Book 1 - The Man With the Golden Torc (29 page)

Right, Molly said at this point. Computers baffle me. I can just
about work my e-mail, and that’s it. Though I do enjoy surfing dodgy porn sites.

So; we both burst into the doktor’s lab at the same moment,
scaring the hell out of the guy, and then stopped short to glare at each other.
I knew Molly by reputation, and of course she recognised the golden armour at
once. We both struck out at each other with every weapon we had, unleashing
energies and forces that would have been immediately fatal to anyone but us.
Doktor Koenig cried out hysterically in German and tried to protect his precious
equipment with his own body. The whole thing escalated very quickly…and we
brought the house down. The Bradbury Building just crumbled and fell apart under
the impact of the forces we unleashed, and the whole place collapsed into ruin
and rubble. Molly and I came out of it entirely unscathed, of course, but Herr
Doktor Koenig was gone, and all his equipment with him. He got blamed for the
explosion, but it was still hardly my finest hour. Certain people in my family
were very scathing.

And that was how I first met the wild witch Molly Metcalf.

The last mission we butted heads on was the case of the
Pendragon reborn. It seemed like every precog and medium in the country worth
her salt was excitedly reporting the return of the Pendragon: that Arthur had
been reincarnated and would soon start to remember who he really was. And so the
race was on to find him, with all sides ready to claim him as their own.

And brainwash the poor sod to their particular cause, Molly
interrupted.

Well, quite, I said.

Anyway, my family always has the best information, and the
Pendragon reborn was quickly identified as one Paul Anderson, a young
advertising executive based in Devon. As it turned out, the only Drood agent in
that area was still incapacitated after a very unfortunate incident involving
one of the local powers, Joan the Wad, so I was sent down to fill in on the
grounds that I was the only field agent not currently working in a case. The
family couldn’t teleport me there in case such a magic was detected and gave
away our interest. So I had to take the train down from London to Devon, and
it’s a hell of a long journey.

The family wouldn’t even spring for a first-class ticket.

But I got to Paul Anderson first, explained the situation as
best I could, showed him my armour to prove I wasn’t crazy, and persuaded him to
come back to the Hall with me, for further testing. Just to make sure he was the
real deal. (You’d be amazed how many pretenders to the throne turn up every
century. And don’t even get me started about the bloody Fisher King.) Paul was
actually rather relieved. Apparently he’d been having recurring and very vivid
dreams of knights in armour clashing bloodily on heaving battlefields, which was
a bit disturbing for a young advertising executive with prospects.

And then Molly turned up. Yelled for Paul to get the hell away
from me, called me a liar and a fascist stooge to my face, and then backed Paul
up against the wall of his own living room while she hit him with all her best
arguments. I argued my corner just as fiercely, and soon Molly and I were
shouting right into each other’s faces. Unfortunately, all we succeeded in doing
was confusing the crap out of Paul, who yelled for both of us to get out of his
house and his life and never come back. Molly wasn’t used to being out-shouted,
so she lashed out at Paul with one of her best resolution spells, forcing his
inherited core personality to the surface.

And that was when it all went to hell in a handcart.

The spell hit something inside Paul Anderson, expanded out of
all control, and blew up the cottage we were standing in. At first I really
thought Molly and I had done it again, but when the smoke cleared the three of
us were all standing safe and sound in the ruins of the cottage. Me in my
armour, Molly inside her protective shield, and Paul Anderson in blackened and
tattered clothing but with a whole new look on his face. Molly seized the moment
to attack me, determined that the Droods would not control and influence this
Pendragon reborn. I fought back, of course, and while the two of us were
distracted, the new Pendragon just walked away, into the night.

The first hint Molly and I got that something had gone terribly
wrong was when the forest on the hill behind the cottage exploded. We stopped
trying to kill each other and looked around, and for as far as I could see the
whole horizon was on fire, as century-old trees burned brightly against the
night sky. The flames leapt up high, fierce and malevolent, driven by more than
natural forces. Molly and I agreed to a very temporary truce and went up the
hill to see what the hell was going on. I’ll never forget my first sight of the
man who had been Paul Anderson, transformed and transfigured, standing laughing
in the flames, untouched by the terrible heat, chanting ancient and awful spells
in a forgotten tongue.

Turned out the precogs and mediums had only got it half right,
as usual. Paul Anderson was a Pendragon reborn, all right, but not Arthur. Paul
was Mordred, son of Arthur, back again to spread his malice in the world.

Molly and I approached him cautiously. We both knew who he was,
who he had to be. I was already thinking seriously about calling in
reinforcements. If Mordred had come into his full power, he was way out of my
league. Fortunately, Molly’s spell had brought him back prematurely, and he was
still pretty confused. Or he’d never have launched such a basic attack spell at
my armour. The armour reflected the spell right back at him and blew his as yet
unprotected human form to pieces. Nothing left of him but bloody gobbets, spread
over a wide area.

Molly disappeared while I was organising a force to deal with
the forest fire.

And the family were really scathing about this one.

That was pretty much the pattern, down the years. Molly and I
would show up to claim some important person or prize, always on different sides
of every argument, more than ready to kill each other to prevent the other from
getting away with the prize or the person. Sometimes I won, sometimes she did,
but I’d say honours were about even, on the whole. I can’t say I ever really
hated her, and I was relieved to discover she felt the same way. It was only
ever business for both of us; just the job, nothing personal. Except in a
strange way I guess it became personal. There’s nothing like repeatedly trying
to kill someone to really get to know them, and admire them. To appreciate their
qualities.

"How many people have you killed, Eddie?" Molly said finally,
hugging her knees to her chest.

I shrugged. The question didn’t make me feel uncomfortable, as
such. It just wasn’t anything I ever thought about. "I stopped counting years
ago. You?"

"Surprisingly few, all things considered. It’s a big thing to
kill someone. You don’t just kill who they are, but everyone they might have
become, and everything they might have done."

"Sometimes that’s the point," I said. It was important to me
that she understood. That I was an agent, not an assassin. "I like to think I’ve
only ever killed in self-defence, or to protect the world. To prevent future
suffering or killing. But in the end…my job was just to do whatever my family
told me to do. And I did, because I trusted them. If they told me someone needed
killing, I always assumed they must have a good reason. In my defence, I would
say that mostly they were right, and obviously so. I have killed some really
evil bastards, in my time. I could give you names…"

"I probably already know them," said Molly. "You have quite a
reputation, Eddie."

"Yes. I was proud of it, once. But not just as a killer, I
hope?"

"Well…mostly. You never were the subtlest of agents, Eddie."

"Lot you know," I said airily. "Most of the jobs I did, I was in
and out and never left a trace. That’s the mark of a good agent: to get the job
done, and no one ever knows you were there."

"If you say so," said Molly, smiling. "But…did you never
question any of your orders? Any of your assignments?"

"Why should I? They were my family. We were all raised to fight
the good fight, to protect the world, to see ourselves as heroes in the greatest
game of all. Family was the one thing you could depend on, in an untrustworthy
world. So I killed the people they told me to. And if sometimes I wasn’t happy
about what I did…I learned to live with it."

"That’s why you live alone," said Molly. "Apart from family, who
could hope to understand the things we do?"

We sat quietly for a while, listening to Enya sing on the
portable CD player. From outside came the low murmur of the wind, the sounds of
the water and the wharf, and the distant rumble of city traffic. A whole world
going on, just as always, not knowing that everything had changed. But that…was
for tomorrow. I could feel my body slowly relaxing, winding down from a day I
thought would never end.

"So," Molly said finally. "What do we do next? What can we do
next?"

"I don’t know," I said honestly. "I’ve learned a lot I didn’t
know, but not the one thing I needed to know. Why my family threw me to the
wolves. Why I’ve been declared rogue from a family I served faithfully all my
life. Why my own grandmother is so determined to see me dead. I must have done
something, but I’m damned if I know what. I mean, I know now why my family have
hung on to power for so long. I know what the Drood family business really is.
But it’s not like I knew or even suspected any of this before today."

"Have you considered contacting other members of your family
who’ve gone rogue?" Molly said suddenly. "Would you like to? I mean, if nothing
else, they should be able to give you some solid hints on how to hide from your
family, how to survive on your own, out in the world."

I thought about that. I still had a definite distaste for the
word rogue, even though I was one now. There had always been rogues, throughout
family history. Certain individuals who threw off family authority and ran away
into the world. Or had been driven out, for good reason. Their names were struck
from the family genealogy, and no one was permitted to mention them, ever again.
Even now, back in the Hall, someone was removing all traces of my existence, and
everyone who ever knew me would be instructed never to use my name again. Even
my uncle Jack and my uncle James would go along. For the family. Rogues were
worse than treacherous; they were an embarrassment. And so they spent their
lives hiding in deep cover, to avoid being hunted down and killed.

"The only rogue I’ve ever known," I said slowly, "was the Bloody
Man, Arnold Drood. Evil little shit. You know what he did? With the children? I
can’t believe how he was able to hide it for so long…Anyway, the family told me
what he’d done and where he was hiding, and I went straight there and killed
him." A horrid thought struck me, and I looked anxiously at Molly. "They told
me…but was it really true? Did I kill an innocent man?"

"No," Molly said quickly, patting me comfortingly on the arm.
"Relax, Eddie. He really did do all the awful things everyone said he did. Your
family weren’t the only ones on the Bloody Man’s trail. But only one of you
could get to him despite his armour." She considered me thoughtfully for a
moment. "How did you manage to kill him, Eddie?"

"Easy," I said. "I cheated. Let’s change the subject. Given that
I’ve been such a good soldier for so long, will any of the other rogues agree to
talk to me?"

"They’ll talk to me," said Molly. "I’ve had dealings with some
of them, in my time. Don’t look so shocked, Eddie. You’re out in the real world
now, and we do things differently here. Alliances come and go, and we all deal
with whomever we have to, to get things done. I don’t have a family to back me
up, so I made my own, out of the few people I really trust. I know people
everywhere. Also, I know people who know people. In fact, I know of three Drood
rogues living in and around London. If I vouch for you, they’ll agree to a
meeting. Probably."

"I don’t care about just surviving," I said. "I won’t hide in a
hole and pull it in after me, like the other rogues. I need to bring my family
down, all the way down, for what they’ve done. For not being what they said they
were. But…there has to be someone around strong enough to stop Manifest Destiny.
Bad as my family are, those bastards are worse. And you can bet all the damage
we did to them today won’t even slow them down. They’re big and they’re
organised and they’re rotten to the core. If I do break the Droods’ hold on the
world…who would be left strong enough to stop Truman from doing all the awful
things he plans to do to everyone who’s not Manifest Destiny?"

"There is one obvious answer," Molly said. "Set them both at
each other’s throats."

"No," I said immediately. "I won’t be responsible for starting a
war. Too many innocents would die, caught in the cross fire. And not everyone in
my family is dirty. Some of them are good people, fighting the good fight not
out of family duty but just because they believe it’s the right thing to do."

"If you say so," said Molly.

It was my turn to consider her thoughtfully. "I couldn’t help
noticing, Molly, that you’ve been very…reticent today. Holding back, as it were.
None of your usual wild magics in any of our battles. In fact, you’ve let me do
most of the hard work."

She grinned. "I was wondering when you’d notice. I’ve been
watching you in action, Eddie. Seeing what you can do. Trying to get a handle on
who you really are. I’ve hated and fought the Droods most of my life, and with
good reason. They killed my parents when I was just a child."

"I’m sorry," I said. "I didn’t know."

"I never found out why. Droods aren’t big on explaining their
actions. That’s how Truman was able to snare me so easily…But you were always
different, Eddie. I’ve fought a dozen different Drood agents in my time, but
you…you were the only one who ever fought clean. You’ve always…intrigued me,
Eddie."