A Night in the Lonesome October (23 page)

    
_Dzzp!_

    
Heavy footsteps crossed the outer room.
 
Then the door immediately across from me was flung open.
 
Jack stood upon the threshold, staring at the cages, the vivisectionists, myself upon the table.
 
Graymalk peered in from behind him.

    
"Just who do you think you are, bursting into a private laboratory?" said the beefy man.

    
". . . Interrupting a piece of scientific research?" said the tall man.

    
". . . And damaging our door?" said the short man with the wide shoulders and large hands.

    
I could see it now, like a black tornado, surrounding Jack, settling inward.
 
If it entered him completely he would no longer be in control of his actions.

    
"I've come for my dog," he said.
 
"That's him on your table."

    
He moved forward.

    
"No, you don't, laddie," said the beefy man.
 
"This is a special job for a special client."

    
"I'll be taking him and leaving now."

    
The beefy man raised his scalpel and moved around the table.

    
"This can do amazing things to a man's face, pretty boy," he said.

    
The others picked up scalpels, also.

    
"I'd guess you've never met a man as really knows how to cut," the beefy one said, advancing now.

    
_Dzzp!_

    
It was into him, and that funny light came into his eyes, and his hand came out of his pocket and captured starlight traced the runes on the side of his blade.

    
"Well-met," Jack said then, through the teeth of his grin, and he continued to walk straight ahead.

    
When we left I realized that the old cat had been right about the seas and messes, too.
 
I wondered what sort of light they would give.

    
When the wards were removed yesterday evening they showed that Nightwind had been by at dusk, trying to peer in.
 
Also, Cheeter.
 
And a huge, lean wolfish-looking creature.
 
And the Things were all still held by their restraints, though struggling enthusiastically.
 
I was feeling a little worse for my usage, but I forced a spring into my step and went and strolled past the church.
 
Tekela was perched atop it and she stirred and studied me as I went by, but we exchanged no words.
 
As soon as I was past, though, I glanced back and saw that she was gone.
 
Good.
 
I went home and slept.

    
This morning, I learned from Larry that Mrs. Enderby had run off to town as soon as word of Rastov's death became current.
 
Later in the day, the Great Detective had shown up to view the remains and the premises.
 
I brought Larry up to date on everything that had happened after I'd left him, and he assured me that he had not been by the house last night.
 
He told me that he intended to rescue Lynette, but that she was safe enough for now.
 
If he freed her too early there would be pursuit both physical and nonphysical, now the power was rising strongly; and more importantly, there would be time for the vicar to make other plans, jeopardizing some unknown innocent.
 
The timing, he said, would be very important.
 
Weakening the vicar this way, he decided, could well be his main part in things.
 
I told him that I'd help any way I could.
 
I rested a lot afterwards and visited with Graymalk.

    
It began to rain late that night, a steady drizzle.
 
Jack was in his laboratory, distilling essences or something like that.
 
I had spoken with him last night, of course, between midnight and one, keeping him current on all particulars of my adventures.

    
"Isn't your association with Jill a little, awkward, this far along in the Game?" I'd said, near to one o'clock.

    
"Strictly professional," he had replied.
 
"Besides, she's a good cook.
 
And what about you and the cat?"

    
"We get along well," I'd said.
 
"Any chance of your getting Jill to change her mind about opening?"

    
"I don't think so," he'd answered.

    
"She's not making you think about switching, I hope?"

    
"Of course not!"

    
"Well, if I may speak freely...”

    
The clock struck one and I couldn't.

    
I watched the darkened windows flood for a while, made my rounds, and slept some more.

    
When all hell breaks loose in our vicinity, it does it with style.
 
I was awakened by an enormous thunderclap, sounding as if it had occurred just overhead; and the brightness of the lightning stroke had been visible through my closed eyelids.
 
Suddenly, I was on my feet in the front hall, not certain how I had gotten there.
 
Along with the echoes of the crash, however, my mind held memory of the sounds of breaking glass.

    
The mirror had shattered.
 
The Things were slithering out.

    
I began barking immediately.

    
I heard an exclamation from the room where Jack worked, followed by the sound of some instrument or book being dropped.
 
Then the door opened and he was hurrying toward me.
 
When he saw the slitherers he called to me, "Snuff, find a container!" and he returned to the laboratory, where I heard a cabinet opened.

    
I looked about.
 
I raced into the parlor, slitherers spreading like a slow tidal wave at my back.
 
Upstairs, the Thing in the Steamer Trunk began beating upon its confines with frantic exertion.
 
I heard wood splinter as it struck.
 
And there were rattles from the attic.
 
Another flash created a moment of yellow day beyond the windows, and the thunderclap that came with it shook the house.

    
There was nothing in the parlor in the way of a mirror, but on a side table near the door stood a partly full (partly empty?) bottle of port wine, of the ruby variety.
 
Recalling that this species casts a spell within the bottle, I reared and pushed it off of the table with my paw, so that it fell upon a rug rather than the floor's wood.
 
It did not shatter, and its cork remained in place.
 
There came another flash and another crash.
 
The Things Upstairs continued their noisy activity, with indication that at least the inhabitant of the steamer trunk had gotten free.
 
A glance hallward showed me the steady, continuous exodus of the Things from the Mirror.
 
I heard Jack's footfalls.
 
An uncanny glow began to fill the room and the hall and it did not seem entirely attributable to the internal incandescence of the slitherers.

    
Rolling the bottle hallward, I saw Jack standing at the hall's far end, a wand in his hand.
 
It was the no-nonsense wand he had used to transfer the slitherers from mirror to mirror earlier, and not the powerful Game artifact, the Closing Wand, which was also in his possession.
 
While he is master of the Knife (or vice-versa), the Knife is not, technically, a Game tool, though it may be used as a part of the Game.
 
The Knife is the embodiment of his curse as well as a special source of power.
 
He saw me and he saw the bottle at the same time that I saw him.

    
Jack raised the wand and used it to part the flowing mass which separated us.
 
Then he came forward and it slithered closed behind him as he advanced.
 
Coming up beside me, he picked up the bottle then, held it in his left hand and uncorked it with his teeth.
 
There came another thunder roll and the eerie lighting assumed a definite greenish cast, giving Jack a corpselike appearance.

    
There was a scrambling sound overhead, and the yellow-eyed Thing from the Steamer Trunk bounded down the stair, cracking the banister as it came.

    
"Deal with it, Snuff!" Jack cried.
 
"I can't!" and he turned his attention and his wand upon the Things from the Mirror, compelling the nearest to enter the bottle.

    
I gathered myself and sprang across the flow of slitherers, moving to the foot of the stair, my lips curled back and hair bristling as the Thing came down.
 
Too bad its neck was so short.
 
I knew I was going to have to tear out its throat.
 
The green light hung about it and the rain sounded like thrown gravel against the roof and windows.
 
The Thing spread its arms, ending in very nasty talons, very wide, and I knew that I had to move immediately, in and out, and accomplish it in a matter of seconds if I were to emerge relatively unscathed, which I would need to be, to help deal with the sequel, which, even now, I could hear scrambling down the attic stair.
 
The lightning flashed again.
 
I roared to the accompaniment of thunder as I launched myself at an awkward angle.

    
I struck the wall on my way down, for the Thing's arm struck me after my jaws had closed like a trap and I'd applied torque with my entire body, crunching and tearing away at its gullet before I let go to drop back.
 
It was the arm and not the talons that connected with me, though.
 
I dropped, momentarily senseless, to the floor, a terrible taste in my mouth, as the Thing from the Attic came into sight at the head of the stair and commenced its descent.

    
Seeing the Thing from the Steamer Trunk reeling and clutching at its throat, dripping steaming juices, the Thing from the Attic slowed for a moment, regarding the carnage.
 
Then it rushed downward.

    
I pulled myself to my feet, preparing to face it as it thrust the reeling one aside and came on.
 
Instead, though, the dying one seemed to take its descent as another attack, swung toward it, and raked it with its talons.
 
The Thing from the Attic seized it, snarling, and bit at its twisted face.
 
At my back, I could hear Jack moving about, bottling slitherers.
 
A moment later, the banister gave way, and the pair on the stair were in the air.

    
Lightning flashed again, and again, and again, thunder coming and staying, becoming its steady accompaniment; and yet more flashes walked through the sky, entered at the windows, fluoresced the ubiquitous green to an eye-piercing intensity.
 
The sounds of the rain were submerged.
 
The house began to shudder and creak.
 
Copies of _The Strand Magazine_ fluttered floorward from the mantel.
 
Pictures fell from the walls, sets of Dickens and Surtees from their shelves; vases, candelabra, glasses, and trays slid from tables; plaster descended like snow from the ceiling.
 
Prince Albert stared at the blizzard through cracked glass.
 
Martin Farquhar Tupper lay atop Elizabeth Barrett Browning, their covers torn.

    
When the Thing from the Attic rose, shaking its head, rolling its eyes, casting wild glances about, the other lay still upon the floor, steam still rising from its scaly throat, head twisted to its left.

    
I seemed to hear Growler, prompting me to try for the throat again, and I slashed forward, attempting to repeat my earlier move.

    
I missed my target as it drew back, attempting, belatedly, to grapple me to it.
 
My impact staggered it, however, and I slashed its left shoulder as I fell.

    
Immediately, as I secured my footing, I seized its right leg above the ankle and ground down for a bone-cruncher of a bite.
 
It recovered quickly and kicked me with the other foot.
 
I hung on for another second's damage before releasing it and scrambling away, able to ride with the second kick.
 
One, I figured I could take in trade for something that would slow its movements.
 
But I lack the bulldog sensibility as well as the physique.

    
The lightning and thunder had continued steadily the entire while, the thunder now having achieved the state of a continuous roaring, as of a tornado singing its deep-throated song about the house, and the intensity of the light had us moving through a tableau of green and black, where tiny sparks now danced upon the surfaces of everything metallic, and all of my hair was on end for reasons other than the stimulus of combat.
 
It was obvious now that this was no normal storm but a manifestation of magical attack.