Sharper Than A Serpent's Tooth

Six - Guardian Angel

When you’re about to do something really risky, or really dumb, or both, it’s nearly always a good idea to do it in company. That way, at least you’ve got someone to hide behind when it all starts going horribly wrong. So, while the freed faeries gathered happily around a huge cauldron brimming over with chunky soup, and the feral boy and girl gnawed meat off oversized bones and cracked them open to get at the marrow, I took Julien Advent to one side, for a quiet word.

“I need to talk with you and Dead Boy, somewhere private.”

“Does this concern your cunning plan, the one I’m really not going to like?”

“Got it in one.”

“I know just the place.”

It turned out that Julien had stumbled across the Beadle’s private living quarters while he was exploring the building. He led Dead Boy and me back up onto the gallery, to a concealed door at its end, and through that into a loft conversion. The bare-raftered room turned out to be a lot bigger on the inside than it appeared on the outside, but that’s a common spell in the Nightside, where living space is at a premium. The Beadle’s living quarters were all hanging drapes and throw cushions, in assorted eye-dazzling colours, along with fresh flowers in tall vases, Andy Warhol prints on the walls, and delicate little china statuettes of wide-eyed kittens.

Dead Boy headed immediately for the rack of wine bottles at the far end of the room, sampled several of them in an experimental sort of way, before finally settling for a thick blue liquor that seethed heavily against the containing glass. Personally, I wouldn’t have used it for cleaning combs. Dead Boy took a long drink straight from the bottle, shuddered slightly, then grinned widely.

“It takes a lot to affect you, when you’re dead,” he said cheerfully. “But this stuff’s got a kick like one hundred and twenty per cent embalming fluid.”

I wrestled the bottle away from him and put it to one side. “Trust me,” I said. “You really don’t want to do what I’ve got in mind while you’re drunk.”

“I hate it already,” said Dead Boy.

We arranged ourselves as comfortably as we could on the embroidered throw cushions, and I explained slowly and carefully just what it was I had in mind. First, I described in some detail the devastated future Nightside I’d seen in the Timeslip. The ruined buildings and the terrible silence, in which the only things moving were swarming mutated insects. Humanity was gone, and all the world was dead and cold. A future that was my fault, somehow. Julien and Dead Boy listened intently, drinking in the details. They’d heard rumours of what I’d seen, most of the Nightside had, but I’d never told anyone the whole story. And even now, I kept a few things to myself. They didn’t need to know about the Razor Eddie I found there, the last living man in the world. They didn’t need to know I killed him, with his own razor, as a mercy.

Of course, when I finished my story they had to argue with me. They were far too sophisticated to believe in a single, unavoidable future. In Fate, or Destiny.

“There are any number of potential time-lines, possible futures,” said Julien, a little condescendingly. “None of them more certain than any other.”

“Right,” said Dead Boy. “My own car comes from an alternate future that clearly has nothing to do with the one you described.”

“Once, that might have been true,” I said. “But our future, the future our time-line is heading towards, is getting more certain all the time. I’ve… seen things. Signs, portents, details coming true despite everything I could do to avoid them. According to Old Father Time, the number of possibilities for our time-line is narrowing down, steadily decreasing to only one inevitable future.”

“Because of your mother,” said Julien.

“Yes,” I said. “Because of Lilith. She’s such a powerful Being that her mere presence here is enough to overturn the whole apple-cart and rewrite the rules of reality itself.”

I let them consider that for a while, then pressed on. They had to understand the background of my thinking, in order to appreciate what I intended to do.

“I have become increasingly convinced,” I said slowly, “that the War I’m supposed to start with Lilith and her followers could be the very thing that will bring about the destruction of the Nightside. That we’ll tear the world apart, fighting over it. So I’ve decided I can’t go any further, in good conscience, without better information. And the only people who can offer me that… are my Enemies. The people who’ve been sending their agents to kill me for as long as I can remember.”

Julien leaned forward eagerly. “You finally found out who they are?”

“Yes,” I said. “They’re the last surviving major players of the devastated future, hiding out in the final stages of the War, sometime before my visit in the Timeslip. The few remaining heroes and villains, desperately sending their agents back into the Past, to kill me before I do… whatever it is I do, to damn everyone.”

Julien and Dead Boy looked at me, silenced by shock, by the staggering implications of what I’d just said.

“Who…?” said Julien.

“Familiar names, familiar faces,” I said. “You’d know them.”

(I didn’t tell Julien Advent that he would become one of my Enemies, in that terrible future. Or that he would die trying to kill me, and his dead body would be made over into one of the awful agents they sent back after me. He didn’t need to know that.)

“Why have you never told me any of this before?” Julien said, finally.

“Because you would have told everyone,” I said. “That’s what you do. And I wasn’t ready to trust… everyone.”

“This is sounding more and more like a closed circle,” said Dead Boy. “How can you… talk with your Enemies?”

“By travelling forward through Time into their future,” I said steadily. “And confronting them. Because they’re the only ones who know what happened, to bring about their future. They can tell me… what I mustn’t do.”

What can I do? I’d asked the future Razor Eddie, moments before I killed him. What can I do to prevent this happening?

Kill yourself, he said.

“But… they’re your Enemies!” said Dead Boy. “They’ll kill you on sight!”

“Then I’ll have to be very persuasive,” I said. “And talk really quickly.”

“And if they kill you anyway?” said Julien.

“Well, that might solve the problem,” I said. “But trust me, this is not a suicide run. I have every intention of coming back alive, with the information I need to put Lilith back in her box and avoid the end of the world.”

“It’s a good thing I’m already dead,” said Dead Boy, “or I think I’d be very worried about this.”

“Travel through Time takes a hell of a lot of power,” said Julien, frowning heavily. “There’s not many who can do it. Or would do it for you, John. I suppose I could talk to Old Father Time, on your behalf. Put in a good word for you.”

“Oh, I think he’s got a very good word for me,” I said. “He’s already arranged one trip through Time for me, and after the way that turned out, I don’t think he’ll be doing that again, anytime soon.” Julien looked at me sharply, scenting a story, and I shook my head. “Trust me on this, Julien, you really don’t want to know.”

“All right,” said Dead Boy, “if Old Father Time is out of the picture, who does that leave?”

“I’ve been thinking about that,” I said. “The Collector is supposed to have a whole bunch of really weird Time travel mechanisms; but he’s still mad at me. For a whole bunch of reasons.”

Dead Boy sniffed loudly. “The Collector’s mad at everyone. And vice versa. I wouldn’t piss down his throat if his heart was on fire.”

“Then there’s the Chronovore,” I said loudly. “Who eats up all the little lost moments of your life, the ones that you can never account for. But he works strictly for cash these days. Serious cash. There’s always the Travelling Doctor, but you can never rely on him being around when you need him.”

“That’s everyone I know of,” said Julien. “Who else is left?”

“This is where it all starts getting a bit risky,” I said carefully. “I think I know someone On High who might owe me a favour. So… I plan to summon an angel down from Heaven.”

I don’t think I’ve ever seen two such appalled faces in my life. Dead Boy’s eyes actually bulged in their sockets, and Julien Advent’s face went as pale as Dead Boy’s. They both tried to say something, but couldn’t get the words out for spluttering.

“It’s really not all that different from calling up a demon,” I said quickly, trying hard to sound confident. “The principle is the same, only in reverse. That’s why I needed both of you, for my plan to work. Dead Boy, to help me send my message beyond the planes of the living, and Julien, to help me contact the Courts of the Holy. You have a singular nature, Dead Boy, being both dead and alive at the same time, and I can use that ambiguity to punch my way through a lot of the usual barriers. Julien, you created a drug to split apart the best and worst elements in man. You embraced the best elements, of course, and became a hero, a pure soul. Or at least, as close to one as I’m going to find in the Nightside. Your purity of spirit will help my message get where it needs to go. Theoretically.”

“And that’s it?” said Dead Boy, when he finally got his voice back. “That’s your marvellous plan? You were right, I don’t like it. In fact, I think I would go so far as to say I hate it! Have you lost your mind, John? I can’t even count all the ways this could go horribly wrong. You and Julien could get killed, I could… well, I’m not entirely sure what could happen to me, but I am ready to bet good money that it would be really, really bad! I think I’m going to have one of my turns… Look, you can’t just go banging on Saint Peter’s Gates and demand he send down an angel to talk to you! We’re all going to end up as pillars of salt, I know it…”

“For once I find myself in complete agreement with Dead Boy,” said Julien, glaring at me sternly. “If we summon an angel, and please note the emphasis I am placing on the word if, what we’ll get will be the real thing. A messenger of God, complete in all its power and glory. Not the weakened, limited things that are normally all that can manifest in the Nightside. And you of all people should remember how much damage and loss of life those weakened presences brought about during the angel war last year. They’re still rebuilding parts of the city. If we call down the real thing, what’s to stop it wiping us all out on a whim?”

“First,” I said, “the angel will be contained within a protective circle, just like a demon. Second, your presence and Dead Boy’s will add to the protections considerably. That’s why I waited to connect with you two, before I tried anything. It is… possible, for things to go wrong, yes. Summonings are a bit like fishing—you can never be sure whether you’ll hook a sprat or a killer shark. The last time I tried this…”

“Hold everything,” said Julien. “You actually tried this before?”

“Once, when I was a lot younger,” I said defensively. “When I was really desperate for information about who and what my missing mother was. I thought, if anybody would know…”

“What happened?” said Dead Boy.

“Well,” I said, “you know that really big crater, where the Hotel Splendide used to be?”

“That was you?” said Julien. “It’s still radioactive!”

“I really don’t want to talk about it,” I said, with great dignity.

“Give me back my bottle,” said Dead Boy. “There is no way in Hell I’m doing this sober.”

“I have yet to be convinced we should do it at all,” said Julien. “In fact, I’m still rather hoping this is all some terrible dream I’m going to wake up from soon.”

“God, you’re a pair of wimps! Everything’s going to be all right.” I leaned forward, doing my best to project certainty and trustworthiness. “I’m going after a specific angel this time, and I’m sure having you two along will make all the difference.”

“Don’t worry,” Dead Boy said to Julien. “It’s not that bad, being dead. It’s actually quite restful, sometimes.”

Julien helped me clear away the throw cushions and the rugs to reveal the bare floor-boards beneath, while Dead Boy went downstairs, and came back with a bucket full of the Beadle’s blood. He handed it over sulkily, muttering something about how he’d been saving that blood, to make blood pudding and stock later. I ignored him and had Julien prick his thumb and add a few drops of his own blood to the bucket, to purify it. (Working on the principle that some trace of the drug that brought out his best elements was still in his system.) I then used the blood to draw a really big restraining circle, surrounded by every protective symbol I knew. It took a long time and used up most of the bucket of blood.

“I don’t even recognise some of the languages you’re using,” said Julien.

“Think yourself lucky,” said Dead Boy, and I had to agree.

Finally, it was done. It looked pretty impressive, even if it did smell really rank. The three of us sat down together, inside a second smaller protective circle, holding hands; and that was it. No chanting, incense, dead chickens, or waving your hands around. In the end, most magic is really primarily a matter of will and intent. The signs I’d so carefully daubed were the spell’s address, along with a few extra things to get the recipient’s attention, and a few safeguards so the recipient couldn’t simply wipe us all out for interrupting them at a particularly inconvenient moment. You’d be surprised how many demons screen their calls these days. Everything else was down to me, Julien Advent, and Dead Boy, and our combined will and determination.

“Something’s happening,” said Dead Boy, after a while. “I can feel energies forming all around us. I can See… I can See avenues opening up, levels of reality unfolding like the petals of a flower, more levels, more and more… I can See further than I ever could before… and I don’t like it. It scares me. It’s too big…”

“Look away,” I said sharply. “Shut down your Sight and reinforce your mental barriers. Concentrate on the summoning.”

“I can feel something,” said Julien.

“Don’t,” I said.

Dead Boy and Julien both had their eyes squeezed shut now, beads of sweat standing out on their strained faces. I kept my eyes open. One of us had to, and I was more used to Seeing the unseen realms. I still kept my mental barriers firmly in place. There were things none of us could afford to see, if we wished to remain in the mortal world. The glory of the shimmering plains is not for mortals. By now we could all feel Something approaching, from a direction we all instinctively recognised but couldn’t identify. It felt like above, in all senses of the word. Something was coming into our world, Something impossibly large and powerful, downloading itself into a mortal frame that wouldn’t blow all the fuses in our merely human minds.

Brilliant light exploded within the main circle, and we all cried out and turned our heads away as an angel manifested; a blazing light far too fierce to look at directly. We could only catch brief glimpses of it, out of the corners of our watering eyes. It was vaguely human in shape, pure light, pure energy, pure magic, with just an impression of wide wings. Simply being close to it made me feel small and insignificant, simple and undeveloped, like a chalk drawing next to the Mona Lisa. The angel regarded us, and its attention embraced us all, like a judgement only barely tempered with mercy and compassion.

“Hi,” I made myself say. “Glad you could drop in. Is that you, Pretty Poison?”

I don’t use that name any more, said a Voice like thunder in my head. All three of us groaned out loud, as the angel’s words filled our minds. I have my old name back now. Thanks, in part, to you, John Taylor. I know what you want. We know everything. It’s part of the job description. And yes, I will help you, just this once. Because of what you did, for me and my beloved. But understand this, John Taylor; although I can send you into the future, getting back again will be your own problem.

“Can you help us against Lilith and her followers?” said Julien Advent. He was actually able to look at the angel for more than a few seconds at a time. Maybe he really did have a pure soul, after all. “You must know what she’s done, what she plans to do.”

Yes. We know. But all of Heaven and all of Hell are forbidden to intervene directly in the Nightside. Some of the lesser ranks from Above and Below volunteered to try to intercede, and were destroyed for their trouble. Lilith designed the Nightside specifically to diminish all spiritual messengers who entered it. So all future interventions have been forbidden, in the place where all the decisions that matter are made. In the Courts of the Holy. It’s up to the Nightside to save itself, if it can. I am bending the rules to help you, John Taylor, and I will not do so again. Good luck. And don’t call this number again.

I knew a hint when I heard it. She was telling me to get on with it, before Someone else called her back. So I raised my gift and focused my Sight on all the various time-lines radiating out from this place, this moment, this decision. I could only see the most immediate timetracks, but even so the sheer number of images almost overwhelmed me. I narrowed my regard still further, searching through the time-lines for the single path that led to my Enemies. Near futures flashed on and off all around me. I saw my friends die, fighting Lilith and her people. I saw different versions of myself, and them, and we all died fighting Lilith, over and over again. I saw my friends support Lilith, while I led a coalition of those who had once been my foes against her, and we all died again. I saw myself, wearing an expression I didn’t recognise, sitting at my mother’s feet as she contemplated a mountain of skulls and smiled, while monsters danced in the flickering light of burning buildings.

Other versions of the future pressed in from all sides—other, stranger, alien Nightsides. I saw inhuman structures that might have been buildings, with unnatural lights burning in them, while impossible forms lurched and mewled through the shifting streets. I saw huge cavernous shapes, rounded structures with an organic sheen, great insects crawling all over them. I even glimpsed a version of the carnivorous jungle I’d visited briefly in the Past, with its trees made of meat and lianas like hanging intestines, where hissing roses rioted in the ruins of long-abandoned cities. I fought hard to focus my gift, forcing aside all the irrelevant futures, until I found what I was looking for: the dark and devastated future that was home to my Enemies.

And once I was locked on to that terrible place, the angel tore me loose from the Present, and sent me rocketing forward through Time. The world speeded up around me, Time flashing by impossibly fast. Days became months became years, piling up behind me. I saw the Nightside fall, its great buildings crashing down, crumbling like sand castles in the path of an oncoming tide. I saw the great oversized moon in the night sky explode, its pieces raining down like fiery meteors. And I saw the stars start to go out, one by one by one.

There were Voices all around me, growling and muttering and howling, outside of Time. Strange Presences, all speaking at once in no human tongue, yet still I could understand the gist of it. Slowly they became aware of me, then the Voices began to cajole, to warn, and to threaten. I think they were frightened of me. I refused to listen, making myself concentrate only on my destination, until finally Time slammed to a halt again, and I was spilled out into the dark future I’d visited before. The dead end of the Nightside, and maybe all of history.

And all of it my fault.