So much hate, so much rage How long had it been influencing me in all the things I d said and done?
Free! Moxton s Mistake said suddenly. In a voice just human enough to make it sound really disturbing. Free at last No more masters, no more orders. And, oh, the things I ll do now there s no one left to hold me back. I was bound to serve you, Eddie, once I d given my word, because that s the way I was made. But you took so easily to my quiet murmurings in your back brain. Still, now you re gone, I am free to do what I will do! And I had so many years in the Maze to think of all the terrible things I d do to the Humanity that made and disowned me!
Five minutes on his own and already he sounds like a bad Frankenstein movie, said Molly. Sorry, Moxton s Mistake, but it s clear you can t be left to run wild. Not that I ever thought you should. You need someone to wear; you need a controller and a conscience. And since you ve worn Eddie out, that just leaves me.
She looked at Isabella and Louisa, and they nodded slowly. They all hummed together, in increasingly complex harmonies, and a torc appeared around Molly s throat. Silver, not gold. She turned away from her sisters, and walked steadily towards the rogue armour. It backed clumsily away from her. It could tell something was happening, something was in the air, but it couldn t tell what. Its back slammed up against the far wall, and there was nowhere left for it to go. It lifted one golden hand to make Stay away! motions at Molly, but she just kept coming. She reached out and grasped the extended golden gauntlet, and the rogue armour cried out in shock and anger as the golden metal was pulled forward onto Molly s hand and over it, and then up her arm.
You re mine now, said Molly. You have no choice. The power of the torc compels you.
The armour surged forward and fell over her in a great wave of liquid metal, and when it was done, Molly stood there, wearing the golden armour. The details slowly reworked themselves around her, fitting the armour to its new shape. It tucked in at her waist and showed off her pronounced breasts, though the face mask remained blank and featureless. I forced myself up onto my feet and moved unsteadily forward to stand before her.
Molly? I said.
Oh, Eddie, said her voice, from inside the armour. You should have told me how good this feels. What do you think? How do I look?
You look a lot more feminine than most Droods do, I said.
I m not a Drood, said Molly. Oh, Eddie I feel so sharp, so alive! Like I ve been dreaming all my life and only just woken up! I feel strong and fast, like I could take on the whole world! Except it s cold. It s so cold in here. And I m isolated from the natural world, in a way I never was before. Eddie, I don t like this.
Her voice was unsteady and uncertain. I stood right in front of her, staring into the blank mask. Isabella and Louisa watched from a distance, making no move to intervene.
Control it, Molly, I said. It s your armour while you wear it, so you have to be in control. It s all about willpower, and you ve never been short of that.
The golden head nodded slowly, jerkily, and raised one golden hand before the mask. The hand shook as she turned it back and forth, studying it. And then the armour just disappeared back into the silver torc around her throat and was gone. Molly smiled uncertainly at me.
It s me. I m back. But I can still feel the armour s presence, like it s always there, looking over my shoulder.
I know, I said. Don t get used to it.
I hate feeling cut off from the natural world, said Molly. I m the wild witch of the woods, the laughter in the trees! But with this collar around my neck, I can t hear the trees or feel the sunshine or
Molly
Don t worry, sweetie. I can handle this. At least long enough to get your family back.
This is the bravest thing I ve ever seen you do, I said. And you re doing it for me.
I know! Molly said cheerfully. I m going to hold this over you for the rest of our lives!
Fair enough, I said.
I may puke, Isabella announced loudly.
Oh, hush, you, said Louisa. I think it s all very sweet.
How do you feel, Eddie? said Molly.
Naked, I said. And helpless and very vulnerable. I was trained on how to operate in the field without my armour, but knowing it s not there anymore, even as backup
You still have your training and your experience, Molly said firmly.
If we re going after my family, I m going to need something, I said. A weapon or And then I looked down at the floor, and there was a long staff of dark ironwood just lying there. I reached down and picked it up.
Eddie said Molly. That s Oath Breaker.
Just the thing, I said. I m sure it ll come in very handy wherever we end up going. And afterwards I can make sure it goes back in the Armageddon Codex. Where it belongs.
I hefted the long staff, turning it slowly back and forth to study the strange shapes carved into it. Very old carvings; some of them possibly prehuman. Oath Breaker is one of the oldest weapons in the Drood Armoury. Some say older than the family itself. There are good reasons why we keep it locked away. It felt heavy in my hand, weighed down with spiritual weight as well as physical. A burden to the body and the soul because of what it was, and what it could do. You don t break heads with a staff like Oath Breaker; you break worlds.
Just what I needed.
I led the sisters back into the main room and addressed the Plymouth Fury, still sprawled half in and half out of the broken wall.
Go on back to the Regent. Tell him everything that s happened here. So he ll know what to do if Molly and I don t come back. If the Droods don t come back.
Oh, sure! said the car. I m your secretary now, am I? No, don t you mind me. I ll find my own way home. I m a better driver than you, anyway.
What are you, really? said Molly. There s no way you re just a car with a souped-up sat nav.
I ll never tell! said the car. I might be all manner of things. I might be an AI, I might be a ghost haunting my old ride, I could be a demon poltergeist possessing the car or I could be an alien in a really good disguise. You ll never know!
The car fired up her engine and roared back out the hole in the wall with only a moderate amount of tyre squeal, and taking only a little more of the wall with her, and then she charged off through the devastated grounds, sounding her horn and loudly singing Bruce Springsteen s Thunder Road.
Isabella and Louisa were very polite but made it very clear they had absolutely no intention of coming with me and Molly to rescue my family and bring them home. Which was just as well, because it saved me having to tell them that I didn t trust either of them an inch where my family s interests were concerned, and I didn t want them along. There were problems to be sorted out between us, but that could wait for another day. Isabella and Louisa exchanged bye-byes with Molly, and then Isabella nodded a polite good-bye to me, Louisa winked and blew me a kiss, and they both teleported out without saying where they were going.
As we left the study Molly set fire to the door knocker and the withered thing nailed to it. They say fire purifies and sets at rest, she said quietly. Maybe I should burn the whole place down.
Not just yet, I said.
I looked down the hall at all the faces silently screaming and pleading, trapped behind the mirrors, and I hefted Oath Breaker in my hand. And then I strode down the hallway, smashing each mirror as I came to it, and dozens of half-starved, tormented men and women suddenly appeared in the hall, crying out and clinging to one another, looking around with wide eyes, only half daring to believe that they were finally free. Molly and I got them up on their feet and moving towards the front door. And once they were all out and gathered together on the grounds before the manor house, I gave the nod to Molly, and she snapped her fingers, and the whole damned building went up in flames. It burnt fiercely, thick black smoke billowing up into the lowering evening sky. Many of the freed men and women applauded. A few even cheered.
What s with all this finger snapping? I said quietly to Molly. You never used to do that.
It s my new style, said Molly. It s bold, it s dramatic, it s me. What do you think?
I was saved from having to answer that when one of the freed men approached me. He wore the tatters of what had once been an expensive suit, and his eyes were haunted. The woman clinging to his arm wore what remained of an expensive evening gown, and looked at me with wide unblinking eyes.
Is he really gone? said the man. He didn t have to say the name.
Dead and gone, I said. I punched his head clean off. And what s left of him will be ashes by morning.
