It mewled in pain, then said, ‘You have called me from the Invisible World again, Brother of Dragons, forced me to endure the suffering of this world. Do you have a question for me this time, or do you merely wish to exhibit your cruelty?’
‘I have three questions,’ Shavi said. The Bone Inspector had told Shavi that as a seer he should be able to communicate with the ‘Others’, but Shavi hadn’t understood the meaning of the statement until that moment.
‘Then speak them, Dragon-Brother, but know this: there is a price to pay for the answers you seek.’
‘What price?’
‘A small thing.’
‘You must tell me first.’
‘No, you must agree to the contract first. That is the way these things are done.’
Shavi knew it was stupid to agree in advance, but he could see no other alternative; there was too much at stake. ‘A small thing?’ he asked.
‘A small thing.’
‘Then I agree.’
The spirit-form made an unpleasant smacking noise and said, ‘Then ask, Brother of Dragons, and may the knowledge benefit you as much as you hope.’
Shavi took a deep breath. Then: ‘Where, exactly, is Ruth Gallagher, Sister of Dragons?’
‘Not a good question, Brother of Dragons. Ruth Gallagher is exactly in the Fixed Lands. She is exactly within a day’s flight from this place. But with respect to you, I will offer the answer you require this time. Ruth Gallagher spends her days in labour next to the river, near a bridge.’
Shavi decided the information was good enough for him to find her. For the second question, he strove to choose his words more cleverly. ‘I know there are supposed to be five Brothers and Sisters of Dragons. Ruth, Laura and myself make three. Who are the other two?’
‘Jack Churchill, known as Church, and Ryan Veitch.’
Shavi couldn’t understand how Church could be one of their group and also have buried the stone all those years ago, but he couldn’t risk asking. He had one more important thing to ask. ‘Where can I find the Fabulous Beasts?’
The spirit-form paused for so long that Shavi thought it was not going to answer. But finally it said, ‘There is only one Fabulous Beast left in this world. It remained behind in the hope that one day a voice would call out and waken it from its slumber.’
It fell silent. Shavi waited.
‘The Fabulous Beast sleeps beneath the Garden of Eden.’
Shavi continued to wait, but it was clear the spirit-form was not going to volunteer any more information. But that is meaningless … The Garden of Eden does not exist.’
‘I have answered your questions, Brother of Dragons, and now I demand my price.’
‘But-’
Shavi’s protestations died in his throat. The spirit-form rushed from the hole in the air with outstretched grasping hands.
4
The howl of pain echoed across the Abbey grounds. Laura and the Bone Inspector rushed across the graveyard to find Shavi sprawled on the grass. Laura turned him over. His hands were clutched to his face and when Laura pulled them away she recoiled in horror. Shavi’s left eye had been torn out leaving a blood-encrusted, gaping socket.
5
After detouring to a costume shop in East London, Shavi had a black leather eye patch covering the empty orbit. ‘Strangely, it no longer hurts,’ he said as he gingerly probed around his cheekbone.
‘Good. So you’re ready to answer some straight questions,’ Laura said sharply from the driver’s seat. ‘You gave up your eye on purpose? Just to get a few answers?’
‘I did not know that would be the price.’
‘Then you’re more of an idiot than I thought,’ the Bone Inspector growled. You think they’re going to take something that’s not important?’
Shavi was surprised by how hard Laura had taken his sacrifice. She had already gone through disbelief, tears and finally had arrived at a cold, hard anger that currently was directed at him.
‘I think the eye patch from the costume shop is quite dashing,’ he said in an attempt to defuse the tension. It didn’t work.
Laura pulled the van over with a screech of tyres. ‘Is this what it’s going to be like, then? You give up an eye. I donate an ovary. You lose a leg. I hack off an arm. Is that it? Because if it is, I don’t want it.’
‘The burger bar is better?’
‘Yes, it is. Let somebody else do this stuff. We can go back to having fun.’
‘There is no one else.’
‘You two shut up.’ The Bone Inspector glared at them. ‘Here’s how it is: you do this or the Army of the Ten Billion Spiders cuts you — and me — out of reality. Gone. Forgotten. Never existed.’ He turned to Shavi. ‘That’s it, isn’t it?’
Shavi nodded.
‘Now find this Ruth Gallagher and maybe you’ll make a bigger spark. And then you find the other two, and then maybe we’ll discover what’s happened to the world and what the Enemy wants.’
They’d already tried a number of care homes near London’s bridges after consulting the Yellow Pages and the A-Z. There was only one left.
‘That’s it,’ Laura said nodding to a large, old house. ‘I hope she’s got more sense than you or we really are fucked in the head.’
6
Ruth felt as if she was waking from a long, deep sleep. Her mind was sluggish, but she was sure clarity lay just on the other side of the fog. Her dream of the owl-man had set something in motion, but she was not yet sure what it was or how it would turn out. The first manifestation of her new state was that she had called in sick to work, and the elation she felt when she put down the phone made her think she should give up her job completely. If she couldn’t afford the flat, she could always move out of the city.
Her phone rang. It was Rourke. ‘I just tried you at work-’
‘I called in sick.’
‘Is that wise?’
Ruth bristled. She wondered why she had put up with Rourke’s claustrophobic attentions for so long.
‘I thought I might drop round to see you,’ he continued.
‘No,’ she said firmly.
‘We could go for lunch?’
‘I’ve got things to do. I’ll call you later.’ Ruth hung up quickly. She realised that in the past he’d always managed to talk her round when she tried to hold him at bay. Was she really that weak?
A noise in the bedroom. Ruth felt a familiar shiver, but this time she didn’t shy away from it.
The bedroom was still. Her bedroom door was ajar. Before she could investigate further, she was drawn to the window by a magnetic sense that someone desperately needed to speak to her.
In the street outside stood the giant she’d encountered on the Underground. He was looking up at her window with an expression of abject concern. When he saw her, he motioned furiously for her to join him. Ruth was surprised to realise she felt no sense of threat. Away from the shadows of the Tube tunnel, the giant appeared benign. Every now and then he glanced from side to side. Ruth knew obliquely that he was watching for the spiders. At that moment, not really knowing why, she decided she would go to him.
The creak of the wardrobe door made her start. Ruth turned to see the door opening of its own accord.
Ruth was gripped by a terrible dread. As the eerie movement of the door halted, she looked inside the wardrobe and saw not her clothes, but a deep, sucking darkness. Within the folds of the impenetrable gloom, something lurked. Ruth felt the inescapable gravity of the presence, the weight of its malign intent. It hungered for her.