The Queen of Sinister

by Mark Chadbourn

  'I think I love you,' he said, stroking her sticky hair; and he meant it.

  They dressed and ventured out into Buckland's office. The thug lay in one corner, moaning gently to himself. Both his kneecaps were shattered. He began to curse loudly when he saw Caitlin and Thackeray.

  Harvey loitered in the doorway, both scared and overjoyed. 'Thought you were a dead dog,' he said to Thackeray obliquely.

  'Nearly ... a couple more minutes.'

  'Glad you pulled through.'

  'Yep. Looks like you're stuck with me for a bit longer.' They shuffled round for a moment, unable to face their emotions, and then Thackeray nodded at Caitlin. 'What about her, then?'

  'Yeah. Who'da thought it?' Harvey eyed her warily. 'Like somebody out of The Matrix.'

  'Red Sonja, more like. You remember Conan? The She-Devil with a Sword. Or in this case a machete.'

  'They're all dead, you know.' Harvey jerked a thumb in the direction of the corridor leading to the concourse. 'All that bastard's men.'

  Thackeray looked Caitlin in the eye; he couldn't quite understand what he was glimpsing there, though it certainly wasn't the blankness he had seen in the woman with whom he had first fallen in love. 'I'm not going to be able to take you back to mother, am I?'

  'But why didn't you kill him?' Harvey nodded towards Buckland, who was increasingly delirious with the pain.

  'He's facing his own punishment.' The new vision Caitlin had gained since the Morrigan had come to the fore was proving a revelation. As Caitlin watched Buckland, she could see the devils dancing over his form, teasing the plague along the meridians of his body where the chi flowed. She knew what it was now: a spirit-plague, a corruption of the soul that attacked the life-giving essence of reality. It wasn't just designed to kill people; it was there to destroy everything. The Blue Fire would be attacked first, and then physical matter would follow.

  And while it could be a natural infestation, the presence of the devils and the malignant and modulated way in which they went about their terrible business made Caitlin sure there was an intelligence behind it. Something had loosed such an awful thing; something wanted Existence destroyed. And that made her think that it was all connected - the plague, the Lament-Brood, the attempt to eradicate her. But who or what could possibly want to wipe out everything that ever was?

  'So, we getting out of here?' Thackeray said. 'Buckland's not going to be much of a threat any more. In a world with the flimsiest of health services, what you've done to him is pretty much a death sentence.'

  'For what it's worth,' Caitlin said.

  'Maybe we could take over from him,' Harvey mused. 'With an enforcer like her, nobody would mess with us.'

  'Nah,' Thackeray said. 'Too much responsibility. I'd rather go on holiday.'

  He looked at Caitlin hopefully, but her face told him all he needed to know.

  They stood on one of the station platforms, the intense darkness thrown back in one small arc by a lone torch held by Harvey.

  Thackeray had his arms around Caitlin's waist, pulling her close so he could feel her tenderness. 'You've really got to go?'

  'Yes. People are counting on me.'

  His sigh was supposed to be theatrical, but it carried the full weight of his feeling. 'It's understandable. You're getting out of Birmingham. Who wouldn't?'

  'You could leave, too.'

  'You'd think, wouldn't you?' He looked deep into her eyes, tried to appear blasé. 'I'd go with you.'

  She shook her head. 'I don't think I'll be coming back, Thackeray. What I've got to do ... well ... my instinct tells me the price is going to be my life. These things always end badly.'

  'Yeah. You see, responsibility ... I don't really get that word.'

  She leaned forward and kissed him gently on the lips. It was subtle but as potent as the passion he had experienced from her earlier. A shiver ran down his spine. He knew in his heart that he would never find another who meant as much to him. Their time together could be counted in days, yet the connection he felt with her was as deep and abiding as the ocean. He wanted to tell her how much he needed her, how he could see, even though she hadn't examined it herself, that she loved him, too. But he could also tell it was pointless. She couldn't stay; obligation lay on her shoulders like a millstone.

  'In this world we've ended up with,' he said, 'things are just too, too tragic.'

  She smiled and electricity jumped between them, but the poignancy was almost too painful for him to bear. She pulled back and his hands fell from her waist. 'Bye, Harvey,' she said with a wave.

  There was a hint of relief in his smile. 'You want to get some shampoo for that hair, Red Sonja.'

  She laughed, dropped from the platform on to the tracks. They watched her as she moved along the lines, and only once did she look back before the darkness swallowed her up. At that moment Thackeray thought he was going to die.

  Harvey slapped a hand on his shoulder. 'I'm sorry, mate. But look on the bright side ... you'd never have been able to argue with her.'

  Thackeray tried to pierce the gloom, imagining her wending her way out into the night, fierce and beautiful and wild, like nature. 'I'd have jumped through fire for her, Harv. I'd have crossed the world.'

  'You're a stupid romantic, Thackeray, and it's a wonder you've got any friends.' Harvey turned away and waved the torch towards the exit. 'Come on ... let's nick Buckland's whisky stash.'

  chapter thirteen In the Court of the Dreaming Song

  'O Liberty! What crimes are committed in thy name!'

  Madame Roland

  Crowther was hot and irritable and the path appeared to go on for ever. The still air beneath the trees had grown oppressively muggy and even long drinks from the numerous cool streams that cut through the forest did little to ease his discomfort.

  Mahalia, dealing with her grief, spoke little, but what worried him was that when she did talk, she was polite, thoughtful, almost good-natured. He was concerned that Carlton's death was an unbearable stress that could eventually destroy her.

  'It might help to talk about him,' he said as he watched her kicking small stones into the thick undergrowth. 'The boy ... uh, Carlton ...'

  'There's nothing to talk about.'

  'You could tell me how you met him.'

  She thought about this for a moment, then said, 'It was after I'd escaped ... from the attic. I'd been living rough, trying to get food anywhere I could ...' She grimaced. 'I ate some disgusting things, just to stay alive. That showed me you'd do anything to survive - anything.' She continued walking, not looking at him. 'I expect you can guess what it was like - a young girl on the street, easy target. One morning four men, four bastards...' She spat the word. '... tried to rape me. Broad daylight, on the footpath, in one of the main shopping areas. People were nearby. Nobody cared, however much I screamed. They just wanted to get on with their business. My problems were my problems.'

  Crowther watched the back of her head, reading the unspoken emotions amongst her words.

  'Carlton came out of nowhere,' she continued. 'Somehow he rounded up some of those people walking by - I don't know how he did it, he couldn't talk, but, you know, he had a way about him - people liked him, people followed him...' She stifled a sob in her throat, took a moment to wipe her eye, but still remained in control, still diamond-hard. 'They drove the men off ... saved me. Carlton saved me. And when he came over and held out his hand to help me up, and just smiled, that way he always did, I knew I'd found a friend - someone who'd help me, someone I could help.'

  Crowther watched her shoulders grow taut and her head bow. Awkwardly, he reached out a hand and laid it on her shoulders. He felt uncomfortable at making such a connection, but it did the job, for she flashed him a brief, sad smile. It made her look like a different person.

  'Now we're never going to find out who he really was ... or what he could do,' she said.

  'Perhaps he was simply a good person,' Crowther said. 'No more, no less. Perhaps he had already done the job i
ntended for him, and nothing more was planned for him. His work was over.'

  Mahalia eyed him curiously. 'Do you believe in God, Professor?'

  'I did, then I didn't, and now ... I'm open to arguments.' The question unnerved him and he quickly moved the conversation away. 'So where do you come from, young Mahalia? You've been a little bit of a dark horse since we met. You've clearly had the benefit of a good education and there's an air of the well-to-do about you.' He kicked himself mentally for sounding so false, but trying to be nice didn't come easily to him. It felt as if they were two blind people groping round in the dark, trying to discover if the other was animal, mineral or vegetable.

  She sighed and for a second he thought she was not going to answer. But the openness they had both displayed had worked a spell on her. 'I don't really like talking about the past,' she said. 'It's gone, dead. But ... OK ... I went to Cheltenham Ladies' College. A boarder. My dad and mum lived in Hampshire. He ran a financial services company. Mum did charity work, that sort of stuff. It wasn't easy to be black in those sorts of circles, but they did OK. They seemed to like it. When the Fall came and everything started going mad, I tried to get back to them. I stole a car with a couple of friends, and when it ran out of petrol I walked. Got back to the house just over a week later. There was no sign of them.'

  'Do you have any idea what might have happened?'

  She shook her head, but had a strange faraway look on her face, as if remembering long-forgotten facts. 'There was some food on the table, half-eaten, but they were gone - like they'd been snatched away. Who knows? Whatever ... you know, the things they did ... they didn't give them any sort of skills to survive in the world we've got now. In their world, they were big shots, but now ... what use are people who only know how to make money?'

  He raised his voice as a strong breeze rustled the undergrowth. 'You're very keen on this survival thing.'

  She shrugged. 'When it comes down to it, you've only got yourself. No one else is going to look after you.'

  He couldn't argue with that. Mopping his brow, he realised something curious: there was no cooling breeze, so how could the undergrowth continue to rustle? The answer came at him like a wolf, and he turned with dread.

  Purple light floated amongst the trees as far as his eye could see. The Lament-Brood's advance had been as silent as death, hidden behind the conversation and the background noise of the forest. He cursed himself for not being more on guard.

  His shock was compounded when he saw that the army had at least doubled in size from the number that had emerged from the river. Could the Whisperers have altered some of the Gehennis, perhaps other of the forest's mysterious inhabitants? A virus, infecting, transforming, spreading exponentially.

  Crowther urged Mahalia to run just as the insidious whispering grew louder. He imagined the virulent sound as snakes slithering through the vegetation, preparing to rise up once near them.

  Mahalia was lighter on her feet and quickly moved ahead while the professor lumbered on behind, lungs burning, face red. Further back, but not much, the thunder of the Lament-Brood's mounts shook the ground.

  Mahalia slowed when she realised he wasn't at her heels.

  'Don't wait for me,' he said.

  She hesitated.

  'I said, don't wait for me!'

  She broke ahead and he did his best to keep up, the whispering growing more intense, insinuating into Crowther's head. Black thoughts bloomed, their florid misery spreading through his mind. His legs grew leaden.

  Give up. Lie down. Die.

  With a rapid flick of his wrist, he smacked his staff against his forehead, and then even harder against his nose. He howled a stream of four-letter words and blood splattered on to his lips, but it earned him some respite.

  Ahead, he saw Mahalia veer into the trees. She'd seen something - probably a short cut, for the path was curling round upon itself. Against his better judgment, Crowther followed. Through the trees, there was blue sky; the forest's edge. Mahalia suddenly came up sharp, wobbling back and forth and trying to balance herself with flailing arms.

  'Wait—!' she cried.

  Crowther couldn't stop. He ploughed into the back of her, propelling her forward, over the edge of a cliff. He yelled out in shock, catching a branch to stop himself following her and then lashing out with his other arm. He was too late. With a scream, she went plummeting down.

  Crowther could hear rushing water, glimpse the white of the rapids far, far below to his right, where the view over the lip was clear.

  Panic exploded in him. He'd killed her! Ignoring the rapidly approaching Whisperers, he dropped to his knees and peered over the lip. Ten feet below, a thin ledge wound its way along the cliff face. There was no sign of Mahalia. A cry caught his attention, and away to his right he saw Matt and Jack edging their way as quickly as possible along the path towards him.

  Dazed, Crowther lowered himself over the lip. He took one last glance at the purple mist drifting dreamily amongst the trees, and then he let go, not really caring if he overbalanced and was smashed on the rocks far below.

  Jack yelled at him. He read the words on the boy's lips before the sound came to him: 'She's still alive!'

  Perplexed, he leaned over the edge to find Mahalia clinging to a crevice not far below the edge of the path, her face bloody from a gash on her forehead. Overcome with a sweeping joy, Crowther tried to get to her, but Jack and Matt barged him to one side so that this time he almost did overbalance. Jack and Matt knelt down, reaching for Mahalia's hands, but the path was so narrow that they could barely gain any purchase.

  Mahalia's arms trembled with the strain, and her face had the desperate fear of someone who knew their life was numbered in minutes. Then her wild, white eyes rolled to the right and the fear became more avid.

  Crowther glanced back along the path to see one of the Gehennis, its horrific form twisted, the purple mist running through it like capillaries of smoke.

  Aware of the approaching danger, Matt and Jack worked frantically, but still couldn't get leverage. Crowther stood up, braced his back against the rock and gripped both their belts. There was a brief moment of anxiety, and then they gave their trust to him, pushing themselves out over the edge and allowing him to take their weight, in the certain knowledge that if he faltered they would all go.

  Crowther knew it, too, but he was determined in a way he had never been before to live up to what was expected of him. Matt and Jack lunged down to grab Mahalia's arms.

  Behind the Gehennis, more of the Lament-Brood followed. The whispering even began to drown out the thunder of the water.

  'I'm not listening!' Crowther roared.

  With a heave, Mahalia came up. For a second they all feared they were going over, but Crowther held firm until Mahalia was on the path.

  'No time to rest!' Crowther yelled. 'Move!'

  Jack helped Mahalia along, though she looked fit to fall again, and Matt followed. The vividness of the experience gave Crowther a moment of startling clarity as he realised that he didn't want to die after all.

  The Lament-Brood pressed hard at their backs as they edged along the precipitous ledge. Finally, the Court of the Dreaming Song came into view. They clambered up a flight of stone steps to a large flagged courtyard suspended over the gorge. An arched oak door twenty feet high led into the interior of the court. But as they hurried towards it, Matt held out his arms to stop them. 'This is a defensible position. We have to destroy the path to stop them getting in here.'

  'How can we do that?' Crowther snapped. Nervously, he glanced back to see a column of Lament-Brood barely two minutes away from the steps. 'Come on,' Crowther said. 'Inside.'

  'No.' Matt grabbed Jack's shoulders. 'You've got to use that thing inside you. Like you did on the boat.'

  Dismay seeped into Jack's face. 'I can't!'

  Matt shook him hard. 'You have to.'

  'Leave him alone.' Mahalia tried to pull Matt's hands free, but she was still weak from the shock.


  'I can't control it,' Jack pleaded. 'I'm afraid ... I could set off the whole Wish-Hex! I could destroy everything!'

  Matt thrust Jack in the direction of the path. 'Just do it. You controlled it before—'

  'That was by chance!'

  '—you can do it again.'

  Jack hovered, looked to Mahalia for support, and then with shoulders sagging, he ran to the top of the flight of stone steps.

  'What if he does take us out?' Crowther yelled above the roar of the water.

  'He won't,' Matt said. 'They wouldn't have put the bomb in him if it could be randomly detonated. They're not stupid - they must have some kind of military mind to do a thing like that. There has to be a fail-safe.'

  'You could have told him that!' Mahalia said.

  'I want him upset and angry so he'll blow that path to kingdom come.'

  Jack looked small and forlorn against the stone rail that ran around the edge of the courtyard. He bowed his head, then pivoted at the waist. When he rose up, a sheet of silvery light ballooned out from him. All the sound was sucked out of the vicinity until, with a pop, the bubble of light burst.

  Matt, Crowther and Mahalia were knocked flat on their backs by a wall of pressure. A sonic boom made their ears ache and when they looked up Jack was clutching on to the rail for support. Beyond him a cloud of dust rose up from where the path had been, and mingling with it were the last few strands of purple mist.

  Matt nodded with satisfaction. 'That did the trick.'

  'There is another way of looking at it,' Crowther said. 'Let's hope we get a warm welcome, because there's no going back.'

  'Somebody's having fun.' Matt nudged Crowther as they examined the large, impressive doors. Jack and Mahalia sat on the rail overlooking the gorge. They were locked in a deep embrace. There was more desperation than passion in their kiss, the recognition of kindred loneliness and a hunger to fill that void.