The Martian Ambassador (24 page)

‘And your reward?’

‘My reward will be power and riches beyond the imagination of any human in history.’

Sophia looked around the room. ‘Have you not power and riches enough, Lord Pannick?’

The smile left his face, and his expression grew dark as he replied, ‘No man who attains my position is ever satisfied with what he has. It is a law of Nature – immutable and inviolable. Put simply, it is the survival of the fittest in a hostile Universe.’

Sophia shook her head. ‘If you are
not
so foolish – and believe me, sir, I do not concede that for one moment – then you must consider the governments of Earth and Mars to be so. Do you really think it will be that easy to goad them into declaring war upon each other? What you have done so far is beastly, to be sure, but it is equally certain that they will realise what is happening, the foul plan behind it, and will not allow themselves to be manipulated in this crude fashion.’

Pannick drained his wineglass and refilled it from the decanter by his side. ‘A very good point, and one which I cannot gainsay. That is the reason why this “foul plan” as you put it has yet to reach its conclusion. What has passed so far is merely groundwork: a preamble, the overture to the main movement which is to come.’

Sophia regarded him in silence for a long moment. ‘A preamble?’

‘Indeed. Of course, a few acts of violence and sabotage are sufficient only to open the abyss. Something else is required to pitch Earth and Mars into it.’

‘And what might that something be?’

‘Two things, actually: two highly significant events, which will be so awful, so utterly catastrophic, that they will completely change the way the people of Earth and Mars see each other. They will be matches thrown into the powder keg which Mr Cold and I have created…’

‘Movements, abysses, powder kegs? I believe you are mixing your metaphors, your Lordship.’

Pannick laughed. ‘Quite so, my dear; I beg your pardon. But if I do so, it is only to impress upon you the irresistible power of our intent.’

In spite of the warmth in the dining room, Sophia felt herself growing gradually colder. ‘And what
are
these “highly significant events”?’

Pannick smiled and shook his head. ‘There will be time for that tomorrow, Lady Sophia. For now, I see that you have not touched your venison. Is it not to your liking? Perhaps you would prefer something else?’

‘No, thank you.’

‘Will you at least take dessert?’

Sophia did not answer.

Lord Pannick sighed. ‘Ah, well. In that case, it is time to impress upon you the seriousness of your situation and why you should not even consider attempting to leave this house, even if that were possible.’

Sophia sensed a movement behind her and turned to see that Indrid Cold had entered the room. She gasped in spite of herself at his powerful bulk; at the white suit he wore, which glistened repulsively in the gaslight like the skin of some subterranean beast; at the pale, wax-like mask that covered his head; at the eyes which burned within.

‘Forgive me, my dear,’ said Pannick. ‘But I must show you what will happen if you prove troublesome to me in any way, or if Thomas Blackwood ignores my request to cease his investigations. Behold, Lady Sophia, the instrument of your destruction!’

Slowly, deliberately, Indrid Cold reached up with both hands and removed the waxen mask from his face… his true face.

When Sophia saw what lay beneath, she felt the breath leaving her lungs, not allowing her even a single scream before unconsciousness overcome her. She heard Lord Pannick laughing maniacally before merciful darkness descended.

The stars shone brilliantly in the moonless sky as Blackwood approached the high wall bordering the Furfield estate. He was dressed all in black, and his face was darkened with camouflage paint: a stealthy wraith of a man whose eyes were the only clue to the anger burning invisibly within him. He knew that in a situation such as this, anger was the most dangerous of emotions, for it made one reckless and clouded one’s judgement, but he could not help himself. Sophia was in there, somewhere, and while the telegram had stated that she would be treated well, for the time being at least, the very thought of her captivity brought a rage upon him that he could barely contain.

Two nights ago, according to the people of Furfield village, Indrid Cold had cleared this eight-foot-high wall in a single leap. Blackwood would need to negotiate it by more conventional means. He took off his black canvas backpack and withdrew from it a rope and grappling hook, which he flung upwards. The hook found purchase immediately and, hastily putting on the backpack again, Blackwood heaved himself up and over, his muscles gaining further strength from the adrenalin pounding through him.

He dropped to the ground and fell instantly into a crouch, scanning the pitch-dark grounds before him. ‘Shanahan,’ he whispered.

‘Here, sir,’ said a voice, which seemed to come simultaneously from inside his mind and an inch from his left ear.

‘You know what you have to do.’

‘That I do, sir: find Lord Pannick’s cogitator, get inside, and see what he’s planning, if I can.’

‘Good. Now, keep your wits about you, and don’t show yourself unless it’s absolutely necessary.’

‘Understood.’

Blackwood hesitated, feeling through his black woollen sweater at the large amulet which he wore about his neck. Saint Germain had given it to him before he left Bletchley Park, telling him that it was a ward against Arabian Star Magick, that it would allow him to enter Lord Pannick’s house undetected and would offer some protection once he was inside. Blackwood had not liked the use of the word ‘some’, but had thanked the Comte nevertheless. The amulet was about three inches in diameter and had been fashioned from meteoritic iron. Upon each of its faces was a curious design: an irregular pentacle with an eye at the centre. Although he was not particularly keen on Magick, preferring more traditional methods of dealing with his enemies, Blackwood was glad of it on this occasion – even if it did weigh rather heavily about his neck.

Maintaining his crouch, he moved off into the night, swiftly, silently and, he hoped, invisibly. His best tactic, he decided, was to circle the main house at a respectable distance, using the surrounding stands of trees as cover whenever possible. In this way, he would be able to gain some ides of the layout of the place and find the best means of entry.

The house was vast, a veritable mountain of Gothic masonry, festooned with gables and turrets, from which a score of chimney stacks sprouted like a miniature forest of petrified stone. As he circled the house, Blackwood had the distinct impression that the stars were concentrated in a great, globular mass directly above it, as though they were colossal bees attracted by some ætherial scent within. But when he blinked and looked again, the stars were not like that at all: they still occupied their normal positions in the firmament.

The house is protected by Star Magick
, he thought. That particular form took its power from the stars themselves, in a way that was still a bafflement to science. It was the most powerful form of Magick known to mankind – so powerful that its very presence seeped into the mind and altered its perceptions, allowing brief glimpses into an ætherial realm of which most people were, blessedly, unaware.

Blackwood touched the heavy lump beneath his sweater once again and hoped that it would be enough to get him in and out of Furfield alive.

He pressed on through the dark, alternately keeping a watch on the house while paying attention to the ground beneath his feet. There was but one light burning in a large upper floor window, and he guessed that Lord Pannick was in that room.
Good evening, your Lordship
, he thought.
I’m looking forward to our first meeting…

As he continued his circumspect progress around the house, Blackwood became aware of a structure in the near distance: a large folly – although it was like no folly he had ever seen before. It appeared to be nothing more than a misshapen pile of masonry, the product of a mind beleaguered by the distorted dreams of opium. There was no rhyme or reason to its design, no harmony or symmetry in its lines: in fact, the closer Blackwood drew to it, the more intense his conviction became that this thing had not been built at all, but rather…
grown
.

That is no folly
, he thought.
Great God, what manner of place is this?

As if in response to his thoughts, the pile of masonry – or whatever it really was – gathered itself into strange movement, extending thick tendrils of stone and flexing them upon the ground, in the manner of some monstrous starfish. There was a hollow, brittle grinding sound as of bricks rasping against each other, and the entire ghastly agglomeration shifted in Blackwood’s direction.

He froze, partly at the approach of the hideous, unnatural thing, and partly because the amulet he wore had begun to grow warm against his skin. He surmised that the Magickal ward had been activated, and was now working to protect him.

The unearthly sentinel lurched forward again, and then appeared to hesitate. It moved in a different direction, and then stopped again.
It knows something is not quite right
, Blackwood thought.
But it can’t detect me. The amulet is working!

After a few more desultory lurches back and forth, the pile of masonry became still once more, and slowly and carefully, Blackwood edged around it. As he did so, he had the powerful impression of an alien awareness casting strange senses into the night, trying to catch the scent of whatever had roused it. He hardly dared breathe as he passed the thing, and at his closest approach, he felt the amulet grow uncomfortably hot against his chest.

As he left the sentinel behind and continued around to the rear of the house, Blackwood felt the temperature of the amulet gradually reduce, until it had become quite cool once again. But all thoughts of the amulet and the dark and noxious powers against which it was intended to offer protection were forgotten when he saw what lay on the other side of Furfield. Two buildings stood upon the wide lawn. Blackwood hesitated and took them in. They looked like prefabricated zeppelin hangars, although one was much larger than the other.

Blackwood decided to make for the larger one, which was perhaps seventy feet high and as many wide. The vast double doors were sealed, and he moved around to the side of the building and tried the handle of the small door he found there. It was locked as well – a superfluous precaution, he thought, given the nature of the bizarre monstrosity which stood watch in the vicinity of the house.

He reached into his trouser pocket and withdrew his lock pick, which he quickly and deftly inserted into the lock and twisted. There was a satisfying click, and the door swung open on soundless hinges. Blackwood slipped inside and closed the door behind him.

The interior was dimly lit by several gas lanterns that had been left burning, and by their subdued light, Blackwood gazed up at what the hangar contained, his lips parted in awe.

The Æther zeppelin was more than three hundred feet long from needle-pointed prow to elegantly-finned stern and bulged to more than sixty feet at its midsection. Its silver skin glinted faintly in the gaslight, and the long, slender gondola which was slung beneath it was flanked by two oversized engines, their delicate, frond-like propeller blades designed to gain purchase on the Luminiferous Æther of deep space. Blackwood was stunned by the beauty of its lines, the sense of vast propulsive force embodied in the huge engines. He had seen the plans for such vessels and was well-acquainted with their design, but this was the first time he had actually stood before one, and the effect was quite breathtaking. These ships were designed to fly much further than any location on Earth: they were ships of
space
, and were intended for the exploration of other worlds in the solar system.

They were the first harbingers of mankind’s presence off the Earth.

But what was Lord Pannick doing with one?

Blackwood approached the gondola and peered in through one of the portholes. The light from the gas lamps was not strong enough to penetrate through to the interior, which was in near-total darkness. He reached into his backpack and withdrew a miniature electric lantern, which he switched on and held up to the thick glass of the porthole. The powerful beam played upon the gondola’s contents, and at first, Blackwood was unsure what he was looking at.

There was row upon row of small, fragile-looking canisters, neatly arrayed on shelves which stretched from floor to ceiling, and which appeared to extend for the entire length of the main cabin. Blackwood intensified the beam of electric light and peered closer. Each canister was filled with a murky yellow substance, which seemed to be smeared across the glass surface.

Blackwood recalled seeing that strange, unclean colour before, in the morgue where Lunan R’ondd’s body had been kept; he recalled the pathologist, Dr Felix Cutter, showing him a test tube containing a smudge of tainted yellow…

‘
Acarus galvanicus
,’ Blackwood whispered. ‘Good God!’

The tiny smudge Dr Cutter had shown him was composed of thousands of larvae, and there appeared to be hundreds of canisters loaded aboard the Æther zeppelin, each full to the brim with the microscopic creatures.

There could be one reason for this, and one reason only.

Pannick is going to take these to Mars
, Blackwood thought.
He’s going to contaminate the entire planet with them!

He switched off his electric light and left the hangar. Outside, all was as it had been: the stone sentinel was still there, unmoving, perhaps asleep once more. The house and its grounds were still in darkness, steeped in the silence of the night. A little way off, the second of the two prefabricated buildings stood, and without delay Blackwood moved swiftly across the grass towards it. He noted how its design differed curiously from the hangar containing the Æther zeppelin: its main access doors were not set into its side, but rather appeared to form part of its roof.

Blackwood went straight to the side door and again picked the lock in a few seconds. He had no idea what he would find inside this smaller hangar, and at first he was a little disappointed to see a small Martian walking machine crouched upon the floor with its three slender legs folded up around it. The hull was only about fifteen feet long and perhaps ten wide. In fact, he had never seen such a diminutive example of these vehicles and suspected that it was actually for Lord Pannick’s private use – the Martian equivalent of a two-wheeler drawn by a single horse.

He was about to turn and leave when something caught his eye, and he stopped and regarded the vehicle more carefully. There was a curious bulge on the dorsal surface of the hull, a feature he had never seen on any other walking machine. He had no idea what its function was, but it certainly ruined the otherwise elegant lines of the vehicle. From the front of the bulge, a short cylinder protruded. The cylinder appeared to be composed of a crystalline material, perhaps ruby.

Stepping around the nearest of the machine’s three-lobed feet, Blackwood stood directly in front of the control cabin and looked up past the cyclopean eye of the observation blister at the strange feature.

What the dickens is that?
he wondered.

The answer, he knew, would have to wait, for he had more pressing business to attend to. Leaving the hangar behind, he headed off into the darkness towards the house. He hadn’t got very far when the temperature of the amulet began to increase again. It was clear that the house was protected by the same dark Magick which had given life to the pile of masonry outside, and Blackwood wondered what would have happened to him had he not been carrying the ward.

He also wondered how much hotter it would get, and if he could stand to keep wearing it once inside…