The Queen of Sinister

by Mark Chadbourn

  She swore in shock, backed away, almost fell over the armchair. The darkness concealed the figure once again.

  Mary moved to the centre of the room, turning back and forth in case the watcher came through the front or the back. A heavy knock sounded at the door.

  Who's there?' she shouted defiantly.

  'I was sent to see you.' The voice was loud, confident, educated with a hint of arrogance.

  'Why are you skulking around outside?'

  'I wanted to be sure I had the right place.' Exasperation, a hint of annoyance; Mary eased a little. He didn't sound like a threat, but then who did? 'Will you open this door?' he snapped. 'I've been walking for hours and I'm cold and I'm wet.'

  Holding the home-made spear ahead of her, she leaned forward and turned the key. Standing on the step was a tall, big-boned man in a sodden overcoat and a wide- brimmed felt hat that had almost lost its shape in the rain; he was carrying a knapsack and a staff. He was in his late fifties, with long, wiry, once-black hair and beard, now turning grey and white. The skin of his cheeks had the leathery, broken-veined appearance of someone who enjoyed a drink, but his eyes were beady, black and unfriendly.

  Mary prodded the spear towards his chest. He looked down at it contemptuously.

  'Are you the witch?' he said curtly.

  'What—?' Mary was taken aback.

  He pushed the spear to one side and forced his way past her. 'A tree told me,' he added gruffly.

  Mary readied herself to herd the visitor out, but he was already stripping off his overcoat and shaking the rain across her living room. He gave up, threw it to one side and marched to the fire to warm his hands. Mary advanced with the spear.

  'You can put that pigsticker down for a start,' he said, watching her from the corner of his eye.

  'If I put it anywhere, it'll be right up your arse.' She considered giving him a prod just to hear him squeal. 'Who are you?'

  He drew himself upright, shaking his head wearily as he flung his hat on top of his coat. 'The name's Crowther. Frank, if you want to be chummy.' His eyes narrowed. 'Though you probably don't.'

  'And—' she prompted, shaking the spear.

  'And I am here to see you,' he interjected with exasperation. 'I presume.'

  Mary chewed her lip for a second, then used the spear to motion him towards the chair. 'Just don't go making everything wet while you tell me about it.'

  He flopped into the chair, weariness etching deep lines into his face as his head lolled on to the chair-back. With his eyes closed, he began, 'I would hope I don't have to begin from first principles. We can accept that there is an element of what used to be called the supernatural in the world, can we not?'

  'Go on.'

  'I have been known, from time to time, to communicate with those other powers. Recently, they've been getting in a bit of a state. Something's up, apparently. A rather big and extremely troubling something, though as usual, trying to get any useful detail from them is like trying to carry water in a sieve. It seems, however, that it's linked to this damned plague.' He flapped a hand. 'Anyway, that's by the by, for now. The important thing is that something can be done about it. Apparently. And it seems I have a part to play, and you, because I was guided here. Frankly, I can think of better things to do, but I presume the survival of the human race is a pressing matter.'

  'Who told you this?'

  'The Wood-born.' He watched her quizzically.

  She nodded. 'The tree spirits.'

  He tutted. 'Don't make them sound like fairy-tale stuff. You get on the wrong side of them and you won't live to regret it. I saw a man once with a hawthorn bush bursting out of his belly. He'd somehow swallowed a fragment of the wood and they'd made it sprout inside him.'

  'He probably deserved it.'

  'How very humane of you.'

  Despite his appearance, Mary didn't feel a sense of threat from Crowther: she was usually good at judging people, but that didn't mean she liked him either. He carried his arrogance like a badge, reminding her of intellectuals she'd met who couldn't help but look down on the common herd.

  'Why should I trust you?' Mary asked.

  Crowther pondered this for a second or two and then a deep sigh shook his large frame. 'The simple answer is that you probably shouldn't.. God knows, if I were in your position, I wouldn't trust me.' The weariness permeating his features appeared to be born from days on the road.

  'You've come a long way,' Mary stated.

  He nodded. 'From the West Country. There's a college there, newly founded after the Fall. It aims to pass on long traditions of studying nature and the heavens and how it all interacts, the wisdom of an age-old group called the Culture, though everyone knows it by a different name. A mystical college. You've heard of it?'

  Mary shook her head.

  'I'd spent all my days in academia - avoiding having a life, I suppose - so it was only natural I ended up there. Couldn't do anything else productive. I'm a professor, which used to mean something, I suppose. Various disciplines came under my aegis - a little psychology here, some archaeology and anthropology there. I was at Oxford for a while—'

  'Married?'

  'Wife dead, I'm afraid.' His features remained impassive; Mary had no idea how much she could believe of what he was saying. 'Children, I don't know where. They're old enough to have minds of their own. No ties, you see. The college sounded enticing ... and it was. Except it's run by one of the most miserable, bad- tempered old bastards you could ever imagine.' His eyes narrowed. 'And one of the Five.'

  Mary's breath caught in her throat. 'They exist, then?'

  He nodded. 'Not a myth, though they're rapidly turning into one. Five people who saved the world when things were going pear-shaped. A shaman, the one in Glastonbury. A warrior - who turned out to be a traitor, killed in the Battle of London. A human-nature-spirit hybrid ... or something, I'm not quite sure. A leader, missing, presumed dead. And one of your own.'

  Mary sat on the arm of the chair, staring into space. 'I'd heard the stories, like everyone, but I hardly dared believe. Are they going to come back?'

  'To save us?' He laughed bitterly. 'They've done their bit. It's down to us now.'

  'Then this college is somewhere quite special.'

  His eyes took on a distant cast. 'The things I learned there ... amazing things ... worlds beyond our own ... the existence of beings we'd always considered gods ... magic ... a new, deep philosophy about the way everything is tied together ...' He brought himself down to earth sharply. 'But that's not important. This is.'

  'You came all this way because the Wood-born told you to.' Mary felt secretly pleased when she saw Crowther flinch slightly beneath her unwavering gaze. 'Out of the goodness of your heart, to help humanity. You don't seem like a good Samaritan.'

  'I never said I was. I'm a part of humanity too, whatever others might think, and I have a vested interest in its survival.'

  'And the tree spirits told you about me?' Mary grew more suspicious the more she considered his words.

  'Not just them. There were rituals, other communications, once I knew something was amiss. And, yes, I was pointed here because of one very special reason, something that shines out like a beacon to those kinds of beings who have a feeling for all this.'

  'And that is?'

  'I am quite prepared to sit down and tell you all about it. But first, is there any chance of a brew before we decide exactly what we're supposed to do?'

  Without gratifying his request with a friendly reply, she turned to go to the kitchen. But as she did so, she noticed something very strange about him in the flicker of the firelight when he bent forward to warm his hands again: there appeared to be holes just beyond the line of his hair and beard, as if something had drilled into his skull.

  When Mary returned with two mugs of the herbal infusion, Crowther had his boots and socks off and was wiggling his toes in front of the fire.

  'You really are a disgusting pig,' she said, handing him his drink.
r />   'Thank you. I see an ability to offend as a mark of unique status.' He slurped on the brew before nodding appreciatively.

  'So,' Mary asked after a few moments, 'did you have any more information or are we supposed to glean something from that load of old cobblers you just told me.'

  'Yes, the key to it all is some girl...'

  Mary stiffened.

  Crowther saw her response. 'You know who I'm talking about?'

  'Put that tea down,' Mary snapped. 'We have to go out.'

  When Mary's call echoed throughout Caitlin's house, she feared the worst. They'd already checked the village hall, but even if Caitlin had gone out on a call, Grant and Liam should still be around at that time of night.

  Crowther stalked off to check the bedrooms, returning with a curt shake of his head. A jarring banging led them into the kitchen, where the back door swung back and forth in the wind. Outside, Mary saw movement at the end of the garden. Running down anxiously, she found a figure so slathered with clay and mud it was at first impossible to tell it was Caitlin. She was knee-deep in a hole, frantically shovelling earth out on to the lawn.

  Caitlin looked up at Mary with big, staring eyes, made whiter by the filth caked around them, and shouted, 'I've got to get them out!' She didn't seem to recognise Mary at all.

  Caitlin dug wildly, spraying mud all around, then threw the spade to one side and dropped to her knees so she could claw at the sodden earth. Mary glanced at the growing hole, and at the mound of earth nearby and knew what had happened.

  'Oh, lovey.' Her voice trembled with pity.

  'I've got to get them out!' Caitlin dug like a woodland animal, thrashing madly as Mary tried to ease her out of the grave.

  In the end, Crowther and Mary between them managed to calm Caitlin enough to get her away from the hole, and once it was out of her sight it was almost as if it was forgotten. Her face grew blank, her eyes empty. She trudged in a dream state towards the kitchen, holding Mary's hand.

  They sat her at the kitchen table, but Caitlin made no attempt to respond to any of Mary's questions, didn't even acknowledge anyone else was with her. Her chin lolled on to her chest as she stared hollowly at the table. She looked like some relict human hiding out in the depths of the jungle.

  Crowther surveyed Caitlin dismissively. 'If this is who we came for, I wouldn't put money on us coming out on top.'

  'Shut up,' Mary snapped. She moved in close to Caitlin and said gently, 'You don't need to worry about Grant and Liam any more, dear. They're in the Summerlands now, happy, content, waiting till they can see you again.'

  The words hung in the stillness of the kitchen, and then a faint light came on in Caitlin's eyes before they flickered towards Mary. Curiously, Mary didn't recognise what she saw there.

  'I know you.' Caitlin's voice was of a higher pitch than usual, almost childlike, with a faint singsong swing.

  'Of course you do, lovey. It's Mary.' She put her hand comfortingly on the back of Caitlin's.

  Caitlin's eyes continued to search Mary's face. 'I'm Amy.'

  Mary flinched. 'No, you're Caitlin.'

  'Caitlin's here, but I'm Amy.'

  Crowther leaned forward and said a little gruffly, 'How old are you, Amy?'

  'Six.'

  'And how many of you are there?'

  Caitlin sat back in her chair and mouthed the numbers as she counted off on her fingers. 'Five,' she concluded. 'Me, Amy. Caitlin. Brigid. Briony. And ... and the one we don't talk about.' A shadow crossed her face.

  In a somewhat unseemly manner, Crowther was enthused by what he'd heard. 'Multiple personality,' he mused, 'or dissociative identity disorder, to give it its proper name. Some debate in psychological circles about whether it actually exists.'

  'The poor girl,' Mary said. 'Is there anything we can do?'

  'A few decades of therapy and a strict drug regime.'

  'I don't like it here. It's scary. There's something frightening in the garden,' Caitlin/Amy said, glancing in a scared, childlike manner towards the back door. 'I want to leave. I don't want to come here again.'

  'Don't you worry.' Mary put on a brave face. She helped Caitlin to her feet and slipped an arm around her shoulders. 'We'll get you somewhere nice and warm and safe.'

  Crowther grumbled as he followed. 'Well, that's torn it.'

  The journey down the rain-washed, wind-torn lane was like a funeral procession, with Caitlin trailing spectrally behind Mary and Crowther taking up the rear in his oversized coat and hat. Halfway along the lane, though, the wind blew the clouds away and the bright, white moon emerged like a spotlight, casting the scene in silhouette and shadow.

  Mary felt instantly on edge. She knew that she had half- seen something from the corner of her eye, registered only by her subconscious. Turning slowly, she saw black shapes moving along the ridge a mile or so to her right, picked out by the moonlight as if nature was informing her of something important.

  She came to a sharp stop, cold and disturbed. 'What's that?' she said. Caitlin didn't look, but Crowther came in close, pushing up the soggy brim of his hat so he could get a better look.

  Two figures moved relentlessly along the back of the ridge. At first glance it looked as if they were riders on horseback, except in silhouette the horses were oddly misshapen, too large, too long and bulky, as if they had been crossed with some kind of giant lizard. The eerie sight brought a shimmer of fear to Mary, and she could tell from his rigid stance that Crowther was disturbed by it, too.

  'Do you recognise them?' she asked. Crowther shook his head.

  'The Whisperers,' Caitlin/Amy muttered, still without looking. Mary and Crowther stared at her for a long moment, then hurried her along the lane.

  In the cottage, Mary locked and barred the door before throwing another log on the fire. Crowther had become more stoic, which manifested itself in a degree of politeness he hadn't exhibited before. He carefully hung his coat and hat on the back of the door while Mary stripped off Caitlin's clothes in the kitchen, washing her face and hands and wrapping her in an old dressing gown. Once she was in the chair in front of the fire, Caitlin sagged back and instantly fell asleep, as if a switch had been thrown.

  'I don't see that we can do anything with her,' Crowther said. Weariness emerged from behind his arrogance and brought lines to his face that added years to his age.

  'Give her time,' Mary said. 'She's had a big blow, but she's a tough kid.' She went to the window and looked out; everywhere was still now that the storm had passed. 'Things are going from bad to worse, aren't they?' she said, almost talking to herself.

  'This plague is a bit of trouble, certainly,' Crowther agreed. 'But if not for that, I don't really know how I feel about it. We seem to have lost a lot of things that were holding us back. We've reset the clock, I think. Time to get it right this time. Which is, I know, very Darwinian, but there you go.'

  'So what do we do now?'

  'I don't know. I was only guided to find you. Somehow the three of us have to find a cure for this plague. Somehow ... I don't know ... I'm sick of all this vagueness.' He sighed. 'I need to contact the other side.'

  Mary knew why there was such an edge to his voice. Such contacts had a cost, sometimes in a transfer of energy, sometimes in something much, much higher. After the first time, she had decided to avoid them. One other question struck her, and it was such a conundrum that she couldn't begin to find an answer. 'Why us?'

  Crowther gave a bad-tempered shrug. 'I suppose we won the lottery.'

  The hot coals in the brazier sent out a dull heat that only dispelled the cold in a tiny circle in its immediate vicinity. Beyond, the Ice-Field rolled out immeasurably, consumed by the infinite blackness of a night where no stars twinkled. They sheltered in the nook of a small rock formation, the only feature on that flat, endless plain. It was crescent-shaped, barely twelve feet high but enough to keep the chilling wind at bay. Snow was frozen hard against it so that it glistened in the ruddy firelight.

  Perched on a
boulder beside the brazier, Caitlin shivered, her arms wrapped around her, not thinking, not feeling.

  Amy stood beside her, tugging at Caitlin's sleeve. The little girl had a powerful innocence about her that made her appear brittle. She peered into the night with wide, frightened eyes. 'Something's coming,' she whimpered. 'It'll be here soon. Then we'll all pay.’

  'Shut up!' The shrill voice came from a neurotic-looking woman in her late thirties, too thin and angular, her face bearing the mean expression of someone who felt they had suffered too much unnecessarily. Briony lit a cigarette and sucked in the smoke, her eyes watering. 'It doesn't do any good whining, you little brat.'

  'Leave her alone. You know she's right.' Brigid was so old she appeared like a gnarled, wind-blasted tree, her bones barely holding on to her flesh. Her hair was a wild mane of white, knotted and greasy. 'We have to get her moving.' She nodded contemptuously towards Caitlin. 'That's the only hope.'

  'You could let me out.'

  They all grew rigid at the rasping voice. Slowly they turned to the dense area of shadow at the back of the shelter. In the deepest part of it, two red eyes burned.

  Across the Ice-Field, the wind howled mercilessly. The night grew a shade darker.

  Mary jumped at the cry reverberating throughout the cottage. It contained physical pain, but also a soul-pain that filled her with dread. Crowther had retired to her bedroom to carry out whatever ritual he used to access the powers that gave him information. He had insisted on secrecy, though she had offered to help him keep the threats at bay.

  He emerged ten minutes later, shaking and drawn as though he were suffering from some debilitating illness. Mary offered him a glass of whiskey, which he knocked back without thanks.

  'Did it work?' she asked.

  'After a fashion. As usual.' He steadied himself against a wall.

  She could see from his face that whatever he had learned had disturbed him greatly. 'What is it?'

  'There's no cure for the plague in this world.'

  Her heart fell. 'No cure?'

  'In this world.'

  The stress he gave to those words made her skin prickle. 'What are you getting at?'