Destroyer of Worlds

7

In the timeless Grim Lands, only seconds had passed. Mallory and Caitlin watched as the flamboyant Callow did a little jig on top of the tomb.

'You've got a lot of energy for a dead man,' Mallory said.

'Ah, but then I am not like others you will find in this dismal place. When I walked the world, I was filled with more life than any of the grey, workaday drudges I encountered on their morose treks into the coffin they called the office. I drank deeply of the heady cup of life! I imbibed all there was to offer. And more!'

Mallory and Caitlin exchanged a glance, but if Callow noticed, he didn't appear to care.

'And then it was all so cruelly snatched away!' Callow added.

'I'm betting one or two others here would say the same thing,' Mallory said.

'No! I was not meant to die. It was an error of cosmic proportions. And if proof you need, it is the simple fact that I am still here.'

Caitlin eyed him curiously. 'What do you mean?'

'I am not allowed to continue. The Grey Lands is simply a waiting room. The vast majority of shades you find here are in the process of moving on. To where, I do not know. Heaven? Hell? Why this is hell, nor am I out of it. Perhaps back into the innocent foetus, with all the possibilities once again lying ahead, to do right, or wrong, learn, or not, and find their way… where? Back here!'

Mallory began to grow weary of Callow's chatter and prepared to head off. Callow instantly read the signs and leaped in front of him.

'Some of the shades get trapped here, true, for reasons I have not yet discerned. But you can tell their type instantly. Consumed by bitterness, infected with despair, none of them exhibit the joy you see here in my humble form. No, I am a true anomaly — neither dead nor alive. Caught in a web not of my own making, and no one prepared to throw up their arms and admit to their mistake.'

'We can't waste time here,' Caitlin said with irritation.

'Take me with you!' Callow pleaded, grabbing hold of Mallory's jacket.

Prising him off, Mallory said, 'Nice story, but I'm pretty sure you're meant to be here, and I wouldn't want to get on the wrong side of whoever sets the rules in this place.'

'Please!' Callow started to cry. 'You don't know what it's like here!'

'Mallory,' Caitlin pressed. When she held up the Wayfinder to examine the direction of the blue flame, Callow stopped crying instantly and his eyes narrowed.

Mallory noticed the sudden change in his demeanour and asked, 'What's wrong?'

'That lantern. I have seen it before. In the possession of my very good friends.' Callow slyly watched Mallory's interest grow. 'The remarkable, the astonishing Jack Churchill. And Ruth Gallagher. And the lovely Laura. Shavi. And the other one.'

'You know Church and the others?' Caitlin asked.

'We were travelling partners for a time, during that age of upheaval, that Age of Misrule. Oh, how they mourned my passing! Oh, how they would celebrate joyously if I returned to the land of the quick!'

The resonant creak of the cemetery gate echoed through the mist. Callow started, and ran to the edge of a mausoleum to peer uneasily into the grey, where he plucked at the fraying sleeve of his jacket. Mallory and Caitlin left him there and tried to pick a path through the cluttered mass of monuments to the dead, but within a moment he had joined them again.

'Let me guide you,' he said. 'You'll never find your way through this sprawling city of the departed without my help. There are many hidden dangers, and sometimes a slight detour could save you a limb or a life. You really would not want to be permanent residents here.'

From behind them came the dull sound of something dry and scratchy being drawn across stone. 'Who's there?' Mallory asked.

'I saw no one. I would not expect the dead to be passing through here at this time; unless, of course, they have learned of your arrival. Then it would be a time to beware. They are jealous of the living, and their bitterness drives them to extremes. And unpleasantness.'

'Bring him along,' Caitlin said. 'It won't hurt.'

'All right. But any sign of deceit and you'll wish you'd stayed in your tomb,' Mallory said bluntly. 'And don't get any ideas about coming back with us. This is a short-term deal through this God-forsaken place.'

'Of course, of course,' Callow said slyly, 'but once we are firm friends on the road of life… or death… who knows?'

'I know,' Mallory said firmly. 'Move.'

With a bow, Callow swung one arm out flamboyantly to guide them on their way. They were soon lost amongst the mausoleums and grave markers and leaning, ivy-covered statues, and though Callow whistled jauntily a few yards ahead of them, they were left uneasy by the constant morbidity of their surroundings.

'Is this what death is,' Caitlin asked, 'one never-changing bleak landscape that goes on for ever?' Hugging her arms around her, she fought off the creeping desolation imposed by their surroundings.

'Don't start asking me about the afterlife,' Mallory said. 'I never used to think there was one. For me, life itself was enough of a purgatory.'

'You too?'

'I didn't use to think that. I was arrogant. Everything was just a big sweet-store where I could pick and choose until I grew fat. Then life slaps you around the face and shows you what it's really like.' He caught himself. 'Now I sound like a pathetic, self-pitying loser. I don't really believe that. There's a lot of good. It's just that once you've experienced the worst there is, it's impossible to see the world in that totally innocent way any more.'

'But we still have hope, don't we? That's what keeps us going. It would have been so easy to give in when Grant and Liam died, but if I had I'd never have met you.' It was Caitlin's turn to catch herself, afraid she'd said too much. She added hastily, 'What happened to you?'

'In my arrogance, I attracted the attention of a particularly nasty bunch of people. I thought I could control them, beat them, until I realised there are people in this world who are capable of harder, more terrible things than you can ever dream, and if you come up against them, you can't match them. You always lose. They gave me a choice that no person should ever have to make. I killed someone, and it destroyed me. I couldn't live with it. And then I tried to kill myself.' He paused. 'I did kill myself. Don't ask me how I ended up here. Maybe there are just a whole load of successive lives. You die in one, you get bumped up to the next.'

'But there's a reason you came here,' Caitlin pressed. 'If you hadn't killed yourself, you wouldn't have been here to try to save this world and we'd have lost long ago. Out of that awful thing, something good is happening.'

'It'd be nice to believe that.' Mallory clearly did not believe. 'But it still sounds naive to me.'

'It's like Shavi kept saying — the pattern, the hidden pattern,' she said. 'It's all too complex, so everything seems random and punctuated with all these bleak, horrible events, but the big picture… it could be something beyond our dreams.'

'I can see the pattern here. You've been sent to make sure I don't turn into a miserable, grumpy old git that the children throw stones at in the street.'

'It's mutual, Mallory.'

With a sudden urgency, he caught her arm. 'There's someone here.' He tried to pinpoint the direction of the noise he had heard, but with the deadened sound of the cemetery, it was impossible. Oblivious, Callow punctuated his progress with bursts of whistling.

Caitlin became darker, her posture more aggressive. The Morrigan drew forwards.

A faint rasp away to his left. Mallory turned, sword drawn, but there was nothing to see. Then a whisper of movement ahead, just beyond the visibility the mist allowed him.

Circling, he thought. Looking for an opening.

Though they were both on their guard, neither were prepared for the silent figure rising up beside a tomb they had just passed. The Hortha gripped Caitlin across the mouth with a twisted blackthorn hand, spun her around and extended the index finger of its right hand to drive it between her eyes and into her brain.

With a muffled snarl, Caitlin drove her axe down into the Hortha's thigh. Dry blackthorn shattered as the blade almost severed the limb. As the Hortha lurched to one side, his attack was thrown off-balance, and the finger-spear tore open the flesh along the side of her temple.

Wriggling free, Caitlin flipped back to land on her feet, axe ready to attack, pausing only to watch with disgust as the Hortha raised its finger to drop a minute amount of her blood into its paper mouth.

The axe crashed into the Hortha's torso, but as soon as Caitlin withdrew it, the blackthorn was already growing back into place with a snap and a pop.

'I taste your thoughts,' it said. 'There is nowhere to run now.'

Caitlin and Mallory attacked together, but the Hortha evaded them with a speed that made it a blur. It used the folding mist to hide itself before coming at them rapidly from another direction. They cut off chunks here and there, a hand, half a leg, but it regrew just as quickly, and their sense of futility mounted with their unease.

Hailing them from the cover of a mausoleum, Callow beckoned frantically. Mallory signalled to Caitlin with his eyes, and when the Hortha withdrew into the mist, they both ran.

'We're just wasting our time,' Mallory said breathlessly as they moved away through the cemetery. 'We're never going to stop him like that.'

'How did he follow us here from the temple?' Caitlin said. 'We left no trail.'

'No time for that now,' Callow said. 'The great Lord gave us brains to use in situations like this. Brute strength is all well and good, but it pales behind the advantages of the grey matter, used well and wisely.'

He led them on a fast, winding path through the grave markers until he came to a mausoleum that had been marked with a red cross on the door.

'What's so special about this one?' Mallory asked.

'These are all houses of the dead,' Callow replied, 'but some are home to worse things than the dearly departed. Once I open the door, venture no further than the light reaches into the dark. Stand on either side of the door, and when your friend enters, emerge victorious!'

At first Mallory wasn't convinced, but when he read the repressed fear in Callow's face as he wrenched the stone door open, he stepped in with Caitlin right behind.

Callow had been right. The light died unnaturally quickly and sound was deadened close to the source. Beyond the few inches of grey illumination around the doorway, the darkness swam like oil. It had dimension, and texture, and gave off a quality that made them feel dread.

As they stood on either side of the door looking into the dark, their skin prickled and they had the unmistakable sense of something looking back at them. Their fears were confirmed when a faint voice whispered, 'Closer.' There was nothing inherently threatening in the tone, but it chilled them nonetheless.

The Hortha was in the mausoleum before they realised, moving low like an animal, rapidly searching the dark depths. Caitlin planted her axe in its back to disable it while they both darted out. Callow slammed the door shut the moment they were in the light.

The sounds that emanated from the mausoleum were chilling: a high-pitched shriek, a frantic rustling, something crashing from wall to wall and a wild thrashing noise. Then an unnerving silence.

Callow gave a deep bow. 'No more will your enemy trouble you.'

'What was in there?' Caitlin asked.

Callow blanched and held up a hand. 'Speak of the devil and he will appear. In some aphorisms, there is a deeper truth. Trust the wisdom I have learned in hedgerow, field and forest: there are times when it is best to speak, and times when silence must rule. Shall we?' He swept an arm to guide their way. 'And, perhaps, a word of thanks?'

Caitlin, who had once again lost the dark sheen of the Morrigan, said with a smile, 'Thank you, Mr Callow, you were a great help.'

'And I intend to carry on in that manner. Indeed, it is my hope to make myself indispensable to you, my travelling companions. Oh, the joys of being part of a band once more! Let us walk on and not look back!'

But Mallory couldn't resist one final glance at the silent mausoleum, and at the others that lay all around, and wondered what other threats lay hidden in the mist.