‘Claude is the local correspondent for my newspaper, The Sentinel , but since the offices of the Journal were bombed, his job has been difficult.’
‘I have photographs of the front,’ Claude explained. ‘I want to get them to Lutetia.’
‘How did you get photographs?’ Aubrey asked. ‘Isn’t the military sensitive about things like that?’
Claude beamed, showing a gap in his front teeth. ‘I have friends at the fortress. They send provisions to the front in lorries. A lorry stops at a bridge just to the north. I jump on, spend time at the front, then jump back on the lorry to come home.’
‘No-one objects? What about the officers?’
‘I take photographs of them and promise I will send them to their wives and sweethearts.’
Claude explained how he’d cross the river and catch a train to Lutetia with Sophie’s stories and his photographs never leaving his grasp.
Sophie insisted that he had been a reliable contact in the past. ‘I will have an account of the defence of Divodorum ready tomorrow,’ she said.
Aubrey thought about the timing. The adage about two birds and one stone came to mind. ‘Claude, if you can join us here at ten o’clock on Thursday, we have to hire a barge to fetch a delivery across the river. If you help us find a reliable bargemaster, we will pay and give you a lift.’
‘A lift?’ Claude raised an eyebrow at Sophie.
‘We will take you across the river as our guest,’ she said airily. ‘It is an Albionish way of saying things.’
35
Claude was leaving when the lorries with von Stralick, Madame Zelinka and the Enlightened Ones drove in through the gates. The backboards banged down. A few of the Enlightened Ones had to be helped down by friends. Aubrey dragged open the front doors of the factory. ‘What happened?’
‘Nothing.’ Madame Zelinka was grey-faced with exhaustion and something else – pain? ‘And too much.’
‘We have a major problem here in Divodorum,’ von Stralick said. He eased Madame Zelinka to a chair, and Aubrey then saw that she was cradling one arm in the other.
‘Only half the Enlightened Ones have come back,’ Caroline said softly.
Von Stralick barked orders to Madame Zelinka’s colleagues. The uninjured began unloading medical supplies from the lorries, while four sat on the floor, against the wall, roughly bandaged.
‘What happened?’ Aubrey repeated.
Von Stralick shook his head. ‘Downstairs. Close the doors first.’
In the basement, the Enlightened Ones showed no trace of panic, just careful, methodical movements. The injured were helped down the stairs and onto the bedding that took up most of the floor space. Others distributed water.
Madame Zelinka refused to lie down. Von Stralick eased her into one of the ancient lounge chairs that George had bought when trying to make the place more comfortable. ‘The fire, at the warehouse.’ Madame Zelinka took a quick inhalation through her teeth, hissing as von Stralick eased her arm a little to arrange a sling around it. When he was done he kept a hand on her shoulder, gently. ‘It has spawned something, a bad residue.’
Aubrey remembered the powerful spell remains that he’d found underneath Dr Tremaine’s Fisherberg residence. ‘It attacked you?’
‘It is dangerous,’ Madame Zelinka said. Her head bowed and she gestured weakly at von Stralick.
He took up the story. ‘The fire was put out by the fireboat, but the animation remained and grew in strength. Zelinka was clubbed by a length of steel that was lying on the ground one minute, then hopping about the next. Soon the entire factory was alive. Our people were fighting for their lives.’
Aubrey shuddered. ‘I might be of some assistance.’
‘We can cope with animated building materials,’ Madame Zelinka said through clenched teeth, ‘but the situation is much worse than that.’
‘The residue is draining into the river,’ von Stralick explained. ‘It could contaminate the whole city. We left some of our people there to do what they could, but it could be very bad.’
‘It will fester and grow if we don’t stop it,’ Madame Zelinka murmured. ‘Divodorum, then downstream.’
Sophie, the native Gallian, was most horrified. She put both hands to her mouth before asking, ‘The animation will spread?’
‘It could.’ Aubrey rubbed his forehead. ‘Magical residue is unpredictable, but I’d say that every town downriver of Divodorum is in danger.’
‘It is our duty to stop it,’ Madame Zelinka said. ‘We will rest, then go back.’
‘I’d like to help,’ Aubrey insisted. He was already running spells through in his mind.
‘Help?’ Madame Zelinka almost smiled. ‘Do you remember the last time you tried to deal with magical residue?’
Aubrey had barely survived, and it was only the fortunate interference from the Beccaria Cage that had allowed him to escape. ‘I’m willing.’
‘I know, I know.’ Madame Zelinka waved a tired hand. ‘Stay here. Leave the residue to the experts.’ She closed her eyes and leaned her head back. Her jaw was clenched against the pain.
Von Stralick caught Aubrey’s eye and took him aside. While the Enlightened Ones moved about with quiet assurance, with Caroline, George and Sophie distributing food to the hungry, von Stralick spoke softly. ‘She is in pain, Fitzwilliam. Surely you know some medical magic.’
‘I don’t. I have the greatest respect for those who do.’
‘Respect?’
‘It scares me.’
‘I have trouble imagining you scared by such a thing.’
‘It’s…’ Aubrey waved a hand, vaguely. ‘It’s so complicated, casting spells that work with all the bits and pieces inside you.’
‘I am informed that you’ve rarely avoided complicated magic in the past.’
‘This is different.’ Aubrey ran his fingers through his hair. ‘If I knew medical magic, I would have used it on you, Hugo, when you were sick. You know that.’
Caroline came over and passed them cups of tea. ‘My training included basic first aid, Hugo. I’ll do what I can.’
Aubrey hadn’t liked letting Hugo down like that, but like most non-magicians, the Holmlander didn’t have any idea about how complex magic was.
Feeling helpless as the Enlightened Ones regrouped, with Caroline’s assistance, he went back upstairs to the kitchen. Sophie and George were busy ladling soup into mugs. George looked over his shoulder. ‘Those potatoes won’t peel themselves, you know.’
Aubrey looked at the pile on the bench and sighed. He picked up the knife and went to work, pondering the glamorous life of an international security operative.
36
Later that afternoon, Aubrey bicycled out to where the Enlightened Ones were hard at work. Their skills were always of interest to him and he watched while the more actively magical of the corps stood at the perimeter of what he saw as a multi-chorused, multi-coloured stain that was spreading from the warehouse site, across the embankment and dripping into the river. Three or four of the Enlightened Ones were chanting spells, short and sharp, in a language unfamiliar to him. Two were waist deep in the river with their arms spread, heads down, as if they were herding fish.
Aubrey concentrated. He felt the pulsing of the residue as both cruel and threatening. He wasn’t surprised, either, that it had the definite touch of Dr Tremaine. When he narrowed his focus, though, he became sure that even though Dr Tremaine’s signature element was buried deep in the magic, his presence was missing. Aubrey was sure that this compression spell was another that Dr Tremaine had organised, but had allowed someone else to actually activate. It was more delegated magic, and Aubrey wondered how far Dr Tremaine had gone with this process.
Other Enlightened Ones were warily circling the smouldering remains of the warehouse. At intervals, one of them would crouch and use a small trowel to scrape away at the earth outside the crumbled walls. Aubrey had no idea what they were doing, but the malevolent animation that had seized the building was well under control.