by Peter Oxley
“Maybe,” said Andras, throwing himself into a chair and draping his legs theatrically over an armrest. “But then again, maybe not.”
“Don’t play games with us, demon,” snarled Pearce, “or I’ll—”
“You’ll what?” asked Andras. “You cannot compel me to act against my will, whereas I could play you like a puppet if I so wished. For all you know, I could have been doing that already, bringing you here as a part of my grand designs. Why do you think I let Prime Minister Disraeli know of my whereabouts?”
“He is no longer Prime Minister,” I said.
Andras tutted. “Of course, I forgot: it’s now that stuffed suit Gladpole, isn’t it?”
“Gladstone,” I corrected.
“Whatever,” Andras waved a hand. “It is so hard to keep track; it’s not enough that you have the lifespan of over-elaborate mayflies, but then you keep chopping and changing your leaders all the time.”
Pearce shook his head at the frustrating irrelevance of this line of conversation. “Will you help us or not?”
Andras picked at one of his claws. “It so happens that our purposes may be intersecting. What did you say the Almadites were doing in this other realm of yours?”
“I didn’t say what they were doing,” said Joshua, glancing at the rest of us. “Not yet.”
“Oh, don’t look at them,” said Andras. “They are much less intelligent that you and I. Not to mention nowhere near as devilishly handsome. Pun intended. So, tell Uncle Andras what the naughty demons are up to.”
I shrugged and then nodded. “Go on, tell him.”
Joshua stood and walked over to the bag that he had lugged with him on our journey to this apartment. “They appeared to be attempting to activate a device. At first I thought they were trying to create a portal through to our world.”
“But…” prompted Andras, waving his hand in a circular motion to encourage him to continue.
“But,” said Joshua, “it lacks the utility to achieve such a task. It is not an active device; indeed, all the runes and incantations upon it point to it having very much a passive purpose.”
“Such as…?” prompted Andras again.
“As though it were created to find something.” He pulled the main part of the Warlocks’ device from his bag, a cone-like metallic object inlaid with red and black symbols that hurt the eyes to look at. He took it over to Andras and turned it round to show him the full extent of the inscriptions. “But what they intended for this to find, I do not know. My first thought was another entry point akin to the Fulcrum on our world, but that does not accord. These symbols here are so unusual…”
Andras held out a hand. “May I?” Without waiting for a response, he snatched it and took it over to the window, holding it up to the light. “Very clever,” he muttered. “Well, they have two already, so it would be a simple extrapolation to work out what properties they shared…” He turned back to face us. “Who was in this little scouting party of yours? The four of you?”
Pearce shook his head. “I was not there. It was these three, plus Kate.” He glared at us.
“Ah, sore point, eh? Upset you weren’t invited to their little party?” Andras’ grin stretched wider. “No, that’s not it, is it? What was that ditty? ‘Heaven has no rage like love to hatred turned…’”
“…‘Nor hell a fury like a woman scorned’,” I completed for him. “Which brings us back to the point of Kate being missing and imprisoned on Almadel. Would you be willing to risk her fury if she knew you were dilly-dallying in this way?”
“Well played that man,” said Andras, nodding at me before turning back to Joshua. “I am curious, did the Warlocks’ device react in any way to your presence?”
“We attacked them before they could activate it,” said Joshua.
“And you have all the components here?”
“Yes, but…”
“Good.” Andras tossed the object over his shoulder and Joshua dived forwards to catch it. “Take good care of that thing,” the demon said. “It is very important. Well, gentlemen,” he grinned at us. “It looks like we are a team once again!”
“Why do I sense we are doing you a favour, rather than the other way round?” I asked.
“Oh, don’t take it personally,” said Andras. “That is the way food always feels when confronted by a predator. Now, something is concerning me: by the way you are dressed and the smells you are giving off, I would surmise that you travelled here by sea?”
“Yes,” said Pearce.
“But I thought time was of the essence? Kate in mortal danger and so on?”
“How else do you suggest we should have got here?” I asked. “France is hardly welcoming of foreigners, and an airship would have drawn far too much attention.”
“Why did young Joshua not create a portal? Do you not think that would have been a lot simpler and quicker?”
We all gaped at him. “You can do that?” I asked Joshua.
“To the Aether, yes,” said Joshua. “But that is all.”
Andras tutted at Byron. “You are causing me to downgrade my opinion of Pooka tutors. And that is saying something.”
“I agree that it is theoretically possible to travel by portal within realms,” said Byron, “but only when they are much more soaked in magic than this one. The Fulcrum still only reaches so far…”
“But it still exists in this realm,” said Andras. “Use that as your focal point and then do what you would normally do. Much easier than punching through to the Aether.”
Joshua shook his head. “I have tried before, but to no avail. I am not powerful enough.”
“Balderdash,” said Andras. He looked around the room as though he were sizing up our relative locations. “Try again now.”
I glared at him. “What are you plotting?”
“Come on, Gus,” said Andras. “We’re all on the same side here.”
“Are we?” I asked.
“Yes.” For once the grin slipped and he looked almost human as he stared back at me. “I fought alongside you at St Albans. If I had wanted to destroy you, I could have done so many times over by now. But I haven’t. Even the Pooka believe in my bona fides. Why can’t you?”
“Greenwich,” I said. “The Aether. Yorkshire. Killing my parents. Trying to steal my soul. Trapping us in the Aether. Taking N’yotsu from us. Need I go on?”
He waved a hand. “In the past.”
“For you, maybe.” I stood and stomped over to the far side of the room, struggling to regain my composure.
Joshua frowned and then shrugged. “I suppose there is no harm in trying,” he said, flexing his shoulders.
“That’s the spirit,” said Andras. “Augustus, be a dear and bring that bag over here, would you?”
I glared at him but complied, picking up the heavy bag and dumping it next to Byron, all the time ignoring Andras’ hungry look as he watched me.
As Joshua started his chanting the air became charged with a tension like that preceding an electrical storm. Once more the runic sword at my back reacted to the magical energies, humming in unison with Joshua’s words as though it were trying to help by echoing and magnifying his incantations.
I looked up as a breeze touched my skin. A vortex swirled into existence in front of us, increasing in extent until it was the size of a large window. We peered through it to see grass, trees and a grey sky beyond.
“Is that…?” I asked.
“St Albans,” said Andras. “Best to get through there before the soldiers realise what’s happening, don’t you think?”
We dived through the opening, taking the sack containing the Warlocks’ device with us. I landed heavily onto the hard ground and looked around; thankfully this time we were just under a mile away from the main camp that housed the soldiers guarding the Fulcrum.
Chapter Five
While the journey from France had taken mere moments, the 30 or so miles west to Hughenden Manor at the southern edge of the Chilterns seemed to take an
eternity.
We approached the squat red brick building with caution, keeping an eye out for soldiers or the police. Everything, though, was quiet as we worked our way through the trees lining the approach to the manor house. I strained my eyes for anything out of the ordinary, my unease growing the longer that everything remained quiet and unremarkable.
“Why do you people insist on creeping around all the time?” tutted Andras.
“You forget that we are fugitives,” I hissed, “who have escaped from the Tower of London, probably making us the most wanted people in the country!”
“Someone seems to have delusions of grandeur,” he sniffed.
“Our crimes were no doubt compounded by bringing you back into the country,” I added. “Something I regret with each minute that passes.”
Andras ignored me, turning instead to Pearce. “You say you went to great lengths to make sure that no one could connect Disraeli to your actions?” he asked him.
“I did.”
“And I am guessing the last place that any sane escapees would go to is the home of the Prime Minister?”
“Former Prime Minister,” I reminded him again.
Andras waved away my words. “Given all of that, why are we skulking about here? This is very undignified, you know.”
Annoyingly, the demon proved to be correct when we were admitted into a house empty of anyone bar a handful of servants, Disraeli and my brother.
“Max,” I greeted him with a warm smile. “So good to see you.”
“And I you,” he said, nodding a greeting from his wheelchair. “You have caused quite a fuss with all of your actions over the past few weeks. What on Earth possessed you?”
“Please, Max,” I said, holding up a hand. “This has all been done to death without you adding your tuppence worth. I know it was a stupid thing to have done, but I am determined to make it right.”
“If you occasionally listened to me, maybe you wouldn’t need to run around cleaning up all the messes you created.”
“Max,” I said, softly but firmly, “This is neither the time nor place for you and I to fight.”
He frowned. “Maybe not. Although…” He shook his head. “Very well. But your actions have taken their toll on all of us, you know.”
“You have been questioned?” asked Pearce.
“Of course. And I was under surveillance as well. Probably still am.”
We stared at him in disbelief but Disraeli chuckled. “Do not worry. We still have some friends in London. I arranged for Mr Potts to be secreted here from his laboratory; in the meantime, those purportedly caring for him are continuing with their routines as usual, creating an illusion of occupation for the time being.”
“As you know, I do not often venture from my laboratory,” said Maxwell. “It would not be considered out of place if I am not seen for a few days. Although the risk that our ruse will be discovered increases with every day that I am absent.”
“Then we should press on,” said Pearce. “I presume Mr Disraeli has briefed you on what we need?”
“Weaponry and transport,” nodded Maxwell. “Fortunately for you, I have had plenty of time to ponder such matters. I have just the items.” He spun his wheelchair round and led us into an adjoining room that he had commandeered in his own imitable fashion, with every available item of furniture stacked high with a profusion of gadgets, tubes, cogs and assorted bric-à-brac.
Maxwell propelled himself to a long table that had once served as a sideboard but was now a makeshift workstation. He cleared aside the looser items gathered on it with a few judicious sweeps of his arm to reveal a dozen weapons—two LeMat pistols, two Lancaster pistols and two Snider–Enfield rifles—resting on top of mismatched wooden boxes.
“These have been adapted along the lines of our previous occult weapons, with the bore in the barrels specifically tailored to generate the particular spin and harmonics that inflict the maximum amount of damage on demons and their kind.”
“Fatal damage?” asked Andras with a glint in his eye.
I picked up a Lancaster pistol, feeling its weight in my hand as I glared at Andras. “Shall we test it?” I asked.
“That will not be necessary,” said Maxwell quickly. “I can assure you that they work perfectly well.”
Pearce inspected one of the rifles, testing the balance and looking down the barrel. He opened one of the boxes and ran his fingers through the bullets contained within. “This should suffice,” he said with a nod.
“I was slightly concerned that I had overdone the munitions,” said Maxwell.
“Not at all brother. I suspect that where we’re going, you cannot have too many weapons.”
“How right you are,” muttered Andras, staring at the guns as though he suspected they would jump up to attack him at any moment. Then he frowned. “There is something else you have not included here. What about the Compound?”
I shuddered as I remembered that hideous man-made mist, one of Maxwell’s creations originally intended to cure me of my demonic predisposition. However, the Compound turned out to attack all living creatures indiscriminately, both human and demon, and N’yotsu and I had barely escaped with our lives when Maxwell had tested the mist on me. In the process, it had conjured up hideous visions—not unlike those I had witnessed when the Warlock had attacked me in the Aether—and attempted to dissolve me from the inside-out. At the Battle of St Albans Maxwell had used the threat of the Compound to force the demon leader Gaap and his minions into retreat, and we had always assumed that that was the ultimate threat still keeping them at bay.
“That would certainly cause trouble,” continued Andras, a glint in his eye, “if we were to release it into the middle of the Citadel in the centre of Almadel. I would love to watch that.”
“We could not wait around long enough to witness the results,” Byron pointed out. “Not without rotting to pieces ourselves.”
“In any case,” Maxwell said as he glanced at Disraeli, “the Compound is no longer available for use.”
“Why not?” asked Andras. “If ever there was a time to use it, now would be perfect, surely?”
“I am afraid that the small quantities of the Compound that I have produced to date have become increasingly unstable,” said Maxwell. “I believe it has been impacted by the growing influence of the Fulcrum. I have not been able to—”
“It is not a viable weapon,” snapped Disraeli. “To wield it would kill us as well as the Almadites, and I have seen nothing to indicate that it can be controlled in any way. I have ordered its destruction, have I not?”
Maxwell looked down. “Indeed you have.”
I shrugged, hefting my chosen pistol, a solid Lancaster, in my hand. “I think we have enough here.”
“We do,” said Pearce.
“You are actually going to do this?” Maxwell asked, looking up at us.
“We have to get Kate,” said Pearce as he checked the mechanisms of each of the weapons. “We have no choice.”
“Then I shall come with you,” said Maxwell, glaring back in defiance as we protested as one. “I am as concerned as the rest of you for Kate’s welfare; of all of us, I probably know her the best.”
We had to concede the point. Since the Battle of Greenwich where Andras had crippled Maxwell, he had relied on Kate for his care at all times of the day and night. As a result, they had forged the sort of close bond that naturally comes from such a relationship.
“The place to which we are going,” said Andras, “is not very conducive to a person with your mobility issues, if you understand me.”
“That was almost tactful,” I said. “Not to mention brave, given that it is your fault he is in that wheelchair in the first place.”
“Nevertheless,” said Pearce, “the demon has a point. Maxwell, we cannot afford the risk.”
“I would also not put it past the Almadites to be planning something to take advantage of Kate’s kidnapping,” said Byron. “While the Fulcrum remains a source of
much instability, your scientific methods are still effective in this world. When we pass through the Aether and to the realms beyond, those things may be completely useless.”
It was Maxwell’s turn to concede the point. “I have been brushing up on my occult knowledge…”
“But with all due respect,” said Joshua, “Byron and I are much stronger and more practised in those matters than you are.”
“And me,” said Andras, waving a hand in the air.
“And back here on Earth,” continued Byron, ignoring the other demon, “you can still do plenty of good with your inventions and scientific knowledge, especially if the Almadites try to invade again.”
“I will need company here in this world, in any case,” said Disraeli.
“Actually Benjamin, I need you to do something,” said Andras. “I suspect that everyone is correct as to the Almadites’ intentions, and I have taken the time over the past few months to prepare the ground.”
“For what?” I asked. “What exactly have you been up to during those months since you left us after St Albans?”
“While you have been gallivanting around losing people in the Aether, I have been busy maintaining my networks and building new ones. In particular with some people in the French, Prussian, Russian and Austrian courts: Emperors and the like. I believe you are also acquainted with those people, Benjamin?”
Disraeli nodded slowly. “I am. But given how touchy our Continental cousins are when it comes to anything even remotely demonic, I am surprised that you were able to obtain an audience with them.”
Andras tapped a clawed finger against the side of his nose. “They say the devil has all the best tunes. He also has the best book of contacts. It is usually those in power—or those who desire it most—who are most receptive to what I have to offer.”
I felt a cold chill run down my spine as I remembered my own experiences of what Andras offered; I had once bargained away my soul to him in return for the fleeting joys of fulfilling my dreams of literary success and recognition. I could still feel the empty hole deep inside me which was created when Andras had started to exact his price, before Maxwell entered into the bargain that had doomed our whole world to the on-going conflict with the creatures from beyond the Aether.