The Day Before Tomorrow (14 page)

 And with that, he sat back down on the rug in front of the fire and affected an air of indifference to the whole proceeding.  The others continued their discussion as if nothing had happened.  But now, Jamie was one of them, like it or not.  And gradually, as if he had never had any doubts about them at all, he joined the conversation.

 ‘Well, I say we go back down there and do a little recon,’ said Stiles.  ‘See what we’re up against.’ 

‘That sounds sensible,’ agreed Denny.  ‘That’s probably what
he’s
doing. Otherwise he’d have struck by now.’ 

‘He’s not been in any hurry – yet,’ said Tamar.  ‘But he must know by now, that we’ll be on to him.  We can’t assume anything.  It may have already started.  We have to be ready.’ 

‘It may be that I speak as a fool,’ said Jamie, tentatively, ‘but why can’t you all just do that Star Trek thing straight into Hell and finish this guy off?’

‘It doesn’t work like that,’ explained Tamar.  ‘For one thing, you can’t teleport into Hell. It’s not a part of the world.  And anyway, it’s too late for that now. He’s already opened the doorway.  The damned will be coming through regardless. Askphrit doesn’t know it, but this is a part of something bigger than him and all his schemes.  Six months ago we might have tried it, but now, all we can do is fight.’ 

‘Fight how?’ said Jamie.  ‘I thought you said there’d be legions of them – against five?’

‘Six,’ corrected Stiles.  ‘Hecaté will be with us.’

‘Okay six, big deal.  Look, I ain’t trying to ruin your party. I just want to know, what’s the plan?’

~ Chapter Twenty One ~

T
he “men upstairs” as Tamar had referred to them were, as all such men are, completely unaware that they were only on the first level of the top floor.  They thought that they were at the very top, the movers and shakers, but in this, they were, of course, deceived.  They were very much the moved and shaken.  Such men are useful.  The buck stops with them, and they give the underlings someone to be in awe of.  The real men in charge are always the sort of people that underlings are never in awe of, being merely more intelligent and powerful, not to mention more devious, than other people.  These people do not have shiny offices with a nice view of the outer rings.  They meet in shadowy rooms and wear shabby clothes.  Many of them take a day job of such staggering mundanity that you might wonder, if you ever noticed them at all, how they managed to get from day to day.  They make decisions, as opposed to making excuses.  And they always know whatever there is to know. 

* * *

Tamar went outside for some air. The house felt curiously stuffy, as if it had not been used by people for a long, long time.  But she knew the real reason; she was feeling nervous. It was too quiet, even for the middle of the countryside.  Outside was better.  At least out here, there was the sound of the occasional owl, quiet scuffling noises, probably foxes, even the breeze made a noise, whisper, whisper, whisper.  Tamar drew in a deep breath.  Now she was ready. 

Jamie was right, though, six against untold legions was bad odds even with her powers, Denny’s Athame and heroic tendencies, Stiles’s dogged determination, Cindy’s magic and a goddess plus a trained soldier.  What they needed was an army. 

* * *

Askphrit had bellowed like a wounded boar when he heard the news.  Demons had dived left and right for cover, and Peirce had hit the ground running.  The whole of Hell had shaken to the sound of his roaring voice. 

‘WHAT DO YOU MEAN, THE FATES ARE GONE?  DO YOU KNOW WHAT THIS MEANS?  WELL
DO
YOU?’  His voice hit new decibel levels ‘
THAT BLOODY WOMAN!!!  I’LL KILL HER, THIS TIME I’LL BLOODY WELL KILL!  HER.  I’LL KILL THE WHOLE BLOODY LOT OF THEM.  HOW DID SHE DO IT, EH?  ANSWER ME THAT!
’ for once, Askphrit had lost his suavity. 

‘My lord?’ whispered Peirce from the shadows in the voice of one who does not really want to be heard.  Unfortunately for him, Hell has excellent acoustics. 

‘WHAT?’  Askphrit calmed down a little.  ‘What?’

‘Well sir, what
does
it mean?’  Peirce covered his ears and, therefore, almost missed hearing the answer that Askphrit gave, in unexpectedly moderate tones.

‘It means, you useless little twerp, that the Fates never existed and, therefore, never could have interfered in anybody’s destiny.’ 

Peirce got the point immediately.  ‘So they know?’ he said, preparing to dive under some furniture.

‘Yes, they know. Are the troops ready?’

‘Yes sir.’  Pierce would have said this no matter what the truth of the situation.  Like all Captains, he understood that, when dealing with Generals (or mad overlords of Hell – and some people have trouble telling the difference) whatever the facts are, you must eliminate the impossible, and whatever you can dodge up, however improbable,
will
be the truth.  Besides, they were the damned, they were
always
ready. It was not as if they were going to get any more damned.

‘Good,’ said Askphrit.  His mood was improving.  ‘We must move immediately.  Perhaps there is still time.  After all, we have at least delayed them for almost a year.  And they don’t know about …’ he coughed.  ‘In any case, they have had no time to prepare, and they haven’t the manpower to deal with an assault of the magnitude that I am preparing to launch.  Ha, they’d need an army.’

* * *

The streets were deserted. This, in itself, would have been suspicious if it were not for the curfew.  Civilians were to be indoors by eight p.m. or be carted off to prison.  And it was now a quarter to eleven.  Armed patrols would swing by at random intervals; the idea was to catch curfew breakers off guard.  It was a curfew in the original sense of the word.  The idea being to keep people in their homes after dark to prevent plotting.  For this reason the curfew was augmented by an enforced complete blackout.  This being the origin of the curfew, an anglicised version of the French
‘Couvre Feu
’.  A law first instigated by William the Conqueror that all fires were to be doused at sunset, to prevent people staying up and plotting.  With no fire for heat and light, in those dark old days, people tended to go to bed.  At least that was the idea.  What the great Conqueror failed to realise, and also his later imitators, was that plotters tend to be devious people who take risks and are quite prepared to break the law to do so. 

And if you do not have magic, a good strong pair of heavily lined curtains will do the trick.

The invisibility spell was hardly necessary. The streets were pitch black, and, in any case, everyone knew that the patrol men were notoriously easy to bribe, should they run into any.  It was the other things that they might run into that they were worried about.  But so far, there had been nothing.  The streets were as deserted as they appeared to be. 

After about an hour, Tamar said. ‘Okay guys let’s see what’s going on down there.’ 

‘Okay,’ said Denny. ‘All those without magic of their own catch hands with someone who has.’  This of course referred to Stiles and Jamie.  Only Jamie disregarded this order, but Tamar grabbed hold of his elbow.  ‘Believe me,’ she said.  ‘You’ll be a lot safer with us.’ 

 He looked at her sourly. ‘You’ve got to be kidding me.’

* * *

Down in the caverns beneath the sewers the curfew was, unsurprisingly, not being observed.  Thus it was, ironically, far lighter down here than it had been up on the street.  On the minus side, the patrols that they were likely to encounter down here were far more deadly and less open to bribery than the ones above their heads. 

Tamar found herself explaining, once again, to Jamie this time, about the homeless people who lived down here.

‘That’s how we first came across this place,’ she said, defending these people against the evil that lurks down here. God, I sound like a bad sermon.’

The sewers were ominously deserted, apart from the few white faced human inhabitants that could be seen scurrying here and there in the dim light.  

‘Are you sure we’re in the right sewer?’ asked Jamie after a while, his voice echoing weirdly along the empty tunnels.   

Denny was worried about Tamar.  She had not even said ‘Damn’.

 She was looking about her, warily, occasionally sniffing the fetid air.  After a while, she visibly relaxed.

‘Wherever they are,’ she said.  ‘They’re not here.  I reckon they …’ 

They emerged from the sewers, bloody, bruised and battered.  Not to mention stinking to High Heaven.

‘It was a good fight, though, wasn’t it?’ said Jamie enthusiastically. Last of the great sceptics.  His opinions were revolving faster than a politician’s in an election year. 

‘They ambushed us,’ wailed Tamar.  ‘I don’t understand it, I couldn’t sense a thing, not even a sniff, and those buggers stink worse than Vikings.’    

Denny put an arm around her, which she shook of pettishly.  She had been fooled, and she was not in a good mood.  Denny raised his eyebrows.  As far as he was concerned, they had all survived, and that counted as a win. 

It had happened so suddenly, which is the point of an ambush, I suppose.  From out of nowhere, apparently, but really from Hell (which was why Tamar had not been able to sense them) about a hundred feral vampires had suddenly appeared.  They had set about them with the old divide and conquer, and they seemed to know exactly what they were about.  They divided Stiles and Jamie from the others, knowing no doubt, that those two could not escape on their own and that the others would not leave them behind.  Unfortunately for them, Tamar was infuriated by this move.  The battle was bloody and swift and soon, what passed for the air down there was choked with flying dust and it was raining limbs, for Tamar had manifested a couple of broadswords and made her progress like a demented windmill.  Cutting off whatever came within her reach.  If not a head, then an arm or leg would do just as well, she really was not fussy.

 ‘Come on,’ said Denny now, ‘Let’s get out of here, we need to regroup, they’ll be after us in a minute.’ 

‘I doubt it,’ said Tamar. ‘That was just a feint.  I think we’re supposed to think we’ve won and just go away with a sense of victory.  But he made it too easy. I’m not falling for
that
!’

‘Of course not,’ said Denny.  ‘That couldn’t have been more than a fraction of what he’s got down there.  That’s why I said, “regroup” and not “celebrate”.  I’m not a complete idiot you know?’

‘
Easy
?’ said Jamie.  ‘You call that easy?  My Lord!’

‘Sorry,’ said Tamar, ignoring Jamie. ‘I’m just a bit pissed off.  I should have seen it coming.’

Stiles who, by his reaction to the ambush, clearly
had
seen it coming – and it was just as bloody well (his most potent weapon was his permanent state of mistrust) tactfully said nothing.

They headed for home in silence.

Jamie wiped the blood off his neck. 

It was a long time until dawn, but, up ahead of them, there were bright lights glowing.  They had decided to double-check the streets before going home. This was Stiles’s idea, which everyone agreed was a good one. 

This seemed like it might be something worth checking out.  As they drew closer, they heard the sounds of what seemed to be a riot. 

‘It’s the prison,’ said Jamie.  ‘Look they’re on the roof.’

They were indeed. Distant shapes, silhouetted against the glow of the searchlights, were dancing and gibbering, brandishing long pieces of wood and iron bars, and shouting defiance.  There were a few small fires. 

‘Sign of the times,’ said Stiles. ‘It’s the bloody overcrowding. It’s got a lot worse of course, since the curfew.’ 

Jamie had the grace to hang his head.    

‘Just look at them,’ said Cindy.  ‘Like animals, disgraceful!  They ought to be locked up.’

They all turned to look at her. Even those of them who were used to this sort of thing from Cindy stared. 

‘Locked up you say?’ said Denny, trying to keep a straight face. 

Then they burst out laughing. 

‘What?’ said Cindy.  ‘What?  What have I said now?’

‘Nothing, darling,’ said Denny.  ‘Oh Cind.’  He draped an arm over her shoulder.  ‘Don’t ever change.’

Cindy pouted.  ‘I don’t see what’s so funny.’

* * *

‘It all went exactly as you planned sir,’ said Peirce, the dutiful captain.

Askphrit frowned.  ‘They only
just
got away, you’re sure?  It wasn’t too easy?’

‘Oh no sir, I sent at least a hundred …’ he faltered at Askphrit’s expression.  ‘Wasn’t that right?’ 

Askphrit rose glowering from his throne. ‘A hundred?’ he said. ‘
One
hundred, that’s
all
?’

‘Sir?’ 

‘Oh God.  Chimps, I am working with chimps!’ he groaned.  ‘One hundred, I don’t believe it.’

‘Sir, I assure you …’

Askphrit grabbed Peirce by the collar.  ‘And I assure
you
,’ he snarled.  ‘She won’t fall for that.  She’ll be back.’

~ Chapter Twenty Two ~

T
hey decided to stop off at their old flat (they would probably never get back to Clive’s house tonight, at this rate, and that suited most of them just fine) and give Jamie a crash course in monster fighting using the training weapons that Denny had used.  Not that he was not a good fighter, he was a trained soldier after all, but vampires require a special skill that is not, as a rule, taught at West Point. 

The problem was that Jamie was exhausted to the point of collapse. As soon as they arrived at the flat he dropped like a stone where he stood on the living room rug, and could not be woken. 

Stiles and Denny heaved him on to the sofa and left him there, where he went off into deep reverberating snore.

Tamar shrugged and idly pulled at a drawer behind her.  It fell out, spilling the contents all over the floor.  As she bent down to pick them up, she gave a cry of shock. 

The floor was covered in old photographs of – her!  Her family, her childhood – surely an impossible thing.