Cronix (48 page)

Oriente shook his head. “I have no idea what it plans for you. At best, it doesn’t care about you. At worst, it may want anyone who remembers the old ways dead. You saw how many Cronix there are out there. They must have been summoned from across the whole of southern England. The wildlife round here could never sustain so many of them. They must be starving…”

He stopped, realizing where that line of reasoning would lead: there was only one possible food source here for so many Cronix.

The spirit seemed to have ebbed out of the old inspector. “Oh Jesus, I can’t tell them that. Can you imagine…”

Oriente stood up, stopping to avoid hitting his head on the low stone ceiling. “Listen, time is running out. I have no idea when they might storm the ramparts. I have to go now. Tell the people...I don't know, tell them I've gone to bring help, to find a more secure refugee. Tell them anything. Just don’t tell them the truth.”

He was about to open the door when Hencock grabbed his arm. “But you can’t leave. You’re the prophet, aren’t you? How can you abandon your people?”

Oriente stared at his gaunt face. “I’m not sure if I’m meant to be a prophet for you people, inspector, or for those things out there. I fear the monsters may be my flock.”

***

A group of ragged defenders were waiting, expectantly, on the ramparts as the two men stepped out. Lola was there too, clutching Pris by the hand. Uxmith was holding the girl’s other hand, and his little brother Boo was slung on his back, arms clasped round his neck. Oriente was surprised to see Shareen standing next to Lola.

“She wants to come too,” Lola said.

“You sure, Shareen?” Oriente felt uneasy at the idea. He had no idea how safe it would be to take extras bodies through that terrifying mass beyond the walls. Shareen swallowed, then nodded. “You always seem to get by,” she said, her voice raspy. “Maybe you’re blessed. May as well throw in my lot with you. Besides,” she added with an uncertain smile at Lola, “why should she get to be the fucking chosen one?”

“Okay,” Oriente said. He held out his hand and she took it. They started down the stairs.

“Wait, you’re leaving us?” shouted a woman, who from her faded good looks must have once been an Eternal. It struck him now how vain the term had been.

A murmur rippled through the crowd. Oriente stopped on the stone steps, his little band of travelers huddled around him. He shouted so the people lining the walls could hear him.

“People of London,” he said. “I have come to believe that my presence here is a danger to you all, that the Cronix will attack this place if I stay here any longer. On my last hunting trip I captured a scold, one of the more sentient of these creatures. She told me the Cronix believe I am a great leader to them, and that I am being held captive here against my will. They have come this day to free me. If I go to them, I believe they will leave and you will be safe.”

He surprised himself with his own sudden inspiration. He looked to Hencock on the wall above. The inspector nodded, his face ashen. “Open the gate,” he yelled, and raised his hand in a gesture of farewell.

“And may god be merciful to you,” Oriente shouted to the confused, frightened defenders of Arundel, although he knew he was actually addressing the all-powerful creature birthed by the Orbiter.

He turned, and the group walked across the courtyard to where a watchman stood holding the wooden gate ajar. Up on the walls, the boy who had played the drum at Pris’s birthday party started a slow, solemn beat, as though accompanying them to the gallows.

“Are we going to die?” asked Pris, voice shaking. Before he could answer Ux piped up. “No Pris, we’re going to be alright.” Oriente turned and smiled at the boy, then stepped through the open gate.

The sight stopped him in his tracks. He felt the skin beneath his right eye twitch: his old tic had was back. Instinctively, he tried to put up a hand to steady it, but it was being clutched by Lola.

At ground level, the wall of Cronix seemed impenetrable, stretching as far as the eye could see. He remembered the crowds of embalmed figures arrayed around the giant statue of Fitch on Epsom Downs, the unease they had always instilled. It was as if those soulless statues had come to life, and for the first time since he had returned to Earth he was afraid. Not just for himself, but for the poor stragglers whose lives he was about to entrust to an uncertain deity. If his nerve was buckling, how petrified must his companions be?

He turned to them. Lola was staring at him for some sign of reassurance. Pris had buried her face in her mother’s side, trembling uncontrollably. Ux just stared straight ahead – he had swung Boo round to his chest, so the infant could not see what lay ahead. Shareen was making a gurgling sound, her eyes bulging and her fingers digging into to Ux’s shoulder. They all appeared ready to turn and flee back to the relative safety of the castle. Above them, on the walls, the crowds peered down, dismayed at losing their hero, yet even more horrified at what the little group was about to attempt.

“Come on,” barked Oriente. “Stick close and don’t stray, not even an inch.”

He felt fingers hooking themselves into the waistband of his kilt, and the group started to shuffle out into the open meadow, towards the solid ranks of the Cronix. Oriente could feel dried stems of grass breaking under his bare feet, the small fingers of women and children pressing against his flesh, and he realized that they were probably all about to die a terrible death.

With their awkward, crab-like steps, it seemed to take an eternity before they closed in on the front line of creatures. At fifty yards, he could see their faces clearly, beautiful worn visages, blank of all expression, eyes fixed on the approaching figures, like dogs watching food going into their master’s mouth. He heard Shareen muttering a prayer against imminent extinction, a steady ohgodohgodohgod that numbed her mind against doing the impossible. Lola’s breathing was ragged, Pris’s crying a pitch below hysteria. They were about to cross the threshold of blind panic.

“Don’t look,” he said. “Make sure you are holding on to me, and close your eyes. I’ll lead you through, just trust me.”

Wet faces pressed his skin. He turned and looked back: the castle walls were still thick with people, watching to see if a miracle or a massacre was afoot, the spectator’s morbid inability to look away.

Twenty yards. He could hear odd noises from the subspecies, growls and groans, the occasional shove of one creature against another. But none broke ranks or turned away its intense, vacant stare from them. Oriente took courage from the fact that they had not yet moved, told himself if they were intent on killing then they would already be steaming piles of meat on the grassy plain.

Ten yards. He found himself praying, inside his head. Oh dear Lord, keep us safe this day. I don’t know who you are or what you want but please protect these innocents from harm. Thank you dear Lord, thank you, thank you and bless you…

The tiny phalanx was almost upon the front rank. Oriente’s mind was numbed by prayers which had morphed into a litany of gratitude that nothing had yet happened.
Thank you, thank you, please keep us safe thank you…

They were almost upon them, just feet away. His gaze fixed on a male Cronix, with blonde hair and a thick beard a much darker shade, almost black, but the face clearly recognizable as … he was amazed that he was even trying to name the long-dead movie star whose face he was now looking into. The creature opened its mouth, ran its tongue over its front teeth.

Robert Redford.
The name sprang from nowhere, even as the creature abruptly, inexplicably, pushed back. As it did so, all the others behind it started shuffling in reverse, yielding a path that opened up deep into the mass of naked Cronix. As the crowd parted, a hiss arose from the throng.

“What’s happening?” It was Lola, too scared, or perhaps too smart, to open her eyes, yet hearing the noise of thousands of feet shuffling.

“They’re letting us through,” whispered Oriente. “They’re letting us through! I was right. Thank you, dear Lord, thank you,” he added, suddenly unselfconscious about uttering his devotions out loud.

“You mean we’re gonna have to walk through them?” It was Shareen, the panic in her voice muffled because her face was pressed into Uxmith’s thick hair.

“Yes Shareen, we’re gonna have to walk through them. Hold tight and keep your eyes shut.”

The space was not wide, only a few feet at most. Still the eyes of the hellish creatures were fixed upon them. They could simply reach out and grab them now, and there would nothing he could do. Oriente could smell their unwashed, sweaty bodies, the ripe odor of dirt and sex and blood. He tried not to catch their gaze, but every so often would be unable to avoid looking straight into the empty eyes of some monster and feel his nerve about to give.

One of them lurched forwards.
Oh god this is it
and could feel his knees weaken. But the creature had only moved into their path because another behind had pushed it, some feud between the tightly pressed killers.

They carried on.

They were at least two hundred yards into the throng now. Being taller than most of the Cronix, Oriente could see their heads stretching away in every direction. About a hundred feet to his right, another head reared above the crowd – a fellow Ranger. He forced himself to ignore it and look straight ahead instead. They still had hundreds of yards to go before making it to the woods.
Keep going, it’s going to be okay, it’s going to be okay
he muttered to the shivering wretches pressed blindly against him.

Something caught the corner of his eye and he looked behind him. A female Cronix, for some reason, reached out and touched Shareen’s back. It wasn’t a grab, just a hand extended, and there seemed, from what he could tell, to be no aggression involved.

Shareen shrieked and looked up, her eyes bulging with terror.

“Not…you,” the Cronix said in a croaky little voice that still managed to carry across the mute masses.

All the color had drained from Shareen’s face and she looked as though she was going to try to run for it.

“Shareen!” Oriente hissed, as soon as he had recovered from the shock of the Cronix actually talking. “Shareen! Put your head down. Do it. Now!”

But Shareen was transfixed by the sea of eyes around her, the wall of bodies pressing in like some nightmare of the apocalypse. Oriente stopped. The shuffling group ground to a halt like a twelve-legged insect running into a rock.

Shareen’s lips were moving, but no sound came out. Her grip on Oriente's kilt had gone, she was no longer clasping hold of Ux. Like a drowning sailor, she was being pulled away in a current of sheer terror, set adrift on this sea of unholy beings. She began staggering back the way they had just come.

“Shareen! Grab hold of Ux. Do it now!” he hissed, afraid that anything louder might break the spell that held the Cronix in its thrall. But Shareen’s fear had possessed her. She looked round and saw, in the distance, the walls of the castle. She stumbled back.

“Stop her,” croaked Oriente. Without looking up, Ux groped the air behind him, feeling for the former nurse’s hand. He was raising his head when Oriente grabbed it and pressed it down again. Shareen was tripping through the narrow channel they had come through, but Oriente could see it was already closing behind them.

He wanted to chase after her, but he couldn’t jeopardize the others. As she stumbled away, and the gap grew wider between them, he noticed the passage through the Cronix had almost closed. She shrieked as a hand reached out and touched her again, threw her arms up in a defensive gesture. A female hissed at her, then another hand shot out and grabbed at her hair, more aggressive this time. She screamed again, then was jerked abruptly off her feet and into the crowd. Oriente could see the mass close around her, and though she was no longer visible, he could hear her screams turning to a gurgled wheeze, before stopping altogether. Lola was crying hard, almost hysterical, against his ribs and held her head tight so she could not look. The kids were pressed so hard against him it felt as though they were trying to burrow inside him, whining and grizzling. Oriente started moving again, issuing murmured reassurances, begging them not to raise their heads. No one did.

In a trance, they spilled from the far side of the crowd. It could have been a matter of minutes or hours, but when they reached the tree line, the Cronix abruptly thinned out. He kept the kids’ heads pinned down as he picked up the pace and they stumbled into the woods. Lola finally looked up and saw they were under the leafy canopy.

“Oh my god, we made it, we made it,” she gasped.

“We’re not clear yet,” Oriente cautioned, but he was glad she was now walking upright, guiding her daughter and moving almost at a run. Their labored breathing was the only thing he could hear now, panting through tears and snot as they jolted through the forest, putting as much distance between themselves and the Cronix as possible. They tripped and stumbled on roots and gulleys. He had no idea how long they ran for.

After what seemed like hours, they emerged into a clearing where a huge horse chestnut tree reared in splendid isolation. Oriente decided they must rest, find somewhere safe to recuperate. He pulled the kids, then Lola, up into the tree's lofty boughs, cutting branches to create a platform for the kids to stretch out on. Almost as soon as they did, Pris and Ux were asleep. Lola cradled little Boo in her arms, while Oriente slipped a few feet further down, his knife drawn, to stand watch.