“Not a lot of room back here,” she said, laying the sheathed sword down on the floor, with a slight double take at the presence of Merlin’s suitcase.
“We had a limited selection of vehicles to choose from,” replied Merlin.
“Based on the prerequisite that it had to make us feel like we were in an episode of The Professionals,” added Vivien. “I’m Bodie and he’s Doyle.”
“So I have to be Georgina Cowley?” asked Susan. “Thanks.”
“She’s the boss, to be fair,” said Vivien.
“Yeah, and thirty years older than the others,” said Susan.
“Still tough, though,” said Merlin. He blipped the engine, put it in gear, and eased out onto the road, craning forward to look up through the windscreen. “You see the helicopter or the birds, Vivien?”
“Can’t see the helicopter,” replied Vivien, who’d wound her window down for a better view. “The murmuration is heading for the middle of the wood.”
“Okay,” muttered Merlin. He put his foot down and the car roared in answer, fishtailing slightly as it left the lay-by and accelerated out into the road.
“Take it easy,” said Vivien. “We don’t want to attract attention.”
Merlin slowed down to thirty, nodding.
“Where are we going?” asked Susan.
“First we need to find a phone and call in,” continued Vivien. “I asked Cousin Linda to follow up on the silversmith records and Aunt Zoë should have got the library card UV photographs done. We need to know that information before we can work anything else out.”
“Yes,” said Susan. The strange fizzing, apprehensive but also expectant sensation inside her leaped up as she spoke. It was almost as if the power that was building up within her also wanted to know—needed to know—who her father was. A puzzle completed would lead her to . . . to completion.
“Thurston and Merrihew will cut in if we call,” warned Merlin.
“I know,” said Vivien calmly. “We have to risk it.”
“Risk it?” asked Susan. “They must know about me by now, surely?”
“They may have known all along,” said Merlin heavily.
“What do you mean?”
“Merlin thinks either Thurston or Merrihew may actually be behind the attempts to kidnap you,” said Vivien calmly. “And therefore also the police officers who were compelled to shoot at us.”
“What?!”
“But I have to say the latter event makes me think they’re not involved, or at least not directly.”
“I don’t know—” Merlin started to say, but Vivien didn’t let him go on.
“They’re definitely both lazy and can’t be bothered with their responsibilities anymore,” continued Vivien. “I agree they should retire. And they may know more about Susan’s father and whoever wants to grab hold of Susan than they let on. But that’s a sin of omission, not commission. I can’t believe either of them would compel police officers to kill us. Or that either would arrange for Mum to be murdered.”
Merlin was silent for a few seconds, intent on the road ahead.
“I don’t know. I think . . . I feel . . . suspicious. But I don’t know. I get mad at them for not doing the things that need to be done. I suppose laziness or inattention is more likely than anything else. . . .”
“What about the Cauldron-Born?” asked Susan. She had a vivid memory of that strange, cricked-neck man crossing the lawn, his horrid shadow crawling behind him. “I know Helen and Zoë said they couldn’t have come from your grail, but do you accept that?”
“Helen and Zoë know far more about our grail and the Grail-Keeper than I do,” said Merlin. “Though I guess I’d like to hear it from the horse’s mouth.”
“The Greats are still going to be a problem,” said Vivien. “Whether they’re actively involved or not, they’ll want to sweep things under the carpet, or even to apply the old-style solution to the problem Susan represents. We need to figure out what—”
“I think I need to go to my father,” said Susan suddenly. She sounded surprised, as if this was a revelation to herself. She frowned, and repeated her words. “I need to go to my father.”
“Uh, Cousin Helen thought he’s probably . . . gone,” said Vivien.
“And I’m pretty sure he isn’t,” said Susan. “I can’t explain it, and I wish it wasn’t happening, but whatever power my father has given me is kind of . . . waking up. And I have this overwhelming sense I need to find him, whoever and wherever he is.”
“Do you have a sense of that?” asked Merlin. “The where, I mean? We’re coming up to a crossroad. I’ve been heading away from those birds, but if you have somewhere more definite. . . .”
“North,” said Susan. Her hand flashed up, and pointed. “North. That’s all I know.”
“If your father is still extant, it’s possible he sent the Fenris,” said Merlin cautiously. “I mean, that would make sense. An Ancient Sovereign securing his child.”
“Why wouldn’t he tell me?” asked Susan. “He could have phoned! Or come to visit Mum. I think whoever wants to abduct me is an enemy of my father, and so, of me.”
“We really need to find a phone,” said Vivien, shaking her head. “We need more information. That has to be our main objective.”
“Keep watching the murmuration,” said Merlin. “And the helicopter. And we need to change this car.”
Chapter Eighteen
The night wraps me in darkness
Clouds deny the stars and moon
I see nothing, hear nothing
Perhaps I do not even exist
THEY DROVE NORTHWEST ALONG A COUNTRY LANE, A NARROW STRIP of asphalt hardly wider than the car, bordered by flat, wire-fenced fields of clover and other hay grass, a rural vista of extreme dullness, certainly not a tourist’s picturesque green and merry England.
Susan looked back at the murmuration of starlings through the rear window. The vast, constantly moving cloud of birds was over the wood now, dark, groping, fuzzy-edged fingers swooping down into the trees and up again, to rejoin the huge flock above.
“I think they’ve worked out I’m not in the wood anymore,” she said.
As she spoke, the murmuration broke into four
