“What do you know about the Merlin Glass?” I said bluntly.
“I have been aware of it for some time,” said the Doormouse, not looking away. “Your uncle Jack and I do consult, from time to time, on occasion. On matters of . . . mutual interest. And I know something of the Glass’ history, of course. It is one of the great Mysteries of the world, after all. You didn’t know? I am surprised . . . The London Knights had the Merlin Glass under lock and key for centuries, until one of them returned it to your uncle Jack a few years back.”
“Wait a minute!” I said. “The London Knights had it? But Merlin gave the Glass to my family! Why did the Knights have it for so long? And why would they give it back?”
“Ask your uncle Jack,” said the Doormouse.
“No, wait, hold on just a minute,” I said. “I looked this up, in the family archives. Merlin Satanspawn made a gift of the Glass to my family, not the London bloody Knights!”
“Oh, he gave the Glass to the Droods, right enough,” said the Doormouse. “But your family knew, better than most, that you should always beware sorcerers bearing gifts. At some point, they chose to give the Glass to the London Knights. For safekeeping, perhaps? Or in return for . . . something else? I really don’t know. Perhaps you should go back and check your family archives more carefully . . .”
“Do you know why Merlin gave the Glass to my family in the first place?” I said.
The Doormouse looked at me, and if there was any expression on his furry face, I couldn’t read it. “If you don’t know, young Drood, I certainly don’t.”
He turned back to his work-bench, and reached out a fuzzy paw to the hand mirror. It slid smoothly away from him, across the bench. The Doormouse blinked a few times and then tried again, with his other paw. The hand mirror jerked back several inches, refusing to be touched. The Doormouse muttered something quite astonishingly obscene, and grabbed at the Glass with both paws. It shot back and forth across the bench, like a drop of water on a hot surface, avoiding his grasp no matter how quickly he moved. The Doormouse finally gave up and stood back, breathing hard.
“It has been acting up, just lately,” I said. “Almost as though it has a mind of its own. I was told . . . there might be something alive or aware, hiding or imprisoned, inside the mirror’s reflection. I can’t say I’ve ever seen anything, but . . .”
“That’s Merlin Satanspawn for you,” said the Doormouse. “Always thinking three steps ahead of everyone else. I think . . . we need to take a closer look at this. Yes . . .”
He turned abruptly away from the work-bench, and hurried off to trot back and forth among the larger pieces of scientific equipment cluttering up his laboratory. He peered closely at some, patted others familiarly like old friends, rejecting one after another as he searched for something specific. There was something about the Doormouse’s laboratory that reminded me irresistibly of the Armourer’s workplace. Though thankfully there weren’t any little mouse lab assistants scuttling around. I took the opportunity to look closely at several half-finished Doors standing off to one side. Bits and pieces protruded, strange tech that made no sense at all to me. Some of the Doors’ insides were so complicated I couldn’t even seem to focus on them properly. As though they possessed too many spatial dimensions for the human mind to cope with.
Molly wandered around, prodding things, until I asked her very politely not to.
The Doormouse came back, huffing and puffing as he pushed a huge piece of equipment ahead of him. It looked a bit like one of those really big telescopes you see in observatories, except for all the ways in which it didn’t. The Doormouse pushed one end right up to the Merlin Glass, which was resting on the work-bench, apparently at peace for the moment, and then he retreated some distance, to peer through an eyepiece on the far end of the apparatus.
“What is that thing?” I muttered to Molly.
“Beats the hell out of me,” she murmured back. “Just looking at half the stuff in this place gives me a headache. Why did you have to get him started on the Glass? We could have been out of here by now!”
I shrugged. I didn’t really have an answer, except that I didn’t like not being able to trust something I’d come to depend on so much. I glared at the Merlin Glass, hoping it would stay put if I just kept my attention fixed on it. I half expected it to jump up off the work-bench, and try to force itself back into my pocket. The Doormouse had his furry face screwed right up, his eye jammed against the eyepiece of the thing that wasn’t a telescope. All the while muttering to himself and pulling distractedly at his whiskers. He finally came out from behind the thing and hurried over to stand with Molly and me. He glowered at the Merlin Glass, but didn’t try to touch it again.
“Interesting,” he said.
“What is?” said Molly. “What?”
The Doormouse looked at me carefully. “You’ve been using the Glass as a Door, mostly?”
“Yes,” I said. That much I was sure of.
“The Merlin Glass has a great many other functions and capabilities built into it,” said the Doormouse. “Some of which have apparently never been accessed, never mind activated. This is a very intricate piece of work . . . I looked inside it, and it just seemed to fall away forever . . . There are layers upon layers, levels within levels. Merlin always was ahead of his Time. I can’t even say for sure what the original purpose of the Glass was. What he intended it to do for the Droods. Or to them . . .”
“Is it . . . I don’t know-alive, or aware?” I said.
“I didn’t see anything to suggest that,” the Doormouse said carefully. “Though it does seem to have a strong survival instinct built in. I suppose Merlin thought it would need that if it was going to hang around with Droods.”
“Is there anyone, or anything, present in the reflection?” I said.
“Oh yes,” said the Doormouse quite casually. He seemed to be concentrating on something else. “I saw it, briefly, looking back at me. Don’t know what it was, though. Or why it’s there. It seemed to be hiding from my equipment, though before today I would have said that was impossible. So! The Merlin Glass has been operating quite efficiently as a Door?”
“Yes,” I said.
“Then I should just use it for that,” said the Doormouse.
“So there’s nothing to worry about, with the Glass?” said Molly.
“I didn’t say that,” said the Doormouse. “I’m just fed up looking at it. Damn thing’s given me a headache.”
I picked up the hand mirror from the work-bench. It didn’t try to avoid my touch. I looked into the mirror, and my reflection stared innocently back at me. I looked carefully at what lay behind me in the reflection, but I couldn’t see anyone, or anything, that shouldn’t be there. I put the Glass away.
And then we all looked round sharply, as a heavy iron bell began to toll loudly somewhere in the background. The Doormouse’s ears stood straight up, and he clasped his paws together in front of him, almost as though he was praying. His eyes were very wide.
“What is that?” said Molly.
“The cloister bell,” said the Doormouse. “General alarm. Panic stations. Something bad is coming, so run like hell while you’ve still got a chance.”
He sprinted out of his laboratory and into the Showroom, not even glancing back to see if Molly and I were following. I had to run at full pelt just to catch up with him, while Molly pounded determinedly along behind me. The Doormouse shot through the Storeroom and back into his reception area, and then slammed to a halt so suddenly I almost crashed into him. He stood very still, head up and whiskers at a slant. Molly caught up with me, clapped a hand on my shoulder, and leaned heavily on me.