Maxie’s Demon (25 page)

‘Piss off!’ I panted. ‘Dee’s near enough getting your number!’

He
snorted. ‘Is he, then? I’ve had his measure long since, boy, and yours to
boot. Can he shield you from these hunters for ever? The power seeks its own way out, as I guessed it would. In this place, in this time, it grows stronger, and you – what are you, you weakling trash from an enfeebled age? Let it overtake you now, and it’ll command you, not you it! So, then. You will relinquish it now, without delay, to me for whom it was truly destined, or I’ll spill it from your
throat!’ He laughed softly. ‘Or would you rather I let fall a word to these strange seekers?’

‘Jesus, d’you think I
want
this going on all the time? Far as I’m concerned you can take it and stuff it up your jacksy!’

He grinned like a dog. ‘Spare me your protests, you mewling little kite’s turd! You’d have me believe
you
would ever spurn such a cup? As you pretended to with Jane, no doubt! Small
chance!’

‘I mean it! You’ve never met these … creatures! What makes you think you could handle them any better?’

‘Strength, brat. Because I’m strong, and I’m not afraid.’

Dee, padding off back upstairs, saw his two Brothers having a friendly chat and nodded benignly. I opened my mouth, but Kelley expertly tightened his grip. The bones in my arm grated agonisingly. The flesh felt ready to burst
like a grape. I gasped with the pain. Still, it saved me from what I’d been about to say. Defying this thug now would be about the stupidest thing I could do.

‘All
right!’ I whimpered, and that was no effort at all. ‘I’ll do it! I’ll do it! Hold the ceremony when you like! I said it’s what I want, didn’t I—’

His grin broadened. ‘Ah, there’s reason at last, my bawchuck!’ He clenched his grip
a little, the bastard, then released it sharply. I fell gasping across the table, clutching my arm. ‘Well, well, I too can be accommodating. Dawn is upon us, so we’ll wait for twilight, and prepare at leisure. I’ll take your word to Brother John.’

‘What, no preparations at all? Not even fasting and keeping vigil and all that crap?’ I said bitterly, trying to massage the pain away.

He smiled
nastily. ‘Your night’s dancing the shaking of the sheets, and with another man’s wife – what braver vigil d’you need? Go, content yourself again for all I care, but make no attempt to leave this house! The servants are in my fee, all, and they will prevent you.’

That I doubted. They were mostly local, he spoke only a few words of German and Czech, and they no more English. They probably wouldn’t
lift a finger for him; more likely at him, the sod. But I’d only get one chance to find out.

Kelley read my face, and chuckled. ‘Aye, and what then? Flee away to your time, brave the turnings of the Wheel alone and unguided? With those hunters in full cry at your back? Know yourself, mannikin, and be wise. I’ll spare you a reward still. A hundred such will soon be nothing to me!’

He rolled cheerfully
away, beaming at the world. I glared at his back. Oh yes, I knew his type. From my very expensive school, the liberal kind; from my youth detention centre, the brutal kind. Both the same dog-eat-dog society uncontrolled kids will always create, without even the rub-along restraint of an adult jail; and at the top of both dungheaps the crowing cocks like Kelley, the bullies, the sadists,
the manipulators, the psychos. At the top or in the gutter – always at the extremes or headed there. And always violent, or the reason violence is. Some of them grow out of it, some sublimate it; but the real psychos just learn to paper over the cracks. Even without Jane’s warning his sudden shift to force wouldn’t have been any surprise. But I’d counted on a bit more time. What to do now?

The
bastard was
right, unfortunately. I’d been a bloody fool to trust Dee and come here in the first place. Even if Dee’s precautions worked, those bandits would track down the physical me soon enough. I couldn’t persuade Dee to guide me home; I knew I wouldn’t be able to convince him about Kelley, not yet. So what could I do? Not just slope off across the Spiral, unguided – I’d all the navigational
instinct of a homing slug.

Could I remember some of Dee’s landmarks? Maybe, but I’d be a bloody fool to risk it if there was any other choice. No, there had to be. I had one ally in this godforsaken place, and I was going to use her.

‘I’ll do as you ask, sweet sir, and gladly!’ Jane leaned over me to pour me out more eggs, which was pleasant, and kept her voice to a whisper. ‘So that no harm
comes to my husband, as you promise. For me ’tis a trifle, but for you – ’tis a wise act, but have a care! This is a perilous ford – one single slip and you overset yourself!’

‘Tell me about
it!’ I whispered back. The only reason I’d resort to a stunt like this was that all the alternatives scared me even more – and giving that bastard Kelley what he wanted, most of all.

When he told Dee I’d
agreed to go ahead, the old fellow was surprised and concerned. He did his level best to persuade me to wait. But I told him, truthfully enough, that these searchers, wherever they came from, were the absolute last straw; and, very reluctantly, he agreed. ‘Though I believe they mean you no ill, they may intend for the good of all to daunt you into agreement. It may be better that you choose of your
own free will first. So be it! I shall go about my preparations upon the instant, and this very even we shall set you free. Meanwhile I suggest that you meditate and seek guidance – eh, Brother Edward?’

‘Aye, Brother John. In this chamber, I’d counsel,’ grinned Kelley. With his triumph in sight his façade was slipping a little, his good nature showing sudden vulpine flashes. He knew my room didn’t
have a streetward window, so I couldn’t even try the knotted-sheets bit.

‘Rest and quiet, the very place!’ nodded Dee. ‘I’ll send up bread and ale for your nuncheon.’

‘Well thought on!’ agreed Kelley, the mask back in place. ‘And forget not that you’re ever in our thoughts, young sir. We shall be watching over you – upon that you may depend!’

I didn’t mind
being alone. It gave me a chance to
think, to work back through my memories, scribble the odd note to myself on a parchment scrap. Jane had left me what I wanted, and when she appeared with my lunch I began to feel almost confident again – the more so for a quick squeeze or two in passing. Then there was nothing but to lie back and doze and think again; about the sewers, and the alchemist, and Kelley’s gold-making machine. No wonder
he was in such a hurry. Rudolph would be getting itchier than ever now I’d appeared. Expecting that endless stream of gold potatoes to start any moment …

The door opened. Kelley stood there, dark-cloaked, carrying another over his arm. It was surprising to see how grey the window looked all of a sudden. Maybe I’d been asleep, maybe just drifting; but there hadn’t been any more visions. As I thought
of it, though, I realised there’d been something else, and still was. There was a heavy, windless stillness about the air, like some huge creature holding its breath. Kelley tossed me the cloak. ‘I’ll have my gown back, sirrah. You’ll not need court clothes under this.’

I shrugged. ‘Suits me. She was right, you know, you should try washing once in a while. Might help your little problem with
women. One more twenty-first-century discovery—’ He just grunted, but I was learning to read that impassive face. I draped the cloak over my twenty-first-century raincoat and followed him downstairs. Jane Dee was there, with Mrs Kelley, and our eyes met as we passed. Hers sparkled, and I felt a great cold thrill. I’d done what I could, and so had she. If it would only work fast enough …

Dee gathered
me up. ‘Have no fear, young Brother mine! I stand for you in this, as in all else now, as steadfast as our Brother Edward. Even though you have chosen the hastier course, you run little risk. The rite is perfected now, the transition shall be brief, the rewards swift – eh? And then back to your own day and age once more, if you so choose. Although I confess we shall be loth to let you go,
the ladies and I, eh, my dears?’ He sighed. ‘Ah, well. To horse, brothers. Mankind’s great day opens as this one closes.’

Silently we filed out into the grey afternoon, and mounted up. As the gate creaked open I did my best not to look too expectant. With any luck—

My luck was out. It took long lunch hours. There was only the usual bustle, passers-by who spared us little attention. A small gaggle
of geese padded by with ill-tempered honks. I sympathised. If Brother Edward had his way, I was going to get stuffed too.

I noticed he took the lead as the horses clopped slowly out. The slower the better, as far as I was concerned. I cast about urgently in the smoky winter light, but there wasn’t any sight or sign of what I was waiting for. I muttered curses; maybe when we got to the gates—

My saddle became one mass of electric icicles. In looking so frantically for one thing I’d forgotten another.

Out of an alley mouth at street’s end two tall figures stepped, casting about as obviously as I’d been. Like everyone else they were wrapped in cloaks against the freezing afternoon; but just for a second these brushed against the narrow alley walls, and there was no mistaking the outlines.
They were women. But there was no mistaking the self-confident swing of their strides, either; and least of all the long swords at their sides. How many women wore those even in this day and age?

And even as that
hit me I saw their cowled heads swing around sharply, simultaneously, towards me, like hawks to a lure.

You can’t be a good car-lifter without pretty sharp reflexes and right then my
adrenaline glands were on a short fuse. I didn’t stop to think. I just leaned right forward in my stirrups, and goosed Kelley’s mount with my metal rein-tips, right under the tail.

I was a bit sorry for the poor beast, but the effect was pretty satisfying by any standards. Up shot its heels as I shrank back, up went its hocks. Up even higher went Brother Ed, like Batman on springs, right out
of the stirrups, over the ears and headfirst down into a smelly vegetable stall.

By the time he touched base among the brassicas I was out of my own stirrups and sliding down among the crowd scurrying to see what all the fuss was about. Behind me I heard old Dee bleating something about Brother come back. I was a bit sorry for him, too, but no way would I risk it. Plan A hadn’t come through in
time, and now the searchers had turned up. I had to make a break for it, Dee or no Dee.

And if I
ever did get back to my own time I was bloody well going to find somewhere the Spiral couldn’t reach and never, never set foot out of it ever again.

Leaving places unobtrusively and at high speed – one of my specialities. Kelley might have trampled the crowd, but I knew Dee wouldn’t be able to ride
fast through the crush. All I had to do was keep my head down and push my way against the flow, towards the shadow of the castle wall. I wasn’t as well hidden as I would have been in a modern crowd, but there were enough taller folk to overshadow me. Away in the background I could hear Kelley’s voice swearing blue murder, and somebody equally indignant letting fly in German – the stallkeeper, I
guessed. A soggy thud suggested a cabbage connecting with somebody’s cranium. A roar from the crowd confirmed it.

I looked back, and swore a bit myself. Dee was making better progress than I’d expected. The proles were obviously well conditioned to get out of a gentleman’s way, probably by the judicious application of hoofprints and whips.

I scuttled crabwise along the wall, looking for a doorway
or something to duck into. What I found was a heavy postern gate, part of the castle, evidently, and not likely to be unlocked. All I could do was pull my cloak around me and hunker down into the shadows, hoping not to be noticed.

The door creaked open behind me. A white hand caught me by the shoulder and tugged me urgently in. The door thudded softly shut, and I found myself looking into a pair
of blazing dark eyes. ‘They are looking for you?’ the woman demanded, in awkward German.

‘Er – yes. Thanks for—’

‘You
would have led them to me. There are not so many places to hide here.’ Not the woman, the girl. Maybe just a teenager, assuming they’d invented such things then. Not at all bad-looking, if you like the dark, strong-featured type, and a bit taller than me. Her face was pale, but
even in the gloom she seemed to crackle with vitality. As my eyes adjusted I realised she wasn’t overdressed, either – just a short shift of some kind, a nightdress maybe. This sort of thing never happened back home.

‘Finished staring?’ she snapped. ‘A truly grateful gentleman would lend me his cloak!’

‘Er—’ Automatically I twitched it off and wrapped it around her. She swirled it experimentally,
with a satisfied twist of her wide mouth. ‘And what do they call you?’

She considered a moment. ‘All right! Elina.’

That wasn’t a Czech name; it sounded more … ‘Greek! You’re … whatsisname, the alchemist! His daughter!’

She sighed. ‘
Pater hemon,
yes, tell the world. Elina, daughter of Hieronymos Makropoulos,
Iatros
. Orphan, rather.’

‘Oh Christ. You mean Rudolph—’

‘No. My father tried that
muck on himself this time. Only he changed the formula. He shouldn’t have. I’m still here.’ She sighed, and shrugged. ‘Rudolf decided to keep me around, to see whether I show any signs of immortality. I didn’t like his ideas for keeping me busy meantime, the evil old
Scheisskerl.
So I climbed across a couple of roofs, wriggled through a grille and here I am, waiting for twilight. How do you know
all this, anyhow?’

‘I think
Rudolph may be warming up your father’s spot for me. And there’s this bastard Kelley trying to set me up.’

She gave that lopsided smile again. ‘Oh, him! You’re another wizard, then.’

‘Wise enough to wish I’d never come here! I’m headed back to my own … country.’

‘I also.’ She cocked her head at me, considering. ‘Too bad we can’t go together, but you’d be a handicap.
You can’t pay your way as I can.’ She glared at my expression. ‘I meant by singing. I’m a very good singer. Thanks for the cloak!’