The Hounds of Avalon (Gollancz S.F.) (14 page)

‘So, I blew it – in the worst way possible,’ Caitlin concluded. ‘I’ve doomed everybody.’

The more Sophie listened, the more she felt a bond growing with Caitlin. They were true sisters. ‘Anyone would have done the same in your situation. Anyone,’ Sophie insisted.

Caitlin shook her head, staring out of the window at the blue sky.

‘Listen to me,’ Sophie said. ‘We’re supposed to be defenders of humanity. To turn your back on your love for your husband and child would have been to give up on that very humanity. You couldn’t win whatever you did.’

Caitlin thought about this for a moment. ‘You’re very wise,’ she said, a little brighter. ‘I wish you’d been there with me.’

‘Lugh mentioned that there were other Fragile Creatures here, after he told me about you,’ Sophie said, changing the subject; that detail had initially been lost in the excitement of meeting another Sister of Dragons.

‘Two friends who followed me from our world to this one. They think they’re my protectors.’ Caitlin smiled. ‘I reckon it’s probably the other way around.’ Caitlin described how she had made her way from the House of Pain to the Court of Soul’s Ease in the company of the two young men, Thackeray and Harvey. Sophie sensed that there was a bond between Caitlin and one of them, but she didn’t pursue it.

‘Do you want to meet them?’ Caitlin asked. ‘They’re probably foraging for food and beer.’

‘That would be fantastic. And to be honest, so would some food and beer.’ Sophie suddenly realised how hungry she really was.

Halfway to the door, Caitlin paused and looked at Sophie with a grave face. ‘What are we going to do now? Just wait for the end?’

‘I’m not the kind of person who does that,’ Sophie said with a clear note of hope. It was enough to keep Caitlin happy, but if Sophie had been asked what possible course of action they could take, she would not have had an answer.

Hal had spent the day filing reports: waste-collection targets; guidelines for the establishment of a Primary Healthcare Trust; monitoring of food production targets and the local economy; a request for extra funding from the local police. At times he could pretend to himself that the Fall had never happened and that the world of mundane things continued as it always had: people’s lives ticking over, no lows, no highs, just maintenance of a steady state of production and consumption.

But occasionally some document would leap out at him to shatter the illusion. Perimeter-defence evaluation reports, for instance, itemising the steps being taken to ensure that no supernatural creature made it into the city to terrorise the population. And, of course, the ever-present energy-creation management report, detailing the current state of the local power grid. It was the single thing that underpinned the slow clawback from the Fall. In those early days when technology had failed in the face of the resurgent supernatural, they had all realised that electricity was the one thing that separated them as civilised beings from some relict man cowering in fear around a campfire. One light bulb was the difference between home comforts and the Dark Ages. So, with one eye on politics and one on survival, electricity had been the first thing the Government had restored when it
transferred to Oxford after the Battle of London. The residents of the city had been almost pathetically grateful.

Prosperity certainly flowed to the power base. The Government had access to the national oil reserves stored in some top-secret reservoir in the south, plus experts in every field and a weight of employees to get the job done. Hal had heard how bad things were in other parts of the country; Oxford was a paradise in comparison. No wonder strict laws had been imposed to prevent inward migration from day one.

When the last file slid into place in the cabinet and the trolley was empty, Hal knew he should have felt a sense of achievement, but he didn’t. It was a job he’d done all his life and at one time he’d felt happy and secure in its mundaneness, but it no longer seemed important. That simple thought instigated a panic response – if he didn’t have his job, what did he have?

He jumped as the door swung open with a crash. Hunter darted in, wincing at his unintentionally noisy entrance, and closed the door quietly behind him.

‘What’s wrong?’ Hal said with irritation.

Hunter stared at him. ‘What’s got your goat?’

‘Nothing. It’s just … you’re stopping me working.’

Hunter glanced at the empty trolley. ‘Sorry to break your concentration,’ he said sarcastically, ‘but we need to talk.’

Wrapped in thick parkas, they made their way past the porter’s lodge and out into the High Street. Hunter led the way to the botanic gardens across the road where he knew they’d have privacy and took a seat next to the fountain. Snow blanketed everything and more flurries were blowing in as they sat. It was odd to see plants and trees in full summer greenery poking out of drifts. The tropical greenhouses rose above the red-brick garden wall, steaming in the cold.

Hunter pulled a bottle of Jack Daniel’s out of his parka and took a long slug before offering it to Hal. ‘It’s June, Hal. Look at it. What’s going on?’

‘The end of the world,’ Hal muttered, uninterested.

‘You know what – I reckon it is.’

Hal gagged on the JD as he checked to see whether Hunter was joking.

‘Back in the day, the Royals used to look out for portents, and if this weather isn’t one, then I don’t know what is.’ Before Hal could sneer, Hunter told him what he’d seen on the helicopter ride to Scotland. ‘We’re being invaded,’ he said finally, ‘and I’ve got this gut feeling that whatever it is is worse than any of those so-called gods and devils and little fucking fairies that came with the Fall. When I saw those things in Scotland, I got a feeling, Hal.’ He took the bottle back with undue haste, then held it tightly as though for comfort. ‘They’re here to wipe us out. Get rid of the infestation once for all. The balloon’s gone up. Apocalypse. Armageddon.’ He snapped his fingers. ‘Poof!’

Hal thought for a moment and then said angrily, ‘Look at us.’

‘What?’

‘Look at us! Why are we friends? Answer me that. I’m a clerk. I file files. You kill people—’

‘Steady on, mate.’

‘A crisis in my day is if a document on “taxation levels” accidentally finds its way into “L” instead of “T”. Meanwhile, you’re slitting some poor bastard’s throat or shoving a screwdriver into his ear.’

‘That would be an unfortunate use of work tools.’

‘We’ve got nothing in common.’ Hal shivered in a gust of icy wind and huddled down further into his parka.

‘Why are we friends?’ Hunter mused. ‘Well—’

‘Apart from the fact that no one else will put up with you.’

‘Oh.’ Hunter considered his response, then said, ‘Well, we’re friends because I know why you’re talking about this instead of what we should be talking about. We’re friends because in all the world you’re the only one I can tell about slitting some poor bastard’s throat and know you won’t judge me. And we’re friends because I’m the only one who will sit and listen to you drivelling on about filing Wanky Polemics under the Dewey Decimal System and Rat’s Arse Rates under A to Z. You’re a boring fucker, Hal, and no mistake. But I love you for it.’

Hal snatched the bottle back and drank more than he should have in a single draught. ‘So it’s all coming to an end,’ he snapped. ‘I’m inclined to say, so what?’

Hunter jumped to his feet and leaped on to the edge of the fountain, in danger of plunging backwards through the thin sheet
of ice into the dark water beneath. ‘Because this is the worst time for it to end. We’ve got a chance to make a fresh start. Put everything right. Build the kind of world we should have. We’re newborns, Hal, and you don’t sacrifice infants.’

‘If it’s as bad as you say, what can be done about it? The PM, the General—’

‘You can’t trust people in power.’

‘How can you say that? You work for the Government. They pay your wages.’

‘They pay me to do a job. And I do it. But they don’t buy
me
. Those in power always think they’re doing things for the
people
. They’re not – they do things they think they would like done if
they
were the people. Do you get me? Old song: “The public wants what the public gets” – beats some old philosopher any day. And that’s how the ones in power think.’

‘What are you saying, Hunter?’ Hal asked wearily.

‘I’m saying, mate, that when push comes to shove, it might be up to us to do something.’

‘Us?’ Hal said incredulously.

‘Us. You and me. Against the world.’

‘Now I know you’ve gone mad.’

‘Desperate times bring out the best in everyone, pal. And disaster is necessary if you want to be resurrected.’

‘I don’t want to be resurrected.’

‘Everyone does. From the life they’re living to the life they should be living.’

‘So, what – you’re saying I should learn how to use a gun so we can go out like Butch and Sundance?’

‘I get to be Sundance. He was the good-looking one.’

‘Stop it, Hunter.’

‘We’re going to do something, Hal, and you don’t have a choice. I just haven’t decided what yet.’

Hal tossed Hunter the bottle, then set off down the path towards the High Street without a backward glance.

‘They said Nero was mad, too!’ Hunter roared after him before laughing as if he’d just heard the funniest joke in the world.

Hal made his way along the High Street in the face of the gusting wind. Night was falling, earlier than he had anticipated. It would
have been much more sensible to go back to his warm room, so perhaps he was as crazy as Hunter after all. The snow drifted against the shops and restaurants, still closed from the days before the Fall but close to coming back into use. Hal could see the occasional swept floor and fresh lick of paint, and sense an almost painfully building anticipation. Human nature was intrinsically optimistic; no one would imagine an even greater Fall coming so hard on the heels of the last one.

Hal picked his route randomly, letting his subconscious drag him this way and that, lost to his thoughts. His mind turned naturally to Samantha, as if she was the only thing in the world that truly mattered; he guessed in his world she probably was. Basically, he was pathetic, he decided; when it came to any kind of emotional life he was paralysed, stuttering like some monastic fool whenever he met a woman. Except this wasn’t just any woman. Samantha made him feel special whenever he saw her. But why couldn’t he express it to her? It was his parents’ fault, obviously, or his teachers’; some trauma during his formative years. Or perhaps he really was pathetic.

The city looked magical under the coating of snow. The dreaming spires gleamed white against the night sky, the domes and ancient rooflines like frosted cakes. Hal stood at the crossroads where the High Street met St Aldate’s and turned slowly in the deserted street. Surveying the city, he realised how much he loved it. It represented so much more than the agglomeration of bricks and mortar that shaped its fabric; its history made it a living thing; its dedication to centuries of learning made it something greater; and he couldn’t help but think that in some way they were spoiling it, though he couldn’t quite grasp how, or why.

As he shuffled around in the snow, raising little fountains of white every time he turned, movement caught his eye.
Something
was heading along Blue Boar Street. It was near to the ground – measured, tiny sparks of light floating in the gloom.

Hal hesitated. Thoughts of the strange, dangerous creatures that now existed beyond the city boundaries dampened his curiosity. But then a soft, lilting song floated out across the drifts, so light and organic it could have been a breeze itself. It was hypnotic, and before he knew what he was doing he had advanced to the end of the darkened side street.

The sight was stranger than anything he could have imagined. A column of tiny figures was making its way along the gutter – men, women and children little more than eight inches high, dressed in clothes that appeared to come from a range of different eras: medieval, Elizabethan, Georgian, some in Victorian top hats and long coats. Hal even made out miniature horses and minuscule dogs in the sombre procession. Some of the figures carried tiny lanterns aloft on crooked sticks to light their path as they walked and sang. A strange atmosphere hovered around them, like an invisible mist into which Hal had wandered. It felt as if he was in a dream, watching himself watching them.