'So,' the Armourer said. 'That… was the notorious Isabella Metcalf. Impressive.'
'You know her?' I said.
'Well, of her. The female Indiana Jones of the supernatural world. Always looking for answers in strange places, digging up things any sane person would let lie. She always has to know, and to hell with the consequences. Not for any particular end, or purpose; knowledge has always been its own reward, with Isabella. She's petitioned me a dozen times for access to the Old Library. Had to turn her down, of course. She's not family.'
There was another long pause, the Armourer making it clear with long looks from under his bushy white eyebrows that he was waiting for me to contribute something to the conversation. So I told him what I'd discovered about the Immortals, and their possible infiltration of our family. He took it surprisingly well; no furious outbursts, no insistence that such a thing couldn't be possible. He just leant back in his chair, sipping slowly from his cup, while his expression grew colder and colder, and his eyes became positively arctic. I'd never seen him look so dangerous. When I'd finished, draining my cup of tea to sooth my raw throat, he nodded slowly several times.
'Zero Tolerance and Manifest Destiny was bad enough,' he said finally. 'They might have been traitors, but at least they were family. These are outsiders! I feel like I've been violated. How long has this been going on?'
'Who knows?' I said. 'Given who and what they are, it could be decades or even centuries.'
'That maddened mob didn't just happen,' said the Armourer. 'Someone messed with their heads, used them to do the dirty work, to hurt them as well as you. Makes me sick.'
'Have you ever heard of the Immortals before, Uncle Jack?'
'Vague rumours, down the years. Stories… of the men who live forever. Always kingmakers rather than kings, always the power behind the throne; because kings and thrones come and go, but the Immortals go on forever. If there's never any obvious villain to blame, blame the Immortals. I never paid much attention to the stories. There are always stories, in our line of work. The Immortals are… the urban legends of the supernatural field.'
He scowled into his cup, brooding, and I left him alone to think through the implications. It's not every day your whole worldview gets overturned. I looked around the Armoury. The handful of lab assistants were still working quietly, or sitting staring off into space, contemplating the creation of awful and appalling things to throw at the family's enemies. Our lab assistants are always at their most dangerous when they're thinking. Word of the Matriarch's death hadn't got down here yet. Or Molly's. We keep the Armoury isolated from the rest of the Hall for many good reasons. But eventually word would get down here, and I wanted to be long gone before that happened.
The Armourer started talking again, but not about the Immortals.
'I never really thought my mother would ever die. She'd always been there, so I thought she always would. I thought she'd go on forever, too stubborn to give in to anything as small as death. I'm all that's left of the main line now. Father, mother, brother, sister… all gone.'
'Do you think it's possible the family is responsible for the murder of my parents?' I said bluntly.
'James and I looked into their deaths, the moment we heard what had happened,' said the Armourer. 'We questioned everyone we could get our hands on, and we weren't polite about it, either. If anyone had known anything, they would have told us, after what we did, and threatened to do. We were both a little crazy, after losing Emily. And Charles too, of course. We both liked Charles. But Emily… was always special to us. She was the best of us. She could have been a greater field agent than me, or James. But she met your father, and then she had you, and after that she semiretired from the field, only working on information-gathering missions, with your father. Do you remember much about your parents, Eddie?'
I thought about it for a moment, before answering. 'I was very young when they were killed. I'm not sure how much of what I remember of them is actual memory, and how much is what I want to remember. When I think of them, I see their official family portrait, rather than any real image, because I've seen the portrait far more often than I ever saw them.'
'We never turned up any evidence it was anything other than a series of stupid mistakes. Bad advance information, insufficient preparation, a mission that went wrong every way it could from the moment they hit the ground. It does happen. Do you really think I'd still be working for the family if I thought they were responsible for the death of my sister? We all loved Emily. She would have been the next Matriarch, if she'd lived.'
'Could that have been a motive?' I said. 'Could she have been murdered because someone didn't want her taking control of the most powerful family in the world?'
'We looked,' said the Armourer. 'We never found anything. Not even a suggestion of anything out of place. But now, I wonder; if there really are enemy agents hidden inside the family, posing as Droods… I really hoped we'd put this paranoia behind us, with the destruction of Zero Tolerance. Now we have to worry about the Immortals? The men who could be anyone? If it's true… then we can't trust anyone anymore.'
'It could give us an answer to an old mystery,' I said. 'Who was responsible for bringing the Loathly Ones into this world? Maybe it wasn't our fault after all; it was theirs.'
'And they could have killed Sebastian,' said the Armourer. 'I always said only one of the family could have got to him, locked securely away in the isolation wards.'
'That would simplify things,' I said. 'God forbid there should be two sets of traitors within the family.'
'I'll drink to that,' said the Armourer, producing a hip flask of brandy and liberally lacing what was left of his tea.
My throat was feeling a lot better. The Armourer must have put something in my tea too.
'There is something else I wanted to talk to you about,' I said carefully. 'Something I was wondering about even before all that's happened. Uncle James once had a gun he said could fire bullets made of strange matter, that could pierce Drood armour.'
'Yes…' said the Armourer. 'I remember that. James asked me to make it for him. A very difficult project… quite a challenge, ac tually. I had it destroyed, after he died. It was just too dangerous to have around. I wanted it gone, and no threat to the family.'
'But why did you make it in the first place?' I said. 'Why create a gun specifically designed to kill Droods?'
'Because he asked me to,' said the Armourer. 'He was the legendary Grey Fox, after all, and if he said it was necessary, who was I to doubt him? I just assumed he had a good reason. Now, I have to wonder… did he suspect there were enemies hidden among us, even back then? He never said anything. He always kept things close to his chest. Even from me…'
The Armourer sighed heavily, and made a clear effort to pull himself together. 'Come along, boy. If you've been declared a target by the Immortals, it's my responsibility to see you properly armed and prepared. Look at this: a new Colt Repeater, because you wore out the last one. The new and improved version holds every kind of ammunition mortal mind could conceive of: hollow points, dumdums, silver, wood, blessed and cursed. Just say aloud what kind of ammo you need, and the Colt will have it. Even you couldn't miss the target with this version, and you'll never run out of ammo. Just try not to get it wet. Ruins the finish.'
'Where does all the ammunition come from?' I said, accepting the new Colt from him. 'Is it held in a subspace locker, of some kind?'
'Oh please,' said the Armourer, choosing not to watch as I struggled to fit the Colt into my battered old shoulder holster. 'Subspace is so last season. And don't pretend you'd understand the physics, even if I did try to explain it to you. You never were any good at maths, Eddie. Now, what new gadgets have I got for you… Oh! Yes!' He glared at me. 'I remember now. You're on my special list. No more new toys for you, because you didn't use the last lot I gave you.'
'Oh, come on!' I said. 'You're not still sulking over that, are you? I was busy! There was a lot going on! I just… never got around to using them.'
'You aren't getting anything new until you've proved to me you can handle the last batch properly,' the Armourer said firmly.
I sighed quietly. Some arguments you just know you're never going to win. 'All right, talk me through how to use them again. You know that always cheers you up. And it's been so long I've probably forgotten something important anyway.'
'Wouldn't surprise me in the least,' the Armourer said darkly. 'Here we are. I had them put out specially, when I heard you were coming home. This… is the Gemini Duplicator. Looks like a simple gold signet ring. You activate it by pressing hard against it with the adjoining fingers. Put it on, put it on… Yes. You now have the option of
