Daemons Are Forever

CHAPTER SEVEN A Thousand and One Damnations

It was early afternoon on a bright and breezy summer day, and the grounds of the Hall rang with the merry sound of organised mayhem. Janissary Jane had half the family out doing military exercises again. Separated into groups with terse, efficient names like Alpha, Beta, and Omega, men and women charged up and down the lawns yelling their battle cries and frightening the gryphons. Group attacked group with blank ammunition, wooden batons, and even bare hands, and generally ran themselves ragged under Janissary Jane’s barked orders. Watching happily from a comfortable deck chair, in the shade of a broad parasol, I thought they looked pretty good. Even if they were making a hell of a mess of the carefully cultivated lawns. The team of gardeners had already thrown a major wobbly, and slouched off for a collective sulk and brew up in their shed.

Janissary Jane had been putting the family through its paces for over two weeks now, and I had to say, the family was taking to military training and discipline like a duck to water. We are all trained to fight the good fight from an early age, but the torcs made it easy. It’s not difficult to play at soldiers when you have the armour to make you fast and strong, and keep you from getting hurt. But not many actually have the aptitude for it. Which is one of the reasons why field agents have always been such a small part of the family.

Training without a torc was a whole different matter. You could get hurt, and so could your opponent. Surprisingly, that hadn’t put off as many of the family as I’d expected. If anything, they embraced the new training. Because it felt more…real. So their achievements felt more real. And they practically worshipped Janissary Jane, who’d done everything the Droods had and more, without the aid of the family armour.

Penny came strolling across the lawns to join me, looking cool and collected in a blindingly white summer outfit, despite the heat of the afternoon. She stood over me, and I offered to pour her a glass of champagne from the bottle I had cooling in an ice bucket. She sniffed disdainfully.

“Are you sure you’re comfortable enough there, Eddie? Got everything you need? Perhaps you’d like me to rush back and bring you out a footstool?”

“Oh, would you?” I said. “I’d be ever so grateful.”

“Blow it out your ear.” Penny looked at the men and women dashing excitedly back and forth in their groups, and throwing themselves upon each with much enthusiasm and violence. “They do seem to be getting into it, don’t they?”

“Damn right,” I said. “I’m exhausted just sitting here watching them. More importantly, it’s doing a hell of a lot for family morale. Everything they’re accomplishing comes from themselves, not from their armour. It’s doing wonders for their self-confidence.”

Penny looked at me. “And that’s why you brought Janissary Jane here.”

“To set an example, yes. I cut the family off at the knees, when I took away their golden torcs. Took away their pride, their self-esteem, and their confidence. Janissary Jane is beating it back into them the hard way, and they love it.”

“I take it you’ve noticed Harry is also watching it all from a safe distance, along with several of his traditionalist chums?”

“Of course,” I said. “He never wants to be a part of anything I organise, but he never misses out on anything that’s happening. He’s probably making notes for his regular report to the Matriarch. She can’t be seen to be taking an interest personally, but Harry’s been her eyes and ears ever since he got here.”

“I told you we should have brought him into the Inner Circle,” said Penny. “Keep your enemies close, and all that.”

“No,” I said flatly. “I don’t trust him.”

“You keep saying that, but you won’t say why.” Penny waited, but I had nothing more to say. She sighed heavily. “All right, his best friend is a hellspawn, but you’re shacked up with the infamous witch of the wild woods. And you let her into the Inner Circle.”

“I trust Molly,” I said. “Hell, I even trust you, Penny dear. Harry, on the other hand … is perhaps a little too much like me. Crafty and devious and following his own flag.”

“You brought the Sarjeant-at-Arms into the Circle,” said Penny. “And you hate his guts. And you know very well he reports everything we say back to the Matriarch.”

“Cyril’s different,” I said. “I can trust him to put the good of the family first. Even over the Matriarch.”

“Well, much as I hate to interrupt this important bit of loafing about you’re so involved in, I have been sent to remind you very firmly, up to and including the use of violence if necessary, that it’s time for the Inner Circle meeting in the Sanctity. We’ve finally got a list of prospective candidates for the new torcs for you to take a look at.”

“About time,” I said, heaving myself gracelessly out of the deck chair. Not that far away, two teams of warriors in training lost their temper and jumped each other, brawling back and forth across the lawn with much flailing of fists, kicking, and occasional biting. Janissary Jane hurried over to bawl them out, and I decided it was time to leave them to it. They’d just have to manage without my moral support.

We all met in the Sanctity again, under the comforting crimson glow of the manifesting Strange. We’d all settled on that for his name, even though he kept plaintively insisting he felt much more like an Ethel. You have to draw the line somewhere. The Armourer was already there, of course, along with the Sarjeant-at-Arms. Molly was waiting at the door when Penny and I arrived. She gave Penny a long, hard look, and made a point of taking my arm in hers as we joined the rest of the Inner Circle.

“Jacob is still missing,” said the Armourer, not bothering with the usual hellos and how-are-yous. “It’s been two weeks since anyone’s seen him. He hasn’t been back to the old chapel, and even the headless nun has been asking rather plaintively what’s happened to him. Though what she sees in him…I’m beginning to think something’s happened to him.”

“How could anything have happened to him?” said Penny. “I mean, he’s dead. Has been for centuries.”

“More likely he’s up to something,” growled the Sarjeant-at-Arms. Ever since he’d been outed as a Cyril, his voice had taken on a distinctly lower tone. “No doubt something foul and appalling, which he will find terribly amusing.”

“Jacob can look after himself,” I said firmly. “I’m sure he’ll turn up when he’s needed. Whether we want him to or not. In the meantime, Penny tells me that you’ve finally agreed on a list of prospective candidates for the new torcs.”

“Yes, finally,” said the Armourer, glaring round impartially. “Fifty names have been arrived at, decided by due process, and after much deliberation, shouting, and hair-pulling.”

“Which means,” the Sarjeant said heavily, “that it’s time to talk about launching our first attack. We need to put on a massive show of force, as soon as possible. Prove to the world that we’re strong and united, and still a force to be reckoned with.”

“No,” Penny said immediately. “We’re not ready yet. We need more time, more training, and a hell of a lot more than fifty torcs before we can successfully put a force in the field.”

“They looked pretty good to me just now,” I said mildly. “And for once, I am forced to agree with the Sarjeant. Quick, someone take a photo. We need to do something big and aggressive, and we need to do it now. Some politicians, and other enemies, are growing increasingly restless. Reports are coming in from all over the world, of sabre rattling between countries, of invasions and excursions into disputed territories, that would never have happened in the old days, when we still ruled with a golden fist and made everyone play nice. And then there are all the usual suspects, stirring up trouble here and there just to test the waters and see what they can get away with. Dr. Delirium, the Cold Eidolon, and Truman in his new base, wherever that is, and I can’t believe we still haven’t got a decent line on that yet. Remind me to kick someone’s arse about that. No, people, we have to do something right now. Strike some shock and awe into our enemies; prove we’re still in the game and that bad boys will be severely spanked.”

“Then pick a target,” said the Sarjeant. “Anyone, as long as they’re a danger. You’re the one who kept going on about the Loathly Ones…”

“This is all moving too quickly,” Penny said stubbornly. “Move before we’re ready, and it could all backfire. We can’t afford for the world to learn just how weak we really are.”

“How will you know when you’re ready?” Molly said reasonably. “Training can only do so much. Eventually you’ve got to kick the little birdies out of the nest and see whether they fly.”

“I don’t know if this qualifies,” Strange said suddenly. “But I’m picking up a new report just coming in to the War Room. It seems to be saying we have a definite location for a large gathering of Loathly Ones.”

We all stood up straighter and looked at each other. Reports had been coming in for some time now that the Loathly Ones had been gathering together in unusual numbers, somewhere down in South America.

“Where?” I said.

“The Nazca Plain,” said Strange. “You know, that place where they have all the big lines dug into the ground, that make up shapes you can only see clearly from orbit, or something. Von Daniken said they were really landing pads for spaceships, in his Chariots of the Gods.”

“Hold everything,” said Molly. “You’ve read von Daniken?”

“Oh, sure!” said Strange. “I love a good laugh.”

So we all trooped straight down to the War Room, carefully not hurrying too much so as not to draw attention to ourselves. The family watched everything the Inner Circle did with great interest, and they did so love to gossip. If we were about to launch our first big attack, I didn’t want the information getting out in advance. The staff in the War Room was more than a bit surprised to see us, as the report on the Loathly Ones was still coming in from our agent in the field, one Callan Drood. We had hardly any agents out in the world at the moment, as it was hard to get anyone to volunteer without the protection of a torc. The Droods have a lot of enemies. Luckily, some of the younger members of the family were keen to prove themselves, and hopefully fast-track themselves for one of the new torcs.

I knew Callan. I’d been impressed by his attitude, and his thoroughness, when I found out he led the team searching through Truman’s old stamping ground under London. I suggested he might like to volunteer for field work, and he jumped at the chance. Though of course he had to be sarcastic and opinionated about it, so he could pretend he’d been talked into it against his better judgement. He didn’t want anyone to think he was a pushover. So I smiled, and sent him to South America. And now he’d been the one to find the Loathly Ones for us.

All the way down in South America. What the hell were they doing in South America?

Callan’s face filled one of the main display screens. He didn’t look too happy about things, but then he never did. His young, broad face was sunburned, his thin blond hair was plastered to his skull, and the sweat was dripping off him. All I could see in the background was a tall bluff face of some dark sandstone, and a sky so blue it was almost painful to the eye.

“About time you got here,” he snapped. “It’s a hundred and thirty in the shade out here, and there isn’t any shade. Bloody unnatural heat. Soon as this briefing has finished, I’m going to go find a swimming pool and drink it. I’m looking out over the Nazca Plain, and the Loathly Ones have been gathering down there for the last six months. They’re building something, out on the plain. I don’t know what it is, but I really don’t like the look of it. Local governments have been well bribed to stay away, and the whole area is out of bounds for tourists. There are guards on all the main approaches to turn people back and discourage anyone from asking too many questions.”

“Can you describe this thing they’re building?” said the Armourer.

“Not really. It’s big, maybe a hundred feet tall, and half as wide, some of it’s machinery and some of it isn’t, and it makes my head hurt just to look at it. There are hundreds of Loathly Ones here, swarming all over the bloody thing and adding bits to it.”

“Could be a weapon of some kind,” said the Armourer.

“No, really; you think so?” said Callan. “And here I was, thinking it was probably the centrepiece of a Loathly Ones theme park. Look, just get the hell down here, okay? This whole thing is creeping me out big-time. Bring reinforcements. And cold drinks.”

“Could this new structure be in any way connected with the ancient lines on the plain?” said Penny. “And the unexpected heat?”

“Damned if I know,” said Callan. “Nothing obvious, anyway.”

“The lines are thousands of years old,” said Penny, frowning seriously. “Laid out in their gigantic patterns so long ago that no one now remembers who did it, or why. They’re even older than our family.”

“There may be something in the old library,” said the Armourer.

“The location can’t be just a coincidence,” said the Sarjeant-at-Arms. “Callan, are you sure there isn’t any connection?”

“Look, I’m just telling you what I see. And I am not getting any closer for a better look. The Loathly Ones have been attacking anyone or anything that shows up on the plain, and I like my soul where it is, thank you very much. If you want to know more about the lines, read your von Daniken.”

“Don’t say you read him too,” said Molly.

“Of course. He has a lot of good insights. If I didn’t know better, I’d swear he was one of us.”

“Thank you, Callan,” I said quickly. “Keep an eye on things till we get there, and report any new activity.”

“Remember the cold drinks.”

I gestured for the communications people to shut down the display screen, and then I looked round at the rest of my Inner Circle. “This is it. The opportunity we’ve been waiting for. The Loathly Ones getting together in unprecedented numbers, and maybe building a new super-weapon? We can’t allow this to continue.”

“I don’t know about unprecedented,” the Armourer said thoughtfully. “I seem to recall something similar, back in my grandfather’s day…I’ll have to look it up in the family records.”

“They don’t normally take over anything bigger than a small town,” said Penny. “And even then, they go to great pains to hide it from the rest of the world. This kind of public display is out of character.”

“You mean it could be a trap?” said Molly.

“I don’t see how,” I said. “They’re right out in the open. And that thing they’re building worries me. No, we’ve found our first target. Taking out a major gathering of the Loathly Ones is the best way to announce to the world that we’re still in business.”

“But we don’t know enough about the situation,” Penny said stubbornly. “We have no idea what it is they’re building, or the dangers involved in destroying it. We don’t even know for sure what defences the Loathly Ones have put in place around it. We need more information, before we commit ourselves to a main assault.”

“The only way we’ll get more information is to go down there and kick the Loathly Ones around till they tell us what they’re doing,” said the Sarjeant.

“Exactly,” I said. “We need to move now, before they finish whatever it is they’re doing, and before they realise we know about it. So we take in a strike force, led by our new torcs, destroy as many of the Loathly Ones as possible, and tear down whatever we find there. I said we were going to war against the Loathly Ones, and this will be a great beginning. Penny, tell the family that we’re ready to hand out the first fifty torcs. We’ll make a whole ceremony out of it. The new knights in armour of the Drood family.”

“Don’t you want to check the names?” said Penny.

“No,” I said. “I trust your judgement. Why, is there someone on the list you think I might object to?”

“Just the one,” said Molly. “Harry.”

“I’d have been surprised if he wasn’t on the list,” I said. “He’s an experienced field agent. And James’s son.”

“But you don’t trust him,” said Penny.

“Of course not,” I said. “He’s James’s son.”

We held the great torc-giving ceremony in the Sanctity, celebrating the bestowing of fifty new torcs on deserving members of the family. The Sanctity was packed from wall to wall with excited family, standing shoulder to shoulder. More filled the corridor outside. We had to set up vid screens, all through the Hall, so everyone in the family could see. This was the start of a new era for the Droods, and I wanted everyone to feel a part of it. Even the Matriarch and her supporters were looking in, from her suite. I checked. Strange shed his beneficent light over all of us, and even broadcast some suitable music, complete with trumpets and fanfares in all the right places.

One by one they came forward and knelt before the crimson glow, the fifty, the chosen few, the new knights of the family, and out of nowhere silver torcs appeared around their necks. A great cheer went up for each of the fifty names, and the family applauded them all till everyone’s hands ached. There were smiles and tears everywhere, and much stamping of feet. There was a common feeling that these torcs were special, and these fifty men and women were special, because they had earned their torcs.

At the end, the Inner Circle pushed me forward to say a few words. I didn’t particularly want to, but everyone there seemed to expect it of me. I got a pretty good cheer as I stepped forward, though perhaps not as good a cheer as the fifty chosen ones got, and it quickly died away as I raised my hands for quiet.

“This is the start of a new day,” I said. “For the family, and for the world. No more sitting around waiting for threats, and then reacting to them. We’re going to take the fight to the enemy. And we’re going to start by bringing down the Loathly Ones! I shall lead a strike force against their new base of operations: fifty torced men and women, and two hundred volunteers, armed with all the very best toys the Armoury can supply. Salute these warriors! The Droods are going to war, and the Loathly Ones are going down! Mark this day, my family, my friends. It’s time to show the world that the Droods are back in town!”

Afterwards, Molly said to me, “Whoever told you that you know how to make a speech?”

“It’s a dirty job,” I said. “But someone’s got to do it.”

We flew down to South America in the family’s private fleet of Blackhawke aircraft. Great big black beasts of the sky, smooth and sleek and driven by powerful engines we reverse engineered from an alien starship that crash-landed in a Wiltshire field in 1947. Five planes, carrying fifty men and women with their new torcs, two hundred heavily armed volunteers, myself and Molly, Janissary Jane and Mr. Stab, and Harry and Roger Morningstar. I could have done without that last addition, but Harry wouldn’t go without him. Molly and I were there because it was my plan, Janissary Jane because she’d trained these people and knew more about fighting demons than all the rest of us put together, and Mr. Stab because…well, basically because I wanted a vicious supernatural serial killer on my side, just in case anything went wrong.

And I wanted to keep him close, where I could keep a watchful eye on him.

Mr. Stab hadn’t joined the rest of us in the Sanctity for the bestowing of the torcs, but then I hadn’t expected him to. He wasn’t what you’d call a social animal. So afterwards I sent Penny to look for him, to tell him about the forthcoming attack on the Loathly Ones. When she didn’t report back after a reasonable time, I got just a little worried. I found a private place, locked the door, tuned the Merlin Glass to the present, and ordered it to look in on Penny and Mr. Stab, wherever they might be. My reflection vanished from the mirror, replaced by a view of the two of them, walking together on the grounds. Just walking, and chatting. Penny seemed completely at ease in Mr. Stab’s company, even after I’d gone out of my way to warn her about what he was, and what he’d done. Their voices came to me quite clearly.

“I wouldn’t have thought you were the fresh air and wide-open spaces type,” said Penny. “I had you marked down as a town mouse.”

“I prefer it out here,” said Mr. Stab.

“Is the room we’ve given you not comfortable enough?”

“I’ve known many rooms, down the years,” said Mr. Stab. He kept his gaze straight ahead, not looking at Penny. “All pretty much the same. Just places to stay, for a while, before I’m forced to move on again. These days I carry a little notebook, to remind me of where I’m staying and what name I’m currently using. No home for me; not anymore. Just another of the many human things I had to give up, to be what I am. My room here is perfectly adequate. Even luxurious. But no; I’m not comfortable here, in the Hall. I’m not allowed to murder, you see, and I find that very trying. It goes against my nature. It grinds against my soul, until I can’t see anything but blood. And that’s why I spend as much time as possible on your extensive grounds, away from…temptation.”

“I don’t think I’ve ever heard you say so much at one time,” said Penny. “You’re a very interesting man, Mr. Stab.”

He looked at her for the first time. “You’re not scared of me?”

“I’m a Drood,” said Penny. “It takes a lot to scare us. And anyway, you’ll be off to South America soon, to fight the Loathly Ones. There’ll be killing enough then to satisfy anyone, even you.”

“It’s not the same,” said Mr. Stab. “I have to murder, to tear the flesh and spill the blood, to see the suffering in their eyes. It’s what I do. It’s all I have.”

“And you always kill women?”

“Yes. Because it’s the only form of intimacy I can ever know now. My punishment and my reward.”

“Is it true…Have you really done all the things they say you have?”

“Oh yes,” said Mr. Stab. “All that, and more. Make no mistake, Penny; I have done terrible things, and gloried in them. I have thrust my arms deep into the guts of horror, and brought them out dripping red up to the elbows. They called me Jack the Ripper, and I was. The things I did, to poor Marie Kelly, in that small shuttered room … I opened her up like a book, and read her secrets. I sent the press a letter, once, and gave them my address. From Hell, it said. And that was just the beginning.”

“And you…have to kill? You’re driven to murder?”

“Yes.”

“Then…if you don’t have any choice, it isn’t really your fault, is it?”

“Yes it is, Penny. I killed those six women of my own free will, savouring the agony and terror in their dying eyes, breathing in their last exhalations like the finest wines. And if this particular form of immortality isn’t quite what I thought I was buying with my ceremony of slaughter, it’s the Hell I earned for the evil I did, back in that unseasonably warm autumn of 1888.”

“But you haven’t killed anyone here,” said Penny.

“I gave my word,” said Mr. Stab. “But it won’t last. It never does.”

“This is a new place. You’ve never known anywhere like Drood Hall. All kinds of things are possible here. Even redemption. Come back to the Hall with me. And just maybe … I can show you that you’re stronger than you think you are.”

He looked at her for a long moment. “This can only end badly, Penny.”

“I don’t believe that,” said Penny. “I’ve never believed that.” I watched through the mirror as she casually slipped an arm through his and led him back across the great grassy lawns, to the Hall.

I must have been frowning in my seat on the plane, because Molly dug me in the ribs with her elbow. “What’s up, sweetie? Afraid of flying?”

“No, it’s not that. I was just…thinking.”

“Well stop frowning like that; you’ll get lines. You know, this really is some plane, Eddie. I’ve flown first class on all the best airlines, on faked tickets of course, but never anything to match this. Really comfortable chairs, plenty of leg room…and it hardly seems like we’re moving. I’ll bet the US president doesn’t have it this good, on Air Force One.”

I had to smile at her enthusiasm. I was pretty excited myself. I’d never been allowed out of the country before. Never been on a plane before. I kept looking out the window to make sure it was real. And yet…there was something in the air in the long cabin, an atmosphere of tension and anticipation. Torced and untorced family members sat side by side, not talking much, trying to pretend they were reading the books or magazines they’d brought with them. The Blackhawke’s augmented engines would get us to our destination in under two hours, but that was more than enough time for everyone to think of everything that could go wrong. I was no different. This was the family’s first big military operation since I took control and changed everything. We had to win this one. For all kinds of reasons.

I wondered what I was going to do, about Penny and Mr. Stab. It’s always the bad boy that makes a girl’s heart beat that little bit faster.

As if I didn’t have enough to worry about.

By the time we’d crossed the South American continent and descended over the Nazca Plain, we’d all got over the novelty of flying in a plane, and were more than ready for a little action. Molly had trouble getting her head around the fact that because the torcs made us invisible to all forms of detection, it meant the planes we travelled in were essentially invisible too. There wasn’t a radar installation or spy satellite anywhere that could detect our presence, even for a moment.

“Look, trust me,” I said finally. “No one knows we’re here, no one knows we’re coming. Compared to us, stealth bombers are painted bright pink, with big neon signs on them saying, Hello, sailor; come and get me! Our only worry is avoiding other aircraft, because we won’t show up on their radar. We’re staying well above all the usual commercial flight paths, but there’s always the chance of bumping into some secret military job, or even the occasional UFO.”

“Hold everything,” said Molly. “UFOs, as in flying saucers? Close encounters of the extremely unlikely kind, where they stick things up your bottom? Really?”

“Not as such,” I said. “But there are a hundred and thirty-seven different alien species currently running around on Planet Earth that we know of. Most of them we keep in line through various long-established treaties and agreements; others we just step on hard now and again, to remind them not to make waves. But there are always a few Unidentified Objects zipping through the stratosphere, on their own inscrutable business, and they can be a damned nuisance sometimes.”

“Real aliens…” said Molly. “That is so cool!”

I had to smile. “You don’t have any trouble that we’re on our way to slap down a bunch of soul-eating demons, but the thought of aliens gets you all excited?”

“That’s different,” Molly said stubbornly. “I just don’t tend to bump into aliens in my line of work. All I know is magic. Vampires, werewolves, ghouls, and necromancers, no problems. Deal with them every day. But most of what I know of aliens comes from Ridley Scott’s Alien and John Carpenter’s The Thing. Tell me that is not representative of most aliens, please. There must be some like ET?”

“Would you rather have the truth, or a comforting lie?” I said.

“Oh, shut up. Are we nearly there yet?”

We landed at a private airfield, far away from anywhere civilised that might ask awkward questions about things like passports and visas. The family owns or leases such places in countries all over the world, for just such occasions as this. (Through a series of concealing false names and cutouts, of course.) We all filed off the Blackhawkes, and the heat hit us like a hammer. The sun was directly overhead in a cloudless sky, and my skin actually smarted just from the impact of the sudden heat. I armoured up immediately, in the interests of self-preservation. The family didn’t need a strike force leader with sunstroke. All the other torced Droods immediately followed suit, leaving the rest of the strike force looking distinctly mutinous. Molly worked a quick but subtle magic, and after that it was always shade wherever they happened to be standing.

Mr. Stab, Roger Morningstar, and Janissary Jane didn’t seem to notice the heat at all. They’d endured much worse, in their time.

I had a quick chat with the guy running the airfield for us, an old rogue with a dark, wrinkled face who’d served the family well and loyally for many years. And would continue to do so, as long as the money kept coming. My armour didn’t throw him at all; he’d seen it before. Though he did compliment me on my new colour scheme. I asked him what he knew about the unusual business down on the Nazca Plain, and he told me what he could, in excellent English.

It seemed foreigners had been coming to the plain in small groups for several months now. All nationalities, all types, but not the usual tourists. These were strange people, even for foreigners, talking and acting oddly, though he found it hard to be specific about what bothered him about them. As though they were always thinking of something else, was the best he could manage. They bought many things in the surrounding towns, and always paid cash. The local merchants loved them, and hoped they’d stay forever. When I pressed him on what these strangers had been buying, he said mostly technology, off-the-shelf stuff and special orders, and an extraordinary amount of livestock. All kinds. Presumably for slaughtering, since none of the foreigners professed any interest in farming, and they bought far more than they could ever hope to eat.

I thanked him and slipped him a little extra for his trouble, just to cement friendly relations. I didn’t need to worry that he might talk about us; he knew better than to talk about Drood business. He’d helped bury the previous airfield owner after he got a bit too talkative. No one betrays the Droods and lives to boast of it.

Janissary Jane got the expeditionary force sorted out into squads and loaded onto the fleet of jeeps the owner had provided, and we set off on the long, hard journey to the Nazca Plains. There was no scenery and no road, just an endless jolting ride across a sullen, empty desert under a baking sun. The trip seemed to last forever, but finally we came to a halt at the base of a cliff overlooking the plain. We disembarked from the jeeps, did a certain amount of stretching and stamping our feet, and then we climbed the steep rise all the way to the top and looked out over the plain. Callan Drood was waiting for us there, looking very sunburned, and extremely pissed off that we hadn’t brought any cold drinks with us. Molly conjured him up an iced bottle of Pepsi, and he drank it so fast he gave himself a headache.

I looked down at what the Loathly Ones were doing on the Nazca Plain. From this height they looked like ants, swarming around and over the huge structure that rose up from the heavily lined and grooved stone plain like a single alien skyscraper. It had to be three hundred feet tall now, a strange and unearthly mixture of styles and materials. Its shape made no sense at all. My mind couldn’t seem to cope with the unexpected dimensions and distortions. Just looking at it made my eyes hurt. Callan came forward to join me.

“It’s better if you look at it for just a few moments at a time. I’m pretty sure we’re looking at something that exists in more than three spatial dimensions, and what we see is only our minds trying to make sense of it. Don’t ask me what the hell it is, or what it’s for, but the Loathly Ones are all over it, all day and all night, inside and out. There’s a single opening at the base, and a lot of what goes in never comes out again. I get the feeling it’s almost finished. The pace of work has accelerated in the last twelve hours, like they’re fighting a deadline. Where are my cold drinks? I was promised cold drinks. And I’d better get a torc out of this. I’ve spent weeks out here, dodging the bastards’ patrols. Very heavily armed patrols, I might add. They kill anyone who gets too close, even clearly harmless tourists, whether they’ve seen anything or not.”

I gestured for him to shut up, and he did. My silver mask allowed me to zoom in on the towering edifice down on the plain, so I could study details as though I was right on top of them. The alien structure struck me as much as a machine as a building, designed to do … something, but the more I looked, the less sense it made. It didn’t take me long to discover what they’d been doing with so much livestock. The Loathly Ones had incorporated bits of them into the structure. Parts of the tower were clearly technological, even if I couldn’t identify it, but other parts were just as clearly organic. Living flesh, whole organs, bloody guts and connective tissues, even entire brains and heads. All alive, maintained as part of the functioning structure. I’d never seen anything like it before, and I’ve seen my share of alien and other-dimensional technology.

Janissary Jane came forward to stand on my other side, and I described what I was seeing to her. She nodded slowly.

“I have seen…something like this, before. It’s not a hellgate. Not as such. But it’s definitely a gateway of some kind.”

“So they’re planning to open a door to somewhere else,” said Molly, joining us to show she wasn’t going to be left out of things. “Maybe they’ve heard you declared war on them, Eddie, and they’re running for home while they’ve still got the chance.”

“A nice thought, but no,” I said. “They were building this long before I took control of the family.”

“And I don’t think this was designed just to open a gateway to Outside,” Janissary Jane said slowly. “It looks more like it’s designed to summon…something, from Outside, and bring it through into our world.”

“Reinforcements?” said Molly. “More Loathly Ones?”

“No,” said Janissary Jane. “With the power this thing uses, it would have to be something more powerful…something far worse than the Loathly Ones.”

“Something worse?” said Callan. “What could be worse than soul-eating demons?”

“Stick around,” I said. “If we don’t shut this thing down before they can open their gateway, you might just find out.”

“I want to go home,” said Callan. “I hate it here.” Molly produced another iced bottle of Pepsi for him, and he wandered off to kick moodily at the unyielding ground.

We all took turns to peer over the edge of the cliff and study the movements of the tiny figures scurrying around down below. There were hundreds of them, men and women and even some children, scrambling all over the huge structure with no regard for their own safety. Heat haze muddied the air between us and them, even with the help of the silver masks, but the extreme temperatures didn’t seem to bother the Loathly Ones at all.

No one was obviously in charge, no orders were given, but they all seemed to know exactly what to do. When I zoomed in on any particular individual worker, the strangeness of them hit me hard. They didn’t move like humans move, and their faces were blank. Sometimes they would all move at once, in perfect precision, like flocking birds. There was nothing human left in them but their shapes; everything else had been driven out by the Loathly Ones.

This was all new to Mr. Stab, and he insisted on having it all explained to him. So I did my best to give him the short version.

The Loathly Ones come from somewhere else, Outside of space and time as we understand them. They have no physical presence in our world, so to survive here they have to invade a body, mentally as well as physically. Preferably human, but not always. When a Loathly One invades, or infects, a human body it eats or corrupts or drives out the soul, opinions differ, and inhabits the remaining husk. Which soon burns out from the unbearable stresses and strains the new owner puts on it. But even after the body dies, and slowly decays, it still goes on, driven by the unearthly energies of the Loathly One. Until the body finally falls apart, and then the Loathly One goes looking for a new host. We call the infected humans drones. Basically, they’re zombies driven by an alien will, for alien purposes.

They destroy lives, and eat souls. And the family brought them here, for its own purposes. We should have known they’d get out of control.

“Sometimes they take over whole towns,” said Harry unexpectedly. “They start with one family, and then take over the entire community, house by house. When they’ve taken control of everyone, they force the town out of our reality and into some kind of pocket dimension, hidden from human detection. Then they use this hidden base to launch attacks on adjoining towns. Luckily they always give themselves away by being too greedy. The family wipes these towns out as fast as we find them.

“I was involved in one such cleansing, a few years back. It was in France, down in the Bordeaux region. They call such towns ghoulvilles. The local authorities sent out a call for help after they stumbled across one during a routine missing persons investigation. I was the nearest field agent, so I took the call. Joined up with a French demon specialist; Mallorie, her name was. A bit bookish, but she knew her business. The Armourer whipped up a dimensional key and shipped it out to us by the usual unnatural express route. And Mallorie and I led a French special forces unit into the ghoulville.”

He stopped for a moment, remembering. His face was calm, reflective, but his eyes were haunted.

“Terrible place. Every nightmare you’ve ever had. The light was fierce, almost too bright for human eyes to bear. The gravity fluctuated, and directions seemed to switch back and forth when you weren’t looking. The air was barely breathable, and it stank of blood and offal and rot. We’d come in hoping to find someone to rescue, but it soon became clear we were too late. There were men and women and even children all over the ghoulville, but all of them were infected. The Loathly Ones had eaten their souls. The children were the worst. They tried to hide what they were, to trick us into getting too close, but they had no idea how to act like children.

“They attacked us. Not even trying to act like humans anymore. They came running from every direction, flailing their arms like retarded children. Came at us with all kinds of weapons, with bare hands, and even bared teeth. We killed them all. Shot them down, cut them down, stamped their lying faces into the bloody ground. Something about them, human but not human, something that used to be human but was now hopelessly corrupted, drove us all crazy. We killed and killed, up one street and down the next, kicking corpses out of the way, till the gutters ran thick with blood. Some tried to surrender, but it was just a trick, to let them get close to us.

“When we were finished, we burned the town down. Left nothing standing. It took us hours, to be sure we’d got all of them. We searched all the houses, sometimes dragging them out of hiding places under stairs, or in the backs of wardrobes. By the end, as we tramped back out of the burning ghoulville, and back to our own world, even hardened French ex-paratroopers were weeping openly. Sometimes … I dream I’m still back there, and always will be.”

He looked around. We were all listening intently. He’d dropped his armour so we could all see his face while he talked, but now he armoured up again, becoming a faceless silver statue. As though he could keep out the memories that still haunted him.

“So when we get down there,” he said, “remember; they may look like people, but they’re not. They’re demons. Kill them for what they’ve done. And for what they make us do, to put things right again.”

The watching Droods nodded, and murmured quietly to each other, hefting their weapons. Mr. Stab was still looking down at the plain, apparently unmoved by what he’d heard. But I liked Harry rather better, for hearing what he’d been through. And I even liked Roger Morningstar a little more, when he put an arm around Harry’s silver shoulders, to comfort him.

“So,” said Mr. Stab, still not looking around. “The infected humans are drones. And that thing down there is …?”

“A nest,” I said. “And we’re the exterminators.”

“Splendid,” said Mr. Stab. “When do we start?”

Janissary Jane split us up into the arranged squads, with designated team leaders. Every group had some torced Droods, to lead the charge and, hopefully, soak up some of the initial punishment. She gave us a brief refresher talk on tactics, which basically boiled down to Don’t bunch up. Don’t get separated. Kill everything down there that isn’t us and Destroy that thing they’re building before they can get it working. There were no last-minute questions, no discussions or dropouts. We were all ready for action. Molly called up the spell she’d been working on since we got there, and a great wind arose, picked us all up surprisingly gently, and carried us down the side of the cliff to deposit us safely on the Nazca Plain.

We all started running the moment we hit the ground, heading straight for the towering structure before us. The drones saw us coming and dropped everything to run straight at us, blocking the way with their bodies. Noises came from their distorted mouths, but there was nothing human in the sound. Some had improvised weapons, most just had bare hands, with fingers curled like claws. There was no emotion in their faces, or no emotion we could read, and they bared their teeth like animals. They weren’t even trying to pretend at being human anymore. They saw the armoured forms leading the charge and knew we were Droods.

More of them came running, from every direction. Men, women, children, even some animals. The Loathly Ones aren’t fussy about what they possess. It’s all flesh to them. But even as our first squads slammed into the first wave of drones, even more came swarming out of the single opening at the base of the towering structure. More and more and more of them, far more than the structure should have been able to contain. Instead of the hundreds of drones we’d been expecting, suddenly there were thousands of them. Maybe hundreds of thousands…and still more and more came running and howling out onto the plain from the single opening.

The fighting had barely begun, and already we were hopelessly outnumbered. But I couldn’t call for a retreat. I’d committed us to this assault. We had to go on, and we had to win, before the Loathly Ones could open their gateway. Our two forces tore into each other, silver fists beating down inhuman faces, but already a terrible sense of hopelessness was seeping through me.

There were just so many of them…

The drones hit us hard, all of them supernaturally strong from the alien energies burning within their stolen, dead, or dying bodies. They threw themselves upon the first torced Droods, trying to bowl them over through sheer force of numbers. When that didn’t work, they clung on to silver arms, clasped silver legs, trying to force them off balance and drag them down. The armoured Droods stood firm, striking about them with their silver fists. Human skulls smashed and splintered under the terrible force of these blows, necks snapped, and heads were torn right off bodies. The armoured Droods broke backs and arms and legs, smashed in chests, and stamped on heads. Blood and guts flew on the air, and ran in streams down gleaming silver armour. Dozens of drones died in the first few moments of the battle, but the sheer mass of numbers soaked up the momentum of our charge, and all too soon we were stopped dead in our tracks. Killing and killing, but making no progress.

The Droods without armour opened up with the weapons the Armourer had provided. Heavy-duty hand cannon, grenade launchers, and even pointing bones and curse throwers. The drones fell in ranks as the guns raked back and forth, mowing them down, but there were always more drones, pressing forward, forcing their way past the beleaguered armoured Droods. We hit the drones with everything we had, and it wasn’t enough. They didn’t care about the damage they took. They felt no pain or fear or horror. A hundred could die, if it meant one would get through to kill.

All our plans and tactics disappeared, replaced by a brute struggle to survive. The squads were overrun or forced apart, and it was everyone for themselves. Most of the unarmoured Droods were dragged down and slaughtered in the first few minutes, overwhelmed by the sheer numbers, by drones who ran uncaring into the face of their weapons. Droods died screaming under flailing fists, hands like claws, and stabbing, clubbing weapons. I could hear them all around me, their human screams mixed in with the inhuman howling of the drones.

And then, impossibly, even the armoured Droods began to fall, as the drones brought strange and unnatural weapons out of the towering structure. Some armoured Droods just disappeared, teleported God knew where whenever one drone pointed a shimmering piece of tech at them. Some Droods fell victim to howling energy blades that ghosted right through the silver armour to cut up the flesh inside. And one corpse with radiation burns and glowing eyes stamped through the chaos, somehow unsaying the Words that activated the armour, so that it just disappeared back into the collar, leaving the owner dazed and helpless and vulnerable.

Mr. Stab appeared out of nowhere and cut that drone’s throat with a long shining scalpel.

I ended up fighting side by side, and then back to back, with Molly Metcalf. Drones came at us from every direction, sometimes with weapons and sometimes without. I fired my Colt Repeater again and again, picking off drone after drone with my gun that never missed and never ran out of bullets, but soon they were too close, vaulting over the bodies of the fallen to get at me. I put the gun away, grew silver spikes on my gleaming fists, and waded into them with all the terrible strength and speed my armour gave me. I struck them down, and they fell broken and bloody before me. I ripped the faces from their heads, smashed their skulls, broke their bones, and stamped them underfoot when they fell. I picked them up and used them as living flails with which to beat the enemy. Blood and gore streamed down my gleaming armour, unable to find a hold. I stamped and spun, striking out with impossible speed. I formed my silver hands into cutting blades and thrust and hacked, butchering everything that came within reach. And still there seemed no end to them.

They beat at me with their hands, and their weapons, and none of them could touch me. But the drones with the terrible weapons were drawing slowly, inexorably, closer.

Molly was hitting them with every offensive magic she knew, chanting and cursing at the top of her voice. Drones were transformed into helpless things, and trampled underfoot. Sometimes their shapes just collapsed, and then ran away like muddy water. She called down lightning bolts from the sky, called up fire from sudden cracks in the hard ground, called storm winds to blow them away. Strange forces crackled on the air before her, incinerating anything that came too close. But her voice was cracking from the strain, and I knew she wouldn’t be able to keep this up for long. Magic takes its toll, and even her hoarded energies wouldn’t last long at this rate.

I looked around during a brief lull in the fighting. I could hear Molly coughing and hacking painfully behind me. All my unarmored Droods were down, dead. Slaughtered, for all their fine training. About a dozen armoured Droods were still fighting, striding slowly through the chaos, striking down their enemies. Islands in a sea of death. Janissary Jane had been right all along. I didn’t need warriors. I needed an army.

Mr. Stab strode elegantly through the madness, no blood staining his fine clothes. He cut and slashed with almost inhuman grace and precision, killing everything that came within reach, and none of the drones could touch him. He was protected by forces far worse than theirs. He stalked the battlefield like a harsh Victorian god of war, smiling a terrible, happy smile, completely at home in Hell.

Roger Morningstar fought side by side with an armoured form I could only assume was Harry. Fierce flames burned all around them, consuming every drone they touched. Roger was smiling too. Harry fought well, with short, controlled, brutal movements, striking down the drones with almost clinical precision. Like it was just a job he happened to be extremely good at.

And Janissary Jane cut a bloody path through the roiling crowds with her infamous old sword, unstoppable in her cold and terrible fury. The greatest demon killer who ever lived.

She fought her way over to join Molly and me. I was wringing with sweat inside my armour, exhausted and running on fumes. My arms ached from so much effort, and my back was killing me. The armour can perform wonders, but I have to work it. And yet still I fought on, determined not to fall for as long as Molly needed me. Reduced to that, and no more. Janissary Jane yelled into my silver mask.

“It’s the tower!” she shouted over the roar of battle. “Something’s happening! I can feel it! I think the gateway’s opening!”

I clubbed down the nearest drones and turned to look. She was right. I could feel it too. A great light was shining out of the single opening, and more sprang from a hundred openings in the jagged sides of the huge structure. The air distorted and rippled all around it, and it was nothing to do with heat haze. I could sense if not see the gateway opening behind the tower, a great and growing circle, like a black sun…and on the other side of that opening…Something unbearably huge and awful and terribly aware. Pressing inexorably against the weakening barrier that was the only thing keeping it out of our small and terribly vulnerable world. Something so big I couldn’t even grasp the shape or nature of it. Like God walking angry in the world…

Whatever the Loathly Ones had summoned, it was here, waiting for the gateway to fully open, and then it would come through and do horrible, unspeakable things to us. Just because it could.

Something far worse than the Loathly Ones could ever hope to be.

I looked quickly around me. I counted ten armoured Droods still standing. I called to them through the armour.

“Get to the base of the structure! Everyone grab a part of it and bring the bloody thing down!”

I turned to Molly. She was swaying on her feet, blood running from her nose and mouth, and even leaving bloody tear tracks on her cheeks. Her body was breaking down under the strains she was putting on it, to channel her desperate magics. She looked at me, trying to work her mouth, but her eyes were vague. I yelled her name, grabbed her shoulder with my silver hand, and squeezed till she winced. Comprehension came back into her face.

“We have to get to the base of the structure, quickly! Molly! Can you clear us a path?”

“I’m tired, Eddie. So tired…”

“Can you do it?”

She glared at me. “Yes! Yes, I can do it! I’m Molly Metcalf, dammit. But you’d better be right about this, Eddie…”

She thrust one arm in the direction of the towering structure, and just like that every drone between us and it exploded into bloody gobbets. I made a mental note never to get Molly really mad at me, grabbed her arm, and we ran for the tower down the narrow aisle she’d opened. Aisles had opened up between all the other armoured Droods and the tower, and they were running too. We raced across the cracked stone ground, while the drones recovered their senses and ran to fill the gaps. We smashed them out of the way, knocked them over, and ran them down, racing for the tower. We all got to the base of the huge structure, and I yelled for all the armoured Droods to grab onto anything that looked substantial or load-bearing. Molly and Janissary Jane, Mr. Stab and Roger Morningstar worked hard to keep the drones back, as we all took hold of the tower and ripped its underpinnings out.

For a long moment nothing happened. The tower was huge, and there were only eleven of us … but we were Droods, and we had the incredible strength of the armour on our side. We ripped the support right out from under the tower, and brought the bloody thing down.

It roared and screamed like a living thing, and explosions ran through its shape like a string of firecrackers. New lights shone from a thousand new openings, while cracks ran up and down the exterior. Shudders ran through the whole height and width of it, and pieces started falling away. It swayed upon its crippled base, and then, slowly, the whole great length of it nodded forward and fell, stretching out across the great stone plain. Slamming down like the hand of God.

The gateway closed. Gone, just like that, and with it all traces of the terrible thing on the other side. The tower almost leisurely measured its length along the plain, and shattered into a million pieces as it hit. Most of the drones were crushed underneath it, and the few who survived turned and ran in a hundred directions. I let them go. I was busy hanging onto Molly, who was protecting us all with a simple force field, using the last of her strength. When it was finally over, only fifteen of us were left standing. Molly clung on to me, trembling in every limb, and I held her to me, only our shared strength keeping us on our feet. Roger Morningstar was holding Harry. Janissary Jane was on the radio to Callan and his people, left behind on the cliff, yelling for him to bring down transport for us. We had to gather up our fallen and get them out of here before the authorities arrived. The nine Droods dropped their armour; they all looked dazed and shell-shocked. Mr. Stab stared around him at the massed heaps of the dead, and smiled.

Harry let go of Roger and limped over to confront me. Behind the impassive silver mask, his voice was cold and harsh.

“We stopped the gateway opening. We brought down the tower and killed most of the Loathly Ones. But was it worth it, Eddie? Look at how few of us are left! Everyone else is dead! This was a debacle, a disaster. We’ve never lost this many family in a single operation in the whole history of our family! All so you could play the hero, one more time. When we get back, I’ll make sure everyone knows this was all your fault!”

“Of course you will, Harry,” I said tiredly. “That’s what you do. Go running to the Matriarch, like the good little toady you are. See what good it does you.”

“If you hadn’t taken away everyone’s torcs, most of those people would still be alive!”

“Yes. You’re probably right there.”

“You should have given everyone new torcs. Not just the ones you trusted to support you.”

I didn’t say anything. What could I say? He was right.

Harry turned his back on me and walked away. Molly finally let go of me and pulled something out of a hidden pocket.

“I found this, in the wreckage of the tower. It’s so full of potential magic, it all but shouted at me. You recognise it?”

I turned it over and over slowly in my hands. It was an amulet of some kind, deeply etched with Kandarian symbols. I could only translate one word.

“Invaders,” I said.

“Wonderful,” said Molly. “The Martians are coming.”

“No,” I said, too tired even to smile. “I’m pretty sure this was part of the summoning spell. An invocation, to bring through…whatever that was we stopped. Except…this is very definitely plural. Invaders…Not just one.”

“I may puke,” said Molly. “All we went through, just to stop one…what?”

“Something from Outside,” I said. “An invasion force, of something far worse than soul-eaters. Move over. I think I want to puke too.”

“Invaders,” said Molly. “Called by the Loathly Ones. Does that mean…more nests, more towers, somewhere else in the world?”

“Almost certainly,” I said. “Maybe in every country in the world. This was just the beginning.”

“God, you can be a real pain in the arse sometimes,” said Molly.

“Comes with the job,” I said. “Let’s go home.”