Keeping low, I ran forward on the balls of my feet, making hardly any noise at all. In a clear area of the great yard I noticed a solitary machine gun on a tripod; it looked like a Vickers Mk 1 and I was relieved to see its fabric ammunition belt was empty. The gun had probably been left there by garrison soldiers and the Blackshirts had enjoyed themselves taking potshots at easy targets: a black sentry box near one of the cottages was a mess of bullet holes and splinters. Maybe Hubble took his military pretensions so seriously he insisted his followers keep up target practice. I wondered if he had them parade marching as well.
Leaving my cover, I crossed open ground to the corner of the White Tower, pausing there to scan the area. Across the yard to my left was a small chapel and directly opposite was a huge multi-windowed blockhouse, complete with elaborate battlements and gargoyles, an octagonal tower on either side of its entrance. I thought I heard noise coming from somewhere in that direction, but although I listened hard nothing else came. Sneaking a hasty look around the turret I was leaning against, I caught a flash of black uniform entering a second raised doorway to the White Tower.
So, was this it? Was this where the Blackshirts and their hostages were gathered? The rest of the grounds seemed deserted and it made sense for Hubble to keep his captives in one location. So what better place than the White Tower itself? There were large display rooms inside, the exhibits anything from cannon to armour, with plenty of space to hold prisoners. And plenty of room to ... I prayed to God they hadn't already begun the transfusions.
I knew I couldn't waste any more time. I slipped round the corner and raced towards the stone staircase leading up to the keep's doorway, at any moment expecting the Blackshirt to reappear, but it didn't happen, I had a clear run. Without breaking stride, I grabbed the iron stair rail and climbed, taking the steps two at a time, holding the Sten gun in one hand by its pistol grip, muzzle aimed at the doorway above, my hand sliding along the top of the rail to steady myself. I reached the small landing without incident. The double doors to the keep were wide open, but there were no sounds from inside. I snuck a quick look, then pulled back again, allowing the impression of what lay beyond the opening to sink in.
The room was below door level, a vast basement chamber with archways and flagstone floor, helmets and breastplates mounted around its dingy walls and cannon of various sizes arranged in neat rows inside alcoves along its length on either side of the central area. Iron chandeliers hung from the high, dusty ceiling, but much of the light came from lanterns placed around the room, the rest from the big doorway itself, revealing a scene so horrific I really didn't want to take a second look.
Leaning back against the outside wall, my eyes shut tight, I fought the nausea that threatened to debilitate me. But it wasn't only the sight of those half-naked bodies down there, corpses of men and women sprawled in their own gore, rubber tubes still attached to some of their arms, the smell of excrement thick with the stench of blood, that caused the sickness in me; no, it was my own dread sense of failure as well.
I'd let them down, left it too late. The Blackshirts had already carried out their stupid, desperate plan to purge their veins and replenish them with new blood, and those first volunteers had paid the price along with their victims, because they lay dead too in that terrible crimson flood. I prayed to God Hubble was down there among them.
I forced myself to take another look, hoping there might be some that were still alive, a few I could help before they bled to death. And I was curious to discover if Hubble really had been destroyed by his own lunacy. I guess I was curious to know about Muriel too.
Some of the Blackshirts were still slumped in wooden chairs, their 'donors' lying beside them; others lay curled up on the soaking floor, their hands curled into claws, mouths open as if in silent screams, as if the infusion of alien blood had sent their bodies into paroxysms of agony. I wanted to scream at them for their reckless stupidity, for the useless barbarity of it all. Why hadn't they at least waited, tried the transfusions one at a time so that when the first or second failed, they'd give it up? I guess I was underestimating their desperation - what the hell did they have to lose anyway? -as well as the damage already done to their brains and their unfailing belief in their leader. But the only pity I felt was for the victims; I felt nothing at all for the parasites.
I stepped inside and stood on the small platform overlooking the charnel house, ignoring its stink as I searched among the contorted shapes; unfortunately, several were face down, or on their sides with their backs to me, and others were half-hidden in the alcoves. To be sure that Hubble and Muriel were with them I had to go down there for a closer inspection.
As I went into that nasty hell-hole I began to realize there were not enough corpses here to account for all the Blackshirts and the people outside the Savoy, and that puzzled me. And the women and children -
where were they? S'far as I could tell, there were no women here, and definitely no kids, yet two nights ago there'd been a whole bunch of them. I figured there were about twenty bodies that I could see, and Hubbe's army alone must've amounted to triple that number, despite their losses in the air raid on the hotel and those I'd killed personally. I reached the bottom of the stairs and stepped over outstretched limbs, avoiding the worst of the blood lake, working my way along the alcoves, peering past the battered cannons into the dark corners, looking for more bodies, hoping to find some live ones.
I must've been concentrating too damned hard, because he was almost on me before I heard the first sound.
I hadn't forgotten about the man I'd followed into this place, my mind had just been distracted, is all. It was the splashing of his boots through the blood that caused me to wheel around in his direction. He must've been waiting inside an opening at the far end of the chamber, watching me all the time, and now he was coming at me in a rush, a mediaeval pike held out before him, its nasty-looking metal point aimed at my gut In that instant I realized it wasn't a Blackshirt uniform he was wearing, but the navy blue day-duty tunic of a Yeoman Warder. His long coat was dusty, torn in places, the red braiding frayed, missing in places, and his unkempt hair hung in loose tangles over his crazy-man eyes, spittle glistening in his long, matted beard. Close as this, I could see two things about those wild eyes: they were leaking blood, and they were filled with a malevolent hatred that was just for me. Jesus, they almost rooted me to the spot, but my reflexes kicked in.
I stepped towards him instead of backing away, turning my body to lessen the target area. There was no time to shoot him (besides, I didn't want to alert any others who might be lurking in this place) so I looped the Sten gun's sling over the pike's metal tip as it skimmed past me, just inches from my stomach.
The sling caught on the red and gold silk tassel between the point and wooden staff and I yanked the weapon towards me, twisting away from the demented warden, using the pole as a lever to knock him off balance. He fell to his knees as i completed the turn and he yelped like the crazy he was as I drove my left fist into the back of his neck. He went down hard, his face smacking against the wet floor. It'd been a smart manoeuvre on my part, but it worked chiefly because of the man's own sluggishness; he had the sickness in him, same as the Blackshirts.
I pounced on him, my knee against his spine, the pikestaff still caught up in the gun's sling. I dug the fingers of my free hand into his matted hair and jerked his head up, then smashed it back down against the flagstone. He gave a small gurgling kind of scream, then lay motionless. He wasn't out though; a low moaning came from him. I was about to repeat the process, send him on his way for good - sure, I knew it wasn't his fault, his brain was as diseased as his blood, but I'd spent too long at war with his kind and there was no sympathy left - but I thought of the victims around us, innocents who'd been murdered because they were different, had something the bad guys wanted for themselves. And I remembered there might be others still alive, but waiting to die. I lifted his head again.