'I'm not going to hurt you.'
'Right.' Her laugh was laced with bitterness. 'I tried to murder you. God, all this time I thought I had. You, and Jack, and Miller, and… and… little Virginia.'
'They're all fine.'
A sob broke through; her expression was shattered. 'You loved me. You're the only person I've ever met who loves me for who I am, not what I can give you, and I betrayed you. Of course you're going to kill me. And you're going to make me suffer first. And why the hell not! I deserve it.' She pushed herself fully into the window, glancing at the dizzying drop.
'What are you doing, Laura?'
'What does it look like I'm doing? You think I can carry on-' The words caught in her throat.
'I still love you.'
Laura flinched as if she'd been slapped.
'I've never said that to anyone before.'
She gulped back a sob. 'What's wrong with you, you crazy bastard? I tried to kill you!'
'I know you. I know how your mind works. I know how your heart works. I know every tiny, twisty turn of your maze-like personality. And I know that once you peel back all the protective layers you've wrapped yourself in, deep down inside you're a good person. I believe in you. Whatever you tried to do to me, that's not you.'
Laura began to cry. 'It's the end of the world out there, and we're having a boyfriend-girlfriend talk! For God's sake, get a grip! You're supposed to be the hero!'
Laura hovered on the brink for a moment, and then collapsed onto the window ledge. Hunter pulled her up, holding the Balor Claw behind his back.
Looking deep into his eyes, she said, 'You always were a good liar, Hunter. Do it, then. I won't stop you.'
Hunter pushed her against the wall and ripped her T-shirt down the back. Embedded in her shoulder-blade was a shiny black spider. As he watched, it dug its legs deeper into her flesh. With relief, Laura began to cry silently.
'You'll never get it out,' she said.
'How long has it been there?'
'After you saved me from the Court of the Final Word and I went back to Earth… no one asked how I found the others so easily in New York. Everyone takes so many coincidences for granted, nobody questions any more. They caught me and fixed that bastard into my flesh. I was their fail-safe. Every time things looked like they were going in the wrong direction, I was forced to give a little shove, make a comment, do whatever it took to destabilise. Brilliant, wasn't it? Because that's what I do anyway!'
'Hold still.' Hunter deftly manoeuvred the Balor Claw so that he could plunge it into the spider without touching Laura's flesh. With a sizzle, the spider was wrenched from Existence.
Gasping for breath, Laura clutched at the wall for support. 'It was whispering in my head all the time. It wouldn't let me speak… do anything to show it was there. I let everybody down.'
'You couldn't help it.'
'Why couldn't I fight against it? I gave Veitch such a hard time when the Caraprix controlled him, and now… I'm so sorry for how I treated him.'
'Hush.' Slipping the Balor Claw into his backpack, Hunter held her tightly.
She remained silent for a moment and then said quietly, 'You bastard. How could you believe in me? Now I've got no excuse.'
'You never had any — you were just too dumb to see it.' He kissed her on the forehead. 'Hmm. I guess this isn't the right time for sex. We have a bit of a job to do first. You up for it?'
Laura pulled herself away from him, gradually finding her equilibrium. 'So, who do you want killing?'
3
From the parting of ways in the lower levels of the Fortress, Church, Ruth, Veitch, Shavi and Tom were guided by the hooded giant's whispering directions to take the most direct route to the location of the Burning Man at the heart of the sprawling complex. They stayed in the network of sewer-like tunnels, vaults and natural caverns that formed the base of the Fortress, where they were sure they would meet no resistance.
'All right,' Veitch said, 'they're going to send their reinforcements to the walls to hold back our forces, but that doesn't mean they're stupid. They're not going to leave an open channel right into the most sensitive part of their operation.'
'They don't know we're coming,' Ruth argued. 'Why waste troops when they could be putting them to good use? Church, what do you think?'
'I agree with Ryan.' Caledfwlch's flames provided Church with just enough illumination to pick his way through the oppressive gloom. He was distracted, increasingly brooding the deeper they progressed into the Fortress. 'At the very least the Libertarian is going to be shadowing us. He might not remember everything that led up to his transformation, but there's a chance he recalls how we got into the Fortress.'
Tom, too, was increasingly introspective, and he compulsively twisted the ring given to him by Freyja.
When the corridor led into another cavern in the bedrock beneath the Fortress's foundations, they came to a slow halt, unnerved by what lay ahead. The previous caverns had been bare rock, but this one resembled a cemetery, with jumbled mausoleums and crypts, and graves in the grey dust floor. Lanterns hung from some of the houses of the dead, the pinpoints of illumination stretching out far into the dark ahead. An autumnal chill hung in the air and there was an odour of damp vegetation, although none was visible.
'Now this is… strange.' Church scanned the cemetery for any sign of movement; it was still and silent.
'It's like the Grim Lands,' Ruth whispered. 'This is just how Mallory and Caitlin described it.'
'What's with all this death stuff?' Veitch asked. 'Grim isn't the word. We become Brothers and Sisters of Dragons when we experience death. We keep getting topped, then coming back — some more than others. And people keep telling us it's in the air and all about us.'
'Death is the key to everything,' Shavi said. 'It always has been; it is just that we have been unable to see it, because of the way we have been brought up to consider it. We think of death as grim, terrible, the ultimate harsh reality, but anyone who has experienced death knows there is magic circling around it. It is almost as if death clears a space, in reality, in the mind, and allows magic to enter. Because death is not mundane, anything but. It is the opposite of mundane. It is, quite definitely, the key to everything. Change. Transformation. We only fear death because we think of it as the end. But if it is only a doorway… the entrance to another room, another house, another street, another town, what then? What then?'
After searching the entrance to the cavern, Church said, 'No way around it. We'll have to go through it.'
'What is this? We're all Going on a Bear Hunt?' Ruth said.
Cautiously, Church led them into the cemetery, the dust soft underfoot, the air growing damper the further they advanced.
'Try telling that to someone who's just lost a loved one,' Veitch said to Shavi. 'Magic? No chance.'
'Of course we feel grief at those times,' Shavi replied, 'and that emotion is so potent it often crushes our senses so much that we fail to appreciate what else is happening. Before I left home, I had to drive my aunt on an emergency trip to the specialist spinal unit at a hospital in Sheffield. My uncle was dying. He had fallen downstairs a few years earlier and paralysed himself from the chest down. From that moment on, it was a constant fight against infection, one that he was losing. The antibiotics were not working. My aunt received a call at midnight to say he did not have long left.'
Shavi's calm voice soothed them, and though Veitch knew it was one of Shavi's kindly acts to keep them at ease during a time of tension, he still appreciated it.
'The M1 was deserted,' Shavi continued. 'The hospital was immense, but completely empty too, when we arrived at two-thirty a.m. And I could tell the moment I stepped out of the car that there was something special in the air. A stillness, a sense of the infinite peering in to see us in our glass tank. I swear there was magic there. And in the ward too, devoid of the usual bustle of waiting relatives, there was a completely different feel. It was buzzing
