Lord Sunday (7 page)

A
fter her decontamination, Leaf was given new clothes to put on. Scratchy underwear and a desert-patterned camouflage tracksuit weren’t what she would have chosen, but it didn’t really matter, since she was going to wear a protective suit over the top. Unlike the military or FBA suits, it was bright yellow and had EVACUEE printed on the front and back. Ellen showed her how to put the suit on, which was to step backwards into the connected overboots and then pull up the front inner toothless zip and pull down the outer zip, before folding over the big
Velcro tabs. The gas mask was next. It was a simpler version of the military ones, without a radio or other electronics, and it smelled rubbery and disgusting. Ellen demonstrated how to put it on and clear it, closing the intake valves and breathing out hard.

Leaf was trying it for herself for the third time when Ellen got a call from outside.

“Roger,” said Ellen. Then to Leaf, “OK, you’re good to go. Major Penhaligon is waiting for you outside.”

Leaf turned to go back out the way she had come in, but Ellen tapped her on the shoulder and pointed to another air-lock-style door. “One way in, one way out,” she said. “I’ll probably see you later for your next decontamination.”

“Ugh.” Leaf grimaced at the thought of being scrubbed again.

“At least your hair is cut now,” said Ellen. “And you might have to wait next time as I expect we’ll be busy getting refugees ready to ship out very soon. I bet you’ll be happy to get out of that suit by then. Even decontamination will be welcome.”

“I guess,” said Leaf. Her own voice sounded
strange and dull, heard through the suit’s hood and the side panels of the mask. “Thanks, Ellen.”

“Just doing my job,” said the woman. “Good luck.”

Leaf waved and went into the air lock. She had to wait while it buzzed and hummed, before the outer door opened to let her into a pressurised tunnel of clear plastic that led to another portable air-lock structure. This one took several minutes to cycle through, the progress of pressure equalisation and door opening being indicated by a row of tiny LEDs that slowly changed from red to green, a process that Leaf found weirdly mesmerising.

Major Penhaligon was waiting outside the final air lock. Chen was with him, and another soldier whose name tag read WILLIAMS, who was carrying a large medical backpack marked with a red cross.

“Miss Leaf?” asked Major Penhaligon.

“Yes.”

“We have a vehicle waiting. Follow me, please.”

Leaf followed the three soldiers down the road to a waiting personnel carrier. The back ramp was down, and they trudged up and sat on the benches
inside, the soldiers on the left and Leaf on the right. She felt a bit like it was an audition.

The ramp closed after them, and the personnel carrier rumbled off. Leaf couldn’t see the driver as the front compartment was separate and sealed.

“Your supposed hospital is here, right?” asked Major Penhaligon. He stretched out to show a folded map to Leaf. It was a detailed aerial and satellite composite map, and Leaf was easily able to pick out the large white building that was Friday’s hospital. It had been circled in red pencil with a question mark, and unlike nearly all the other buildings did not have its name or other information printed on the map.

Ominously, there was also a shaded circle drawn on the map. Centred on East Area Hospital, it was labelled INITIAL KILL ZONE and its outer circumference ran across the front of Friday’s building.

“That’s it,” confirmed Leaf, tapping the map.

Major Penhaligon nodded and sat back.

Leaf looked out through the small, very thick armour glass window. It made everything look blurry and it was initially hard to work out exactly where they were, but she soon recognised a building and
got her bearings. Only a few minutes later, they pulled up in front of Friday’s hospital.

There were no signs outside that indicated the building was a hospital of any kind. It looked just like the other low-rise oldish office buildings on the street, sharing with them the hallmarks of the micronuke attack, as all the windows facing East Area Hospital were shattered and there were burn marks across the facade. There had been some trees out in front as well, but they were now only blackened stumps.

Leaf felt a momentary doubt as she climbed out the back of the personnel carrier. What if all the sleepers were gone, transported back to the House by yet another machination of a Trustee? Then Major Penhaligon would think she was a nutcase or a real troublemaker—

She was thinking about that when Martine suddenly burst out through the front doors. Though she was wearing a scarf over her head and a surgical mask, it was easy to tell just from her staring eyes that she was absolutely terrified.

“Help!” she screamed. She almost fell down the wheelchair ramp, towards Sergeant Chen, who
rushed forward to catch her. “There’s a thing – it’s come from the—”

Martine didn’t have the breath to get out what she wanted to say, but Leaf at least was certain she knew. A thing from the House.

“What?” asked Major Penhaligon. “A
what
?”

Martine just pointed back behind her, her arm shaking. “It…it came out of the pool.”

“I don’t believe this!” snapped Major Penhaligon. “Williams! Take care of this woman.”

He brushed past Martine and stormed up to the front doors of the hospital. Leaf hurried after him, calling out, “Be careful! There’s…uh…weird stuff going on.”

Sergeant Chen, who was striding up the ramp next to Leaf, turned her masked head to the girl. “Weird, like winged guys?”

“Weirder,” said Leaf.

“Uh-huh.” Chen drew her pistol and racked the slide. “Wait up, Major! Could be real trouble.”

Major Penhaligon, who had been about to open the door, hesitated. Then he stepped back and readied his own pistol.

“This seems ridiculous,” he said. “But I suppose
it could be the Greyspot virus or something, making someone go crazy. Chen, stay close. Miss Leaf, you wait here.”

He pushed open the door and went in slowly, turning his head so that he could scan the corridor despite the limited field of vision imposed by his mask. Chen followed, and Leaf, despite being told not to, followed Chen.

The lobby and administrative offices were empty, but as Major Penhaligon and Sergeant Chen advanced down the central corridor, with Leaf tagging along some distance behind, they heard someone screaming ahead, near where the ramp went down to the lower level.

A sleeper staggered out of the top of the ramp, took several steps and then was horrifyingly gripped by a long green tentacle. It wrapped around the old man, yanked him off his feet and dragged him back out of sight. There was another scream, and then silence.

“You see that?” asked Major Penhaligon unnecessarily.

“Sure did,” said Chen. “Twenty feet long at least, and as thick as my arm. I don’t want to see whatever it’s attached to—”

The tentacle reappeared as she spoke, questing around the corner. It was followed by another, and another, and then the main body of the creature rounded the corner. It was the size and shape of a small car, with dimpled, tough-looking hide that was bright green. It had hundreds of foot-long legs under this central torso, and three big tentacles in total, each of which was easily thirty feet long.

On top and in the middle of its main body, there was another shorter limb, perhaps a neck, about three feet long, which supported a sensory organ that resembled a daisy, hundreds of pale yellow anemone-like tendrils swirling around a central, darker yellow orb. As Major Penhaligon took a step forward, these anemone tendrils all turned towards him, as if it could sense his movement. He stopped, but most of the tendrils continued to point stiffly at him, with only a few still fluttering on the sides, as if they were watching for other potential enemies.

“Watch it, but hold your fire,” said Major Penhaligon. He then muttered something into his radio, which Leaf couldn’t catch.

“I don’t reckon shooting that with anything less
than a fifty cal would be worthwhile,” said Chen, but she kept her pistol trained on the creature.

“It’s got a collar,” said Leaf, pointing to a thin band that was wound around the neck-limb. There was a slim braided lead attached to the collar, and the lead stretched back around the corner.

“You said weird and you were
so
right,” said Chen.

“I wonder who’s holding the lead,” said Leaf.

She was answered a moment later when a humanoid figure stepped out from behind the creature. He was green-skinned, seven feet tall, and wore a tailed coat made of autumn leaves and breeches apparently of green turf. Because he wasn’t wearing any shoes, Leaf had a clear view of his long, yellow-brown toes, which closely resembled the taproots of a willow.

In his right hand he held a scythe, the butt planted upon the ground. The staff of the scythe was at least nine feet long, and the curving blade stretched behind him, from shoulder to shoulder. It was made from some dark metal that did not reflect the light.

“I have come for the girl called Leaf,” said this
figure, clearly a Denizen. He waved one negligent hand. Leaf noticed that his thumbnails were a darker green than his skin, so dark they were almost black. “You others may go.”

“What…Who are you?” replied Major Penhaligon.

“I am commonly called the Reaper, and that will suffice,” replied the Denizen. “Leaf-girl, your presence is required by my Master. Come to me.”

“Your Master?” asked Leaf. Major Penhaligon was whispering on his radio again, and Chen had moved her aim to the green Denizen. “Would that be Saturday or Sunday?”

“It is not needful that I tell you. Walk to me, child, ere I set the beastwort upon your companions.”

“Get ready to run,” whispered Chen, so low Leaf almost couldn’t hear her.

“Run!” shouted Major Penhaligon. As he shouted, he and Chen started shooting at the beastwort. Leaf turned and sprinted as fast as she could for the doors, the booming shots echoing around her, followed by the clomp of boots as Penhaligon and Chen caught up with her. Chen picked her up under one huge arm as they crashed through the doors, Major
Penhaligon turning around to fire several times into the leading tentacle as it almost grasped his leg. While the bullets hit, they appeared to do little if any damage.

“To the carrier!” shouted Major Penhaligon. The vehicle had turned so that its turret machine gun was facing the door of the hospital, and its back ramp was open. Chen took Leaf out one side, with Major Penhaligon close behind, and as they ran for the ramp, the machine gun started to fire deafeningly over their heads.

Williams and Martine were already inside. They scurried back as Chen, Leaf and Major Penhaligon hurtled in, and then Chen pulled the lever to close the rear ramp. It whined and slowly began to rise, even as one of the beastwort’s tentacles slithered around the corner and gripped the edge.

Outside, the heavy chatter of the turret machine gun stopped, and over the internal speaker the driver’s panicked voice shouted, “It’s not stopping. I can’t—”

The vehicle shook with a sudden impact, knocking Leaf to the floor. As she scrambled up, another tentacle came in the other side of the ramp.
Chen hacked at it with her combat knife, but its flesh was like a rubbery sponge. The knife simply rebounded off, no matter how much force Chen applied.

Then the tentacles fastened themselves completely around the ramp and ripped it off, the heavy armour plate torn in half as easily as a stick of licorice. The door went flying through the air to crash into a burned-out car across the street, and the beastwort slithered into view.

Chen and Major Penhaligon tried to push Leaf back behind them, as if they could somehow shield her from the monster, but Leaf resisted.

“No!” she said. It took all her courage to get out the next few words, but she managed. “It’s no good. I’ll go…I’ll go with them. If I do, they’ll probably leave everyone else alone.”

“That is so,” said the Reaper, who stood suddenly in the doorway. “Come. There is little time.”

“No!” said Major Penhaligon. He grabbed Leaf’s arm as she scrambled towards the rear of the carrier. “There must be something we can—”

“There isn’t,” said Leaf quietly. She shook off Major Penhaligon’s light grip and stepped out of the
carrier. She stopped to look back and added, “There’s nothing any of us can do. I just…I just hope Arthur can save me…save us all…”

“Arthur?” asked Major Penhaligon. Even distorted by the mask, the surprise and shock in his voice was evident. “My little brother?”

“Yes,” said Leaf.

“Enough!” said the Denizen. He reached out and gripped Leaf’s shoulder. She flinched under his touch, and felt a wave of fear so intense that she almost fell. But she fought against it and remained upright. She didn’t want the Denizen – or Chen and Penhaligon – to see how scared she was. It was lucky the mask covered her face or they’d know, since she couldn’t stop the tears that were welling up uncontrollably, or even wipe them away.

“Come!”

“Look after the sleepers!” Leaf shouted before she was pushed away, back towards the doors of Friday’s hospital. Only, through the rainbow prism of her tears, she saw they were not the doors of the hospital. They had become one tall arched door, decorated with a thousand swirling patterns and shapes, pictures of things that had happened and
things that might yet come to pass, a confusing kaleidoscope of colours and movement that Leaf knew she must not keep looking at, lest she be so drawn in she lost her senses.

In other words, it was the Front Door of the House.

T
he two Denizens clamped Arthur’s wrists with manacles that shone with their own intense blue light. He had seen that sorcerous steel before, binding the Old One to his clock, so he struggled even harder. But the Denizens were too strong, and they were aided by the unseen power that Arthur felt pressing down upon him, the power that he knew emanated from the Seventh Key that Lord Sunday must be holding in his hand.

As one of the Denizens fastened a chain to the manacle on his right hand, Arthur summoned up
all his strength. Wrenching his arm free, he held out his hand, pointed it directly at Sunday and shouted, “I, Arthur, anointed Heir to the Kingdom, claim the Seventh Key—”

Lord Sunday’s eyes narrowed. He made a slight gesture with the Key that lay hidden in his cupped hand. Arthur immediately lost his voice, his next few words croaking away into unintelligibility.

“You cannot claim the Key without the aid of Part Seven of the Will,” said Lord Sunday. “And I do not wish to listen to your blatherings.”

The Denizens finished fastening the chains, drawing Arthur’s hands up behind his back. He could feel the sorcery in the manacles. It felt like a terribly cold current in the metal, eternally running anticlockwise around his wrists. They felt so strong he doubted whether he could break them even if he managed to get back the Fifth and Sixth Keys, which seemed unlikely. They were still jumping and flying about inside the silver net, which Sunday was holding at arm’s length in his left hand, while his right held the Seventh Key. Arthur wished he could see what that Key was, but it was entirely hidden. Whatever it was, it had to be small – though it might
grow and change, Arthur thought, as Sunday had changed himself.

Lord Sunday looked up and Arthur followed the direction of his gaze. There was something above them, a black dot against that beautiful blue sky with its whispery clouds. The dot grew larger and larger, swooping down towards them from some great height, and Arthur saw it was a huge dragonfly. It descended very quickly to hover up above them, its wings almost touching the tops of the hedges on either side.

It was a
very
big dragonfly. Its body was about sixty feet long and each of its multipart, buzzing wings was easily twice that length. Arthur couldn’t see clearly from below, but there was something on its back, a kind of cabin or deckhouse, with stained-glass windows and a roof of wooden shingles.

A Denizen, wearing a one-piece coverall of soft tan leather and a kind of hunting hat with a feather, threw a long rope ladder down from the tail of the dragonfly. The ladder unrolled itself as it fell, ending near Lord Sunday, who quickly began to climb up it, effortlessly taking three or four rungs at once.

While Lord Sunday was climbing up, the Denizen
on the dragonfly went further back along the creature’s body and threw down a rope that ended in a large hook. The Denizens holding Arthur looped his chain around the hook, the Denizen above waved to some other unseen crew and the rope was hauled up, leaving Arthur dangling some thirty feet below the dragonfly. It was a very painful position, with his arms twisted behind his back and the manacles on his wrists supporting his entire weight. Arthur knew that prior to his transformation he would have been screaming in pain as his arms were dislocated at the shoulder. Now, though it hurt a lot, he merely grimaced and contained his pain, the anger inside him still stronger than any other feeling.

Part of that anger was addressed to himself.

How could I have been so stupid?
Arthur thought.
I should have got out of here somehow, as soon as I knew it was the Incomparable Gardens. I never should have been so careless with an unknown Piper’s child…

The two tall, green-skinned Denizens shinned up the rope ladder and it was drawn up. Arthur heard a whistle above him, and the thrum of the dragonfly’s wings increased in tempo and pitch. Its legs, which
had been dangling just above Arthur, retracted against the vast abdomen.

The dragonfly zoomed up and jinked sharply to the right in a move that sent Arthur swinging on his chain, jerking his arms enough to make him let out a small gasp. His arms might be dislocation-proof now, but some part of his brain hadn’t worked that out and was still sending
intense pain – do something
signals.

Arthur forced the pain back down. Then, with a Herculean effort, he leaned forward till he was head down, hooked his feet through his linked arms and swung through so that his manacled wrists were now in front and above him, and he could hold on to the chains rather than having his whole weight supported by the manacles and his wrists. He was still suspended by chains under a fast-moving giant dragonfly, but at least his wrists and shoulders didn’t hurt as much.

With the lessening of the pain, Arthur found he could concentrate on other things, like looking around. The dragonfly had settled into level flight at about a thousand feet up, Arthur guessed, giving him a panoramic view of the Incomparable Gardens.

In other circumstances, it would have been a wonderful vista. Below him was a patchwork of hundreds or possibly thousands of different gardens, all separated by corridors of tall green hedges like the one in which he had been ambushed. There were gardens that were small and green and tidy; gardens of russet and tan that sprawled across many acres; there were deserts and low rolling hills and swamps, and even several beaches that bordered portions of ocean no more than a hundred yards long and wide. A small proportion of the gardens had buildings, varying from garden sheds to minarets and modern buildings that would not have looked out of place in Arthur’s home town.

Amid the patchwork of gardens, there were several other locations that occupied much larger areas. One, some distance away on Arthur’s right, was a green area that was at least a mile wide and several miles long, with a dry pond or muddy pit at its centre. A moment later, Arthur recognised this as the point where Saturday’s assault ram had broken through and, as he peered more closely he saw that there were tiny figures moving around the hole, and across the green lawn towards the
ridge of wildflowers, where many more little dots moved. But he was several miles away, with the dragonfly climbing higher, so he couldn’t tell if the tiny figures were Sunday’s insect soldiers or Saturday’s Denizens.

Not that it really matters
, thought Arthur. He needed to concentrate on what he was going to do, instead of wondering about what was happening in the battle between Saturday and Sunday – or, for that matter, the battle in the Upper House below them, between the Piper and Saturday.

He looked up at the manacles on his wrists. As far as he could see, with the wind in his eyes and the constant swinging back and forth as the dragonfly changed course, the manacles were all one piece of sorcerous steel. They had no keyholes or bolts or any other obvious fasteners, and the chain ran through protruding eyelets that were half an inch thick and seemed as much part of the manacle as the main band, with no signs of welds or any weakness that might be exploited.

It was likely that they could only be unfastened by the Seventh Key or some similar power. Perhaps Arthur, with all the other six Keys, might be able to
command his release if he was not opposed by Lord Sunday. But he didn’t have even one Key now.

He brought his wrists together and tried to get the fingers of his right hand under the left manacle, to see if he could bend or break it with his now otherworldly strength. But the manacles were too tight, and in his heart he knew there was no chance that they could be opened by any physical act. Made with sorcery, they could only be undone by sorcery.

Next, Arthur tried to summon a telephone, as he had done in other parts of the House. But whether he asked for one aloud or simply tried to will a telephone into existence, nothing happened.

After that, he tried to call the First, Second, Third and Fourth Keys to him, as he had done in the Middle House. But that didn’t work either, no matter how he shouted and raged, his voice hoarse from whatever Sunday had done to him, made worse by the constant rush of wind.

Always, he felt the unseen pressure of the Seventh Key working against him. It was clear that he could not prevail against it.

Despite that, after a bit of a rest, or as much of
a rest as it was possible to have while swinging on chains under a giant dragonfly moving at full speed, Arthur tried again. But all he managed to do was give himself a raging headache, to add to the pain in his wrists and shoulders.

Eventually he just let himself swing by his chains and tried to think. He was in a desperate situation, Arthur knew that much. While he now was very hard to kill, Lord Sunday certainly had the power to slay him if he wanted to, though if he did want to, he presumably would have already done so.

Arthur thought about that a little more. Sunday had been able to catch and hold the Fifth and Sixth Keys while Arthur was being bound, but perhaps if he’d tried to kill Arthur, the Keys would have defended him more strongly. Also, if he did kill Arthur, then Sunday could never take the other Keys. They had to be handed over willingly.

It was possible that Lord Sunday might not even want the other Keys. Arthur had no idea what Sunday really wanted. After all, it was Saturday who had set the fall of the House in motion, and Saturday who had invaded the Incomparable Gardens, because the Gardens were the only part of the House likely to
survive the onrush of Nothing that had already taken the Far Reaches, the Lower House and who knew what else by now.

All Arthur knew was that Lord Sunday was one of the original faithless Trustees who had not obeyed the Architect, and had broken and hidden the seven Parts of the Will instead of following the Will’s instructions. As Arthur was effectively an agent of the Will, and the supposed Rightful Heir of the Architect, Lord Sunday was automatically his enemy.

But maybe we can work something out,
he thought.
We both have to stop the tide of Nothing, to save the House and the rest of the Universe. Maybe I could confirm that he would stay in charge of the Incomparable Gardens and he’d be left alone, that seems to be what he wants…

Arthur sighed as his thoughts continued into less optimistic regions.

Who am I kidding? Dame Primus would never agree. Besides, who knows what Sunday is really up to? I have to escape! But how?

He sighed again, the sigh turning into a grimace of pain as the dragonfly changed direction again,
swinging Arthur out wide, scraping the manacles across the raw wounds on his wrists, no matter how tightly he held the chain above the manacles.

With the pain came an unexpected realisation. Since he’d taken the Fifth Key at least, any pain he felt had come with a burning desire to retaliate, to strike against whoever or whatever had caused him hurt. But he was not angry now and he felt no great store of rage waiting to explode within him.

I am weaker without my Keys,
thought Arthur.
But I am also more myself.

They were heading towards a new landmark, a tall green hill that was still several miles away. It looked a lot like Doorstop Hill in the Lower House, though it was significantly higher and the bottom slopes were terraced and dotted with trees. There was also something on the crest of the hill, a low building or construction of some kind, but it was too far for him to easily identify.

Directly below him, the variety of gardens continued, still divided and penned in by the tall green hedges. Arthur watched them flicker by as he desperately tried to think of some stratagem to gain his release. He let his eyes go out of focus,
half-lidding them against the rushing wind, and the gardens below blurred into a patchwork of many shades of green and brown and blue.

Blue,
thought Arthur.

He blinked and refocused. There was a lake and, about half a mile beyond, one of those strange, truncated oceans dumping its waves on to a two-hundred-yard-long stretch of cut-off beach.

Navigable waters,
thought Arthur, swiftly followed by a single, piercing image of a tall, white-bearded sailor with deep-set eyes of the clearest blue, wielding a harpoon that glittered and shone with the most powerful sorcery.

This was the Mariner, second son of the Architect and the Old One, who had sworn to aid Arthur three times and had already done so twice. Wherever there were navigable waters, the Mariner could sail, and Arthur thought that if anything other than the Seventh Key could break his chains, it would be the Mariner’s harpoon.

I have to call him straightaway, since he could take ages to get here. Which means I need my medal.

The Mariner’s medal was in Arthur’s belt pouch, near his hip, which presented a problem. Suspended
as he was, with his wrists manacled together, he couldn’t just reach down, undo the pouch and retrieve it. Nor, after a few attempts, could he pull himself up high enough to get his hands near the pouch, because when he did so he started to spin around violently.

Next, Arthur tried swinging his legs up so that he could hang upside down. But a few attempts showed him that even though he could manage to turn upside down and get his hands near his belt pouch without going into the same sort of spin, there was no way he could undo the pouch and get the medallion out, at least not without a very high chance of the medallion and his yellow elephant simply dropping out and being lost forever.

He was still trying to work out how he could get the medal when the dragonfly began to descend. It was still flying towards the terraced hill Arthur had seen, only it was no longer aiming for the top of the hill, but at a point about halfway up.

Arthur swung himself right way up again as he got lower, and tried to stop his spin. There was something on the terrace that had caught his eye and he wanted a better look.

He got it, and he felt a chill colder than the icy steel. On the terrace halfway up the hill, lying flat, was a twenty-foot-wide clock face, with vertical numbers of blue sorcerous metal. The clock had long, sharply pointed hands, and next to their central pivot was a small trapdoor.