The Hounds of Avalon (Gollancz S.F.) (52 page)

The plan had clearly been put in motion at some point in the ancient history of Cadbury Hill when the Wish Stone had been buried. But not just anyone could have found it.

Another connection.

Not just anyone: only a Brother or Sister of Dragons. That was the key: the Pendragon Spirit was integral to this grand scheme.

And then he had it. ‘Jack Churchill,’ he said out loud. The symbolic ‘King’ of the last group of Five. Ryan Veitch was definitely dead and buried after the devastation of the Battle of London, but Jack Churchill was only
presumed
dead. There hadn’t been a body, that much was clear from the intelligence briefing Samantha had recovered from the files.

What if, during the final cataclysmic struggle, Jack Churchill had somehow been thrown into T’ir n’a n’Og? Perhaps amnesiac, perhaps in a coma. Hal’s mind raced. What if he was such a powerful avatar of the Pendragon Spirit that he could defeat the Void’s Anti-Life? A secret weapon, waiting to be found, and brought back, and used. The ultimate weapon that would tip the balance in the war.

Hal couldn’t be sure that he was right, not completely, but the symbolism and the facts fitted together nicely; and instinctively he
was
convinced.

He had to tell Hunter immediately. Perhaps there was still time for the Brothers and Sisters of Dragons to cross the barrier between
the worlds somehow and bring Jack Churchill back from his exile. The stories said that time operated differently in the Otherworld. Hunter and the others could be there and back in the blink of an eye.

Hal felt a rush of excitement mingled with relief. He had played his part, and he’d done so without leaving his armchair. With a whoop, he jumped up, ready to rush out to the High Street to find Hunter.

Only he was no longer alone. Two armed soldiers stood just inside the door, and between them was Reid.

‘Time to go, Hal,’ he said, with a cold smile.

As he made his way along the High Street towards the barricade, Hunter heard his name called anxiously. He turned to see Samantha running through the snow, looking desperate.

Jumping down, he ran to her and they embraced passionately. ‘How did you find me?’ he said softly when they pulled apart.

‘There was a giant … all surrounded by blue light …’ Samantha appeared dazed after her meeting with the Caretaker. ‘He told me where you were, said I had to take his lantern back to him.’

Hunter fetched the Wayfinder from the horse, where it had been hanging from the saddle. ‘Tell him thanks for the loan,’ Hunter said, handing it over.

Touching the lantern had an effect on Samantha: her pupils grew less dilated, her mind cleared. ‘Hal’s in trouble,’ she said suddenly.

‘I know.’

‘He’s—’

Hunter took her by the shoulders to calm her. ‘He’s safe. Don’t worry.’

She leaned forward to kiss him strongly, and Hunter felt a surge of love so deep and powerful that it shook him to the core. As he pulled away, he could see that Samantha felt it, too. ‘Don’t get killed, Hunter.’ She caught herself, then added, ‘You and I—’

‘You know Hal loves you,’ Hunter interrupted. It was a truth that he had only come to realise in the last hour, but once he had recognised it, it was obvious.

Samantha was taken aback by his response. ‘I know he likes me—’

‘You should go to him. You’ll make a good couple. If all this pans out right.’

Samantha took a step back, struggling to find solid ground. ‘I thought … we could …’

‘A betting man would say I probably won’t come out of this alive. And even if I do, there are lots of places to go, people to see. Women …’ His voice trailed off; he couldn’t keep it up any longer, but he could see from the hardening of Samantha’s face that he had done enough. ‘Go to Hal. He’s at Mrs Damask’s,’ he said. ‘He needs you.’

She backed away, still unsure what to make of his words, but her pride would not allow her to say any more. ‘Don’t worry, I will.’

When Hunter was a short way down the road, he allowed himself one quick glance back at the tiny departing figure, the blue light from the Wayfinder washing out across the snow. The sight was heartbreaking.

Then he turned towards the sounds of battle rising up from all sides and spurred his horse onwards, his mind locked on conflict and victory.

The snow was falling heavily when Mallory arrived at the southern barricade. It added an incongruously ethereal atmosphere to the street scene, dampening sounds, blanketing the flaws of human living. But as he neared the hastily erected metal wall, the sounds of battle rose up. There were no cries of pain or anger from the Lament-Brood beyond; they remained eerily silent, washing against the barricade like a summer swell in a harbour.

But the soldiers lined up along the walls made up for it with a cacophony of defiance. It was all an act; Mallory could see that their faces were etched white with fear. Beyond the barricade, the hellish invading army stretched as far as the eye could see.

They fired SA8os, hand pistols, rifles, from the walls and from all vantage points on the nearby buildings. Brass cartridges rained through the air, glittering in the arc lamps, and the sound was like a Caribbean rainstorm. Further back from the barricade, the big guns waited for any enemy breakthrough of the front line.

Mallory reined in his horse and waited; it was only a matter of
time before the defences were swept aside by the massive, unfeeling force pressing against them. Yet it happened even more quickly than he had anticipated. Within fifteen minutes, there was a sound like the howl of a dying animal as the metal plates began to buckle under the weight of bodies crushed against them.

One of the soldiers firing from the top of the wall lowered his weapon, his mouth gaping. ‘Jesus Christ. What’s that?’

On the other side of the barricade, the purple mist was rising as the Lament-Brood clambered on top of each other to allow those behind to gain purchase. They reminded Mallory of ants. But riding the crest of the twisted bodies was a gleaming yellow-white figure that Mallory recognised from Hunter’s description as the Lord of Bones. It had grown in size, now almost twice the height of a man, its bulk increasing a little with every skeleton sucked into its voracious mass. There was a hunger to it, in the avid gleam of its eyes and the way it reached out with clacking-bone hands, desperate to snatch anything that fell within its reach.

Most of the soldiers leaped from the wall as it fell apart, but one remained in position a second too long, firing his pistol futilely into the seething mass. The Lord of Bones’ eyes swivelled towards the soldier, fixed on its target and then moved towards it with alarming speed. Crushing hands shattered the soldier’s wrist and yanked him forwards.

The Lord of Bones stood erect on the roiling Lament-Brood beneath it and pressed the yelling, squirming soldier against its chest. Mallory was sickened as he watched the victim’s skeleton sucked out of his body, leaving a flopping sack of skin and organs that was tossed to one side to splatter into the snow.

And then the Lord of Bones threw its head back, opened its mouth and released a sound that was not a sound. It made Mallory’s stomach turn and his brain fizz. It was the creature’s roar of victory.

Mallory lost sight of the Lord of Bones in the confusion as the barricade burst apart and the Lament-Brood flooded through into the city. For a brief moment, he was rooted as the Lament-Brood caught hold of fleeing soldiers, broke necks, ran swords through stomachs, gouged out eyes. And then, mere seconds later, repossessed the dead, twisting their bodies, forcing weapons to
meld with bone and flesh, the re-animated corpses joining the ranks of those who had slain them to turn on their former comrades.

The big guns released a hail of massive fire power. Mallory fought to control his horse, glad that something had torn his gaze away from the hellish vision. Smoke swept across the street. When it cleared, scores of the Lament-Brood had been ripped to pieces, but hundreds more surged in to take their place. The gun positions were overrun in seconds, the remaining soldiers fleeing, powerless.

Mallory drew Llyrwyn and suddenly the street was flooded with brilliant blue light; even the falling snow appeared to be sapphire flakes. Mallory had never seen such a powerful display: the flames raged so forcefully along the blade that it vibrated in his hand, rang up his arm and into his heart.

Digging in his spurs, he propelled his horse into the fray. Lament-Brood fell beneath the trampling hooves, skulls split, torsos crushed. The air itself singed as Mallory swung his sword. The Lament-Brood fell before him like grass before a scythe. None could touch him, and soon the ground was covered with corpses and his horse was trampling them into the snow.

In Mallory’s mind, all sound disappeared, the hacking of bone, the ringing of steel, the thunder of hooves, until a deep silence swaddled him. He couldn’t smell, taste, touch, and a blue sheen lay across his mind. In that instant, he was the sword and the sword was him, each possessing and being possessed by the other.

Finally the Lament-Brood fell back at some silent summons. Their ranks parted and the Lord of Bones marched through. It towered over Mallory even on horseback, its bones splattered with red human blood.

It surveyed Mallory for a moment, a cold intelligence that insinuated through the blue into Mallory’s mind, unbearably alien, betraying no recognisable emotion. And then, when it was satisfied that it understood what lay before it, it drove forward with a speed belied by its size.

Mallory forced his horse to dance out of the creature’s path, but it only just evaded the charge. The Lord of Bones’ talons ripped through Mallory’s trousers and into the flesh beneath. And as the fingers scythed across his flesh, Mallory felt a tugging in his bones, as if they were on the verge of being sucked out of his body.

Mallory guided the horse to circle and then drive in. Llyrwyn
blazed through the air to smash against the bone-creature’s shoulder blade. The impact almost threw Mallory out of the saddle. Bone erupted outwards and parts of the creature’s form began to fall away. But it clearly felt no pain and immediately launched another attack that Mallory only just avoided.

They continued that way for nearly half an hour, with no sign of the creature weakening. Every now and then, the Lord would draw blood with its razor-sharp fingers and Mallory’s clothes were now wet and sticky in many places. Mallory had a vision of losing the battle, of the thing pulling his skeleton clean out of his skin. He wondered with a sickening fascination what his final thoughts would be.

The horse’s breath and his own mingled in a hot, white cloud in the freezing air. But while Mallory tirelessly sustained his attack, his horse was growing sluggish. Finally, as Mallory brought his searing sword down in a hissing strike that shattered a portion of the Lord of Bones’ skull, his mount failed to retreat quickly enough.

The Lord of Bones seized its moment. Like a striking snake, it grabbed Mallory and ripped him from the saddle, pressing him close to its hard body. It smelled incongruously of milk.

Mallory fought to free himself, but a powerful sucking sensation had already manifested deep inside him. It felt as though hooks had been attached to his bones and were pulling them out through his muscle and skin. The agonising pain drove him to the edge of unconsciousness, but he continued to fight to the last.

The hurricane wind came from nowhere. Mallory and the Lord of Bones were thrown through the air against a building on the far side of the road. The Lord of Bones took the brunt of the impact, but Mallory was knocked unconsciousness by the shock.

When he came round, he was lying in the snow, his entire body on fire with pain from the sucking power of the Lord of Bones. But it was fading. The creature was staggering around, its right arm shattered into pieces and a section of its torso falling away.

The wind had died down a little, but the snow still blasted against Mallory’s skin like hot pins. Dazed, he staggered to his feet, searching for his sword. It lay half-buried in a drift nearby. But the Lord of Bones had seen him again and was rapidly stalking his way.

Before it could reach him, there was a deafening clap of thunder. Lightning crashed down in a direct hit on the Lord of Bones. In the
flash of blinding light, Mallory was hurled backwards, but this time he fought to stay conscious.

The air reeked of burned iron. What remained of the Lord of Bones still stalked around, smoke rising from the shattered bones. Drunkenly, Mallory retrieved his sword. The moment the weapon was in his hands and the blue flames were roaring, his mind became sharp and focused. He attacked the Lord of Bones with venom, not stopping his hacking and slashing until only a few bone shards remained and a faint purple mist was drifting in the now-subsiding gale.

Mallory looked around eagerly. He knew who he had to thank for his survival. Sophie stood in the driver’s seat of the jeep, arms raised in supplication to the sky. Gradually, she sagged as the power faded. She managed a wave and a smile before Shavi urged her to drive to another location.

The Lament-Brood appeared disoriented by the Lord of Bones’ destruction, but Mallory could see that they were slowly re-forming their ranks to prepare for their next advance. All the surviving soldiers had fled to another fall-back position. There was nothing else he could do. Reclaiming his weary horse, he turned back into the city, following the tracks of Sophie’s jeep.