his side, but he couldn't see them anywhere. He rolled onto one elbow and desperately tried to get up.
George appeared, coughing and shaking his head, waving both arms so it appeared as if he were swimming through the smoke. He helped Aubrey to his feet. 'Things are getting well out of hand here,' he managed to say over the roar of a massive blaze taking hold in the hangar. 'A good time to be careful.' A dull thud and a further, smaller explosion made them both duck, but apart from a shrill whistling, nothing came their way.
Caroline emerged from the smoke and Aubrey's rising panic settled. 'Von Stralick's here.'
'What?' Aubrey blinked through the drifts of oily smoke.
'Von Stralick. I just saw him at the head of a band of soldiers, fleeing the hangar and heading toward the airfield.'
'Ah. That'd be who set off the explosion, then.' Aubrey couldn't imagine the Marchmainers blowing up their own facility. Unless they did it by accident.
They hurried across the road and into the workshop. Aubrey's nerves jangled with every step, as he expected to be confronted either by angry Marchmainers or the Holmlanders who'd blown up the hangar. Neither was a desirable encounter.
Aubrey almost ran into the wall of the workshop, so thick was the smoke. With George and Carolin
e close, he found the door. Another magic pulse struck him, and he had to steady himself against its power. It's definitely coming from in there, he thought, and gestured to his friends. He pushed the door back on its rollers and, heart racing, he stepped inside.
A let-down. It was a motor pool or repair shop, chains hanging from rafters, racks of spare parts covering the walls. Beyond the three lorries was another, jacked up and with its engine cover open.
Aubrey's gaze slid over these mundane details and locked on the rear wall of the workshop. It was unlike the plywood-lined walls on the other sides. It was a heavy, riveted steel barrier that wouldn't have been out of place on a battleship. The magical waves were rolling straight through it. 'Strongroom,' Aubrey said.
'A strongroom's not much use with an open door,' Caroline noted.
Aubrey nodded. 'George, can you make sure no-one comes in from outside?'
'Will do, old man.'
'Caroline –'
'I'm coming with you.'
'You're coming with me.' Aubrey saw by the set of her face that arguing would be useless. 'All right. But stay behind me and be ready to run.'
'You be ready to run, too.'
Aubrey jumped. A groan had come through the open door of the strongroom.
'Someone's in there,' Caroline said.
He nodded, not wanting to speak with a throat was suddenly dry. He licked his lips, then inched through the doorway.
'Saltin!'
The Gallian airman was sitting on a wooden stool in a windowless room lined with metal bars. His face was sweating and contorted. Another groan burst through his gritted teeth and his eyes rolled back in his head. Magic was dense in the air, strong enough to make Aubrey dizzy.
With bone-white hands, Saltin clutched the Heart of Gold in his lap.
Saltin was suffering. Aubrey reached out a hand, but then let it fall. It was clear that the Marchmaine plight had become desperate. Perhaps Gabriel had run out of volunteers and dupes. Saltin, the poor fool, had stepped forward and now here he was, tormented as the artefact wreaked its power on him.
'Saltin!' he shouted but the airman didn't respond. His head sagged, then lolled backward, the whites of his eyes showing.
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