“Just bones?” I said. “No different from anyone else’s?”
“No,” said Alex. “I think, if you dragged away the crucifix and dug him up… he’d look exactly like he did the day he was buried. Untouched by time or the grave. And he’d open his eyes and smile at you, and tell you to cover him up again. He was the Devil’s son after all, the Antichrist in person, even if he did refuse the honour to make his own path. You really think the world is finished with him yet? Or vice versa? No… the bastard’s still hoping some poor damned fool will find his missing heart and return it to him. Then he’ll rise out of that grave and go forth to do awful things in the Nightside… and no-one will be able to stop him.”
“God, you’re fun to be around, Alex,” I said.
We moved on, giving the grave plenty of room. The blue-white light moved with us, cold and intense, and our shadows seemed far too big to be ours. The darkness and the silence pressed in around us. Finally, we came to a bare and undistinguished-looking door, set flush into the stone wall. A gleaming copper latch, inscribed with blocky Druidic symbols, held it shut. I reached out a hand to the latch, then snatched it quickly back again. Some inner voice was shouting loudly that it would be a very bad idea for anyone but Alex to touch it. He smiled at me tiredly.
“This door will open out onto anywhere you want, within a one-mile radius of the bar,” he said. “Announce your destination out loud, and I’ll send you on your way. But be really sure of where you want to go, because once you’re through the door, that’s it. It’s a one-way door.”
“Who put it here?” said Suzie.
“Who do you think?” said Alex.
“You mean this door’s been here for fifteen hundred years?” I said.
Alex shrugged. “Maybe longer. This is the oldest bar in the world, after all. Now get the hell out of here. I’ve got customers waiting upstairs with my money burning a hole in their pockets.”
“Thank you, Alex,” I said. “You didn’t have to do this.”
“What the hell,” said Alex. “You’re family. In every way that matters.”
We smiled briefly at each other, then looked away. We’ve never been very good at saying the things that matter.
“Where do we want to go to?” said Suzie, probably not even noticing the undercurrents. She’d never been very good at emotions, even hers. “You can bet Walker’s people will be guarding all the approaches to the Necropolis.”
“Not if we go directly there,” I said.
“Not possible,” Alex said immediately. “I told you, nothing over a mile radius.”
I grinned. “I was thinking of paying the Doormouse a visit.”
Suzie winced visibly. “Do we have to? I mean, he’s so damned… cute. I don’t do cute.”
“Brace yourself,” I said kindly. “It’ll be over before you know it.”
I announced our destination in a loud, clear voice, and Alex hit the latch and pulled the door open, revealing a typical Nightside street. People and other things bustled briskly back and forth, and the gaudy Technicolor neon pushed back the gloom of the cellar. I strode forward into the welcoming night, with Suzie right behind me, and Alex slammed the door shut.
To the crowds in the street, we must have seemed to appear suddenly out of nowhere, but that was nothing new in the Nightside, so no-one noticed, or if they did, no-one gave a damn. They were all intent on pursuing their own pleasures and damnations. The twilight daughters catcalled to prospective customers from the street corners, sticking out their breasts and batting kohl-stained eyes. Club barkers cried their wares to the more unsuspecting tourists, and the traffic on the road roared past without ever, ever stopping.
I hurried down the rain-slick pavement, noting without surprise that some people were already muttering my name and Suzie’s into mobile phones. Must be a really good price on my head. And there was the Doormouse’s shop, right ahead. It was set between a new establishment called the Bazaar of the Bizarre and a music emporium that specialised in rare vinyl LPs from alternate dimensions. I paused despite myself to check out the latest specials in the window. There was a Rolling Stones album with Marianne Faithfull as the lead singer, a Pink Floyd debut LP where they were fronted by Arthur Brown, and a live double album of Janis Joplin, from her gigs as an overweight, middle-aged lounge singer in Las Vegas. I wasn’t tempted. Not at those prices.
The frosted-glass doors hissed open as I entered the Doormouse’s excellent establishment. Then I had to go back out again and drag Suzie Shooter in. Inside, it was all very high-tech, with rows of computers and towering stacks of futuristic technology, most of which I couldn’t even identify, let alone hope to understand. The Doormouse had very good contacts and an uncanny eye for a bargain. But what he did best… was doors. He came bustling forward to meet us, a cheerful six-foot-tall roughly humanoid mouse, with dark chocolate fur under a pristine white lab coat, complete with pocket protector. He had a long muzzle with twitching whiskers, but his kind eyes were entirely human. He lurched to a halt before us, clapped his paws together, and chattered pleasantly in a high-pitched but perfectly clear voice.
“Welcome, welcome, sir and lady, to my humble establishment! Am I correct in thinking I am in the presence of two of the Nightside’s most noted celebrities? John Taylor and Shotgun Suzie, no less! My, my, what a day! I know, I know, you weren’t expecting all this technology, were you? No-one ever does. You hear the name Doormouse, and immediately your thoughts go all rustic, but I, sir and lady, am a Town Mouse! And proud of it! Now, what can I do for you? I have doors for everyone, to everywhere, and all points between. And all at very reasonable prices! So, just state your travelling needs, and I shall rush to satisfy them! Why is she growling at me?”
“Don’t mind her,” I said. “She’s being herself. Are you the only mouse in the Nightside? That is…”
“I quite grasp your meaning, sir. There were others, once, but they all moved away to a small town in the countryside. Wimps. I am the only one of my kind currently residing here.”
“Good,” said Suzie. “I was beginning to think I’d have to start putting bigger traps down.”
“I need a door,” I said, loudly. “One that will take us directly to the Necropolis. Is that going to be a problem?”
“Oh no, sir, not at all,” said the Doormouse, edging just a little further away from Suzie. “I always keep a number of the more common destination doors in stock, ready for sale. Both inside and outside the Nightside. This way if you please, sir and… lady…”
He scurried away deeper into his shop, with Suzie and me in close pursuit, to a showroom full of doors standing upright on end, apparently entirely unsupported. Neat handwritten labels announced the destination they opened onto. Shadows Fall, Hy Breasil, Hyperborea, Carcosa. Together with a whole series of doors that would take you practically anywhere inside the Nightside. But it was two other doors that caught my attention, standing a little off to one side. They were labelled simply Heaven and Hell. They looked no different than any of the others— simple waxed and polished wood, each with a gleaming brass handle.
“Ah yes,” said the Doormouse, easing chummily in beside me. “Everyone notices those.”
“Can they really take you where it says they go?” I said.
“That is a matter of some debate,” the Doormouse admitted, crinkling his muzzle. “The theory’s sound, and the mathematics quite clear. Certainly no-one who’s gone through has ever come back to complain…”
“Let us talk of other things,” I said.
“Yes, let’s,” said the Doormouse.
He led us past other doors, some labelled in languages and ideographs even I couldn’t identify. And I’ve been around. We finally came to a door labelled Necropolis. The Doormouse patted it affectionately with one padded paw.
“I always keep this one charged up and at the ready for people who need to visit the Necropolis for a sad occasion. Much more dignified than fighting the traffic in a black Rolls Royce. This door will deliver you and the… lady, to right outside the main entrance.”
“Not inside?” I said sharply.
“She’s started growling again,” said the Doormouse. “No, no, sir. Never inside! My doors lead only to exterior locations. If word got out that I was willing to provide access to the interiors of buildings, thus circumventing all usual security measures, you can be sure the Authorities would send Walker to shut me down. With prejudice. Now, sir, let us talk of the price.”
We haggled for a while, and he drove a really hard bargain for a mouse. We finally settled for an only
