World's End (Age of Misrule, Book 1) (67 page)

"What do you mean?" Church asked.

"What I say, as always. It is physically impossible for me to lie. One of the gifts bestowed upon me for my time in Otherworld." There was a note of bitterness in his voice.

Church's eyes narrowed. "Who are you?"

"I told you my name. Thomas Learmont. But you may also know me as Thomas the Rhymer."

Veitch looked from the confusion on Church's face to the others. "You bastards better keep me in the loop."

"Thomas the Rhymer," Church began cautiously, "was a real person who managed to cross over into mythology. He was a Scottish Nationalist during the war with England. In a way, he's like Scotland's answer to King Arthur-a mythical hero who was supposed to sleep under a hill-"

"Under this hill," Tom interrupted.

11 -until there was a time of great need, when he would return. That's what the old prophecies said. But he lived in the thirteenth century."

Witch looked at Tom. "Blimey, you've aged well."

"I lived at Earlston, a short ride from Melrose," Tom said. "We were an old family, quite wealthy, with land hereabouts, although my estate was eventually gifted to the Church by my son." The faint sadness in his face at the memory was amplified by the shadows cast by the flickering torches. "Unlike my father, who worked hard, I was always too much of a dreamer. I was an elegant singer and I spent many an hour lazing in the countryside composing new works, usually just ditties about the people I knew and the women I loved. There was one girl in particular. To seek true inspiration for a song about her I rode up into the Hills of Eildon, where I settled myself beneath a hawthorn tree with a view of what seemed like, at that time, the entire world. I chose to ignore the old wives' tales linked to the hawthorn, that it signified death, that its blossom represented rebirth." He sighed. "That it was the chosen tree of the Faerie Queen. But I had no idea that an entire world existed under the hill, like all the fools used to say about the faery mounds. But I was the true fool, wasn't I? They were simply misremembering old wisdom. I was ignoring it."

He took off his cracked glasses to clean them. Church searched his face for any sign that this was more dissembling, but he could only see honesty there.

"So the Faerie Queen got you?" Veitch asked; he was still having trouble grasping the truth of everything they had experienced. In numerous conversations he had exasperated Shavi with his apparent inability to see beneath the surface of the myths and legends.

"The Faerie Queen. The Great Goddess. Just names we give to attempt to understand something unknowable. She was terrible to behold. Terrible. When I looked at her I swore I was looking into the face of God. I loved her and hated her, couldn't begin to understand her. I let her take me apart and put me back together, let her put me through the most unimaginable torments, to sample the wonder that came off her. It was a time of the most incredible experiences, of pain and pleasure, of being given a vista deep into the mystery of existence." He blinked away tears and, for a second, Church thought he saw in his eyes something that looked disturbingly like madness. "I was like a dog looking up at his mistress," he added wistfully. "And I was a hostage who came to depend upon his captor."

"It sounds awful." Ruth placed a sympathetic hand on the back of his. "Is that how they see us-as playthings?"

Tom nodded. "In the main. Some are close to us and have grown closer through contact down the ages. Others could strip the meat from our bones and leave the remains in a pile without giving it a second thought. They see themselves as fluid, as a true part of the universe. We are just some kind of bacteria, with no significant abilities, no wisdom."

"Then how did you get out?" Ruth said.

He smiled coldly. "She took a liking to her pet. At times I felt like I was in Otherworld for just a night, at other times all that I experienced made it feel like centuries. In truth, seven years had passed when I was allowed to return. I wandered down from the hill, crazed and gibbering, and was eventually returned to my home to recuperate. It was only later I discovered how much she had changed me."

"What did she do?" Ruth's voice was hushed; the others watched Tom intently.

"During one of my torments I was given the power of prophecy and The Tongue That Cannot Lie." His laugh made them all uncomfortable. "In a world built on lies, that was bad enough. But being able to see into the future ..." He shook his head, looked away.

"You know everything that's going to happen?" Church asked.

"Not at all. I see glimpses, images frozen as if they were seen from the window of a speeding car. That's how they see it. They know time isn't fixed."

"It must have been impossible for you to adjust," Ruth said.

He smiled sadly at her insight. "After all I'd been through, how could I begin to associate with my old friends and neighbours, my family? I tried. I married, and my wife bore me my son, Thomas. But I no longer felt a part of humanity. No one could begin to understand the thoughts in my head. I looked around me and saw simple people living simple lives, people ignorant of the universe. Savages. I'd moved beyond them, but I could never be a part of Otherworld. I'd lost everything. And I knew, in one terrible moment, that I was always meant to be alone."

There was power in the emotion of Tom's words. Church had never truly liked the man, certainly had never trusted him, but now he was overcome with respect; how many people could have survived all he had experienced?

"True Thomas, they called me!" Tom laughed; the others could barely look at him. "Still, I did my best. I became involved in politics, as an agent for the Scots against the English, but politics isn't a place for a man who cannot lie. I wasn't successful, to say the least, and as my failures mounted I discovered the Earl Of March was plotting to have me murdered."

Tom rummaged in his haversack for the tin containing his hash and made a joint with such laborious attention to detail that Church could tell it was merely to distract him from the full force of his memories. The others waited patiently until he had sucked in the fragrant smoke, then he continued.

"I fled into the Highlands briefly, eventually ending up at Callanish, and it was there I met one of the guardians of the old places and the old wisdom that stretched back to the days of the Celts."

"The people of the Bone Inspector?" Church asked.

Tom nodded. "It seemed we had much in common. He knew the true meaning of the hawthorn. After much pleading, and due in the main to my particular circumstances, he agreed to initiate me in the ancient natural knowledge that his people had practised in the sacred groves until the Romans had driven them out to become wanderers, hidden from the eyes of those who needed them."

He sighed and took another long, deep drag. "But it still didn't give me that sense of belonging which I so desperately needed. I was adrift in this world and eventually, as I knew in my heart I would, I wandered back to Otherworld. By then, of course, my patron had lost interest in me, but I was accorded some respect for my shaping at her hands, and for my singing voice and poetry, by many of the others in this place."

"But you still couldn't feel a part of it," Ruth said.

He nodded. "For nearly four hundred years in the world's time I attempted to find a place for myself, although it only seemed a handful of years here. But eventually I grew homesick and I realised that all my suffering had brought me one thing-my freedom. I could come and go as I pleased. Every now and then I would spend some time in our world, and when I got bored I would wander back."

"The best of all possible worlds," Church said.

"No. The worst."

"Is that how you got stuck in all that sixties stuff?" Witch nodded disrespectfully at Tom's hair and clothes.

"That period marked my longest time away from Otherworld. It was closest in thought and deed to how I felt inside me and I thoroughly enjoyed every moment of it."

Ruth put an arm around his shoulders. "Tom, you really are an old hippie. Peace, love and self-indulgence!"

"You could have told us all this before," Church said.

"I had to be sure I could trust you implicitly before I told you anything of significance. If I learned anything from my time as a spy, it was that knowledge is power, and I didn't want to have my true nature exposed and used against me too early in the game."

"And you're sure now?" Veitch said tartly. "That's a relief."

"What about the Fomorii and Balor?" Church asked. "Did they let you in on what was happening?"

Tom shook his head; a spasm of pain crossed his face. "It still will not let me talk about that." He rubbed at his nose furiously. "After Ogma has done what he can, perhaps."

With the final barrier of deceit removed, they felt they had been brought closer together. Perhaps it was the special qualities of the food and drink, or the sense of security offered by Ogma's library, but despite the pressures and secrets amongst them, they felt ready to face up to what lay ahead; their failures didn't seem so bad, their successes great in the face of monstrous odds. Church even ventured to say they had a chance.

While Tom smoked another joint and Veitch finished off the wine, Shavi decided to investigate the bookshelves again, although he seemed disturbed at what he had discovered before. Church slipped out quietly, and though he didn't say where he was going, they all knew he was checking on Laura. Ruth was sure in her heart she had more in common with him than Laura; that, if they allowed themselves, they could have the kind of relationship about which they both had dreamed.

These thoughts were preying on her as she wandered disconsolately through the chambers until, by chance, she entered a room where Ogma sat at a table, hunched over an enormous book. She was so deep inside herself she was halfway across the room before she saw him and by then it was too late to retreat. He raised his head and levelled his undecipherable gaze at her.

"You have the mark of one of the Golden Ones upon you," he said, although she was sure he hadn't glimpsed the design scorched into her palm.

She described her experiences with Cernunnos and he nodded thoughtfully as he listened. "The Wish-Hex caused great hardship for us all."

"Do you hate them?" she asked. "The Fomorii, I mean."

He raised his eyebrows curiously, as if he couldn't grasp her question. "The Fomorii are an infection to be eradicated." He seemed to think it was answer enough.

"If you don't mind me saying," Ruth continued, "you seem very different to Cernunnos or whatever his true name is. More approachable." But not much, she thought.

He thought about this for a moment, then said, "We are not of a kind. Some of us are very close to you, barely a shimmer of difference. Others are so far removed that they are like distant suns burning in the vast reaches of space. We have our own mythologies, our own codes, our own hierarchies. There are those we look up to and those we look down upon."

"You have a structured society like ours? But you're supposed to be gods, at least that's what the ancient people of my world thought."

He smiled. "Even the gods have gods. There is always something higher."

"Are you gods?"

He raised his open hands, but gave nothing away.

Church watched Laura for a while, but could tell nothing from her face. The only relief he felt was that at last he had some time alone to deal with the mess he felt inside. It was as if the moment he had reached out to touch Laura's back at Manorbier, his emotions had split open like a ripe peach. He didn't know how to deal with any of them; every single thought and sensation was almost unbearable. He fumbled anxiously with Marianne's locket, but it seemed to have lost its magic; nothing could calm him.

Worse, he still couldn't shake off the sensation of cold which seemed to be eating into his marrow. There was a thin coating of frost on the Black Rose which he constantly dusted away, only to see it replaced every time he secretly inspected it. He wondered if the rose itself were actually the cause of the iciness, but he didn't seem able to let himself consider that too deeply. He certainly couldn't bring himself to throw the flower away,

About an hour later, Ogma was ready to deal with Tom. They gathered in a room that was bare, apart from a sturdy oaken table and a small desk on which lay a range of shining silver instruments of indefinable use; Church was instantly reminded of Calatin's torture rack. While Tom climbed on to the table, apparently unafraid of what lay ahead, the others gathered in one corner to watch the proceedings.

"How's Laura?" Ruth whispered to Church.

His weary head shake told her all she needed to know. She didn't probe further, but deep down she wondered how the five Brothers and Sisters of Dragons would fare if one of them were missing.

Ogma applied some thick, white salve to Tom's lips and while it didn't knock him out, it must have anaesthetised his nerve endings, for a second later the god began to slice into Tom's temple with a long, cruel knife; Tom didn't flinch at all, but Ruth closed her eyes.

The salve must have done something to the blood flow too, for despite the depth of the incision, there was little bleeding. Ogma followed in with a handpowered drill which ground slowly into Tom's skull as the god rotated the handle; all the time Tom's eyes flickered as he stared implacably at the vaulted ceiling.

But then, as the judder of Ogma's hand showed the drill had broken through, a transformation came over Tom: his eyes appeared to fill with blood and his face contorted into an expression of such primal rage it made him unrecognisable. The salve had worked its power on his body too, for it was obvious he couldn't move his arms and legs, but he opened his mouth to yell and scream in the hideous Fomorii language. Ogma ignored him, but it was so disturbing to see that the others had to look away and even Veitch blanched.

Then, as they looked back, they saw the strangest thing. The drill hole must only have been a pencil-width, but somehow Ogma seemed to work the tips of two fingers in there, then three, then four, and then his entire hand was sliding into the side of Tom's forehead. Tom shrieked and raged impotently, but Ogma simply laid his other hand on his head to hold it still. Finally his hand was immersed right up to his forearm before he began to withdraw it.