Church bristled at the echo of his own thoughts. ‘She doesn’t deserve to die like those others out there.’
That would be a matter of opinion. I think she does deserve to die. I presented her with a perfectly good opportunity and she chose to turn me down. I find that very disrespectful.’
Jerzy had been watching the scene, wrapped in the drapes. Tentatively, he stepped forward and tugged gently at Church’s arm. His eyes pleaded but he said nothing.
‘Speak up, you grinning buffoon!’ the intruder said. ‘Ah, I see. You don’t want to be seen to be disloyal in case, by some extremely slight probability, your mistress escapes with her life.’ The intruder said to Church in a tired voice, ‘What he’s trying to tell you is that you should let her die because then you will both be free of her control. And that sounds eminently sensible to me.’
‘But even then I’d still be a prisoner,’ Church replied, ‘of my guilt.’ His eyes briefly locked with Niamh’s.
‘You really have been seduced by her propaganda, haven’t you?’ the intruder said wearily. He flexed his fingers and prepared to strike.
‘Who are you and what do you know about Ruth?’
The intruder’s cruel smile grew more enigmatic. ‘Finally, a discussion that really matters. Of course, the first question is the most important. Let’s talk about me. What should you call me? I have many names, and you’ll never discover the one that really counts. But for the sake of argument you may call me the Libertarian, because I believe in personal freedom … from the rigours of choice, from life itself. See? I too can play the favourite game around these parts.’
The Libertarian increased the pressure on Niamh’s neck with a twist of cruelty. She clawed at his arm, her breathing shallow.
‘I said, let her go.’ Church raised his sword.
‘Ooh, a weapon,’ the Libertarian said with mock-dismay. He was unthreatened, but he released the pressure of his arm a little so Niamh could gulp air. Church took a step forward. The Libertarian’s red gaze became so menacing that Church stopped dead in his tracks.
Summoning his strength, Church asked, What about Ruth? Tell me.’
‘Ah, the love of your life, waiting so mournfully at the end of time-’
‘What do you mean?’
‘A word to the wise: her survival is wholly dependent on you. Interfere in any way and she will die.’
‘I don’t understand. Interfere in what?’
The Libertarian made a faux-puzzled expression. ‘Now there’s the question. Perhaps it would be better not to interfere in anything, just to be on the safe side.’
His words triggered a moment of revelation. ‘You … and whoever murdered my friends in Carn Euny … and the spider-thing that controlled the Redcaps — you’re all together in this.’ Church added a disturbing codiciclass="underline" And Etain, too.’
The Libertarian continued to play his part with studied theatricality. ‘Look at Existence, all nice and shiny and neat and new. Then pull back the surface and, lo, there we are. An army … no, that doesn’t do us justice — a civilisation. We’re all around you, all the time, yet you never see us, not really, not directly. Just an occasional glimpse on the periphery of vision. We live in the cracks between reality. We watch from the shadows, peer from the depths of caves, from drains and sewers, from the dusty windows of empty houses and rooftops at night.’
‘What do you want?’
‘The same as anyone else — food, drink, a roof over our heads.’ His sarcasm hung in the air for a moment. ‘We are everywhere. We are legion. There, a quotation that has not yet been written. Or perhaps it is being written as we speak. Ah, the mysteries of Existence.’ He smiled coldly. ‘We are the flipside of your world, but the flipside does not always have to stay at the bottom.’
Something in the Libertarian’s eyes or tone made Church unaccountably fearful. ‘If you are what you say you are, why are you so concerned about me?’
The Libertarian’s eyes narrowed.
‘It’s the Pendragon Spirit, isn’t it?’
Niamh seized the opportunity to break free from the Libertarian’s grip. She scrabbled across the floor to Church’s side, all her haughtiness gone. ‘The light burns too brightly in you,’ she gasped. ‘They are only brave enough to crush you by subtle means, from a distance.’
‘Some of us can strike directly,’ the Libertarian said, ‘and we will, when the time is right.’
‘He asked me to destroy you, in the night, while you slept,’ Niamh said. ‘I refused. No Golden One would obey such an order.’
‘If you do it, it has to be of your own free will,’ Church noted sardonically.
‘Our power may be limited now, but it grows with each step closer to the Source,’ the Libertarian said, before skipping lithely to the open window. He bowed and dived through it.
Church rushed to the window, hoping the killer had leaped to his death, but he could just make out a dark shape disappearing down the side of the sheer wall. The handholds were few and far between, but somehow the Libertarian found them, moving with remarkable speed.
Church turned to Niamh, clearly still dazed by her experience. ‘Are you okay?’ he asked.
The goddess eyed him as if he were speaking a foreign language. ‘You could have allowed me to be eradicated from Existence. You would have been freed from your obligation.’
‘I could. But I wouldn’t have been able to live with myself.’
A flicker of emotion crossed Niamh’s normally impassive features, before she snorted, haughty once more.
‘I saved your life,’ Church said. ‘You can deny it, but it’s true. And if you think your life has some value I’d ask for one small thing in reward.’
7
The journey took ten days, across a mythic landscape of forests that stretched as far as the eye could see, their secret depths dark and cool and mysterious, and sweeping grasslands skirting the edge of mountains that scraped the sky; through verdant, peaceful glens and past mirror-glass lakes where clouds scudded silently.
The landscape almost served to soothe Church’s unease. But at night, as he lay beside the campfire, the deep waters inside him moved with a slow, tidal pull. The Libertarian’s words hinted at a hidden pattern behind the mundane reality of his life, but he could not find the connections that would give him understanding.
Jerzy had been his guide, poring over maps given to him by Niamh’s advisors and studying the sun and the stars. He had been silent for much of the last leg of their journey, but as they rounded the base of a crag above which eagles soared, he said in a troubled voice, ‘The tension makes me queasy. When will the queen make her move?’
‘What do you mean?’
‘Surely you do not expect to reach your destination?’
‘Why not?’
‘It is not the way of the Golden Ones to give a person what they desire. They love their sport. We will wake one morning in the Court of the Soaring Spirit and find the entire journey a dream. Or as you reach out to knock on the door, the Court of Peaceful Days will turn into a stone at the roadside, or an egg in the nest of one of those eagles. Or-’
‘If it’s going to happen, it’s going to happen. But I think Niamh might just allow me this one thing.’
‘Why would she do that? It is not her way.’
‘There was something different about her after the Libertarian left … I don’t know.’
Jerzy shrugged. His fixed grin took the edge off his downcast manner.
Soon after, the Court of Peaceful Days hove into view, a network of interconnecting, long, low stone buildings with a wood growing all around it, and amongst the residences, and in some places within the buildings themselves, sprouting out of the red-tiled roofs. Flags and banners fluttered from many buildings, while emblems were embedded in the walls. A winding path led to the main door, passing through a solitary wrought-iron gate that soared up nearly fifteen feet, topped with spearheads. The gate swung open soundlessly to allow Church and Jerzy through.