Moment of Truth (41 page)

When in a place of fear and doubt,
he thought,
a man who is certain is bound to be followed.
The guards didn't spare him a glance. They hurried past, eager to do their duty.

Then the lights went out and Aubrey cheered.

Not the best idea,
he thought as he heard voices shouting nearby. Drawing attention to oneself by cheering in the middle of a disaster was the sort of thing that attracted attention, but the darkness – in this case – was his friend.

He set off, with Caroline on his mind. While he ran, a man on a much adapted, much disrupted mission, he helped matters by shouting ‘Fire!', ‘Intruders!' and ‘Beer!' at regular intervals whenever a startled face showed itself.

Some time later – five minutes? ten? – he parked himself in a closed doorway for a moment, to catch his breath and appraise the situation while confused Holmlanders rushed up and down, shouting. He fumbled in his pocket for Caroline's ring. While her efforts to get it to him were eminently practical in terms of rope slicing, he had another, equally practical, use for it.

He could use it to find her.

Once outside, he had a moment of wonder when he saw the results of his spell. In the light from the other wings and the rising sun, he could see that the entire eastern end of the administration wing had collapsed into a mass of rubble. Giant wooden beams protruded from the ruin of plaster, brick and tile. Water gushed from a lonely pipe, while dozens of Holmlanders ran about in shock.

The enspelled ring led Aubrey to a room in the original building, high up in one of the towers. A short corridor, four cells, two opening on either side, and two guards who Aubrey was sure were nervously wondering what the uproar was all about. From the concealment of the stairwell, Aubrey cast a small spell that shifted the air away from the faces of each of the guards, thanks to the Law of Transference. The eyes of one rolled up, then the other, and they slid down the wall, unconscious. Aubrey cancelled the spell and used the keys from the belt of one of the guards to free Caroline.

She was ready, standing at the door, alert and ravishing in her intensity. ‘Aubrey.'

‘Caroline.'

‘You're unharmed?'

‘Yes. And you?'

‘I'm well, thank you.'

‘That's splendid.'

With a touch of asperity, she raised an eyebrow. ‘Now we've established our excellent standard of health, may we escape?'

‘Ah. One moment.' Aubrey held out her ring. ‘It's yours. I used it to find you.'

An odd expression crossed Caroline's face. Aubrey's heart expanded, then contracted in an aching motion. She shook her head. ‘Keep it. You never know.'

‘Good idea.'

‘Speaking of ideas, have you a plan for getting out of here?'

He grinned. ‘Oh, you're going to like this one.'

So we're safe for the moment,' Caroline said, her back against the concrete. She peered through the elephant's eyes at the chaos, firelight adding a weird orange cast to the proceedings. Near the ruin, Aubrey could see the baron raging about, trying to restore order while organising the troops to fight the fire that Aubrey's hasty wall removal had brought about. ‘What's your plan?'

‘George, that generator won't be fixed soon?'

George grinned. ‘I shouldn't say so. Not with the amount of ironmongery Sophie managed to get into the turbine.'

‘While you fought off three of their operators,' Sophie said admiringly. She had taken up position next to the still-unconscious Théo. ‘I did what I could.'

‘I don't expect the fourth fellow was expecting your elbow jab to his forehead. I'm sure he's regretting grabbing you from behind like that.'

Sophie rubbed the aforementioned elbow. ‘We dragged them all from the building before the generator expired,' she explained. ‘I'm glad.'

So was Aubrey. He had no interest in slaughter. He quickly told George and Sophie what they'd found in the warehouse. Their faces hardened when he explained how the brains of the wounded soldiers had been harnessed to both animate the creatures and make them so formidable.

‘We can't let this go on,' George said.

‘It shan't,' Caroline said. ‘Aubrey has taken care of that.'

‘Good show. But we still need to report this back to Albion.'

‘And so we shall,' Aubrey promised.

‘And getting out of here will take magic?' Caroline prodded.

‘Animation magic,' Aubrey said. ‘George, do you remember when we rescued Major Saltin from that crippled dirigible?'

‘Close shave, that one. Especially when our ornithopter nearly went down. You had to turn it into a bird.'

‘Precisely,' Aubrey said. That sort of animation magic wasn't commonplace, and Aubrey wouldn't even have attempted it if not for the desperate circumstances.
Which we once more seem to be in.

‘Oh,' Caroline said. ‘I have a feeling we may be entering the realm of the ridiculous.'

Aubrey rubbed his hands together. The encounter with Dr Tremaine had sapped him, but he really had no choice. ‘The Law of Similarity states that things that are alike can be encouraged to assert their likeness, given the correct application of magic. Combine it with the Law of Familiarity, and the possibilities are endless.'

‘An ornithopter is like a bird,' Sophie said. ‘So it became a bird.'

‘Something like a bird, anyway.' Aubrey said. ‘I think I've ironed out a few wrinkles with that spell. Caroline, can you please keep an eye on what's going on out there?'

Aubrey had been constructing the spell ever since the plan came to him, so he was ready. The spell was in Etruscan. He was particularly careful with the elements for range and dimensionality. This was a strain for he was encompassing multiple objects at once, but he managed it through sheer grit and finished with a discreet signature element.

‘Good Lord.' George was looking over Caroline's shoulder. ‘The zebra. It moved.'

‘The crocodile did too.' Caroline turned to Aubrey. ‘You've animated the other concrete animals.'

‘Look at the penguin!' Sophie cried.

Suddenly, they were thrown sideways. Aubrey was ready and caught himself with a hand against the concrete flanks of the elephant. ‘Not just the others. I thought I may as well go the whole hog, as our colonial cousins might say.'

Another lurch. The concrete walls trembled. The elephant shook, and then it jolted, with one great thump. Immediately, it rolled back a little, then it rocked again, side to side, before tottering forward.

With ponderous footsteps, the concrete elephant began to walk.

Aubrey beamed at the success of his spell and he caught Caroline's eye. She grinned at him. ‘The last elephant ride I had was in Siam,' she said, ‘but I was on the outside, not the inside.'

Aubrey hunched up so he could better look forward through the beast's eyes. After making sure Théo was secure, Sophie huddled close to George and all four of them could see the pandemonium that Aubrey's spell had produced.

All the concrete animals were moving. The giraffe was marching slowly and stiff-leggedly. It was as if it were a toy and a cosmically sized but invisible child's hand were propelling it in clumsy motion. Soldiers were dashing away on either side as it blundered until it collided with the remaining wall of the administration wing. It swung from side to side for a moment, still marching directly into the wall, before it slid aside and began tromping south. One flank dragged against the building, wrenching window frames apart and creating a screeching din. Several soldiers fired rifles at it, more as a gesture of outrage than with any prospect of doing it harm. Bullets ricocheted from its concrete hide and hummed off in dangerously unpredictable directions.

The concrete crocodile was swarming directly through the garden, with rather sinuous grace for a concrete creature. Its tail swayed from side to side as it scattered Holmlanders without actually connecting with any of them. The way it snapped its jaws, regular as clockwork, was encouragement enough to flee the area and many of the soldiers took up the invitation, backing away or simply turning tail and running.

The gorilla, the tiger, the lion and the polar bear were all in motion, adding their particular beastly overlay to the bizarre scene. Outlined against the flames of the burning building, the tiger looked as if it had leaped from a furnace. The lion tottered forward, demolishing a lorry that had been full of terrified troops who scattered at the beast's approach. The polar bear bumped into the giraffe and sent them both off on an angle toward the factory, which caused more panic. The gorilla was asserting its apeness by attempting to scale one of the towers on the original building. A radio mast was clearly in its sights.

The penguin merely stood in place, rocking from side to side. Aubrey wished he could nip over and give it a push to get it started.

‘I say, old man.' George steadied himself as the elephant crushed a large metal bin with a dreadful squealing noise. Its motion was a violent rocking, like a small boat on a storm-tossed sea. ‘How do you steer this thing?'

‘Steer?' Aubrey said vaguely. The elephant was heading directly for the solitary tree at the end of the garden: a slender cypress. ‘Ah, yes. Steer.'

This was going to be tricky. Aubrey hadn't built in any fine control. Such a thing would be a challenge, for it would mean organising the legs on either side to take larger or smaller steps to turn left or right, depending on which direction...

‘Hold on!' George cried.

The elephant didn't strike the tree head-on, something for which Aubrey was grateful, after he picked himself up. It glanced off and was sent in a new direction toward the barracks – barracks which had been partially reduced to splinters by the passage of the crocodile, which was now in the process of ploughing through the chain mesh fence, and the tiger, which looked as if it were limping. Nearby, one of the guard towers had collapsed, thanks to being rammed by the zebra, which had since veered off in a large spiral and was circling the factory, homing in on the gap in the warehouse where the train was waiting. This was apparent to someone in relative command, for the zebra was under a concerted fusillade of rifle fire – not that it made any difference. One soldier, braver than the rest, had sent a speeding lorry at the zebra, leaping out just before it collided. The zebra's off foreleg buckled for a moment, but then it swung and the lorry was thrown aside like an insect.

Aubrey turned his attention to the barracks, now only a few yards away. Two guardsmen stood in front of the huts, waving their arms as if they could scare the elephant away. When they realised the concrete beast wasn't so easily distracted, they flung themselves aside at the last minute and the elephant crashed into the side of the nearest hut.

This time, the four friends were ready and braced themselves, George sparing a hand to steady Théo in place. They were shaken but not hurt. The elephant slowed a little, but then it pushed forward. Over the sounds of small-arms fire, shouting and the splintering of timber came the deep-bellied groan of a building surrendering the struggle. The entire long side of the hut gave up and collapsed inward, which meant that the corrugated iron roof slid backward, helping to tear the far wall from its foundations.

The elephant was unperturbed by this and crunched on through timber and glass, leaving destruction in its path.

Ahead was the fence, partly demolished by the crocodile. Away from the buildings, the elephant was ignored as it broached the fence and bumbled onward toward the woods to the south of the complex.

‘Shall we?' Caroline said, indicating the hatch.

It was a scramble, but they laughed with a giddy combination of relief and triumph, clinging to each other and helping as the elephant lurched from side to side. Aubrey held onto an ear and lowered Caroline, then helped George with Sophie's comatose brother. Sophie laughed as George swung her down before he leapt to her side. For a moment, Aubrey paused, swaying with the lumbering gait of the concrete creature, feeling like a captain abandoning his ship. Then he, too, laughed and tumbled to a soft, grassy landing.

They looked back toward Baron von Grolman's factory. The administration wing was still on fire, and it was spreading to the factory. The tiger was butting up against the train on one side, while the zebra had rebounded from it and was making toward the gatehouse. It was gathering the most attention, as a crushed and breached gatehouse was not what a secure facility needed. The gorilla had managed to climb the radio mast, but it had toppled under the weight of the concrete ape, which had plummeted right through the roof of the old building.

‘Where's the crocodile?' Aubrey asked.

‘Over there,' Caroline pointed, ‘on the west. It's making for the town.'

‘It will probably fall in the river first,' said Sophie and Aubrey was saddened by this, but he brightened when he thought of the concrete animal, gamely ploughing along at the bottom of the river, not needing to breathe, making headway for as long as the spell lasted.

The other animals were wreaking havoc, in a way that Aubrey could only have dreamed of. Both wings of the original buildings were ablaze. Half of the barracks were demolished. The factory and warehouse, however, were battered but not damaged in any significant way.

Without warning, the original building exploded.

Aubrey threw an arm up in front of his face, but was still blinded for an instant. George let out an oath. Behind them, the elephant rocked a little but then resumed its inexorable progress toward the woods.

All the original buildings were now on fire, and a patter of debris fell about them, testimony to the force of the explosion. ‘A fuel tank?' Caroline wondered aloud.

‘Perhaps a store of the enhanced coal,' Aubrey suggested.

‘Maybe the gorilla fell on it,' George said.

They reached the trees. Aubrey squinted. Dark figures were flitting through the trees. ‘Company,' he muttered.

‘Welcome company?' George peered at the woods.

Aubrey smiled. ‘It's Katya and her crew.'