The Mask of Destiny (36 page)

‘You want me to sit up here?' Ruby said to Charlotte. ‘Okay. But you stay close in case I fall off!' She laughed then climbed into the saddle on top of the three golden rods. Charlotte stood behind her with a steadying hand on one shoulder

Green held the mask to Gerald. ‘Put this on Miss Valentine's face,' Green said. ‘I want to see it at work.'

Gerald looked down at the mask. It glowed.

He reached out and Green tipped the mask into his hand. As it touched his palm, it softened; it seemed to mould to Gerald's fingers. He swallowed a jagged ball of pain as a lightning bolt shot up his arm and into his chest, piercing his heart like a blade. It took all his strength to stay upright, to hide the torment he was suffering.

And the scales were blasted from his eyes.

The golden rods had given Gerald a clarity of sight. But it was nothing to the purity of vision that he experienced holding the Oracle's mask. A white surge cleared everything from his mind; a wave of light silenced the usual mental noise leaving a perfect emptiness.

Nirvana.

Gerald felt he could control the power in his grasp; he could direct it to whatever ends he desired. And he saw a way forward.

‘Isn't it funny, Gerald.' Green's voice cut through the white silence. ‘The number of times I've tried to kill you, only for you to wriggle free. And then you lead me right to the object of my desire. It's as if you were destined to live for that purpose.'

Gerald's focus was absolute. He took a step towards Ruby perched on the Oracle's tripod. She was smiling at him. ‘Hello, Gerald,' she said. ‘What do you have there?'

Charlotte and Green leaned forward.

Gerald raised his hand, holding the golden mask between his fingertips.

‘That's it, Gerald,' Green said, his eyes wide. ‘Let's witness the birth of a new Oracle.'

Gerald's course was set. He couldn't let this treachery stand.

Nothing is certain
.

Gnothi seauton.

Know thyself.

Ruby smiled again, her eyes calm and relaxed.

Gerald moved closer. The mask was centimetres from Ruby's face.

‘
Gnothi seauton!
' Gerald cried. ‘Know thyself!'

Then he thrust his hand forward, and drove the Oracle's mask hard onto Charlotte's face.

The moment the mask bridged Charlotte's nose it moulded onto her, sealing itself against her skin with a burning hiss. She howled with pain, throwing her hands to her face to tear at the metal veil across her eyes. The poisoned hairpin flew into the air in a lethal arc.

Gerald pulled Ruby clear of the tripod just before the pin skewered the seat. He threw her across the pit, straight into Sir Mason Green. The impact knocked Green sideways and he fell, striking his head on the stone floor.

Green lay motionless. Sam sat on the side of the pit, his eyes wide.

‘I can see!' Charlotte howled, her hands pressed to her temples. ‘I can see everything.'

Gerald raced to Ruby lying on the floor. She blinked up at him as he rolled her over and inspected the skin near the inside of her elbow. ‘Just as I thought,' he muttered. He was looking at a fresh puncture wound.

‘All the future is mine!' Charlotte stepped out of the pit and was stumbling towards the doorway. ‘The future is mine!'

Then she stepped across the white marble line in the floor.

The moment her foot touched the stone on the other side, her spine snapped straight. Her screams reached a new level. Her arms flung back and her chin tilted up. She was like a white swan in the moment before flight.

A blinding pulse of energy burst through the eyeholes in the mask. White light filled the room like an exploding star. Gerald threw himself over Ruby and shielded his face. He could sense the raw power against his back. The brightness was overwhelming. Then Charlotte's screams stopped, and the temple was silent.

For a few seconds, Gerald didn't move. Then he slowly righted himself.

Charlotte stood frozen in place near the door to the temple, the mask still on her face.

Gerald yanked the hairpin from the Oracle's chair and held it out like a dagger. He circled to the front of Charlotte and looked up at her.

Her skin was a chalky white and her head was still tilted up, as if she was staring into the furthest corners of eternity. Gerald reached out a hand and tapped Charlotte's arm. At his touch, the limb disintegrated into a fine powder.

Gerald jumped back. ‘Holy cow!' The tip of the hairpin brushed Charlotte's shirt, and the rest of her body caved in. Like an imploding building, Charlotte collapsed in a mound of crystalline sand. Feet, legs, torso, shoulders—they all went down like a house of cards. Last to go was her head, which landed intact on the pile of sand on the floor. The mask fell free, revealing a pair of calcified eyes, sealed against all light.

Gerald stared in shock at the fossilised head that gazed sightless back at him.

He moved only when he heard the muffled groan coming from Ruby.

‘What happened?' Ruby was gulping in air. She wiped a hand across her face. ‘I feel kind of woozy.' She raised herself to her elbows and looked around the chamber. ‘What happened to Charlotte?'

‘Never mind her,' Gerald said. ‘Do you remember anything after we fell asleep in here?'

Ruby thought for a second, then she placed a hand on her forearm. ‘There was a needle,' she said. ‘Oh my gosh! She injected us with something.'

Sam's voice floated across from the far side of the pit. He was flat on his back on the floor. ‘Whatever it was, it made everything hilarious.'

Gerald grinned. ‘I knew it,' he said. ‘Green tried to convince me that you were working for him.'

‘Are you serious?' Sam said. He stumbled over to them. ‘Who would ever believe that?'

Gerald cleared his throat. ‘Yeah,' he said. ‘Ridiculous.'

Ruby gave him a curious look. ‘What happened to Charlotte?'

‘She crossed the line,' Gerald said.

‘I saw that,' Ruby said. ‘But what happened to her? It was like she turned to salt.'

‘I think she was…' Gerald struggled to find the right word, ‘…I think she was consumed. When I held that mask, it was like I could see what was going to happen down here. I could see Charlotte stepping over that line in the floor and then petrifying like that.'

‘But why did it happen?' Sam asked.

‘I think it's the reason the Oracle did her thing locked up in this chamber. If you're going to see into the future, you can't actually exist in the present.'

‘In English, please.'

‘Ruby was right. It's like that walk around the table at the restaurant back in London,' Gerald said. ‘Everything anyone does has an impact on future events. The future isn't some predetermined place that we're travelling to—it's something that we create with every decision we make. By crossing that line on the floor, Charlotte must have moved from a place where the Oracle could have no impact on the outside world, to one where she could.'

‘And every step she took further into the outside world was changing the future,' Ruby said. ‘Every time she moved, the future she was seeing had to be recast in her mind.'

‘It was too much for her brain to take. She couldn't process it,' Gerald said. ‘It ate her up.'

Sam let out a grunt. ‘I guess she didn't see that coming, then.'

Gerald looked down at the mask, pitched into the pile of sand. ‘Each Oracle must have been condemned to stay in this room. If she crossed that line, she'd end up like that.'

Ruby looked over at the tripod in the centre of the shallow pit. ‘That was the only safe place for her to sit until the day she died,' she said.

Gerald scanned the line of busts along the wall. ‘This must be all that's left of the Oracles of Delphi. What a sacrifice.' He knelt and picked up Charlotte's head. It was surprisingly heavy. There was a vacant plinth at the end of the wall and Gerald lifted the head onto it. As he settled it in place, he saw there was a neat
Charlotte
engraved in the base. He looked at the bust next to it.

‘Clea,' he said. ‘Looks like she knew how all this would end from the very start.'

Sam nudged the mask with the toe of his shoe. ‘What do we do with this thing?'

Gerald pulled his T-shirt over his head and wrapped it around his right hand. Gingerly he scooped up the mask and carried it back to the opening beneath the tripod. ‘It was locked up safe in here for sixteen hundred years,' he said. ‘No reason it can't stay here for the next sixteen hundred.'

Sam suddenly shouted, ‘Nico!' He made a dash for the door. ‘They tied him up back in the temple.'

Gerald went to follow, but Ruby held him back.

She looked up at him. ‘You know Green was lying, don't you. About Sam and me.'

Gerald raised and lowered a shoulder. ‘I know. He just wanted to use you as a test dummy and he wanted me to do the honours. He almost had me convinced though. What he said was true—you're the only reason I kept pursuing this thing. You're the one who kept me going. He made it sound like you'd put on an act. I couldn't believe you'd be interested in…' His voice trailed off.

Ruby smiled. ‘In you?' she said, her face lighting up. ‘Oh, Gerald. I kept urging you on because I know how important it was for you to solve this mystery, to do what your great aunt asked. I would never lie to you.'

Gerald bit his bottom lip. ‘You're a good friend,' he said.

Ruby hugged him. ‘So are you,' she said.

And, for the first time, Gerald hugged back.

A low moan sounded from the floor. Sir Mason Green was starting to come to. Gerald pulled the laces from his shoes and bound the old man's ankles and hands.

‘There,' Gerald said, beaming up at Ruby. ‘Best defence to a murder charge there is—the victim with a pulse.'

Epilogue

‘E
ight hearts!'

Mrs Rutherford studied Sam over the top of her glasses.

‘A brave bid indeed, Master Sam,' she said, rifling through her hand. ‘Are you sure?'

Sam grinned with supreme confidence. ‘No guts, no glory, Mrs R.'

The game of Five Hundred had been a battlefield for the best part of an hour. Sam and Mr Fry were partnered against Ruby and Mrs Rutherford, and the scores were even. The tension over the card table in the drawing room at Gerald's Chelsea townhouse was starting to build.

Gerald and his lawyer, Mr Prisk, sat in armchairs by the fireplace, going over a sheaf of papers on a low coffee table. A tray with a pitcher of iced lemon squash sat untouched on the table.

Gerald looked up from the pad where he was doodling while listening to Mr Prisk. ‘Hey, guess what?'

‘What?' Ruby said.

‘Did you know that
cheap old relic
is an anagram for
Delphic Oracle
?'

‘Is that right?' Ruby said. She laid the joker on Sam's lead. ‘My trick, dopey.'

The housekeeper beamed with delight. ‘Oh, well played, Miss Ruby. The girls win again.'

‘Ha! Who would have thought that parlour games could be such fun,' Ruby said. She gathered the cards together and cut the pack. ‘Another hand?'

Mr Fry stood from the table and straightened his jacket. ‘I better not. I have an appointment in an hour and I best be getting ready.'

‘Dinner with Miss Turner again, Mr Fry?' Ruby said. ‘That's the third time this week, isn't it?'

Fry turned a russet red. ‘Miss Turner will be going down to Cheltenham next week to oversee Miss Gupta's return to school. I am merely keeping her company while she is in London.'

‘Ignore her, Mr Fry,' Gerald said. ‘She's teasing. Have a great night.' Before Fry could reach the door, Gerald spoke up again. ‘And Mr Fry?'

The butler turned in the doorway to face him.

‘Yes, sir?'

‘Thanks again for what you did in France. There aren't many people who'd risk arrest the way you did. I'd be locked up if it wasn't for you.'

Fry's face grew wistful. ‘I know. I think about it every day.' He closed the door behind him as he left.

Mr Prisk pulled the papers together on the coffee table and signed the top one. ‘Now Gerald, you will need to come to court this Thursday, just for the formality of having the charges against you withdrawn. And I believe Inspector Jarvis will be asked to apologise for his, ahem,
enthusiastic
pursuit of you.'

‘I should hope so,' Mrs Rutherford said. ‘Shooting at children, indeed.'

‘To be fair, that was one of the local Delphi police,' Ruby said. ‘Like Nico said, some of the local police were a bit excitable.'

‘What will happen to Sir Mason now?' Mrs Rutherford asked.

‘At the moment he's in jail in Athens,' Mr Prisk said, pouring himself a glass of squash. ‘The Greek authorities are trying to satisfy themselves that he's alive. The records still show that he's dead. And because he's officially dead, he can't access any of his money to hire lawyers. So he'll be there for some time, even before he faces any of the hundred or so charges that will be laid against him.'