Book 1 - The Man With the Golden Torc (56 page)

"I don’t see Alexandra or Matthew," I said carefully. "What have
you done with them, Jacob?"

He met my gaze easily, and just for a moment something of his
old terrifying self surfaced in his gaze. "They won’t be coming back. Ever."

"Don’t ask," the Armourer said stiffly. "Trust me, you really
don’t want to know."

"Poor Alex," I said, and I meant it.

"Just what was this Alex person to you, anyway?" said Molly.

"It was more…what she might have been," I said. "If things had
gone differently."

"Oh…" said Molly. "Yeah. I’ve had lots of relationships like
that."

I looked at her for a moment. "I won’t ask," I said finally.

"Best not to," she agreed.

And then, finally, I looked at the Armourer, my uncle Jack, and
said the one thing I’d been putting off, the one thing I knew I’d have to say
the moment I saw him coming through the door. "I’m sorry, Uncle Jack. I’m really
sorry, but…Uncle James is dead."

"I know," said the Armourer. "You couldn’t have done anything
else, Eddie. James wouldn’t have given you any other choice. For him, the family
always came first. And he never could say no to Mother."

"He was supposed to kill me on the motorway," I said. "But he
let me go. Gave me a chance…made all this possible."

"Good for him," said the Armourer. "Maybe he was growing up, at
last. So, the Gray Fox is dead…Good bartenders and bad women will be weeping
bitter tears in bars all around the world once word gets out."

There was no point in telling him that Molly had actually killed
my uncle James. The family was going to have enough problems accepting her as it
was.

Jacob fixed me with a firm look. "You have to address the
family, Eddie. Here, now! Explain to them what’s been going on. They need to
know the truth. I’ll summon them here, and you can tell them what needs to be
done to put the family back together again."

"What?" I said. "I don’t know what to tell them!"

"You’ll think of something," said the Armourer. "You have to
take charge, Eddie. Push change through before the old guard take control
again."

"Wait just a minute!" I said quickly. "I never even wanted to be
a regular part of the family, let alone tell them how to run things! I ran away
from this family the first chance I got, remember?"

"Well, you can’t run away this time," said the Armourer. "Not
after all the trouble you’ve caused. You’ve smashed our defences, wrecked the
Hall, demoralised the family fighters, destroyed the Heart, and taken away
everyone’s torcs! You have a duty to undo the damage you’ve done."

"But—" I said.

"Only you can tell them the truth," said Jacob.

"It’s what your uncle James would have wanted," the Armourer
said solemnly.

I glared at him. "I never knew you were so proficient at
emotional blackmail."

He grinned. "Runs in the family."

And then we all winced and shuddered as Jacob took on his
deathly aspect again. His spectral presence filled the chamber, cold and distant
and only remotely human, powerful beyond imagination now that he was no longer
bound by life’s limitations. His voice spread out through all of the Hall,
ordering every member of the family to attend the Sanctity. Right now, no
omissions, no excuses. I caught only the edges of the ghostly summons, and that
was still enough to make me sway on my feet. The sheer power in Jacob’s voice
was like nothing in this world. No one in the family would dare disobey.

And soon enough they came streaming through the great double
doors and into the huge empty chamber of the Sanctity in ones and twos, and then
in groups, and finally in crowds until there was a steady flow of bewildered
Droods pressing in through the two doorways. Many of them were still wide-eyed
with shock from the sudden loss of their torcs. For the first time in their
lives they felt utterly defenceless and vulnerable, and they were desperate for
answers and reassurances. They came in gabbling and shouting, only to subside
instantly into murmurs and mutterings once they saw who was waiting for them.
The family rogue, the family ghost, the bloodied Armourer, and the infamous
Molly Metcalf. Whatever answers were coming, they clearly weren’t going to be
very reassuring. Still they kept streaming into the Sanctity, house Droods and
security Droods, researchers and planners and house staff, and every other
member of the family. Right down to some extremely wide-eyed children, the
smallest carried in their parents’ arms. The Sanctity filled up from wall to
wall with Droods pressed shoulder to shoulder, while more peered in through the
doorways.

"Make a start," the Armourer said to me. "Before people start
getting crushed in the pack."

I looked at Molly, and she conjured up an invisible platform for
the four of us to stand on, and then raised it several feet into the air, so
everyone could see and hear me.

"It helps that they have to look up to us," she muttered in my
ear.

"Gives us the psychological edge. Now go on; promise them bread
and circuses, or something."

"Speaking of edges," said the Armourer just a little testily.
"Could you perhaps put a little colour into the edges of this damned platform so
some of us can see where the bloody things are? It’s a long way to fall, and
some of us are feeling a bit fragile just at the moment."

The edges of the platform glared suddenly silver. They were a
lot closer than I’d realised.

The chamber was now packed to bursting, with more faces peering
in through the open doors. The muttering kept threatening to break out into
something more, but didn’t, because any time someone started to raise their
voice they found Jacob glaring at them, and then they got all tongue-tied and
went right off the idea. The crowd went completely silent as the Matriarch
finally arrived, pushing her way through the crowd. Everyone made as much room
for her as they could to let her pass. She reached the front of the crowd and
glared up at me on my platform. Instead of Alistair at her side stood the
Sarjeant-at-Arms. His face was bruised and swollen, but his gaze was as cold and
direct as ever. I nodded to the Matriarch.

"Hello, Grandmother. How’s Alistair?"

"Alive. Barely. He’s in the infirmary. They’re trying to save
his face."

"He surprised me," I said, aware everyone in the Sanctity was
hanging on our every word. "He was a good man, and true, at the end."

"I’ve always known that," said the Matriarch. "He served the
family. Not like you. What have you done to us, Edwin? Where are our torcs?
Where is the Heart?"

"That’s what you’re all here for," I said. "To hear the truth at
last." I looked out over the crowd, at all the confused, frightened, desperate
faces. "You’re here to learn the truth about everything that’s happened.
Everything that’s been hidden from you down all the centuries of this family’s
existence. The secrets only a Drood can tell you."

"We know you," said a female voice from deep in the crowd. "But
what’s the infamous Molly Metcalf doing up there with you?"

There was a general murmur of agreement, quickly cut off as
Molly snapped her fingers and the woman in the crowd squeaked loudly as all her
clothes suddenly disappeared. Molly smiled sweetly upon the crowd.

"Any more questions? I just love answering questions from the
crowd."

And while the crowd was quiet, I told them everything.

I explained to them what the Heart really was and the true
nature of the bargain that had given us all our torcs. There were shocked cries
and gasps, but no one challenged me. I told them how the bargain had to be
confirmed by every new Matriarch, and every eye in the chamber went to Martha
Drood. She ignored them all, glaring coldly up at me. I explained how I’d
destroyed the Heart, and why they hadn’t all died when their torcs disappeared.
And then I told them the final awful secret of the Droods, known only to the
inner circle. That we were not the secret defenders of humanity, but their
secret rulers.

I think there would have been a riot then, as various factions
in the family shouted and pushed at each other, but Jacob rose suddenly up into
the air and took on his spectral aspect again. The temperature in the Sanctity
plummeted, and we all shuddered, and not just from the cold. Death was in the
chamber and looking right at us. Jacob glared about him with no longer human
eyes, and everyone went very quiet and very still, not wanting to draw his
attention. Jacob sank slowly back onto the platform and resumed his usual form.

From the silence, one voice rose. The Matriarch cursed me,
naming me traitor to the family, calling me a fool and a liar and an enemy of
everything the Droods stood for. She said I was no grandson of hers and called
on every Drood present to rise up and drag me down and kill me. Her voice rose
and rose, shrill with fury and hysteria, spittle flying from her mouth, until
suddenly the Sarjeant-at-Arms dropped a hand on her shoulder and gave her a good
shake. Her voice cut off abruptly, and she looked at him, shocked. The Sarjeant
let go of her and turned his back on her to address the crowd.

"You all know me," he said, and his familiar harsh voice held
everyone’s attention. "You all know what I stand for. And I tell you, Edwin has
earned the right to be heard. He’s the truest son this family ever had. Go on,
boy. Tell them what they need to know."

"Thanks," I said. "I still hate your guts, mind."

"Goes with the job," he said, entirely unconcerned. "Get on with
it."

So I told them the rest: how I’d been falsely outlawed by the
Zero Tolerance faction who were secretly running Manifest Destiny. That really
put the cat among the pigeons. They all knew about Truman and what his people
stood for.

"We’ve been lied to," I said finally, tiredly. "We’re not who we
thought we were. We aren’t the good guys, and haven’t been for centuries. But we
can be; we can be what we were meant to be. If you’re prepared to fight for it."

The men and women before me didn’t look much like fighters at
the moment. Most of them looked pretty shell-shocked, as though someone had just
punched them all in the gut, after hearing so many unpleasant and unsuspected
truths one after the other. They looked at each other uncertainly, and then back
at me, until finally a voice at the back of the crowd said:

"What do you want us to do?"

"I want us to do what we were born to do! I want us to be what
we were always supposed to be: shamans to the tribe, protecting people from all
the evil forces that threaten them! Only now the tribe is humanity, and we have
to be warriors of the world, fighting the good fight; not for ourselves, but
just because it’s the right thing to do! We have to earn the right to be proud
to be Droods again!"

"But…how can we fight, without our torcs?" said another voice.

I smiled and let one hand rise to the silver torc at my throat.
"The Heart is gone, but fortunately I’ve found a new sponsor for the family."
And I subvocalised, Show them, strange matter.

The new armour flowed over me in a moment, encasing me
completely in shining silver. The crowd cried out; some even applauded. A great
voice spoke to them then, the strange matter addressing the family through me,
its voice full of peace and calm and good fellowship:

"Long and long have I pursued the creature you knew as the
Heart, across all the many dimensions, to punish it for all its terrible crimes.
Now it is gone, I will stay here to help undo the evil it did. I will be your
new protector, and there shall be torcs for all."

"How long do you plan on sticking around?" said a practical
voice.

"Until I’ve taught you all how to be strong without armour,"
said the voice. "You have no idea of your true potential."

There was a lot more murmuring in the crowd about that.

"But what price do we have to pay for this new armour?" said
another voice in the crowd. "The Heart wanted our children. Our unknown brothers
and sisters. What do you want?"

"Just to help," said the voice. "That’s my job. And you’ve
already paid me, by destroying the Heart. You have no idea how long I’ve spent
chasing that damned thing. I’m just glad it’s finally over…I’m entitled to some
leave, so I think I’ll spend it here. Just for a few millennia. Fascinating
dimension, fascinating people. You’re really going to have to tell me more about
this sex thing you do…"

"Later," I said quickly, subvocalising. "You know, I can’t keep
calling you ‘strange matter.’ Don’t you have a name I can use?"

How about Ethel? said the voice in my head. That’s a good name.

"We’ll discuss that later, too," I said. "Now get this armour
off me, please."

Oh sure.

The silver armour disappeared back into my torc, and I looked
out over the family again. "Follow me, and you’ll all have armour again. And we
will all be…what the family was supposed to be, before we lost our way."

"Under your leadership?" the Matriarch said loudly, her voice
harsh and unforgiving.

"Not if I have anything to say about it," I said. "Never wanted
that. Too much like hard work." There were a few chuckles from the crowd.

"No; we’ve had enough leaders. They can’t be trusted. You all
agreed to the Heart’s bargain, Grandmother; generations of Matriarchs agreeing
to the slaughter of generations of children."

"We had no choice!" she said fiercely. "We had to be strong, to
fight the forces of darkness!"

"You always had a choice," I said. "We never did. We never
agreed to the sacrifice of our brothers and sisters, Grandmother."

And there must have been something in my voice, because she
looked away and did not answer.

"I suggest an elected council," I said to the crowd. "You can
sort out the rules. Except that all current members of the council must be
banned. They were part of the conspiracy. Part of the lies. I’ll see things
through the transition, and then…I’m out of here. Back to being a field agent
again. That’s where I belong."