Timekeepers: Number 2 in Series

by Catherine Webb

  Sam opened his mouth to answer, and hesitated.

  There was something… like… singing? Very far off?

  He stared at Adam in slow dread. ‘Oh, Time,’ he muttered.

  ‘What’s the matter? Sam, what’s wrong?’

  He looked at the expression of concern on Adam’s face. ‘They’re here,’ he answered with a little shrug. ‘I shouldn’t have stayed.’

  ‘Who’s here?’

  He smiled wanly. ‘Everyone.’

  At which point, in accordance with the universal laws of plan-screwing, the windows exploded inwards. A bit showy, thought Sam; assassins should, by rights, simply knock on the door and murder whoever answers it. Coming in through the windows was unnecessarily flash, especially since they were on the first floor.

  He heard Adam exclaim, ‘Shit!’ – and spun in time to see one of the assassins of Heaven, a Firedancer, all in red, his dragon-bone knife already out. Sam yelled, ‘Adam, get out of here!’, but heard no answer from his comrade. Backing up against the wardrobe he looked around for Adam and saw him standing stock-still, a little smile across his face. The music in Sam’s ears roared in triumph, the song of the Pandora spirits, of… Hate? Was it Hate that Seth had sent to fill the room? But why, then, hadn’t Adam moved yet?

  No time to contemplate such details. A Firedancer lunged for Sam, who caught the man’s wrist – if indeed you could call Firedancers men – and pulled him down towards an upward-bound knee. Firedancer and knee collided, and the Firedancer sagged. There was a hiss of metal as Sam drew his small, silver dagger that, though looking no more interesting than a sharpened pencil, still had the gleam of something designed for killing. He looked round the room. Three Firedancers – one doubled over and in no condition to fight, judging by his groans – and Adam. Standing motionless. Smiling at nothing.

  The other two Firedancers decided to try killing from a range. They raised their hands, fire flashing around their fingers. Sam warded quickly as fire flared, tearing through the room and around him. It struck the wardrobe behind him, blackening the chemical-tanned wood. At the top of the bed, the pillows ignited, burning slowly and quietly to themselves. Sam waited until the fire had cleared from the shields in front of his eyes and retaliated. The principle of fighting fire with fire, though basically sound, could fall down badly when taking on Firedancers. Fire could put them briefly out of action, but it certainly wouldn’t kill them.

  Therefore the light that Sam called to his fingers was bright blue, streaked with silver, and shimmered around him with a quiet hiss. He saw the Firedancers back away and grinned. ‘Shouldn’t have come looking, should you?’ he asked, and threw the coldfire. It struck the Firedancers, splattering out on impact in every direction. Frost crawled along their red robes, turning them pure white. In ordinary people – ordinary immortals – it would have inflicted little more than stiff joints and drastic inconvenience. With Firedancers, the reaction was very different. They screamed. In the moment of deafening distraction Sam leapt forwards, spinning round to bring his dagger down hard into the shoulder of one Firedancer. He heard something uncomfortably like the crunch of someone walking on glass and yanked his blade free, trailing orange-red blood.

  Pain exploded in the small of his back and he staggered, almost falling into the bed, which was by now burning fast, filling the room with noxious black smoke. He coughed, eyes watering, and heaved himself to one side. The shattered remnants of the stool Adam was swinging slammed down on to the bed next to him. He saw the hatred twist Adam’s face. This was what happened when the Pandora spirits came; they consumed your mind, bringing in its place just a single emotion. Sam was the only one they couldn’t touch, because, with the Light filling him from inside out, they had to pass through the shards of too many other minds.

  Even his closest allies, however, could be affected. Like Adam. ‘Adam!’ he yelled, knowing all the while that it was futile to try and reason.

  One of the frost-encrusted Firedancers had crawled to the window, blood soaking through his clothes. Sam watched as the Firedancer bodily tossed himself out of the window and fell. Falls wouldn’t kill a Firedancer either. Not nearly as effectively as the kind of magic Sam could muster. Another Firedancer had made for the door and was trying to drag himself downstairs. The third…

  The third…

  Sam pitched himself on to the floor. Which was lucky, as it meant the Firedancer’s blade sliced the air instead of his throat. A knife of dragon-bone, one of the few weapons guaranteed to kill a Waywalker like Sam. He put his back against a wall and raised his hands as Adam brought the stool swinging at his face. The air rippled, catching the stool where Adam held it, suspended motionless. With a wrench Sam pulled it from Adam’s grip and tossed it across the room.

  The third Firedancer gave a screech like nothing human, nor even immortal, and dived for Sam’s throat, hands blazing fire. Sam kicked out, striking the Firedancer in the chest. Heat crawled along his shins, and his feet slid on impact with the floor, the soles of his shoes rapidly melting. He pushed the Firedancer back, who staggered and fell on to the now roaring bed. There was a scream, barely audible over the noise of the fire and the humming of the Pandora spirit.

  Adam grinned as he advanced towards him. ‘Adam!’ Sam yelled, coughing through the smoke. ‘Don’t be stupid!’

  Adam drew his hands back, fingernails lengthening into claws. Sam acted on instinct, twisting his hands round each other in a tight, rapid circle. Adam’s feet were pulled off the floor and up, even as his body seemed to be knocked to one side by an unseen force. For a second he spun on empty air, then crashed down hard against the opposite wall, by the shattered windows.

  Sam got to his feet and held out his hands. On the blazing bed the bags he’d packed, themselves already smoking, leapt up and flew into his grasp. He trod out the few small licks of flame that threatened to consume them and tossed the bags out of the door. Then he clambered over to Adam, tears streaming down his face, holding his jacket across his nose and mouth. He felt for Adam’s pulse, sensed its weakness. By now the fire on the bed had spread to the curtains. Sam seized Adam by the ankles and dragged him out of the room and down the stairs, thankful that at least his friend had resumed a fully human form. Kicking open the front door, he pulled the little spirit out into the street.

  A small crowd of mortals had already gathered, gawping in what struck Sam as an exceptionally unhelpful manner at the fire now clawing its way out of the shattered windows.

  When they saw him, covered in soot and looking battered, the silence rang. Of course, thought Sam. A Pandora spirit could affect far more than one person at a time. But the more people it affected, the thinner its powers would stretch. Perhaps, if he hurried…

  He grabbed his bags and was halfway down the street before someone behind him yelled, ‘Fucker!’ By then he was unstoppable. Let the world rise up against him at the spirits’ command. He was used to being alone. Let them take his allies, let them turn even mortals against him. He was the bastard Son of Time. His entire life had been spent in preparation for this.

  Sam no longer felt care. He worked best when alone. And now, he knew, there was serious work to be done.

  TWO

  Soho Square

  H

  e carried two bags – one a large leather satchel containing almost everything he owned in the world, including money, a few hastily purchased clothes, a crown that was nothing more than a band of plain silver, a phone card, and a slightly spongy chocolate bar that had been there for longer than was healthy. The other was a plastic hockey-stick bag of the kind that sporty types carry to demonstrate to the world that they’re professionals. Sam had neither played hockey for several decades, nor did he carry a stick. In the bag was a short, very light silver sword that hadn’t tarnished in the thousands of years he’d owned it; and somewhere in the recesses of his left sleeve he also enjoyed the ownership of his thin silver dagger. Though neither of these items was particularly flashy, they had the power
to kill other Waywalkers, the Children of Time, where ordinary weapons of iron and steel might fail.

  He had, to date, never killed one of his siblings. Which was remarkable, because they’d tried to kill him on numerous occasions and he’d even returned the favour a couple of times. But neither side in the endless Heaven v. Sam conflict had scored any major points. Until now.

  Now the battle wasn’t about the fact that he was the only bastard Son of Time ever to be acknowledged with a sword and crown. He had been caught up in this conflict because within him he had the power not only to destroy Cronus, but any Incarnate in the universe, even Time himself. It gave the battle an almost impersonal feeling, as though being Bearer of Light was only a title: a ball in a pinball machine, bouncing around dangerously, but still just something for scoring points.

  So he was determined to show Them. Them with a capital letter, They who thought he’d die to destroy Cronus, or that he hadn’t the guts to fight, or that he’d fight and die and lose anyway. Above all, he’d show Time. No matter what it took, he’d fight back.

  It seemed, therefore, an anticlimax to start the fight with a trip to the local chemist.

  He bought some tubes of toothpaste, in two different colours, which was important. He also bought a bottle of surgical spirit, a large box of talcum powder, and a small plastic-framed mirror. From the newsagent next door he bought several cans of Coke, some bottles of beer with screw tops, a ball of string, a bottle of the cheapest whisky he could find, a pad of paper, a biro and a packet of J-cloths.

  He walked to Kensington Gardens and sat by the lake under a plane tree. Children were playing football, people were feeding the geese. They were really trying to feed the swans, but the geese were that bit faster. Above the red dome of the Albert Hall the sky was blue with the occasional white, fluffy cloud. Young lovers dawdled along the paths between Marble Arch and Queensway, and a pair of schoolgirls picnicked on damp sandwiches and too much chocolate while gossiping in conspiratorial voices. Sam laid out his booty and set to work with a calm, careful air. The Coke cans he carefully shook, before writing ignition wards on their thin metal sides with a finger trailing red sparks. At a thought, the already pressurised can would get red hot. He then placed one of the Coke cans inside the box of talcum powder.

  Sam opened the whisky bottle, on the inside of which he traced another ignition ward, this time leaving the end of the ward untied. Concentrating hard, to keep the ward from firing spontaneously, he picked up the ball of string and wrapped the end of the ward round the end of the string. He was careful to keep the string in contact with the bottle, and thus not damage the ward as he tied it round the mouth of the bottle and screwed the lid back on. He then wrote ‘Do not touch, signed Lucifer’ on a piece of paper and tied that down to the bottle with the same piece of string. The bottles of beer he emptied on to the grass and replaced the tops.

  His miniature magical arsenal prepared, he walked towards Marble Arch. Beyond Hyde Park, and several streets of expensive hotels, he found a petrol station and went over to a pump. He didn’t bother with a properly thick illusion but simply stood at the pump, unconcernedly pouring petrol into the beer bottles and soaking the J-cloths as well. People passed him by without a glance. When anyone did look his way, all they saw was a man standing by a pump: Sam was very careful to make sure of that. Sure, the nearby CCTV cameras wouldn’t be deceived by the tiny tendrils of thought he was manipulating; but they were the least of his worries. Screwing the lid back on the last bottle, he walked away stinking of petrol and feeling satisfied. He’d studied arson at the feet of masters. And just because he usually found magical means more efficient, it didn’t mean he hadn’t listened.

  Sam made his way beyond Bond Street and its grand antique shops, and crossed Regent Street into the byways of Soho with their bizarre mixture of Georgian architecture, clubs, offices and prostitutes. It was beginning to get dark, which was good; he liked darkness, especially when forced to call attention to himself.

  The streets grew narrower. Some were heaving with young fashionables in black, others were all but deserted. On one a lady clad in leather asked him if he wanted to come inside – ‘Looking for business, love?’ – on another a drunk in a soiled anorak told him he was the devil in disguise, and an inferior one at that.

  Reaching Soho Square he looked at his watch, which he kept perpetually on GMT no matter what plane he was on. Ten to nine. A good time, neither busy with office workers struggling to commute home nor with clubbers thronging back out on the streets. The gates to the square were locked, so he dropped his bags on the other side and climbed over the railings. He’d chosen this place, a small haven of green in a maze of shops and office blocks, for the particular reason that it was where two Ways, of Heaven and Hell alike, formed Portals that opened on to Earth.

  Sam went over to an area of grass beneath a flowering cherry tree, its pink blooms unappreciated in the dark by all but the most sensitive of beings. There he collected four sticks and stuck them into the ground at intervals around him. Having positioned the whisky bottle behind his back and towards the Hell Portal, he trailed its string towards the sticks, winding it round each one a little above the ground. He then placed the box of talcum powder in front of him and towards the Heaven Portal, careful to judge the range of any potential explosion. To be doubly sure of his weaponry, he also lined up five of the Molotov cocktails of petrol and foul-smelling rag within reach along with seven of the Coke cans.

  He then took out the tubes of toothpaste. These were in two colours, unattractive red and sickening green, and smelt so disgusting they had to be good for you. He drew a long green circle of toothpaste around him, tying it off at the end in a traditional ward pattern. Wards were always stronger when they had an artificial line to follow, but it was up to the practitioner to decide which material to use to write the line. Sam had long ago discovered that chalk was too insubstantial and easily washed away, ink just seeped into the earth, and trying to draw your line with a stick usually resulted in a lot of turned up mud and no real indentation that could serve as a path for magic. He’d switched to less likely warding materials, finally hitting on toothpaste as a suitable catalyst for magic. The red toothpaste he squeezed out in blobs at strategic points around the green circle, and filled them with magic – not much, just enough so that if, say, someone trod on it, Sam would immediately know in time to react. The green toothpaste he infused with an altogether more active form of magic, a warding dome of his power to protect against outside attack.

  The toothpaste began to glow a pale, pale white. With luck, any attackers should see the toothpaste as his only defence, and notice neither his warning system nor the explosives he’d left lying around. The whisky bottle he expected to go off with an impressive bang, which was why he’d positioned it behind him. If anyone did decide to attack him, they’d want to sneak up behind. And if in the darkness they failed to notice the piece of trailing string – well, that was their mistake, wasn’t it? Alternatively, if their eyes were keen enough to see the whisky bottle and its note warning them from touching the string, chances were they’d do exactly what they were told not to, and the effect would be much the same. Never say he left anything to chance.

  Sam drew out the mirror. It was pretty tacky and might as well have worn a badge saying ‘Does the red lipstick really go with the green eye liner?’, but it would serve. He settled cross-legged inside the circle, sword half out of the hockey case, and released a slow sigh.

  Scrying, his mother had once said, long ago in Heaven, was a loud business.

  ‘Loud?’ he’d responded.

  The Incarnation of Magic had nodded sagely at her son. Though never an acknowledged Queen of Heaven and therefore not a legitimate wife of Time, his mother was a Greater Power. Magic had been rejected because she could make the impossible come to pass, and Time didn’t like that. Time looked at billions and billions of futures and could see which future was most likely to happen, how many repercussions of on
e event would lead to the same outcome – the one to which he’d then try to guide the universe.

  Magic never wore one particular face when walking in a mortal form; that day she’d looked stern but kind. A teacher, helping her child to survive.

  ‘Some spells are quiet. Lighting a candle, touching minds, calling to the animals, whispering to the winds, listening to the land – these things are quiet. But to send your mind out into the world and actively seek answers, this is a loud process. It draws attention. And if that attention doesn’t want those answers found, it will send people to stop you.

  ‘A scry will give you the position of your enemies. But it will also give them your own position, because the power necessary to sustain it properly will blaze out. And all the worse if they are watching for you. Sometimes you can pass unnoticed, for example if you are scrying for something that cannot scry back, or for something that does not watch for magic. But if you are scrying another magical being, it will most likely turn on you and hunt you down, and whilst in the scry you will be powerless to prevent it.’

  ‘So what can I do?’

  ‘You can use your common sense, and assume the worst. Assume you are hunted. And prepare for it in advance. Trap the hunters.’